Richard threw his hooded forest cloak around his shoulders and headed for the door. Cara looked up from beside the hearth, where she hurried to finish collecting her gear, and gave him a nod to let him know she’d be right behind him. He could see Nicci in the back room rushing to get her things before he got far.
In his urgent need to find Kahlan, Richard’s imagination was beginning to get the better of him. He could see her hurt, see her in pain. The thought of Kahlan somewhere alone and in trouble made his heart quicken with dread.
Against his will, the crushing memory of the time she had been beaten nearly to death flooded forth. He had given up everything else and had taken her far away back into the mountains where no one could find them so that she would be safe and could have time to heal. That summer, after she had started to recover her strength, and before Nicci had shown up to capture him and take him away, had been one of the best summers of his life. How Cara could forget that special time was incomprehensible to him.
From force of habit, he lifted his sword to make sure it was clear in its scabbard before he threw open the simple plank door.
Damp air and iron gray morning light greeted him. Water collected by the roof dripped from the eaves, splashing back against his boots. Cold drizzle prickled against his face. At least it was no longer pouring rain. Clouds hung low and thick, hiding the tops of oaks walling off the far side of the small pasture, where trailers of mist drifted like phantoms above the glistening grass. Massive gnarled trunks sheltered dark shadows.
Richard was angry and frustrated that it had to rain now, of all times. If it hadn’t rained, his chances would have been far better. Still, it would not be impossible. There were always signs.
There would still be tracks.
The rain would make it harder to read them, but even this much rain would not erase all trace of the tracks. Richard had grown up tracking animals and people through the woods. He could follow tracks in the rain. It was more difficult and more time-consuming, and it required intense concentration, but he could certainly do it.
And then it hit him.
When he found Kahlan’s tracks, then he would have proof that she was real. Nicci and Cara would at last have no choice but to believe him.
Everyone left unique tracks. He knew Kahlan’s. He also knew the route they’d come in by. Along with his and Cara’s tracks, Kahlan’s tracks would also be there for all to see. A sense of hope, if not relief, surged up through him. Once he found a set of readable prints and showed them to Nicci and Cara, there would be no more arguing. They would realize that it wasn’t a dream and that there really was something seriously wrong.
Then he could start following Kahlan’s tracks out of their camp and find her. The rain would slow that effort but it wouldn’t stop him, and there might be a way for Nicci’s ability to help speed that search.
Men milling about outside saw him stepping out of the small house and rushed in from all around. These men were not soldiers, in the strict sense. They were wagon drivers, millers, carpenters, stonemasons, farmers, and merchants who had struggled their whole life under the repressive rule of the Order, trying to eke out a living and support their families.
For most of these working people, life in the Old World meant living in constant fear. Anyone who dared to speak out against the ways of the Order was swiftly arrested, charged with sedition, and executed. There was a steady stream of charges and arrests, whether true or not. Such swift “justice” kept people in fear and in line.
Continual indoctrination, especially of the young, produced a significant segment of the population who fanatically believed in the ways of the Order. From birth, children were taught that thinking for themselves was wrong and that fervent faith in selfless sacrifice for the greater good was the only means to an afterlife of glory in the Creator’s light, and the only way to avoid an eternity in the dark depths of the underworld in the merciless hands of the Keeper. Any other way of thinking was evil.
The properly devout were only too eager to see things remain as they were. The promise of riches to be shared with the common people kept the ever-pious supporters of the Order perpetually waiting for their quota of the blood of others, waiting to share in the loot of the wicked, who, they were taught, were their selfish oppressors and therefore sinners who deserved their fate.
From the ranks of the righteous came a flood of young men volunteering into the army, eager to be part of the noble struggle to crush the nonbelievers, to punish the wicked, to confiscate ill-gotten gains. The sanction of the plunder, the free rein of brutality, and the widespread rape of the unconverted bred a particularly vicious, and virulent, kind of zealotry. It had spawned an army of savages.
