Wizard’s fire burned with unparalleled intensity. It was sticky, and once it was stuck fast, not only could you not get it off, you couldn’t extinguish the flame. It burned until its power was spent. So much as a drop of it stuck to a leg could burn down to the bone. To say that it was excruciatingly painful did not begin to describe the horror of it. Those touched by even a speck of it could think of nothing but getting it off.
Kahlan had seen men in battle splashed with small amounts of it on an arm or hand. They would use their own sword to hack off the limbs to prevent the wizard’s fire from climbing up onto the rest of them. Others, in their mad panic to escape it, would accidentally run into pools of it.
In the blindingly intense light of the exploding sea of fire, Kahlan could see silhouetted Shun-tuk reduced momentarily to little more than black skeletons. In the next instant, even that much vaporized to nothing.
For the most part, as they ran they tried not to look back because of the intensity of the light. It was so blindingly bright that, like the rest of them, Kahlan not only had to turn her face from it, she also squinted against the painful illumination. The wave of heat it gave off felt like it might ignite her hair and melt her skin.
The fire made the horse carrying Richard more than a little skittish. Kahlan kept a firm hold on the reins up near the bit to prevent it from bolting. She was thankful that she had covered the horse’s eyes.
She had no idea of how many of the Shun-tuk were consumed in the burning sea of wizard’s fire, or how many might not be harmed by it at all. She had trouble imagining anyone who would not be harmed by it. She did know that now that it had been unleashed, there was no time to worry about it.
“Let’s go,” she said as she took hold of Zedd’s sleeve.
His eyes looked vacant. He had put everything he had into the creation of the conflagration. He had been determined to make sure he used every ounce of effort he could muster to protect them, to protect his unconscious grandson.
Zedd blinked. “What?”
“You did good, Zedd. You have given us a chance.” Kahlan again tugged his sleeve. “Now come on—we have to go.”
The old wizard looked more than exhausted, but he kept up with Kahlan as she started pulling the horse ahead into the gorge. The horse was only too glad to be led away from the burning nightmare behind them. Kahlan knew that the wizard’s fire would continue to burn for quite a while and continue to catch victims in its fiery snare. Those with even a little of it on them would be incapacitated and it would be months before they healed, if ever. Many of those burned would die within hours or days. Yet more, those not vaporized by the intensity of the fire, but who had been close enough to inhale the noxious heat, would die in breathless agony within a short time.
As Kahlan pulled the horse up the dark gorge, Nicci stepped up beside her. “I’ve never seen him do that before,” she whispered to Kahlan. “I think he put everything he had into it to try to stop even those with occult powers.”
Kahlan glanced over at the sorceress. “Do you think it worked?”
“No. But it was a noble effort. I know what such things take to create, and that took more than a lot. I hope he saved some for when we get them farther up into the gorge. When we do, I’ll help him with some Subtractive Magic.”
The sorceress quickly moved out in front of Kahlan and cast her hand out. A flame floated ahead, gently lifting up through the air, among the pine boughs. It was not fire meant to be destructive, but a small flame meant to show them where they were going and light the ground enough that they wouldn’t trip over tree roots and rocks.
Nicci turned to the tightly packed group of men following behind them. “Keep your eyes ahead. They need to adjust to the darkness. Try not to look back because once we get farther in Zedd is going to be laying down more wizard’s fire behind us. Within the confines of the gorge it will be even brighter. It will help blind the enemy to the darkness of the trail ahead and slow them down. Don’t look back and let it blind you too.”
The men following behind nodded that they understood.
Nicci led the way, with Kahlan right behind her. They had to pick their way carefully along the side of the brook, frequently over slick, moss-covered rocks. While Kahlan, in her official capacity as a Confessor, had traveled the countryside her whole life, Nicci had grown up in cities and until she met Richard had rarely set foot on dirt. Being with Richard for as long as she had been, she had learned how to walk in the woods, which was fortunate because there was no trail up the gorge. They were in uncharted wilderness and had to pick their way as best they could.
Sometimes some of the men had to rush out ahead to hack away at fallen limbs or saplings to clear them out of the way for the horse. Kahlan was especially careful to let the horse pick where it wanted to step. They couldn’t afford to have it break a leg.
The small lights Nicci released from time to time revealed rock walls rising up in places. The sheer rock faces were wet with water seeping through the tiniest cracks. Slime grew in long strings that hung down, their tips dripping water. Where there were rocky hillsides, cedar trees grew down close to the brook. In places up higher on those steep hillsides, where they could get a good foothold, towering pines grew. Where it was too rocky or steep for the forest monarchs, smaller trees and shrubs with roots fanning out like claws clung to the rugged hillside.
The terrain at the bottom of the gorge would not be easy to traverse in the daytime. At night it was quite difficult, but not entirely impossible. Picking their way up the ever-rising ground was slow going, though. At least it would be no easier for the Shun-tuk.
