“Listen to me. I don’t know what’s going on, but you mustn’t die just to free me.”
Tears of desperation stung her eyes. She blinked them away. She fought to keep her voice from becoming a wail.
“Don’t go, Richard. I don’t care what it means for me, as long as you can be free. I would die happy if doing so would keep you from the enemy’s cruel hands. I can’t allow the Order to have you. I can’t allow you to endure the slow grinding death of a slave in exchange for my life. I can’t allow them to—”
She bit off the words of what she feared most; she couldn’t bear the thought of him being tortured. It made her even more dizzy and sick to think of him being maimed and mutilated, of him suffering all alone and forgotten in some distant stinking dungeon with no hope of help.
But Nicci said they wouldn’t. Kahlan told herself that, for her own sanity, she had to believe Nicci’s word.
Kahlan realized Richard was smiling to himself, as if trying to commit to memory every detail of her face while at the same time running a thousand other things through his thoughts.
“There’s no choice,” he whispered. “I must do this.”
She clutched his shirt in her fist. “You’re doing just as Nicci wants—she knows you’ll want to save me. I can’t allow you to make that sacrifice!”
Richard looked up briefly, gazing out at the trees and mountains behind their house, taking it all in, like a condemned man savoring his last meal. His gaze, more earnest, settled once more on hers.
“Don’t you see? I am making no sacrifice. I am making a fair trade. The reality that you exist is my basis for joy and happiness.
“I make no sacrifice,” he repeated, stressing each word. “To be a slave, even if that is what happens to me, and yet know you’re alive, is my choice over being free in a world in which you don’t exist. I can live with the first. I can’t, with the second. The first is painful, the second unbearable.”
Kahlan beat a fist against his chest. “But you will be a slave or worse and I can’t bear that!”
“Kahlan, listen to me. I will always have freedom in my heart because I understand what it is. Because I do, I can work toward it. I will find a way to be free.
“I cannot find a way to bring you back to life.
“The spirits know that in the past I’ve been willing to forfeit my life for a just cause and if my life would truly make a difference. In the past, I have knowingly imperiled both our lives, been willing to sacrifice both our lives—but not in return for nothing. Don’t you see? This would be a fool’s bargain. I’ll not do it.”
Kahlan pulled her breaths in small gasps, trying to told back the tears as well as her rising sense of panic. “You’re the Seeker. You must find a way to freedom. Of course you will. You will, I know.” She forced a swallow past the constriction in her throat as she tried to reassure Richard, or perhaps herself. “You’ll find a way. I know you will. You’ll find a way and you’ll come back. You did before. You will this time.”
The shadows of Richard’s features seemed dark and severe, cast as they were in a mask of resignation.
“Kahlan, you must be prepared to go on.”
“What do you mean?”
“You must find joy in the fact that I, too, live. You must be prepared to go on with that knowledge and nothing else.”
“What do you mean, nothing else?”
He had a terrible look in his eyes—some kind of sad, grim, tragic acceptance. She didn’t want to look into his eyes, but, standing there with her hand against his chest, feeling the warmth of him, the life within him, she couldn’t make herself look away as he spoke.
“I think it’s different this time.”
Kahlan pulled her hair back when the wind dragged it over her eyes. “Different?”
“There’s something very different about the feel of this. It doesn’t make sense in the way things in the past have made sense. There’s something deadly serious about Nicci. Something singular. She’s planned this out and she’s prepared to die for it. I can’t lie to you to deceive you. Something tells me that, this time, I may never be able to find a way to come back.”
“Don’t say that.” In weak fingers trembling with dread, Kahlan gathered his dark shirt into a wrinkled knot. “Please don’t say that, Richard. You must try. You must find a way to come back to me.”
“Don’t ever think I won’t be doing my best.” His voice was impassioned, almost to the point of sounding angry. “I swear to you, Kahlan, that as long as there is a breath in my lungs, I’ll never give up; I’ll always try to find a way. But we can’t ignore the possibility just because it’s painful to contemplate: I may never be back.
