“If you help me save my friends, and stop Rahl, I don’t care what you do to me after that.” Scarlet snorted. “Are short-tailed gars a threat to dragons?”
The dragon unhooked her talon from him. “Gars.” She spat the name. “I have eaten enough of them. They are no match for me, not unless there were eight or ten together, but gars don’t like to gather together in numbers, so that’s not a problem.”
“It’s a problem now. When I saw your egg, there were dozens of gars around it.”
Scarlet gave a grunt, and tongues of flame licked out between her teeth. “Dozens. That many could pull me from the sky. Especially if I were carrying my egg.”
Richard smiled. “That’s why you need me. I will think of a plan.”
Zedd screamed. Kahlan and Chase both jerked back. Kahlan’s brow wrinkled. He had never done this before when he had sought out the night stone. The sun was already down, but in the fading light she could see his skin was nearly as white as his hair.
She grasped him by the shoulders. “Zedd! What is it?”
He didn’t answer. His head fell to the side as his eyes rolled back. He still wasn’t breathing, but that much was normal; he hadn’t breathed in the past when he sought the night stone. She exchanged a worried glance with Chase. Kahlan could feel Zedd shivering under her hands. She shook him again.
“Zedd! Stop it! Come back!”
He gave a gasp, whispered something. Kahlan put her ear by his mouth. He whispered again.
Kahlan was horrified. “Zedd, I can’t do that to you.”
“What did he say?” Chase demanded.
She looked up at the boundary warden, her eyes wide in fear. “He said to touch him with my power.”
“Underworld!” Zedd gasped. “Only way.”
“Zedd, what’s happening?”
“I’m trapped,” he whispered. “Touch me or I’m lost. Hurry.”
“You better do as he says,” Chase warned.
Kahlan didn’t like that idea one bit. “Zedd, I can’t do that to you!”
“It’s the only way to break the hold. Hurry.”
“Do it!” Chase bellowed. “There’s no time to argue!”
“May the good spirits forgive me,” she whispered as she closed her eyes.
She felt trapped by panic; she had no choice. Dreading what she was going to do, her mind fell silent, calm. In the calm, she relaxed her restraint. She felt her power build, taking her breath away. Released, the power slammed into the wizard.
There was a hard impact to the air all about. Thunder with no sound. Pine needles rained down all about. Leaning over them, Chase gave a little grunt of pain; he was closer than he should have been. Silence fell over the woods. Still the wizard did not breathe.
Zedd stopped shaking, his eyes came down, he blinked a few times, his hands came up and he gripped Kahlan’s arms. With a gasp, he took a breath.
“Thank you, dear one,” he managed through the deep breaths.
Kahlan was surprised that the power, the magic, didn’t seem to have taken him. It should have. She was relieved it hadn’t, but astonished.
“Zedd, are you all right?”
The wizard gave a nod. “Thanks to you. But if you hadn’t been here, or had waited any longer, I would have been trapped in the underworld. Your power has brought me back.”
“Why didn’t it change you?”
Zedd straightened his robes, seeming a little embarrassed at his helpless predicament. “Because of where I was.” He held his chin up. “And because I’m a wizard of the First Order. I used your Confessor’s power as a lifeline, to find my way back. It was like a beacon of light in the darkness. I followed it back without letting it touch me.”
“What were you doing in the underworld?” Chase asked before she had a chance.
Zedd gave a cross look to the boundary warden, and didn’t answer.
Kahlan’s worry surged. “Zedd, answer the question. This never happened before. Why were you pulled into the underworld?”
“When I seek the night stone, part of me goes to it. That’s how I find it, and can tell where it is.”
Kahlan tried not to think of what he was saying. “But the night stone is still in D’Hara. Richard is still in D’Hara.” She grabbed fists full of his robes. “Zedd…”
Zedd’s eyes went to the ground. “The night stone is no longer in D’Hara. It’s in the underworld.” His angry eyes came up to her. “But that doesn’t mean Richard is not still in D’Hara! It doesn’t mean anything has happened to him! Only the night stone.”
With a strained expression. Chase turned to setting up the camp before darkness fell. Kahlan still held Zedd’s robes, frozen in terror.
“Zedd… please. Could you be wrong?”
He shook his head slowly. “The night stone is in the underworld. But dear one, that doesn’t mean Richard is. Don’t let your fear run away with you.”
Kahlan nodded as she felt tears run down her cheeks. “Zedd, he has to be all right. He has to. If Rahl has kept him there this long, he wouldn’t kill him now.”
“We don’t even know that Rahl has him.”
She knew he just didn’t want to admit it out loud. Why else would he be at the People’s Palace, if Darken Rahl didn’t have him?
“Zedd, when you sought the night stone before, you said you could feel him, that he was alive.” She almost couldn’t bring herself to ask, could hardly get the words out, afraid of what he might say. “Did you sense him in the underworld?”
He looked into her eyes a long time. “I didn’t sense him. But I don’t know if I would, if he were in the underworld. If he were dead.” When she started crying, he pulled her against him, hugging her head to his shoulder. “But I think it was only the night stone there. I think Rahl was trying to trap me there. He must have gotten the night stone from Richard, must have sent it to the underworld to snare me.”
“We’re still going after him,” she cried. “I’m not turning back.”
“Well, of course we are.”
Kahlan felt a warm tongue on the back of her hand. She stroked the wolf’s fur, smiled over at him.
“We’ll find him. Mistress Kahlan. Don’t you worry, we’ll find him.”
“Brophy’s right,” Chase called over his shoulder. “I’m even looking forward to the lecture we’ll be getting about coming after him.”
“The box is safe,” the wizard said, “that’s what matters. Five days from tomorrow is the first day of winter, and then Darken Rahl will be dead. We will have Richard back after that, if not before.”