“When you make peace with the Majendie, before you let them plant once again, you must add another condition. You must tell them that in honor of the killing being brought to an end, in honor of the peace, they will let the Sisters cross their land.” She watched his eyes a moment before she finally nodded. “Your people will do the same.”narrowed his eyes at the Sister. “satisfied?”
“In the valley, when you struck down a beast, a thousand snakes sprang forth from its corpse. This is no different.
“It would be impossible,” she said, “for me to accurately recall all the lies you’ve told today. I’ve reprimanded you before for lying, and cautioned you not to do it again. I told you not to swing the axe today, and you did it anyway, despite my warning. I can scarcely tally all the commands you’ve managed to violate in this one day. What you’ve done has not finished the killing, but only begun it.”
“In this, Sister, I am the Seeker, not your student. As Seeker, I have no tolerance for human sacrifice. None. The deaths of others are a separate issue. You cannot use it as a link to justify murder. There will be no compromise in this. And I don’t think you want to punish me for stopping something I would wager you wish had been stopped long ago.”muscles in her face relaxed. “As a Sister of the Light, I have no power to change things, and under obligation to save more lives, I had to uphold what has been for three thousand years. But I admit I hated it, and in a way I’m glad you have taken it out of my hands. But that does not negate the trouble it will cause, or the deaths. When you put the Ra-da’Han on, you told me that holding the leash to that collar would be worse than wearing it. Your words are proving true.”lower eyelids filled with glistening moisture. “You have made my greatest love, my calling, a misery.
“I am past wanting to punish you for your disobedience. In a few days we will be at the palace, and I will at last be finished with you. They will have to deal with you.
“We shall see how they handle you when you displease them. I believe you will find they are not prepared to be as tolerant as I have been. They will use that collar. And when they do, I also think they will come to regret holding your leash more than do I. I think they will come to regret trying to help you, as do I.”put his hands in his back pockets as he stared off at the thick forest of oak and leather leaf. “I’m sorry you feel that way, Sister, but I guess I can understand it. Although I admit I have fought being your prisoner, what happened today was not about you and me.
“This was about what is right. As one who would wish to teach me, I hoped you would share that moral stance. I hoped the Sisters would not want to teach the use of the gift to one who could easily bend his convictions to the circumstance.
“Sister Verna, I was not trying to displease you. I simply could not live with myself if I had allowed a murder to take place under my nose, much less if I had participated in it.”
“I know, Richard. But that only makes it worse, because it’s all one and the same.” She unclasped her hands and peered about at the fire and their supplies, finally pulling a cake of soap from a saddlebag. “I’ll make a stew, and bannock.” She tossed the cake of soap to him. “du Chaillu needs a bath.”Chaillu folded her arms in a huff. “While I was chained to a wall, the dogs who came to mount me did not offer me water so I would smell pretty for you.”Verna squatted down, pulling supplies out. “I meant no offense, Du Chaillu. I simply thought you would want to wash the dirt of those men off you. If it were me, I would want nothing more than to try to wash the feel of their hands from my flesh.”Chaillu’s indignation faltered. “Well of course I would!” She snatched the soap from Richard. “You smell of that beast you ride. You will wash too, or I will not want to be near you and will send you off to eat by yourself.”chuckled. “If it will keep the peace with you, I’ll wash, too.”Du Chaillu marched off toward the pond, Sister Verna called quietly to him. He waited next to her while she pulled a pot from a saddlebag.
“Her people have been killing any “magic man” they could get their hands on for the last three thousand years. There is no time to give you history lessons.” She looked up to his eyes. “Old habits spring to hand as easily as a knife. Don’t turn your back on her. Sooner or later, she is going to try to kill you.”quiet tone unexpectedly raised bumps on his flesh. “I’ll try to keep myself alive, Sister, so you can deliver me to the palace and at last be free of your onerous charge.”hurried toward the pond and caught up with Du Chaillu as she was walking through the reeds. “Why did you call that your prayer dress?”Chaillu held her arms out, letting the breeze ruffle the strips of cloth on her dress. “These are prayers.”
“What are prayers? You mean the strips of cloth?”nodded. “Each is a prayer. When the wind blows, and they fly, each sends a prayer to the spirits.”
