terrified, cruel, mindless, wicked, greedy, corrupt, and sinful. He was depicted forever torn between otherworldly forces controlling every aspect of his miserable existence, an existence incomprehensible in its caldron of churning evil, with death his only escape into salvation.
In the vortex of this torrent of tortured life, this cataclysm of corruption, this depravity and debauchery, rose up Richard's statue in bold, glowing opposition.
The mass and weight of the ugliness surrounding Richard's statue seemed to shrink back into insignificance. The evil of the wall carvings seemed now to be crying out at their own dishonesty in the face of incorruptible beauty and truth.
More than that, though, Richard's statue existed without conflict; the figures showed awareness, rationality, and purpose. This was a manifestation of human power, ability, intent. This was life lived for its own sake. This was mankind standing proudly of his own free will.
LIFE
This was life as it should be lived-proud, reasoned, and a slave to no other man. This was the rightful exaltation of the individual, the nobility of the human spirit.
This offered life.
The blacksmith lifted his arms up toward the statue before him, laughing as tears ran down his face.
People who had come to see the other carvings, now began gathering to see what stood in the center of the plaza. They stared with wide eyes, many seeing for the first time the concept of man as virtuous in his own right. The statement was so powerful that it alone invalidated everything up on the walls. That it had been carved by man underscored its veracity.
The carvers wandered away from their work to come see what stood in the plaza. The masons came down from the scaffolding. The tenders set down their mortar buckets. The carpenters climbed down from their work at setting beams. The tilers laid aside their chisels. The drivers picketed their horses. Men digging and planting the surrounding grounds set down their shovels. They came from all directions toward the statue in the plaza.
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As people took it in, they began to run off to get others. Soon, men were coming down from the shops on the hill to see what stood in the plaza. Men and women who had come to watch the construction now ran off home to get loved ones, to bring them to see what stood at the emperor's palace.
It was vision to the blind.
It was life to the dying.
CHAPTER 66
"What do you think?" Cara asked in a low voice.
"I don't know. We don't have much light left. I guess there's only one way to be sure."
They had decided to simply be as aloof and casual as possible. She had thought they looked pretty simple in their traveling clothes, but in a place as drab as Altur'Rang, the two of them had a hard time being inconspicuous. In retrospect, she wished they would have had the time to find something shabby to wear. Kahlan felt they were about as inconspicuous as a pair of painted whores at a country farm fair.
Looking both ways, Kahlan gently rapped on the door. No answer came. She knocked again, a little louder. She tried the knob, but it was locked. After checking the hall again, she pulled a knife from her belt and worked it under the molding, springing it out until the door popped open. She grabbed Cara's sleeve and pulled the woman in with her.
Kneeling on the floor in the far corner, she flipped back the flap and saw his things inside-his war wizard's clothes were in the bottom. Near tears, she clutched the pack to her chest.
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Kahlan thrust her hand into the air. "Cara! No."
"Thieves! You're thieves! That's not yours! Put it back!"
"Is your name Kamil, or Nabbi?"
"I'm Kamil. Who are you? How do you know my name?"
"Then you're no friend!"
Kahlan shushed him. "Gadi murdered a friend of ours. After we captured him, Gadi told me your name."
"Gadi killed someone?"
He stole a quick glance over his shoulder. "What did you do to him? To Gadi?" "We put him to death," Kahlan said, not revealing the full extent of the deed.
"It took him a long time to die," Cara said.
"So, who are you two?" he asked.
"So, what are you doing here?"
His suspicion returned. "Yeah?"
"I'm his wife. His real wife."
Kahlan's voice hardened. "Nicci isn't his wife." His eyes brimmed with tears as a grin overcame him. "I knew it. I knew he didn't love her. I could never understand how Richard could have married her."
"And you?" Kamil asked Cara.
"Cara is Richard's good friend."
Kamil turned back to Kahlan. "But what is Richard doing with Nicci, then?"
Kahlan took a deep breath. "It's a long story."
Kahlan appraised his dark eyes for a moment. She liked what she saw there. Still, she thought it best to keep it simple.
"Magic? What magic?" he pressed without pause.
Kamil gazed skyward as he thought it over. He finally nodded. "That makes sense. That's the kind of man Richard is-he would do anything to save the woman he loved. I knew he didn't love Nicci."
Kamil gestured at the two pallets. "He didn't sleep with her. I bet he slept with you, when you were together."
"I don't know." He scratched his head. "You just look like you belong with him. When you say his name I can see how you care for him."
"So, do you know where Richard is, now?" Kahlan asked.
Kahlan briefly scanned the room. "What about Nicci?"
Kahlan's gaze drifted through the darkening room, from table, to basin, to cupboard. She would hate to leave, only to have him show up a minute after she left. Kamil thought it was odd that Nicci wasn't home. That they were both gone was troubling.
"At the site."
Kamil gestured into the distance. "Out at the emperor's new palace they're building. Tomorrow's the big dedication."
