The maze Richard took them through led them ever higher up the slippery cobblestones. The heart of the town was a warren of passageways, some of them with steps to climb the steeper alleyways. In some places there were courtyards to the side screened by solid wooden gates. Kahlan looked through the spaces between the wooden slats and was able to see small tables and chairs. There was nothing threatening in any of the enclosed spaces she looked into.
No matter how far they went, the buildings were all constructed the same way. The moonlight among the vertical stone walls was enough for them to see by, but barely, and not enough to banish the spooky shadows in angular, twisting corners. Kahlan worried about what might be lurking in those shadows.
In many places they had to step carefully lest they walk in the muck that people dumped out of the windows. Large populations of rats scurried along close to the walls. The alleyways stank of the waste thrown out from chamber pots. The streets didn’t smell much better. The stench mixed with the woodsmoke creeping along the ground to make a pungent tang. In places the overwhelming smell made Kahlan feel sick to her stomach. She was eager to get away from Bindamoon and out into the fresh air of the surrounding forests.
As the sky began to brighten with the approaching dawn and they came to the top of a cobblestone passageway, they got their first glimpse between buildings at what lay out beyond the town. It wasn’t a good enough view to satisfy Kahlan, but through the vertical slit between walls she was at least able to see open countryside. The expectation of getting away had them all hurrying to get beyond the buildings of the town and out into the concealment of the forests.
When they finally reached the outer edges of the town, where some of the buildings sat right atop the wall where it met the mountain, they all finally got their first good look over that wall and down the trail on the western side of Bindamoon. In the brightening daylight, Kahlan could see that the path went off into snow-crusted trees. She knew that anyone would be able to follow their tracks in the snow, but she also knew that the path would eventually descend below the snow line, where it would be much easier for them to disappear into the thick trees and brush among the rocky outcroppings.
She could see that lower down the pass there were dense green forests blanketing the slopes to either side that would help conceal them. In the center of the descending ground among the hills, far below, she could see a broad valley with a large stream snaking back and forth through flat grassland. She could also see the path in places as it wound its way down toward that expansive valley.
Beyond the grassland with that meandering stream, the countryside was open. There were no mountains to block their way.
What Kahlan was looking out at was the eastern ranges of the Midlands where it met D’Hara.
She felt a swell of excitement at seeing that open ground. Her heart beat faster. Each breath came quicker. She was almost home. She felt tears unexpectedly well up at the thought of finally being in the Midlands.
“It’s our way out,” she whispered to Richard with tear-choked words.
Richard circled an arm around her shoulders to give her a quick hug. “We will be to Aydindril before you know it.”
Below them they could see that the road went through the opening in the western wall of Bindamoon. She knew, though, that once on that road they would be out in the open, where they could be easily spotted from either side of the town. To make matters worse, it was getting brighter, as the sun was close to rising behind them. It couldn’t be avoided, so they hurried down out of the buildings to the road that would get them as far away from the town as swiftly as possible.
Once they were on the main road that led through the wall and out of town, everyone kept a watch all around. Fortunately, they didn’t see anyone. Lights from lamps began coming on in a few windows behind them, but Kahlan didn’t see anyone looking out.
The road led to an arched opening in the wall that was much like the one in the wall they had come through when they had entered Bindamoon from the east side, meaning that the town was a walled fortress with a wall guarding it from both sides of the pass.
Kahlan was relieved to see that the portcullis was drawn up. As they passed into the dark, arched tunnel through the wall, they all kept looking back to make sure no one was watching or following. Kahlan’s gaze flicked from window to window, but she still didn’t see anyone watching them. The huge wooden doors, like the ones on the eastern side of the town, also stood open.
She was alarmed to see, up on the wall, a small group of ravens looking down, watching them pass beneath.
Beyond the wall, the road dwindled back down to a well-worn trail. They hurried away as quickly as possible without running, putting distance between them and the town. As soon as they were out of the protection of the town, the cold air returned. With the mild conditions inside Bindamoon she had forgotten just how cold it had been outside.
Kahlan felt a sense of relief when they finally made their way in among sparse trees. Most were pine, and the ground was open. In places there were groupings of white birch. She could see that off ahead the woods became increasingly dense. She looked forward to getting into dense woods, where they couldn’t so easily be spotted, although, she realized, the ravens would probably follow and keep track of them. Once they reached the Midlands and were away from Bindamoon, she thought, the ravens might finally abandon following them. She didn’t care if they flew around outside the Keep once she got there.
Suddenly, without warning, the air around them turned green. Kahlan had been lost in her thoughts as they marched along; Richard thrust an arm in front of her to prevent her from inadvertently taking another step and walking into the world of the dead. As everyone lurched to a stop, the strange green glow was all around them. Going any farther would bring up the darkness of the underworld.
“Bags,” he growled. “I was afraid of that.”
It was unusual for Richard to curse. In this case, she couldn’t say she blamed him. She shared the same frustrated rage.
