Rachel clutched her doll tighter to her chest and stared at the dark thing watching her from the bushes. At least she thought it was watching her. It was hard to tell because the eyes were as dark 37 страница

Kahlan frowned. 'What makes you think that?'

'Why did you close the doors after you had looked?'

'Out of respect for the dead.'

'When we came to them, they were closed. Those who did this rape had no respect. They would not have closed all the doors. They wanted anyone who came to see what they had done. Someone else has been here, and closed the doors.'

Kahlan glanced to the doors, seeing the meaning of what he said. 'I think you're right.' She shook her head. Those who did this would not have closed the door.'

Chandalen leaned on the railing again, looking down at the wide stairs. 'Why are we here?'

'Because I had to know what happened to these people.'

'You saw that outside. Why are we here, in this house?'

Kahlan glanced at the steps leading up to the top floor. 'Because I have to know if the queen was killed, too.'

He looked over his shoulder toward her. 'She means something to you?'

Kahlan was suddenly aware of the pounding of her heart. 'Yes. Do you remember the statues near the door we entered?'

'A woman, and a man.'

She nodded. The statue of the woman is a statue of her mother. My mother was a Confessor. The statue of the man is a statue of her father. King Wyborn. He was also my father.'

Chandalen lifted an eyebrow. 'You are sister to this queen?'

'Half sister.' Summoning courage, she started for the stairs. 'Let's see if she is here, and then we can be on our way to Aydindril.'

Kahlan's heart was still pounding as she stood before the door to the queen's chambers. She couldn't bring herself to open it. It smelled dreadful in the hall, but she hardly noticed.

'Do you wish me to look for you?'

'No,' she said. 'I must see with my own eyes.'

She turned the knob. The door was locked, the key still in place. She touched the icy metal plate. This is a lock, the thing I told you of before,' she lectured as she pulled the key out and held it up. This is a key.' Replacing the key, she twisted it with shaking fingers. 'If you have a key, you can open the lock, and then the door.'

Someone had obviously locked the door, out of respect for the queen.

The windows were intact, as was the furniture. The room was as freezing cold as the rest of the palace, but the smell made them suddenly gag and hold their breath.

Human excrement covered everything in the outer sitting room. The two of them stared in shock. Dark piles dotted the carpets and sat on the desk and table. The blue velvet chairs and couches were soaked with yellow, frozen urine. Someone had even squatted neatly in the fireplace.

Holding their mantles across their noses, they stepped carefully across the room to the next closed door. The queen's bedchamber was worse. There was hardly a place to put a foot without stepping in it. But as covered as the floor was, the worst was the bed; it was heaped with feces. Delicately painted floral scenes on the walls were smeared with it. If everything hadn't been frozen solid, they would have been driven from the room by the stench. As it was, it was barely tolerable.

Thankfully, there were no bodies. The queen was not here.

The names on Kahlan's mental roster of who could have done all this fell away, and only one nation was left. The ones who had been at the top, before.

'Keltans,' she hissed to herself.

Chandalen was dumbfounded. 'Why would these men do this? Are they children who do not know better?'

After a last look around, Kahlan led them back out into the hall, locking the door once more, at last taking a full breath. 'It's a message. It's meant to show their disrespect for the people who lived here. It says that they have nothing but scorn for these people, and anything that's theirs. They've soiled their foe's honor in every way they could think of.'

'At least your half sister is not here.'

Kahlan snugged the thongs of her mantle tight at her neck. 'At least there is that.'

She descended the steps, pausing to look once more at the closed doors on the second floor. Chandalen watched her after he, too, glanced to the row of doors.

She sought to fill the silence. 'We must go and find Prindin and Tossidin.'

His face was lined with ire. 'Does this not make you angry?'

She realized only then that she was wearing her Confessor's face. 'It would do no good for me to show my anger right now. When the time is right, you will know just how angry I am.'

CHAPTER 30

In a cramped daub and wattle house next to the hole in the city's wall, Kahlan watched as Chandalen built a small fire for her in the central pit. The two brothers were nowhere to be seen.

'Warm yourself,' he said. 'I will see if Prindin and Tossidin are close, and tell them where we wait.'

After he had left, she drew off her mantle, even though she knew it wasn't a good idea to get too used to the warmth because it would only make the cold seem worse later. Drawn by the lure of the fire, she squatted close, rubbing her hands together over the flames, shivering as the warmth seeped into her bones.