“And what do you pray for?”
“Every one of these prayers is the same, from the heart of the person who gave me their prayer. They are all prayers to have our land returned to us.”
“Your land? But you are in your land.”
“No. This is where we live, but it is not our land. Many ages ago, our land was taken by the magic men. They banished us here.”reached the edge of the pond. Puffs of breeze drew up ripples in dark patches. The bank was grassy with thick patches of rushes to each side, extending out into the water.magic men took your land? What land?”took our land from our ancestors.” She pointed in the direction of the Valley of the Lost. The land on the other side of the Majendie. I was going to our land, with our prayers, to ask the spirits if they would help our land be returned to us. But the Majendie caught me, and I was not able to take our prayers to the spirits.”
“How will the spirits return your land to you?”shrugged. The old words say only that we must send one every year to our land, to pray to the spirits, and if we do, our land will be returned.” She untied her belt and slipped it to the ground. With unsettling grace, she tossed the green-handled knife aside, sticking it in the round end of a branch on a log.
“How?”gave him a curious frown. “By sending us our master.”
“I thought you were the Baka Ban Mana, those without masters.”shrugged. “Because the spirits have not sent us one yet.”Richard was puzzling over this, she reached down, took hold of her dress, and pulled it off over her head.
“What do you think you’re doing!”frowned. “It is me that I must wash, not my dress.”
“Well, not in front of me!”looked down at herself. “You have already seen me. I have not grown any different since this morning.” She looked up at him. “Your face is red again.”
“Over there.” He pointed. “Go on the other side of the rushes. You on one side and me on the other.”turned his back to her.
“But we have only one soap.”
“Well, you can throw it to me when you’re through.”came around to the front of him. He tried to turn again but she followed him around, grabbing at his buttons.
“I cannot scrub my own back. And it is not fair. You have seen me, so I should see you. That is why you are turning red, because you have not been fair. This will make you feel better.”slapped her hands away. “stop it. Du Chaillu, where I come from this is not proper. Men and women do not bathe together. It’s just not done.” He turned his back to her again.
“Not even my third husband is as shy as you.”
“Third! You have had three husbands?”
“No. I have five.”stiffened. “Have?” He turned to her. “What do you mean “have’?”looked at him as if he had asked if trees grew in the forest. “I have five husbands. Five husbands and my children.”
“And how many of those do you have?”
“Three. Two girls, and a boy.” A wistful smile came to her. “It is a long time since I have held them.” Her smile turned sad. “My poor babies will have cried every night, thinking I am dead. No one ever returned from the Majendie before.” She grinned. “My husbands will be anxious to draw lots to see who will be the first to try to give me another child.” Her smile faded and her voice trailed off. “But I guess a Majendie dog has already done that.”handed her the soap. “It will all turn out fine. You’ll see. Go bathe. I’ll go on the other side of the rushes.”relaxed in the cool water, listening to her splash, waiting for her to finish with the soap. A mist thickened over the pond, stealing slowly, silently, into the surrounding trees.
“I’ve never heard of a woman having more than one husband. Do all the Baka Ban Mana women have more than one husband?”giggled. “No. Only me.”
“Why you?”water stopped splashing. “Because I wear the prayer dress,” she said, as if it should be self-evident.rolled his eyes. “Well, what does…”came swimming through the rushes toward him. “Before you can have the soap, you must wash my back.”let out an aggravated sigh. “All right, if I wash your back, will you then go back on your side?”presented her back to him. “If you do a proper job.”she was satisfied, she finally went back to get dressed while he washed. She told him over the chirp of bugs and the trill of frogs that she was hungry. He was pulling his pants on while she called for him to hurry so they could eat.threw his shirt over his shoulder and ran to catch up with her as she headed toward the smell of cooking. She looked much better clean. Her hair looked like a normal person’s, instead of a wild animal’s. She looked no more like a savage, but somehow noble.wasn’t dark yet, but getting close to it. The mist that had formed over the pond was drifting in around them from behind. The trees were disappearing in the gathering fog.the two of them stepped into the ring of light around the fire, Sister Verna stood. Richard was putting his right arm through his sleeve when he froze at the wide-eyed look on Sister Verna’s face. She was staring at his chest, at the thing he had never let her see before.the scar. At the handprint burned there. At the handprint that was a constant reminder of who fathered him.Verna was as white as a spirit. Her voice was so soft he had to strain to hear her. “Where did you get that?”Chaillu was staring at the scar, too.pulled his shirt closed. “I told you before, Darken Rahl burned me with his hand. You said I was only having visions.”gaze slowly rose to meet his. Her eyes were filled with something he had never seen in them before. Unbridled fear.
