Wizard's First Rule (87 page)

“Oh, I remember Adie quite well.” He gave Richard his most innocent look. “But Adie has two good feet, not one.”

Richard and Kahlan both came to their feet in a rush. “What?”

“Yes,” Zedd smiled, turning away. “Seems it grew back.” He bent, pulling an apple from Richard’s pack. “Quite unexpectedly.”

Richard took Zedd’s sleeve and turned him around. “Zedd, you…”

The wizard smiled. “Are you thoroughly sure you wouldn’t like to be a wizard?” He took a bite of the apple, pleased at seeing the astonishment on Richard’s face. Zedd handed him the knife, the blade as sharp as he had ever seen it.

Richard shook his head and turned to his work. “I just want to go home and be a guide. Nothing more.” He thought awhile, then asked, “Zedd, all the time I grew up with you, you were a wizard and I never knew. You didn’t use the magic. How could you stand not to? Why didn’t you?”

“Ah, well, there are dangers to using the magic. Also, pain.”

“Dangers? Like what?”

Zedd regarded him for a moment. “You have used magic, with the sword. You tell me.”

“But that’s the sword, that’s different. What dangers are there for a wizard in using the magic? And what pain?”

Zedd gave a small, sly smile. “Only just finished with the first lesson, and already he is eager for the second.”

Richard straightened. “Never mind.” He hoisted the pack onto his back. “All I want to be is a woods guide.”

Apple in hand, Zedd started toward the trail. “So you have told me.” He took a big bite. “Now, I want you two to tell me everything that has happened since I was knocked unconscious. Don’t leave out a thing, no matter how trivial.”

Richard and Kahlan exchanged a crimson look. “I won’t tell if you don’t,” he whispered.

She held him back with a hand on his arm. “I swear, not a word about what happened in the spirit house.”

By the look in her eyes, he knew she meant to keep her word.

For the rest of the day as they trudged along the trails, keeping off the main roads, the two of them told Zedd the stories of everything that had happened since they were attacked that day at the boundary. Zedd made them go back to previous events at the oddest places in a story. Working off each other’s words, Richard and Kahlan managed to weave the story of the Mud People without mention of anything that happened between them in the spirit house.

As they drew nearer to Tamarang, they crisscrossed roads, and began to see refugees carrying their belongings on their backs, or on small carts. Richard saw to it that they didn’t stay long in the sight of people, and placed himself between them and Kahlan whenever he could. He didn’t want anyone recognizing the Mother Confessor. He was relieved each time they were back in the woods. The forest was where he was most comfortable, even though it had proven its dangers to them.

Late in the day, they had to take to the main road in order to cross the Callisidrin River. It was too big and swift to risk fording, so they took the big wooden bridge. Zedd and Richard kept Kahlan protectively between them as they walked among the people crossing the bridge. Kahlan kept the hood of her cloak up so people wouldn’t see her long hair. Most of the people were headed for Tamarang, seeking shelter and safety from the marauding forces, supposedly sweeping in from Westland. Kahlan said that they would reach Tamarang by the middle of the next day. From now on they would have to travel most of the time on the road. Richard knew that they would have to move far from the road at night to be clear of any people. He began watching the sun so as to leave them time to move deep enough into the forest before it became too dark.

“Does that feel good?”

Rachel pretended Sara answered that it did, and tucked a little more grass around her doll to be doubly sure she was warm enough. She nestled the loaf of bread with the cloth tied around it next to Sara.

“You’ll be warm for now. I have to go get some wood before it’s too dark, and then we’ll have a fire. Then we can both be warm.”

She left Sara with the bread in the wayward pine and went outside. The sun was down, but it was still light enough to see. The clouds were a pretty pink. She looked at them once in a while as she picked up sticks, holding them against her body with the other arm. She checked her pocket to be sure the fire stick was still there. She
had almost forgotten it last night, and was scared now, unless she checked to make sure she hadn’t forgotten it again.

She looked up again at the pretty clouds. Just as she did, some big dark thing swooped low over the trees a little way up the hill. It must be some big bird, she thought. Ravens were big, and dark. It must be one of those noisy ravens. She picked up some more sticks. Then she saw a bunch of blueberry bushes, low against the ground in an open place, their leaves starting to turn a flaming red. She threw the sticks down.

She was so hungry, she sat down on the berry bushes and started eating them as fast as she could pick. It was getting late in the year, and the berries were starting to get dry and shriveled, but they were still good. In fact, they tasted wonderful. She started putting one in her pocket for each one she ate. She moved on her hands and knees, picking berries, eating them, and putting them in her pocket. It was getting darker. Once in a while, she looked up at the pretty clouds. They were getting a darker color. Purple.

When her stomach felt better, and her pocket was full, she picked the sticks up and went back to the wayward pine. Once back inside, she untied the cloth that was around the bread and dumped the berries from her pocket onto the cloth. She sat down and ate the berries off the cloth as she chatted with Sara, offering to share her berries as she ate. Sara didn’t eat many. Rachel wished she had a mirror. She wished she could look in a mirror at her hair. Earlier in the day, she had seen herself in a dark pool. Her hair looked so wonderful, all even. Richard was such a nice man to cut it for her.

