Richard turned to the two messengers who had come from General Reibisch. “Tell the general I’m pleased with the speed he’s making, and I’m pleased to know he believes he can make it before Jagang’s forces arrive. Tell him the same orders he already has are still in effect; I want him to stand off.”
Nearly every day messengers came and went, entering past different Dominie Dirtch at the border so as to be less noticed. Richard had given General Reibisch orders to stay well to the north, well beyond Jagang’s screen of scouts, sentries, and spies. If it came to a fight, surprise was one of the most valuable elements the D’Haran army could possess. The general agreed with that much of it, but was loath to leave Richard with only a thousand men in potentially hostile territory.
Richard had explained, in the letters he’d written the man, that while he understood the general’s concern, they needed to keep his force hidden until and unless they were called. Richard had explained in gruesome detail the horrific and futile death awaiting them at the border if the army tried to breach the Dominie Dirtch. Until they won the agreement of the Anderith people, they dared not approach their border in force.
Moreover, Richard didn’t trust Minister Chanboor. The man’s tongue was too smooth. Truth didn’t wear a tongue smooth; lies did.
The Dominie Dirtch were a spider’s web waiting to claim the careless. The look of easy conquest could be a trap to lure the D’Haran force to their death. More than anything, Richard feared all those men brave young men being slaughtered before the Dominie Dirtch. Especially when he knew such sacrifice could accomplish nothing. They would die and the Dominie Dirtch would still stand untouched.
General Reibisch had written back, promising Richard that, once they were in place to the north, they would charge south without pause should Richard call upon them, but he promised to stay put until called.
“Yes, Lord Rahl,” the taller messenger said as he clapped a fist to his heart, “I will tell the general your words.” They both wheeled their horses and trotted off down the road.
Richard checked that his bow and quiver were secure before he climbed into his saddle. Kahlan flashed him her special smile as they turned their horses up the trail. She, too, Richard knew, was relieved to be alone at last, if for only a brief ride up a side trail.
It was wearing to have people constantly around them. When they held hands, eyes took it in. If they did so in front of people while speaking to them, Richard could tell by the looks that it was news that would visit a thousand ears before a few days passed. He knew by the unblinking stares that it would be spoken of for years to come. At least it was a favorable thing for people to gossip about. Better they should talk about the married Lord Rahl and Mother Confessor holding hands than something awful.
Richard watched Kahlan sway in the saddle, spellbound by the taper of her body down to her waist, the flare of her hips. He thought she had just about the most alluring shape he had ever seen. He sometimes found it remarkable to think a woman like that would love him, a man who had grown up in a little place in Hartland.
Richard missed his home. He guessed those feelings had surfaced because the forest trail up the mountain reminded him so much of places he knew. There were hills and mountains to the west of where he grew up, remote places, that were much like the forests and mountains in which they found themselves.
He wished they could return to visit his home in Hartland. He had seen remarkable things since leaving the autumn before, but he guessed none held your heart like the place you grew up.
When the trail passed near a steep decline affording a view, Richard looked off to the northwest, through gaps in the peaks. They were probably closer to where he had grown up than they had been since he left. They had come across those same mountains into the Midlands, through the boundary while it had still been up, at a place called Kings’ Port. It wasn’t very far to the northwest.
Despite how close it might be, because of the weight of his responsibilities, home in Hartland was now a very distant place.
Besides the responsibility of being Lord Rahl and having everyone depending on him, there was Jagang, who, given half a chance, would enslave the New World as he had the Old. People depended on Richard for everything from the bond that protected them from the dream walker, to pulling everyone together into one force to stand against Jagang’s huge armies.
Sometimes, when he thought about it, it seemed he was living someone else’s life. Sometimes he felt like a fraud, and people were one day going to wake up and say “Now wait a minute, this Lord Rahl fellow is just a woods guide named Richard. And we’re listening to him? We’re following him into war?”
And then there were the chimes. Richard and Kahlan were inextricably involved with the chimes. They were responsible for the chimes being in the world of life. Even though it was unintentional, they brought the chimes of death forth.
In their traveling around Anderith to talk to people, they had heard stories of the strange deaths. The chimes were greatly enjoying their visit to the world of life. They were having a marvelous time killing people.
In response to the danger, people had fallen back to old superstitions. In some places people gathered together to pay homage to the evil spirits loosed upon the world. Gifts of food and wine were left in clearings in the woods, or in a fallow field. Some folks thought mankind had violated moral bounds, had become too corrupt, and the avenging spirits had been sent by the Creator to punish the world.
Some people left gifts of stones down the center of roads, and piled yet more rocks at crossroads. No one could explain to Richard exactly why, and were annoyed that he would question the old ways. Some put dead flowers out in front of their door at midnight. Good-luck charms were in great demand.
The chimes killed anyway.
