Naked Empire (62 page)

Each day of hard travel, Richard’s condition worsened, but his fear for Kahlan drove him relentlessly onward. Most of the time, hour after hour, through sunlight, darkness, and occasional rain, they ran at a steady lope. Richard used a staff he’d cut himself to help keep his balance. When he thought he would be unable to go on, Richard deliberately picked up the pace to remind himself that he could not give up. They stopped at night only long enough to get a few hours’ sleep.

The men had trouble keeping up with him. Cara and Jennsen didn’t; they were both used to strenuous exertion in the course of difficult journeys. All of them, though, were so exhausted from the unrelenting pace that they talked only when necessary. Richard drove himself doggedly, trying not to think about his own hopeless condition. It didn’t matter. He reminded himself that with every step they ran, if it was fast enough, they were gaining on Nicholas and just that much closer to Kahlan.

In moments of despair, Richard told himself that Kahlan had to be alive, that Nicholas could have killed her long ago if that was his intention. He wouldn’t have run if she were dead. Kahlan would be much more valuable to him alive.

In a way, he felt an odd kind of relief. He could push as hard as he needed. He didn’t have to worry about his health. There was no antidote to the poison. Given the time, it would kill him. There was no solution to the problem of his gift being out of control; that, too, would kill him. There was nothing Richard could do about either. He was going to die.

The wooded hills were easy enough traveling. They were open, with broad, green meadows sprinkled with wildflowers and a patchwork of grassland. Wildlife was abundant. Were he not dying, in pain, and sick with worry for Kahlan, Richard might have enjoyed the beauty of the land. Now it was just an obstacle.

The sun in his eyes was slipping down behind the towering mountains. Soon darkness would be upon them. A little earlier, Richard had used his bow to take a buck when the opportunity presented itself. Tom had made quick work of butchering it. The rest of them needed to eat, or they would not be able to keep up the pace. Richard supposed that they would have to stop for a while to cook the meat and get some sleep.

Owen came up beside Richard as they trotted through a sea of grass rolling beneath the breeze. Owen pointed ahead. “There, Lord Rahl. That stream coming out of the hills is getting close to the Order’s encampment. Just a little farther, over that line of hills and toward the mountains.” He pointed to the right. “Off that way, not far, is my town of Witherton.”

Richard changed his course a little to the left, heading for the woods that started at the foot of a gentle rise. They made the trees just as the orange disc of the sun slipped behind the snowcapped mountains.

“All right,” Richard said, coming to a breathless halt as they entered a small clearing. “Let’s set up camp here. Jennsen, Tom, why don’t you two and the men stay here—get some meat cooking while I go with Owen and Cara to scout this fortification and see if I can figure out how we’re going to get in.”

When Richard started out, using his staff to help balance, Betty started following him. Jennsen snatched Betty’s rope.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Jennsen said. “You’re staying here. Richard doesn’t need you tagging along to attract attention at the worst possible time.”

“What should we make for you to eat, Lord Rahl?” Tom asked.

Richard couldn’t stand the thought of eating meat. After all the bloody fighting, he needed to balance his gift more than ever. His gift was killing him, but if he did the wrong thing it might hasten the end and then he might not last long enough to get Kahlan away from Nicholas.

“Whatever we have that isn’t meat. You have time before we come back, so you can cook some bannock, some rice, maybe some beans.”

Tom agreed to take care of it and Richard followed after Owen. Cara, looking more unhappy than he could ever remember seeing her, put a hand on his shoulder.

“How are you holding up, Lord Rahl?”

He dared not tell her how much pain he was in from the gift, or that he had started to cough up blood. “I’m all right for now.”

By the time they dragged back into their camp, almost two hours later, the meat on the spit was finished cooking and some of the men had already eaten. They were just curling up in blankets to get some sleep.

Richard was beyond being tired. He was certain that they had been close to Kahlan. It had been agonizing to have to return, to leave the place where Nicholas held her, but he had to use his head. Wild, irrational action would bring only failure. It would not get Kahlan out of there.

Richard was being driven by needs beyond food or sleep, but as he watched Owen sit heavily near the fire, he knew that Owen and Cara were exhausted and he imagined that they had to be hungry. Rather than sit, Cara waited at his side. She would not allow him to get far from her watchful protection. Nor would she voice any concern for herself or her needs.

He could never have imagined, back in the beginning, ever feeling this close to a Mord-Sith.

Jennsen stood and rushed to meet him. “Richard—here, let me help you. Come and sit.”

Richard flopped down on the grass near the fire. Betty came over and begged a place beside him. He let her lie down.