"Oh, no. It's years and years from being done. It's only started, really. But they are going to dedicate it to the Creator, now. A lot of people have come to Altur'Rang for the ceremony."
Kamil nodded. "He's a carver. At least, he is now. He used to work at Ishaq's transport company, but then he got arrested-"
Kamil's eyes turned away from her frantic expression.
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"He carves statues, now?"
Wonder of wonders. Richard carving. But all the carvings they had seen in the Old World were grotesque. Richard would not like to carve such ugliness. Obviously, he had no choice.
"Yes, if you'd like. But don't you want to wait to see if he comes home, first? He may be home soon."
"For the last few months, he worked at night a lot. He's carving some special statue for them." Kamil's face brightened. "He told me to go tomorrow to see it. With the dedication tomorrow, it may be he's still finishing it. I've never seen where he works, but Victor, the blacksmith, may know."
Kamil scratched his head again as his expression turned to disappointment. "But the blacksmith will be gone for the night."
"There may be a lot of people there. Crowds go out there to see the place-I've gone out there myselfand tonight there may be more than usual, because of tomorrow's ceremony."
"We'll give him an hour," Kahlan said. "If he doesn't return by then, then it's most likely because he's working. If he doesn't come back, we'll have to go out there and look for him."
Kamil waved his hand to dismiss their concern. "I'll go out on the front steps and watch for Nicci. You two can wait in here, where no one will see you. I'll come warn you if I see Nicci coming up the street. I can always take you out the back way if I see her returning home."
"That sounds good to me, Kamil. We'll wait in here." Kamil hurried out to his guard post. Kahlan glanced around the tidy room.
Kahlan was exhausted. She glanced down at the sleeping pallet closest to Richard's things, then nodded. She lay down on his bed. The room was getting dark. Just being where he slept was a comfort. Being so close, but so far, she couldn't fall asleep.
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Some had been angered by it. She, of all people, understood that. Still, Nicci could hardly believe the hateful reaction of some people to such beauty. Some people hated life. She understood that, too. There were those who refused to see-who didn't want to see.
It had all come clear for her. For the first time in her life, life made sense. Richard had tried to tell her, but she hadn't listened. She had heard the truth before, too, but others-her mother, Brother Narev, the Order-had shouted it down, and shamed her out of listening.
When she saw the statue, she saw at last the truth she had always refused to see, suddenly and clearly standing before her. This was the valid vision of life for which she had hungered, yet which she had evaded, her entire life.
She had lived her whole life on shifting quicksand, where reason and the intellect were not to be trusted, where only faith was valid, and blind faith was sacred. She, herself, had enforced mindless conformity to that empty evil.
Richard had answered their tower of empty lies in one righteously beautiful statement for all to see, and had punctuated it with the simple words on the back of the bronze sundial.
Freedom exists first and foremost in the mind of the rational, thinking individual-that was what Richard's statue had shown her. That he had carved it, proved it. A captive of her and the Order, his ideals had risen above both.
Nicci knew now that she had worn black ever since her mother's death in an endless, shapeless longing to bury not just her mother's hold over her, but, more important, her mother's evil ideals.
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As soon as she found him, they would leave. They would go back to the New World. They would find Kahlan. Then, Nicci would set things right. She had to be close to Kahlan, at least within sight, in order to undo the spell. Then Kahlan would be free. Then Richard would be free.
Nicci lay down in her bed and wept at the thought of the outrage she had done to them both. She was overcome with shame. She had been so blind for so long.
She at least could work to correct the harm she had caused.
Thunderstruck, Kamil threw up his arms. "It's the middle of the night. I've never seen so many people out here. What are they all doing here?"
The city had been crowded with people, too. With the city guards prowling the streets, uneasy about all the late-night activity, it had been necessary to restrain their eagerness in favor of caution. It had taken them hours to get out to the site by way of back streets, dark roads, and Kamil's guided tour of alleyways.
They followed him up a road lined with workshops, most closed up and dark. A few had men inside, still working at benches by the light of lamps or candles.
"Have you seen it?"
He pointed excitedly. "Down at the palace. In the plaza." He started running again. He called behind as he went. "I have to go get my wife and sons. They have to see it."
Kamil ran over to a shop and tugged on a door, but it was shut up tight. "Victor isn't here." His voice couldn't conceal his disappointment. "It's too late."
He thought a moment. "The plaza? I know the place, but . . . wait, that's where Richard told me to go. The plaza. He said to go to the plaza tomorrow."
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So jammed was the place with people, that it took them over an hour just to make it down the hill and across the expanse of grounds around the palace. Even though it was the middle of the night, more people kept arriving all the time.
Cara pulled her hand out from under her cloak and casually showed Kahlan her Agiel.
"Really?" Cara asked. "I thought it roughly even."
It wasn't long before the line behind them grew so large that they could no longer see the back end winding out into the grounds. The people all around seemed filled with a strange kind of nervous expectancy.
"Would you like some?" she asked.
