“Lily,” Kahlan asked the younger girl first in a soft voice as she smiled, “do you remember when you went to watch your brother play Ja’La?”
Lily nodded. “He won. We were real happy that he won. Pa said Darby scored a point.”
“Yes, we saw him play, and we were happy for him, too. Do you remember the two people you talked to? A man and a woman?”
She frowned. “When Ma and Pa were cheering? That man and woman?”
“Yes. Do you remember what they said to you?”
“Beth was holding my hand. They asked if it was my brother we was cheering for.”
“That’s right,” Beth said from the other bed. She had to stop talking as she was taken with a bout of coughing. When she recovered and caught her breath, she went on. “They said Darby played really good. They showed us the pretty thing they had.”
Richard stared at her. “Pretty thing?”
“The shiny thing in the box,” Lily said.
“That’s right,” Beth said. “They let me and Lily see it.”
“What was it?”
Beth frowned through her headache. “It was… it was… I don’t know exactly. It was in a box that was so black you couldn’t see its sides. The shiny thing inside was pretty.”
Lily nodded her agreement. “My doll saw it, too. She thought it was real pretty, too.”
“Do you have any idea what it was?”
They both shook their heads.
“It was in a box that was as black as midnight. To look at it is like looking down a dark hole.” Richard said.
They both nodded.
“Sounds like the night stone,” Kahlan whispered to him.
Richard knew well that blackness. Not only the night stone had been like that, but also the outer covering of the boxes of Orden. It was a color so sinister that it seemed to suck the very light from a room.
In Richard’s experience, that void of light was only associated with immensely dangerous things. The night stone could bring beings forth from the underworld, and the boxes of Orden held magic that, if used for evil, could destroy the world of life. The boxes could open a gateway to the underworld.
“And inside was something shiny,” Richard said. “Was it like looking at a candle, or the flame of a lamp? That kind of shiny?”
“Colors,” Lily said. “It was pretty colors.”
“Like colored light,” Beth said. “It was sitting on white sand.”
Sitting on white sand. The hairs on the back of Richard’s neck stood on end. “How big was the box?”
Beth held her hands not quite a foot apart. “About this big on a side. But it wasn’t very thick. Kind of like a book. It was almost like they opened a book. That’s what the box reminded me of—a book.”
“And inside, the sand that was inside, did it have lines drawn in it? Kind of like if you were to draw lines in dry dirt with a stick?”
Beth nodded as she succumbed to a bout of rattling coughs. She panted, catching her breath, when they finally ceased.
“That’s right. Neat lines, in patterns. That’s just what it was like. It was a box, or maybe a big book, and when they opened it to show us the pretty colors, it had white sand in it with careful lines drawn in it. Then we saw the pretty colors.”
“You mean, there was something sitting in the sand? This thing that made the colored light was sitting in the sand?”
Beth blinked in confusion, trying to remember. “No… it was more like the light came out of the sand.” She flopped back on her bed and rolled on her side, in obvious distress from her sickness.
From the plague. From black death.
From a black box.
Richard stroked a hand tenderly down her arm and pulled the blanket back up over her as she moaned in pain. “Thank you, Beth. You rest now, and get yourself better.”
Richard couldn’t thank Lily. He dared not trust his voice.
Lily lay back. Her tiny little brow puckered. “I’m tired.” She pouted, near tears. “I don’t feel good.”
She curled up and put her thumb in her mouth.
Kahlan tucked Lily in, and promised her a treat as soon as she was well. Kahlan’s tender smile brought a small smile to Lily’s mouth. It almost made Richard smile. Almost.
In the alley, after they had left the Anderson house, Richard pulled Drefan aside. Kahlan told the others to wait, and then she joined them.
“What are tokens?” Richard asked. “You told the grandfather that the youngest had tokens on her.”
“Those spots on her legs are called tokens.”
“And why was the old man nearly struck down with dread when he heard you say the girl had them?”
Drefan’s blue eyes turned away. “People die of the plague in different ways. I don’t know the reason, except to imagine it has something to do with their constitution. The strength and vulnerability of everyone’s aura is different.
“I’ve not seen with my own eyes all manner of death the plague causes, as, thankfully, it is a rare occurrence. Some of what I know I learned from the records that the Raug’Moss keep. The plagues I’ve seen have been in small, remote places. In the past, many centuries ago, there have been a few great plagues in large cities, and I’ve read the records of those.
“With some people it comes on of a sudden—very high fevers, intolerable headaches, vomiting, searing pains in their backs. They are out of their minds with the agony of it for many days, even weeks, before they die. A few of these recover. Beth is like that. She will get much worse, yet. I have seen people like her recover. She has a small chance.
“Sometimes, they look like the first boy, with the black death overwhelming them and rotting their bodies. Others are tortured with horribly painful swellings in their neck, armpits, or groin; they suffer miserably until they finally die. Bert is like that. If the distemper can be brought to a head, and encouraged to break and run, then they occasionally recover.”
“What about Lily?” Kahlan asked. “What about these tokens, as you called them?”
