Vin

Vin is a half-skaa Mistborn from the Final Empire on Scadrial. She later becomes known as Heir to the Survivor, the Ascendant Warrior and the Lady Mistborn, as well as taking on the alias Valette Renoux. She was born to Tevidian Tekiel's skaa mistress in year 1005 FE in Luthadel, and was raised by her half brother Reen after he discovered that their sister had been murdered by their mother. The two lived on the streets and worked in the underground, until eventually coming to work in Camon's crew.

Vin trains in and works with Kelsier's crew after he prevents Camon from beating her to death, and infiltrates the nobility under the guise of Valette Renoux, eventually helping to save the survivors of the skaa rebellion's army and killing Shan Elariel before fighting the Lord Ruler and killing him. After the Collapse, she marries Elend Venture and sets herself and Elend up as the empress and emperor of the New Empire, respectively, during the Siege of Luthadel, wherein she kills Zane and Straff Venture, saves the city from rampaging koloss and forces Lord Cett to swear his allegiance to them. In the aftermath of the siege, she inadvertently frees Ruin from its prison at the Well of Ascension.

Following Ruin's release, Vin helps to secure her and Elend's empire; locating the Lord Ruler's storage caverns, participating in the Siege of Fadrex City, and takes up the Shard Preservation shortly prior to the Battle of Hathsin, wherein she gives her life to kill Ruin. In the years following the Final Ascension, she becomes a mythical figure to the descendants of the survivors, known as the Ascendant Warrior. In the Words of Founding, it is said that she became the guardian of the mists and now watches over people in the night.

Characterization
At the beginning of the first book, Vin is a very untrusting girl growing up in Luthadel in the Central Dominance. She knows that she is special because she can use Luck (Allomancy) to help her survive in her thieving crew.

She has an older brother named Reen, but he deserted her. She still hears his voice in her head, however this is revealed to be Ruin, speaking through her ever-present earring.

Her sister was a Seeker, and her skaa mother was insane. Her mother, under Ruin's influence, killed Vin's baby sister viaHemalurgy to bestow Vin with an earring to increase her use of Bronze. Reen, seeing this terror, fled with Vin. After he deserted her, Vin found out that he had been killed by Steel Inquisitors, trying to protect her by denying her existence.

Her father, Tevidian is former Lord Prelan, and was executed by the Inquisitors. Vin scarcely knew her father, due to her existence being illegal under the Lord Ruler's law.

Vin lived a hard life, growing up on the streets. Reen taught her to trust no one. She has trouble going against this, but eventually learns to trust her fellow Crew members.

While attending noble balls in the guise of Valette Renoux, Vin falls in love with Elend Venture, a nobleman, and heir to the strongest noble house: House Venture. Elend becomes King at the end of the first book, marries Vin in the second, loses his title of King, and becomes Emperor at the end of the book. This effectively makes Vin the Empress.

The Church of the Survivor originally viewed Vin as a deity, the Lady Heir, as she was the apprentice of Kelsier, whom the Church of the Survivor worship as a messiah. At some point in the next three hundred years, she is then known as the Ascendant Warrior.

Abilities
Vin is a Mistborn of great power and skill. She can pierce Copperclouds through usage of the earring she got from her mother, which Hemalurgically increases her abilities to sense other Allomancers. She has great skill with most other metals, and can make use of Duralumin to control Koloss, Kandra, and potentially Steel Inquisitors, although due to Ruin's influence, this is never possible. As Preservation's chosen successor, she can draw power from the Mists, and used this ability to kill the Lord Ruler and later defeat 13 Steel Inquisitors. She can only do this, however, when she is not wearing her earring, as Ruin is able to block her connection to the mists thanks to the earring's Hemalurgic properties. Vin is more powerful than most Mistborn, coming from a "pure lineage," although first generation Mistborn (such as the Lord Ruler, and for functional purposes Elend) have greater raw power. She can Push and Pull on metals, and Soothe and Riot with a high degree of power. She has great control of Ironpulls and Steelpushes, using horseshoes to fly forward indefinitely. She can defeat Ham, a trained Thug, using only pewter and is able to win many fights in this manner.

