d  into  smaller  forces, D'Hara would  fall under  the  shadow of the
Order. The D'Haran  Empire,  forged to unite  the New World against tyranny,
would end before it had really gotten started.
     Richard  had to  get back to Victor and Nicci  so that  they could  all
continue  what  they  had begun--devising  the  most effective  strategy  to
overthrow the Imperial Order.
     But they were running out of time to resolve another problem, a problem
they didn't yet understand.
     "I'm  glad you found us, Sabar. You can tell Victor and Nicci  that  we
need to see to something first, but as soon as we  do, we'll be able to help
them with their plans."
     Sabar looked relieved. "Everyone will be happy to hear this."
     Sabar hesitated, then tilted  his  head,  gesturing north. "Lord  Rahl,
when I came to find you, following the directions Nicci gave me, I went past
the area where she was to meet with you, and then I continued coming south."
Worry stole  into his expression. "Not  many  days ago, I  came to a  place,
miles wide, that was dead."
     Richard looked up. He realized that his  headache seemed to be suddenly
gone. "What do you mean, dead?"
     Sabar waved his hand  out toward the evening gloom.  "The  area where I
was  traveling  was much like this place; there  were some trees, clumps  of
grass, thickets of brush." His voice  lowered.  "But then I came  to a place
where everything that grew ended.  All at the same place.  There was nothing
but rock beyond. Nicci had not told me that I would come to such  a place. I
admit, I was afraid."
     Richard  glanced to  his right--to the east--to the  mountains that lay
beyond. "How long did this dead place last?"
     "I walked, leaving life behind, and I  thought I might  be walking into
the underworld itself." Sabar looked away from Richard's eyes. "Or into  the
jaws of some new weapon the Order had created to destroy us all.

     "I  came to be  very afraid and  I was going to turn back.  But  then I
thought about how the Order made me  afraid my whole life, and I didn't like
that feeling. Worse, I thought about how I would stand before Nicci and tell
her I turned around rather than go to Lord Rahl as she asked of me, and that
thought made me ashamed, so  I went on.  In several  miles  I came again  to
growing things."  He let out a breath. "I was  greatly relieved,  and then I
felt a little foolish that I had been afraid."
     Two. That now made two of the strange boundaries.
     "I've been to places like that, Sabar, and I can tell you that  I, too,
have been afraid."
     Sabar broke into a grin. "Then I was not so foolish to be afraid."
     "Not foolish at all. Could  you tell  if this dead area was  extensive?
Could you tell  if  it was more than just a patch of open rock  in that  one
place?  Could  you  see if  it  ran in  a  line,  ran in  any  direction  in
particular?"
     "It was like  you  say, like a line." Sabar flicked his hand toward the
east. "It came down out of the far mountains, north of that  depression." He
held  his hand flat like  a  cleaver, and sliced  it  downward  in the other
direction. "It ran off to the southwest, into that wasteland."
     Toward the Pillars of Creation.
     Kahlan leaned close and  spoke  under her breath. "That would be almost
parallel to the boundary we crossed  not  far back  to the south.  Why would
there be two boundaries so close together? That makes no sense."
     "I don't know,"  Richard whispered to her. "Maybe whatever the boundary
was protecting was so dangerous that whoever placed it feared that one might
not be enough."
     Kahlan  rubbed her  upper arms  but didn't comment. By the look  on her
face, Richard knew how  she felt about such a notion--especially considering
that those boundaries were now down.
     "Anyway,"  Sabar said  with a self-conscious  shrug, "I was happy I did
not turn back, or  I would have had to face Nicci after she had asked  me to
help Lord Rahl--my friend Richard."

     Richard  smiled. "I'm glad, too, Sabar. I  don't think that  place  you
went through is a  danger any  longer, at  least not a danger the way it was
once."
     Jennsen could contain her curiosity no longer. "Who is this Nicci?"
     "Nicci is  a sorceress," Richard said. "She used  to be a Sister of the
Dark."
     Jennsen's eyebrows went up. "Used to?"
     Richard nodded. "She worked to further Jagang's  cause, but she finally
came to see how wrong  she had  been and joined our side." It was a story he
didn't  really feel like going into.  "She now  fights  for us. Her help has
been invaluable."
     Jennsen  leaned in, even  more astonished.  "But can you trust  someone
like that,  someone who had labored  on behalf of Jagang? Worse, a Sister of
the Dark? Richard, I've been with some of those women,  I  know how ruthless
they are. They may have to do as Jagang  makes them, but they're  devoted to
the Keeper  of the  underworld.  Do you really think you can trust with your
life that she will not betray you?"
     Richard  looked  Jennsen in the eye.  "I trust you with a knife while I
sleep."
