'They've already joined with us,' General Riggs said, offhandedly. 'Our cause is theirs, and theirs ours. They know how to expunge those who would serve the Keeper and thus our enemies. We will cleanse the land of all who serve the Keeper. Goodness must triumph.'
'You mean your cause. It is you who would rule.'
'Are you blind, Confessor? I rule here, now, but this is not about me; it's about the future. I simply fill the post for now, furrow the field so it may produce. It's not I who is the focus.
'We offer everyone the chance to serve with us, and every man with me has taken that offer. Others have joined our troops in our battle. We are no longer D'Haran troops. They are no longer troops of their homeland. We are all the Imperial Order. Any of right mind can lead us. If I fall in our noble struggle, another will rise up to take my place, until all the lands are joined under united rule, and the Imperial Order can flower.'
Either the man was too drunk to know what he was saying, or he was mad. She glanced about at the dancing, drunken, singing men at campfires all about. Mad as the Bantak. Mad as the Jocopo.
'General Riggs.' He had been muttering angrily under his breath, but stopped and looked up at her. 'I am the Mother Confessor. Like it or not, I represent the Midlands. In the name of the Midlands I call upon you to to halt this war immediately and either return to D'Hara, or come to the council with your grievances. You may petition the Central Council with any dispute you have, and it will be heard, but you may not visit war upon my people. You will not like the consequence if you choose not to heed my orders.'
He sneered up at her. 'We make no compromises. We'll annihilate all who don't join us. We fight to stop the killing, to stop the murdering, as the good spirits have called upon us to do. We fight for peace! Until we win peace, we will have war!'
She frowned. 'Who told you this? Who told you that you must fight?'
He blinked at her. 'It's self-evident, you stupid bitch!'
'You cannot possibly be so stupid as to think the good spirits tell you to wage war. The good spirits do not act in such overt ways.'
'Ah, well then, we have a disagreement. That is the purpose of war, is it not? To settle such matters? The good spirits know us to be in the right, else they would easily join against us. Our victory will prove they side with us or we could not win in our struggle. The Creator Himself wishes to see us triumph, and our victory will be proof of that.'
The man was a lunatic. She redirected her attention to the Keltish commander. 'Karsh ...'
'General Karsh.'
'You demean the rank, General. Why did you slaughter the people of Ebinissia?'
'Ebinissia was given the opportunity to join us, as will all be given the opportunity. Ebinissia chose to fight. We had to make an example of her heathen people, to show others what awaits them if they fail to join us in peace. It cost us nearly half our men, but it was a goal worth the cost. Even now, those lost are being replaced by others joining with us, and we will swell in rank to take in all the known lands.'
This, you call leadership? Extortion and murder?'
General Karsh slammed his mug down on the table. His eyes were fire. 'We visit upon them what they visit upon our people! They raid our farms, our border towns. They kill Keltans as if we were bugs to be stepped on!
'Yet we offered them peace. It is they who chose to shun our mercy. They were offered a chance at peace, a chance to join us; they chose war. In that way, they chose to aid us; they've made an example for others of the folly of fighting us.'
'And what have you done with Queen Cyrilla? Did you slaughter her, too, or is she back there in your whores' tents?'
They all laughed. 'She would be,' Riggs put in, 'if we'd found her.' Kahlan almost sighed aloud with relief.
She looked back to Karsh, who was taking another swig. 'What has Prince Fyren to say of this?'
'Fyren's in Aydindril! I'm here!'
So, perhaps the Crown wasn't a part of this. Perhaps this was little more than a band of murdering outlaws who fancied themselves as more.
Kahlan knew Prince Fyren, knew him to be a reasonable man. Of the Keltish diplomats assigned to Aydindril, he was the one who had done the most to bring Kelton forward into the alliance of the Midlands through the Central Council. He cajoled and persuaded his mother, the queen, to go the route of peace rather than conflict. Prince Fyren was a gentleman, in every sense of the word.
'Besides being a murderer, General Karsh, you are also a traitor to your own land and Crown. To your own queen.'
He hammered his pewter mug down on the table. 'I'm a patriot! A protector of my people!'
She leaned the slightest bit forward. 'You're a treasonous bastard and an outlaw cutthroat without conscience. I leave to Prince Fyren the honor of condemning you to death. It will, of course, be a posthumous sentence.'
Karsh pounded his fist. 'The good spirits know of your treachery against the people of the Midlands! This proves their words true! They've told us we cannot be free as long as you live! They've called upon us to kill all those like you! All those who blaspheme! The good spirits will not abandon us in our struggle. We shall defeat all who do the Keeper's bidding.'
'No real officer,' she said, contemptuously, 'would listen to the babbling of the Blood.'
The wizard had made an angry-looking ball of liquid fire, and was slowly juggling it back and forth between his hands while he watched her. The flames spit and hissed, dropping little sparks. General Riggs belched and then put his knuckles on the table as he leaned toward her.