In addition to her Allomantic abilities, Vin possess great resourcefulness and cunning, attributes gained from her time on the streets. She has a strong sense for danger, and is able to read a battle situation quickly, such as when she defeated Cett's assassins. She demonstrated a willingness to try innovative battle techniques, such as turning off her atium early to lull Shan into fatal overconfidence, as well as when she defeated Zane, who was burning atium, despite not burning atium herself.

Vin has also shown herself to be skilled in disguising herself as seen when she inserted herself into the court lifestyle under the guise of Valette Renoux. She used this alias to help Kelsier spy on the nobility, as well as plant lies among them.

Hero of Ages
Through much of the series, Vin is thought to be the Hero of Ages, but eventually it is revealed that she is not. While this title is common, both Alendi and the Lord Ruler claiming it, the only true Hero of Ages is Sazed.

Vin being the Hero of Ages was really an elaborate plot by Ruin to achieve freedom. He altered the texts of the Terris Religion, making it appear as if Alendi, and later Vin, was the Hero. Vin uses her increased Seeking ability to find the Well of Ascension, then Ruin uses the altered texts to trick Vin into freeing him.

During the third book, Vin absorbs all of the Mists, becoming Preservation. After Ruin arranges for the death of Elend, Vin uses her new power as the God Preservation to kill Ruin, which also results in her own death. Sazed then absorbs the power from the bodies of Vin and Ruin and becomes Harmony. Sazed hints at his ability to return Vin and Elend back to life later on when he learns more about his new powers.

Weapons and Combat
In terms of melee combat and weapon skills, Vin was very talented. Having undergone training in combat from both Kelsier (a full Mistborn), and Hammond (an accomplished Thug), Vin has developed a unique set of skills. Primarily using obsidian daggers to prevent Allomantic influence by her opponents, Vin uses various Steelpushes and Ironpulls to quickly maneuver around the battlefield. Doing so she will often surprise her opponents by striking from unforeseen angles. Vin will often utilize tricks to allow her to position herself for surprise attacks as well. An example of this is Pushing her coin pouch away to make it seem as if she was moving in that direction, only to strike from an alternate one. In addition to the use of daggers Vin has been trained in the use of staffs, and even handled a koloss great sword to devastating affect, though in the case of the sword Vin wielded through the strength granted by pewter and not pure skill.

Early Life
Vin was born of Tevidian Tekiel, lord prelan of the Steel Ministry to a skaa prostitute. Vin had an unnamed younger sister as well as an older half brother on their mother's side, Reen. Vin and her sister inherited Allomantic powers from their father, the latter being born a Seeker.

Her mother was insane and was driven by Ruin to kill Vin's infant sister with a bronze pin, creating a Hemalurgic spike which the mother then used to pierce the young child Vin's ear. Because of the earring's Hemalurgy, this gave Ruin access to speak into Vin's mind and influence her. Ruin was able to use Vin as an unwitting pawn and get himself released from the Well of Ascension. Because the Hemalurgy allowed Vin to take on the Allomantic power of her murdered sister, her Allomantic Seeking ability became twice as strong as a typical Mistborn or Seeker, enabling her to pierce Allomantic copperclouds and locate the hidden Well of Ascension.

Her half-brother Reen saved Vin from their mother and after the death of her mother and sister, she lived on the road with him. At times, she had lived like a beggar, sleeping in exposed alleys. Reen's lessons and attempts to strengthen her -- like taking her on burglaries to teach her to steal and teaching her to survive the skaa underground -- were abusive. He beat her for things such as being too friendly with other crewmembers or making a foolish comment and drawing unwanted negative attention. This abuse had a profound effect on Vin's ability to trust, but was successful in instilling the lessons he believed she needed to learn to survive and work the thieving crews in Luthadel until he apparently deserted her. Vin later discovers that Reen never betrayed her. Despite being captured by Inquisitors and tortured, Reen never gave her up, swearing that she had died even while he was being tortured.