     Jennsen  sat  back up.  She  smiled,  more  out of  embarrassment  than
anything else, Richard thought. "I guess I see your point."
     "What else did Nicci say," Kahlan asked, keen to get back to the matter
at hand.
     "Only that I must go in her place and meet you," Sabar said.
     Richard knew that Nicci was being cautious. She didn't want to tell the
young man too much in case he was caught.
     "How did she know where I was?"
     "She said  that she  was able to tell where you were by magic. Nicci is
as powerful with magic as she is beautiful."
     Sabar said  this in a tone of awe. He didn't know the half of it. Nicci
was one of the  most powerful sorceresses ever  to have lived.  Sabar didn't
know that when Nicci was  laboring toward the ends  sought by the Order, she
was known as Death's Mistress.
     Richard surmised that Nicci  had somehow used the bond to the Lord Rahl
to find him. That bond  was loyalty sworn in the heart, not by rote, and its
power  protected those so sworn from the dream walker  entering their minds.
Full-blooded D'Harans, like Cara, could tell through the bond where the Lord
Rahl  was. Kahlan had  confided to him that she  found it unnerving the  way
Cara always  knew where  Richard was. Nicci  wasn't D'Haran, but she  was  a
sorceress and she  was  bonded to Richard, so she might have  been  able  to
manipulate that bond to tell where he was.

     "Sabar, Nicci must have  sent you to  us for  a reason,"  Richard said,
"other than to say that she couldn't wait for us at our meeting place."
     "Yes, of course," Sabar said  as he nodded hastily, as  if chagrined to
have to be reminded. "When I asked her what I was to say to you, she told me
that  she had put it all in  a letter." Sabar opened the leather flap of the
pouch at his belt. "She said that when she realized how far away you  really
were, she was distraught and couldn't take the  time to journey to  you. She
told me that it was important for me to be sure I found you and gave you her
letter. She said the letter would explain why she could not wait."
     With one finger and a thumb, Sabar lifted out the letter, looking as if
he were handling a deadly viper instead of a small roll sealed with red wax.
     "Nicci told me that  this is dangerous," he explained, looking up  into
Richard's eyes.  "She said that if anyone but you opened it, I should not be
standing too close or I would die with them."
     Sabar carefully  laid  the rolled  letter on Richard's palm.  It warmed
appreciably  in his hand. The red wax  brightened,  as if lit by  a  ray  of
sunlight even though  it was getting dark.  The glow  spread from the wax to
envelop the whole length  of the rolled letter. Fine cracks raced all across
the red  wax,  like  autumn ice on a pond breaking up under the weight  of a
foot placed on it. The wax suddenly shattered and crumbled away.
     Sabar swallowed.  "I hate  to think of  what  would  have  happened had
anyone but you tried to open it."
     Jennsen leaned in again. "Was that magic?"
     "Must have been," Richard told her as he started to unroll the letter.
     "But I saw it fall apart," she said in a confidential tone.
     "Did you see anything else?"
     "No, it just all of a sudden crumbled."
     With a thumb and finger, Richard  lifted some  of the disintegrated wax
from his palm. "She probably put a web of magic around the  letter and keyed
that spell  to my touch. If anyone else had tried to break that  web to open
the letter it  would have  ignited the spell. I guess that my touch unlocked
the seal.  You saw the result of  the magic--the broken seal--not  the magic
itself."

     "Oh, wait!" Sabar smacked his forehead with the flat of his palm. "What
am I thinking? I'm supposed to give you this, too."
     Shrugging the straps off his shoulders and down his arms, he pulled his
pack around  onto his lap. He quickly undid  the leather thongs  and reached
inside,  then  carefully  lifted  out  something wrapped  in  black  quilted
material.  It was only about a foot tall but not very big around. By the way
Sabar handled it, it appeared to be somewhat heavy.

     Sabar set the wrapped object on the  ground,  upright,  in front of the
fire. "Nicci told me that  I should give this  to you, that the letter would
explain it."

     Jennsen leaned  in a little, fascinated by  the mystery of the  tightly
wrapped object. "What is it?"
     Sabar shrugged. "Nicci didn't  tell me." He made a face that  suggested
he was somewhat uncomfortable with the way he was in the dark  about much of
the mission he'd been  sent on. "When Nicci looks at you and tells you to do
something, it goes out of your head to ask questions."

     Richard smiled to himself as he began to unroll the letter. He knew all
too well what Sabar meant.
     "Did Nicci say anything about who could unwrap that thing?"
     "No, Lord Rahl. She just said to give it to you, that  the letter would
explain it."
