Faith of the Fallen (26 page)

Her brow twitched. “If you wish to think of it in those terms, I admit it is true that your time as the leader of the D’Haran Empire is over. But that is not the point. The point is that everything about your life up until now”—Nicci glanced pointedly at Kahlan—“is over.”

Her words seemed to chill the air. They surely chilled Richard.

“What’s the rest of it?” He knew there had to be more, something that would make sense of it all. “What other terms are there if I want to keep Kahlan alive?”

“Well, no one is to follow us, of course.”

“And if we do?” Kahlan snapped. “I might follow you and kill you myself, even if it means the end of my own life.” Kahlan’s green eyes shone with icy resolve as she cast a threatening glare on the woman.

Nicci lifted her brows deliberately as she leaned ever so slightly toward Kahlan, the way a mother would in cautioning a child. “Then that will be the end of it—unless Richard stops you from doing such a thing. That is all part of what he must decide to do. But you make a miscalculation if you think I care one way or the other. I don’t, you see. Not at all.”

“What is it you intend me to do?” Richard said, pulling Nicci’s unsettlingly calm gaze from Kahlan. “What if I get where you’re taking me, and I don’t do as you wish?”

“You misunderstand, Richard, if you believe that I have some preconceived notion of what it is I wish you to do. I don’t. You will do as you wish, I imagine.”

“As I wish?”

“Well, naturally you won’t be allowed to return to your people.” She tossed her head, flicking back strands of her long blond hair that the wind had pulled across in front of her blue eyes. Her gaze never left his. “And I suppose if you were to be in some way impossibly and defiantly contrary, then in that case, such would obviously be an answer in and of itself. It would be a shame, of course, but I would then have no use for you. I would kill you.”

“You would have no further use? You mean Jagang would have no further use.”

“No.” Once again, Nicci looked surprised. “I do not act on behalf of His Excellency.” She tapped her lower lip. “You see? I removed the ring he put through my lip marking me as his slave. I do this on behalf of myself.”

A yet more disturbing thought surfaced. “How is it that he can’t enter your mind? That he can’t control you?”

“You don’t need me to answer that question, Richard Rahl.”

It made no sense to him; the bond to the Lord Rahl worked for those loyal to him. He could see no way that this could be construed as an act of loyalty. This was unequivocally an act of aggression and against his will; the bond shouldn’t work for her. He reasoned that perhaps Jagang was in her mind and she unaware of it. The thought occurred to him that maybe Jagang was in her mind, and it had driven her insane.

“Look,” Richard said, feeling like they weren’t even speaking the same language, “I don’t know what you think—”

“Enough talk. We are leaving.”

Her blue eyes watched him without anger. It almost seemed to Richard that for Nicci, Kahlan and Cara were not there.

“This doesn’t make any sense. You want me to go with you, but you aren’t acting on behalf of Jagang. If that’s true, then—”

“I believe I’ve made it as clear as possible and quite simple, besides. If you wish to be free, you may kill me at any opportunity. If you do, Kahlan will also die. Those are your only two choices. Although I believe I know what you will do, I am in no way certain. Two paths now lie before you. You must take one.”

Richard could hear Cara’s angry breath behind him. She was a coiled spring ready to strike. Fearing she might do something of irredeemable harm, he lifted his hand just to be sure she knew he meant for her to stay behind him.

“Oh, and one additional matter, should you think to resort to some plot or treachery, or, for that matter, refuse to do the simple things I ask of you: through the spell that joins us, I can at any time end Kahlan’s life. I have but to will it. It is not necessary for me to die. She lives every day from now on only by my grace, and thus yours.

“I wish her no harm, and have no feelings one way or the other about her life. In fact, if anything, I wish it to be long. She has brought you a measure of happiness, and in return for that, I hope she will not have to forfeit her life. But then, you have some influence over that by your behavior.”

Nicci cast a deliberate glare over Richard’s shoulder, to Cara. She then reached out and with her fingers gently wiped blood from his mouth. She finished cleaning his chin with her thumb. “Your Mord-Sith has hurt you. I can help you if you wish.”

“No.”

“Very well.” She wiped her bloody fingers clean on the skirt of her black dress. “Unless you want to risk other people causing Kahlan’s death without your intending it, I suggest you insure that others don’t act without your consent. Mord-Sith are resourceful and determined women. I respect their devotion to duty. However, if your Mord-Sith follows us—and my magic will tell me if she does—Kahlan will die.”

“And just how will I know Kahlan is all right? We could get a mile away from here, and you could use that magic link to kill her. I would never know.”

Nicci’s brow creased together. She looked genuinely puzzled.