Camon's Crew
Vin continues to work in thieving crews until Camon's crew finishes their latest scam, this time against the Canton of Finance. Though the scam seems to have gone unnoticed, unbeknownst to them, Vin's Allomancy alerts the obligators to her abilities, and a Steel Inquisitor is put on Vin's trail. Kelsier notices this as he is following Vin and Camon, and steps in to distract the Inquisitor, making them lose Vin's trail for the time being. During her time working in the crew, Vin grew to somewhat trust Ulef, another member of the crew. Though she did not think of him as a friend, believing that friendship was a gateway to betrayal, he is the closest thing to a friend she has at the time. As Vin gets a foreboding feeling and prepares to leave the crew's lair, she tells Ulef that she's leaving, and asks him to join her. However, Ulef betrays her to Camon, who is at the time drunk and believes that Vin plans to sell him out to the Steel Ministry. Camon flies into a drunken rage, intending to beat her to death, before Kelsier enters the lair and intervenes, saving Vin's life. Kelsier has Milev replace Camon, and has the latter put out on the streets.

Kelsier's Crew
Vin joins Kelsier's crew and begins her Mistborn training with him.

In her first practical lesson with Kelsier, they venture outside the city walls and are picked up in a carriage by Sazed, who takes them to Fellise, where Vin is tutored by him as it is decided that she will infiltrate the noble court on their behalf. She contributes to the plan by supplying a method to infiltrate the Steel Ministry from her old crew: Theron's fake canal convoys.

During the meeting, Ham interrupts, reporting that the Ministry found Camon's lair, where Milev and his crew had continued to operate. The crew move to investigate the lair, wherein Vin's old crew mates has been butchered by an Inquisitor. Finding the former crewleader hung from a hook in the streets, the crew realize that the Inquisitors must still be on Vin's trail after Camon's last scam.

The House War
Vin spies on the noble houses by disguising herself as a noblewoman: Valette Renoux, an identity created as a cover, who is the fourth cousin of Lord Renoux, daughter of Lord Hadren and Lady Fellette Renoux. Kelsier reveals that he chose House Renoux and the Valette cover in part because of their status as weapons merchants, making them valuable to various houses and drawing the nobles that the rebellion needs to focus on to them. Vin attends her first ball at Keep Venture to establish her identity within Luthadel, and she attracts the attentions of several young men, declining their offers to dance on account of her inexperience. She recognises her father and meets Elend Venture, the heir to House Venture, although she only learns who Elend really is after the fact when speaking with Sazed.

Vin follows Kelsier one night, discovering the spikeway between Luthadel and Fellise in the process. After he discovers and confronts her, he introduces her to atium for the first time, and they attempt to raid the Lord Ruler's palace, Kredik Shaw. During the raid, the pair are forced to flee when attacked by the Steel Inquisitors guarding the palace, and Vin is left behind. She recovers Alendi's logbook before she is gravely wounded in her attempt to escape. Sazed, however, manages to save her from the Inquisitors and brings her back to Clubs' hideout. Vin spends the subsequent two weeks unconscious as she recovers from a massive wound in her side, and it takes three more months to recover fully from her ordeal at Kredik Shaw.

Gradually, Vin grows more comfortable when adopting the Valette persona, but she is given a sobering reminder of the realities of the Final Empire when she witnesses a soldier murder a skaa kitchen boy for begging from a nobleman.

Vin tries to get training from Ham with pewter by watching him spar, but the two find out that the Luthadel Garrison is being called away to quell the skaa rebellion's army led by Yeden in a sudden attack against the Holstep Garrison as a test of their strength. After informing the rest of the crew, Vin joins Kelsier on a desperate mission to save the skaa army's survivors. They find the army being massacred in an ambush from the Valtroux Garrison, and Vin stops Kelsier from trying to stop it, reminding him that even though they are Mistborn, they're not invincible. Instead, they return to the caves, finding the two thousand men, lead by Demoux, who stayed behind out of loyalty to Kelsier. Vin and Kelsier lead the remnants of the army back to Luthadel.