“You must face the fact that it looks like you must go on without me, but with the knowledge that I’m alive, just as I will have that awareness of you in my heart where no one can touch it. In our hearts, we have each other and always will. That was the oath we swore when we were married—to love and honor each other for all time. This can’t change it. Distance can’t change it. Time can’t change it.”
“Richard…” She choked back her wail, but she couldn’t keep the tears from coursing down her face. “I can’t stand the thought of you being a slave because of me. Don’t you see that? Don’t you see what that would do to me? I’ll kill myself if I must so that she can’t do this to you. I must.”
He shook his head, the wind ruffling his hair. “Then I would have no reason to escape her. Nothing to escape for.”
“You won’t need to escape, that’s just it—she won’t be able to hold you.”
“She’s a Sister of the Dark.” He threw open his hands. “She will simply use another means I won’t know how to counter—and if you’re dead, I won’t care to.”
“But—”
“Don’t you see?” He seized her by her shoulders. “Kahlan, you must live to give me a reason to try to escape her.”
“Your own life is your reason,” she said. “To be free to help people will be your reason.”
“The people be cursed.” He released her and gestured angrily. “Even people where I grew up turned against us. They tried to murder us. Remember? The lands that have surrendered into the union with D’Hara will likely not remain loyal, either, when they see the reality of the Imperial Order’s army moving up into the Midlands. Eventually, D’Hara will stand alone.
“People don’t understand or value freedom. The way it now stands, they won’t fight for it. They’ve proven it in Anderith, and in Hartland, where I grew up. What more clear evidence could be seen? I hold out no false hope. Most of the rest of the Midlands will quail when it comes time to fight against the Imperial Order. When they see the size of the Order’s army and their brutality with those who resist, they will surrender their freedom.”
He looked away from her, as if regretting his flash of anger in their last moments together. His tall form, so stalwart against the sweep of mountains and sky, sagged a little, seeming to huddle closer to her as if seeking comfort.
“The only thing I have to hope for is to get away so I can come back to you.” His voice had lost all traces of heat as he spoke in a near whisper. “Kahlan, please don’t take that hope from me—it’s all I have.”
In the distance she could see the fox trotting across the meadow. Its thick, white-tipped tail followed out straight behind as the fox made its inspection for any rodents that might be about. As Kahlan’s gaze tracked its movement, from the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of Spirit standing proud and free in the window. How could she lose the man who had carved that for her when she needed it most?
She could, she knew, because now he needed what only she could give him. Looking back up into his intense gray eyes, she realized she could not hope to deny him his earnest plea and only request, not at a time like this.
“All right, Richard. I won’t do anything rash to free you. I’ll wait for you. I’ll endure it.
“I know you. I know you won’t ever give up. You know I expec
t no less from you. When you get away—and you will—I’ll be waiting for you, and then we’ll be together again. We’ll never be apart in our hearts. As you said, our oath of love is timeless.”
Richard closed his eyes with relief. He tenderly kissed her brow. He lifted her hand from his chest and pressed soft kisses to her knuckles. She saw then how much her pledge meant to him.
Kahlan pulled her hand back and quickly removed her necklace, the one Shota had given her as a wedding gift. It was meant to prevent her from getting pregnant. She turned Richard’s hand over and pushed the necklace into his palm. He frowned in confusion at the small, dark stone hanging from the gold chain draped over his fingers.
“What’s this about?”
“I want you to take it.” Kahlan cleared her throat to keep her voice. She could only manage a whisper. “I know what she wants of you—what she will make you do.”
“No, that’s not what…” He shook his head. He said, “I’m not taking this,” as if turning it away would somehow deny the possibility.
Kahlan put her hand to the side of his face. His face wavered before her in a watery blur.