The small room was one of only two that had been a large part of some family's world. The table was broken but the crude bench sitting against the wall was not. A few pieces of clothing were scattered about, along with bent tin plates and a broken spinning wheel. Three bobbins were crushed into the dirt floor.

Kahlan retrieved a dented pot from among the rubble, deciding it was easier to use it than to unpack one of their own. She heaped it full of snow from outside the door, placed the pot on three stones in the fire, then warmed her icy fingers again, finally pressing them against the cold flesh of her face. There was tea in a crushed canister in the corner, but she instead pulled her own from her pack while she waited for the snow to melt, and the men to return.

Try as she might, she couldn't get the faces of the dead young women out of her mind.

Several times, she added snow as that in the pot melted down. As the water was just starting to bubble, Prindin came through the door. He leaned his bow against the wall and with a sigh slumped down heavily on the bench.

Kahlan stood and glanced to the empty doorway. 'Where's your brother?'

'He should be here soon. We took different ways back, to be able to look at more tracks.' He craned his neck, looking through the doorway into the second room. 'Where is Chandalen?'

'He went to find you and Tossidin.'

Then he will be back soon. My brother is not far.'

'What did you find?'

'More dead people.'

He didn't seem to want to talk about it at the moment, so she decided to wait until Chandalen returned with Tossidin before questioning him.

'I was just warming water. We'll have some hot tea.'

He nodded, flashing her his handsome smile. 'It would be good to have hot tea.'

Kahlan bent over the pot, shaking tea from a leather pouch with one hand, and holding her long hair back from her face with the other.

'You have a fine-looking bottom,' came his voice from behind.

She straightened and turned to him. 'What did you say?'

Prindin pointed toward her middle. 'I said you have a fine-looking bottom. It is a good shape.'

Kahlan had learned not to be startled or insulted by the strange customs of different peoples of the Midlands. Among the Mud People, for example, a man complimenting a woman on her breasts was the same as saying she looked to be capable of being a fit and healthy mother, able to nurse her future children. It was a compliment that brought smiles of pride from the flattered woman's family, and was a sure way for a suitor to make friends with her father. At the same time, asking to see a woman with the sticky mud washed from her hair was likely as not to raise drawn bows - it was tantamount to asking the young woman for improper favors.

The Mud People treated matters of sex in an especially casual manner. Kahlan had more than once been brought to blushing by Weselan's unexpected and cavalier descriptions of coupling with her husband. Worse, she was as likely as not to do it in his presence.

As she stared at Prindin, the visions of the young women's faces, too, floated before her eyes.

Though Prindin had not complimented her on her breasts, it seemed to her that a woman's hips could be construed to carry the same maternal compliment. She knew he meant no disrespect, but still, his beaming smile made the hairs on her arms stand on end. Maybe it was just the inappropriate timing, with the dead all about, that unnerved her. But he hadn't seen the dead young women.

Prindin's smile faded only a little as a frown came to his brow. 'You look surprised. Doesn't Richard With The Temper ever tell you how fine your bottom is?'

Kahlan fumbled for words, not sure how to bring this to an honorable halt. 'He has never mentioned it, specifically.'

'Other men must have told you this before. It is too fine for them not to notice. The shape of your body is very good to look at. It fills me with desire to...' He frowned in puzzlement. 'I don't know your word for...'

Blood went to her face in a red rush as she took a step toward him. 'Prindin!' She relaxed her fists and brought her voice back in check. 'Prindin. I am the Mother Confessor.'

He nodded, his grin returning, but not quite as confident. 'Yes, but you are a woman, too, and your shape...'

'Prindin!' He blinked at her as she ground her teeth. 'In your land it may be proper to speak to a woman in this fashion, but in other places in the Midlands, it is not. In other places, speaking in this manner is offensive. Very offensive. More than that, I'm the Mother Confessor, and it's not proper to speak to me in this way.'

His smile vanished. 'But you are now one of the Mud People.'

"That may be true, but I'm still the Mother Confessor.'

His face blanched. 'I have offended you.' He leapt up from the bench and fell to his knees before her. 'Forgive me, please. I meant no disrespect. I meant only to show my favor for you.'

Her red face glowed in embarrassment. She had done it now; she had humiliated him.

'I understand, Prindin. I know your words are harmless, but you must not speak this way outside your land. Others would not understand your ways and would be greatly offended.'

He was nearly in tears. 'I did not know. Please say you forgive Prindin.' He clutched at her pants, and gripped her upper thighs with his powerful fingers.

'Yes... of course... I know you meant no harm.' She took hold of his wrists, pulling them gently from her legs. 'I forgive you....'