“Why would I do that?”

A storm of rage and panic pushed his emotions first one way, and then the other. “Why are you doing any of this!”

She regarded him in silent curiosity for a moment. “I have my reasons. I’m sorry, Richard, that you must suffer in this. Making you suffer is not my purpose. I give you my word that I will not harm Kahlan without informing you.”

“You expect me to believe your word?”

“I’ve told you the truth. I have no reason to lie to you. In time, you will come to understand everything better. Kahlan will come to no harm from me as long as I am safe, and you come with me.”

For reasons he couldn’t fathom, Richard found himself believing her. She seemed dead honest and completely sure of herself, as if she had reasoned it all out a thousand times.

He didn’t believe that Nicci was telling him everything. She was making it simple so that he could grasp the important elements and have an easier time deciding what to do. Whatever the rest of it was, it couldn’t be as devastating as this much of it. The thought of being taken from Kahlan was agony, but he would do almost anything to save her life. Nicci knew that.

The enigma resurfaced. It was somehow linked to this.

“The spell that protects a person’s mind from the dream walker works only for those loyal to me. You can’t expect to be safe from Jagang if you do this. It’s an act of treachery.”

“Jagang does not frighten me. Don’t fear for my mind, Richard. I’m quite safe from His Excellency. In time, perhaps you will come to see how wrong you have been in so many things.”

“You’re deceiving yourself, Nicci.”

“You only see part of it, Richard.” She lifted an eyebrow in a cryptic manner. “At heart, your cause is the cause of the Order. You are too noble a person for it to be otherwise.”

“I may die at your hands, but I will die hating everything you and the Order stand for.” Richard’s fists tightened. “You’ll not get what you want, Nicci. Whatever it is, you’ll not get it.”

She regarded him with great compassion. “This is all for the best, Richard.”

Nothing he said seemed to hold any sway with her, and he could make no sense of the things she said. The fury inside boiled up. The magic of the sword fought him for control. He could barely contain it. “Do you really expect me to ever come to believe that?”

Nicci’s blue eyes seemed to be focused somewhere beyond him.

“Possibly not.”

Her gaze fixed on him once more. She put two fingers between her lips as she turned and whistled. In the distance, a horse whinnied and trotted out of the woods.

“I have another horse for you, waiting up on the other side of the pass.”

Terror clawed at his bones. Kahlan’s fingers tightened on his arm. Cara’s hand touched his back. Memories of being captured before and all it meant, all the things he had endured, made his pulse race and his breath come in rapid pulls. He felt trapped. Everything was slipping through his fingers and there didn’t seem to be anything he could do about it.

He wanted more than anything to fight, but he couldn’t figure how. He wished it were as simple as striking down his adversary. He reminded himself that reason, not wishing, was his only chance. He seized the calm center within, and used it to quell the rising storm of panic.

Nicci stood tall, her shoulders square, her chin up. She looked like someone facing an execution with courage. He realized then that she truly was prepared for whichever way it was to go.

“I have given you your choice, Richard. You have no other options. Choose.”

“There is no choice to make. I’ll not allow Kahlan to die.”

“Of course not.” Nicci’s posture eased almost imperceptibly. A small smile of reassurance warmed her eyes. “She will be fine.”

The horse slowed from its trot as it approached. When the handsome dappled mare halted beside her, Nicci took ahold of the reins near the bit. Its gray mane ruffled in the cold breeze. The mare snorted and tossed her head, uneasy before strangers, and eager to be away.

“But…but,” Richard stammered as Nicci stepped up into the stirrup. “But, what am I allowed to take?”

Nicci swung her leg over the horse’s rump and settled into the saddle. She squirmed herself into position and adjusted her shoulders, setting them back. Her black dress and blond hair stood out in stark relief against the iron sky.

“You may bring anything you like, as long as it isn’t a person.” She clicked her tongue, urging her horse around to face him. “I suggest you take clothes and such. Whatever you wish to have with you. Take all you can carry, if you want.”

Her voice took on an edge. “Leave that sword of yours, though. You won’t be needing it.” She leaned down, her expression for the first time turning cold and threatening. “You are no longer the Seeker, or Lord Rahl, leader of the D’Haran empire, or for that matter, you are no longer the husband of the Mother Confessor. From now on, you are nobody but Richard.”

Cara stepped out beside him, a thunderhead of dark fury. “I am Mord-Sith. If you think I’m going to allow you to take Lord Rahl, you’re crazy. The Mother Confessor has already stated her wishes. My duty, above all else, is to kill you.”

Nicci curled three fingers around the reins, her thumbs holding them tight. “Do as you must. You know the consequences.”