Such was the nature of the Imperial Order soldiers who had poured into the New World and now rampaged nearly unchecked across Richard and Kahlan’s homeland.
The world stood at the brink of a very dark age.
It was this very threat that Ann believed Richard had been born to fight. She and many others believed it was foretold that if free people were to have a chance to survive this great battle, have a chance to triumph, it would only be if Richard led them.
These men before him saw through the empty ideas and corrupt promises of the Order, saw it for what it was: tyranny. They had decided to take back their lives. That made them warriors in the struggle for freedom.
A surprised upwelling of shouted greetings and cries of delight broke the early-morning stillness. As they gathered in close, the men all talked at once, asking if he was well and how he felt. Their sincere concern touched him. Despite his sense of urgency, Richard forced himself to smile and clasp arms with men he knew from the city of Altur’Rang. This was more the kind of reunion they had been hoping for.
Besides having worked beside many of these men and having become
acquainted with others, Richard knew that he was also a symbol of liberty to them—the Lord Rahl from the New World, the Lord Rahl from a land where men were free. He had shown them that such things were possible for them, too, and given them a vision of the way their lives could be.
To his own mind, Richard saw himself as the same woods guide he had always been—even if he had been named the Seeker and now led the D’Haran Empire. While he had gone through many trying times since leaving home, he was really the same person with the same beliefs. Where he had once stood up to bullies, he now had to face armies. While the scale was different, the principles were the same.
But right then, all he cared about was finding Kahlan. Without her, the rest of the world—life itself—didn’t seem very important to him.
Not far off, leaning against a post, stood a brawny man wearing not a smile but a menacing glare that had set permanent creases in his brow. The man folded his powerful arms across his chest as he watched the rest of the men greeting Richard.
Richard hurried through the crowd of men, clasping hands as he went, toward the scowling blacksmith. “Victor!”
The scowl gave way to a helpless grin. The man gripped arms with Richard. “Nicci and Cara would only let me go in to see you twice. If they didn’t let me see you this morning, I was going to wrap iron bars around their necks.”
“Was that you—the first morning? You passed me on your way out and touched my shoulder?”
Victor grinned as he nodded. “It was. I helped carry you back here.” He put a powerful hand on Richard’s shoulder and gave him an experimental shake. “You look well mended even if a little pale. I have lardo—it will give you strength.”
“I’m fine. Maybe later. Thanks for helping bring me in here. Listen, Victor, have you seen Kahlan?”
Victor’s brow bunched back up with deep creases. “Kahlan?”
“My wife.”
Victor stared without reaction. His hair was cropped so close that his head almost appeared shaved. The rain beaded on his scalp. One brow arched.
“Richard, since you have been gone you took a wife?”
Richard anxiously looked over his shoulder to the other men watching him. “Have any of you seen Kahlan?”
He was greeted with blank expressions from many. Others shared a puzzled look with one another. The gray morning had fallen silent. They didn’t know who he was talking about. Many of these men knew Kahlan and should have remembered her. Now they were shaking their heads or shrugging their regrets.
Richard’s mood sank; the problem was worse than he thought. He had thought that maybe it was only something that had happened to Nicci and Cara’s memory.
He turned back to the master blacksmith’s frown. “Victor, I have trouble and I don’t have time to explain. I don’t even know how I would explain. I need help.”
“What can I do?”
“Take me to the place where we had the fight.”
Victor nodded. “Easy enough.”
The man turned and started out toward the dark woods.
With two fingers, Nicci pushed a wet balsam bough out of her way as she followed several of the men through the dense woods. At the edge of a thickly forested ridge they headed down a trail that switched back and forth in order to negotiate the steep descent. Slippery rocks made the climb down treacherous. It was a shorter route than the one they had used to carry Richard back to the deserted farmhouse after he’d been hurt. At the bottom they picked their way over exposed fractured rock and boulders, skirting the fringe of a boggy area guarded by a towering cluster of silvered skeletons of cedars standing vigil in the stagnant water.