"I've never made such an offer, before." The woman giggled. "Seems the right thing to do, now, doesn't it?"
Throughout the night, the line inched along. Kahlan's back ached painfully. She even saw Cara grimace as she stretched.
Kahlan leaned in close. "What difference does it make? Where have we to go before morning? When morning comes, we can go up to the blacksmith's place or to the carving areas over there and hopefully find Richard, but we can do nothing tonight."
"You want to run into Nicci again? You know what she's capable of. The next time we may not be so lucky to escape. We haven't come all this way to battle her-I just want to see Richard. Even if Richard goes back there-and we don't know that he will-we do know he's got to return here in the morning."
The sky was taking on a faint reddish glow by the time they made it to the foot of the marble steps. They could hear moaning and wailing up ahead. Kahlan couldn't see the cause, but people up on the plaza were weeping freely. Oddly enough, some people could be heard to laugh joyfully. A few others cursed, as if they had been robbed of their life savings at the point of a knife.
As they slowly made their way up the steps, Kahlan and Cara tried to stay low behind the people surrounding them so as not to draw attention to themselves. The plaza above was lit by dozens of torches, their flickering light giving an indication of the vastness of the crowds. The smell of the burning pitch mixed sourly with the stale sweat of the packed multitude.
quick glance ahead. She blinked at what she saw, but it was gone almost as fast as she saw it, screened by the throng. The people ahead wept some, it sounded, with joy.
The scenes carved in the stone up on the walls were disturbing. If they were any different from the others she had seen in the Old World, it was only in that they were more gruesome, more horrifying, more desolately hopeless, and more plentiful.
She felt a sense of gloom overcoming her. This was the Order: pain, suffering, death. This was what was in store for the New World at the hands of these monsters. She couldn't take her eyes from the scenes on the walls, from the fate that awaited the people of her homeland-the fate so many blindly embraced.
Cara gripped Kahlan's arm, her fingers digging in painfully as she, too, was taken by the sight. The statue of the man and woman seized Kahlan's imagination with their nobility of spirit.
LIFE, it said at the base.
"Please look and move along so that others may view it too," the men at the sides kept calling. They weren't wearing uniforms; they were as tattered-looking as everyone else. They appeared to be ordinary citizens who had just stepped in to help.
As Kahlan shuffled around the statue, unable to take her eyes from it, she reached
out to touch it, as did everyone else. As she was carried past, her fingers met the smooth flesh in stone, knowing it was also where Richard's fingers had been. She wept all the harder.
"Your life is yours alone. Rise up and live it."
The crowd kept coming up the steps, forcing the people around the statue to move on. Men at the rear guided people between the columns, out through the rear of the partially built palace, and out of the way so that others could come up to view the statue.
Kahlan was overcome with a burble of laughter. "I was going to say, `I wish Richard could see it.""
Kamil grabbed Kahlan's hand. She saw him take Cara's, too.
"Where to?" Kahlan asked him. "Where do you think we can find him?"
Kamil's words, "Richard carved it," rang joyfully through her mind.
CHAPTER 67
Richard brushed himself off. He stood outside the transport company building where he used to work when he had first come to Altur'Rang, and where he had been locked in all night. Of course, he had been asleep, so he didn't know Jori had locked him inside.
Work. What work? This was the day of the celebration, the dedication. When Brother Narev saw the statue, Richard was not going to have to worry about work anymore.
Richard had no real choice. At least he would get to see Victor's face when he saw the statue. Richard smiled at that thought. It was the only pleasant prospect the day held.
As fearful as the prospect of such a fate was, he had carved the statue with conscious intent and with forethought, knowing the probability of the eventual price. What he had accomplished was worth that price. Slavery was not life. Nicci had once promised him that if he died, or chose death, that would in itself be her answer, and she would not harm Kahlan. Now, Richard could only put his faith in that promise.
For so early in the morning, there was an unusual amount of activity on the streets of Altur'Rang. Now and again, squads of heavily armed city guards rushed
down the streets. There were a lot of people come to the city for the dedication celebration. He supposed that was why there were so many people out on the streets.
When he arrived at the Retreat, Richard was shocked by what he saw. The open miles of grounds were covered with people. They crowded in around the palace walls like ants around spilled honey. He couldn't even begin to estimate how many people blanketed the surrounding hills. It was disorienting to see the panoply of color where before he had seen only brown dirt and green winter rye. He had no idea that this many people had wanted to come to the dedication. But then, he had been working day and night for months--how would he hear what people planned?
The road was crowded with people. They seemed excited, happy, and expectant. It was a far cry from the way most people in the Old World usually appeared or behaved. Maybe a celebration, even one such as this, was better than the rest of their dreary days.
"There he is! Grab him!"
The guards came at him in a dead run. People scattered out of the way, some screaming in fright.
Except that Nicci had told him that if he used his magic, Kahlan would die. Would she know?
Richard stood submissively still as the guards roughly seized him by his arms to subdue him. Others snatched his shirt from behind.