     "If it had a  web around it, like the  letter, she  would  have  warned
you." Richard looked  up.  "Cara," he said, gesturing at the bundled package
sitting  before the fire, "why don't you unwrap it  while Kahlan and  I read
the letter."
     As Cara sat cross-legged on the ground and started working on the knots
in the leather thongs around the black quilted wrap, Richard held the letter
sideways a bit so that Kahlan could read it silently along with him.
     Dear Richard and Kahlan,
     I  am sorry that  I cannot  tell  you everything right now that I would
have you know,  but there  are urgent matters  I must see to and  I dare not
delay. Jagang has initiated something I  considered impossible.  Through his
ability as  a dream walker, he has forced Sisters of the Dark he controls to
attempt to create  weapons out of people, as was done during  the great war.
This is dangerous  enough  in itself,  but  because Jagang does not have the
gift,  his understanding of such things  is very crude.  He  is a blundering
bull  trying to use  his  horns to  knit lace. They are  using the  lives of
wizards as the fodder for his experiments. I don't yet know the exact extent
of their  success, but  I fear to discover the results. More  of this  in  a
moment.
     First,  the  object  I  sent. When  1  picked up  your trail and  began
tracking it to  where we were to meet, I discovered this. I believe you have
already come across it because  it has been touched by  a principal involved
in the matter or involved with you.
     The object is a  warning beacon. It  has been  activated--not  by  this
touch, but by events. I cannot overstate the danger it represents.
     Such objects  could only be made by the wizards of  ancient  times; the
creation of such an object required both Additive and Subtractive Magic, and
required the gift of both to  be  innate. Even then, they are so rare that I
have never actually seen one.
     I have, however, read  about them down in  the vaults at  the Palace of
the Prophets.  Such warning beacons are kept viable  by  a link to  the dead
wizard who created them.
     Richard sat back and let out a troubled breath. "How can such a link be
possible?" Kahlan asked.
     He hardly had to read  between the lines to  be able to tell that Nicci
was warning him in the gravest possible terms.
     "It  has  to be linked somehow  to the underworld,"  Richard  whispered
back.
     Little  points of firelight danced in her  green eyes as she stared  at
him.
     Kahlan glanced again  at Cara as  she worked at the knots,  pulling off
one  of  the leather thongs around an object linked to  a dead wizard in the
underworld. Kahlan held up the edge of the letter as she urgently read along
with him.
     From what  I know  of such warning beacons,  they monitor  powerful and
vital   protective  shields  created  to  seal   away  something  profoundly
dangerous. They are paired. The first beacon is always amber. It is meant to
be  a  warning to the one who caused the breach of the seal. The  touch of a
principal  or  one  involved  with a  principal  kindles  it  so  it  may be
recognized for what  it is and  serve as it  was  intended--as  a warning to
those involved.  Only after alerting the one it is  meant to warn  can it be
destroyed. I send it to be absolutely certain you have seen it.
     The precise nature of  the  second  beacon is  unknown to  me, but that
beacon is meant for the one able to replace the seal.
     I don't  know the nature of the seal or what it was protecting. Without
doubt, though, the seal has been breached.
     The source of the  breach, while not the specific cause activating this
beacon, is self-evident.
     "Oh, now wait a minute," Cara  said, standing,  backing away as if  she
had released a  deadly plague from the  black quilting, "it  isn't  my fault
this time." She pointed down at it. "You told me to, this time."
     The translucent statue Cara had touched before now stood  in the center
of its unfolded black quilted wrapping.
     It was the same statue: a statue of Kahlan.
     The statue's  left arm was pressed  to  its  side, the  right  arm  was
raised,  pointing. The  statue, in an hourglass shape,  looked as if it were
made of transparent amber, allowing them to see inside.
     Sand  trickled  out of  the top  half  of the  hourglass,  through  the
narrowed waist, into the bottom of the full dress of the Mother Confessor.
     The sand was still trickling  down, just  as it had been the last  time
Richard  had seen  the thing. At  that time, the top half had been more full
than the bottom half. Now, the top held less sand than the bottom.
     Kahlan's face had gone ashen.
     When he'd first seen it, Richard wouldn't have needed Nicci to tell him
how dangerous such  a  thing was. He hadn't wanted any of them to touch  it.
When they  had first  come across it,  in a recess of rock beside the trail,
looking almost like part  of the rock itself, the thing was  opaque,  with a
dull, dark surface, yet it was clearly recognizable as Kahlan. It  was lying
on its side.
     Cara wasn't pleased to  find such a thing and  didn't  want to  leave a
representation of  Kahlan lying about for  anyone to find and to pick up for
who-knew-what.  Cara  snatched  it up, then, even  though Richard started to
yell at her to leave such a thing be.