“Well?” Tom asked. “What do you think of the place?”

“I don’t know. It has well-made timber walls with trenches dug before them. There are snares and traps all around the place. It has a gate—a real gate.” Richard sighed as he rubbed his eyes. His sight was getting blurry. It was getting more difficult all the time to see things. “I haven’t quite figured it out, yet.”

It was hard to think with the smell of the cooking meat. It was making him sick. Richard took a piece of bannock and the bowl of rice and beans Jennsen handed him.

He couldn’t eat while watching them eat the meat or, worse, smelling it.

Richard stood. “I’m going to go for a walk.” He didn’t want to make them feel bad about their dinner, or feel guilty for eating meat in front of him. “I need some time alone to think it out.”

Richard gestured for Cara to sit back down and stay where she was.

“Get some dinner,” he told her. “I need you to stay strong.”

Richard walked off through the trees, listening to the chirp of crickets, watching the stars through the canopy of leaves. It was a relief to be alone, not to have people asking him anything. It was tiring to have people always depending on him.

Richard found a quiet place where an old oak had fallen. He sat and leaned back against the trunk. He wished he never had to get up. If not for Kahlan, he wouldn’t.

Betty showed up. She stood before him, looking at him intently as if to ask what they were going to do next. When Richard said nothing, Betty lay down in front of him. It occurred to him that maybe Betty just wanted to offer him some comfort.

Richard felt a tear run down his cheek. Everything was falling to pieces. He couldn’t hold those pieces together any longer. He could hardly breathe past the lump in his throat.

He lay down and put an arm over Betty.

“What am I going to do?” He sniffled. He wiped the back of his hand across his nose.

“Kahlan, what am I going to do?” he whispered in forlorn misery. “I need you so much. What am I going to do?”

He was at the end of all hope.

He had thought, when he’d seen Nathan unexpectedly arrive, that help was at hand. The bright ember of that last hope had been extinguished. Not even a powerful wizard could help him.

Powerful wizard.

Kaja-Rang.

Richard froze.

The words sent to him by Kaja-Rang, those two words emblazoned across the granite base of that statue, echoed through his mind.

Those two words were meant for Richard.

Talga Vassternich
.

Deserve Victory.

“Dear spirits…” Richard whispered.

He understood.

Nicholas watched as Lord Rahl made his way back into the camp among his men after his despairing whispered last prayer to the dear spirits. So sad. So very sad that the man was going to die. He would soon be with his dear spirits…in the Keeper’s realm of the underworld.

Nicholas relished the game. The poor Lord Rahl was so lost and confused. Nicholas wished the game could continue for a good long time, but Lord Rahl had little time left. So sad.

But it would be much more fun after Lord Rahl died, after that last detail was finally finished. Jagang thought this pathetic man was resourceful.
Don’t underestimate him
, Jagang had warned. Perhaps Jagang was no match for the great Richard Rahl, but Nicholas the Slide was.

His spirit swelled with delight at the expectant thought of Lord Rahl’s death. That was going to be something to watch. It would be a grand finale of the play of life. Nicholas intended to see it all, to see every sad moment of the last act. He imagined that Lord Rahl’s friends would gather to weep and wail as they stood by, helpless, watching him slip into the welcoming embrace of death, eternity’s shepherd, come to help him begin the magnificent, never-ending spiritual journey away from the bitter interlude that had been life.

The final curtain was about to draw closed. Nicholas so loved sad endings. He could hardly wait to watch it played out.

Hate to live, live to hate.

Nicholas wondered, too, as did Lord Rahl, what would get him first, the poison or his gift. It seemed to tug first toward one, and then toward the other. For a time the headaches inflicted by his gift nearly put him down; then the poison would tighten its pain and make him gasp in agony. It was a fascinating question, one that, as in any good play, would not be answered until the very end. The tension was delicious.

Nicholas was rooting for the gift to win the fatal contest. Poison was all well and good, but what a vastly more intriguing twist of fate it would be to see a wizard of Lord Rahl’s ability and potential, a wizard unlike any to be born since an era long buried in the dunghill of mankind’s history, succumb to his birthright—to his own vast but vain power…another victim of men reaching too high in life. That would be a fascinating and fitting end.

Not long to wait.

Not long at all.

Nicholas watched, not wanting to miss a single delectable detail. With the spirit of Richard Rahl’s lovely bride beside him, as it were, Nicholas felt almost a part of the family as he attended the approach of such a great man’s tragic end.