But he didn't want to go back into that dark hole.
"May I ask what are you talking about, Brother Neal?"
"What, you don't like it?"
Neal found that he enjoyed administering punishment, and did it again.
"Oh, you're going to pay for your blasphemy, Cypher. You're going to pay the price, this time. You'll confess to it all, before we're done. But first, you'll watch your wicked perversion destroyed." Neal, his face twisted with superior, selfrighteous indignation, gestured to the burly guards. "Let's get him down there. And don't be shy about making way through the crowd."
"I'm sorry," Kamil said, looking glum as he watched her pace. "I don't know why Victor isn't here. I thought he would be, I really did."
"Look," Cara said. Kahlan saw she was peering down toward the palace. "Guards with spears are moving the crowd off the plaza."
Cara's mouth twisted in exasperation. Kahlan turned to the young man kicking a toe at the dirt, looking shamed by his failed plan to help them find Richard.
"Sure. What?"
Kamil stretched his neck and gazed down at the palace. "Well, all right. If Richard does come here, I wouldn't want him to miss you. What shall I tell him, if I see him.
Kahlan thought they could make it down to the plaza to have a look, but everyone else seemed to have the same idea. It took forever just to make it down the hill to the grounds. The closer they got, the tighter the people were jammed together. Kahlan's progress ground to a halt. It was a struggle just to keep contact with Cara. Everyone in the crowd seemed intent on squeezing forward toward the plaza. More people crushed in all the time.
The conversation on everyone's lips was about only one thing: the statue.
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If only she had her power.
Nicci had searched for Richard. She hadn't found him. She hadn't been able to find the blacksmith, Mr. Cascella, or Ishaq, either. As soon as she could find Richard, she could tell him that she had been wrong, and then they could leave Altur'Rang. She wanted so much to see his face when she told him she was taking him back to Kahlan and that she was going to reverse the spell. Of all people, they were the last who should have to suffer for what Nicci had learned.
And then, Nicci saw Brother Narev and his disciples appear up on the plaza, all in their dark brown robes, Brother Narev in his creased cap, the rest with their faces hidden in deeply cowled hoods. Crowding the rear of the plaza were a few hundred officials of the Order who had traveled in to attend the palace dedication-important men, all.
It was then that she caught a fleeting glimpse of Richard behind the. officials, with guards surrounding him. The whole central area around the plaza was thick with the surly guards.
When the crowd quieted, he began in that terrible grating voice of his, a voice that had haunted her from that day in her house when she was little, that voice that she had allowed to rule her mind, that voice that, along with her mother's, had done her thinking for her.
His arm glided back toward the statue. His long thin fingers opened. His voice rumbled with revulsion. "Evil, itself."
"Fellow citizens of the Order," Brother Narev said in a voice that Nicci thought
might crack the stone walls, "today you will see what happens to evil, when confronted by the virtue of the Order."
Brother Neal swaggered forward, then, lugging with him a sledgehammer.
Brother Narev lifted the sledgehammer above his head as if it were a sword held high in triumph.
The crowd was silent in their bewildered disappointment. From what Nicci could tell as she had walked among them throughout the day, they had come to believe that this statue was some new offering by the Order to the people-some grand thing for them to see at the emperor's palace, some bright shining hope. They were confused and stunned by what they were hearing.
As the sun's last ray fled below the horizon, Brother Narev lifted the heavy sledgehammer high in the flickering light of smoking torches. The sledgehammer wobbled momentarily at the apex of its arc before descending in a heavy swing. The crowd sent up a collective gasp as the steel head rang out when it struck the male statue's leg. A few small chips fell away. It had done surprisingly little damage.
Even from the distance, Nicci could see Brother Narev's face turning crimson as Richard stood watching and chuckling. The crowd murmured, hardly able to believe any man would laugh at a brother of the Order-at Brother Narev himself.
The dozens of guards who had their spears leveled at Richard could hardly believe it.
"You will destroy your depraved work yourself."
Richard accepted the handle of the sledgehammer. He could have looked no more noble doing so if he had been taking a jewel-encrusted sword.
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"You are ruled," Richard said in a voice that rang out over the multitude, "by mean little men."
"My crime?" Richard asked aloud. "I have given you something beautiful to see, daring to hold the conviction that you have a right to see it if you wish. Worse . . . I have said that your lives are your own to live."
"Evil is not one large entity, but a collection of countless, small depravities brought up from the muck by petty men. Living under the Order, you have traded the enrichment of vision for a gray fog of mediocrity-the fertile inspiration of striving and growth, for mindless stagnation and slow decay-the brave new ground of the attempt, for the timid quagmire of apathy."
"You have traded freedom not even for a bowl of soup, but worse, for the spoken empty feelings of others who say that you deserve to have a full bowl of soup provided by someone else.
Laughter, pleased laughter, rippled through the crowd.
Richard cocked his head. "Oh? The collective assembly of the Order, and of brothers, fears to hear what one insignificant man could say? You fear mere words that much, Brother Narev?"