     When she picked it up, it started turning translucent.
     In a panic, Cara set it back down.
     That was when the right arm had lifted and pointed east.
     That was when  they could  begin to  see  through the thing, to see the
sand inside trickling down.
     The implied  danger of the sand  running  out had them all upset.  Cara
wanted to pick  it up again and turn it over, to stop the sand from falling.
Richard,  not  knowing  anything about such an  object and doubting that  so
simple a solution would have any beneficial effect,  hadn't  allowed Cara to
touch it again. He had piled rocks and brush around it so no one  else would
know it was there. Obviously, that hadn't worked.
     He  knew  now  that  Cara's  touch  had  nothing to do  with  what  was
happening,  except to initiate  the  warning, so he thought to  confirm  his
original belief. "Cara, put it down."
     "Down?"
     "On its side--like  you wanted to do the last time--to see if that will
stop the sand."
     Cara stared at  him for a moment and  then used the toe  of her boot to
tip the figure over on its side.
     The sand continued to run as if it still stood upright.
     "How can the  sand do that?" Jennsen asked, sounding quite shaken. "How
can the sand still fall--how can it fall sideways?"
     "You can see it?" Kahlan asked. "You can see the sand falling?"
     Jennsen  nodded. "I  sure can,  and I have to tell  you, it's giving my
goose bumps goose bumps."
     Richard could only  stare at her staring at  the statue of Kahlan lying
on its  side.  If nothing else, the sand running sideways through the statue
had to be magic. Jennsen  was a  pillar of Creation, a hole  in the world, a
pristinely  ungifted offspring of Darken Rahl. She should not be able to see
magic.
     And yet, she was seeing it.
     "I  have  to agree with the young lady," Sabar  said. "That's even more
frightening than those  big black birds that I've seen circling for the last
week."
     Kahlan straightened. "You been seeing--"
     When he heard Tom's urgent warning yell,  Richard rose  up  in  a rush,
drawing his sword in one swift  movement. The unique sound of ringing  steel
filled the night air.
     The magic did not come out with the sword.


        CHAPTER 14



     KahIan  ducked to the side, out of harm's  way,  as  Richard pulled his
sword free. The distinctive ring of steel being  drawn in anger  fused  with
Tom's  warning yell  still echoing through  the surrounding hills to  send a
flash of fright tingling across her flesh. As she stared  out into the empty
blackness of the  surrounding night, her  instinct was to  reach for her own
sword, but she had packed it in the  wagon rather than wear it, so as not to
raise suspicions  about who  they might be--women in the  Old  World did not
carry weapons.
     By the light of the fire, Kahlan could clearly see  Richard's face. She
had seen  him  draw the Sword of Truth countless  times  and in a variety of
situations, from that very first time when Zedd, after giving him the sword,
commanded  him  to  draw  it  and  Richard tentatively  pulled  it from  its
scabbard, to times he  pulled  it free in the heat  of battle, to times like
this when he drew it suddenly in defense.
     When Richard  drew the sword, he was also drawing its attendant  magic.
That  was the function of the weapon; the magic had  not been created simply
to defend the  sword's true owner, but, more importantly, to be a projection
of his intent. The Sword of Truth was not even really a talisman, but rather
a tool, of the Seeker of Truth.
     The true weapon was the rightly named Seeker who wielded the sword. The
sword's magic answered to him.
     Each and every one of the times Richard had drawn the sword, Kahlan had
seen that magic dancing dangerously in his gray eyes.
     This was the first time he had drawn the sword that she didn't see  the
magic in his eyes; the raptor's glare was pure Richard.
     While seeing him  draw the  sword without seeing its concomitant  magic
evident in his eyes  shocked her, it seemed  to surprise  Richard even more.
For an instant he hesitated, as if mentally stumbling.
     Before  they  had  time  to even wonder what had prompted Tom's warning
yell, shadowy shapes slipping through the cover of the nearby trees suddenly
stormed out of the darkness and into their midst.  The sudden sound and fury
of bloodcurdling cries filled the  night  air as men rampaged into the camp,
lit at last by firelight.
     They didn't appear to be  soldiers--they weren't wearing uniforms-- and
they weren't attacking  as soldiers would, with weapons drawn. Kahlan didn't
see any of the men brandishing swords or axes or even knives.
     Weapons or not, there were a lot of  men and they yelled  fierce battle
cries as if they intended nothing short of  bloody murder. She knew, though,
that the sudden shock of deafening noise was a tactic designed to render the
intended target powerless with fright, making them easier to cut  down.  She
knew because she used such tactics herself.