“What do we do now?” Vika asked.
Richard backed them all away from the green wall of death. He glared back toward the fortress town.
“We no longer have a choice,” he said. “The boundary completely blocks any way to get out. We’re going to have to go back to Bindamoon.”
Kahlan gestured off to the sides. “Maybe if we checked to the sides there might be an opening in the boundary wall—a way around it if not through it.”
Richard shook his head in anger. “You know as well as I do that’s a false hope. Someone wanted to get us here to Bindamoon and to keep us here. They were willing to kill any traveler or trader who might come along and walk into the boundary in order to make that happen. This place is a trap and they aren’t going to let us escape it so easily.”
When they turned back, off in the distance they could see Iron Jack, hands planted on his hips, standing on top of the wall, watching them.
15
With the boundary now blocking any hope for escape, they had no choice but to turn around and trudge back toward the tunneled opening in the wall. Satisfied to see that they were returning, Iron Jack turned and vanished from the top of the wall. Kahlan wondered where he was going.
Richard fumed in a quiet rage. His silence was telling. She knew that when he got like this it was best not to ask him anything unless it was important. The focus of his anger rightly belonged on whoever was doing this to them.
As was his way, he had first tried to avoid a conflict. Now that those who had created this trap had made avoiding conflict impossible, he was prepared to meet it head-on.
Kahlan struggled to put one foot in front of the other. She was exhausted, both physically and mentally. It seemed like everything was grinding her down. Her worry, though, was for the twins, not for herself.
It seemed like forever ago that they had started out from the People’s Palace, and yet the distant Wizard’s Keep seemed no closer. In her mind, the Keep had come to seem more an
impossible dream than a place they would ever reach.
They had been traveling for so long her belly had grown quite large. She was relieved to feel the babies kick from time to time, because it meant they were still alive. Everyone sacrificed their own food to give to her, knowing she needed it for the growing babies.
Because they had lost an unknown stretch of time in the strange wood, she was no longer sure of when the babies would come, other than knowing that it was still a ways off. But with as big as she was getting, that time was clearly getting closer, while the Keep wasn’t.
She reminded herself that she was still the Mother Confessor, and no matter her concerns and doubts, this was no time to show weakness.
She gestured to the sides. “There is still some forest here, outside the wall. I don’t like that place inside the walls. We know they already tried to spell us—or poison us—with the food, and we know that the man up there bound your sword into its scabbard. Obviously, it’s dangerous in there. Why don’t we just go into the woods and set up a camp while we come up with a plan?”
Richard kept his gaze resolutely ahead as he continued to march toward the opening in the wall. “How is camping out here going to get us to the Keep?”
“I don’t know,” Kahlan said in a weary voice, “but how is going back in there without a plan going to get us to the Keep?”
“I have a plan.”
Kahlan gave him a sidelong glance. “And what would that be?”
Richard didn’t look over at her. “The people who are preventing us from getting to Aydindril by doing all these things to stop us, like the way they used my gift to bring up the boundary, are after those babies you are carrying. They are willing to let people who wander into that wall die. They are after the hope of our world and willing to kill innocent people to get what they want. I can’t let this threat stand. I’m going in there and putting a stop to it.”
Kahlan again stole a sidelong glance at him. “That’s your plan?”
“That’s all the plan I need.”
Kahlan didn’t think that was the case, but she didn’t want to argue with him. He was not the one wanting to get her babies.
The witch woman looked distraught with concern. “But if they are powerful enough to do all the things they have done to draw us into this trap, and as you say they are willing to let innocent people die, do you think it wise to walk right back into their trap?”
Richard shot her a quick glare before looking ahead as he continued on. “They think they are smart and powerful because they have contrived to use my gift to put up the boundary to lure us to this place. What they have actually done is to attract lightning, and that lightning is about to strike them down.”
Out of the corner of her eye, Kahlan saw Vika and some of the others smile. They were eager to face the threat and put an end to it. Kahlan was as well, but it wasn’t likely going to be as easy as it sounded.
Although it was a rather foggy memory, she knew that she had already started to miscarry once. She feared losing the twins. She had lost a baby before and didn’t want it to happen again. In the past she never would have hesitated to back Richard, but now that she was about to be a mother, it added a complication to everything. She had always been willing to put her own life on the line, but now she had to consider putting the lives of the twins at risk, to say nothing of all the people of their world.
On the other hand, if they were to protect their children from the Glee, they needed to get to the Keep, where it would be safe to give birth. Of course, while they might be safe there, the rest of the world would not be. That meant that to protect her children, and everyone else, the situation actually demanded that she fight more ferociously than ever before.
How they would eliminate the overriding threat posed by the Glee she couldn’t begin to imagine, but she knew that the worst thing they could do would be to hide forever in the Keep while everyone else faced the onslaught of the Glee. They had to stop the immediate danger, and once it was eliminated, they needed to find a way to stop the Golden Goddess.