"We fear no words. Virtue is on our side, and will prevail. Speak your blasphemy, so all may understand why moral people will side against you."
"Every person's life is theirs by right. An individual's life can and must belong only to himself, not to any society or community, or he is then but a slave. No one can deny another person their right to their life, nor seize by force what is produced by someone else, because that is stealing their means to sustain their life. It is treason against mankind to hold a knife to a man's throat and dictate how he must live his life. No society can be more important than the individuals who compose it, or else you ascribe supreme importance, not to man, but to any notion that strikes the fancy of that society, at a never-ending cost of lives. Reason and reality are the only means to just laws; mindless wishes, if given sovereignty, become deadly masters.
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Richard pointed with the sledgehammer back at the statue. "This is life. Your life. To live as you choose." He swept the head of the sledgehammer in an arc, pointing out the carvings up on the walls. "This is what the Order offers you: death."
The spears rose.
Richard rested the sledgehammer across his shoulder. He lifted his other hand up to the statue as he addressed the crowd one last time.
Richard briefly touched the sledgehammer to his forehead.
In a moment of brittle silence, she heard the faintest sound, the ripping popping crackling whisper of the stone itself.
The officials at the back of the plaza cheered. The guards hooted and hollered as they waved their weapons in the air.
Nicci stared in a daze. Her throat constricted with the agony of it. Her eyes watered. They all watched, as if having just witnessed a tragic, pointless death.
Down closer to the steps, a clear voice rang out from the stunned crowd. "No! We'll not stand for it!"
to the front, furiously trying to fight his way through the press of people to get to
"We'll not stand for it!" he roared. "I'll not let you enslave me any longer! Do you hear? I'm a free man! A free man!"
And then, as one, they lunged forward.
Nicci screamed with all her might, trying to get Richard's attention, but her voice was lost in the hurricane.
CHAPTER 68
The mob rolled without pause over armed guards descending the steps to meet them. A number of people fell wounded or killed. The bodies were trampled beneath the surge of people. Those in front couldn't stop if they wanted to-the weight of tens of thousands behind them propelled them onward. But they didn't want to stop. The roar was deafening.
Richard wanted Brother Narev. He saw, instead, armed men rushing in at him. Richard swung and buried the head of the sledgehammer in the chest of a man who came at him with sword raised high. As the man flew past, the handle of the sledgehammer sticking from the crater in his chest, Richard snatched the sword from his fist, and then, blade in hand, he unleashed himself.
But guards were not what Richard was mainly interested in. If he was to lose everything, he wanted Narev's head in the bargain. As he fought his way through the chaos of people crushing into the plaza, he couldn't find Brother Narev anywhere.
"Richard!" Victor called out.
"What should we do with him?" one man asked.
"Why ask me? It's your revolt." He met the eyes of the men with challenge. "What do you think you should do with him?"
Richard shook his head. "No. You tell me what you intend to do with him. But you should know, this man is a wizard. When he comes around, he's going to start killing people. This is a matter of life and death, and he knows it. Do you? This is about your lives. It is for you to decide what to do, not me."
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The men all shook their fists as they yelled their agreement.
"And that's what we intend to do with him," Victor said.
Victor blinked; then his belly laugh rolled out. With his free hand, he clapped Richard on the side of his shoulder.
The press of the crowd drove them back to the columns. Richard reached down and snatched the dead brother's robes, pulling the body along with him. The mass of towering stone walls and marble columns afforded some protection from the raging river of people.
"What was that!" Victor called out through the din of screaming, yelling, and the roar of the explosion.
Hordes of people had captured a number of the brothers and officials, and were beating them to death with chunks of white marble from the rubble of the statue.
"I understand," Victor said as he fought to keep from being swept away.
Richard started pulling off the dead brother's robes. "You men have to keep these people out of the palace. Narev is in there. Anyone who goes in could easily be killed. You have to keep people out. It will be a death trap in there with the brothers."
"We'll keep them back," men called to Richard.
Richard popped his head up through the neck opening. "I'm going in there. In the darkness, Narev will think I'm a brother, and I'll be able to get close to him." He poked his confiscated sword through the robes to hide the blade. He covered the
hilt with his wrist. "Keep people out Narev commands dangerous magic. I have to stop him."
The men who had assumed command began fanning out, urging people to follow their orders. Some people did, and as they did, yet more followed. With all the officials who they'd captured now dead, the mob was slowly being brought to task, and not a moment too soon. The crushing weight of people flooding up onto the plaza was a danger to everyone.
Victor saw what everyone was doing. "Richard . . . I'm so sorry-"
"Later!" Richard yelled over the pandemonium. "I've got to stop Narev! Keep these people out-they'll only die in there!"
Richard put the tumult and confusion behind him, and stepped through a gaping doorway between the columns . . . into the darkness.
Richard had been a woods guide long before he became the Seeker, long before he became Lord Rahl. Darkness was his element. In his mind, he gathered that cloak of darkness around himself.