“Richard,” she whispered, “you must not show anyone at the palace what you have upon you. Except the Prelate. She may know what to do. You must show her. But no one else.” She stepped closer. “do you understand? No one!”slowly buttoned his shirt. “Why?”
“Because, if you do, they will kill you. That is the mark of the Nameless One.” Her tongue wet her lips. “sins of the father.”the distance came the plaintive howl of wolves. Du Chaillu shuddered and hugged herself as she stared off into the deepening fog.
“People will die tonight,” Du Chaillu whispered.frowned at her. “What are you talking about?”
“Wolves. When wolves howl like that in the mist, they are foretelling that people are to die violently in the night, in the mist.”44materialized out of fog and mist, the white fangs of death. The startled prey, at first immobilized by bone-chilling fright, jumped to flee before the white death. Fangs of white steel ripped into them without mercy as they bolted for their lives. Death squeals tore the night air with their terror. Hysteria sent them running heedlessly onto the waiting cold, white steel.men tasted fear before they died.spread on a wild uproar of noise. The ringing chime of steel, the splintering of wood, the ripping of canvas, the groan of leather, the pop of bones, the whoosh of fire, the crash of wagons, the thuds of flesh and bone hitting ground, and the screams of man and beast all joined into one long cacophony of terror. The wave of white death drove the tumult before it.sharp smell of blood washed through the air, over the sweet aroma of blazing wood, the acrid tang of igniting lamp oil, the smoky smack of flaming pitch, and the gagging stench of burning fur and flesh.wasn’t wet with the cold mist was greasy-slick with hot blood.white steel fangs now were coated with blood and gore; white snow became a soggy mat of red splashes. The cold air was seared by gouts of flame that leapt up to turn the white fog an incandescent orange. Sinister, dark clouds of smoke hugged the ground while the sky burned overhead.zipped past, spears arced through the air, splintered lances spun away into the mist, and severed pike heads whirled off into the darkness. Remnants of torn tents flapped and fluttered as if battered by a furious storm. Swords rose and fell in waves, driven by the grunts that accompanied frantic effort.ran in every direction, like frenzied ants. Some tumbled to the ground, spilling their viscera across the snow. One of the wounded, blinded by blood, stumbled aimlessly until a white shadow swept by, a spirit of death, cutting him down. A wagon wheel bounced past, its progress quickly obscured from view by dark curtains of acrid smoke that drifted past.alarm had been raised; the sentries were long dead. Few in camp had realized what was happening until it was upon them.camp of the Imperial Order had lately been a place of noise and wild celebration, and for many, in their drunken state, it was hard to tell that anything of consequence was happening. Many of the men, poisoned by the bandu in the ale, lay sick around fires. Many were so weak they burned to death without trying to escape flaming tents. Others were in such a drunken stupor that they actually smiled at the men who drove swords through their guts.the ones who were not drunk, or who were not drunk to the point of dullness, didn’t truly appreciate what was happening. Their camp was often a place of raucous noise and confusion. Huge bonfires roared throughout the night, for warmth and as gathering places. They were generally the only reference points in the disorderly layout, so the fires of destruction caused little concern, except in the immediate area.D’Harans, fighting in the camps was simply part of the revelry, and men screaming when they were stabbed in altercations was not noteworthy. What one had was only his if he was fierce enough to keep it from others who were always ready to take it. Alliances among D’Harans were shifting sands that could last a lifetime or, more commonly, for as little as an hour, when a new alliance became more advantageous or profitable. The drinking, and the poison, dulled their grasp of the sheer volume of screams.battle they were disciplined, but when not in battle, they were ungoverned to the point of