Such an obscene threat was somehow more chilling, coming as it did from the

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mouth of a boy. It made her sick to her stomach to hear a child express Jagang's vile thoughts.

The boy's arm gestured for his master. "One of my beauties, and quite the lethal lady, besides." Kahlan thought she detected in Jagang's gravelly growl a hint of the false bravado of a bluff. Almost in afterthought, he added, "You haven't really seen her."

Kahlan heard in the assertion the ghost of a question he dared not ask, and knew by it that there was something more to this. She wished she knew what.

She shrugged again. "Lethal? I wouldn't know."

He licked the blood from his lips. "That's what I thought."

"I wouldn't know because she didn't seem all that lethal. She didn't manage to harm any of us."

The grin returned. "You lie, darlin. If you really saw Nicci, she would have killed at least some of you, even if she didn't manage to kill you all. You couldn't best that one without her scratching someone's eyes out, first."

"Really? So sure, are we?"

The boy let out a belly laugh. "Darlin, I know Nicci. I'm sure."

Kahlan smiled her contempt into the boy's brown eyes. "You know I'm telling you the truth."

"Really?" he said, still chuckling. "How's that?"

"You know it's the truth because she's one of your slaves, so you should be able to enter her mind. You can't, though. I know why you can't. Even though you aren't too bright, I don't suppose you'll need to think too long to imagine why not."

Fierce rage fired the boy's eyes. "I don't believe you."

Kahlan shrugged. "Suit yourself."

"If you saw her, then where is she now?"

As she turned her back on him, Kahlan told him the brutal, bitter truth and let him interpret it his own way. "Last I saw her, she was on her way into oblivion."

Kahlan heard the bellow behind her. She spun back to see Cara trying to stop him with her Agiel. Kahlan heard the bone in his arm snap. It didn't even slow him. The boy, in a wild rage, his hands clawed, his teeth bared, lunged for Kahlan.

Half turned back to him, Kahlan lifted her hand against the full weight of the boy crashing toward her as he leaped for her throat. His small chest contacted her hand. His feet were clear of the ground. It felt not as if he were throwing himself at her, but no more than dandelion fluff, floating to her on a breath of air.

Time was hers.

It was not necessary for Kahlan to invoke her birthright, but merely to withdraw her restraint of it. Her feelings could provide her no safe haven; only the truth would serve her now.

This was not a small boy, hurt, alone, afraid.

This was the enemy.

The inner violence of her power's cold coiled force slipping its bounds was breathtaking. It surged up from that deep dark core within, obediently inundating every fiber of her being.

She could count each small rib under her fingers.

She contained no hate, no rage, no horror . . . no sorrow. In that infinitesimal spark of time, her mind was in a void where there was no emotion, only the allconsuming rush of time suspended.

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He had no chance. He was hers.

Kahlan did not hesitate.

She unleashed her power.

From an ethereal state as part of her innermost essence, that power became all.

Thunder without sound jolted the air-exquisite, violent, and for that pristine instant, sovereign.

The boy's face was twisted by the hate of the man who had controlled him. In that singular moment, if she was the absence of emotion, then he was the embodiment of it. Kahlan stared back into that lost child's face, knowing that he saw only her merciless eyes.

His mind, who he was, who he had been, was already gone.

Trees all around shook from the force of the concussion. Snow dropped from branches and boughs. The terrible shock to the air lifted a ring of snow that grew around the two of them in an ever-expanding circle.

Kahlan had known that Jagang could slip into and out of a person's mind between thought, when time itself did not exist. She had no choice but to do as she had done. She could not afford to hesitate. With Jagang in a person's mind, even Cara could not control them.

Jagang had burned his bridges behind him as he fled the young mind.

The boy fell dead at Kahlan's feet.

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CHAPTER 35

Kahlan swayed on her feet as she stood over the crumbled body of the boy, feeling her emotions flood back in. As always happened, using her Confessor's power left her drained and exhausted. In the aftermath, the forest sat in silent judgment. Here and there, the virgin snow around the small body exhibited its red evidence.

Only then did Kahlan even pause to consider if she might have killed Cara, too.

A Mord-Sith would not live long after the touch of a Confessor. There had been no choice. She had done her best to warn Cara, to let her know to get clear, but in the end Kahlan couldn't allow her decision to be influenced by any consideration other than what had to be done. Hesitation could have meant disaster.

Now that it was over, though, dread roiled through.

Kahlan looked around, and to the right saw Cara sprawled in the snow. If she had been touching the boy when Kahlan unleashed her power . . .

Cara groaned. Kahlan staggered to her and dropped to a knee. She clutched the fur at Cara's shoulder and with a mighty effort pulled her over.

"Cara-are you all right?"

Cara squinted up with a look of disgust working its way to the surface of pain. "Well of course I'm all right. You didn't think I would be foolish enough to hang on to him, did you?"

Kahlan smiled in thankful relief. "No, of course not. I only thought you might have broken your neck jumping away."

Cara spat snow and dirt. "Nearly did."

Warren helped them both to their feet. Grimacing, he rubbed his shoulders and then his elbows. From what Kahlan had often been told, being too close to a Confessor unleashing her power was a painful experience, sending a shock of agony through every joint. Fortunately, it did no real damage and the suffering faded quickly.

As Warren glanced over at the dead boy, she knew that there was other pain that would not leave so quickly.

"Dear Creator," Warren whispered to himself. He looked back at Kahlan and Cara. "He was just a boy. Was it really necessary-"

"Yes," Kahlan said in a forceful voice. "I'm positive. Cara and I have encountered this situation before-with Marlin."

"But Marlin was grown. Lyle was so small . . . so young. What real harm-"

"Warren, don't start down the path of what-might-have-been. Jagang controlled his mind, just as he controlled Marlin's mind. We know about this. He was a deadly threat."

"If I couldn't hold him," Cara said, "nothing could."

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Warren sighed in misery. He sank to his knees at the boy's side. Warren whispered a prayer as his fingers stroked the boy's temple.

"I guess the blame rightly lies at Jagang's feet." Warren stood and brushed the snow from his knees. "Ultimately, Jagang is the one who brought this about."

Kahlan could see the distant figures of their men, rushing up the hillside to rescue her. She started down toward them.

"If it pleases you to think so."

Cara stayed right with her. Warren struggled through the snow to catch up. He snatched Kahlan's arm and pulled her to a stop.

"You mean Ann, don't you?"

Kahlan schooled her anger as she studied Warren's blue eyes.

"Warren, you were a victim of that woman, too. You were taken to the Palace of the Prophets when you were young, weren't you?"

"I guess so, but-"

"But nothing. They came and took you. They came and took that poor dead child back there." Kahlan's fingernails dug into her palms. "They came and took Richard."

Warren pressed his hand gently to the side of Kahlan's arm. "I know how it seems. Prophecy is often-"

"There!" Kahlan angrily pointed back at the corpse. "There is prophecy! Death and misery-all in the sacred name of prophecy!"

Warren didn't try to answer her rage.

Kahlan forced control into her voice, if not the emotion behind it. "How many are going to die needlessly in a perverted devotion to seeing prophecy carried out? Had Ann not sent Verna here for Richard, none of this would be happening."

"How do you know that? Kahlan, I can understand how you feel, but how can you be sure?"

"The barrier stood for three thousand years. It could only be brought down by a wizard born with both sides of the gift. There has been none until Richard. Ann sent Verna to get him. Had she not, the barrier would still be there. Jagang and the Order would be on the other side. The Midlands would be safe. That boy would be playing ball somewhere."

"Kahlan, it's not so simple as you make it seem." Warren opened his hands in an expression of frustration. "I don't want to argue this with you, but I want you to understand that prophecy gets fulfilled in many ways. It often seeks its own solution. It could be that had Ann not sent for Richard, he would have, for some other reason, ventured down there and brought down the barrier. Who is to know the reason? Don't you see? It could be that it was bound to happen, and Ann was simply the means. If not her, then another."

Kahlan pulled angry breaths through gritted teeth. "How much blood, how many corpses, how much grief will it take before you see the harm prophecy has inflicted upon the world?"

Warren smiled sadly. "I am a prophet. I've always wanted to be a prophet in order to help people. I wouldn't put my faith in it if I truly thought it was the cause of harm." He smiled more brightly with a memory. "Don't forget, without prophecy, you would never have come to meet Richard. Aren't you better off having had him come into your life? I know I am."

Kahlan's look of cold fury took the warm smile from his face.

"I-would rather have been condemned to a lonely life without love, than to know

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that harm has come to him because he came into my life. I would rather never have met him, than to have come to know his value, and know that that value is being dashed on the rocks of this mad faith in prophecy."

Warren stuck his hands in the opposite sleeves of his purple robes as his gaze sank to the ground. "I understand how you can feel that way. Please, Kahlan, talk to Verna."

"Why? She's the one who carried out Ann's orders."

"Just talk to her. I almost lost Verna because she felt the same way as you do now."

"Verna?"

Warren nodded. "She came to believe she had been used maliciously by Ann. For twenty years she was on a fruitless search for Richard, when all the while Ann knew right where he was. Can you imagine how Verna felt when she discovered that? There were other things, too. Ann tricked us into believing she was dead. She maneuvered Verna into being Prelate." Warren pulled a hand from his sleeve and held his first finger and thumb an inch apart. "She was once this close to throwing her journey book into a fire."

"She should have."

Warren's sad smile returned. "I'm just saying it might make you feel better to talk to her. She will understand how you feel."

"What good is that going to do?"

Warren shrugged. "Even if you're right, so what? What's done is done. We can't undo it. Nicci has Richard. The Imperial Order is here in the New World. Whatever caused the events, they are upon us and we must now deal with that reality."

Kahlan appraised his sparkling blue eyes. "You learned this studying prophecy?"

His smile widened into a grin. "No. That was what Richard taught me. And, a pretty smart woman I know just told me not to start down the path of what-mighthave-been."

As much as she was of a mind to hold on to it, Kahlan felt her anger slipping away. "I'm not so sure how smart she is."

Warren waved down at the troops charging up the hill with their swords drawn, signaling the allclear. The men slowed to a fast walk, but didn't sheathe their weapons.