Richard came across an older woman lying bleeding in the hall, whimpering in agony. He bent to one knee, putting a hand gently to her shoulder as he kept his eyes on the dark hall ahead and its sockets of blackness to each side.
A smile of recognition overcame her. "Leg," she said.
"I want to live. I wanted to help." She took the strip of cloth and pushed his
hands away. "Thank you for cutting me the cloth. I can do it, now." She clutched his robe, pulling him closer. "You've showed us life with your statue. Thank you."
"I was trying to get that cockroach. Will you do it?"
Richard started moving again. From the distance came screams of rage, and pain. Guards who had escaped into the maze of the unfinished palace were battling people who had gone in after them.
"Who are you?" he whispered toward Richard, lifting his hand to use his magic to light a small flame above his palm.
Richard pulled his sword free and concealed it once more under his robes.
Richard stepped back into the blackness of a room as he heard guards running his way. As they turned into the hallway, Richard again drew his sword. When they were close, he burst out of the doorway and took off the first guard's head. The second swung his sword, missed, and lifted it for another strike. Richard ran his sword through the man's belly. The wounded guard pulled back, off the blade. Before Richard could finish him, more men burst into the hall. The man with the gut wound wasn't going to be a problem anymore; it would take him hours of agony to die.
Richard raced onward toward the sounds of explosions. Every time gouts of flame flashed through the morass of hallways, he hid his eyes with a hand in order to preserve his night vision. When the blinding flashes ceased, he quickly continued in the direction from which they had come.
Down below the main floor were networks of interconnected rooms, made up of a confusing snarl of chambers and narrow halls. As he plunged through a labyrinth of shadowy rooms, going through holes in unfinished walls and empty doorways,
he came suddenly upon a cloaked man with a sword. He knew none of the people were armed.
In a flash of moonlight, Richard was stunned to see the Sword of Truth over the shoulder of the person. It was Kahlan.
She saw only a figure in brown robes-a brother-standing in a shaft of moonlight. The hood shadowed his face.
In one terrible blinding instant, Richard knew what he had to do. It was his only chance-Kahlan's only chance-to be free.
He had to.
And then he attacked her.
Nicci was getting closer.
She didn't hesitate for an instant. Without pause, still spinning, her hand reached up and pulled free the Sword of Truth. The air rang with the unique sound of steel he knew so well.
Richard entered a numb world all his own. He knew what he had to do. He felt no emotion. He blocked high, controlling her attack and where he wanted her to go with the blade. He had to get her to put it where he intended, if there was to be any chance.
--]--- Kahlan was in the realm of uncontrollable rage. The instant she seized the hilt, the Sword of Truth had inundated her with pounding fury. Nothing in the world felt better than knowing she was going to kill with it. The weapon, too, demanded blood.
Now, she had one of them.
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He was hers.
His mouth opened. Now was the time; he had to stop her-keep her from doing any more. He had to do it now. If she wrenched the blade through him, ripped him open any more, Nicci would never be able to heal him. Her power could only heal so much.
He reasoned that she cared enough for him to do that.
He needed to tell her it was him. To stop.
His mouth was still open.
He couldn't make himself say her name.
They were a good distance away.
She ran toward the pair. The man pulled free another sword strapped over his shoulder. The strange feeling welled up in Nicci. Something was terribly wrong, but she didn't know what.
With a cry of lethal fury, the man in the cape drove his sword through the brother.
And then the feeling slammed into her with full recognition.
--]--- 522
Kahlan's eyes twitched up in shock. She saw his face in the moonlight. In that same instant, he heard Nicci scream.
She fell back with a horrified shriek.
"Richard!" Kahlan cried. "Nooo! Nooo!"
"Pull it out," he whispered.
Kahlan, nearly hysterical, scrambled to do as he asked. Richard saw Cara limping up out of the darkness. She seized his shoulders as Kahlan drew out the blade in one swift, panicked yank, as if she hoped the action would somehow undo what she had done.
The world seemed to tip and whirl. Richard could feel the sickeningly wet warmth of his blood soaking down him. He could feel his weight against Cara. Kahlan hovered close.
He couldn't help smiling at seeing her.
He wondered if he had made a terrible mistake.
Nicci was still running toward them.
Even if it was no more than a whisper, Nicci heard his plea.
Even in her shock, Nicci knew with clarity what she must do.
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An arm swept out of the darkness and hooked her by the neck, taking her from her feet. She cried out as she was yanked into the blackness. She could feel the bulge of hard muscles as she clawed at the arm. The man stank. She could feel his lice ticking against her face as they sprang at her.
She dug her heels into the stone as he drew her back into the black labyrinth. She kicked furiously at him. She tried to draw her dacra from her sleeve, but he seized her arm and twisted it behind her back.
Nicci couldn't breathe. He chortled with glee as he dragged her into the darker recesses of the rooms beneath Jagang's palace.
Cara desperately clutched his shoulders as he lay back against her. He was cold. She was warm.
