Wasteland

by Terry Goodkind

  Shale harrumphed. She came closer and peered up at Richard, as if seeing him in a new light. “Lord Rahl, someday when we have the time, I would like very much for you to explain to me precisely what you just did.”

  Richard, one arm still around Kahlan, holding her close, shrugged. “It was just some simple calculations.”

  “Uh-huh.” She cast a critical look over at the greasy, black, ashen remains. “Simple calculations. Yes, of course. I can see that.” She planted a fist on her hip. “Then how is it that you can turn a raging mob of monsters to ash, and yet you can’t seem to light a lamp with your gift?”

  Richard shrugged. “The lamp isn’t trying to kill us all.”

  He turned to the soldier still with them. “When those men down there gather their senses and get over here, they can help you take care of this.” He gestured around at the carnage still left all over the floor from the previous attack. The remains continued to leak blood and fluids in ever-growing pools. “I need to see to some urgent business.”

  With a steely look, the man clapped a fist to his heart.

  Richard gestured off at the destruction he had created. “I’m truly sorry about those men. They didn’t deserve to die. They especially didn’t deserve to die by my hand.”

  The soldier glanced briefly at the ashen remains. “You had no choice, Lord Rahl. You just preserved any hope we have for all of us to survive, for all of us to have a future. These monsters want to hunt and kill us all. Grieve for those fallen men of the First File but know that they were doing what they believed in and what they chose to do.”

  Richard gripped the man’s shoulder. “Thank you. You got some of them, too. You did good, too.” He gestured to the remains of the two who had fought off the Glee when Mr. Burkett had been fleeing. “You and your two brothers-in-arms.”

  The soldier nodded his appreciation.

  “Mr. Harris,” Richard said, as he took Harris’s arm and helped pull him the rest of the way upright, “take us to the place with the maps of the palace you told us about.”

  “At once, Lord Rahl.” He hesitated. “And thank you, Lord Rahl, for before.” He pointed over the side. “For catching me.”

  “‘Master Rahl protect us,’” Richard quoted from the devotion. “Just doing my job. Now let’s go.”

  12

  Edward Harris wasted no time as he led Richard and everyone with him to one of the grand marble staircases to begin their descent from the upper level to the secure lower vault where the palace design plans were located. Because it was so open, this was one of the few staircases that didn’t echo with all their footsteps. Instead, the whispers of conversation drifted up to them.

  When they reached the main floor, Richard saw large numbers of people gathered in small groups all around the expansive corridor, engaged in worried talk about what had just happened. Richard could see soldiers and workers in the distance dealing with the remains of Mr. Burkett as well as a broad area covered with greasy ash—the remains of the Glee Richard had killed.

  The hushed conversations, fearful talk, and tearful stories tapered off and died out when the Lord Rahl, the Mother Confessor, and the alluring Shale marched through their midst with five Mord-Sith in red leather escorting them. The eyes of hundreds of people watched them making their way along the corridor. Some were probably surprised to see the Mother Confessor in traveling clothes and wearing a long knife at her belt. Business at the shops had come to an end after many of the customers as well as the people working in the shop had fled in fear for their lives.

  Richard wondered if the Golden Goddess was watching through any of those eyes, and if another attack would suddenly appear out of nowhere, possibly with many times the numbers sent for the last attack. He hoped the goddess had been watching through someone’s eyes and had been discouraged from the notion that simply sending large numbers would bring her success. Richard feared it would, but maybe if she saw the ashes of hundreds of her kind up on the balcony it would discourage her.

  Everyone with him watched nervously for another attack. Down in the corridor the Glee could kill hundreds. For the time being, though, they seemed to be focused on killing Richard and Kahlan, not the people in the palace.

  Richard knew that by now a great number of people—both those seeing the battles play out up on the balcony, and others watching from the upper galleries—would have finally seen the frightening Glee. There was no more keeping it secret. Talk of such sightings, the deadly battle, and power unleashed by the Lord Rahl against the howling monsters would be spreading to every corner of the palace. By morning, everyone would have heard about it. Everyone would be talking about little else.

  He knew that fear would have many people either holed up in their quarters or fleeing the palace. There was no safe place anywhere in their world, of course, but the people didn’t know that. As far as Richard was concerned, his job was to worry about finding a way to stop the threat, not to give them comfort and assurances.

  As they quickly moved down the corridor, he wondered about the lone Glee he had seen off on the opposing balcony, just standing there, watching him. Richard feared to imagine what that was about. Something about the look they shared still haunted him.

  At the least that silent observer had seen Richard turn more than a hundred of its kind to ash. If it had been there as a spy for the goddess, then it had some bad news to report back to her. He didn’t know if such a report would strike fear into her heart, or merely make her angry and even more determined. What he did know was that appeasement wasn’t an option.

  Turning off the main corridor, Harris, in the lead, finally took Richard and company out of the public areas and out of the sight of so many people. He wondered if she would think of watching them through Harris’s eye. Once they were in the restricted areas, he took them down a series of hallways and corridors.

  Kahlan, almost having to run, put her arm through Richard’s as she leaned close. “We will get her back, Richard.”