"Well," Warren said, "she was smart enough to figure out Jagang's plan, and in the middle of being attacked by his gifted minion to keep her wits about her and to trick him into thinking she had fallen for his scheme."

Kahlan drew her face into a peevish scowl. "How old are you, Warren?"

He looked surprised by the question. "I turned one hundred fifty-eight not long ago."

"That explains it," Cara griped, starting off down the hill. "Stop looking so young and innocent all the time, Warren. It's just plain irritating."

--]--- By the time Kahlan, Cara, Warren, and their escort of guard troops arrived back in camp several hours later, it was a scene of furious activity. Wagons were being loaded, horses hitched, and weapons readied. Tents were not yet being taken down, but soldiers in their leather and chain-mail armor, and still eating the remnants of their dinners, were gathered around officers, listening to instructions for when the

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order was given to send a force out to intercept the enemy moving north. Other officers in tents Kahlan passed were bent over maps.

The aroma of stew drifting through the afternoon air reminded her how hungry she was. Winter darkness came early, and the overcast made it feel like it was already evening. The endless cloudy days were getting to be depressing. There was little chance to see much of the sun; soon, heavier snow would make it down this far south.

Kahlan dismounted and let a young soldier take her horse. She no longer rode a big warhorse. She, and most of the cavalry, had switched to smaller, more agile mounts. For a clash between large units, big warhorses added weight to a charge, but since the D'Haran Empire forces were so outnumbered, they had decided it would be best to trade weight far speed and maneuverability.

By changing tactics in such a way, not just with the cavalry but with their entire army, Kahlan and General Meiffert had been able to keep the Order off balance for weeks. They let the enemy put a huge effort into a crushing attack, and then dodged it just enough to save themselves while letting the Order, being tantalizingly close, wear themselves out. When the Order tired from the effort of such massive attacks and paused to rest, General Meiffert sent in glancing attacks to step on their toes and make them dance. Once the Order dug in for the expected attack, Kahlan withdrew their forces to a more distant spot, rendering useless the Order's effort at building defenses.

If the Order tried the same thing again, the D'Harans continued to harry them day and night, buzzing around them like angry hornets, but staying out of reach of a heavy swat. If the Imperial Order tired of not being able to sink their teeth into their enemy, and turned their forces to go after population centers, then Kahlan had her men jump on their tails and put arrows in their backs as they struggled to get free. Eventually, they would have to forget their thoughts of plunder and turn back toward the threat.

The Imperial Order was maddened by the D'Harans' constant badgering tactics. Jagang's men were insulted by that kind of fighting; they believed real men met face-to-face in the field of battle, and exchanged blow for blow. Of course, it didn't trouble their dignity that they greatly outnumbered the D'Harans. Kahlan knew such a meeting would be bloody and only to the Order's advantage. She didn't care what they thought, only that they died.

The more angry and frustrating the Imperial Order became, the more recklessly they behaved, launching impetuous attacks into well-ordered defenses, or heedlessly pressing men into doomed attacks trying to take ground they couldn't possibly take in such a fashion. It sometimes stunned Kahlan to watch so many of the enemy march into range below their archers, fall dead, only to have yet more men march right in behind them, continuously adding corpses to a battlefield already choked with the dead and dying. It was insanity.

The D'Harans had suffered several thousand dead or seriously wounded. On the other hand, Kahlan and General Meiffert estimated that they had killed or wounded in excess of fifty thousand of the enemy. It was the equivalent of stepping on one ant as the colony poured out of its anthill. She could think of nothing else to do but to keep at it. They had no choice.

Kahlan, with Cara at her side, crossed a river of men to get to the command tents sporting blue cloth strips. Unless you knew the day's color code, finding the command tents would be nearly impossible. Because of the fear of an infiltrator or an

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enemy gifted finding and being able to kill a group of senior officers gathered together, they met in nondescript tents. Colored cloth strips marked many of the tents-the men used them as as system of finding their units when they had to move on short notice and so often-so Kahlan got the idea of using the same system to identify the command tents. They changed the color code often so no one color would become known as the officers' colors.

Inside the cramped tent, General Meiffert looked up from where he bent over a table with a map unfurled at a cockeyed angle. Lieutenant Leiden, of Kelton, was there along with Captain Abernathy, the commander of the Galean forces Kahlan had brought down with her weeks before.

Adie was sitting quietly in the corner, as the representative of the gifted, watching the goings-on with her completely white eyes. Blinded as a young woman, Adie had learned to see using her gift. She was a remarkably talented sorceress. Adie was quite proficient at using that talent to do the enemy harm. Now she was there to help coordinate the Sister's abilities with the needs of the army.

When Kahlan inquired, Adie told her, "Zedd be down at the southern lines, checking on details."

Kahlan nodded her thanks. "Warren went down there to help, too."

Kahlan scrunched up her freezing toes in her boots, trying to bring feeling back to them. She blew warm air into her cupped hands and then turned her attention to the waiting general.

"We need to get together a good-sized force-maybe twenty thousand men."

General Meiffert sighed his frustration. "So they are moving an army up past us."

"No," she said. "It's a trick."

The three officers frowned their puzzlement as they waited for an explanation.

"I ran into Jagang-"

"You what!" General Meiffert shouted in unbridled panic.

Kahlan waved a hand, allaying his fears. "Not like you're thinking. It was through the body of one of his slaves." She stuck her hands under her arms to warm them. "The important thing is that I played along with Jagang's scheme so that he would think we were falling for his plan."

Kahlan explained how Jagang's ruse of troop movements was meant to work and how its true design was to draw away a good-sized force so as to leave those remaining behind weaker. The men listened as she laid it all out while pointing to the locations on the map.

"If we were to send that many men out," Lieutenant Leiden asked, "wouldn't that be just what Emperor Jagang wanted?"

"It would be," she told him, "but that's not what we're going to do. I want those men to ride out of camp, to make it look as if we were doing what he expected."

She leaned over the map, using a piece of charcoal to sketch in some of the nearby mountains she had just traveled through, and showed .them a lowland pass around several.

Captain Abernathy spoke up. "We have my Galean troops-they're close to the number you need to serve as the decoy."

"That's what I was thinking," General Meiffert said.

"Done," Kahlan said. She pointed at the map again. "Circle around these mountains, here, Captain, so that when the Order attacks our camp, thinking to roll over us, your men can stick them in their soft side, right here, where they won't expect it."

Captain Abernathy, a trim man with a graying bushy mustache that matched his

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eyebrows, nodded as he watched Kahlan pointing out the route on the map. "Don't worry, Mother Confessor, the Order will believe we're gone, but we'll be standing ready to drive right into their ribs when they come for you."

Kahlan turned her attention back to the general. "We'll also need to secretly trickle another force out of camp to wait at the opposite side of the valley from Captain Abernathy, so that when the Order comes up the valley in the middle, we can drive into their ribs from both sides at once. They won't want to let us cut off and trap part of their force, so they'll turn tail. Then our main force can drive steel into their vulnerable backs."

The three officers considered her plan in silence, while outside the confusion of noise went on. Horses galloped past, wagons creaked and bounced along, snow underfoot crunched as soldiers shuffled past, and men called out orders.

Lieutenant Leiden's eyes turned up toward Kahlan. "Mother Confessor, my Keltans could be that other force. They've all served together a long time, and work well in our own units under my command. We could begin slipping out of camp at once and gather down there to wait for the attack. You could send a Sister with us to verify a prearranged signal, and then I could take my men in when Captain Abernathy attacks from the opposite side."

Kahlan knew the man wanted to redeem himself in her eyes. He was also looking to establish for Kelton a measure of autonomy within the D'Haran Empire.

"That will be a dangerous spot, Lieutenant. If anything goes wrong, we can't come to your aid."

He nodded. "But my men are familiar with the area and we're used to traversing mountainous country in the winter. The Imperial Order is from a warmer land. We have the advantage of weather and terrain. We can do the job, Mother Confessor."

Kahlan straightened, letting out a breath as she appraised the man. General Meiffert, she knew, would like the idea. Captain Abernathy would, too; Galea and Kelton were traditional rivals, so the two would just as soon fight their own way, and separately.

Richard had brought the lands together, so that they would all come to feel they were one, now. That was vital if they were to survive. She supposed that they were fighting for the same goal, so in that way they were working together-they would have to coordinate their attacks. Lieutenant Leiden did make sense, too; his troops were mountain fighters.

"All right, Lieutenant."

"Thank you, Mother Confessor."

Kahlan thought to add some insurance. "If you acquit yourself well in this, Lieutenant, it could move you up in command."

Lieutenant Leiden clapped a fist to his heart in salute. "My men will make their queen proud."

Kahlan acknowledged his pledge with the nod of the Mother Confessor. She addressed them all. "We had better get under way."

General Meiffert grunted his agreement. "This will be a good opportunity to knock down their numbers. If it goes even half right, this time we'll bleed them good." He turned to the other two officers. "Let's get started. We need to have your men moving at once to give them enough time to be in position by morning. There's no telling how long they might wait to attack, but if it comes as soon as dawn, I want you in position and ready."

"The Order favors attacking at dawn," Captain Abernathy said. "We can be on

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our way within the hour. We'll be in place and ready by dawn, should they come in early." "As can we," Lieutenant Leiden agreed.

The two officers bowed and started to leave.

"Captain," Kahlan called. The men turned back.

"Mother Confessor?"

"Do you have any idea what could be keeping Prince Harold and the rest of your army? He should have been here long ago. We could really use the rest of your men."

Captain Abernathy's thumb twiddled a bone button on the front of his dark coat. "I'm sorry, Mother Confessor. I, too, thought they should have been here by now. I can't imagine what could be keeping the prince."

"He should have been here by now," she repeated under her breath to herself. She looked up at the captain. "Weather?"

"Perhaps, Mother Confessor. If there are storms, that could have delayed him. That is probably the reason, and in that case I don't imagine he should be much longer. Our men train in the mountains in such conditions."

Kahlan sighed. "Let's hope he's here soon, then."