The one thing that made the weight of it all tolerable was Kahlan. She made the effort of the struggle bearable. For her, he would endure anything.
Kahlan raised an arm. “Just up there.”
Richard dismounted with her. Most of the trees were spruce or pine. Richard cast about until he found a young silver-leafed maple and tied the reins of their horses to a low branch. Tying reins to pine or spruce, or worse, a balsam, resulted often as not in sticky reins.
Richard looked up when he heard a snort. Not far off, a horse, its ears perked forward, watched them. Grass hung from each side of its mouth, but it had stopped chewing.
“Well, hello girl,” Richard called.
Wary, the horse tossed its head and backed a few steps to add to its distance. When Richard tried to get closer, it backed away more yet, so he halted. A creamy chestnut color, the horse had an odd leggy splotch of black on its rump. When Richard called to it again, trying to coax it closer, it turned and ran.
“I wonder what that’s about,” he said to Kahlan.
Kahlan held out her hand in invitation. Richard took it.
“I don’t know. Maybe someone’s horse has gotten away. It seems to be uninterested in having anything to do with us, though.”
“I suppose,” Richard said as he let her lead him by the hand.
“This is the only way in,” she told him as they walked along the lake shore, around a small clump of spruce.
The clouds had been building all day, threatening thunderstorms. Now, as they walked out onto a nub of rock sticking up at the end of the flat spit of land, the sun emerged between the towering, billowing clouds.
It was a beautiful sight, a shaft of warm sunlight breaking through amber clouds, slanting down between the mountains to touch the still lake. Across the way, water tumbled over a prominence of rock, sending up into the warm air a drifting mist that sparkled in the sunlight above the golden water. Richard took a deep breath, savoring the sweet aroma of woods and lake. It was almost like home.
“This is the place.” She gestured. “Up there, higher up, is the desolate place where the paka plant grows, and the gambit moth lives. These pure waters come from that poisoned area.”
The air shimmered in the afternoon light. “It’s beautiful. I could stay here forever. I almost feel like I should be scouting new trails.”
They stood for a while, hand in hand, savoring the view.
“Richard, I just wanted to tell you that the last couple of weeks as we’ve talked to people… I’ve really been proud of you. Proud of the way you’ve shown people hope for the future.
“Whatever happens, I just want you to know that. That I’m proud of the way you’ve handled it.”
He frowned. “You sound like you don’t think we’ll win.”
She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. What will be will be. People don’t always do what’s right. Sometimes they don’t recognize evil. Sometimes people choose evil because it suits them or because they’re afraid, or because they think they will get something for themselves out of it.
“The most important thing is that we’ve done our best, and you’ve shown people the truth. You put their well-being, their safety before all else, so if we do triumph, it will be for the right reasons. You’ve given them the chance to prove their heart.”
“We’ll win.” Richard gazed out over the still water. “People will see the truth in it.”
“I hope so.”
He put his arm around her neck and kissed the top of her head. He sighed with the pleasure of the mountain lake, the quiet.
“There are places deep in the mountains to the west of where I grew up that I don’t think anyone but me has ever visited. Places where the water falls from the rocks high overhead, higher than here, and makes rainbows in the afternoon air. And after you swim in the clear pools, you can curl up on the rocks behind the waterfall and watch the world through the falling water.
“I’ve often dreamed of taking you there.”
Kahlan twisted a strand of her hair around a finger. “Someday, Richard, we’ll visit your special places.”
As they stood close, watching the waterfall, Richard was reluctant to break the spell of the dream, especially to talk about their purpose, but at last he did.
“So, why is it called the Ovens?”
Kahlan lifted her chin to point. “Behind the waterfall is a cave that’s warm. Sometimes hot, I’m told.”
“I wonder why Joseph Ander mentioned the place?”
Kahlan rested a hand on his shoulder. “Maybe even Joseph Ander appreciated a beautiful place.”
“Maybe,” he mumbled as he searched the scene for a sign of why the wizard would have been interested in this spot. Richard didn’t think much of Joseph Ander’s sensibilities or that he had a keen appreciation of such natural beauty. While the man spoke at length about the beauty of nature, it was always in regard to the orderly makeup of a society.
Richard noted that all the rock of the mountains around them was a peculiar greenish gray, except the rock of the cliff across the lake, where the waterfall was. That rock was darker. Not a lot, but it was definitely different. It had more gray than green in it, probably because the grain of the granite had black flecks, although from the distance, it was hard to tell.
Richard raised his arm, pointing across the lake to the wall from which the water cascaded in a majestic downward arc.
“Look at that rock, and tell me what you think of it.”
Kahlan, her white Mother Confessor’s dress glowing in the sunlight, almost looked like Richard’s dream-image of a good spirit. She blinked at him.
“What do you mean? It’s a rock.”
“I know, but look at it. Tell me what strikes you about it.”
She looked at the cliff and back at him. “It’s a big rock.”