'Enough talking. Get down here, you little wench, so we can start the party. Us brave freedom fighters need a little fun.'
General Karsh at last smiled.. 'And then tomorrow, or perhaps the next day, you will be beheaded. Our men, our people, will rejoice at your death. They will exult in our triumph over the Mother Confessor, the symbol of oppression by magic.' His smile left as he turned red-faced once more, 'The people must see your punishment to know that good can prevail! To have hope! When we have your head, our people can rejoice!'
'Rejoice that all you brave freedom fighters are strong enough to kill a single woman?'
'No,' General Riggs said. He appeared for the first time sober as he looked up at her. 'You miss the true meaning of what we do. You fail to see its significance.'
His voice lowered, his tone softened. 'It's a new age we enter, Confessor. An age that has no place for your old religions. The line of Confessors and their wizards is at an end.
There was a time, three thousand years ago, when nearly everyone was born with the gift. Magic held sway over all things. That magic was used to vie for power. Wizards abused their power. In their greed, they killed one another. They killed others who had the gift, and so fewer lived to pass it on. Over time, those with the gift were culled from the race of men.
'Yet those left still contested for rule, and further thinned the ranks of those born with the gift. The magic, the other creatures of magic who were their charges, such as you, have been steadily stripped of their protection and fount of magic. Today there are almost none born with the gift. Magic itself is dying with them. They have had their chance to rule, just as did Darken Rahl with his magic, and they have failed. Their time, the time of wizards, is past.
'Their protection of the twilight beings is at an end, and so the age of magic is at an end. The time of man is upon us now, and there is no place in that world for the ancient, dying religion you call magic. It is time for man to take his place as inheritor of the world. The Imperial Order is upon the world, now, and if it were not them, it would be man by another name. It is time for man to rule, for magic to die.'
Kahlan felt a sudden hollowness. An unexpected tear ran down her cheek. A choking feeling of true panic clawed at her throat.
'Do you hear that, Slagle?' she whispered hoarsely. 'You have magic. The ones you aid would put an end to you, too.'
He tossed the little ball of fire to his other hand, the light of its flames dancing across his
grim face. 'It is as it must be. Magic, chaste or foul, is the Keeper's conduit to this world. When I have helped extinguish magic in all its forms, then I, too, must die. In that way, I will serve the people.'
Riggs gazed up to her, almost sorrowfully, as he went on.
'Our people must see the last living embodiment of that religion die. You are its symbol, the last creature of magic created by wizards. With your death, they will be filled with hope for the future, and be emboldened to extinguish all the remaining pockets of filth and perversion that are magic.
'We are the plowshare. Those lands now infested with magic will be freed of its taint, and can be resettled by pious people. Then, at last, we shall all be free of your dogmas, which have no part in the glory of the future of man.'
He straightened, taking a drink from his mug. The harshness returned to his voice. 'After we finish with you, then we'll bring Galea to heel, and the rest of the lands.' He slammed the mug down. 'Until complete and total victory is ours, we demand war!'
Rage swelled in her, banishing the momentary sensation of loss and panic, swelled on behalf of all those beings, the twilight beings, who depended upon her for voice and protection.
She nodded slowly as she held the general's gaze.
'In my capacity as Mother Confessor, the highest rank of authority in the Midlands, to whose mandate all must bow, I grant your wish.' She leaned forward and spoke in a hiss. 'Let there be war. On my word and office, not one of you shall be granted quarter.'
Kahlan's fist came up to the wizard. It was for him she had come.
Her chest heaved with wrath, and with terror at the madness of these men. She let the magic surge within her, demanding release, demanding this wizard's death.
It was for him she had come. She must not fail. The Blood Rage screamed through her.
She called the lightning forth.
Nothing happened.
She froze for an instant in the panic of the failure of the magic. Then Riggs lunged for her leg.
Kahlan hauled back on the reins. The ferocious warhorse sprang into battle. He bellowed as he reared, kicking his front legs. Kahlan grasped his mane for dear life. A lashing hoof caught Riggs across the face, throwing him back. The thrashing hooves crashed down on the table, shattering it to splinters. Men in chairs toppled backward. Nick's front hooves crushed the head of one of the D'Haran officers, the leg of another.
The horse spun and kicked at the men. Kahlan gave him her heels, and he leapt into a gallop as the wizard was rising to his feet. Surprised men threw themselves out of the way. She took a quick glance over her shoulder to see the wizard throwing his hands out. A ball of wizard's fire exploded to life before him, turning in the air, awaiting command. He threw his arms out again, sending the fire on its way toward her.
The warhorse leapt over fires and men, kicking up both snow and flaming firewood. His legs caught tent lines, yanking them down. Kahlan spotted what she wanted, what she wanted more than life itself, and maneuvered the horse for it.
