"Lord Rahl," Rikka spoke up, looking a little uneasy once he met her gaze, "there is another way out."
Richard frowned at her. "What are you talking about?"
"There is another way out besides the main entrance. It is only accessible through passages deep in the Keep."
"How do you know such a thing?"
"Your grandfather showed it to me."
Richard didn't have time to wonder at such a thing. "Do you think you can find it again?"
Rikka considered a moment. "I believe so," she finally said. "I sure wouldn't want to get us lost down in the Keep, but I believe I can find the way. Starting out from here we're already part of the way, so it won't be quite so hard."
Richard went to rest his hand on the hilt of his sword as he considered. The sword wasn't there. He rubbed his palms together, instead.
"Maybe it would be better if we went that way."
Rikka turned, her blond braid whipping around as she did so, and started away. "Follow me, then."
Richard let Nicci go ahead of him, then followed, letting Cara bring up the rear. He hadn't gone a dozen steps when he stopped. He turned and looked back.
Everyone glanced to where he was looking and then watched him, puzzled by what he could be thinking.
"We can't go that way, either." He turned back to Rikka. "Zedd showed you that way out of the keep. He knows Mord-Sith. he knows that despite how well you two got along, if presented with a choice, your loyalties will fall to me.
"Zedd is fond of using tricks. He will let Ann and Nathan guard the routes to the main entrance to the Keep. He will lie in wait on the route he showed you, Rikka."
"Well, if there are only two ways out," Nicci said, "that means they will have to split up to make sure both are blocked. That's if Zedd goes through the thought process as you've laid it out. He might forget that he told Rikka about the other way out, or he might not think that she would tell you. That way still might be clear."
Richard slowly shook his head as he stared off at something else—the wide platform partway back around the walkway around the stagnant water in the bottom of the gloomy interior of the tower.
"While what you say is possible, counting on Zedd to make such a strategic mistake would be foolish."
Nicci was looking a bit worried. "Well, you can't use your power without chancing calling the beast, but I certainly can use mine. And I have more power at my command than Zedd does. If they split up as you suggest, then we will not have all three to contend with at once."
"No, but I'd not like to have that kind of a test, especially not in the Keep. It's possible that there are defenses here that he has initiated to protect the First Wizard should he be attacked. You might simply try to catch him up in a conjured tangle to slow him down while we escape and it might be all it takes to trigger something lethal. Besides, even if you do manage to succeed at such a thing, he could still come after us.
Nicci folded her arms. "Then what, exactly, do you suggest we do?"
He turned back and once again met her blue eyes. "I suggest that we take a way out that they can't follow."
Her nose wrinkled up. "What?"
"The sliph."
Everyone looked back down the walkway as if the sliph might be standing there waiting for them to come and travel with her.
"Of course," Cara said. "We could escape without them ever knowing where we've gone. There will be no tracks. More than that, though, it can put us a tremendous distance away from the danger. They will have no hope of ever following us."
"Exactly." Richard clapped her on the back of the shoulder. "Let's go."
They all followed him as he rushed down the walkway and through the blasted open doorway. Inside the sliph's room, Nicci cast magic, igniting the torches in brackets on the walls as they all gathered around the well. Everyone peered down together.
"There's only one problem," Richard said out loud as the thought came to him while gazing down into the black abyss. He looked up at Nicci. "I have to use magic to call the sliph."
Nicci took a deep breath and let it out with a discouraged look. "That is a problem."
"Not necessarily," Cara said. "Shota told us that using your magic had the potential to call the blood beast. But it acts randomly. When you use magic, it would be logical that it would thus find you, but the beast doesn't act through logic. It might come when you use magic, Shota said, or it might not. There's no way to tell or predict."
"And we're pretty certain that we're not going to be able to walk out of this place without having to confront the others," Nicci pointed out.
"Trying to run will present two problems," Richard said, "getting past them and then keeping out of their grasp to prevent them from trying to 'heal me.' This makes more sense. The sliph would be a certain way to escape without Zedd, Ann, and Nathan having any way to either follow or know where I went—and it would also avoid confronting them, something I'd not like to have to do. I love my grandfather; I don't want to have to defend myself against him."
"I almost hate to say it," Cara said, "but this makes more sense to me, too."
"I agree," Rikka said.
"Call the sliph." Nicci held a handful of her hair back as she looked down to peer into the well again. "And hurry, before they come looking to see what's taking me so long."
Richard didn't hesitate. He stretched his fists out over the well, He needed to call his own gift in order to call the sliph and calling his own ability was not something he was good at. He resolved that he had done it before; he would have to do it again.
He let his tension go. He knew that he had to do this or he very well might lose his chance to ever find the one woman he loved more than life itself. For a moment, the pain of how much he hurt every day without her nearly made him pull inward with the aching misery of it.
With his sincere and burning need to do whatever he must in order to help Kahlan, his need ignited deep within him. He felt it roaring up from the core of his being, taking his breath. He tightened his abdominal muscles against the power of the feeling within him.
