Owen nodded. “That first night, when I told you all of my great need, I had just given him the poison.” His gaze returned to Richard. “You had just drunk it, within hours. Had you agreed to give my people the freedom they need, I would have given you the antidote then, and you would be free of the poison. It would have cured you.
“But you refused to come with me, to help those who cannot help themselves, as is your duty to those in need. You sent me away. So, I did not offer you the antidote. In the time since, the poison has worked its way through your body. Had you not been selfish, you would have been cured back then.
“Instead, the poison is now established in you, doing its work. Since it was so long since you drank the poison, the antidote I had with me was no longer enough to cure you, only to make you better for a while.”
“And what will cure me?” Richard asked.
“You will have to have more of the antidote to rid you of the rest of the poison.”
“And I don’t suppose you have any more.”
Owen shook his head. “You must give my people freedom. Only then, will you be able to get more of the antidote.”
Richard wanted to shake the answers out of the man. Instead, he took a breath, trying to stay calm so that he could understand the truth of what Owen had done and then think of the solution.
“Why only then?” he asked.
“Because,” Owen said, “the antidote is in the place taken by the Imperial Order. You must rid us of the invaders if you are to be able to get to the antidote. If you want to live, you must give us our freedom. If you don’t, you will die.”
Chapter 23
Kahlan reached in to seize Owen by the throat. She wanted to strangle him, to choke him, to make him feel the desperate, panicked need of breath that Richard had endured, to make him suffer, to show him what it was like. Cara went for Owen as well, apparently having the same thought as Kahlan. Richard thrust his arm out, holding them both back.
Holding Owen’s shirt in his other fist, Richard shook the man. “And how long do I have until I get sick again? How long do I have to live before your poison kills me?”
Owen’s confused gaze flitted from one angry face to another. “But if you do as I ask, as is your duty, you will be fine. I promise. You saw that I brought you the antidote. I don’t wish to harm you. That is not my intent—I swear.”
Kahlan could only think of Richard in crushing pain, unable to breathe. It had been terrifying. She couldn’t think of anything else but him going through it again, only this time never to wake.
“How long?” Richard repeated.
“But if you only—”
“How long!”
Owen licked his lips. “Not a month. Close to it, but not a month, I believe.”
Kahlan tried to push Richard away. “Let me have him. I’ll find out—”
“No.” Cara pulled Kahlan back. “Mother Confessor,” she whispered, “let Lord Rahl do as he must. You don’t know what your touch would do to one such as he.”
“It might do nothing,” Kahlan insisted, “but it might still work, and then we can find out everything.”
Cara restrained her with an arm around her waist that Kahlan could not pry off. “And if only the Subtractive side works and it kills him?”
Kahlan stopped struggling as she frowned at Cara. “And since when have you taken up the study of magic?”
“Since it might harm Lord Rahl.” Cara pulled Kahlan back farther away from Richard. “I have a mind, too, you know. I can think things through. Are you using your head? Where is this city? Where is the antidote within the city? What will you do if using your power kills this man and you are the one who condemns Lord Rahl to death when you could have had the information we need had you not touched him.
“If you want, I will break his arms. I will make him bleed. I will make him scream in agony. But I will not kill him; I will keep him alive so that he can give us the information we need to rid Lord Rahl of this death sentence.
“Ask yourself, do you really want to do this because you believe it will gain you the answers we need, or because you want to lash out, to strike out at him? Lord Rahl’s life may hang on you being truthful with yourself.”
Kahlan panted from the effort of the struggle, but more from her rage. She wanted to lash out, to strike back, just as Cara said—to do whatever she could to save Richard and to punish his attacker.
“I’ve had it with this game,” Kahlan said. “I want to hear the story—the whole story.”
“So do I,” Richard said. He lifted the man by his shirt and slammed him down atop the crate. “All right, Owen, no more excuses for why you did this or that. Start at the beginning and tell us what happened, and what you and your people did about it.”
Owen sat trembling like a leaf. Jennsen urged Richard back.
“You’re frightening him,” she whispered to Richard. “Give him some room or he will never be able to get it out.”
Richard took a purging breath as he acknowledged Jennsen’s words with a hand on her shoulder. He walked off a few paces, standing with his hands clasped behind his back as he stared off in the direction of the sunrise, toward the mountains Kahlan had so often seen him studying. It had been on the other side of the range of the smaller, closer mountains, tight in the shadows of those massive peaks thrusting up through the iron gray clouds, where they had found the warning beacon and first
encountered the black-tipped races.
The clouds that capped the sky all the way to the wall of those distant peaks hung heavy and dark. For the first time since Kahlan could remember, it looked like a storm might be upon them. The expectant smell of rain quickened the air.
“Where are you from?” Richard asked in a calm voice.
Owen cleared his throat as he straightened his shirt and light coat, as if rearranging his dignity. He remained seated atop the crate.
“I lived in a place of enlightenment, in a civilization of advanced culture…a great empire.”
“Where is this noble empire?” Richard asked, still staring off into the distance.
Owen stretched his neck up, looking east. He pointed at the far wall of towering peaks where Richard was looking.
“There. Do you see that notch in the high mountains? I lived past there, in the empire beyond those mountains.”
Kahlan remembered asking Richard if he thought they could make it over those mountains. Richard had been doubtful about it.
He looked back over his shoulder. “What’s the name of this empire?”
“Bandakar,” Owen said in a reverent murmur. He smoothed his blond hair to the side, as if to make himself a respectable representative of his homeland. “I was a citizen of Bandakar, of the Bandakaran Empire.”
Richard had turned and was staring at Owen in a most peculiar manner. “Bandakar. Do you know what that name, Bandakar, means?”
Owen nodded. “Yes. Bandakar is an ancient word from a time long forgotten. It means ‘the chosen’—as in, the chosen empire.”
Richard seemed to have lost a little of his color. When his eyes met Kahlan’s, she could see that he knew very well what the word meant, and Owen had it wrong.
Richard seemed to suddenly remember himself. He rubbed his brow in thought. “Do you—do any of your people—know the language that this ancient word, bandakar, is from?”
Owen gestured dismissively. “We don’t know of the language; it’s long forgotten. Only the meaning of this word has been passed down, because it is so important to our people to hold on to the heritage of its meaning: chosen empire. We are the chosen people.”