"Mother Confessor! Mother Confessor! What's wrong?"
"Someone has Nicci. They're choking her. Cara-you have to go save Nicci, or Kahlan will die. And Nicci is the only one who can heal me. Go. Hurry."
"I understand" was all she said as she gently, but swiftly, laid him back on the cold stone.
It was wet. He didn't know if it was blood, or water. They were underground, in the nether reaches of the Retreat. Through open beams where the flooring above hadn't been laid, moonlight flooded down to light Kahlan struggling not far away. He could see, then, as she fought an invisible foe, that it was water. That's what it was. Not blood. Water. The palace was next to the river. It was wet in the little rooms and halls down in the bottom.
Gripping his abdomen, holding the wound closed lest his insides burst out, he inched his way through the water, across the cold stone. The pain had finally and firmly arrived. He could feel the terrible damage inside. He tried to blink away the tears of hot agony. He had to hold on. Icy sweat drenched his face. Kahlan had to hold on.
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It seemed a stupid way to die, really. He thought it should be somehow more . . . grand.
He wished he could tell Kahlan that he loved her, and that she hadn't killed him but that he had done it. It was his doing, not hers. He'd just used her in his plan. It would have worked.
--]--- Richard opened his eyes and groaned in agony. He wanted it to end. It hurt too much. Now, he just wanted it to end. It hadn't worked. He would have to pay the price. But he wanted the sickening, ripping, terrifying pain to end.
A shadow fell across him.
Richard could sense the Sword of Truth, sense its magic. It wasn't far from his fingers.
Richard's fingers found the sword. They curled around the wire-wound hilt.
A glow ignited around Neal's fingers. He was conjuring magic. Lethal magic. Richard, in his barely conscious condition, despite his need, could not focus his mind, could not call forth his own ability to do anything to stop Neal. At least, the pain would end. At least, Kahlan wouldn't think it was she who had killed him.
Richard, his hand already around the hilt, pulled the sword from underneath the man's legs and in one mighty lunge, ran it through Neal's heart.
Standing behind Neal was the woman Richard had helped. She had bandaged her leg. In both hands, she held the marble hand of the woman Richard had carved. She had crushed Neal's skull with her keepsake of the statue.
CHAPTER 69
In the rooms and hallways in the distance, Richard could hear occasional screams as blasts of magic exploded through the night, as people were injured and killed.
Richard squinted in the darkness. "Who are you?" he managed to whisper.
"What happened to the Mother Confessor?"
"Who are you?"
for a while, looking for Nicci, and-never mind. A woman found me just down
desperately to get to you earlier, but I couldn't get near-there I go again. Tell me
"I was run through with a sword."
"Under my hands."
"I need Nicci to do it."
Richard's eyes fell on the still form of Kahlan. "Can you help her?"
"Is she . . . is she still.. ."
He closed his eyes in relief, and in pain.
"But I need Nicci to-"
"Besides, I came to try to stop Nicci. I know her better than anyone. You can't put your life in her hands. You can't put your faith in her."
"It's not faith. I know-"
It had all gone for nothing. He felt a tear run from the corner of his eye and across his cheek.
"I know," she whispered with a smile. "I saw the statue. Now, move your hands for me. I need to have mine there."
He felt magic tingle into him, following the damage down deep inside him. He clenched his teeth as he held in a cry.
"I understand," he said. He gasped sharply. "Do it, then."
Richard opened his eyes and saw that Sister Alessandra's eyes were opened wide. For an instant, he wondered why.
A bony hand shoved her aside.
Death's own skull grinned down at him.
The tall angular figure in robes and a creased cap towered above him as he lay helpless on the cold wet floor.
Brother Narev swept his arm around, as if in introduction.
"I, on the other hand, will live here a long, long time, and see the Order bring morality to the world. Down here, in these chambers, radicals like you will confess their wickedness. I just wanted you to know, before you are embraced in the Keeper's cold arms for all eternity."
The bloom of light turned a honey color. As if the air had thickened, the light slumped off to the sides.
A howl of fury grew in Narev's throat. His shook his fists in rage.
"I am your worst nightmare. I am a thinking man who can't be deluded by your lies, any more than I can be burned by your foul magic."
Once free, and out of Richard's reach, Narev bent and seized the hilt of the sword lodged in the Sister's back. He tugged but it didn't come completely out. He growled in fury, his boots slipping on the slimy floor, as he yanked on the sword.
With all his strength, Richard lunged at the man's legs. Brother Narev toppled back onto the wet floor. Richard, his middle wrenched in torture, threw himself atop Narev's legs to hold him down. Bony fingers clawed at Richard's face, trying to gouge his eyes. Richard turned his head away. With fierce effort, he clutched at the heavy robes, dragging himself up the man's body, ignoring the blows to his face as he did so.
Narev tried to roll, to throw Richard off. Richard spread his legs to make it harder for Narev to flip him over, and held tight as the man twisted and fought. He could feel his insides tearing.