anarchy. Pay, for D’Harans on expeditions, was in large part a share of the plunder—they had looted Ebinissia, despite all their talk of a new law—and having that new plunder made them perhaps less than single-minded in their devotion to duty. At battle, or the first sound of an alarm, they became a single unified fighting machine, almost an entity of one mind, but in camp, without the overriding purpose of war, they became thousands of individuals, all bent on serving their own self-interest.an alarm to warn them, they paid the added noise and screaming little attention. Above the noise of their own business, trading, stories, laughter, drinking, gambling, fighting, and whoring, the unheralded battle a short distance away went largely unnoticed. The officers would call them if needed. Without that call to duty, their life was their own, and someone else’s troubles were not theirs. They were unprepared when the white death materialized.sight of white spirits appearing among them was a paralyzing force. Many a man wailed in fear of the Shahari spirits. Many envisioned that the separation between the world of the living and the world of the dead had evaporated. Or that they had somehow been suddenly cast into the underworld.the ale, both poisoned and unadulterated, it might not be so. As it was, the drink, and their confidence in their numbers and strength, left them vulnerable as they would never be again. But not all were drunk, or dull. Some rose up fiercely.watched it all from atop her dancing warhorse. In a sea of raw, unbridled emotion, she wore her Confessor’s face.men were neither moral nor ethical; they were animals who lived by no rule but might. They had raped the women at the palace and had mercilessly butchered the people of Ebinissia, from the aged down to newborn babes.man lunged through the ring of steel around her, grabbing at her saddle for support. He gaped at her, crying a prayer for mercy from the good spirits. She split his skull.wheeled her horse to face Sergeant Cullen. “Have we captured the command tents?”sergeant signaled, and one of the white, naked men ran off to check as they drove deeper into the camp of the Order. When she spotted the horses, she gave the signal. From behind she heard the sound of galloping hooves, and the sharp rattle of chains: scythes of death, come to reap a crop of the living.a sound like a boy running past a picket fence with a stick in hand, the chain scythes being pulled at a full charge reaped a snapping of bone that meshed into a long, clacking roar. The beasts” screams and the dull thuds as they slammed the ground drowned out the sound of galloping hooves and breaking bone.the drunken enemy turned from the white spirits to stare at the ghastly spectacle. It was the last thing they saw. Men stumbled from their tents, to watch without understanding what it was that was occurring before their eyes. Others wandered aimlessly, mugs in hand, as if at a fair, drunkenly looking from one sight to another. There were so many, some had to wait a bit for their turn to die.were not drunk and saw not spirits but men painted white. They saw an attack, and understood well-honed blades coming for them. A pocket of fierce counterattack was surrounded and broken, but not without cost. Kahlan rallied her men and drove her wedge of white steel deeper into the heart of the enemy’s camp.saw two men on huge draft horses—she couldn’t see who they were—having cut down all the horses they could find, take to charging down a line of tents, reaping havoc as well as helpless men. The chain caught something as solid as bedrock. It whipped the horses around into a brutal collision. The riders went down. Men with swords and axes swarmed over them.man with sword to hand, and sober, she was alarmed to note, appeared suddenly next to her leg. He looked up with a fierce glare. His sharp eyes made her feel suddenly nothing more than a naked woman sitting on a horse.took all of her in. “What the…”foot of steel erupted from his breastbone, driving a grunt from his lungs.
“Mother Confessor!” The naked man behind yanked his sword free and pointed with it. “The command tents are over there!”movement to the other side caught her attention. With a backhanded swing, she caught the side of a stumbling drunk’s neck.