“Please, Richard. Please take it. For me. I couldn’t bear the thought of another woman having your child.” Or even the thought of the attempt at its creation—but she didn’t say that part of it. “Especially not after mine…”
He looked away from her eyes. “Kahlan…” Words failed him.
“Just do it for me. Take it. Please, Richard. I’m doing as you ask and will endure your captivity; please honor my request in return. I couldn’t stand the thought of that bewitching blond beast having your child—the child that should be mine. Don’t you see? How could I ever love something I hated? And how could I ever hate something that was part of you? Please, Richard, don’t let it come to that.”
The cold wind lifted and twisted her hair. Her whole life, it seemed, was twisting out of her control. She could hardly believe that this place of such joy, peace, and redemption, a place where she had come to live again, could be a place where it would all be taken away.
Richard held the necklace out to her, as if it were a thing that might bite him. The dark stone swung under his fingers, gleaming in the gloom.
“Kahlan, I don’t think that’s what this is about. I really don’t. But anyway, she could simply refuse to wear it and threaten your life if I didn’t…”
Kahlan pulled the gold chain from his fingers and laid it all in a small neat mound in his palm. The dark stone glimmered from its imprisonment behind the veil of tiny gold links. She closed his fingers around the necklace and held his fist shut with both of her hands.
“You’re the one who demands we not ignore those things that are painful to contemplate.”
“But if she refuses…”
Kahlan gripped his fist tighter in her trembling fingers. “If it comes to a time when she makes that demand of you, you must convince her to wear the necklace. You must. For me. It’s bad enough for me to think she might take my love, my husband, from me like that, but to also fear…”
His big hand felt so warm and familiar and comforting to her. Her words came choked with desperate tears. She could do no more than beg. “Please, Richard.”
He pressed his lips tight, then nodded and stuffed the necklace in a pocket. “I don’t believe those are her intentions, but if it should turn out to be so, you have my word: she will wear the necklace.”
Kahlan sagged against him with a sob.
He took her by the arm. “Come on. Hurry. I have to get whatever I need to take. I’ve only got a few minutes, or all this will be for nothing. I can take the shorter trail and still catch up with her at the top of the pass, but I don’t have much time.”
Chapter 23
Kahlan was aware of Cara, wearing her bloodred leather, standing in the doorway to their bedroom watching Richard cram his things into his pack. Kahlan nodded as she and Richard exchanged brief, stilted instructions. They had already come to terms with the life-and-death issues. It seemed they both feared to say anything of consequence for fear of disturbing the delicate, desperate, difficult agreements they had reached.
The meager light coming in the small window did little to brighten the gloom. Cara, over in the doorway, blocked some of the light. The room had the feel of a dungeon. Richard, dressed in dark clothes, looked like a shadow. So many times, as she lay in bed recovering, Kahlan had thought of it that way—as her dungeon. Now it had the palpable sense of a dungeon, but with the clean aroma of pine walls instead of the stench of a stone cell from where trembling, sweating prisoners were taken to their death.
Cara looked forlorn one moment and the next like lightning seeking ground. Kahlan knew that the Mord-Sith’s emotions had to be as torn as her own, balancing on a knife’s edge with despair and grief on one side and rage on the other. Mord-Sith were not used to being in such a position, but then, Cara was now more than simply Mord-Sith.
Kahlan watched Richard pack the black trousers, black undershirt, black and gold tunic, silver wristbands, over-belt with its pouches, and golden cloak into his pack, where they took up a good portion of the available space. He was wearing his dark forest garb; he didn’t have time to change. Kahlan hoped a time would soon come when he would escape and again wear the clothes of a war wizard to lead them against the Order. They all needed him to lead the D’Haran Empire against the invading horde from the Old World.
For reasons that weren’t always entirely clear, Richard had become the linchpin of their struggle. Kahlan knew his feelings about that—that people must be willing to fight for themselves and not only for him—were valid. If an idea was sound, it had to have a life beyond a leader, or the leader had failed.