     Blade in  hand, Richard was  fully  in his  element; focused, resolute,
ruthlessly committed--even without his sword's attendant magic.
     As assailants  charged  in, the sword, driven  by  Richard's own wrath,
flashed  through the air,  a  flash of crimson light from the fire's  flames
reflected  along the blade's length, lending it a fleeting  stain of red. In
that charged moment of attack met,  there  was a  split  second  when Kahlan
feared that without the sword's magic, it all might go terribly wrong.
     In  an  instant, the  camp  that  had  been  so  quietly  tense  became
pandemonium. Although the attackers weren't dressed like soldiers, they were
all big and  as  they  swept in there  was no doubt  whatsoever as  to their
hostile intent.
     A  man  rushing onward  threw  his arms  up to seize Richard before his
sword could be brought to bear.  The sword's tip whistled as it came around,
driven by deadly commitment. The blade severed  one of the man's raised arms
before exploding  through his skull.  The  air above the fire  filled with a
spray of blood, bone, and  brain. Another man lunged. Richard's sword ripped
through his chest. In the space of two blinks, two men were dead.
     The  magic at  last  seemed to slam into Richard's  eyes, as if finally
catching up with his intent.
     Kahlan couldn't make  sense of  what  the men were doing. They attacked
without weapons drawn, but they  seemed no less fierce for it. Their  speed,
numbers, and  size,  and the angry  look of  them, were  enough to make most
anyone tremble in fright.
     From  the darkness, more men  rushed in on them. Cara stepped  into the
path of the attack, lashing out with her Agiel. Men  cried out in horrifying
pain when her  weapon  made contact, causing hesitation among the attackers.
Sabar, knife to hand, tumbled to the  ground  with  one of the  men  who had
seized him from behind. Jennsen ducked away  from another  man snatching for
her hair. As she spun away from him, she slashed his  face  with her  knife.
His cries joined a strident chorus of others.
     Kahlan realized that  it  wasn't just men  yelling, but the horses were
also  screaming  in  fright. Cara's Agiel against  a  bull  neck  brought  a
terrifying shriek. Men yelled with effort and shouted  orders that  were cut
off abruptly as Richard's  sword tore through them. All  the  yelling seemed
directed at the task of overwhelming the four of them.
     Kahlan understood, then, what was going on. This  was not an attempt to
kill, but to capture. For these men, killing would be a great mercy compared
to what they intended.
     Two of the burly men  dove  across the fire,  arms spread wide as if to
tackle Richard and  Kahlan. Cara reached out and seized a  fistful of shirt,
abruptly  spinning one of  the two around. She drove her Agiel into his gut,
dropping him to his  knees. The other man unexpectedly encountered Richard's
sword  thrust straight  in with formidable muscle  driving it. The scream of
mortal  pain  was brief before the sword slashed his  throat. Cara, standing
above the  man on his knees, pressed her Agiel to his chest and  gave  it  a
twist that dropped him instantly.
     Already, Richard was  leaping over the fire to penetrate into the brunt
of the  attack. As his boots landed with a thud, his sword cut  the man atop
Sabar nearly in two, spilling his viscera across the ground.
     The man  Jennsen had slashed rose up only to be met by her knife driven
by desperate  fright. She jumped  back  as he tumbled forward, clutching the
base of his throat where  she had severed his windpipe. Cara snagged the man
Jennsen didn't see going for her back. The Mord-Sith,  her face a picture of
savage resolve, held her Agiel to his throat, following him to the ground as
he choked on his own blood.
     Then, among  the men Richard ripped into, Kahlan  saw the knives coming
out. The men abandoned  their failed  attempt to bring him down  by grabbing
and overpowering him, and decided,  instead,  to knife him. If anything, the
threat of the knives served  only to further unleash  Richard's fury. By the
look in  his  eyes, the  sword's  magic seemed  to be fully  engaged  in the
battle.
     For an instant,  Kahlan  stood transfixed by  the sight  of Richard  so
ruthlessly  committed  to self-defense  that  the  act  of killing  became a
graceful manifestation  of art--a dance with death. Compared  with Richard's
fluid  movements,  the men  blundered  like  bulls.  Without wasted  motion,
Richard slipped among them as if  they  were statues,  his  sword delivering
unrestrained violence. Each thrust met a vital area of the enemy. Each swing
sliced through flesh and bone. Each turn met an attack and crushed it. There
was no  lost  opportunity,  no slash that missed, no  thrust gone  wide,  no
bobble that only slightly  wounded. Each time he spun past the thrust  of  a
blade, met a rush, or turned to a new attack, he cut without mercy.