Captain Abernathy confidently met her gaze. "I know for a fact that the prince was eager to collect his men and get down here to help. Galea spans the Callisidrin Valley. The prince personally told me that it was to our own best interest to halt the Imperial Order down here, rather than letting them advance further up into the Midlands, where our lands and our families would come under the terror of the enemy."

Kahlan could see in Lieutenant Leiden's eyes that he was thinking that if Prince Harold instead decided to make a stand in the Callisidrin Valley, in order to selfishly protect his homeland of Galea, such an obstacle very well could force the Order to instead bear toward the northeast in their advance, around the intervening mountains, and over into the Kern Plain-right toward Leiden's homeland of Kelton. If Lieutenant Leiden was imagining such treachery, he had the wisdom not to voice it.

"I know the weather was bad when I came down," Kahlan said. "It is winter, after all. I'm sure Prince Harold will soon be here to help his queen and the fellow people of the D'Haran Empire."

Kahlan offered them a smile to soften the subtle threat. "Thank you, gentlemen. You'd best get to your tasks. May the good spirits watch your backs."

After the men had saluted and horned off to their work, Adie put her hands to her knees and levered herself to her feet.

"If you do not need me, I must see to informing the Sisters, Zedd, and Warren of our plans."

Kahlan nodded wearily. "Thank you, Adie."

Adie, her eyes completely white, saw with the aid of her gift. Kahlan could feel that gifted gaze on her.

"You have used your power," the old sorceress said. "I be able to see it in your face. You must rest."

"I know," Kahlan said. "But there are things needing to be done."

"They will not get done if you fall ill, or worse-which could happen." Adie's thin fingers gripped Cara's arm. "See to it that the Mother Confessor be left alone for a while, so she can at least rest her head on the table, if nothing else."

Cara swung the folding chair around and set it behind the table. She pointed at it while leveling a stern look at Kahlan.

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"Sit. I will stand watch."

Kahlan was exhausted. Using her Confessor's ability sapped her strength. She needed time to recover. The hard ride back had only made matters worse. She went around the table and sat down heavily in the folding chair. She opened her fur mantle and set it back on her shoulders. Richard's sword was still strapped to her back, its hilt jutting up above her shoulder. She didn't bother to remove the sword.

Adie, at seeing Kahlan comply without complaint, smiled to herself and went on her way. Cara took up guard at the entrance as Kahlan's head sank down into her pillowed arms. Trying not to let the terrible events of the day overwhelm her, she instead thought of Richard, remembering his handsome smile, his penetrating gray eyes, his gentle touch. Her own eyes closed. In her weariness, the chair and table felt as if they were spinning her around. In moments, though, as she held her thoughts of Richard in her mind's eye, she felt herself sliding into sleep.

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CHAPTER 36

Mother Confessor?"

Kahlan squinted up at a dark shape above her. She blinked, clearing her vision, and saw that it was Verna. The gold sunburst ring of the Prelate of the Sisters of the Light reflected a glimmer of lamplight. Behind her, twilight tainted the tent canvas with a rusty glow.

Kahlan rubbed the sleep from her eyes. Verna wore a long, gray wool dress and a dark brown cloak. At her throat, the dress had a bit of white lace that softened the austerity of the outfit. Verna's brown hair had a carefree wave and spring to it, but her brown eyes held a troubled look.

"What is it, Verna?"

"If you have a moment, I would like to talk to you."

No doubt, Verna had been talking to Warren. Whenever Kahlan saw them together, the shared intimate glances, the chance furtive touch reminded her of the way she and Richard felt about each other. It softened Kahlan's feelings about Verna's stern exterior, to know she was in love-knowing, for that matter, that she was capable of tenderness. Kahlan knew that she, too, must be regarded with the same sort of curiosity, if not amazement, where tender feelings were concerned.

She sighed, wondering if this was going to be a "talk" about Ann and prophecy. Kahlan wasn't in the mood.

"Cara, how long have I been asleep?"

"A couple of hours. It will soon be dark."

As tight and sore as Kahlan's shoulders and neck were from sleeping with her head on the table, the lateness of the hour didn't come as a surprise. She stretched to the side and then saw the frail looking sorceress sitting on a short bench. She had a dark blanket over her lap.

"How do you feel?" Adie asked.

"I'm fine." Kahlan could see her breath in the frigid air. "The men we sent out?"

"Both groups be on their way, more than an hour ago," Adie said. "The first group, the Galeans, all left together in big columns. The Keltans dribbled out in small groups not as likely to be noticed by any spies watching."

Kahlan yawned. "Good."

She knew they had to fear an attack by the Imperial Order as soon as morning. At least that should give their men enough time to travel to their positions and be ready. Waiting for an attack made her stomach feel queasy. She knew the men, too, would be on edge and likely get little sleep.

Adie idly ran a thin finger back and forth along the red and yellow beads at the neckline of her modest robes. "I came back after the Galeans left, to help Cara keep people away so you would not be disturbed while you rested."

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Kahlan nodded her thanks. Apparently, either Adie thought Kahlan had rested enough, or she thought Verna's visit was important.

"What is it, then, Verna?"

"We have . . . discovered something. Not so much discovered it, as had an idea."

"Who is `we'?"

Verna cleared her throat. Under her breath she beseeched the Creator's forgiveness before she went on.

"Actually, Mother Confessor, I thought of it. Some of my Sisters helped me with it, but I'm the one who thought it up. The blame falls to me."

Kahlan thought that was an odd way of putting it. She didn't think Verna looked at all pleased by her own idea, whatever it was. Kahlan waited silently for her to go on.

"Well, you see, we have a problem getting things past the enemy's gifted. They have Sisters of the light, but also Dark, and we don't have their power. When we try to send things-"

"Send things?"

Verna pursed her lips. "Weapons."

When Kahlan's brow twitched with a questioning look, Verna bent and gathered something from the ground. She held out her open hand, showing Kahlan a collection of small pebbles.

"Zedd showed us how to turn simple things into devastating weapons. We can use our power to fling them or even with our breath blow on some small thing, like these pebbles, and use our magic to send them out faster than any arrow, even an arrow from a crossbow. The pebbles we flung out in this way cut down waves of advancing soldiers. The pebbles traveled so swiftly that sometimes each would pierce the bodies of half a dozen men."

"I remember those reports," Kahlan said. "But that stopped working because their gifted caught on to the artifice and now defend against such things."

Kahlan recognized the weary look of the weight of responsibility in Verna's brown eyes. "That's right. The Order learned how to look for things of magic, or even things propelled by magic. Most of our conjuring that is in any way similar has become useless."

"That's what Zedd told me-that in war magic is most often unseen, that each side manages only to balance the other."

Verna nodded. "It is so. We do the same against them. Things they used at first, we now know how to counter so we can protect our men. Our warning horns, for example. We learned that we must code them with a trace of magic to know they are genuine."

Kahlan drew her fur mantle up around her neck. She was chilled to the bone and couldn't seem to get warm. Not surprising, seeing as how she was spending all of her time outdoors. It was insanity to be carrying on a war in such conditions. She guessed that war in fine weather was no more sane. Still, she ached to be inside, beside a cozy fire.

"So what is this thing you thought up?"

As if reminded of the cold, Verna pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulders. "Well, I got the notion that if the enemy gifted are, in a sense, filtering for anything magic, or even anything being propelled by magic, then what we need is something not magic."

Kahlan gave Verna a grim smile. "We do. They're called soldiers."

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Verna didn't smile. "No. I meant something the gifted could do to disable enemy troops without risk to our own men."

Adie shuffled forward to stand behind Kahlan's left shoulder as Verna reached into her cloak and pulled out a small leather pouch closed with a drawstring. She tossed it on the table before Kahlan, then set a piece of paper beside it.

"Pour a little on the paper, please." Verna was holding her stomach as if she were having indigestion. "But be careful not to touch it with your finger or get it on your skin-and whatever you do, don't blow on it. Be careful not to even breathe on it."

Adie leaned in to watch as Kahlan carefully poured a small quantity of a sparkling dust from the pouch onto the square of paper. She pushed at the little pile with the corner of the pouch. There were hints of pallid colors, but it was mostly a pale, glimmering, greenish-gray.

"What is it? Some kind of magic dust?"

"Glass."

Kahlan's eyes turned up. "Glass. You thought up glass?"

Verna let out a tsk at herself for how foolish she must have sounded. "No, Mother Confessor. I thought of breaking it. You see, this is just simple glass that has been broken and crushed into fine pieces-almost dust. But we used our Han to aid us when we crushed the glass with a mortar and pestle. By using our gift, we were able to break the glass into very tiny fragments, but in a special way."

Verna leaned over, her finger hovering above the little greenish-gray mound. Cara leaned in beside her in order to look down at the dangerous thing on the piece of paper.

"This glass-every piece-is sharp and jagged, even though each piece is very tiny. Each piece is hardly bigger than dust, so it weighs nothing, almost like dust."

"Dear spirits," Adie said before whispering a prayer in her own language.

Kahlan cleared her throat. "I don't understand."

"Mother Confessor, we can't get our magic past the defenses of the Order's gifted. They are prepared for magic, even if it's a simple pebble but uses magic to hurl it at their troops.

"This glass, however, even though we used magic to break it, has no magic properties-none at all. It's just inert material, the same as the dust kicked up by their feet. They can't detect it as magic, because it isn't magic. Through their gift, they will sense this as simple as dust, or mist, or possibly fog, depending on atmospheric conditions at the time."

"But we sent dust clouds at them before," Kahlan said. "Dust to make them sick and such. They mostly countered it."

Verna held up a finger to note her point as she smiled a grim smile. "But those were dust clouds containing magic. Mother Confessor, this does not. Don't you see? It's so light it floats in the air for a long time. We could use simple magic to cast it up into the air, and then withdraw the magic, or we could simply fling it up into the breeze, for that matter. Either way, we have only to let their troops run through it."

"All right." Kahlan scratched an eyebrow. "But what will it do to them?"

"It will get in their eyes," Adie said in her raspy voice from behind Kahlan's shoulder.