Runnels pouring down mossy banks carved deep cuts through the forest loam to expose speckled granite beneath. Several days of steady rain had left standing ponds in a number of low places. For the most part the rain filled the woods with the pleasing fragrance of damp soil, but in low places and crannies the damp, decomposing vegetation smelled of rot.
Even though she was warm from the short, arduous trek, the damp, cool air still left Nicci’s fingers and ears numb with cold. She knew that this far south in the Old World the heat and humidity would soon return with such vengeance that it would make her long for the unusual spell of cool weather.
Having grown up in a city, Nicci had spent little time outdoors. At the Palace of the Prophets, where she had lived most of her life, outdoors meant the manicured lawns and gardens of the grounds covering Halsband Island. The countryside had always seemed vaguely hostile to her, an obstacle between one city and another, something to be avoided. Cities and buildings were a refuge from the inscrutable dangers of the wilderness.
More than that, though, cities had been where she toiled for the betterment of mankind. That work had had no end. Forests and fields had not been any of her concern.
Nicci had never appreciated the beauty of hills, trees, streams, lakes,
and mountains until she had come to know Richard. Even cities were new to her eyes after Richard. Richard made all of life a wonder.
Carefully making her way up the slippery, dark rock of a brief rise, she finally spotted the rest of the men quietly waiting under the outstretched limbs of an ancient maple. Farther away, Richard crouched, studying a patch of ground. He finally rose to stare off into the dark expanse of woods beyond. Cara, his ever-present shadow, waited near him. Under the dense vault of soothing green, the Mord-Sith’s red leather outfit stood out like a clot of blood on a tablecloth at tea.
Nicci understood Cara’s fierce and passionate protection of Richard. Cara, too, had once been his enemy. Richard had not simply gained Cara’s blind allegiance by virtue of becoming the Lord Rahl; he had, far more importantly, earned her respect, trust, and loyalty. Her red leather outfit was intimidating by design, a promise of violence should anyone even think of causing him harm. It was not an empty promise. Mord-Sith had been trained since they were young to be absolutely ruthless. While their primary purpose had been to capture the gifted and use their power against them, they were perfectly capable of using their ability against any opposition. Men who knew and trusted Cara, without realizing they were doing it, kept more distance from her when she wore her red leather.
Nicci knew how it felt for Cara to be brought back from the numb madness of mindless duty, to come to again value life.
Off in the distance, through the gloom and shadows and dripping leaves, the hoarse croak of ravens echoed through the forest. Nicci caught the sickening stench of rotting carrion. Looking around for landmarks as Richard had taught her, she spotted, at the base of a rocky outcropping, a pine that she remembered because it had a secondary trunk that curved out low to the ground almost like a seat. She recognized the spot; beyond the screen of vines and brush lay the scene of the battle.
Before Nicci could get to Richard, he ducked under low-hanging branches and started into the underbrush. Rising up on the far side, he waved his arms over his head and yelled like a lunatic. The deep shade among towering spruce erupted with the flapping of wings as, all at once, hundreds of the huge black birds bounded into the air, shrieking with indignation at having their feast interrupted. At first it looked as if the birds might contest the field of battle, but when the air sang with the unique sound of Richard’s sword being drawn, they fled into the darkness back
among the trees almost as if they knew what a weapon was and feared this one in particular. Their deep, angry croaking receded into the hazy mist. Richard, the triumphant scarecrow, glowered after them for a time before sliding his sword back into its scabbard.
He finally turned to the men. “All of you, please stay out of this area for now.” His voice echoed off through the tall pines. “Just wait back there.”