     Kahlan was furious that she didn't have her sword. There was no telling
how many more  men there were. She knew all too well  what it was like to be
helpless  and  overwhelmed by  a gang of men. She started edging  toward the
wagon.
     Jennsen and Sabar were both tackled by a burly man diving in out of the
darkness. As they  hit  the  ground, the man  landed atop them, knocking the
wind from them. His big hands  pinned  their  wrists to  the ground, keeping
their knives at bay.
     Richard's  blade swept past  with  lightning speed, slicing  across the
man's  back,  severing  his spine.  Richard  went  to a  knee  as he turned,
whipping the  sword around to impale  another attacker rushing  in at a dead
run, trying to get to Richard before he could recover. The look on the man's
face was a picture of  horrified surprise  as  he ran instead onto Richard's
sword, running  it into his  own chest up  to the  hilt. The heavy  man atop
Jennsen and Sabar convulsed, unable to draw a breath, as they threw him off.
Richard,  still on one knee,  yanked the sword free as  the mortally wounded
man fell past him.
     As  another man  rushed into  camp,  looking around, trying  to get his
bearings, Cara slammed her Agiel against his neck. As he crumbled, she drove
her elbow up to smash the face of a  man following  the first  in, trying to
grab  her from behind while she  was occupied. Crying out, his hands covered
crushed bone and gushing blood. She spun and kicked him between the legs. As
he fell forward,  his hands going  to  his groin, she broke his jaw with her
knee, turned, and dropped a third man by slamming her Agiel to his chest.
     Another  attacker threw himself  at  Sabar, knocking  him  back.  Sabar
lashed out with his knife, making solid contact. Another man saw the opening
and snatched  up  Nicci's letter  lying  on the ground. Kahlan  dove for the
letter  in his fist,  but missed as  he yanked his hand back before  dashing
away. Jennsen blocked his escape. He straight-armed her  as he charged past.
Jennsen was  knocked reeling, but came around to bury her knife between  his
shoulder blades.
     Jennsen managed to keep hold of her knife,  twisting it  forcefully, as
the man arched his back with a gasp of pain and then a  bellow of anger that
withered to  a wet burble before it was fully out of  his  lungs. Jenn-sen's
knife had  found  his heart. He staggered, stumbled, and fell onto the fire.
The flames whooshed to life as his clothing ignited. Kahlan  tried to snatch
the letter  from his fist as  he  writhed in horrifying pain,  but, with the
intensity of the heat, she couldn't get close enough.
     It  was already too late, though;  the  letter she and Richard had only
had  a chance  to partially read flared briefly before transforming to black
ash that disintegrated and lifted skyward in the roar of flames.
     Kahlan  covered her mouth and  nose,  gagging on the  stench of burning
hair and flesh as she  was driven back by  the heat. Though  it  seemed like
hours of fighting, the assault had only just begun and  already men lay dead
everywhere as yet more of the big men joined the attack.
     As she  recoiled from the flames and her futile  attempt to recover the
lost letter, Kahlan turned again toward the wagon, toward her sword.
     She looked up  and  saw a man who seemed as big as  a mountain charging
right at her, blocking her way. He grinned at seeing  that he had run down a
woman without a weapon.
     Beyond the man,  Kahlan saw  Richard. Their eyes  met. He had taken his
sword to the bulk of the attack, trying  to cut it down before it could  get
to the rest of them, trying to  end  it before  harm could get to any of the
rest of them.
     He couldn't be everywhere at once.
     He wasn't close enough to get to her in time. That didn't stop him from
trying. Even as he  did, Kahlan discounted the attempt. He was too far away.
The effort was futile.
     Looking into the eyes of the man  she  loved more than life itself, she
saw his pure rage; she  knew  that Richard  was seeing  a face  that  showed
nothing: a Confessor's  face, as her  mother  had  taught  her. And then the
racing enemy came between them, blocking their sight of one another.
     Kahlan's vision focused on the man bearing down on her. His arms lifted
like a bear lost in a mad charge. His teeth were gritted with determination.
A grimace  twisted his face in his wild effort to reach her before she could
dodge to the side, before she had a chance to escape.
     She knew he was too close for her to have that chance and so she didn't
waste any effort in a useless attempt.
     This one  had made  it past  the killing.  He  had avoided Jennsen  and
Sabar.  He had  figured his attack to skirt Richard's blade while  making it
past Cara's Agiel as she turned to another man.  He hadn't charged in  madly
like the rest; he had delayed just enough to time his onslaught perfectly.
     This one knew he was on the verge of having what he sought.
     He  was far  less than a heartbeat away,  plunging  toward  her at full
speed.
     Kahlan  could  hear  Richard's scream even as her gaze met the gleam of
the man's dark eyes.