  Richard nodded. “As long as I’m alive, we will.”

  “Don’t put it that way,” she admonished. “Not after what just happened back there.”

  Richard forced himself to show her a smile as he briefly hugged her close with one arm.

  Four soldiers standing guard over an even more highly restricted area saw him coming accompanied by Mord-Sith. They saluted with fists to hearts. Richard was aware that it would only take one ungifted person, like one of those four soldiers, for the goddess to see where they were going.

  Richard didn’t have any idea how the goddess selected a person to use as an observer. He hoped that maybe it took her a bit of time to find a new person.

  “Just because we’re in the restricted corridors,” he told the rest of those with him, “doesn’t mean we’re safe. The Glee can show up in here just as easily as they did up on the balcony. Stay alert.”

  The Mord-Sith, all spinning their Agiel at the end of the fine gold chains around their wrists, nodded.

  Inside the next set of doors was a simple stone service stairwell that did echo all the way down four flights of stairs. At the bottom there was a small room with a locked door. Harris, who fortunately had keys for such doors, hurriedly unlocked it. Beyond, a broad hallway stretched off into darkness.

  “People don’t have any reason to regularly come down here, so it isn’t kept lighted,” Harris explained. He gestured to shelves. “We’ll need to take some of those lamps.”

  He collected one of the dozens from the shelf, then lit it with a splinter he caught to flame from another lamp mounted to the wall outside that door. Each of the Mord-Sith collected a lamp and let him light theirs from the same splinter.

  Harris pointed off into the darkness. “Down that way is where all of the palace plans are kept.”

  Nyda stepped out in front of the group. “Wait here. Let me and Vale go check, first.”

  Richard was in a hurry, but considering how many surprise attacks they had experienced, he decided to let
them do their job. He tilted his head for them to go on ahead, then watched as the bubble of light moved with them down the long, dark stone passageway until they reached double doors the end.

  Nyda’s voice echoed when she turned and called back to them, “Clear.”

  Richard knew that there was no such thing as clear. The Glee could show up anywhere, but at least he knew they weren’t waiting for them down in the darkness. At least, not yet.

  “Let’s go,” he said as he started out.

  The rest of the group followed down the passageway of gray stone to the gray-painted, broad metal door. There was an odd kind of lock built into the door that required moving a series of five levers sticking out of the metal covering up or down to one of several dozen specific, marked positions. Once the man had the levers properly positioned, he pulled up on a heavy lever to draw the bolt back. The hinges squealed in protest as it swung open. The air that escaped smelled musty.

  “What do you do if you forget the lock sequence?” Richard asked. “Or if you go missing and they need to open the door?”

  Harris shrugged with a smile. “There are a half-dozen palace officials who know the lock sequence, but if none of them could be found and if it was important enough, then I guess the soldiers would simply break it down. It’s not like a vault door, such as the one to get into the inner shaft of the plateau, and it’s not protecting a treasure of gold. It’s a strong metal door, but with enough effort I would guess it could be broken down. The lock is basically meant to keep out people who might be snooping around where they don’t belong. An enemy who wanted to attack the palace, for example, could make good use of all the plans and diagrams in here. That’s why it’s locked.”

  “I guess that makes sense,” Richard said as all of the Mord-Sith rushed in before the door was even fully opened.

  “Did Mr. Burkett know the sequences for the lock levers?”

  “Of course. Him and then six of his assistants, including me.”

  Richard didn’t say anything, but Mr. Burkett had already proven he was willing to betray the interests of the palace. Richard had wanted him out of the palace and banished forever. But considering that he knew the lock combination, not only to this place but, Richard had to assume, to many others, it was probably a good thing that he was dead.

  Once inside, Shale swept out her arm to light all the lamps placed liberally around the surprisingly vast room. It was a lot bigger than Richard had envisioned. Arches all around the outside walls were held up by unadorned stone pillars. Three more substantial pillars down the center of the room held up the row of arches that in turn held up the vaulted ceilings.

  Between each pillar against all the walls, crosshatched boards created what had to be thousands of uniform, diamond-shaped cubbyholes for all the rolled-up diagrams. A series of at least a dozen large tables sat in the center of the room, each big enough to spread out one or more of the diagrams. Richard couldn’t even begin to guess at the number of rolled-up plans.

  Harris went to the right, to the nearest series of cubbyholes holding rolled plans. He pointed up at the label in the top of the arch.

  “See? Everything is numbered and labeled so you can find the plan you need if you know the section name in the palace. If you don’t, there is a map of each floor over there where each section is labeled. This section between pillars and the ones next to it are all ‘W.’ We need sections with ‘M’ at the top.”

  The five Mord-Sith spread out, going around the room, looking at the letter at the top of each arch.

  “Here they are,” Cassia called out from the far-right corner. “Section M.”

  “See here?” Harris asked when they reached the section she had found. “They’re organized in vertical rows. Here are rows A and then rows B and so on. Depending on the number of areas with rolled plans, those rows might continue on the other side of the pillar.”

