The Bands of Mourning Review: Wax and Wayne Go Treasure Hunting With History Breathing Down Their Necks
If The Alloy of Law was Brandon Sanderson proving that guns and Allomancy can play nicely together, and Shadows of Self was the point where Elendel started to crack, then The Bands of Mourning is the big Wax and Wayne road trip that blows the doors open on Mistborn as a whole.
Ancient relics tied to the Lord Ruler, airships, a masked new culture, and a late-book reveal that made me sit up on the sofa. It is book three in the Wax and Wayne sequence and book six in the overall Mistborn saga, first published in 2016 and clocking in at roughly 447 pages in most editions.
If you have just come from my reviews of The Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self, consider this the next stop on the line. If you have not, I will keep this mostly spoiler-light, but this is not a friendly entry point, so I will keep nudging you back to those earlier books.
Quick verdict: is The Bands of Mourning worth reading for Wax and Wayne fans?
Short answer: yes, especially if you already like these characters.
The Bands of Mourning feels like the strongest Wax and Wayne novel up to this point. It keeps the witty, gun-slinging energy from The Alloy of Law, carries over the emotional weight and theological questions from Shadows of Self, then adds a full treasure-hunt plot with new cultures and heavy Cosmere ties.
If book one proved the concept and book two dug into the pain, book three is where the group heads out into the wider world and starts changing the future of Scadrial.
Mistborn: Wax and Wayne – Book 3
Title: The Bands of Mourning
Author: Brandon Sanderson
Series: Mistborn Era 2 (Wax and Wayne #3, Mistborn #6)
Length: About 447 pages (Tor edition)
Published: January 26, 2016
Genres: Fantasy with steampunk, treasure hunt, and heist elements
Best for: Readers who enjoyed The Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self and want bigger stakes, new cultures, and stronger Cosmere links.
Where The Bands of Mourning fits in Wax and Wayne
Reading order for Mistborn Era 2
Mistborn has two completed eras so far: the original trilogy and the Wax and Wayne quartet. Era 2, the Wax and Wayne sequence, runs in this order:
1. The Alloy of Law
2. Shadows of Self
3. The Bands of Mourning
4. The Lost Metal
The Bands of Mourning is the third Wax and Wayne book and the penultimate novel of this era.
Do you need the first two Wax and Wayne books?
Yes. Absolutely yes.
This story leans on:
- Wax’s grief and crisis of faith after Shadows of Self
- Steris’s long, slow journey from awkward fiancée to partner
- Marasi’s career growth and earlier work with the constabulary
- The Set and their shadowy plans from previous novels
If you have not met these people yet, start with my Alloy of Law review, then move on to Shadows of Self. Your future self will thank you.
Do you need Mistborn Era 1?
You can follow the main plot of The Bands of Mourning without the original Mistborn trilogy, but you will miss a lot of the emotional payoff. This book pulls directly on the Lord Ruler’s legacy and on events around the end of The Hero of Ages. Readers who know Era 1 will spot references, symbols, and twists that go well beyond “fun Easter egg”.
If your goal is the full experience, the ideal order is: Era 1, then Wax and Wayne in sequence.
Affiliate Disclaimer: This article may contain affiliate links to the discussed products or services, for which - through no additional cost to you - we may receive a small commission. For more details please check our Disclaimer page.
Spoiler-light setup: Wax and Wayne on a relic hunt with airships
From Shadows of Self to a new mission
At the end of Shadows of Self, Wax was shattered by loss and furious with Harmony. Elendel had survived Bleeder, but political trust looked thin, and we learned that bigger threats sit behind the city’s troubles.
The Bands of Mourning opens with Wax still carrying that anger. He is preparing to marry Steris, trying to move on, and then a kandra named VenDell shows up with a job offer tied to an old Terris legend.
The pitch: legendary Bands, strange photos, and New Seran
A damaged kandra, ReLuur, claims he found proof that the Bands of Mourning are real. They are said to be the Lord Ruler’s old metalminds, a set of bracers that might grant anyone a full suite of Allomantic and Feruchemical powers.