She missed Richard. She wished he were here now, to run away with her, to hug her. He gave the bestest hugs in the whole world. If Kahlan weren’t so mean, he could give her hugs too. Kahlan would find out then how wonderful his hugs were. For some reason, Rachel missed her, too. Her stories, and her songs, and her fingers on her forehead. Why did she have to be so mean and say she was going to hurt Giller? Giller was one of the nicest men in the world. Giller gave her Sara.

Rachel broke the sticks as best she could, so they would fit in the circle of stones she had made. After stacking them carefully, she pulled out the fire stick.

“Light for me.”

She set the fire stick down on the cloth with the berries and then warmed her hands and ate a few berries while she told Sara some of her troubles, how she wished Richard were hugging her, how she wished Kahlan weren’t mean, how she hoped Kahlan didn’t hurt Giller, how she wished she had something other than berries to eat.

Some bug bit her on the neck. She let out a little squeal and swatted it. There was a little bit of blood on her hand when she took it away. And a fly.

“Look, Sara. Look at how that stupid fly bit me. It made blood.”

Sara seemed sorry for her sting. Rachel ate a few more berries.

Another fly bit her neck. Rachel swatted it, not squealing this time. There was another spot of blood on her hand.

“That hurt!” she told Sara. With a frown, she threw the squished fly in the fire.

The fly that bit her on the arm made her jump. She slapped it flat. Another bit
her neck. Rachel flailed at the flies in the air around her face. Two more bit her neck, making blood before she smacked them. Tears welled up in her eyes from the pain of the stings.

“Get away!” she yelled as she waved her hands around.

Some were inside her dress, biting her chest and back. More bit her neck.

Rachel started screaming as she batted at the flies, trying to get them off. Tears streamed down her cheeks. A fly bit the inside of her ear, making her scream even louder. The sound of it buzzing in her ear made her cry and scream as she dug with her finger, trying to get it out. She thrashed her arms as she yelled.

Rachel screamed in a high pitch as she stumbled out of the wayward pine, wiping flies off her eyes. She ran, arms lashing out, trying to get the flies away. The flies followed her as she ran and screamed.

Something in front of her made her stop dead in her tracks.

Her wide eyes worked their way up the giant, fur-covered body of the thing. Its belly was pink, and had flies on it.

Against the fading colors of the sky, it slowly unfolded huge wings, spreading them wide. Not wings covered with feathers, wings covered with skin. Rachel could see big blood veins in them, throbbing.

With all her courage, she put her shaking hand in her pocket. The fire stick wasn’t there. Her legs wouldn’t move. She didn’t even feel the flies that were biting her. She heard a sound like a cat purring, but a lot louder. Her eyes went up further.

Glowing green eyes glared down at her. The purring sound was a low growl.

The mouth opened with a louder growl, lips pulling back, showing its long, curved teeth.

Rachel couldn’t run. She couldn’t move. She couldn’t even scream. She shook as her wide eyes looked up into those mean eyes that glowed green. She forgot how to move her feet.

A big claw reached for her.

She felt something warm running down her legs.

Richard folded his arms and leaned back against the rock. “Enough!”

Zedd and Kahlan both turned their heads, seeming to have forgotten he was even there. He had been listening to the two of them arguing for at least the last half hour as they sat in front of the fire, and was tired of it. In fact, he was just plain tired. Dinner was long since done and they should be getting some sleep, but instead they were trying to decide what they would do tomorrow when they reached Tamarang. Now, instead of arguing, they started presenting their cases to him.

“I say we march in there and I deal with Giller. He is my student. I will get him to tell me what’s going on. I’m still Wizard of the First Order. He will do as I say. He will give me the box.”

Kahlan pulled her Confessor’s dress from her pack and held it up to Richard. “This is the way we deal with Giller. He is my wizard and he will do as I say because he knows the consequences.”

Richard let out a deep breath as he rubbed his eyes with his fingertips. “You both want to eat a chicken we haven’t even plucked yet. We aren’t even sure whose chicken it is.”

“What do you mean?” Kahlan asked.

Richard leaned forward. Now he had their attention, at last. “At the very least, Tamarang is giving a sympathetic ear to D’Hara. At the very worst, Darken Rahl is there. Most likely, the fact is somewhere between the two. If we march in there and tell them what we want, they might not like it. Tamarang has a whole standing army to express to us how much they don’t like it. Then what? Are the three of us going to fight a war with their army? How is this going to get us the box? How is it going to even get us to Giller? If we have to fight, I’d rather it be on the way out, not on the way in.”

Richard expected one of them to express some sort of objection while they sat as if being scolded, but neither did, so he went on.

“Maybe Giller is waiting and hoping someone will come, so he can help them get away with the box. Then again, maybe he will not be so willing to part company with it. But we won’t know if we never make it to him, now, will we?” He addressed Zedd. “You told me the box has magic, and a wizard, or Rahl, can feel that magic, but a wizard can also cover the feeling of that magic with a wizard’s web, so the box can’t be detected. That could be why Queen Milena wanted a wizard—to hide the box from Rahl, and use it as a bargaining tool. If we create a big commotion, and scare Giller, no matter how he feels about us, he may be
frightened, and use the opportunity to escape. It could also be that Rahl is just waiting for the quarry to be flushed from cover, and then he will pounce.”

Zedd turned to Kahlan. “I think the Seeker has some good points. Perhaps we should hear him out?”

Kahlan smiled a little. “I believe you are correct, good wizard.” She turned to Richard. “What is your way?”