The Pillars of Creation (Sword of Truth 7)

“But magic—”

“Magic is a tool, not a solution.”

Jennsen reminded herself to remain composed even though she wanted to seize the woman by the shoulders and shake her until she agreed to help. Unlike with Lathea, she did not intend to lose this chance for that help. “What do you mean, magic is not a solution? Magic is powerful.”

“You have a knife. You showed it to me.”

“That’s right.”

“And when you are hungry do you wave your knife in someone’s face and demand their bread? No. You entice them to give you bread by giving them a coin in exchange.”

“You mean you think they can be bribed?”

Another sigh. “No. Of all I know, I can tell you that they cannot be bribed—at least not in the conventional sense. However, the principle is not entirely without some parallel.

“When Friedrich wishes bread, he doesn’t use his knife to take the bread from those who have it—at least not in the sense of how you wish to use magic. He uses his knife as a tool to carve figures and then he gilds them. He sells what he made with his knife, and then exchanges that coin for the bread.

“You see? If he would use the knife—the tool—to directly solve the problem of getting bread, it would do him more harm in the end. He would be a thief and hunted as such. He uses his head, instead, and uses the knife as a tool to create something with the aid of his mind, thus solving the problem of obtaining bread with his knife.”

“You mean, then, that I need to use magic indirectly? I must somehow use magic as a tool to help me?”

Althea sighed heavily. “No, child. Forget magic. You must use your head. Magic is trouble. Use your head.”

“I did,” Jennsen said. “It wasn’t easy, but I used my head to come to you to get help. It’s a spell I need now as a tool to help me—to hide me. In that way it will be a tool, as you suggest.”

Althea looked away into the hearth, watching the wavering flames. “I cannot help you in that way.”

“I don’t think you understand. I’m hunted by powerful men. I just need a spell to hide my identity—like you did when I was little, when I lived at the palace with my mother.”

Still, the old woman stared off into the hearth. “I cannot do that. I don’t have the power.”

“But you do. You’ve already done it, once.” A lifetime of frustration, fear, loss, and futility surfaced, bringing with it bitter tears. “I didn’t travel all this way, suffer all this hardship, to have you tell me no! Lathea told me no, told me that only you can see the holes in the world, and that only you could help me. I must have your help, your spell, to hide me. Please, Althea, I’m begging for my life.”

Althea would not look her in the eyes. “I cannot cast a spell like that for you.”

Jennsen choked back the tears. “Please, Althea, I just want to be left alone. You have the power.”

“I do not have what you’ve invented in your mind for me. I have helped you in the only way I can.”

“How can you sit here knowing that other people are suffering and dying—and not help? How can you be so selfish, Althea? How can you not help when I need it?”

Friedrich put a hand under Jennsen’s arm, lifting her to her feet. “I’m sorry, but you’ve asked what you would. You’ve heard what Althea has to say. If you’re wise, you will use what you’ve learned to help yourself. Now, it’s time for you to leave.”

Jennsen pulled away. “All I want is the help of a spell! How can she be so selfish!”

Friedrich’s eyes blazed with fury, even if his voice did not. “You have no right to speak to us in that manner. You don’t know anything about it, about the sacrifices she’s made. It’s time for you to—”

“Friedrich,” Althea said in a soft voice, “why don’t you make us some tea?”

“Althea, there is no reason you should have to explain any of it—least of all to her.”

Althea smiled up at him. “It’s all right.”

“Explain what?” Jennsen asked.

“My husband may sound harsh to you, but it’s because he doesn’t want me to burden you. He knows that some people leave here unhappy with the knowledge I give them.” Her dark eyes turned up to her husband. “Make us some tea?”

Friedrich’s face twisted with a long-suffering expression before he nodded in resignation.

“What do you mean?” Jennsen asked. “What knowledge? What is it you aren’t telling me?”

As Friedrich went to a cupboard and retrieved a kettle and cups, setting the cups on the table, Althea gestured for Jennsen to sit on the pillow before her.

Chapter 23

Jennsen made herself comfortable on the red and gold pillow on the floor in front of the sorceress.

“Many years ago,” Althea began, clasping her hands in her lap atop her black-and-white print dress, “more than you might believe, I traveled with my sister to the Old World, beyond the great barrier to the south.”

Jennsen decided that, for the time being, it might be best just to keep quiet and learn what she could, rather than bring up what she already knew—that the new Lord Rahl, bent on conquest, had destroyed the great barrier to the south in order to invade the Old World, and that Sebastian had come up from the Old World to try to find a way to help the emperor, Jagang the Just, stop the invading D’Harans. She thought that maybe if she understood it all a little better, herself, then she might be able to come up with a way of convincing Althea to help her.

“I went to the Old World to go to a place called the Palace of the Prophets,” Althea said. This, too, Jennsen had heard of from Sebastian. “I have a gift for a very primitive form of prophecy. I wanted to learn what I could about it, while my sister wished to learn about cures and such. I also wanted to learn things about people like you.”

“Me?” Jennsen said. “What do you mean?”

“The ancestors of Darken Rahl were no different than he. They all eliminated any ungifted offspring they discovered had been born. Lathea and I were young and full of fire to help those in need, and also those we felt were unjustly persecuted. We wanted to use our gift to help change the world for the better. While we each hoped to study different things, we both went for much the same reasons.”

Jennsen thought that seemed pretty close to how she felt and was just the kind of help she was talking about, but she also knew that right then was not the moment to say it. She asked, instead, “Why did you have to travel all the way to the Palace of the Prophets to learn these things?”

“The sorceresses there are renowned to have experience with many things, with wizards, and magic, and most of all, with matters to do with this world and with the worlds beyond.”

“Worlds beyond?” Jennsen gestured to the space outside the outer gilded ring on the Grace setting not far away. “You mean, the world of the dead?”

Althea leaned back as she reflected. “Well, yes, but not exactly. You understand the Grace?” Althea waited for Jennsen’s nod. “The sorceresses at the Palace of the Prophets have knowledge about the interactions of the gift, the veil between worlds, and their interdependent relationships—how it all fits together. They are called the Sisters of the Light.”

Jennsen recalled with a jolt that Sebastian had said that the Sisters of the Light were with Emperor Jagang, now. Sebastian had offered to take Jennsen to the Sisters of the Light. He’d said he thought they might be able to help her. It had to be that they had something to do with the Creator’s Light, and especially the gift, in the center of the Grace.

Another thought came to her. “This has something to do with what Lathea said? That you could see the…holes in the world, as she called it?”

Althea smiled with the pleasure of a teacher seeing a student flirting with discovery. “That’s the tip of the tooth. You see, the ungifted offspring of the Lord Rahl—of every Lord Rahl going back thousands of years—are different than anyone else. You are holes in the world to those of us with the gift.”

“What does tha

t mean, exactly—holes in the world?”

“We are blind to you.”

“Blind? But you see me. Lathea could see me, too. I don’t understand.”

“Not blind with our eyes. Blind with our gift.” She swept an arm out toward Friedrich at the fire with an iron kettle, and then toward the window. “There are living things all around. You see them with your eyes—you see Friedrich and the trees and such—just as I do, just as everyone does.” She held up a finger to make her point. “But through my gift, I also see them.

“While our eyes may perceive you, those of us with the gift cannot see you with that aspect of ourselves. Darken Rahl could not see you any more than I can. Neither can the new Lord Rahl. To those of us with the gift, you are a hole in the world.”