“Let’s go! To the command tents! Now!”men abandoned the enemy they were decimating to follow her as she jumped Nick over men and fires and crumpled wagons. As they followed, they didn’t stop to slaughter the confused, panicked, and drunken D’Harans everywhere, but cut down those they could if it didn’t slow their pace. Where necessary, they engaged the sporadic resistance.large command tents were surrounded by her white Galeans. They held a small group of about fifteen men at swordpoint. Before them lay a neat row of at least thirty bodies on their backs in the snow.of her men were throwing battle standards and flags atop a large pile already smoldering and burning in the fire. Empty casks lay scattered in the snow. When their army had come under attack, the commanders had issued no orders. The army of the Imperial Order was without benefit of direction.Sloan pointed with his sword to the line of bodies. These officers were already dead. The poison did its work. These others were still alive, although not in the best of health. They were all lying about in their tents. We could hardly get them up. They asked us for rum, if you can believe it. We’ve held them, like you said.”surveyed the faces of the bodies in the snow. She didn’t see what she wanted. She looked to the faces of the captured officers. He wasn’t there either.directed her Confessor’s face to a Keltish officer at the end of the line. “Where’s Riggs?”glared at her, and then spat. Kahlan lifted her gaze to the man holding him. She drew her finger across her throat. He didn’t hesitate. The officer went down in a heap.looked to the next officer. “Where’s Riggs?”eyes darted about. “I don’t know!”drew her finger across her throat. As he went down, she looked to the next man, a D’Haran commander.
“Where’s Riggs?”eyes were wide, but not at the two bleeding bodies beside him. His horror was for her. A spirit before him. He wet his lips.
“He was hurt; by the Mother Confessor. I mean, by you. Before.” His voice trembled. “When you were… alive.”
“Where is he!”winced, shaking his head vigorously. “I don’t know, great spirit! He was hurt, his face was cut by the horse. He is being tended to by the surgeons. I don’t know where their tents are.”
“Who knows where the surgeon’s tents are?”trembled and shuddered as they shook their heads. Kahlan stepped her horse down the line of officers. She stopped before one she knew.
“General Karsh. I am very pleased to see you again. Where’s Riggs!”
“Wouldn’t tell you if I knew.” He grinned as he leered up at her. “You look better naked than I fancied. Why are you whoring with this lot? We could do you better than these boys.”man holding him twisted his arm until he cried out. “show respect for the Mother Confessor, you Keltish pig!”
“Respect! For a whore holding a sword? Never!”leaned toward him. These “boys” have you under their blades. Every one is a better man than you, I would say.
“You wanted war, Karsh. You have your wish. You have war, now. A real war, not a slaughter of women and children, but a war led by me—the Mother Confessor. A woman. War without quarter.”sat up straight in her saddle, letting his eyes linger on her breasts. “I have a message, Karsh. A message for the Keeper. You will be with him presently. Tell him I said to make plenty of room; I’m sending all his disciples home.”gaze swept down the line of men holding the officers. She drew her finger across her throat in a quick gesture. The response was just as quick.the bodies tumbled forward, she cried out, her hand darting to her neck. A stinging pain jolted her. It was in the exact same place…was the pain of Darken Rahl’s lips on her neck, the pain she had felt when he had come to them in the spirit house, when he had burned Richard with his hand. When he had kissed her neck and silently promised her unimaginable horrors.rushed forward. “Mother Confessor! What is it!”took her hand away. Blood coated her white fingers. She couldn’t say how she knew, but she knew without doubt that the blood was drawn by the perfect, snow white teeth of Darken Rahl.
“Mother Confessor! There’s blood on your neck!”