Two weeks later, after Vin has recovered from the consequences of pewter-dragging, the executions in the later named Square of the Survivor begin. She discovers her father's identity as the Steel Ministry's lord prelan during the executions after pointing him out to Kelsier. The executions provide Kelsier the opportunity to renew the crew's determination, by showing them what it is that they're truly fighting for.

After the executions in the fountain square, the crew commit even more to provoking an all out house war in earnest, making it the top priority now that the bulk of their army is lost. Vin begins to spread bad information among the nobility, while remaining the crew's primary spy among them. Vin and Kelsier go to meet Marsh in the Twists, and while waiting, she experiences burning gold for the first time, seeing the two versions of herself, the trusting version who lost her street instincts, and the hateful and lonely version. The meeting with Marsh yields the truth about the Ministry Allomancers, that they're used in the Soothing stations positioned throughout the skaa sections of Luthadel.

In the course of spying on the nobility and spreading her information, Vin learns from Elend that House Venture works the Pits of Hathsin and mines the Lord Ruler's atium. As the house war reaches the point of no return, the noble parties and balls come to a close as alliances are formalised. Elend rejects Vin, but she saves his life shortly after when she uncovers Shan Elariel's plot to kill him. She fights Shan, and her fellow assassins, killing the male Mistborn accompanying Shan. When confronting Shan directly, Vin realises that her atium is about to run out, and extinguishes it prematurely, leading Shan to think that she is vulnerable. Vin burns atium at the last second, taking Shan by surprise and killing her.

Vin and Kelsier discover what they assume to be Marsh's remains during their next meeting with him, and Kelsier decides to retaliate by destroying the Pits of Hathsin and ending the atium production there for the next three hundred years. The Lord Ruler orders more executions in response to the attack, and Vin watches as Kelsier interrupts them, rescuing the House Renoux prisoners and killing Bendal, before he faces the Lord Ruler and is killed by a spear through the chest, feeling betrayed by his death after all of his assurances as Ruin returns in Reen's voice to reaffirm her sense of betrayal.

The Skaa Riots & the Death of the Lord Ruler
Vin is imprisoned in Kredik Shaw after Kelsier's death at the hands of the Lord Ruler, and is forced to burn aluminum to destroy her metals. She is taken to be questioned by the Lord Ruler, and has her earring ripped out while battling him, allowing the mists to invest their power in her, restoring all her Allomantic abilities. Vin kills him by Pulling out his metalminds and fatally stabbing him with a spear.[expand]

TenSoon would later argue during his judgement that as the one to kill the Lord Ruler, Vin had effectively taken his place and inherited his title, and should thus be considered the Mother of the kandra to replace their Father.

The Siege of Luthadel
After the fall of the Final Empire, she helps Elend establish his ideas for fair and free governance. Whilst the Siege of Luthadel progresses, she practices her Allomancy, courts Zane Venture, discovers duralumin, befriends the kandra TenSoon, and successfully intimidates the two besiegers: Straff Venture and Ashweather Cett.

Zane and the Attack on Keep Hasting
Upon hearing that Elend went into Jastes Lekal's koloss army, Vin experiences a round of uncertainty and self-doubt, uncertain of even her ability to protect one person. Zane takes advantage of her doubt, and convinces her that Elend won't let her protect him, and that she should attack Cett.

Alongside Zane, Vin launches a brutal assault on Keep Hasting, the keep which Lord Cett appropriates as his own residence once he enters Luthadel. In minutes, the two Mistborn wipe out three hundred of the one thousand men garrisoned there and make their way to Lord Cett and his son, Gneorndin Cett to threaten them. Though Vin has suspected ever since she first saw him that Cett is an Allomancer feigning his physical disability, it quickly becomes evident that neither he nor his son are Allomancers, or that they pose any threat on their own, leading Vin to spare their lives. When Zane moves to kill them, she convinces him not to. Following the attack, Cett pulls out of the city and withdraws from the siege entirely.