“I’ve never seen them before, with my own eyes, but I’ve read about them in our records. The tokens will appear on the legs and sometimes on the chest. People who have the tokens rarely know they are sick, until the end. They will one day discover to their horror that they have the tokens upon them, and be dead shortly thereafter.
“They die with little or no pain. But they all die. No one with tokens on them ever lives. The old man must have seen them before, because he knew this.
“The plagues I’ve seen, as violent as the outbreaks were, never displayed the tokens. The records say that the worst of the great plagues, the ones that brought the most widespread death, were marked with the tokens. Some people thought they were visible signs of the Keeper’s fatal touch.”
“But Lily is just a little girl,” Kahlan protested, as if arguing could change it, “she doesn’t seem so sick. It isn’t possible for her to…”
“Lily is feeling out of sorts. The tokens on her legs are fully developed. She will be dead before midnight.”
“Tonight?” Richard asked in astonishment.
“Yes. At the very latest. More likely within hours. I think perhaps even…”
A woman’s long, shrill scream came from the house. The horror in it sent a shiver through Richard’s bones. The soldiers who had been talking in low voices off at the end of the alley fell silent. The only sound was a dog barking down the next street.
A man’s anguished cry came from the house.
Drefan closed his eyes. “As I was about to say, even sooner.”
Kahlan buried her face against Richard’s shoulder. She clutched his shirt. Richard’s head spun.
“They’re children,” she wept. “That bastard is killing children!”
Drefan’s brow bunched. “What’s she talking about?”
“Drefan”—Richard tightened his arms around Kahlan as she shook—“I think these children are dying because a wizard and a sorceress went to a Ja’La game a
few days back and used magic to start this plague.”
“That’s not possible. It takes longer than that for people to fall sick.”
“The wizard was the one who hurt Cara when you first arrived. He left a prophecy on the wall in the pit. It begins: ‘On the red moon will come the firestorm.’”
Drefan regarded him with a dubious frown. “How can magic start a plague?”
“I don’t know,” Richard whispered.
He couldn’t bear to speak aloud the next part of the prophecy. The one bonded to the blade will watch as his people die. If he does nothing, then he, and all those he loves, will die in its heat, for no blade, forged of steel or conjured of sorcery, can touch this foe.
Kahlan trembled in his arms, and he knew she was agonizing over the final part of the prophecy.
To quench the inferno, he must seek the remedy in the wind. Lightning will find him on that path, for the one in white, his true beloved, will betray him in her blood.
31
At the edge of the expansive palace grounds, a patrol of D’Haran soldiers spotted them and snapped to attention. Just beyond the soldiers, in the streets of the city, Kahlan could see people everywhere going about their business pause to bow to the Mother Confessor and the Lord Rahl.
Although the activities of commerce, on the surface, seemed like any other day, Kahlan thought she could detect subtle differences: men loading barrels into a wagon scrutinized people who passed close by; shopkeepers appraised customers carefully; people walking on the street skirted those stopped in conversation. The knots of people gossiping seemed more numerous. Laughter was conspicuously absent from the streets.
After they had solemnly saluted with fists to the leather armor and chain mail over their hearts, the patrol of soldiers not far off broke into good-natured grins.
“Huzzah, Lord Rahl!” they cheered as one. “Huzzah, Lord Rahl!”
“Thank you, Lord Rahl,” one of the soldiers shouted toward them. “You cured us! Restored our health! We’re well because of you. Long live the great wizard, Lord Rahl!”
Richard froze in midstride, not looking at the soldiers, but staring at the ground before him. His cloak, snared in a gust of wind, embraced him, shrouding him in its golden sparkles.
The others joined in. “Long live Lord Rahl! Long live Lord Rahl!”
Hands balled in fists, Richard started out once more without looking their way. Kahlan, her arm around his, slid her hand down and urged his fist open to twine her fingers in his. She gave his hand a squeeze of silent understanding and support.
From the corner of her eye, Kahlan could see Cara, back behind Drefan and Nadine, gesturing angrily at the patrol to silence them and move them along.
In the distance before them, on a gentle rise, the expanse of the Confessors’ Palace rose up in all its splendor of stone columns, vast walls, and elegant spires, standing out a pristine white against the darkening sky. Not only was the sun going down but murky clouds scudded by, messengers, delivering a vow of a storm. A few errant snowflakes flitted past on the wind, scouting for the horde to come. Spring had not yet prevailed.
Kahlan gripped Richard’s hand as if clutching at life itself. In her mind’s eye, she saw nothing but sickness and death. They had seen near to a dozen sick children, stricken with plague. Richard’s pallid face looked hardly better that the six dead faces she had seen.
Her insides ached. Holding back her tears, her cries, her screams, had cramped her stomach muscles. She had told herself that she couldn’t lose control and cry in front of mothers who were terrified that their sick children might be sicker than they had imagined, or as sick as they knew, but refused to believe.
Many of those mothers were hardly older than Kahlan. They were just young women, faced with a crushing plight, who fell to piteous prayer for the good spirits to spare their precious children. Kahlan couldn’t say that she wouldn’t have been reduced to the same state in their place.
Some of the parents, like the Andersons, had older members of their families to rely on for advice and support, but some of the mothers were young and alone, with only husbands hardly more than boys themselves, and no one to turn to.