Chandalen came through the door, his face set in a grim cast. He took a quick glance at Prindin before looking up into her eyes.

'What is this?'

'Nothing.' She hastily helped Prindin to his feet as his brother entered the room. 'But we're going to have to have a talk about the proper way to speak to ladies in the Midlands. There are things you three will need to be taught, to keep you out of trouble.' She smoothed her pant legs and the lingering sting of where Prindin's strong fingers had been, and then straightened herself. Tell me what you've found.'

Chandalen cast a withering glare at Prindin. 'What have you done?'

Prindin took a half step back, diverting his eyes. 'I did not know it would be wrong. I told her she had a fine...'

'I said it was nothing,' Kahlan said, cutting him off. 'It's just a small misunderstanding. Forget about it.' She turned to the fire. 'I made hot tea. Get some cups - there are some we can use on the floor over there - and we will have some tea while you tell me what you found.'

Tossidin made for the cups, thumping the back of his brother's head along the way, adding a whispered reprimand. Chandalen shrugged off his mantle and squatted before the fire, warming his hands. The brothers brought the cups, Prindin rubbing the back of his head, and passed them around.

In an attempt to let them all know Prindin hadn't lost any honor in her eyes, Kahlan directed her attention and first question to him. 'Tell me what you found.'

Prindin glanced briefly at the other two before setting his face with a serious expression. 'Ten, maybe twelve days ago, this killing was done. The enemy came mostly from the east, but there were many, and some came from farther to the north and south. They had war in the narrow places in the mountains with men from this city. Those men from the city not killed ran away as they were overrun and gathered their numbers here, and tried to make a stand. While they ran to here, they were chased by their enemy, fighting and dying as they ran.

'More and more of the invaders poured through the passes, sweeping around to the south, here, where they had a battle. After they defeated those men, and killed the ones they captured, the enemy came through the wall. When they were finished in this city, all of them, together, went east again.'

Tossidin leaned in a little. 'Before they left, they took their dead from the city. They used wagons; there are many tracks from the wheels. It took them maybe two days to take all their dead from here. Many thousands. The people here must have fought like demon spirits. The ones who did this lost more men than they killed.'

'Where are the bodies?' she asked.

'In a bowl in a pass to the east,' Prindin said. 'The wagons took the dead along the road, and then they were thrown down into the low place. They are piled so deep we do not know how low the ground is there.'

'What did they look like?' She took a sip of tea, holding the tin cup with both hands wrapped around it, soaking up the warmth. 'How were they dressed?'

Prindin reached under his shirt and pulled out a folded cloth. He handed her the bloodred bundle. There were poles, with these on them. Many of the men wore clothes with the same symbols on them, but we did not want to take the clothes from the dead.'

Kahlan unfolded the banner and stared in shock at the long red triangle draped over her hands. In the center was a black shield with an ornate silver letter on it. The letter R. It was a war banner, with the shield and symbol of the House of Rahl.

'D'Haran soldiers,' she whispered. 'How could that be?' She looked up. 'Were there Keltans, too?'

The three men looked at one another. They didn't understand. They didn't know the Keltans.

There were some with other clothes,' Prindin said. 'But most had this symbol on them, or on their shields.'

'And they went east?'

Tossidin nodded. 'I do not know the way to tell you their numbers, but there were so many that if you stood in the same spot on the wide road they took, you would be there all day watching them pass.'

'Also,' Prindin said, 'as they were going, others joined them, from the north where they had been waiting, and went with them.'

Kahlan's eyes narrowed as she frowned in thought. 'Did they have many wagons? Big wagons?'

Prindin snorted a laugh. They must have hundreds. These men do not carry anything. They use wagons. They have victory, because they are many, but they are lazy. They ride in wagons, or use them to carry their things.'

'It takes a lot of supplies,' she said, 'to support an army that big. And if they ride in wagons it keeps them fresh for fighting.'

'It also makes them soft,' Chandalen said defiantly. 'If you carry what you need, like we do, then you grow strong. If you walk without carrying what you need, or ride in wagons, or on horses, then you grow soft. These men are not strong, like us.'

'They were strong enough to crush this city,' Kahlan said, looking up from under her eyebrows. 'They were strong enough to win the battle and destroy their opponent.'

'Only because they are many,' Chandalen argued, 'like the Jocopo, not because they are strong, or good fighters.'

'Large numbers,' she said, quietly, 'has a strength all its own.'

None of the three men disagreed with that.

Prindin downed the last of his tea before speaking. 'Their numbers are all gone now. They stay together as they go east.'