     The man let out a cry of rage as he lunged. His feet left the ground as
he  sailed  through  the  air  toward  her. His  wicked  grin  betrayed  his
confidence.
     Kahlan  could  see his eyeteeth hooked over his cracked lower  lip, saw
the dark  tooth in the front of the  top row between his other yellow teeth,
saw  the little white hook of a scar, as if he had once been eating  with  a
knife and  had  accidentally  sliced  the corner  of his mouth.  His stubble
looked like wire. His left eye didn't open as  wide as  his right. His right
ear had a big V-shaped notch taken out of the upper portion. It reminded her
of the way some farmers marked their swine.
     She could see her own reflection in his dark eyes as her right arm came
up.
     Kahlan wondered  if he  had  a wife, a woman who cared for  him, missed
him, pined for him. She wondered if he might  have children, and, if he did,
what  a man like this would teach his children. She had a momentary flash of
the  ugliness it  would  be to have this  beast  atop her, his wire  stubble
scraping  her cheek raw, his cracked  lips  on hers, his yellow teeth raking
her neck as he lost himself in what he wanted.
     Time twisted.
     She  held  out  her  arm.  The man  crashed in toward her. She felt the
coarse  weave of his dark brown shirt as the flat of her hand met the center
of his chest.
     That  heartbeat of time  she  had before he was  atop  her  had not yet
begun. Richard had not yet managed to take a single frantic step.
     The weight of the bear of a man against her hand felt as if it were but
a  baby's breath. To Kahlan, it seemed  as if he were frozen in space before
her.
     Time was hers.
     He was hers.
     The  rush of  combat, the cries,  the yells, the  screams; the stink of
sweat and blood; the flash  of  steel, the clash of bodies;  the curses  and
growls; the fear, the terror, the heart-pounding dread... the  rage  ... was
no longer there for her. She was in a silent world all her own.
     Even though she had been born with it  and had always felt  it there in
the  core  of  her being,  the awesome power  within,  in  many ways, seemed
incomprehensible,  inconceivable,  unimaginable,  remote. She knew it  would
seem that way  until  she let  her  restraint slip, and then she  would once
again be joined with a  force  of such  breathtaking magnitude that it could
only  be  fully  comprehended as  it was being experienced. Although she had
unleashed it more times than she could remember,  no matter how prepared she
was the extraordinary violence of it always still astonished her.
     She regarded the man before her  with  cold calculation, ready for that
violence.
     As he had charged in on her, time had belonged to this man.
     Now time belonged to her.
     She  could feel  the  thread count of the fabric of his shirt, feel his
woolly chest hairs beneath it.
     The heart-pounding shock of  the sudden attack, the violence of it, was
gone now. Now there was only this man and her, forever linked by what was to
happen. This man had consciously chosen his own fate when he chose to attack
them. Her certainty of what was  called for carried  her beyond the need for
the assessment of  emotion,  and  she felt none--no joy, not even relief; no
hate, not even aversion; no compassion, not even sorrow.

     Kahlan shed those  emotions to make way  for the rush of power, to give
it free run.
     Now he had no chance.
     He was hers.
     The man's face was contorted with the intoxicated, gloating glee of his
certitude  that he was the glorious victor  who would have  her, that he was
now the one to decide what was to become of her life,  that  she was but his
to plunder.
     Kahlan unleashed her power.
     By her  deliberate  intent,  the subordinate state  of  her  birthright
instantly altered into  overpowering force able to alter the  very nature of
consciousness.

     In the  man's dark eyes  had come the spark of suspicion that something
which he could not comprehend had irrevocably begun. And then there came the
lightning  recognition  that  his  life, as  he  had  known  it,  was  over.
Everything he wanted, thought about, worked toward,  hoped  for, prayed for,
possessed, loved, hated ... was ended.
     In her eyes he saw no  mercy, and that, more than anything, brought him
stark terror.
     Thunder without sound jolted the air.
     In that instant, the violence of it was as  pristine, as  beautiful, as
exquisite, as it was horrific.
     That  heartbeat  of time Kahlan had before he  was on her had still not
yet begun.
     She could see in the man's eyes that even thought  itself was  too late
for him, now. Perception itself  was being  outpaced  by the race  of brutal
magic tearing through his mind, destroying forever who this man had been.
     The force of the concussion jolted the air.
     The stars shuddered.
     Sparks  from  the fire lashed  along  the  ground  as the  shock spread
outward in a ring, driving dust before its passing. Trees shook when  hit by
the blow, shedding needles and leaves as the raging wave swept past.
     He was hers.