"That's right," Verna said. "It gets in their eyes, just as any dust would. At first, it will feel like dust in their eyes and they will try to blink it away. However, since the fragments are all still jagged and razor sharp, they will instead embed themselves

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in the body's tissue. It will stick in their eyes, and build up under their eyelids, where it will make thousands of tiny cuts across their eyes with each blink. The more they blink, the more it eats away at their delicate eyes." Verna straightened and pulled her cloak together. "It will blind them."

Kahlan sat in numb disbelief at the madness of it all.

"Are you sure?" Cara asked. "Might it just irritate them, like gritty dust?"

"We know for sure," Verna said. "We . . . had an accident, and know all too well what it does. It may do more damage when it gets in the throat, the lungs, and the gut-we don't know about that, yet-but we do know for sure that such special glass, if we grind it to just the right size particles, will float in the air and people passing through the cloud will be blinded in remarkably short order. As long as we can blind a man, he can't fight. It may not kill them, but as long as they are blind they can't kill us, or fight back as we kill them."

Cara, usually gleeful at the prospect of killing the enemy, did not seem so, now. "We would have but to line them up and butcher them."

Kahlan put her head in her hands, covering her eyes.

"You want me to approve its use, don't you? That's why you're here."

Verna said nothing. Kahlan looked up at last.

"That's what you want, isn't it?"

"Mother Confessor, I need not tell you that the Sisters of the Light abhor harming people. However, this is a war for our very existence, for the very existence of free people. We know it must be done. If Richard were here . . . I just thought that you would want to be made aware of this, and be the one to give such orders."

Kahlan stared at the woman, understanding then why she was holding her hand over a pain in her stomach.

"Do you know, Prelate," Kahlan said in a near whisper, "that I killed a child today? Not by accident, but on purpose. I would do it again without hesitation. But that won't make me sleep any better."

"A child? It was truly necessary to . . . kill a child?"

"His name was Lyle. I believe you know him. He was another one of the victims of Ann's Sisters of the Light."

Verna, her face gone ashen, closed her eyes against the news.

"I guess if I can kill a child," Kahlan said, "I can easily enough give the orders for you to use your special glass against the monsters who would use a child as a weapon. I have sworn no mercy, and I meant it."

Adie laid a gnarled hand on Kahlan's shoulder.

"Kahlan," Verna said in a gentle voice, "I can understand how you feel. Ann used me, too, and I didn't understand why. I thought she used everyone for her own selfish purposes. For a time, I thought her a despicable person. You have every reason to believe as you do."

"But I would be wrong, Verna? Is that what you were going to add? I'd not be so sure, were I you. You didn't have to kill a little boy today."

Verna nodded in sympathy but didn't argue.

"Adie," Kahlan asked, "do you think there would be anything you might be able to do for the woman who was accidentally blinded? Perhaps you could help her?"

Adie nodded. "That be a good idea. Verna, take me to her, and let me see what I can do."

Kahlan cocked her head as the two women moved toward the tent opening. "Did you hear that?"

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"The horn?" Verna asked.

"Yes. It sounds like alarm horns."

Verna squinted in concentration. She turned her head to the side, listening attentively.

"Yes, it does sound like alarm horns," she finally declared, "but it doesn't have the right trace of magic through it. The enemy does that often-tries to get us to act based on false alarms. We've been having more and more lately."

Kahlan frowned. "We have? Why?"

"Why . . . what?"

Kahlan stood. "If we know they're false alarms, and they don't work, then why would the Order increase the attempts? That makes no sense."

Verna's gaze roved about as as if searching in vain for an answer. "Well, I don't know. I can't imagine. I'm no expert in the tactics of warfare."

Cara turned to go have a look. "Maybe it's just some scouts coming back in."

Kahlan turned her head, listening. She heard horses running, but that wasn't so rare. It could be, as Cara suggested, scouts returning with reports. But, by the sound of the hooves, the horses sounded big.

She heard men yelling. The clash of steel rang out-along with cries of pain.

Kahlan drew her Galean royal sword as she started around the table. Before any of them could get more than a step, the tent shuddered violently as something crashed against its walls. For an instant, the whole thing tipped at an impossible angle; then steel-tipped lances burst through the canvas. With a rush of wind the tent collapsed around them.

The heavy canvas drove Kahlan to the ground as it caved in. She couldn't get a grip on anything solid as the tent rolled her over and began dragging her along. Hooves thundered past, pounding the ground right beside her head.

She could smell lamp oil as it sloshed across the canvas. With a whoosh, the oil and the tent ignited. Kahlan coughed on the smoke. She could hear the crackle of flames. She could see nothing. She was trapped-rolled up in the bucking tent as it slid across the ground.

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CHAPTER 37

Tightly shrouded in stiff canvas, Kahlan couldn't see anything. She choked and gagged on the thick, acrid smoke burning her lungs. She pulled frantically at the canvas, trying to disentangle herself, but as she bounced and tumbled along the ground, she couldn't make any headway gaining her liberty. The heat of flames close to her face ignited in her a sense of panic. Her weariness forgotten, she kicked and struggled madly as she gasped for air.

"Where are you!"

It was Cara's voice. It sounded close, as if she, too, was being dragged along and strenuously engaged in her own fight for life. Cara was smart enough not to shout Kahlan's name or title when surrounded by the enemy; hopefully, Verna knew better, as well.

"Here!" Kahlan shouted in answer to Cara.

Kahlan's sword was trapped, pressed to her legs by the rolled canvas. She managed to wiggle her left hand up onto the knife at her belt. She yanked it free. She had to turn her face to try to keep away from the heat of the oily flames. The smothering smoky blindness was terrifying.

With angry resolve, Kahlan stabbed at the canvas, punching her knife through. Just then, the tent hit something and they were bounced into the air. The hard landing knocked the wind from her lungs. A gasp pulled in suffocating smoke. Again, Kahlan plunged her knife into the heavy canvas and slashed an opening as her entire shroud erupted into flame.

She yelled again to Cara. "I can't get-"

The tent hit something solid. Her shoulder whacked hard into what felt like a tree stump and she was flipped up and over the top of it. Had she not been wearing her stiff leather armor, the blow surely would have broken her shoulder. Crashing down on the other side, Kahlan tumbled free and across the snow. She spread her arms to stop herself from rolling.

Kahlan saw General Meiffert reach up, seize a fistful of chain mail, and unhorse the man who had been dragging her tent. The man's eyes gleamed from behind long, curly, greasy hair. His stout body was covered with hides and furs over chain mail and leather armor. He was missing his upper teeth. As he lunged at the general, he lost his head, too.

Yet more Order troops wheeled their big warhorses, striking down at the D'Harans scrambling both to escape the blows and to mount a defense. One of the warhorses charged Kahlan's way, its rider leaning out, swinging a flail. Kahlan sheathed both her knife and sword. She snatched up the lance of the man who had been dragging the tent. She brought the long weapon up and spun around just in time to

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plant the butt end in a frozen rut and let the charging warhorse take the steel-tipped point in his chest.

As the grinning Order soldier with the flail leaped from the staggering horse, he drew his sword with his free hand. Kahlan didn't wait; as he was still alighting on his feet, she spun while drawing her own sword and landed a solid backhanded blow across the left side of his face.

Without pause, she dove under the legs of another horse to dodge a blade when the horse's rider slashed down at her. She sprang up on the other side and hacked the rider's leg open to the bone twice before turning just in time to ram her sword up to its hilt into the chest of another horse sidling in, trying to crush her against the first. As the animal reared with a wild scream, Kahlan yanked her sword free and tumbled away just before the big horse crashed to the ground. The rider's leg was trapped, and he was at an awkward angle to defend himself Kahlan made the best of the opportunity.

For the moment, the immediate area was clear, enabling her to scramble over to the tent where the general was on his knees, yanking at the snarled mess of canvas and rope. More Order cavalry were thundering past, threatening to trample Verna, Adie, and Cara still trapped in the tangle of tent. At least the burning section had pulled away.

Kahlan worked beside General Meiffert to tug and cut the canvas. At last they ripped open the heavy material, freeing Adie and Verna. The two women were rolled up together, nearly in each another's arms. Adie's head was bleeding, but she pushed away Kahlan's concerned hands. Verna emerged from the cocoon and stumbled to her feet, still dizzy from the wild ride.

Kahlan helped Adie up. The scrape on her brow didn't look too serious. General Meiffert pulled frantically at the canvas. Cara was still inside, somewhere, but they no longer heard her.

Kahlan seized Verna by the arm. "I thought they were false alarms!"

"They were!" Verna insisted. "Obviously, they tricked us."

All around, soldiers were engaged in pitched battle with Imperial Order cavalry. Men shouted in fury as they threw themselves into battle; some screamed as they were wounded or killed; others called out orders, commanding a defense, while the men on horseback ordered in their attack.

Some of the cavalry were setting fire to wagons, tents, and supplies. Others charged past, trampling men and tents. Pairs of riders teamed up to single out soldiers and take them down, then charged after another victim.

They were using the same tactics the D'Harans had used. They were doing what Kahlan had taught them to do.

When a soldier, draped in filthy fur and weapons, cried out in bravado as he rushed at her wielding a raised mace studded with glistening bloody spikes, Kahlan took his hand off with a lightning-swift blow. He staggered to a stop and stared a her in surprise. Without missing a beat, she drove her sword into his gut and gave it a wrenching twist before pulling it free. She turned her attention elsewhere as he crashed down atop a fire. His screams melted in with all the others.

Kahlan fell to her knees once more to help General Meiffert free Cara. He had found her amid the snare of rope and folds of canvas. From time to time one of them had to turn to fight off sporadic attackers. Kahlan could see Cara's red boots sticking out from under the canvas, but they were still.

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Tent line was tangled around Cara's legs. With Kahlan and the general working together, they cut through the mire of rope and were finally able to unroll Cara. She held her head as she moaned. She wasn't unconscious, but she was groggy and unable to get her bearings. Kahlan found a lump in her hair, at the right side of her head, but it wasn't bleeding.

Cara tried to sit up. Kahlan pressed her down on her back.

"Stay there. You were hit on the head. I don't want you to get up just yet."

Kahlan looked over her shoulder and saw Verna, nearby, singling out Imperial Order troops, each twitch of her hands casting a fiery spell to blast them from their horses, or a focused edge of air as sharp as any blade, yet more swift and sure, to slice them down. Without the gift themselves, or one of the gifted to protect them, the enemy's simple armor was no defense.