Richard held out a restraining arm to prevent Cara from going up after Nicci and dragging her off the horse. “Take it easy,” he whispered. “Time is on our side. As long as we’re all still alive, we have the chance to think of something.”

The strain of Cara’s weight against his arm eased. She reluctantly backed a step.

“I have to get some things,” Richard said to Nicci, trying to buy that time. “Wait, at least, until I can get my pack together.”

Nicci laid the reins over and stepped her horse back toward him. She rested her left wrist across the saddle’s pommel.

“I’m leaving.” With a long graceful finger of her other hand, she pointed. “You see that pass up there? You be with me by the time I’m at the top, and Kahlan will live. If I cross over and you aren’t with me, Kahlan will die. You have my word.”

It was all happening too fast. He needed to think of a way to stall. “Then what good will any of this have done you?”

“It will have told me what means more to you.” She sat back up in her saddle. “When you think about it, that is quite a profound question. It is yet to be answered. By the time I get to the top of the pass, I will have the answer.”

Nicci rocked her hips in the saddle, urging the horse ahead into a walk. “Don’t forget—top of the pass. You have until then to say your good-byes, pack what you wish to take, and then catch up with me if you wish Kahlan to live. Or, if you choose to stay, you have until then to say your good-byes before she dies. Understand, though, when making your choice, that the first will be as final as the second.”

Kahlan struggled to run toward the horse, but Richard clutched her around her waist.

“Where are you taking him?” she demanded.

Nicci stopped her horse momentarily and gazed down at Kahlan with a look of frightening finality.

“Why, into oblivion.”

As she watched Nicci turn her dappled mare toward the pass and the distant blue mountains beyond, Kahlan was still struggling to overcome her dizziness from what the woman had done to her. Off near the distant trees, a doe and her nearly grown fawn, two of the small herd of deer that frequented the meadow, stood at alert, their ears perked, watching Nicci, waiting to see if she might be a threat. Spooked by what they saw when Nicci turned their way, both deer flicked their tails straight up and bounded for the trees.

Kahlan refused to allow herself to give in to the disorientation. But for Richard’s iron arms around her waist, she would have thrown herself at the Sister of the Dark. Kahlan had desperately wanted to unleash her Confessor’s power. No one had ever deserved it more.

Had her senses not still been floundering in a daze, she might have been able to invoke her power through the Con Dar, the Blood Rage of an ancient ability she possessed. Such rare magic would have bridged the relatively small distance, but, reeling from the lingering force of Nicci’s conjuring, the attempt had been futile. It was all Kahlan could do to keep her feet under her and her last meal in her stomach.

It was frustrating, infuriating, and humiliating, but Nicci had surprised her and with magic as swift as Kahlan’s Confessor’s power had taken her before she could react. Once Nicci’s talons clutched her, Kahlan had been powerless.

She had grown up being trained not to be taken by surprise. Confessors were always targets; she knew better. Any number of times in similar situations she had prevailed. Lulled by months of tranquillity, Kahlan had lost her edge. She vowed never to let it happen again…but that would do her no good now.

She could still feel Nicci’s vital magic sizzling through her, as if her soul itself had been scorched in the heat of the ordeal. Her insides roiled as waves of the onslaught had yet to settle down. The cold air rushing across the meadow, bending the brown grass, swept up to chill her burning face. The wind carried an unfamiliar scent into the valley, something that her jumbled senses perceived as vaguely portentous. The big pines behind the house bowed and twisted but stood tall as the wind broke against them with a sound not unlike waves rushing against stone cliffs.

Whatever sort of magic had been unleashed in her, Kahlan was convinced Nicci had told the truth about its consequence. Despite how much she hated the woman, because of the maternity spell Kahlan felt a connection to her, a connection that she could only interpret as…affection. It was a bewildering sensation. While positively disturbing, it was also, in a way, a comforting connection to the woman beyond her vile magic and twisted purpose. There seemed to be something deep within Nicci worth loving.

Regardless of Kahlan’s far-fetched feelings, her perception and reasoning told her the truth of the matter: such impressions were illusion. If she got the opportunity, she would not again hesitate for an instant to kill Nicci.

“Cara,” Richard said, glaring at Nicci’s back as she walked her horse across the meadow, “I don’t want you even thinking about trying to stop her.”

“I’m not going to allow—”

“I mean it. I mean it more than any order I’ve ever given you. If you ever brought Kahlan to harm in such a way…well, I trust you’d never do such an evil thing to me. Why don’t you go get dressed.”

Cara growled a curse under her breath. Richard turned to Kahlan as the Mord-Sith marched off into the house. Kahlan only then really noticed that Cara was naked. She must have been interrupted in her bath. The magic Nicci used had fogged Kahlan’s mind, blurring her memory of recent events.