After the attack, Vin hid in an abandoned thieves' hideout, frightened by her own actions until TenSoon and Elend find her and talk to her. She reveals that Kelsier sometimes frightened her with his rationale for killing nobles. During her conversation with Elend, she decides that she has to go north to the Terris Dominance and look for the Well of Ascension.

Zane attempts to convince Vin to leave with him, but she refuses and he becomes upset, attacking her. In the ensuing fight, TenSoon's identity is exposed to her. Zane additionally reveals multiple of his manipulations throughout the siege; placing an Allomancer among Cett's staff, forcing Vin to fight off Allomancer assassins in front of Elend to intimidate him, and attempting to make Vin explore her potential as a killer. Zane seemingly has the advantage, as he is burning atium and blocking her every attack, and in her desperation, Vin attempts to draw on the mists to no avail, because her Hemalurgic earring is not removed during the fight. However, TenSoon tips her off to the Flaw, hinting at it and allowing her to take control of him with a duralumin-enhanced Soothing. Vin uses this to her advantage, attacking Zane with TenSoon's body and retrieving the bead of atium, although the latter turns out to be a fake, a lead ball with a thin coat of atium. Cornered, with no means of escape, Vin is forced to fight Zane, and uses his own foresight granted by atium to predict what he will do and allowing her to react, causing her atium shadow to split. Vin stabs him in the neck, killing him.

Vin goes to find Elend in her wounded condition, and while Sazed tends to her wounds, she marries Elend. Sazed takes the opportunity to convince the couple to flee the city in search of the Well of Ascension, in an attempt to save them, along with Spook.

The Battle of Luthadel
Convinced of the need to find the Well of Ascension, Vin and Elend leave Luthadel, and head towards the Terris Dominance in hope of finding the Well of Ascension. Some time after their departure, the koloss army attacks Luthadel. Vin realises that the Well is located under Kredik Shaw, and returns to find the Battle of Luthadel under way. She utilises a duralumin-enhanced steel jump to kill Straff Venture via bisection with a koloss blade, and stops the koloss assault on the city by controlling them through emotional Allomancy.

The Well of Ascension
She finds the Well of Ascension beneath Kredik Shaw in the aftermath of the battle. Once they enter the Well's chamber, the mist spirit attacks Elend -- it's hand forced by Kelsier -- fatally stabbing him in the hope that Vin would use the power to save him. Despite Preservation's best attempts to prepare Vin to take up the power, and Kelsier's attempt force her to use it, Vin enters the Well and, encouraged by Ruin's tricks, gives up the power in the belief that it is the best choice, thus inadvertently releasing Ruin from his prison as he had been manipulating her to do. Preservation shows Vin the final bead of lerasium in the chamber in order to allow her to save Elend by feeding him the bead and transforming him into a Mistborn.

Aftermath of the Koloss Assault
The crew hold a funeral service for the fallen at Keep Venture. While Demoux speaks at the service, Vin sits on the steps, watched over by Ham. Kelsier attempts to comfort her in the wake of the disastrous release of Ruin, but due to the separation between the realms, she is unable to hear him.

The New Empire
Vin and Elend set about expanding their empire, and bring large numbers of koloss under their control by killing Ruin's Inquisitors. They search for the atium cache and the storage caverns, discovering more about the history of the world. They also read about the metal electrum, which helps to protect them from atium attacks.

The Siege of Fadrex
They besiege Fadrex City, in hope of locating the atium, and the last of the Lord Ruler's plates. During the siege, Vin's attempts to gather information about through Ashweather Cett's contacts lead her to Slowswift. She speaks with Slowswift and though he is reluctant to sell information about Aradan Yomen's weaknesses, she quickly deduces how to convince him to sell her the information: by appealing to his fear of change and convincing him that the change coming upon the world is inevitable, and that Yomen cannot protect Fadrex from it.