Kahlan caught Verna's attention and motioned for her help. Seizing the woman's cloak at her shoulder, Kahlan pulled Verna close to speak into her ear so as to be heard above the noise of battle.

"See how she is, will you? Help her?"

Verna nodded and then huddled at Cara's side as Kahlan and the general turned to a fresh charge of cavalry. As one man galloped in close, wielding his lance around, General Meiffert dodged the strike and then leaped up onto the side of the horse, catching hold of the saddle's horn. With a grunt of angry effort, he drove his sword through the rider. The surprised man clawed at the blade in his soft middle. The general yanked his sword free, then grabbed the man by the hair and dragged him out of the saddle. As the dying man fell away, General Meiffert sprang up into the saddle, in his place. Kahlan snatched up the fallen cavalryman's lance.

The big D'Haran general wheeled the huge horse into the way of charging enemy cavalry, protecting Verna and Cara. Kahlan sheathed her sword and used the lance to good effect against the warhorses. Horses, even well-trained warhorses, didn't appreciate being stabbed in the chest. Many people considered them just dumb beasts, but horses were smart enough to understand that driving themselves onto a pointed lance was not what they wanted to do, and reacted accordingly.

As horses bucked and reared when Kahlan stabbed them with her lance, many of their riders fell. Some were injured from the fall onto scattered equipment or the frozen ground, but most came under the swarming attack of the D'Harans.

From atop his Imperial Order warhorse, General Meiffert commanded his men to form a defensive line. After directing them into place, he charged off, roaring a string of orders as he went. He didn't tell his men who to protect, so as not to betray Kahlan to the enemy, but they quickly saw what it was he intended them to do. D'Harans grabbed up the enemy lances, or came running with their own pikes, and soon there was a bristling line of steel-tipped pole weapons presenting a deadly obstacle to any approaching cavalry.

Kahlan called out orders to men on either side, and, as she joined the line, commanded them into position to block an Imperial Order cavalry unit of about two hundred who were trying to make good their escape. The enemy might have been emulating the raids the D'Haran cavalry had made on the Imperial Order's camp, but Kahlan wasn't about to allow them to succeed at it. She intended them to fail.

The enemy's horses balked when they encountered a solid line of advancing pikes brandished by men shouting battle cries. Soldiers coming from behind the Order cavalry rained down arrows. D'Harans dragged trapped riders from their saddles, down into the bloody hand-to-hand fighting on the ground.

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"I don't want one of them escaping camp alive!" she yelled to her men. "No mercy!"

"No mercy!" every D'Haran within earshot called out in answer.

The enemy, so confident and arrogant as they had charged in, relishing the prospect of spilling D' Haran blood, were now nothing more than pathetic men in the ungainly grip of despair as the D'Harans hacked them to death.

Kahlan left the soldiers with the lances and pikes, now that a defensive line had been established and the enemy was trapped, and ran back through the fires and choking smoke to find Verna, Adie, and Cara. She had to dodge wounded soldiers of both armies on the ground. The fallen attackers who still had fight in them snatched at her ankles. She had to stab several who tried to rise up to grab her. Others afoot who suddenly appeared, she had to cut down.

The enemy knew who she was, or at least they were pretty sure. Jagang had seen her, and no doubt had described the Mother Confessor to his men. Kahlan was sure to have a heavy price on her head.

There seemed to be Imperial Order men scattered throughout the camp. She doubted there had been an attack by foot soldiers; they were probably cavalrymen who had lost their mounts. Horses were often easier moving targets to hit with arrows and spears than were men. In the gathering darkness it was hard to make out enemy soldiers. They were able to sneak through the camp undiscovered as they hunted targets of value, such as officers, or maybe even the Mother Confessor.

When the lurking enemy spotted Kahlan making her way through the chaos, they came out from their hiding places to go after her with wild abandon. Others, she came upon and surprised. Remembering not only her father's training, but Richard's admonition, Kahlan cut fiercely into the enemy soldiers. She gave them no opening; no chance; no mercy.

Her training under her father had been a good foundation for the esoteric tactical precepts that Richard had taught her when she was recovering from her wounds back in Hartland. Richard's way had seemed so strange, then; now, it seemed so natural. In much the same way a lighter horse could outmaneuver a big warhorse, her lighter weight became her edge. She didn't need the weight because she simply didn't clash with the enemy in the traditional manner, as they expected. She was a hummingbird, floating out of their reach, swooping in between their ponderous moves to efficiently deliver death.

Such moves were not at odds with the manner of fighting that her father had taught, but complemented it in a way that fit her. Richard had trained her not with a sword, but with a willow switch, a mischievous smile, and a dangerous glint in his eyes. Now, Richard's sword, strapped over the back of her shoulder, was an everpresent reminder of those playful lessons that had been not only unrelenting, but deadly serious.

She finally found Verna, bent over Cara, but didn't see the general anywhere. Kahlan snatched Verna's sleeve.

"How is she?"

"She threw up, but that seemed to have helped, once it passed. She will probably be woozy for a while, but I think she's otherwise all right."

I "She has a thick skull," Adie said. "It not be cracked, but she should lie still for

a time-at least until she recovers her balance."

Cara's hands groped as if having trouble finding the ground beneath her. Despite

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her obvious dizziness, she was cursing the Prelate and trying to sit up. Kahlan, squatting beside Cara, pressed her shoulder to the ground.

"Cara, I'm right here. I'm fine. Lie still for a few minutes."

"I want at them!"

"Later," Kahlan said. "Don't worry, you'll get your chance." She saw that the blood was cleaned from Adie's head. "Adie, how are you? How is your head?"

The old sorceress gestured dismissively. "Bah. I be fine. My head be thicker than Cara's."

Soldiers had gathered, forming a protective wall of steel. Verna, Adie, and Kahlan crouched over Cara, keeping an eye on the surrounding area, but the fighting immediately around them seemed to have ended. Even if pockets of battle remained, with the large number of D'Haran soldiers who had protectively closed ranks, the four women were safe for the time being.

General Meiffert finally returned, charging through the line of D'Haran defenders as they parted for him. He leaped from his enemy warhorse. The horse tossed his head at the indignity of being ridden by the enemy, and ran off. The young D'Haran general crouched down on the opposite side of Cara. Winded, he started talking anyway.

"I've been down checking with the front lines. This is a raid, much like what we've been doing to them. It looked bigger than it really was. When they spotted the Mother Confessor, they called their men into this area, so the damage was mostly focused in this section."

"Why didn't we know?" Kahlan asked. "What went wrong with the alarm?"

"Not sure." He was shaking his head, still getting his breath. "Zedd thinks that they learned our codes, and that when we blew the alarm, they must have used Subtractive Magic to alter the magic woven into the sound that tells our gifted that it's a real attack."

Kahlan let out an angry breath. It was all starting to make sense to her. "That's why there have been so many false alarms. They were numbing us to them so that when they attacked, we would be unconcerned, falsely believing our own alarms were just another enemy false alarm."

"I'm guessing you're right." He flexed his fist in frustration. He looked down then and noticed Cara scowling up at him. "Cara. Are you all right? I was so-I mean, we thought you might be badly hurt."

"No," she said, casting a cool glare at Verna and Kahlan, each of whom used a hand to hold her shoulders down. She casually crossed her ankles. "I just thought you could handle it, so I decided to take a nap."

General Meiffert gave her a quick smile and then turned a serious face to Kahlan.

"It gets worse. This cavalry attack was a diversion. They hoped it might get you, I'm sure, but it was meant to make us believe it was just a raid."

Kahlan felt her flesh go cold with dread. "They're coming, aren't they?"

He nodded. "The entire force. They're still a distance out, but you're right, they're coming. This was just to throw us into confusion and keep us distracted."

Kahlan stared, dumbfounded. The Order had never attacked at sunset before. The prospect of the onslaught of hundreds of thousands upon hundreds of thousands of Imperial Order troops storming in from the darkness was bloodcurdling.

"They've changed their tactics," Kahlan whispered to herself. "He's a quick study. I thought I'd tricked him, but I was the one who was taken in."

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"What are you mumbling about?" Cara asked, her fingers locked together over her stomach.

"Jagang. He counted on me not being fooled by those troops going around in a circle. He wanted me to think I had outsmarted him. He played me for a fool."

Cara made a face. "What?"

Kahlan felt sick at the implications. She pressed a hand to her forehead as the awful truth inundated her.

"Jagang wanted me to think I had his scheme figured out, so we would pretend to play along and send out our troops. He probably figured they wouldn't be sent after his decoy, but would be used instead against his real plan of attack. He didn't care about that, though. All along, he was planning on changing his tactics. He was waiting only until those troops left so that he could attack before they were in place and while our numbers were reduced."

"You mean," Cara asked, "that whole time you were talking to him, pretending to believe he was moving troops north, he knew you were pretending?"

"I'm afraid so. He outsmarted me."

"Maybe, maybe not," General Meiffert said. "He hasn't succeeded, yet. We don't have to let him have it his way. We can move our forces before he can pounce."

"Can't we call back the men we sent out?" Verna asked. "Their numbers would help."

"They're hours away," General Meiffert said, "traveling through back country on the way to their assigned locations. They would never get back here in time to help us tonight."

Rather than dwell on how gullible she had been, Kahlan put her mind to the immediate problem. "We need to move fast."

The general nodded his agreement. "We could fall back on our other plansabout breaking up and scattering into the mountains."

He ran his fingers back through his blond hair. The gesture of frustration unexpectedly reminded Kahlan of Richard. "But if we do that, we would have to abandon most of our supplies. In winter, without supplies, a number of our men wouldn't last long. Either way, killed in battle or dying of hunger and cold-you're just as dead."

"Broken up like that, we would be easy pickings," Kahlan agreed. "That's a last resort. It may work later, but not now. For now, we need to keep the army together if we're to survive the winter-and if we're to keep the Order distracted from its designs at conquest."

"We dare not allow them to go uncontested into a city. It would not only be a bloodbath, but if they picked the right city, we would face a near impossible task of dislodging them." The general shook his head. "It could end up being the end of our hopes of driving them back to the Old World."