Considering herself sovereign in matters of Richard’s safety, Cara paid no heed to his request. Instead, she followed him as he made his way into the small clearing beyond, staying close but out of his way. Nicci wove her way among the saplings and wet ferns, moving past silent men, until she reached a thin patch of white birch topping a hillock that edged one side of the clearing. Hundreds of black eyes set in the white bark watched as she made her way among them to finally halt at the brow of the bank. When she rested her hand on the peeling papery bark of one, she noticed the bolt from a crossbow stuck in the tree. Arrows jutted from other trees as well.
Beyond, dead soldiers lay sprawled everywhere. The stench staggered her. The ravens had been driven off, but the flies, fearing no sword, remained to feast and breed. The first hatch of blowfly maggots were already hard at work.
A good number of men were headless or were missing limbs. Some lay partly submerged in the stagnant pools of water. The ravens, along with other animals, had been at many of them, taking advantage of the opportunity afforded by gaping wounds. The thick leather armor, heavy hides, studded belts, chain mail, and wicked assortment of weapons no longer did these men any good. Here and there the clothes around bloated bodies strained to remain buttoned, as if trying to maintain dignity where there could be none.
Everything—from the men’s flesh and bone to their fanatical beliefs—would lie here and rot in this forgotten patch of forest.
Waiting in the trees, Nicci watched as Richard briefly inspected the corpses. That first morning he’d already killed a great many of the soldiers before Victor and his men arrived and charged in to help him. She didn’t know how long Richard had been fighting with that arrow in his chest, but it wasn’t the kind of injury that anyone could endure for long.
Huddled back under the partial shelter of the huge maple, the nearly two dozen men pulled cloaks tight against the chill and settled in to wait.
Everywhere in the hushed forest, boughs of pine and spruce hung heavy and wet, quietly dripping water to the sodden ground. Here and there the drooping branches of maple, oak, and elm lifted whenever a breath of breeze relieved them of their heavy load of water, making it appear as if the trees were gently waving. The humid air dampened what the drizzle didn’t reach, making everyone miserable.
Beyond the standing water, Richard crouched again, studying the ground. Nicci couldn’t imagine what he was looking for.
None of the men waiting back under the tree appeared at all interested in revisiting the site of the pitched battle or seeing the dead. They were content to wait back where they were. Killing was unnatural and difficult for these men. They fought for what was right and they did what they had to do, but they didn’t relish it. That in itself spoke to their values. They had buried three of their own dead, but they had not buried the bodies of close to a hundred soldiers who would have eagerly killed them had Richard not intervened.
Nicci remembered her surprise, the morning of the battle, coming upon Richard among all the dead and not at first understanding what had felled so many of them. Then she’d seen Richard slipping among those brutes, his sword moving with the fluid grace of a dance. It had been spellbinding to watch. With every thrust or slice, a man died. There had been a thick swarm of the soldiers—many bewildered by seeing so many of their fellows crashing to the ground. Most had been burly young men who always dominated because of their muscle—the type who enjoyed intimidating people. The soldiers moved in jerks and fits, chopping and lurching at Richard, but they always seemed to strike just after he had already gone. His flowing movement didn’t fit the blundering attack they were looking for. They began to fear that the spirits themselves had set upon them. In a way, perhaps they had.
Still, their numbers were too great for one man, even if that one man was Richard and he wielded the Sword of Truth. Just one of those ignorant, lumbering, brawny men connecting with a lucky swing of his axe would be all it took. Or one arrow finding its mark. Richard was neither invincible nor immortal.
Victor and the rest of his men had arrived just in time—a few moments before Nicci, too, made it to the scene. Victor’s men had flown into the fray, drawing the attention away from Richard. Once Nicci arrived, she
had ended it in a blinding flash as she unleashed her power against the soldiers still standing.
Fearful of being exposed not only to the impending storm but, far more troubling, to potentially untold numbers of enemy soldiers who could appear on the scene at any moment, Nicci had instructed the men to carry Richard back through the woods to the secluded farmhouse. The most she had been able to do for him on that terrible race to cover had been to trickle a thread of her Han into him, hoping it would help keep him alive until she was able to do more. Nicci swallowed back the anguish of the ghastly memory.