“It’s nothing. I’m all right. I must have just been nicked by an arrow, that’s all.” She gathered her wits and courage. “Put the head of every officer on a pole, for all their men to see, to let them know they are without leaders. And hurry.”the time the last dripping head was hoisted up, D’Ha-rans were pouring in from all sides. Most were drunk, laughing as if it were nothing more than a drunken brawl. But inefficient and clumsy as they were, their numbers were alarming. They were like a swarm of bees; for every one knocked down, ten replaced him.men fought fiercely, but they were no match for the overwhelming numbers sweeping in. Men she had talked to, reassured, inspired, yelled at, and smiled to were falling with cries of pain and terror. They had been here too long., a pitched battle erupted. The Galeans were being driven back. If they were driven back, they had no chance of escape. They couldn’t go back the way they had come, back to men who would have had time to have been sobered by the carnage around them, to gather their senses, and their spirit.surprise, they were nothing but a bunch of naked boys and one woman. If they tried a second time what had worked once, they would all die. They had to cleave their way through the Order, to the other side of the valley. D’Harans hacked in at the white forms. Her ankle was grasped by a powerful hand. She hewed it off and shook her foot to shed the disembodied hand.were in danger of being swallowed into the belly of this beast.the death cries of her men, disregarding her promise not to leave the protective ring of the fiercest Galean swordsmen, disregarding her promise not to deliberately put herself into peril, Kahlan charged Nick into the thick of the battle, and beyond—into the enemy.sword stabbed to each side, into any enemy close enough. Teeth gritted, she swung at flesh and bone. Her wrist tingled from the jarring impacts, and her arm was so weary she feared she would not be able to lift the sword much longer.that she would be taken down, her men poured ahead, toward her, with renewed resolve. They drove the dark wave back, rolling over it as she urged her horse forward into the sea of dark leather uniforms.stood in the stirrups, holding her sword high. “For Ebinissia! For her dead! For her spirit!”had the desired effect. Men of the Order who were confused by the white enemy, but were nonetheless determined to crush them, whatever they were, stopped and stared openly at a white, naked woman atop a horse suddenly in their midst. Their faith, that the attack was from men and not spirits, faltered. They gaped in open astonishment. She swept her gaze around at all the eyes peering up at her.swung the white sword in a circle over her head as a breeze ruffled her white hair back off her shoulders. “In the name of their spirits, I have come to avenge them!”clad men fell to their knees, dropping their swords, pressing prayerful hands together. They held those hands up to her. They wailed for protection. They called for her mercy. They cried for forgiveness. Had they been sober, she wondered, would the illusion be so convincing? As it was, the effect was apocalyptic.
“We grant no quarter!”all faces stared up toward her, as eyes shed tears of trepidation, weapons set upon them from behind. The sudden, violent, merciless wave of hard steel terrified them, convinced them that the spirits would have them all. They broke and ran, dropping weapons, screaming in fear of the underworld.had done what they had come to do. Time was now against them. They needed to escape.charged onward, a deadly, swift river of white that poured over and around the tents and fires and wagons and men, surprising ever more of the lethargic enemy, killing as many as they could while rolling ahead. White death moved into the mist once again.glanced behind, and saw the pairs of draft horses, their riders holding the chains up between them. She waved them into the stream of white, urging them to move faster. They started unhooking one end of the chains from the hame hooks and looping the chain over the horn on the other horse, to give each horse freedom, now that they needed to make a quick escape.the distance, in the fog to the right, she saw a line of picketed horses. She saw Brin and Peter come together, snap the end of the chain over the other hook again and urge Daisy and Pip into gallops. She thought to scream at them, to order them to keep with the others, that they couldn’t hope to get them all, that they had done enough and must leave now, that it was too late. But she knew they wouldn’t hear her.dropped the loops of chain. They spread the horses to pull the steel taut as they peeled away toward the picket line of horses. The hooves of the big horses thundered across the ground. She took a last look at Brin and Peter, knowing it would be the last time she ever looked upon them in this world, and then turned her attention ahead.pointed with her sword. “There are the rest of the supply wagons!”men knew what to do. As she charged the column past, the wagons were doused with lamp oil. Wheels were staved in, and torches thrown. The wagons erupted in flame. More torches set fire to tents. The men brought awake by the noise and fire found blades sweeping at them. The fires faded into an orange glow in the mist behind as they plunged onward into the fog.they broke free of the camp, and were in open snow. Now that they were away from the camp, and its fires, the darkness pressed around them. The men in front faltered, looking about as they jogged.
“Scouts forward!” she yelled. “Where are the scouts!”men charged through the ranks, to the fore, pointing out the direction of the pass they sought. She looked for the others, turning from side to side. None came. She galloped Nick to the van, after the two scouts.
“Where are the others! They were ordered to be in the lead!”round, wet eyes that looked up at her answered her question without words.
“All right,” she said, “you two know the way. Get us out of here.”men had scouted the pass they wanted. Fifty, to be sure there would be a good number left to show the way. Two were left.a silent growl she cursed the spirits. Shamefaced, she called the curse back. They had at least left her those two; without them, they would be left to wander in the fog, freezing and vincible to the men of the Order chasing them.pulled Nick to a halt beside the stream of naked men. She swooped her arm frantically.
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