Kahlan gestured over her shoulder. "What about that valley we talked about, back there? The high pass is narrow-it can be defended on this side by two men and a dog, if need be."

"That's what I was thinking," he said. "It keeps the army together-and keeps the Order having to contend with us, rather than being able to turn their attention on any cities. If they try to move around us up into the Midlands, there are easy northern routes out of the valley from which we can strike. We have more men on

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the way, and we can send for others; we need to stay together and maintain our engagement with the Order's army until those forces arrive."

"Then what are we waiting for?" Verna asked. "Let's get moving."

He gave her a worried look. "The problem right now is that if we're to make it into that valley before the Order can pounce on us, we're going to need more time to do it. The pass is too narrow for wagons. The horses can make it, but not the wagons-they'll have to be dismantled. Most of our equipment is designed to be knocked down so the parts can be portaged, if need be. We'll have to leave a few that aren't. It won't take long to get started, but we're going to need time to funnel all the men and supplies over that narrow pass-especially in the dark."

"Torches will work well enough with a steady line of men," Adie said. "They must only follow the one in front, and even if the fight be bad, they can do it."

Kahlan remembered the handprint made of glowing dust. "The gifted could lay down a glowing track to guide the men."

"That would help," the general said. "We're still left with our basic problem, though. While our men are trying to break down and move all our equipment and supplies, and waiting their turn to go over the pass, the Order will arrive. We'll find ourselves in a pitched battle trying to defend ourselves while withdrawing at the same time. A withdrawal requires the ability to move faster than the enemy, or at least keep him at bay while pulling back; the pass doesn't provide that."

"We've kept ahead of them before," Verna said. "This isn't the first attack."

"You're right." He pointed to his left. "We could try to withdraw up this valley, instead, but in the dark and with the Order attacking, I think that would be a mistake. Darkness is the problem, this time. They're going to keep coming. In daylight, we could establish defenses and hold them off-not at night."

"We already have defenses set up, here," Cara said. "We could stand where we are and fight them head-on."

General Meiffert chewed his lower lip. "That was my first thought, Cara, and still an option, but I don't like our chances in a head-on, direct confrontation like this, not at night when they can sneak great numbers of men in close. We couldn't use our archers to advantage in the dark. We can't see their numbers or movements accurately, so we wouldn't be able to position our men properly. It's a problem of numbers: theirs are almost unlimited, ours aren't.

"We don't have enough gifted to cover every possibility-and in war it's always what you don't cover that gets hit. The enemy could pour through a gap, get in behind us in the dark, without us even realizing it, and then we're finished."

Everyone was silent as the implications truly sank in.

"I agree," Kahlan said. "The pass is the only chance we have to keep from losing a major battle tonight-along with a huge number of our men. The risk without real benefit of standing and fighting is a poor choice."

The general appraised her eyes. "That still leaves us with the problem of how we're going to get over that pass before they annihilate us."

Kahlan turned to Verna. "We need you to slow the enemy down to give us the time we need to get our army over that pass."

"What do you wish me to do?"

"Use your special glass."

The general screwed up his face. "Her what?"

"A weapon of magic," Cara said. "To blind the enemy troops."

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Verna looked thunderstruck. "But I'm not ready. We only made up a small batch. I'm not ready."

Kahlan turned back to the general. "What did the scouts say about how much time we have until the Order is upon us?"

"The Order could be here within an hour, at the soonest, two at the latest. If we don't slow them down, we'll never make it out of this valley with our men and supplies. If we can't find a way to delay them, we can only run for the hills, or stand and fight. Neither is a choice I would make except in desperation."

"If we just run for the hills," Adie said, "we be as good as dead. Together, we be alive and at least be a threat to the enemy. If we scatter, the Order will take the opportunity to attack and capture cities. If our only choice is to scatter, or stand our ground and fight, then we can only choose to stand and fight. Better to try, than to die one at a time out in the mountains."

Kahlan rubbed her fingers across her brow as she tried to think. Jagang had changed his tactics and decided to engage them in a night battle. He had never done that before because it would be so costly for him, but with his numbers, he apparently wasn't concerned about that. Jagang held life in little regard.

"If we have to fight him, in a full battle, here, now," Kahlan said in resignation, "we will probably lose the war by dawn."

"I agree," the general finally said. "As far as I see it, we have no choice. We have to act quickly and get as many of our men over the pass as we can. We'll lose all those who don't get over before the Order arrives, but we'll manage to preserve some."

The four of them were silent a moment, each considering the horror of that reality, of who would remain behind to die. Furious activity continued around them. Men were rushing around, putting out fires, collecting panicked horses, tending to wounded, and battling the few remaining invaders they had trapped. The Order soldiers were greatly outnumbered. Not for long, though.

Kahlan's mind raced. She couldn't help being furious with herself at being gulled. Richard's words echoed through her mind: think of the solution, not the problem. The solution was the only thing that mattered now.

Kahlan looked again to Verna. "We have an hour before they're upon us. You have to try, Verna. Do you think you have any chance at making your special glass and then deploying it before the enemy is upon us?"

"I will do my best-you have my word on that. I wish I could promise more." Verna scrambled to her feet. "I'll need the Sisters who are tending the wounded, of course. What about the ones working at the front lines? The ones countering enemy magic? Can I have any of them?"

"Take them all," Kahlan said. "If this doesn't work, nothing else is going to matter."

"I'll take them all, then. Every one," Verna said. "It's the only chance we have."

"You get started," Adie told Verna. "Go down near the front lines, on this side of the valley where you will be upwind from the attack. I will begin collecting the Sisters and get them down there to help you."

"We need glass," Verna said to the general. "Any kind. At least a few barrels full."

"I'll have men down there with the first barrel right away. Can we at least help to break it up for you?"

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"No. It won't matter if what you throw in the barrels breaks, but beyond that, it must be done by the gifted. Just bring whatever glass you can collect, that will be all you can do."

The general promised her he would see to it. Holding her hem up out of her way, Verna ran off to the task. Adie was close on her heels.

"I'll get the men moving now," the general told Kahlan as he scrambled to his feet. "The scouts can mark the trail; then we can start moving the heavier supplies first."

If it worked, they would slip out of Jagang's grasp.

Kahlan knew that if Verna failed, they could all very well lose their lives, and the war, by morning. General Meiffert paused with one last hesitant look, one last chance for her to change her mind.

"Do it," she said to the general. "Cara-we have work."

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CHAPTER 38

Kahlan pulled her horse up short. She felt the heat of blood rushing to her face. "What are you doing?" Cara asked as Kahlan threw her leg over the horse's neck and leaped to the ground.

The moon lit a layer of lacy clouds scudding past, giving a faint, serene illumination to the surrounding countryside. The thin layer of snow gathered the muted light of the moon to make it more luminous than it otherwise would be.

Kahlan pointed in the direction of the small figure she could just make out in the dim light. The skinny girl, surely not much past ten years, was standing at a barrel, ramming a metal rod down inside to smash the glass in the bottom. Kahlan handed the reins to Cara as soon as she had dismounted.

Kahlan stalked over to the Sisters working on the snowy ground. Running off in a haphazard line, to keep the wind at their backs, were over a hundred of the women, all focused intently on the work before them. Many had their cloaks tented around themselves and their work.

Not far down that line, Kahlan bent, put a hand under the Prelate's arm, and lifted her to her feet. Mindful of the serious nature of the work going on, Kahlan at least kept her voice quiet, since she wasn't able to make it congenial.

"Verna, what is Holly doing down here?"

Verna glanced over the heads of a dozen intervening Sisters kneeling before a long board, breeze at their backs, carefully griding glass chips with pestles in mortars. There being not nearly enough pestles and mortars, many of the women to the other side were using dished rocks and round stones to carefully crunch the glass chips. The concentration showed on each woman's face. The accident that had blinded a Sister had happened when the wind had changed, and a gust had blown her work back up in her face. The same thing could happen again at any time, although, as darkness had settled in, the wind had at least died down to a steady breeze.

Holly was bundled in an oversized cloak. She had a determined grimace as she lifted the rod and then let it drop down in the barrel set away from the Sisters' dangerous work. Kahlan saw that the rod had a faint greenish glow to it.

"She's helping, Mother Confessor."

"She's a child!"

Verna pointed off into the darkness, to what Kahlan hadn't seen. "So are Helen and Valery."

Kahlan pinched the bridge of her nose between her first finger and thumb and took a purging breath. "What madness would possess you to have children down here near the front helping to-to blind people?"

Verna glanced at the women working nearby. She took Kahlan's arm by the elbow and led her out of earshot of the others. Alone, where they were less likely

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to be heard, she folded her hands before herself as she assumed the stern visage that came so naturally to her.

"Kahlan, Holly may be a child, but she is a gifted child, and she is far from stupid besides. That goes for Helen and Valery as well. Holly has seen more in her young life than any child should see. She knows what's going on tonight, with that attack, and with the attack that's coming. She was terrified-all the children were."

"So you bring her to the front-to the greatest danger?"

"What would you have me do? Send her back somewhere to be watched over by soldiers? Do you wish me to force her to be alone at a time like this so she could only tremble in terror?"

"But this is-"

"She's gifted. Despite how horrific it seems, this is better for her, as it is for the others. She's with the Sisters, who understand her and her ability as other people can't. Don't you recall the comfort you derived from being with older Confessors who knew the way you felt about things?"

Kahlan did, but said nothing.

"The Sisters are the only family she and the other novices have, now. Holly is not alone and afraid. She may still be afraid, but she's doing something to help us, so that her fear is channeled into something that will assist in overcoming the cause of her fear."

Kahlan's brow was still set in a glare. "Verna, she's a child."

"And you had to kill a child today. I understand. But don't let that terrible event make it harder on Holly. Yes, this is an awful thing she is helping to do, but this is the reality of the way things are. She could die tonight, along with the rest of us. Can you even imagine what those brutes would do to her, first? At least that much is beyond the imagination of her young mind. What she can comprehend, though, is fear enough.