The man's eyes bulged as Richard finally managed to start to choke the life out of him. Bony hands thumped at Richard's shoulders.
Narev freed a leg and brought his knee up into Richard's wound.
--]--- Nicci woke, dazed, to the sound of a low, wicked laugh. She knew the voice. She knew the smell. Kadar Kardeef.
Nicci screamed in pain as the pitch burned into the flesh of her thigh.
"I don't care what you do to me," Nicci cried in rage. "I'm glad I burned you. I'm glad you've had to beg."
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With all her might, Nicci struggled against him. She could undo the spell, if only Kahlan were closer. So near, but so far.
But she would have to kill Kahlan to do it.
Nicci panted as she struggled, trying to back away from the heat on her flesh. The hissing torch waved in front of her face. She knew she deserved such a fate; but she was driven to wild panic by the fear of it.
"I say we start at the bottom, so we can hear your screams."
In a moment of stark terror, Nicci knew that no matter how much it was to hurt, no matter how frightening it was to be, she would not take Kahlan's life. Richard had given her the answer she had sought. She had taken too much already. In return for that lesson, she could not now violate it.
Kadar Kardeef laughed as he watched her dress ignite. He held her in a firm grip Nicci could not escape.
The one who had crashed into them was just getting up, shaking her head as if to clear it. Nicci recognized her. It was the Mord-Sith, Cara.
Nicci threw herself at Kadar, grabbing the torch in both hands as she pushed it into the big man's face. The pitch splashed against his mask of rags. The cloth on his chest and around his head ignited with a loud whoosh.
Nicci snatched Cara's hand as the woman was regaining her feet. "Hurry! I must get to Richard!"
"Give me one reason why I should trust you with Lord Rahl's life."
Nicci gazed into Cara's eyes. "Because I saw his statue, and I understand, now, how wrong I've been. Have you ever been wrong, Cara? Really wrong? Can you ever understand what it's like to realize you've been unthinkingly serving evil, and hurting good people? Can you understand that Richard has shown me there is something to live for?"
Nicci was shocked to see the bodies strewn on the floor around them. Sister Alessandra, Brother Neal, Brother Narev. She knew by the way Richard looked that there was precious little time-if it was not already too late.
Nicci took Kahlan by her shoulders and gently pulled her back. Kahlan looked up in confusion, hatred, and hope.
"I don't trust you. Why would you help?"
"You have brought nothing but suffering and-"
"Why should I trust her with his last few minutes of his life?"
Kahlan searched Cara's eyes for a moment, then turned to Nicci.
"You and Richard have already done enough." Nicci took Kahlan's tearstained face in her hands. "Just be still, and let me do this."
Nicci had to.
Kahlan went rigid with the shock of pain it caused. Nicci knew exactly how it felt, because she felt the same pain.
Kahlan's mouth opened in a silent cry. Her green eyes widened with the torment flooding through them both-as the root of magic embedded in every fiber of their two beings vibrated in response to the call of the light.
530
Richard pulled a shuddering breath as he opened his eyes. Somehow, he was lying in a position that didn't hurt. He feared to: move, lest the crushing pain return.
The darkness around him was still and quiet. In the distance, he could hear the sounds of battle raging on. The ground beneath him shuddered with some great impact.
Under his fingers lay the hilt of the Sword of Truth. Because the storm of magic was calmed, he knew the sword was in its scabbard.
"Kahlan?" he whispered.
The closest leaned in. "I'm here." She took up his hand.
Another figure leaned in. "Lord Rahl? Are you awake?"
"Oh, Richard, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I stabbed you. It was all my fault. I should have taken an instant to be sure before I did it. I'm so sorry."
Silence greeted him.
"No," Richard insisted, "I let you win."
"No, really."
"How do you feel?" Nicci asked in that silken voice he knew so well.
Nicci raised her hand and made a scissors motion with two fingers. "Gone for good."
"Richard, I can never ask your forgiveness because I can never return what I
stole from you, but I want you to know that I now understand how wrong I've been. My whole life, I have been blind. I'm not making an excuse. It's just that I want you to know that you have restored my vision. In giving me the answer I sought, you gave me my life. You gave me a reason to want to live."
"Life. You sculpted it so big that even someone who had so blindly served evil, as I had done, could see it. You must no longer prove yourself to me. Now, it is for me, and those here you have inspired, to prove ourselves to you."
"So . . . you are a Sister of the Light again?" Kahlan asked.
"You both have shown me the value of life, the rationale of freedom. If I am to serve beside anyone, now, it will be beside others who hold dear the same values."
"Richard," Kahlan objected, "you don't have to try to assuage my guilt by saying that."
Richard tried to sit up again. Nicci restrained him again.
"All right," Richard conceded. He sat up carefully with Kahlan's help. "I'll keep your words in mind, but I still have to get up there." He turned to Kahlan. "By the way, what are you doing all the way down here? How did you know where I was? What's happening to the north, in the New World?"