ReLuur’s evidence includes:
- photographs of strange metalminds
- odd writing that nobody in Elendel can read
- hints that the Set has already taken an interest
VenDell wants Wax on a mission to investigate, trace the Set, and find the Bands. Wax agrees when the clues point toward the city of New Seran, where his own family business and missing relatives might be involved.
Tone, pacing, and the “Indiana Jones with Allomancy” feel
From there the book settles into an adventure structure. We get:
- train journeys and small-town stops
- tense parties in New Seran
- graveyard scenes and hidden compartments
- a trip to a remote temple that may or may not hide the legendary Bands
The pacing starts at a measured walk while relationships and politics catch up, then shifts gears into an airship escape, a temple raid, and a final battle that made me genuinely gasp. The last stretch stacks action, character choices, and lore reveals with that familiar Sanderson avalanche feel.
Character growth: Wax and Wayne at full strength
This is the Wax and Wayne book where the whole cast finally feels like a complete crew. Everyone has a job, everyone has a moment, and your emotional investment gets rewarded.
Wax: family secrets, faith, and the Set
Wax is still the Twinborn lawman who can ricochet bullets off lampposts, but his inner life is messier than ever. He is:
- trying to move forward from Lessie’s death
- still deeply angry at Harmony’s choices
- forced to confront old Terris memories and the Terris village again
This time the stakes are not just his city or his conscience. They are also his family. The Set’s plans tie directly to his uncle Edwarn and his sister Telsin, which means that every clue cuts on a personal level as well as a global one.
Wayne: jokes, guilt, and quiet bravery
Wayne still steals scenes with bad accents, hats, and an impressive ability to make the worst possible joke at the worst possible time. He also continues to carry guilt from past actions, and that weight shows up in the risks he takes for his friends.
He remains comic relief, but the book keeps reminding you that he is more than that. When everything falls apart later, he has to be more than that.
Marasi and Allik: statistics, leadership, and first contact
Marasi grows a lot here. She steps into a leadership role, handles sensitive information, and ends up responsible for first contact with a completely new group of people. Her background in law and numbers meets a situation that does not fit neatly into forms or reports.
Those “new people” are the Southern Scadrians, represented by Allik Neverfar, a masked airship crewman with his own culture, slang, and very understandable suspicion of northern motives. Their dynamic gives the middle of the book a warm, yet slightly chaotic energy, and it lets Sanderson show how people from the north come across through very different eyes.
Steris: the surprise star of Wax and Wayne
If you liked Steris in Shadows of Self, you are in for a treat. Her carefully timed plans and terrifyingly detailed disaster lists are not just quirks any more. In this book they save lives.
We see her:
- plan for train disasters in obsessive detail
- prepare for travel and social events with labeled folders and emergency supplies
- stand her ground even when she feels out of place
Those habits become her version of Wax’s guns or Marasi’s reports, and the romance between her and Wax finally feels solid and earned here.
How it felt as a reader
By the time the group reaches the temple, I had that feeling you get late in a great season of television where everyone’s arcs are finally intersecting. The crew feels like a family, not just a collection of side characters around Wax. When the last battle spins out, that connection makes every hit land harder.
I really did gasp at one particular moment in that sequence. You will know it when you see it.
New discoveries: Lord Ruler relics, Southern Scadrians, and rewriting history
The Bands themselves: relics that bridge the eras
The Bands of Mourning are legendary metalminds that once belonged to the Lord Ruler. Stories say they contain a copy of his powers that anyone could tap if they found and claimed them.
Chasing this relic does two things at once:
- it gives Wax and Wayne a classic treasure-hunt plot
- it gives Era 2 a direct, physical link back to the tyrant who haunted Era 1
The closer they get to the Bands, the clearer it becomes that myths have been twisted, and that some very dangerous people want that power for themselves.