With the cliffs and perilously steep hillsides, Kahlan was confident that the Shun-tuk would not be able to get out around them, especially since the fastest route was the one they were taking at the bottom of the gorge where the footing was better. The slopes were far trickier to traverse. Traveling that way would be slower and dangerous. That meant that Richard had been right, and by going this way they would be able to funnel the Shun-tuk into a narrow space.
The trees up ahead suddenly lit with bright yellow light as Zedd, bringing up the rear, unleashed more wizard’s fire back at the enemy following them. It lit the way for them.
The jolt of another explosion shook the ground. She could feel the thump from the concussion deep in her chest. Kahlan didn’t know how many Shun-tuk it was killing, or how many were getting through. She and everyone else were being careful not to look back and be night-blinded by the intensity of the thunderous blasts.
Nicci raced back to help Zedd. When Kahlan heard the ripping sound, like tearing canvas, and saw the white light on the treetops around them, Kahlan knew that the sorceress was using a mix of Additive and Subtractive Magic on the enemy. It was as violently destructive as wizard’s fire, but she doubted that it would affect those with occult abilities any more than did wizard’s fire. At least it would be deadly to those without such protection and reduce their numbers.
With the sword in her hand and its attendant rage, she was eager to encounter some of the enemy that got through. Richard’s life was in great peril because of these half people. All of their lives were. She had to resist the urge to turn back and fight.
The time was not yet right. It would come soon enough, she knew, and when it did then her sword—Richard’s sword—would taste their blood.
CHAPTER
23
From time to time Kahlan glanced back over her shoulder at her unconscious husband draped over the back of the horse. He was helpless and depending on her. She intended not to let him down. She was determined to get them through the danger, get them to relative safety, and especially get them back to the People’s Palace so that Zedd and Nicci could remove the poison that was slowly killing them both.
She was sick and tired of not being able to live her life with him, of not being able to be alone with him, of not being able to have a normal conversation with him, of not being able to make love to him, of not being able to love
him in the most simple and joyful of ways because they were always desperately fighting not only for their lives, but so that everyone else could have those things.
The peace that had begun to settle in after the war had been a wonderful taste of all those things. Cara’s marriage celebration at the People’s Palace had been a brief sample of life the way it should be. But all too soon that joy had turned to ashes for Cara and Ben, and for everyone else.
Having the Sword of Truth in her hand inflamed those feelings and brought them boiling to the surface.
Now they were once again in a fight for their lives. If they were to survive this time, if they were to live, they not only needed to escape the Shun-tuk chasing them, they also needed to get home.
But home back in the heart of D’Hara was a long way off.
Without horses, it was going to be a long and difficult journey, especially with her and Richard so weakened. There was no choice, of course. Her thought was to try to find some towns or cities along the way where they could get some horses.
Off in the distance behind them, Kahlan could hear the thunderous explosions from Zedd’s wizard’s fire rolling up the gorge, punctuated by the sharp thunder of Nicci’s dark lightning. Sometimes, she could hear the screams of the dying. The sounds reverberated off the walls of the gorge, like a war emanating from the spirit world, as if it were an otherworldly battle between good and evil.
The gorge narrowed as they climbed higher, with rock walls soaring up in the darkness to either side. It felt like they were climbing up through a deep split in the mountains—a crack in the world itself. Intermittently the walls to each side, normally hidden in the darkness, were suddenly revealed in the flashes of light from the explosions in the distance behind.
Irena remained close to the horse as gifted help to defend Richard if need be. She watched all around, looking for any sign of trouble. Kahlan didn’t know what Irena’s capabilities were, or if she could be of any help to Zedd and Nicci in reviving Richard.
Kahlan wanted to get to safety so that they could work on bringing him back to consciousness. She knew what a terrifyingly forsaken experience Richard was enduring. The longer the blackness lasted, the worse it became, and the more dangerous. She was eager for Zedd and Nicci to help him, but at the moment the Shun-tuk were a more urgent threat.
With Nicci using her abilities against the enemy, Irena and Samantha had taken over the duty of casting small flames out ahead to light their way up the ravine. As trickles of water ran down from above, they gathered to cascade over rocks in a number of places, splashing and getting them wet, making traveling with the terror of being chased even more miserable.
Kahlan realized, then, that except for the small lights floating out ahead, the darkness hadn’t been interrupted for quite a while by the reflections of wizard’s fire off the towering rock walls. Nor had she heard the thumping explosions of Nicci’s power. After climbing in the quiet for a time, Samantha dropped back beside Kahlan.
“How is Lord Rahl doing?” the young sorceress asked.
Kahlan laid a hand over Richard’s back. “He’s still breathing, but other than that I have no way of telling.”
“I do,” Samantha said as she placed her small hand against the side of his face. “I’m familiar with the feel of the poison in both of you. I should be able to judge any change in it.”
It wasn’t long before she reluctantly withdrew the hand.
“Well?” Kahlan asked when Samantha didn’t say anything.
The young woman’s dark eyes looked up. “I’m sorry, Mother Confessor, but it’s worse than I’ve ever felt before.”