Light ignited between his outstretched fists. He recognized the sensation from having done it before. He pressed the padded silver-leather wristbands he wore together. He had not had these the first time, but they were what the sliph had told him he should use to call her again. They brightened to such intensity that through his flesh and bone Richard could see the other side of the heavy silver bands.
He focused his intent. He wanted nothing else but for the sliph to come to him so that he could help Kahlan. He hungered for it. He demanded it be done.
Come to me!
The glow of light wailed as it ignited in a line down the center of the well, like a lightning bolt, but instead of the sound of thunder, the air crackled with the ripping roar of fire and light racing away at incredible speed into the depths of blackness.
Those around the stone wall gazed anxiously down inside the well lit by the flash of light. Nicci also glanced around, keeping an eye on the room around them, apparently worried about the appearance of the beast. The echo of the power Richard had sent down into the well was a long time in fading away, but at last all fell silent.
In the stillness of the Keep, in the quiet of the mountain of dead stone towering around and above them, came a distant, deep rumbling.
A rumbling of something coming to life.
The floor began to quake with growing force, until it began lifting dust from the joints and cracks. Small pebbles danced on the trembling stone floor.
Far down in the distant depths the well began filling with something rushing up the shaft at impossible speed, roaring with a howling shriek of velocity as it came. The howl grew as the sliph rushed upward to meet the call.
Nicci, Cara, and Rikka backed away from the well as shimmering silver shot upward, coming to an instantaneous stop that somehow seemed graceful.
Within the undulating silver pool, a lustrous metallic hump mounded up, rising above the edge of th
e stone wall surrounding the well. It drew up into a bulk, rising of its own accord, gathering into a recognizable shape. Its glossy surface, like a liquid mirror, reflected everything around the room, distorting the images reflected off its surface as it grew and transformed.
It looked like living quicksilver.
The rising shape continued to contort, bending into edges and planes, folds and curves, until it warped into a woman's face.
A silver smile widened in what seemed to be recognition. "Master, you called me?"
The sliph's eerie, feminine voice echoed around the room, but her lips hadn't moved.
Richard stepped closer, ignoring Nicci and Rikka's wide-eyed astonishment. "Yes. Sliph, thank you for coming. I need you."
A silver smile was pleased. "You wish to travel, Master?"
"Yes, I wish to travel. We all do. We all need to travel."
The smile widened. "Come, then. We will travel."
Richard herded everyone close to the wall. Liquid metal formed into a hand that reached out to touch each of the three women in turn.
"You have traveled before," the sliph said to Cara after only brief contact with her forehead. "You may travel."
The glistening hand gently brushed a palm across Nicci's brow, lingering for a bit longer. "You have what is required. You may travel.
Rikka lifted her chin, ignoring her distaste for magic, and stood her ground as the sliph touched her forehead.
"You may not travel," the sliph said.
Rikka looked indignant. "But, but, if Cara can—why can't I?"
"You do not have both sides required," said the voice.
Rikka folded her arms defiantly. "I must go with them. I'm going, too. That's all there is to it."
"It is your choice, but if you try to travel in me, you will die, and then you will not be with them either."
Richard laid a hand on Rikka's arm before she could say anything else. "Cara captured the power of someone who had an element of the required magic; that's why she can travel. There is nothing to be done about it. You have to stay here."
Rikka didn't look at all happy, but she nodded. "The rest of you had better get going, then."
"Come," the sliph said to Richard, "and we will travel. To which place do you wish to travel?"
Richard almost said it aloud, but then stopped himself. He turned to Rikka.
"You can't come with us. I think you had better leave now, so that you don't even hear where I'm going. I don't want to take the chance that if you know, then the others might somehow find out. My grandfather can be clever when he wants to be and pull tricks to get his way."
"You don't need to tell me." Rikka sighed in resignation. "You're probably right, Lord Rahl." She smiled at Cara. "Protect him."
Cara nodded. "I always do. He's pretty helpless without me."
Richard ignored Cara's boast. "Rikka, I need you to tell Zedd something for me. I need you to give him a message."
Rikka frowned as she listened intently.
"Tell him that four Sisters of the Dark have captured Kahlan, the real Mother Confessor, not the body buried down in Aydindril. Tell him that I intend to come back as soon as I can and I will bring him the proof. I ask that when I return, before he tries to cure me, he allow me to show him the evidence I will bring. And tell him that I love him and understand his concern for me, but that I'm doing as the Seeker must do, as he himself charged me to do when he gave me the Sword of Truth."
When Rikka had gone, Cara asked, "What evidence?"
"I don't know. I haven't found it yet." Richard turned to Nicci. "Don't forget what I told you before. You have to breathe in the sliph once we go under. At first you'll want to hold your breath, but that just isn't possible. Once we arrive and come up out of the sliph, you must let her out of your lungs and again breathe in the air."
Nicci was looking more than a little nervous. Richard took her hand. "I'll be with you, as will Cara. We've both done this before. I won't let go of you. It's hard to make yourself breathe in the sliph for the first time, but once you do, you will see that it's quite a remarkable experience. It's rapture to breathe the sliph."
"Rapture," Nicci repeated with more than just a little incredulity.
"Lord Rahl is right," Cara said. "You'll see."