She could hear the wail of the wizard's fire coming for her. She could hear the screams of men unexpectedly caught up in it. She stole another glance to see the blue and yellow ball of flame tumbling through the tents and men, growing all the time, taking a course as drunken as the wizard. Wizard's fire had to be guided, and in his state, the wizard was having difficulty controlling what he had wrought. Were he sober, she would be dead by now.
Dear spirits, she prayed, if I'm to die, let me have time enough first to do what I must.
Kahlan reached her goal. As she galloped past, she yanked a lance from a snowbank and wheeled her horse. She dug her heels in, and Nick leapt ahead at a full gallop.
The ball of fire wailed toward her, setting tents and men afire. It grew and tumbled as the distance closed.
The lance was unexpectedly heavy, made for men who had more muscle than she, and she had to carry it upright to save her strength. The warhorse didn't flinch as he galloped, not at the noise, the confusion, the running men, or the wizard's fire. She pulled to one side and then the other, Nick's hooves digging into the packed snow. She dodged obstacles, weaving her way toward the wizard's fire at full speed. Toward the wizard.
Slagle tried to change the course of the fire, to block her advance, each time she wove in her headlong rush. His reactions were slow, but as the distance closed, she knew he wouldn't need to be fast to catch her up in it.
At the last instant, she wheeled her horse around to the right. The fire roared by so close she could smell burnt hair, and then she was racing again.
As she charged the horse ahead, the wizard's fire exploded behind, cascading across the ground like a burst dam. The horrifying death screams of man and beast caught in the conflagration filled the night air. Dozens of men, all afire, rolled through the snow, trying to put out the flames. But wizard's fire was not so easy to extinguish; it was alive with purpose.
The howls of pain panicked those around who didn't know what was happening. Men screamed in fear of spirits they thought were setting upon them. Swords were drawn and wielded, hacking at those running for their lives from the fire. Battle erupted out of nothing. The air carried not only the choking stench of burning flesh, but now blood.
She ignored the screams and sought the silence within.
The wizard stumbled backward and fell. He came to his feet whirling his arms. Fire formed in the air at the arc of his fingertips.
Though there was confusion all about, only one thing filled her vision. The wizard.
She couched the lance, tucking the base under her right armpit, jamming her grip tight against the leather stop. Gritting her teeth, she used all her strength to lift the heavy lance over Nick's bobbing head, to the left side, so as not to unbalance herself in the saddle.
Nick took her direction as if he could read her mind. She steered him at full speed, but it seemed to her that the last ten yards took hours, a race between her charge and the wizard calling forth fire.
Wizard Slagle looked up to direct the fire just as her lance caught him in the chest. The impact shattered the lance to splinters at midlength and nearly tore the wizard in half. She and her horse flew through a spray of blood.
Kahlan swung the half lance at a man lunging for her, catching him across the head. The impact tore the lance from her grip. She wheeled the horse and leaned forward over his withers as she galloped at full speed back through the confusion around the command tents. Her heart pounded as fast as the horse's hooves.
One of the D'Haran officers from the table was up and screaming for a horse. Men leapt onto horses bareback. As she began putting distance between them, she could hear him yell that if they failed to catch her they would be drawn and quartered to a man. A quick glance showed a good three dozen riders joining the chase.
Away from the command tents, back the way she had come, men didn't know what was happening, and saw a galloping rider as simply part of the drunken festivities. None moved to stop her. Men, tents, fires, polearms and lances stuck upright in the snow, stacks of pikes, horses, and wagons all flashed by in a blur.
Nick jumped anything he couldn't dodge. The threat of him not jumping or dodging had men diving for cover. Men at games tumbled out of the way, coin and dice flying into the air. Tents pulled up when Nick's legs caught their lines, flew up and billowed in a tangle behind, snaring her pursuers. Horses and riders crashed to the ground. Others ran over their own men in their frenzied attempt to keep her in sight.
Kahlan spotted a sword hanging in a scabbard that was fastened to the side of a wagon, and as she ran past, she pulled it free. Galloping past picket lines, she swung the sword, cutting the lead lines. She hacked the rump of one horse as she charged past. He kicked and screamed in fright and pain, panicking the rest of the horses. They bolted headlong in every direction. Lanterns on poles toppled onto tents, setting them afire.
The horses in pursuit balked at the fires, rearing and bucking, throwing their riders to the ground. A man lunged suddenly
into her path, avoiding Nick's flying hooves and grabbing for her. Kahlan drove the sword home through his chest as she flew by. The hilt tore from her hand. She leaned forward and held on as Nick raced through the endless camp. The men chasing weren't as close, but they were still coming.
Suddenly, she was free of the camp, galloping through the open snow. Kahlan followed her own tracks across the flat by the waning light of the moon. The muscular horse plowed through the snow almost as if it weren't there.
She reached the trees at last, and before plunging in and ascending the steep slopes, she checked over her shoulder.
A good fifty men were not three minutes behind. She would be able to open the lead as she went up along the forest trail, but they would still catch her.
She would see to that.
CHAPTER 39
2 - Stone of Tears Page 70