Upon approaching the next informant, Hoid, for confirmation of Slowswift's information, she hesitates before contacting him and because of Kelsier's desperate attempts from the cognitive realm to keep Vin away from him get through to her, due to her burning bronze. She gets a bad feeling about the situation and leaves. She trusts her instincts and keeps away from Hoid entirely.

Vin briefly scouts the Canton of Resource from outside, then proceeds to the third and final of Cett's informants, but Preservation empowers Kelsier with something similar to Allomancy, so that he can better follow Vin through Fadrex City while she is spying. Her bronze burning picks up on Kelsier trailing her in the cognitive realm, and she believes she is being followed by an enemy Mistborn and attempts to lose him. Ruin interferes upon noticing Kelsier, however, stopping him from pursuing her and sending a puppet of his own making after Vin, imitating the pulses that Kelsier was giving off in order to trick her. Ruin's puppet stops giving chase the moment Vin turns to face it, and she concludes that it must have been the mist spirit.

Vin is captured and imprisoned by Yomen. While imprisoned, Vin is visited by an apparition of Reen, who is later revealed to be Ruin. After learning about Ruin, she fights Marsh, and escapes back to Luthadel where she fights the other Inquisitors and destroys the palace in a mist-powered Push, finally able to use the mists after Marsh regains enough control over his body to defy Ruin and remove her earring and Hemalurgic spike.

The Battle of Hathsin & The Final Ascension
When Vin absorbs the mists in the fight against the Inquisitors her body is eventually vaporised by the power and she takes up the Shard Preservation and attempts to right the world in similar ways to the inexperienced Rashek. She fails in many of the same ways as Rashek, initially, from unforeseen consequences of each action, as well as Ruin's interference. She observes the final fight between Elend and Marsh, fueling Elend's Allomancy with Preservation's power. Marsh beheads Elend, killing him, and removing the last thing binding Vin to the world. She attacks Ruin directly, killing both Ati and herself, leaving both Shards to be taken up by Sazed.

In his letter to Spook, Sazed reveals that he had spoken with Vin and she was happy where she was, Sazed also tries to bring her back to life but reveals that merely healing a body does not return souls.

Post-Catathendre Myths and Culture
In the world remade by Harmony, Vin becomes mythologised as the Ascendant Warrior, and is rarely referred to by name. The myths tell of her slaying the Lord Ruler, carrying the world upon her arms, able to kill with a glare alone, able to discover secrets no others knew, and capable of defeating entire armies of enraged koloss on her own. It is believed that she merged with the mists, becoming their guardian and watching over those in the night. The "Lady Mistborn's knives" are considered relics from mythology, alongside other objects such as the Lord Ruler's metalminds. Additionally, she is a historical model for modern women in the Elendel Basin, her example creating more egalitarian views about women in the Basin's society. Her legacy in this regard is also written into law. However, the way in which she is mythologised leaves a staggering reputation for other women in the Basin to live up to.

Large statues of her and Elend stand atop their tomb and museum in the Field of Rebirth and dominate the area. In New Seran, an old, sunken statue of Vin, eight feet tall and made of black marble, resides in a graveyard among the graves of the impoverished. Ranette created a gun which she named Vindication, after Vin. Vin is depicted ripping out the Lord Ruler's insides in several illustrated religious texts. In some artwork of her, such as the murals in Kelesina Shores' mansion in New Seran, she is depicted rising above a flock of ravens, symbolic of Steel Inquisitors.

Coinshots have started calling the nightscape above the mists, only accessible to those who can push themselves into the sky, the Ascendant's Fields. (History from the 17th Shard Coppermind Wiki)

Trivia

 * Vin was originally male in a single chapter of Mistborn before Brandon changed his mind.
 * If Spensa met Vin, they would probably get along well.