Southern Scadrians and medallion tech
The new masks in the game belong to the Southern Scadrians. Their people live far from Elendel in lands that nearly froze when Harmony remade the world. They survived thanks to strange metal medallions that let ordinary people access Allomantic or Feruchemical abilities, and to help from a mysterious figure with a familiar spike through his eye.
The crew meets Allik, a Southern Scadrian airshipman whose people were captured and tortured by the Set after their ship crashed. Through him we see:
- a masked culture with its own myths and view of the Survivor
- airships powered by Allomancy and medallions
- a different angle on Harmony’s choices and on how the north uses its relative comfort
It shifts Mistborn from “one country with a complicated past” to “one planet with multiple societies learning about each other, sometimes at gunpoint”.
How the ending reshapes Mistborn history
Near the end of the book, Wax and friends discover a hidden Coppermind that reveals something very important about the man behind those Southern legends and about what really happened to a certain Survivor.
I will not spell it out here for spoiler reasons. I will only say that the reveal made me think hard about the end of The Hero of Ages and the years that followed, and it made me very curious about how future Mistborn eras will treat this bit of history.
Cosmere Connections in The Bands of Mourning
- Relics linked to the Lord Ruler and his metalminds.
- Southern Scadrians with medallions that share Allomantic and Feruchemical powers.
- Hints that challenge our understanding of the end of Mistborn Era 1.
- Clear signs that Era 2 is building toward larger Cosmere stories.
Themes: exploration, power, and who gets access to magic
Grief, agency, and moving on from Shadows of Self
Wax spends most of Shadows of Self feeling like a broken tool in Harmony’s hand. The Bands of Mourning pushes that further, then starts to heal it.
He has to decide whether he believes Harmony is genuinely trying to protect people or simply using them. He also has to decide what kind of husband, brother, and lawman he wants to be in a world where gods, kandra, and secret societies all have their own agendas.
The book does not give him easy answers, which made his choices at the end feel earned.
Exploration versus exploitation
On the surface, the mission south looks like exploration. There are lost temples, new writing systems, and cultures nobody in Elendel has seen before. Underneath, there is a constant tug of war between curiosity and control.
The Set sees Southern tech as something to steal. Elendel politicians see airships and medallions as resources that might solve their problems or give them an edge. The Southern crew have very good reasons not to trust either.
The book does not lean into long lectures, but it keeps presenting small moments where characters must decide whether they are explorers, thieves, or something in between.
Who owns magic, who gets left behind
The discovery of medallions that can grant powers to anyone immediately raises questions. If Allomancy and Feruchemy used to be tied to bloodlines and specific groups, what happens when technology can hand those gifts to anyone with the right piece of metal around their neck.
Sanderson pokes at that idea here. The Set is already experimenting with new ways to give and take powers. The kandra are nervous. Harmony is clearly worried about more than one threat at once. You can feel the series quietly setting the stage for future eras where magic and tech are much harder to separate.
My reading experience with The Bands of Mourning
The Wax and Wayne book that finally feels huge
On a simple level, this was just a very fun book to read. It gave me:
trains and airships
hidden temples and puzzles
family arguments and banter in cramped train cars
an end sequence that felt like a proper capstone to the first three Wax and Wayne novels
The world feels bigger than in The Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self, which makes sense, since we reach beyond Elendel and the Roughs and meet whole new societies.
Comparing it to Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self
If you are trying to decide whether to keep going with Wax and Wayne, here is how the trilogy so far shakes out for me:
The Alloy of Law introduces the era, shows that guns plus Allomancy can work, and builds the first version of our crew
Shadows of Self deepens the emotional stakes, tears Wax down, and asks hard questions about Harmony and justice
The Bands of Mourning keeps all of that, then sends the group on a world-expanding quest that ties directly back to Era 1 and forward to whatever comes next
You can follow that progression through my Alloy review and my Shadows of Self review, then come back here when you are ready for the airships.