     His full  weight  flying  forward  knocked  Kahlan back a  step as  she
twisted out of  the way.  The  man flew past her and crashed  to the ground,
sprawling on his face.
     Without an instant  of hesitation, he scrambled  up onto his knees. His
hands came up in prayerful supplication. Tears flooded his eyes.  His mouth,
which only  an instant before was so  warped with perverted expectation, now
distorted with the agony of pure anguish.

     "Please, Mistress," he wailed, "command me!"
     Kahlan  regarded  him, for  the first time in  his  new life,  with  an
emotion: contempt.



        CHAPTER 15



     O'nly the  sound of Betty's soft, frightened bleating  drifted out over
the  otherwise silent  campsite. Bodies lay  sprawled haphazardly across the
ground.  The attack appeared  to  be  over. Richard,  sword in hand,  rushed
through the  carnage to get to  Kahlan. Jennsen stood  near the  edge of the
fire's light, while Cara checked the bodies for any sign of life.
     Kahlan left the man she had just touched with her power kneeling in the
dirt, stalking past him toward  Jennsen. Richard met her halfway there,  his
free arm sweeping around her with relief.
     "Are you all right?"
     Kahlan nodded, quickly appraising  their  camp,  on the lookout for any
more attackers, but saw only the men who were dead.
     "What about you?" she asked.
     Richard  didn't  seem to  hear  her  question. His arm slipped from her
waist. "Dear spirits," he said, as he  rushed to one of the bodies lying  on
its side.
     It was Sabar.
     Jennsen  stood not  far away, trembling with  terror, her knife held up
defensively in  a fist, her eyes wide. Kahlan gathered Jennsen  in her arms,
whispering assurance that it was over,  that it was ended, that she was  all
right.
     Jennsen clutched at Kahlan. "Sabar--he was--protecting me--"
     "I know, I know," Kahlan comforted.
     She  could see  that  there was no urgency in Richard's movements as he
laid Sabar on his back. The young man's arm flopped lifelessly to the  side.
Kahlan's heart sank.
     Tom ran into camp,  gasping for air.  He  was streaked  with  blood and
sweat. Jennsen wailed and flew into his arms.  He embraced her protectively,
holding her head to his shoulder as he tried to regain his breath.
     Betty bleated  in dismay  from beneath  the wagon,  hesitantly emerging
only  after Jennsen  called  repeated encouragement to her. The  puling goat
finally rushed to Jennsen and huddled trembling against her skirts. Tom kept
a wary watch of the surrounding darkness.
     Cara calmly  walked among the  bodies,  surveying them for  any sign of
life. With most,  there could be no question. Here and there she  nudged one
with  the  toe of  her boot, or with the  tip  of  her Agiel. By her lack of
urgency, there was no question that they were all dead.
     Kahlan put  a tender  hand  to  Richard's  back  as  he crouched beside
Sabar's body.
     "How many people must die," he asked in a low,  bitter  voice, "for the
crime of wanting to be free, for the sin of wanting to live their own life?"
     She saw that he still held the Sword of Truth in a white-knuckled fist.
The  sword's  magic,  which  had  come  out  so  reluctantly,  still  danced
dangerously in his eyes.
     "How many!" he repeated.
     "I don't know, Richard," Kahlan whispered.
     Richard  turned  a glare  toward the man across the camp,  still on his
knees, his hands  pressed together in  a beseeching gesture  begging  to  be
commanded, fearing to speak.
     Once touched by a Confessor, the person was no longer who they had once
been. That part  of  their mind was forever gone.  Who  they were, what they
were, no longer existed.
     In its  place  the  magic  of a  Confessor's  power  placed unqualified
devotion to  the  wants and  wishes  of the Confessor who  had touched them.
Nothing else mattered. Their  only purpose in life, now, was to  fulfill her
commands, to do her bidding, to answer her every question.
     For one thus touched, there  was no crime they wouldn't confess, if she
asked it of them. It was  for  this alone that  Confessors had been created.
Their purpose, in a way, was the same as the Seeker's--the truth. In war, as
in all other  aspects  of life, there was no  more important  commodity  for
survival than the truth.
     This man, kneeling not far away, cried in  abject misery because Kahlan
had asked nothing of him. There could be no agony more ghastly, no void more
terrifying, than to be empty of knowing her wish. Existence without her wish
was pointless. In the absence of her command, men touched by a Confessor had
been known to die.
     Anything she now asked  of him, whether  it  be  to tell  her his name,
confess his  true love's  name, or to murder his beloved mother, would bring
him boundless joy because he would finally have a task to carry out for her.
     "Let's find out what this is all about," Richard said in a low growl.
     In exhaustion, Kahlan stared at the man on his  knees. She was so weary