That thought added resolve to her determination. It was time to show whoever was stopping them exactly why she was the Mother Confessor. Richard was right: whoever had trapped them in this place had to be stopped, one way or another. As for the threat of the Glee, she couldn’t imagine how they could overcome predators who could simply come into their world at will, but in the back of her mind she knew that such a threat could be faced only by a war wizard.
The more she thought about it, the more she realized that Richard was right. They had to go back into the town and end the threat, or they would never make it to safety and then be able to find a way to stop the goddess. Their world would never be safe until they did. Unfortunately, she was pretty sure who was at the center of all their current problems, and that was the one thing she truly feared to face, but this time there could be no backing down.
They all marched resolutely through the dark tunnel and emerged again inside the town. None of the narrow streets and alleys were straight, so it was hard to know the best route. There was often a warren of sharp corners and wedge-shaped intersections confronting them. In some places they had to pass under arches with parts of the buildings crossing overhead and in other places go under lines with laundry. Richard didn’t seem deterred by the maze. He took them on a route that headed ever closer to his destination: the tall, white palace.
As they came around a corner of a wider passageway, they were confronted by Iron Jack, fists on his hips, standing to block their way. To the sides behind him it looked like there was a converging intersection of several narrow alleyways. Kahlan had been wondering how long it would take him to make an appearance. He obviously had guessed where they were headed.
“I will escort you back to your guest quarters,” Iron Jack said in a threatening tone.
“We’re not going to any guest quarters,” Richard said. “We are going to see the queen. Either you can take us there, or we will go on our own.”
The burly man gripped his kinky red beard as he cocked his head to the side and peered at them with one eye. “That would require an audience.”
“That’s not a problem,” Richard said. “I am the Lord Rahl, leader of the D’Haran Empire, and I intend to grant your queen an immediate audience.”
“That’s not what I mean,” the man growled.
“No, but it’s what I mean.”
“I’m the gifted man who rendered your sword useless,” he reminded Richard. “You would make a very big mistake if you think to defy me.”
Richard didn’t look to be moved by the threat. “You can take us to this queen, or you can stand aside and we will go see her ourselves.”
Iron Jack’s sly smile grew wider as his eyes narrowed. “I’m afraid that I can’t allow that. If you try, I will put you down.”
Richard marched ahead. As he did, he rammed the heel of a hand against the man’s big chest, slamming him back up against the wall of a building with enough force to make his teeth bang together.
“Good luck with that,” Richard said on his way past.
Kahlan hurried to catch up and then followed close on Richard’s heels. Vika and the rest of the Mord-Sith, each with an Agiel in a fist, also rushed to keep up, adding their glares at Iron Jack on their way past.
Kahlan was glad to see that Iron Jack didn’t follow them. She hoped he had gotten the point and wouldn’t challenge them again.
Shale leaned closer to Kahlan and spoke in a low voice. “That man worries me.”
“Why?”
“Because while I can’t determine how gifted he is, I don’t think I have the power to stop him if he comes for us.”
Kahlan didn’t look at the sorceress as she hurried along. “Richard does.”
16
When Kahlan looked up between buildings, she finally got a good glimpse of the soaring palace. It wasn’t dark and sinister-looking. Instead it looked light and elegant. While the base was obviously quite large
, it didn’t have a lot of grounds around it the way a typical palace would have had. It did, though, seem impossibly tall and graceful. Small, round spires, each with a conical tile roof and an arched window, stuck up here and there in various places along the towering height of the palace. Colorful pennants flew from each of those pointed roofs.
When they got closer, Kahlan spotted a flock of black-and-white wood storks, slowly flapping their broad wings and then soaring together in the clear morning air. She realized from how small the birds looked against the white walls of the palace that the place was both bigger and taller than she had thought at first. The scale of it didn’t seem real.
She also realized, now that she was seeing the town for the first time in daylight, that most of the buildings were actually washed with faint color. There were a light mint green, pale pink, light blue, and soft yellows. All of the colors had faded over time so that the stone showed through.
Bindamoon was in many ways cramped and unappealing, even with the long-faded colorful paint, but the palace, glowing in the early morning sunlight as it overlooked the town, was actually rather magnificent. She realized that it was a mistake to ascribe a sinister aspect to a building inhabited by what could only be sinister people.
Considering all the twists and turns they had to make, there clearly wasn’t a direct route through the town to the palace. That left them to try to find their way through the maze of structures as they worked their way ever closer to the palace rising up above them.
The buildings of the town seemed to have sprouted around the soaring palace like mushrooms around a tree trunk in damp weather.
As they got close, they didn’t need the view between buildings; it loomed over them. Here and there Kahlan saw people in the windows of the surrounding buildings, looking out, greeting the early morning. In a few places, women leaned out to pull in laundry that had dried overnight. Occasionally, in the distance, she saw people hurrying among the buildings, but she didn’t see anyone nearby.
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