"If she wanted to hide somewhere, I would have let her, but she has a right-if she so chooses-to contribute to saving herself. She is gifted and can use her power to do the simple part of what needs doing. She begged me to give her the chance to help."

In anguish, Kahlan gathered her fur mantle at her throat as she glanced back over her shoulder at the little girl using both her spindly arms to lift the heavy steel rod and drop it again to break the glass in the bottom of the barrel. Holly's features were drawn tight as she concentrated on using her gift while at the same time lifting the weight of the rod.

"Dear spirits," Kahlan whispered to herself, "this is madness."

Cara impatiently shifted her weight to her other foot. It wasn't indifference to the situation, but a matter of priorities. Madness or not, there was little tine left, and, as Verna said, they could all die before the night was finished. As cruel as it sounded, there were more important matters than the life of one child, or, for that matter, three.

"How is the work going? Are you going to be ready?"

Verna's bold expression finally faltered. "I don't know." She lifted a hand hesitantly, motioning out over the dark valley before them. "The wind is right, but the valley approach to our forces is quite broad. It's not that we won't have some, it's that we need to have enough so that when the enemy gets close, we can release the glass dust to float across the span of the entire field of battle."

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"But you have some. Surely, what you have will do damage to the enemy."

"If there isn't enough, then they may skirt it, or it may not be concentrated enough to do the damage necessary to bring their forces to a halt. Their attack will not be turned back by a small number of casualties." Verna squeezed one fist in her other hand. "If the Creator will just slow the Imperial Order enough to grant us another hour, at the least, then I believe we may have enough."

Kahlan wiped a hand across her face. That was asking a lot, but with the darkness, she thought that it just might be possible that the Order would have to go slow enough to give Verna and her Sisters the time they needed.

"And you're sure we can't help? There is nothing any but the gifted can do to assist you?"

Verna's mask of authority again emerged in the moonlight.

"Well, yes, there is one thing."

"What is it, then?"

"You could leave me alone so I can work."

Kahlan sighed. "Just promise me one thing." Verna raised an eyebrow as if willing to listen prudently. "When the attack comes, and you have to use this special glass, get the children out of here first? Get them to the rear, where they can be taken over the pass to safety."

Verna smiled with relief. "We are of like minds in that, Mother Confessor."

As Verna hurried back to her work, Kahlan and Cara returned along the line of Sisters, past the end to where Holly was preparing glass to supply those gifted women. Kahlan couldn't help but to stop for a word.

"Holly, how are you getting along?"

When the girl rested the rod against the side of the barrel, Cara, absent any fondness for magic, aimed a suspicious frown at the faintly glowing metal. As Holly took her small hands from the metal, the greenish glow faded, as if a magical wick had been turned down.

"I'm fine, Mother Confessor. Except I'm cold. I'm getting terribly tired of being cold."

Kahlan smiled warmly as she ran a gentle hand down the back of Holly's fine hair. "As are we all." Kahlan crouched down beside the girl. "When we get over into another valley, you can get warm by a nice fire."

"That would be splendid." She cast a furtive glance at her steel rod. "I have to get back to work, Mother Confessor."

Kahlan couldn't resist pulling the girl close and kissing her frigid cheek. Hesitant at first, the thin little arms surrendered to desperately encircle Kahlan's neck.

"I'm so scared," Holly whispered.

"Me too," Kahlan whispered back as she squeezed the girl tight. "Me too."

Holly straightened. "Really? You get scared, too, that those awful men will murder us?"

Kahlan nodded. "I get frightened, but I know we have a lot of good people who will keep us safe. Like you, they work as hard as they can so that we can all someday be safe, and not have to be scared anymore."

The girl stuck her hands under her cloak to warm them. Her gaze sank to the ground at her feet. "I miss Ann, too." She looked up again. "Is Ann safe?"

Kahlan groped for words of comfort. "I saw Ann not long ago, and she was fine. I don't think you need worry for her."

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"She saved me. I love her and miss her so. Will she be with us, soon?"

Kahlan cupped the girl's cheek. "I don't know, Holly. She had important business she was taking care of. I'm sure, though, that we'll see her again."

Pleased with that news and seemingly relieved to know that she was not alone in her fears, Holly turned back to her work with renewed determination.

As Kahlan and Cara collected their horses, they heard a horse approaching at a gallop. Before she recognized the rider, Kahlan saw and recognized the black splotch on its rump. When he saw her waving, Zedd trotted Spider around to her. He slid down off the animal's bare back.

"They're coming," the wizard announced without preamble.

--]--- Verna rushed up, having seen Zedd ride in. "It's too soon! They weren't supposed to be here this soon!"

He gaped at her in astonishment. "Bags, woman, shall I tell them that it would be rather inconvenient for them to attack right now and to please come back to kill us later?"

"You know what I mean," she snapped. "We don't have enough, yet."

"How long till they get here?" Kahlan asked.

"Ten minutes."

That thin sliver of time was the only bulwark between them and catastrophe. Kahlan felt as if her heart rose into her throat, recalling suddenly the forsaken feeling of being mobbed and beaten to death. Verna sputtered in wordless frustration, anger, and dread.

"Do you have any ready?" Zedd asked as calmly as if he were inquiring about dinner.

"Yes, of course," she said. "But if they will be here that soon, we've not enough. Dear Creator, we don't have nearly what we'll need in order to drift it out all across the front. Too little is as good as none."

"We've no choice, now." Zedd gazed off into the darkness, perhaps seeing what only a wizard could see. His jaw was set in bitter disappointment. He spoke in a disembodied voice, a man going through the motions when he knew he had come to the end of his options, perhaps even his faith. "Start releasing what you have. We'll just have to hope for the best. I have messengers with me; I'll send word of the situation back to General Meiffert. He will need to know." To see Zedd seemly relinquish hope cast their fate in the most frightening light possible. Zedd was always the one who kept them focused and gave them courage, conviction, and confidence. He gathered up Spider's reins in one hand and gripped her mane with the other.

"Wait," Kahlan said.

He paused and looked back at her. His eyes were a window into an inner weariness. She couldn't imagine all the struggles he had faced in his life, or even in the last few weeks. Kahlan ran through seemingly a thousand thoughts as she searched frantically for some way of turning away their grim fate.

Kahlan couldn't let Zedd down. He had so often carried them; now he needed another shoulder to help endure the weight. She presented him a look of fierce determination before she turned to the Prelate.

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"Verna, what if we didn't release it in the way we planned? What if we didn't simply let it drift out, hoping for the breeze to. carry it where we need it?"

Verna opened her hands in a bewildered gesture. "What do you mean?"

"Won't it take more of the glass-the amount you say you need-simply so that there is enough to let it drift all the way across the valley, and yet have enough to hang in the air, too?"

"Well . . . yes, of course, but-"

"What if," Kahlan asked, "we released it in a line along the face of the front? Right where it was needed. Then it would take less, wouldn't it?"

"Well I suppose." Verna threw up her hands. "But I told you, we can't use magic to help us or they will detect our conjuring and then they will shield for the glass as fast as we release it. It will be useless. Better to release what we have and hope for the best."

Kahlan glanced out over the empty plain faintly lit by the placid clouds veiling the moon. There was nothing to be seen out in the valley. Soon, there would be. Soon, the virgin snow would be trampled by the boots of over a million men.

Only the sound of glass being crushed on stone and the thump of the steel rods in the barrels disturbed the quiet darkness. Soon, bloodcurdling battle cries would inundate the hush of the night.

Kahlan felt the suffocating dread she had felt when she first realized that all those men had caught her alone. She felt the anger, too.

"Collect what you've made so far," she said. "Let me have it."

They all stared at her.

Zedd's brow drew together in a wrinkled knot. "Just what are you thinking?"

Kahlan pulled her hair back from her face as she rapidly pieced together her plan, so that it was whole in her own mind, first.

"The enemy is attacking into the wind-not directly, but close enough for our purpose. I'm thinking that if I ride along the front of our line, right in front of the advancing enemy troops, and I release the glass dust, letting it dribble out as I go, then it will flow out in the wind behind me, right into the faces of the enemy. Delivering it right where it's needed, it won't take as much as it would were we to let it drift out from here hoping to spread it all across the valley." She looked from one startled face to another. "Do you see what I'm saying? Closer to the enemy, wouldn't it take much less to do the job?"

"Dear Creator," Verna protested, "do you have any idea how dangerous that would be?"

"Yes," Kahlan answered in grim resolve. "A lot less dangerous than facing a direct attack by their entire force. Now, would that work? Wouldn't it take considerably less if I were to ride along the front, trickling it out as I went, than letting it drift out to them from here? Well? We're running out of time."

"You're right-it wouldn't take nearly as much." Verna touched her lip as she stared off into the darkness while considering. "It's better than the way we were going to do it, that much is sure."

Kahlan started pushing her. "Get it together. Now. Hurry."

Verna abandoned her protests and ran off to collect what they had. Cara was about to unleash a tirade of objections when Zedd lifted a hand as if to ask she let him do the objecting, instead.

"Kahlan, it sounds like you might have something here, but someone else can do this. It's foolish to risk-"

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"I'll be needing a diversion," she said, cutting him off. "Something to distract their attention. I'll be riding by in the dark, so they probably won't notice me, but it would be best if there were something to occupy their attention, just in case, something to make them look elsewhere-for the last time."

"As I was saying, someone else can-"

"No," she said in quiet finality. "I'll not ask someone else to do this. It was my idea. I'm doing it. I won't allow someone to take my place."

Kahlan deemed herself responsible for the peril they were in. It was she who had blundered and fallen for Jagang's trick. It was she who had come up with the plan and ordered the troops out. It was she who made Jagang's night attack possible.

Kahlan knew all too well the terror everyone felt, waiting for the attack. She felt it herself. She thought of Holly, fearful of being murdered by the marauding beasts coming out of the night for her. The fear was all too real.

It would be Kahlan who had lost the war for them, this very night, if they didn't get their army back across that pass to safety.

"I'm doing this myself," she repeated. "That's the way it's going to be. Standing here arguing about it can only cost us our chance. Now, I need a diversion, and I need one quickly."