Who will enjoy The Bands of Mourning (and who might not)
Great fit for readers who…
already enjoy Wax and Wayne as a character set
like fantasy that mixes banter, grief, and big set pieces
are curious about Cosmere connections and love the feeling of a story opening up into a wider setting
Might not be your favourite if…
you wanted Wax and Wayne to stay as small, Elendel-focused mystery stories
you strongly prefer the very tight, clockwork plotting style of the original trilogy and feel impatient when side threads pause and resume later
Content notes – The Bands of Mourning
- Gunfights, explosions, and on-page deaths.
- Grief, religious doubt, and family betrayal.
- Body horror linked to Hemalurgy, kandra, and experiments by the Set.
If you are tackling Wax and Wayne with a group, you might also like our 50 Book Club Discussion Questions for extra talking points once the last chapter is done.
How The Bands of Mourning sets up The Lost Metal and beyond
Loose ends and rising threats
By the end of The Bands of Mourning, several big pieces are still in motion:
the Set has not finished whatever it started
Trell and strange red-tinted metals are still a mystery
Southern Scadrian politics and trade sit on the horizon
Wax has made his choice about Harmony, but the relationship is far from simple
All of that feeds straight into The Lost Metal, which wraps up the Wax and Wayne saga and pushes Mistborn closer to its planned future eras. But before we go into the last book, there is a tiny, yet very important novella, we must explore first - Mistborn Secret History!
Where to go next on His and Hers Book Club
If you want to keep exploring this world with us, you can:
start at the beginning with The Alloy of Law by Brandon Sanderson: A Mistborn Return That Actually Feels New
bridge into this book with Shadows of Self by Brandon Sanderson: Mistborn Era 2 Turns Sharp, Strange, And Personal
learn more about the author with 10 Surprising Facts About Brandon Sanderson
or, if you are planning your next read already, check our Best Fantasy Books of 2025, According To BookTok for more series to binge once you leave Scadrial behind for a while
FAQ: Wax and Wayne and The Bands of Mourning
Is The Bands of Mourning the last Wax and Wayne book?
No. The Bands of Mourning is the third novel in the Wax and Wayne sequence. The final book of Mistborn Era 2 is The Lost Metal, published in 2022.
Do I need to read The Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self first?
Yes. You can follow the broad strokes without them, but the character arcs and emotional hits rely heavily on events from The Alloy of Law and Shadows of Self. If you are starting fresh, go first to my Alloy review, then to the Shadows of Self review, before picking this one up.
Do I need to read Mistborn Era 1 before Wax and Wayne?
Strictly speaking, no. You can read Wax and Wayne as a separate adventure set 300 years after the original trilogy. For the full emotional and thematic impact, especially in The Bands of Mourning, I strongly recommend reading Era 1 first, since this book pulls directly on the Lord Ruler’s legacy and the end of The Hero of Ages.
How long is The Bands of Mourning and how quick is the read?
Most print editions sit at about 447 to 448 pages, with a word count around 127,000, similar to the longer books in cross-genre fantasy. The adventure structure, short chapters, and late-book avalanche make it an easy binge for many readers.
What genre is The Bands of Mourning?
The book mixes high fantasy with steampunk flavour and a clear treasure-hunt spine. You get Allomancy and Feruchemy alongside railways, early cars, airships, and hidden temples, all framed through the ongoing story of Wax and Wayne and their work for Elendel and Harmony.
What age range is The Bands of Mourning suitable for?
Most sources and reviewers treat Wax and Wayne as suitable for teens and adults. There is frequent action, some body horror, and themes of grief and betrayal, but sexual content stays very low on the page. If you are choosing it for a younger teen or a school group, you might want to skim the more intense sections first, especially scenes involving the Set’s experiments and late-book confrontations.
If you are already this deep into Wax and Wayne, you are in an excellent spot to finish the era. Just be prepared for the fact that, after The Bands of Mourning, the future of Mistborn will probably look different to you than it did back in the ashfalls of Era 1.
New to Oscar Wilde? This reading guide covers his books, plays, essays, and stories in order, with three beginner paths, context on his 1895 trial, and book club prompts.