As he threw other clothes and small items into his pack, Richard told Kahlan that maybe she could find Zedd, that he might have some ideas. She nodded and said she would, knowing Zedd wouldn’t be able to do anything. This terrible triangle was not liable to be susceptible to influence by outsiders—Nicci had seen to that. It was just a hope Richard was giving her, the only bouquet he could offer in the desolate void of reality.
Kahlan didn’t know what to do with her hands. She stood twining her fingers together as tears dripped off her chin. There must be something to say, something important, some last words while she had the chance, but she couldn’t think of them. She supposed he knew what she felt, what was in her heart, and words couldn’t add anything to that. She pressed her fist against the aching knot of anxiety in the pit of her stomach.
A sense of doom crowded in the room like a fourth person, a grim guard waiting to take Richard away. This was the heart of terror, being controlled by what you couldn’t see, couldn’t reason with, couldn’t persuade or battle. The doom waited, implacable, immune, indifferent.
As Cara vanished from the doorway, Richard pulled a fistful of gold and silver from an inside pocket in his leather pack. He hastily dropped roughly half back in the pack and then held out the rest.
“Take this. You might need it.”
“I’m the Mother Confessor. I don’t need gold.”
He tossed it on the bed for her anyway, apparently not wanting to argue with her in their last moments together.
“Do you want any of the carvings?” she asked. It was a stupid question and she knew it, but she had to fill the awful silence and it was the only thing to come into her head, other than a hopeless plea.
“No. I’ve no need for them. When you look at them, think of me, and remember I love you.” He rolled a blanket tight, wrapped it with a small patch of oiled canvas, and tied it with leather thongs to the bottom of his pack. “I guess if I were to want any, I could always carve some.”
Kahlan handed him a cake of soap.
“I don’t need your carving to remind me of your love. I’ll remember. Carve something to make Nicci see that you should be free.”
Richard glanced up with a grim smile. “I plan on seeing to it that she knows I won’t ever give in to her and the Order
. Carvings won’t be necessary. She thinks she has this all planned out, but she’s going to find out I’m bad company.” Richard jammed a fist in his pack, making more room. “Very bad company.”
Cara rushed back in, carrying small bundles with the corners tied in knots at the top. She plopped them down one at a time onto the bed.
“I put together some food for you, Lord Rahl. Things that will keep for traveling—dried meat and fish and such. Some rice and beans. I… I put a loaf of bread that I made on top, so eat it first, while it’s still good.”
He thanked her as he put the small bundles into his pack. He put the bread to his nose for a deep whiff before packing it away. He gave Cara a smile of appreciation.
Richard straightened. His smile evaporated in a way that for some reason made Kahlan’s blood go cold. Looking like he was in the throes of committing himself to some last, grim deed, Richard pulled the baldric off over his head. He held the gold-and-silver wrought scabbard in his left hand and drew the Sword of Truth in his white-knuckled right fist.
The blade rang out with its unique metallic sound, announcing its freedom.
Richard drew his sleeve up his arm and wiped the sword across his forearm. Kahlan winced as she watched. She didn’t know if he cut deeply accidentally, or on purpose. With an icy sensation she recalled that Richard cut very precisely with any sharp steel edge.
He turned the blade and wiped both sides in gouts of vivid red blood. He bathed the blade in it, giving it a voluptuous taste, wetting its appetite for more. Kahlan didn’t know what he was doing or why he was doing it now, but it was a frightening ritual to witness. She wished he had drawn it before and cut down Nicci. Her blood, Kahlan would not fear seeing.
Richard picked up the scabbard and slammed the Sword of Truth home. Blood running over his hand left greasy red smears across the scabbard as he slid his hand down the length of it, to the tip, and then seized the sheathed weapon at its center point in his fist. His head bowed, his eyes on the dull silver and gold reflections lustrous even through his own blood, he loomed closer to her.
Faith of the Fallen Page 29