Zedd let out an angry breath. The fire was back in his eyes. He flicked out his hand, pointing. "Warren is back there waiting for me. The two of us will move to separate locations and give you your diversion."

"What will you do?"

At last, Zedd surrendered to a grim, cunning grin. "Nothing fancy, this time. No clever devious tricks, like they no doubt expect. This time, we'll give them a good old-fashioned firefight."

Kahlan gave a sharp tug to the strap at her ribs holding her leather armor on her shoulders, chest, and back, cinching it down tight. She nodded once to seal the pact.

"Wizard's fire it is, then."

"Keep an eye to your right, to our side, as you ride. I don't want you to get in the way of what I mean for the enemy. You must also watch for what their gifted send back at me."

As she secured her cloak, she nodded assent to Zedd's brief instructions. She checked the straps on her leg armor, making sure they were tight, remembering how the enemy's strong fingers had clawed at her legs, trying to unhorse her.

Verna came-rushing back, a big bucket at the end of each arm pulled down straight by the weight. Some of the Sisters were scurrying along beside her.

"All right," the winded Prelate said. "Let's go."

Kahlan reached for the buckets. "I'll take-"

Verna yanked them back. "How do you propose to ride and sprinkle this out? It's too much. Besides, you don't know its properties."

:'Verna, I'm not letting you-"

"Stop acting like an obstinate child. Let's go."

Cara snatched one of the buckets. "Verna is right, Mother Confessor. You can't hold on to your horse, release the glass dust, and carry both buckets all at the same time. You two take that one, I'll take this one."

The willowy Sister Philippa rushed to Cara's side and lifted the bucket. "Mistress Cara is right, Prelate. You and the Mother Confessor can't do both buckets. You two take one; Mistress Cara and I will take the other."

There was no time to argue with the three determined women. Kahlan knew that

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no one would be able to talk her out of what she had to do, and they probably felt the same. Besides, they had a valid point.

"All right," Kahlan said as she pulled on her gloves.

She lashed tight the fur mantle she wore over the top of the wool cloak. She didn't want anything flapping in the wind. The hilt of her sword was covered, but she figured she wouldn't be needing it. The hilt of Richard's sword stuck up behind her shoulder, her ever-present reminder of him-as if she needed one. She quickly tied her hair back with a leather thong.

Verna tossed a handful of the fluffy snow, checking the wind. It had held its direction and was light, but steady. At least that much was in their favor.

"You two go first," Kahlan said to Cara. "Verna and I will wait maybe five minutes to let what you release drift in toward the enemy, so that we won't ride through it. Then, we'll follow you across the valley. That way we'll be sure to overlap what you release with ours so as not to have any gaps. We need to make sure there's no safe place for the Order to get through. We need the ruin and panic to be as uniform and widespread as possible."

Sister Philippa, noting what Kahlan had done, fastened her cloak securely at her neck and waist. "That makes sense."

"It would be more effective doubled like that," Verna agreed.

"I guess there's no time to argue this foolishness," Zedd grumbled as he seized Spider's mane and pulled himself up, laying across the horse's back on his belly. He swung a leg over Spider's rump and sat up. "Let me have a minute or two to get ahead of you and let Warren know, then we'll start showing the Imperial Order some real wizard work."

He pulled his horse around and smiled. It was heartening to see it again.

"After all this work, someone had better have some dinner waiting for me on the other side of that pass back there."

"If I have to cook it for you myself," Kahlan promised.

The wizard gave them a jaunty wave and galloped off into the darkness.

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CHAPTER 39

Kahlan stuffed a boot in the stirrup, grabbed the saddle horn, and sprang up into her seat. The cold leather creaked as she leaned over and held a hand down in order to help Verna up. Once the Prelate squirmed in close behind Kahlan, two Sisters carefully handed the heavy wooden bucket up to her. Cara and Sister Philippa were on their horse and ready, the Sister balancing her bucket on her thigh.

"Get the children back across the pass," Verna ordered.

Sister Dulcinia bobbed her head of gray hair. "I will see to it, Prelate."

"Whatever more of the glass you can have ready by the time the Mother Confessor and I ride out, you should release into the wind for good measure, then get yourselves spread out behind our lines to help if the Order breaks through. If we fail, the Sisters must do their best to hold the enemy off while as many as possible make it across the pass to safety."

Sister Dulcinia again promised to carry out the Prelate's orders.

They all waited a few minutes in silence while giving Zedd the head start he needed to reach Warren with instructions. There seemed nothing else to say. Kahlan concentrated on what she had to do, rather than worrying whether or not it would work. In the back of her mind, though, she was aware of how notoriously imperfect were such last-minute battle plans.

Judging that they had waited as long as they dared, Kahlan motioned with her arm, signaling Cara to start out. The two of them shared a last look. Cara offered a brief smile, good luck-then raced away, Sister Philippa holding tight to the MordSith's waist with one arm and balancing the bucket on her thigh with the help of her other hand.

As the sound of hoofbeats from Cara's horse faded into the night, Kahlan for the first time realized that, in the distance, she could hear the collective yells of hundreds of thousands of Imperial Order troops. The countless voices fused into one continuous roar as their attack drew ever closer. It almost sounded like the moan of an ill wind through a canyon's rocky fangs. Her horse snorted and pawed the frozen ground. The awful drone made Kahlan's pulse race even faster. She wanted to race away, before the men got too close, but she had to wait, to give the glass dust Cara and Sister Philippa released time to drift out of the way.

"I wish we could use magic to protect ourselves," Verna said in a quiet voice, almost as if in answer to what Kahlan was thinking. "We can't, of course, or they would detect it."

Kahlan nodded, hardly hearing the woman. Verna was just saying anything that came to mind so as not to have to sit and listen to the enemy coming for them.

The bitter cold long forgotten, her heartbeat throbbing in her ears, Kahlan sat still as death, staring out into the empty night, trying to envision every aspect of the

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task at hand, trying to go through it all in her mind first, so she wouldn't be surprised by anything that might happen and then have to decide what to do. Better to anticipate, if you could, than to react.

As she quietly sat her horse, she let her anger build, too. Anger made a better warrior than fear.

Kahlan fed that anger with images of all the terrible things she had seen the Imperial Order do to the people of the Midlands. She let the memories of all the bodies she had seen pass through her mind, as if they came before the Mother Confessor to plead with stilled tongues for vengeance. She remembered the women she had seen wailing over murdered children, husbands, sisters, brothers, mothers and fathers. She remembered strong men in helpless anguish over the senseless slaughter of their friends and loved ones. In her mind's eye, she saw those men, women, and children suffering at the hands of a people to whom they had done no harm.

The Imperial Order was but a gang of killers without empathy. They merited no pity; they would get none.

She thought about Richard in the hands of that enemy. She savored her promise to kill every one of them if she had to until she got Richard back.

"It's time," Kahlan said through gritted teeth. Without looking back over her shoulder, she asked, "Are you ready?"

"Ready. Don't slow for anything, or we will end up its victims, too. Our only chance is to keep fresh air streaming over us to carry the glass dust all away from our bodies. When we get to the opposite side, after I've dumped it all, then we'll be safe. By that time, the Order should be in a state of mass confusion, if not complete panic."

Kahlan nodded. "Hold tight. Here we go."

The horse, already in an excited state, probably from the approaching cries, sprang away too fast, nearly dumping Verna off the back. Her arm jerked tight around Kahlan's middle. At the same time, Kahlan reached back and caught Verna's sleeve, holding her on. As they raced away and Verna fought to regain her balance, the bucket lurched, but Verna was able to steady it. Fortunately, it didn't spill.

Even as the muscular gelding was obeying her command and racing away, his ears were turned to the approaching clamor. He was skittish carrying the unfamiliar burden of two riders. He was well trained and had seen battle often enough, so he probably was also edgy because he knew what the war cries signified. Kahlan knew he was strong and quick. For what she had to do, speed was life.

Kahlan's heart galloped as fast as the horse as they thundered through the blackness of the valley. The enemy was much closer, now, than they had been when Cara passed through not long before. The horse's hoofbeats partly drowned out the battle cries of countless enemy soldiers to their left.

Terrifying bits of memories of fists and boots flashed unbidden into her mind as she heard men coming toward her in the dark, screaming for blood. She felt her vulnerability as never before. Kahlan turned those memories from fear to anger at the outrage of these brutes coming into her Midlands and murdering her people. She wanted every one of them to suffer, and every one of them dead.

There was no telling precisely how far the enemy had already advanced, or, with the moonlight behind her, even her own exact direction. Kahlan worried that she might have sliced it too close to the bone, and that they could unexpectedly encounter a wall of bloodthirsty men. She wanted to be close, though, to deliver the blinding

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dust right in their faces, to be sure it had the best chance to work, to turn back the attack. She resisted the urge to guide her horse to the right, away from the enemy.

The night suddenly ignited with harsh yellow light. The clouds went from gray to bright yelloworange. White snow blazed with garish color. An awful droning sound vibrated deep under her ribs.

A hundred feet in front of her and maybe ten feet above the ground, tumbling liquid yellow and blue light roared headlong across her route, dripping honeyed fire, trailing billowing black smoke. The seething sphere of wizard's fire vividly illuminated the ground beneath it as it shot past. Even though not directed at her, the sound alone was enough to make Kahlan ache to cringe away in dread.

She knew enough about wizard's fire, how it clung tenaciously to the skin, to be more than wary of it. Once that living fire touched you, it couldn't be dislodged. Even a single droplet of wizard's fire would often eat through flesh down to bone. There was no one either brave or foolish enough not to fear it. Few people touched by such conjured flame lived to recount the horror of the experience. For those who did, revenge became a lifelong obsession.

Then, in the light of that bright flame streaking across the valley floor, Kahlan caught sight of the horde, all with swords, maces, flails, axes, pikes, and lances raised in the air as they yelled their battle cries. The men, grim, daunting, fierce, were all in the grip of a wild lust for the fight as they ran headlong out of the night.

In the moonlight, Kahlan could see for the first time since she had joined up with the army the full extent of the enemy forces. The reports had told the story, but could not fully convey the reality of the sight. The numbers were so far removed from her experience as to defy comprehension. Eyes wide, jaw hanging open, she gasped in awe.