'East.' She thought a moment while the three waited. 'Did they go through a pass that has a thin rope bridge stretched above it? A bridge that can only be crossed by one person at a time, on foot?'

The brothers nodded.

Kahlan stood. 'Jara Pass,' she whispered to herself as she turned to stare out the door. 'It's one of the few big enough for their wagons.'

There is more,' Tossidin said as he stood, too. 'Maybe five days after they left, more men came here.' He held up the spread fingers of both hands. This many did the killing here.' He closed all but a lone little finger on his right hand. This many came here after it was done.'

Kahlan glanced to Chandalen. The ones who closed the doors.'

He nodded as the two brothers frowned.

They searched the city,' Tossidin went on. There were no people left here to kill, so they followed the tracks, followed those that went east, to join with them.'

'No,' Kahlan said. They were no allies of those who did this. They didn't go to join them. They're going after them, though.'

Prindin considered this a moment. Then if they catch the ones who did this, then they, too, will die. They have no numbers like those they chase. They will be like fleas trying to eat a dog.'

Kahlan snatched up her mantle and flung it around her shoulders. 'Let's get going. Jara Pass is wide and easy enough for large wagons, but it's also very long and meandering. I know small passes - like the one that takes that rope bridge over the Jara, and then up through Harpies Cleft - that an army cannot travel, but we can, and it's much shorter. What they travel in three or four days, we can travel in one.'

Chandalen stood, but did so in an easy manner. 'Mother Confessor, following these men will not take us to Aydindril.'

'We have to go over one of the passes to get us to Aydindril. Harpies is as good as any.'

Chandalen still made no move to recover his mantle. 'But that way lies an army of thousands. You wanted to get to Aydindril with as little trouble as possible. That way lies trouble.'

Kahlan squatted with her boot over a snowshoe, and began lacing on the binding. The faces of the dead young women wavered before her eyes. 'I'm the Mother Confessor. I will not allow this to happen in the Midlands. It's my responsibility.'

The men glanced uneasily at one another. The brothers moved to retrieve their snowshoes. Chandalen did not.

'You said your responsibility was to go to Aydindril as Richard With The Temper asked. You said you must do as he asked.'

Kahlan paused her work at the binding of the second snowshoe. Anguish seared though her. She considered Chan-dalen's words, but only briefly. 'I'm not abandoning that responsibility.' She finished the binding and stood. 'But we're Mud People. We have other responsibilities, too.'

'Other responsibilities?'

Kahlan tapped the bone knife that was tied to her arm, under her mantle. 'To the spirits. The Jocopo, the Bantak, and now these men, have listened to spirits that would have them do great evil - spirits that come through the tear in the veil. We have responsibilities to the spirits of our ancestors, and their living descendants.'

She knew that to close the veil, she needed to reach Zedd, to get help for Richard. It was possible that Richard was the only one who could close the veil. Chandalen was right; they must reach Aydindril.

But the faces of the young women still filled her mind. The horror of what had been done to them still coursed through her.

The two brothers were sitting on the bench putting on their snowshoes. Chandalen stepped close to her and lowered her voice.

'What good will come of us catching this army? It is wrong.'

She looked into his brown eyes. They were not filled with defiance as they had been in the past, but with genuine concern.

'Chandalen, the men who did this killing, and went east, are perhaps fifty thousand strong. The ones who closed the doors in the palace and are chasing that army are perhaps five thousand. They are filled with anger, but if they catch the ones they're chasing, they'll be slaughtered, too. If I have a chance to prevent five thousand men from dying, then I must try for that chance.'

He lifted an eyebrow. 'And if you are killed in this, then what greater evil will break its bounds?'

'That's what you three are supposed to prevent - my being killed.'

She started for the door. Chandalen gently gripped her arm and brought her to a halt. He spoke calmly.

'It will be dark soon. We can rest here tonight, and cook food. We can leave in the morning after we are rested.'

The moon will be up soon to light our way. We have no time to waste.' She leaned toward him. 'I'm going on, now. If you're as strong as you say, you'll go with me. If you're not, you may rest here.'

Chandalen put his hands on his hips. His lips tightened as he let out a deep breath. He appraised her with frustration.

'You cannot walk more than Chandalen. We go, too.'

Kahlan gave him a quick, tight smile, and swept through the door. The brothers snatched up their bows and jumped to fall in behind her while Chandalen bent to tie on his snowshoes.

