Naked Empire (Sword of Truth 8)

“Like what?”

Kahlan stared off into the memories. “I once delayed for half a second in killing someone.”

“But I thought you said that it was wrong to be too rash.”

“Sometimes the most foolhardy thing you can do is to delay. She was a sorceress. By the time I acted it was already too late. Because of my mistake she captured Richard and took him away. For a year, I didn’t know what had happened to him. I thought I would never see him again, that I would die of heartache.”

Jennsen stared in astonishment. “When did you find him again?”

“Not long ago. That’s why we’re down here in the Old World—she brought him here. At least I found him. I’ve made other mistakes, and they, too, have resulted in no end of trouble. So has Richard. Like he said, we all make mistakes. If I can, I want to spare you from making a needless mistake, at least.”

Jennsen looked away. “Like believing in that man I was with yesterday—Sebastian. Because of him, my mother was murdered and I almost got you killed. I feel like such a fool.”

“You didn’t make that mistake out of carelessness, Jennsen. They deceived you, used you. More importantly, in the end you used your head and were willing to face the truth.”

Jennsen nodded.

“What should we name the twins?” she finally asked.

Kahlan didn’t think that naming the twins was a good idea, not yet anyway, but she was reluctant to say it.

“I don’t know. What names were you thinking?”

Jennsen let out a heavy breath. “It was a shock to suddenly have Betty back with me, and even more of a surprise to see that she had babies of her own. I never considered that before. I haven’t even had time to think about names.”

“You will.”

Jennsen smiled at the thought. Her smile grew, as if at the thought of something more.

“You know,” she said, “I think I understand what Richard meant about thinking of his grandfather as wizardly, even though he never saw him do magic.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I can’t see magic, so to speak, and Richard didn’t do any tonight—at least none I know of.” She laughed softly, as pleasing a laugh as Kahlan had ever heard, full of life and joy. It had a quality to it much like Richard’s, the feminine balance to Richard’s masculine laugh, two facets of the same delight.

“And yet,” Jennsen went on, “the things he said made me think of him in that way—wizardly—like he said about Zedd. When he was saying that, I knew just what he meant, just how he’d felt, because Richard has opened up the world for me, but the gift wasn’t the magic he showed me. It was him showing me life, that my life is mine, and worth living.”

Kahlan smiled to herself, at how very much that described her own feeling of what Richard had done for her, how he had brought her to cherish life and believe in it not just for others, but, most importantly, for herself.

For a time they sat together, silently watching the empty wasteland. Kahlan kept an eye on Richard as he tossed in his sleep.

With growing concern, Jennsen, too, watched Richard. “It looks like there’s something wrong with him,” she whispered as she leaned close.

“He’s having a nightmare.”

Kahlan watched, as she had so many times before, as Richard made fists in his sleep, as he struggled silently against some private terror.

“It’s scary to see him like that,” Jennsen said. “He seems so different. When he’s awake he always seems so…reasoned.”

“You can’t reason with a nightmare,” Kahlan said in quiet sorrow.

Chapter 6

Richard woke with a start.

They were back.

He had been having a bad dream. Like all of his dreams, he didn’t remember it. He only knew it was a bad dream because it left behind the shapeless feeling of breathless, heart-pounding, undefined, frantic terror. He threw off the lingering pall of the nightmare as he would throw off a tangled blanket. Even though it felt as if the dark things in lingering remnants of the dream were still clawing at him, trying to drag him back into their world, he knew that dreams were immaterial, and so he dismissed it. Now that he was awake, the feeling of dread rapidly began to dissolve, like fog burning off under hot sunlight.

Still, he had to make an effort to slow his breathing.

What was important was that they were back. He didn’t always know when they returned, but this time, for some reason, he was sure of it.

Sometime in the night, too, the wind had come up. It buffeted him, pulling at his clothes, tearing at his hair. Out on the sweltering waste, the scorching gusts offered no relief from the heat. Rather than being refreshing, the wind was so hot that it felt as though the door to a blast furnace had opened and the heat were broiling his flesh.

Groping for his waterskin, he didn’t find it immediately at hand. He tried to recall exactly where he’d laid it, but, with other thoughts screaming for his attention, he couldn’t remember. He would have to worry about a drink later.

Kahlan lay close, turned toward him. She had gathered her long hair in a loose fist beneath her chin. The wind whipped stray strands across her cheek. Richard loved just to sit and look at her face; this time, though, he delayed but a moment, looking at her only long enough in the faint starlight to note her even breathing. She was sound asleep.

As he scanned their camp, he could just make out a weak blush in the eastern sky. Dawn was still some time off.

He realized that he’d slept through his watch. Cara and Kahlan had no doubt decided that he needed the sleep more than he was needed for standing a watch and had conspired to not wake him. They were probably right. He had been so exhausted that he’d slept right through the night. Now, though, he was wide awake.

His headache, too, was gone.

Silently, carefully, Richard slipped away from Kahlan so as not to wake her. He instinctively reached for his sword lying at his other side. The metal was warm beneath his touch as his fingers curled around the familiar silver-and-gold-wrought scabbard. It was always reassuring to find the sword at the ready, but even more so at that moment. As he silently rolled to his feet, he slipped the baldric over his head, placing the familiar supple leather across his right shoulder. As he rose up, his sword was already at his hip, ready to do his bidding.

Despite how reassuring it was to have the weapon at his side, after the carnage back at the place called the Pillars of Creation the thought of drawing it sickened him. He recoiled from the mental image of the things he had done. Had he not, though, Kahlan wouldn’t be sleeping peacefully; she would be dead, or worse.

Other good had come of it, too. Jennsen had been pulled back from the brink. He saw her curled up beside her beloved goat, her arm corralling Betty’s two sleeping kids. He smiled at seeing her, at what a wonder it was to have a sister, smiled at how smart she was and all the wonders of life she had ahead of her. It made him happy that she was eager to be around him, but being around him made him worry for her safety, too. There really wasn’t any place safe, though, unless the forces of the Order that had been unleashed could be defeated, or at least bottled back up.

A heavy gust tore through their camp, raising even thicker clouds of dirt. Richard blinked, trying to keep the blowing sand out of his eyes. The sound of the wind in his ears was aggravating because it masked other sounds. Though he listened carefully, he could hear only the wind.

Squinting against the blowing grit, he saw that Tom was sitting atop his wagon, looking this way and that, keeping watch. Friedrich was asleep on the other side of the horses, Cara not far away on the desert side of Kahlan, putting herself between them and anything that might be out beyond. In the dim starlight Tom hadn’t spotted Richard. When Tom scanned the night in the opposite direction, Richard moved away from camp, leaving Tom to watch over the others.

Richard was comfortable in the cloak of darkness. Years of practice had taught him to slip unseen through shadows, to move silently in the darkness.

He did that now, moving away from camp as he focused on what had awakened him, on what others standing watch would not sense.