Nicholas felt it only fair that the Mother Confessor should get to see it all played out, see the sad end to her beloved. As she watched along with Nicholas, she was suffering seeing the agony of it as Richard Rahl walked back into his camp.

Nicholas savored her distress. He had not yet begun to make her suffer. He would soon have a very long time with her to explore her capacity for suffering.

The people there in the woods around the campfire looked up, curious as their master returned among them. They all waited, with Nicholas, watching, with Nicholas, as their Lord Rahl stood over them. His figure wavered in the fire, as it did in Nicholas’s vision. It was almost as if he were already but a spirit, about to drift away into the glorious oblivion of the dead.

“I’ve figured it out,” Lord Rahl told them. “I know how to attack the fortification.”

Nicholas’s ears pricked up. What was this?

“At first light we go in,” Lord Rahl said. “Just as the sun breaks over the mountains. Right then, on the east side, we’ll come in over the wall. The guards won’t be able to see well because the sun will be in their eyes when they look in that direction. Men don’t look where it’s troublesome to look.”

“I like it,” one of the other men said.

“So we will sneak in, then, rather than try to attack,” another said.

“Oh, no, there will be an attack,” Lord Rahl said. “A big attack. An attack that will set their heads to spinning.”

What was this? What was this? Nicholas watched, watched, watched. This was most curious. First Lord Rahl was going to sneak over the wall, and then he would have his men attack? How was he going to set their heads to spinning? Nicholas was fascinated.

He moved in a little closer, fearing to miss a precious word.

“The attack will involve all the rest of you men,” Lord Rahl said. “You will all come in toward the gate at first light. While you’re attacking through the gate and drawing their attention, I will be slipping over the wall. While you will be there to distract them, in part, you will play an even more vital role that they will never expect.”

The game was afoot. Nicholas was in rapture as he listened, as he watched. He so liked the game—especially when he knew all the rules, and could bend them to his wishes. It was going to be a glorious day, tomorrow.

“But, Lord Rahl,” the big man, Tom, asked, “how are we going to be able to attack through the gate if it’s as formidable as you say?”

Nicholas hadn’t thought of that. How curious. A key part of Lord Rahl’s plan seemed to be faulty.

“That’s the real trick,” Lord Rahl said. “I’ve already figured it out and you’ll be amazed to hear how you’re going to do it.”

He had already figured it out? How curious. Nicholas wanted to hear what possible solution could solve such a major hitch in Lord Rahl’s plan.

Lord Rahl stretched and yawned. “Look,” he said, “I’m exhausted. I can’t stand up anymore. I need to get some rest before I lay it all out for you. It’s complicated, so I’d better wait until just before we leave.

“Wake me up two hours before dawn, and I’ll explain the whole thing, then.”

“Two hours before dawn,” Tom repeated in confirmation of the orders.

Nicholas was furious. He wanted to hear it now. He wanted to know the wonderful, fabulous, complicated plan.

Lord Rahl gestured to his delicious companion, the one named Cara, and then to several of the young men. “Why don’t you come with me and get some sleep while the rest finish their meal.”

As they started away, Lord Rahl turned back. “Jennsen, I want you to keep Betty here, with you. Make sure she stays here. I need some sleep; I don’t need the smell of goat to wake me up.”

“Am I going with you in the morning, Richard?” the one called Jennsen asked.

“Yes. You play an important part in the plan.” Lord Rahl yawned again. “I’ll explain after I’ve slept. Don’t forget, Tom. Two hours before dawn.”

Tom nodded. “I will wake you myself, Lord Rahl.”

Nicholas would be there as well, to watch, to hear the final piece of Lord Rahl’s plan. Nicholas could hardly stand to wait that long. He would be there early. He would hear every word of it.

And then, Nicholas would have a surprise waiting for Richard Rahl when he and his men came for a visit.

Maybe neither the poison nor his gift would take Lord Rahl.

Maybe Nicholas would do it himself.

Her spirit a helpless prisoner of the Slide, Kahlan could do nothing but watch along with him. She was unable to answer Richard’s forlorn pleas, unable to cry in sorrow for him, unable to do anything. She ached to be able to hold him in her arms again, to comfort his pain, his heartache.

He was near the end. She knew that.

It broke her heart to see his precious life slipping away.

To see his tears.

To hear him cry her name in longing.

To hear him say how much he needed her.

She felt so cold and alone. She loathed the feeling of being adrift. She desperately wanted to be back in her body. It waited somewhere back in a lonely room in the fortified encampment. Nicholas’s body waited there, too. If only she could get back there.

Most of all, she wished there were some way she could warn Richard that Nicholas knew his plan.