Kahlan put her free hand over the painful spasm in her abdomen. She knew how devastated Richard felt. He had more than enough to carry on his shoulders. She had to be strong for him.
Majestic maple trees stood to each side, the bare thicket of branches laced together over their heads. It wouldn’t be long before they budded. They passed out from the tunnel of trees, onto the winding promenade that led up to the palace.
Behind them, Drefan and Nadine carried on a whispered discussion of herbs and cures to be tried. Nadine would propose something, and Drefan would give his opinion as to whether it would be useless or might be worth trying. He would gently lecture her on the paths of infirmity, and the causes of breaks in the body’s defenses that allowed an affliction to gain hold.
Kahlan got the vague impression that he almost seemed to view those who fell sick with contempt, as if because they took so little care with their auras and flows of energy that he talked about all the time, it was only to be expected that they would succumb to a pestilence unworthy of those like himself who minded their bodies better. She guessed that one with his knowledge of healing people must get frustrated with those who brought disease upon themselves, like the prostitutes and the men who went to them. She was relieved, at least, that he wasn’t one of those.
Kahlan wasn’t sure if she felt Drefan was justified in some of the things he was saying, or if it was simple arrogance. She herself had felt frustration at people who flouted dangers to their health. When she was younger, there was a diplomat who became ill every time he ate rich sauces with certain spices. They always left him with difficulty breathing. He loved the sauces. Then one time, at a formal dinner, he gorged himself on the sauces he loved, and fell dead at the table.
Kahlan could never understand why the man would bring such sickness on himself, and had trouble feeling sorry for him. In fact, she always viewed him with contempt when he came to a formal dinner. She wondered if Drefan didn’t feel much the same way about some people, except that he knew much more of what made people sick. She had seen Drefan do remarkable things with Cara’s aura, and she knew, too, that sickness could sometimes be influenced by the mind.
Kahlan had on a number of occasions stopped in a small place called Langden where lived a very superstitious and backward people. It was decided by their powerful local healer that the headaches that so bothered the people of Langden must be caused by evil spirits possessing them. He ordered white-hot irons put to the bottoms of the feet of those with headaches to drive out the evil spirits. It was a remarkable cure. No one in Langden was ever possessed again. The headaches vanished.
If only the plague could vanish so easily.
If only Nadine could vanish so easily. They couldn’t send her away, now, when there would be so much need among the people. Like it or not, Nadine was going to be around until this was over. Shota seemed to be tightening her clutches around Richard.
Kahlan didn’t know what Richard had said to Nadine, but she could imagine. Nadine had suddenly been stricken with overt politeness. Kahlan knew Nadine’s apology hadn’t been sincere. Richard had probably told her that if she didn’t apologize, he would boil her alive. With the way Cara’s gaze so often passed over Nadine, Kahlan suspected that Nadine had more to worry about than Richard.
Kahlan and Richard led the rest of their group between the towering white columns set to each side of the entrance, through the open doors carved with geometric designs, and into the palace. The cavernous grand hall inside was lit by windows of pale blue glass set between polished white marble columns topped with gold capitals, and by dozens of lamps spaced along the walls.
A leather-clad figure in the distance wandered toward them across the black-and-white marble squares. Someone else approached from the right side, from the guest rooms. Richard slowed to a stop and turn
ed.
“Ulic, would you please go find General Kerson. He might be at the D’Haran headquarters. Does anyone know where General Baldwin is?”
“He’s probably at Kelton’s palace, on Kings Row,” Kahlan said. “He’s been staying there since he arrived and helped us defeat the Blood of the Fold.”
Richard nodded wearily. Kahlan didn’t think she had ever seen him looking worse. His spiritless eyes stared out from an ashen face. He swayed on his feet as he squinted, looking for Egan not ten feet away.
“Egan, there you are. Go get General Baldwin, please. I don’t know where he is, but you can ask around.”
Egan cast a quick, uneasy glance toward Kahlan. “Would you like us to bring anyone else, Lord Rahl?”
“Anyone else? Yes. Tell them to bring their officers. I’ll be in my office. Bring them there.”
Ulic and Egan both clapped fists to hearts before turning to their duties. As they departed, they conveyed a message through quick hand signals to the two Mord-Sith. In response, Cara and Raina maneuvered closer to Richard, screening him as Tristan Bashkar came to a wary halt.
Berdine meandered up on the other side, her rapt attention on the open journal in her hands. She seemed completely absorbed in what she was studying, and oblivious to anything around her. Kahlan put out a hand to stop her before she bumped into Richard. She rocked to a halt like a rowboat that had drifted in and grounded on the shore.
Tristan bowed. “Mother Confessor. Lord Rahl.”
“Who are you?” Richard asked.
“Tristan Bashkar, of Jara, Lord Rahl. I’m afraid we haven’t been formally introduced.”
Life sparked into Richard’s gray eyes. “And have you decided to surrender, minister Bashkar?”
Tristan had been about to bow again at an expected formal introduction. He hadn’t expected Richard’s questions to come first. He cleared his throat and straightened. His easy smile welled onto his face.
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