For the first time, Kahlan had the feeling, the real, fully realized feeling, that Richard was dying. He was slipping away from her and there was nothing she could do about it. Against her best efforts, she imagined Richard dying, and what a dead world it would be without him.
She swallowed and gripped the sword tighter.
When she heard the distant call of a mockingbird, she recognized it as a signal from men of the First File. The wizard’s fire had killed all that it was going to kill. That meant that the rest of the Shun-tuk they would face would be the ones with some degree of occult powers—powers that Kahlan and the rest of those with her knew nothing about. There was no telling what they were capable of, except she knew they could raise the dead, and that was certainly trouble enough.
Powers or no powers, though, they would bleed. It was up to the soldiers, now, to be the steel to protect them, to protect their Lord Rahl. Now was the time the threat had to be ended.
Kahlan looked down at Samantha. “Take the reins.”
“What?”
“Take the reins. We don’t have a lot of men. Every sword counts.” She lifted the point of the Sword of Truth, its power thundering through her. “I have to help the men. You need to lead the horse, now.”
Despite the fear in her eyes, Samantha nodded. “I understand.”
Kahlan spotted Nicci weaving her way up through the soldiers to get Kahlan. The sorceress’s beautiful features were set with grim determination.
“Let’s go,” she said. “It’s time to end this.”
This time, it was Kahlan who pushed out in front of Nicci, taking the lead.
The time had come at last for her sword to taste all the Shun-tuk blood it could ever want.
Both Kahlan and the sword were eager for the fight.
CHAPTER
24
They didn’t have to go far before they encountered the soldiers. They had been slowing, hanging back a bit, trying to create a gap in case those with Richard had to take him and run for their lives. The men were trying to create a head start for the others if it ended up being a last-stand fight to the death. As Kahlan and Nicci squeezed between the men, headed back down the gorge, Nicci cast a small spark of flame out in front to provide enough light so they could get their footing, but it was only enough to light up a short distance ahead of them.
She knew that they had outpaced the Shun-tuk and been able to give themselves at least a slight lead, but the soldiers had now given back some of that gap to insulate Richard. Kahlan didn’t know how far they would need to go before they encountered the enemy.
When Nicci finally cast out a larger flame to drift higher up and out ahead of them, and it lit the entire scene beyond, Kahlan’s blood went cold.
“Dear spirits,” she whispered.
Beyond the dark figures of their own men in their chain mail and dark leather armor, all down the gorge was what looked like an endless sea of white figures snaking up the chasm. There were so many that Kahlan couldn’t see the far end of the serpent.
After all the Shun-tuk had entered the gorge, Sergeant Remkin was supposed to close them off from behind. Those men were supposed to be the hammer that would smash the Shun-tuk against Commander Fister’s anvil. Since she couldn’t see the end, she had no way of knowing if Remkin had been able to shut the back door.
Kahlan quickly recognized that there were a great deal more of the enemy than she had expected to see. She had expected vast numbers to have been vaporized by the wizard’s fire and Nicci’s power. Despite how many had died, there were more than ample Shun-tuk left to do the job they had been sent to do.
When they had been back in the encampment they had no way of knowing the numbers of the Shun-tuk scattered out beyond in the woods. She remembered the way they kept coming, but she now realized that they had been seeing only a limited view. She never realized how many more there were back in those woods.
She didn’t think that Commander Fister or any of the rest of them expected that there might be this many. These weren’t merely spirit trackers; this was an army. It was apparent that when Sulachan and Hannis Arc sent men to accomplish a task, they sent enough to make sure they could not possibly fail.
She now knew something important about both of them: they were never careless. They planned carefully and then deployed overwhelming, withering, brute force to accomplish what
they were after. Neither employed subtlety—they were dedicated to applying overpowering might to crush any opposition.
As disheartening as that knowledge might be, she had just learned something important about their enemy. It would keep Kahlan from ever underestimating them.
It also brought to mind what the prisoner had told them—that Sulachan had dark spirits waiting for her and Richard beyond the veil to the world of the dead. Sulachan was not a man who was satisfied to merely kill those who opposed him.
In a flash of comprehension, Kahlan now realized that they had not captured that prisoner by chance or accident. Sulachan intended the man to be caught. Sulachan had wanted to deliver a message. The spirit king had wanted Richard and Kahlan to know that death would not be an ending of suffering, but the beginning of an eternity of it.
There would be no peace to be found in death for either her or Richard, no eternal rest.
Pushing the worry of such thoughts aside and focusing on the task at hand, Kahlan knew that the one thing they did have working for them was the narrowness of the gorge. In such a narrow space, the Shun-tuk couldn’t spread out to apply that overwhelming crushing weight of numbers. They could only present a limited leading edge of forces.
Because the pass was narrow, it allowed the First File to use a limited number of men to span the gap. That meant they could continually rotate fresh men to the front, so that the ones who had been fighting fiercely for a time could take a break to regain their breath while fresh men stepped in to work with maximum effort at hacking the enemy to pieces. By rotating men in that way, they could fight much longer, and with sustained, deadly brutality.
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