From a distance, she watched as Richard continued his meticulous inspection of the scene of the battle, ignoring the fallen soldiers, for the most part, and paying particular attention to the surrounding area. She couldn’t imagine what he hoped to discover. As he searched, he had begun moving in a back-and-forth pattern, progressing steadily outward from the small clearing, circling the scene in ever-widening arcs. At times he inched along the ground on all fours.
By late in the morning Richard had vanished into the woods.
Victor finally tired of the silent vigil and marched through a bed of ferns nodding under the gentle fall of rain to where Nicci waited.
“What’s going on?” he asked her in a low voice.
“He’s looking for something.”
“I can see that. I mean what’s going on with this business about a wife?”
Nicci let out a tired sigh. “I don’t know.”
“But you have an idea.”
Nicci spotted Richard, briefly, moving among the trees some distance away. “He was seriously wounded. People in that state sometimes suffer delirium.”
“But he’s healed, now. He doesn’t look or act feverish. He sounds normal enough in everything else, not like a person suffering visions and such. I’ve never seen Richard behave like this.”
“Nor have I,” Nicci admitted. She knew that Victor would never voice to her such concerns about Richard unless he was deeply worried. “I would suggest we try to be as understanding as possible of what he’s gone through and see if he doesn’t soon start to get his thoughts sorted out. He was unconscious for days. He’s only been awake for a few hours. Let’s give him some time to clear his head.”
Victor considered her words before finally sighing and giving his nod of agreement. She was relieved that he didn’t ask what they would do if Richard didn’t soon get over his delirium.
She saw Richard, then, returning through the shadows and drizzle. Nicci and Victor crossed the field of battle to meet him. On the surface his face seemed to show only stony intensity, but, as well as she knew him, Nicci could read in his expression that something was seriously wrong.
Richard brushed leaves, moss, and twigs from the knees of his trousers as he finally reached them. “Victor, these soldiers weren’t coming to take back Altur’Rang.”
Victor’s eyebrows went up. “They weren’t?”
“No. They would need thousands of men for such a task—maybe tens of thousands. This many soldiers certainly weren’t going to accomplish any such thing. And besides, if that was their intent, then what would be the point to slogging through the bush this far away from Altur’Rang?”
Victor made a sour face in admission that it had to be that Richard was right. “Then what do you think they were doing?”
“It wasn’t yet dawn when they were out here moving through the woods. That suggests to me that they might have been reconnoitering.” Richard gestured off through the woods. “There’s a road in that direction. We’d been using it to travel up from the south. I had thought we would be camped far enough off it for the night to avoid trouble. Obviously, I was wrong.”
“We last heard that you were to the south,” Victor said. “The road makes for quicker traveling, so we were using the trails to cut cross-country so we could catch the road and take it south.”
“It’s an important road,” Nicci added. “It’s one of the main arteries—one of the first—that Jagang built. It allowed him to move soldiers swiftly. The roads he built enabled him to subdue all of the Old World under the rule of the Imperial Order.”
Richard gazed off in the direction of the road, almost as if he could see through the wall of trees and vines. “Such a well-made road also allows him to move supplies. I think that’s what was happening here. Being this close to Altur’Rang, and being well aware of the revolt that had taken place there, they were probably concerned about the possibility of an attack as they passed through the area. Since these soldiers weren’t massing for an attack on Altur’Rang, I’d guess they had something more important
going on: watching over supplies moving north for Jagang’s army. He needs to crush the last of the resistance in the New World before the revolution at home burns his tail.”
Richard’s gaze returned to Victor. “I think these soldiers were reconnoitering—clearing the countryside in advance of a supply convoy. They were most likely scouting in the predawn in the hopes of catching any insurgents asleep.”