  He trailed his finger down one row and then down two more before he leaned in to check the numbers on the bottom of the cubbyholes. He had to go to the end of the section they were in; then he pulled out a long, rolled plan. At the nearest table he spread it out, putting weights each table had on the sides to keep the plans from rolling back up.

  He pointed. “See, it’s written here, down at the bottom. ‘M111-B.’”

  Richard, standing at the edge of the table, looking down at the diagram, leaned in a little. Everyone to either side leaned in, looking with him. Richard was the only one who actually knew what he was looking at.

  He stared at what he was seeing, hardly able to believe it.

  “What’s wrong?” Kahlan asked. “Your face just turned white.”

  “Lord Rahl, what is it?” Shale asked in the dragging silence.

  Richard’s gaze traced all of the passageways, the rooms, the circular halls, the dead ends, the entrapments, the false helix, the lateral routes, the complex of twinned and tripled passageways, checking, hoping he was wrong.

  He wasn’t.

  “We’re in trouble,” he said, not really having intended to say it out loud.

  13

  “Why are we in trouble?” Kahlan asked, alarmed by the way he was acting. He seemed not to hear her. “Richard, why are we in trouble?”

  She finally had to put a finger on the side of his jaw and turn his face toward her to get him to pay attention.

  “What?”

  “You said we’re in trouble. Why are we in trouble?”

  Richard straightened and took a step away from the table as he raked his fingers back through his hair.

  “Richard,” Kahlan said again, this time with exaggerated patience, drawing his name out to make him look at her, “what do you see? What is it?”

  He stared at her for a long moment. “It’s a complication.”

  “Well, I can see by the weird and confusing design of the place that it looks incredibly complicated. But what do you see?”

  He was shaking his head even as she was talking.

  “No. You don’t understand. It’s a complication.” He swept a hand out over the plan. “This kind of design is called a complication.”

  Shale looked exasperated. “You mean it’s an exceedingly complicated maze? We all can see that. Is that what you mean to say?”

  “No,” Richard said, irritably, as if no one was really paying attention to what he was saying. “No. I mean it’s a complication.”

  “Richard,” Kahlan said, pinching the bridge of her nose with a finger and thumb as she let out a composing breath, “I know you think that should explain it, but we don’t understand what that means to you. You need to tell us what you mean by that. What are you trying to say?”

  Kahlan knew that Richard’s unorthodox way of thinking often galloped so far out ahead of what they saw, taking into account things only he knew about or understood, that he often seemed to make no sense. It was one of the reasons the Mord-Sith, along with others, sometimes said he acted crazy. It seemed that way to people because they didn’t understand what was in his head.

  “It’s a complication. That’s what this kind of design is called. That is the name for it: a complication.” Richard lifted an arm, indicating everything above. “This whole place is laid out atop a spell-form drawn on the ground.”

  “The People’s Palace,” Kahlan said, nodding, “yes, we know that. We know the palace is a spell-form.”

  Shale leaned in, holding a hand against her arm. “A what? A spell-form? Now what are you talking about? You’re beginning to sound as crazy as him.”

  Richard squinted at her in a way that told Kahlan he was having a hard time believing Shale would ask something so basic. “You know … a spell-form.”

  Shale folded her arms and straightened without saying anything, clearly not understanding and expecting him to explain.

  Richard took a settling breath to back himself up. “Well, you know what a Grace is, right?”

  “A Grace?” Shale squinted with uncertainty at what we was getting at. “Well yes, my mothe
r and father taught me to draw a Grace when I was little. I know what a Grace is. What does that have to do with anything?”

  Richard leaned toward her a bit. “A Grace is an example of a spell-form. The lines that make up the Grace, the design of it, is called a spell-form.” He moved his finger around in the air before him as if drawing a Grace. “When you drew the Grace you were drawing one example of a spell-form.”

  It was Shale’s turn to frown. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. A Grace is a Grace is a Grace.”

  Richard threw up his hands in exasperation. “A Grace is a spell-form! Like any spell-form it can be drawn in different ways for different purposes.”

  “Different purposes? Now what are you talking about?”

  “Think of the spell-form this way. Imagine a plan drawn for a building. That’s called a building design, right? But the resulting building can be different, depending on how you draw the design. Do you see what I mean? It can have more rooms or more floors drawn on the design and the resulting reality in brick and mortar will be a reflection of how the design was drawn.”

  She stared openly at him a moment. “So, a spell-form, such as the Grace, can be drawn in different ways?”

  “Of course. Didn’t your parents warn you never to draw it in blood? Or out of order?”

  “Well, obviously.”

  “That’s because a Grace is a spell-form, and like all spell-forms, since they involve magic, if not drawn correctly they can cause great trouble. There are certain spell-forms that are lethal if drawn incorrectly or in the wrong order. Some, like the Grace, if deliberately drawn by a strongly gifted person in certain ways other than the formal procedure like you were taught, can be used to invoke any number of things.”

  “Any number of things?” Shale was still frowning as she watched him. “Like what?”

  “Well, drawn by the right person, in a specific order and manner, a Grace can conjure up the world of the dead. The Grace is only one of many examples of spell-forms, some of them very minor and relatively unimportant and some quite consequential.”