Kahlan did recall quite clearly, though, the feel of the Agiel. The shattering torture of the Mord-Sith’s weapon had spiked through Nicci’s magic like a lance through straw. Even though Cara had used her Agiel on Nicci, Kahlan felt it as if it had been used directly against the side of her own neck.

Kahlan gently touched Richard’s jaw in sympathy, then took hold of his upper arms instead when he gave her a look that suggested no need for sympathy. His big hands closed on her waist. She stepped into his embrace and rested her forehead against his cheek.

“This can’t be,” she whispered. “It just can’t.”

“But it is.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“That I let her take me by surprise.” Kahlan trembled with anger at herself. “I should have been alert. If I’d done as I should have, and killed her first, it would never have come to this.”

Richard ran a hand gently down the back of her head, holding her to his shoulder.

“Remember how you killed me in a sword fight the other day?” She nodded against him. “We all make mistakes, get caught off guard. Don’t blame yourself. No one is perfect. It could even be that she cast a web of magic to dull your awareness so she could slip up to you like…like some silent unseen mosquito.”

Kahlan had never considered that. Caught off guard or not, though, it made her furious with herself. If only she had not been paying attention to the stupid chipmunk. If only she had looked up sooner. If only she had acted without waiting a split second to analyze the true nature of the threat to decide if it warranted the unleashing of her devastating magic.

Almost from birth, Kahlan had been instructed in the use of her power, with the mandate of unleashing it only upon being certain of the need. Much like killing, a Confessor’s power was the destruction of who a person was. Afterward, the person acted exclusively on behalf of the Confessor, and at the direction of the Confessor. It was as final as death.

Kahlan looked up into Richard’s gray eyes. They looked all the more gray with the gray sky behind him.

“My life is a precious and sacred thing to me,” she said. “Yours is no less to you. Don’t throw yours away to be a slave to mine. I couldn’t stand it.”

“It’s not come to that yet. I’ll figure something out. But for now, I have to go with her.”

“We’ll follow, but stay well back.” He was already shaking his head. “But, she won’t even be aware—”

“No. For all we know, she could have others with her. They could be waiting to catch you if you follow. I couldn’t bear the thought of knowing that at any moment she could use magic or somehow find out you were following. If that happened, you would die for nothing.”

“You mean you think she could…hurt you to make you tell her I planned to follow.”

“Let’s not let our imaginations get the better of us.”

“But I should be close, for when you make a move—for when you figure a way to stop her.”

Richard cupped her face tenderly in his hands. He had a strange look in his eyes, a look she didn’t like.

“Listen to me. I don’t know what’s going on, but you mustn’t die just to free me.”

Tears of desperation stung her eyes. She blinked them away. She fought to keep her voice from becoming a wail.

“Don’t go, Richard. I don’t care what it means for me, as long as you can be free. I would die happy if doing so would keep you from the enemy’s cruel hands. I can’t allow the Order to have you. I can’t allow you to endure the slow grinding death of a slave in exchange for my life. I can’t allow them to—”

She bit off the words of what she feared most; she couldn’t bear the thought of him being tortured. It made her even more dizzy and sick to think of him being maimed and mutilated, of him suffering all alone and forgotten in some distant stinking dungeon with no hope of help.

But Nicci said they wouldn’t. Kahlan told herself that, for her own sanity, she had to believe Nicci’s word.

Kahlan realized Richard was smiling to himself, as if trying to commit to memory every detail of her face while at the same time running a thousand other things through his thoughts.

“There’s no choice,” he whispered. “I must do this.”

She clutched his shirt in her fist. “You’re doing just as Nicci wants—she knows you’ll want to save me. I can’t allow you to make that sacrifice!”

Richard looked up briefly, gazing out at the trees and mountains behind their house, taking it all in, like a condemned man savoring his last meal. His gaze, more earnest, settled once more on hers.

“Don’t you see? I am making no sacrifice. I am making a fair trade. The reality that you exist is my basis for joy and happiness.

“I make no sacrifice,” he repeated, stressing each word. “To be a slave, even if that is what happens to me, and yet know you’re alive, is my choice over being free in a world in which you don’t exist. I can live with the first. I can’t, with the second. The first is painful, the second unbearable.”

Kahlan beat a fist against his chest. “But you will be a slave or worse and I can’t bear that!”

“Kahlan, listen to me. I will always have freedom in my heart because I understand what it is. Because I do, I can work toward it. I will find a way to be free.

“I cannot find a way to bring you back to life.