CHAPTER 31

Richard watched the horses eating grass that wasn't there, and scratched his itchy beard. The surface of the valley was baked and barren, but the horses seemed contented in their grazing, as if there were lush green grass beneath their feet. Illusion, it seemed, deluded and enticed even the horses. He wondered what wasn't there that he was going to see.

Sister Verna at last moved, pulling up on Jessup's lead line, pulling him away from his browsing. 'This way.'

Ominous, dark clouds hugged the ground ahead, boiling as if alive and eagerly awaiting them. Richard pulled the other two horses on, following after the Sister. She had told them that they must walk because the horses could be suddenly spooked by things unseen and could carry them, helpless, into a spell.

Sister Verna abruptly altered her course across the featureless ground, taking them a little to the right. The dark cloud of dust and dirt lifted and tumbled, driven by the gusts that, as of yet, didn't touch them. Sister Verna looked over her shoulder, her expression as dark as the cloud.

'Whatever you see, you ignore it. Whatever it is, it isn't real. You just ignore it. Do you understand?'

'What am I going to see?'

She redirected her attention to the way ahead. Her white blouse was damp with sweat, as was his shirt. 'I can't tell you. The spells seek those things in your own mind you fear or long for, so everyone sees different things. Yet some visions are the same. Some fears are the same in all of us. Some of the magic we will see is not visions, but real. Like those clouds of dust.'

'And what did you see the last time that you're so afraid of?'

She walked in silence for a time. 'One I loved.'

'If she was a loved one, why would you be afraid to see her?'

'Because he tried to kill me.'

Richard blinked at the stinging sweat in his eyes. 'He? Do you have a man you love, Sister?'

She watched the ground as she walked. 'Not anymore.' Her voice was soft with sorrow. She glanced up at him a moment, before seeking the ground once more with her eyes. 'When I was young, I had a love. Jedidiah.'

She was silent, so he asked. 'He is not your love anymore?' She shook her head. 'Why not?'

Pausing only a moment, she wiped her brow with a finger before moving on. 'I was young, perhaps younger than you, when I left the Palace of the Prophets. Left to find you. We didn't know if you had been born yet. We knew that if you had not been, you would be, but we didn't know when, so three Sisters were sent.

'But that was many years ago. I've spent better than half my life away from the palace. From Jedidiah.' She stopped again, peering first right, then left, before starting ahead once more. 'He will have long ago forgotten me, and found another.'

'If he really loved you, Sister, he won't have forgotten you and found another. You haven't forgotten him.'

She tugged on her horse's line, pulling him away from something he wanted to investigate. 'Too many years have passed. We've grown older apart. I have grown old. We are not the same people we were. He is one with the gift, and has his own life. It would not include me.'

'You're not old, Sister. If you really love each other, time shouldn't matter.' He wondered if he was talking about her, or himself.

Sister Verna gave a soft, private laugh. 'Youth. Youth holds much hope, but not much wisdom. I know the ways of people. Of men. He has been too long from my skirts. He will long ago have sought another.'

Richard felt himself blushing in the heat. 'Love has more to it than that.'

'Ah, so you know so much of love, yes? You, too, will soon be searching the charms of a new pair of pretty legs.'

Richard was about to vent a rush of sudden anger when Sister Verna stopped. She looked up. The dark cloud swirled in, closing in on them.

From somewhere, Richard heard the faint sound of someone screaming his name.

'Something is wrong,' Sister Verna whispered to herself.

'What is it?'

She ignored him, pulling Jessup to the left. 'This way.'

Lightning lit the air about them. A blinding bolt struck the ground ahead, sending a shower of the chalky earth skyward. The ground shook with the impact. Every muscle flinched from the nearness of the strike.

When the lightning tore the dark wall open for an instant, Richard saw Kahlan. She was standing, watching him. And then she was gone.

'Kahlan?'

Sister Verna reversed course. 'This way. Now! Richard, I told you, it is not real. Whatever you saw, you must ignore it.'

He knew it was an illusion, but the sight ran a sharp pang of longing through him. He groaned inwardly. Why did the magic have to attract him with visions of her? His own mind, Sister Verna had said, would bring forth the things he feared, or those for which he longed. Which was this, he wondered, fear or longing?

'Is the lightning real?'

'Real enough to kill us. But it's not lightning in the sense of what you know. This is a storm of spells that are battling each other. The lightning is a discharge of their power as they fight each other. At the same time, it also seeks to destroy any intruder. Our way is among the gaps in their battle.'

Again, he heard the distant scream of his name, but it wasn't Kahlan's voice. It was a man's voice.

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