"Just remember," Richard added, "when it ends you will not want to let go of the sliph and breathe air again—but you must. If you don't, you'll die. Do you understand?"
"Of course," Nicci said with a nod.
"Come on then." Richard started to climb up on the wall, pulling Nicci up with him.
"Where will we travel, Master?"
"I think we should go to the People's Palace, in D'Hara. Do you know the place?"
"Of course. The People's Palace is a central site."
"A central site?"
If living quicksilver could be said to look puzzled by a question, the sliph looked puzzled. "Yes, a central site. Like this place here is a central site."
Richard didn't understand, but didn't think it was relevant and so didn't press the issue. "I see."
"Why the People's Palace," Nicci asked.
Richard shrugged. "We have to go somewhere. We'll be safe at the Palace. But more importantly, they have libraries there with rare ancient books. I'm hoping that maybe we can find something about Chainfire. Since the Sisters have Kahlan, I'm thinking that Chainfire might have something to do with some kind of magic.
"From what we've heard, the D'Haran army is somewhere in the vicinity on their way south. What's more, the last time I saw Berdine, another Mord-Sith, was when I left her here in Aydindril, so she will probably be either close to our troops or the palace. I need her to help me translate some of the material from the books I'm bringing along. Besides that, she has Kolo's journal and she may already know something helpful."
He glanced at Cara. "Maybe we can see General Meiffert and see how things are going with the troops."
Cara's face lit with surprise and a broad grin.
Nicci nodded thoughtfully. "I guess all that makes sense, and I guess it's as good a place as any. It gets you out of immediate danger and that's what matters most right now."
"All right, sliph," Richard said, "we wish to travel to the People's Palace in D'Hara."
A liquid silver arm came up and slipped around all three of them. Richard felt the warm, undulating grip compressing to get a firm grasp on him. Nicci had his hand in a death grip.
"Lord Rahl?" Cara asked.
Richard held up the hand that wasn't holding Nicci's to halt the sliph before she could lift them into the well. "What?"
Cara bit her lip before finally speaking. "You're holding Nicci's hand. Will you hold my hand, too? I mean, I wouldn't want the three of us to get separated."
Richard tried not to smile at the worry on her face. Cara feared magic, even if she had already done this before.
"Sure," Richard said as he took her hand. "I wouldn't want us to get separated."
A sudden thought struck him.
"Wait!" he said, stopping the sliph before she could start.
"Yes, Master?"
"Do you know a person named Kahlan? Kahlan Amnell, the Mother Confessor?"
"This name means nothing to me."
Richard sighed in disappointment. He hadn't really expected the sliph to know Kahlan. No one else did, either.
"Would you happen to know a place called the Deep Nothing?"
"I know several places in the Deep Nothing. Some have been destroyed, but some still exist. I can travel to them if you wish."
Richard's heart quickened in surprise. "Are any of these places in the Deep Nothing also a central site?"
"Yes, one of them," the sliph said. "Caska, in the Deep Nothing, is a central site. Would you like to travel there?"
Richard glanced to both Nicci and Cara. "Do either of you know this place, Caska?"
Nicci shook her head.
Cara was frowning. "I think I remember hearing something about it when I was litt
le. I'm sorry Lord Rahl, but I don't remember exactly what—just that the name sounds familiar from old legends."
"What do you mean, legends?"
Cara shrugged. "Old D'Haran legends… something about dream casters. Stories people told. Something about the history of D'Hara. It seems like Caska is a name from olden times."
Olden times. Dream casters. Richard remembered that when he'd skimmed through some of the book Gegendrauss that he'd found back in the shielded room, he had seen something about casting dreams, but he hadn't translated the passage. Even though Richard was the leader of the D'Haran Empire, he knew very little about the mysterious D'Hara.
Even if Cara didn't know more, Richard still felt as if he had just taken a step closer to finding Kahlan.
"We wish to travel," he said to the sliph. "We wish to travel to Caska, in the Deep Nothing."
It had been a long time since Richard had traveled in the sliph and he felt a bit apprehensive. But his excitement that he was finally making connections to find the answers that had for so long eluded him swept away any concern.
"We travel to Caska, then," the sliph said, her voice echoing around the stone room where once Kolo had died standing guard over her as the great war had come to an end. At least, everyone thought it had come to an end, but those ancient conflicts had not ended so easily and now they had again flared to life.
The arm lifted all three of them off the wall and plunged them down into the silver froth. Nicci's grip on his hand tightened and she gasped in a breath before going under.
CHAPTER 60
With an arrow's speed, Richard flew through the silken silence of the sliph, yet at the same time he glided with the slow grace of a raven riding the stilled currents above towering trees on a moonlit night. There was no heat, no cold. In the silence, sweet sounds filled his mind. His eyes beheld light and dark together in a single, spectral vision, while his lungs swelled with the sweet presence of the sliph as he breathed her into his soul.
It was rapture.
Abruptly, it ended.
Grainy darkness exploded in his sudden vision. There seemed to be blocky shapes all around as he broke the surface. Nicci's hand gripped his in terror.
[Sword of Truth 9] - Chainfire Page 69