“The spirits know that in the past I’ve been willing to forfeit my life for a just cause and if my life would truly make a difference. In the past, I have knowingly imperiled both our lives, been willing to sacrifice both our lives—but not in return for nothing. Don’t you see? This would be a fool’s bargain. I’ll not do it.”

Kahlan pulled her breaths in small gasps, trying to told back the tears as well as her rising sense of panic. “You’re the Seeker. You must find a way to freedom. Of course you will. You will, I know.” She forced a swallow past the constriction in her throat as she tried to reassure Richard, or perhaps herself. “You’ll find a way. I know you will. You’ll find a way and you’ll come back. You did before. You will this time.”

The shadows of Richard’s features seemed dark and severe, cast as they were in a mask of resignation.

“Kahlan, you must be prepared to go on.”

“What do you mean?”

“You must find joy in the fact that I, too, live. You must be prepared to go on with that knowledge and nothing else.”

“What do you mean, nothing else?”

He had a terrible look in his eyes—some kind of sad, grim, tragic acceptance. She didn’t want to look into his eyes, but, standing there with her hand against his chest, feeling the warmth of him, the life within him, she couldn’t make herself look away as he spoke.

“I think it’s different this time.”

Kahlan pulled her hair back when the wind dragged it over her eyes. “Different?”

“There’s something very different about the feel of this. It doesn’t make sense in the way things in the past have made sense. There’s something deadly serious about Nicci. Something singular. She’s planned this out and she’s prepared to die for it. I can’t lie to you to deceive you. Something tells me that, this time, I may never be able to find a way to come back.”

“Don’t say that.” In weak fingers trembling with dread, Kahlan gathered his dark shirt into a wrinkled knot. “Please don’t say that, Richard. You must try. You must find a way to come back to me.”

“Don’t ever think I won’t be doing my best.” His voice was impassioned, almost to the point of sounding angry. “I swear to you, Kahlan, that as long as there is a breath in my lungs, I’ll never give up; I’ll always try to find a way. But we can’t ignore the possibility just because it’s painful to contemplate: I may never be back.

“You must face the fact that it looks like you must go on without me, but with the knowledge that I’m alive, just as I will have that awareness of you in my heart where no one can touch it. In our hearts, we have each other and always will. That was the oath we swore when we were married—to love and honor each other for all time. This can’t change it. Distance can’t change it. Time can’t change it.”

“Richard…” She choked back her wail, but she couldn’t keep the tears from coursing down her face. “I can’t stand the thought of you being a slave because of me. Don’t you see that? Don’t you see what that would do to me? I’ll kill myself if I must so that she can’t do this to you. I must.”

He shook his head, the wind ruffling his hair. “Then I would have no reason to escape her. Nothing to escape for.”

“You won’t need to escape, that’s just it—she won’t be able to hold you.”

“She’s a Sister of the Dark.” He threw open his hands. “She will simply use another means I won’t know how to counter—and if you’re dead, I won’t care to.”

“But—”

“Don’t you see?” He seized her by her shoulders. “Kahlan, you must live to give me a reason to try to escape her.”

“Your own life is your reason,” she said. “To be free to help people will be your reason.”

“The people be cursed.” He released her and gestured angrily. “Even people where I grew up turned against us. They tried to murder us. Remember? The lands that have surrendered into the union with D’Hara will likely not remain loyal, either, when they see the reality of the Imperial Order’s army moving up into the Midlands. Eventually, D’Hara will stand alone.

“People don’t understand or value freedom. The way it now stands, they won’t fight for it. They’ve proven it in Anderith, and in Hartland, where I grew up. What more clear evidence could be seen? I hold out no false hope. Most of the rest of the Midlands will quail when it comes time to fight against the Imperial Order. When they see the size of the Order’s army and their brutality with those who resist, they will surrender their freedom.”

He looked away from her, as if regretting his flash of anger in their last moments together. His tall form, so stalwart against the sweep of mountains and sky, sagged a little, seeming to huddle closer to her as if seeking comfort.

“The only thing I have to hope for is to get away so I can come back to you.” His voice had lost all traces of heat as he spoke in a near whisper. “Kahlan, please don’t take that hope from me—it’s all I have.”

In the distance she could see the fox trotting across the meadow. Its thick, white-tipped tail followed out straight behind as the fox made its inspection for any rodents that might be about. As Kahlan’s gaze tracked its movement, from the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of
Spirit
standing proud and free in the window. How could she lose the man who had carved that for her when she needed it most?

She could, she knew, because now he needed what only she could give him. Looking back up into his intense gray eyes, she realized she could not hope to deny him his earnest plea and only request, not at a time like this.