Naked Empire (Sword of Truth 8)

With soldiers of the Imperial Order occupying Bandakar, getting in to recover the antidote from one place sounded difficult enough, but retrieving it from all three places sounded beyond difficult.

“Well, since time is short, I have a better idea,” Richard said. “Make me more of the antidote. Then we won’t have to worry about getting what you’ve hidden and we can simply worry about how best to take on the men of the Order.”

Owen shrugged one shoulder. “We can’t.”

“Why not?” Richard leaned in. “You made it before—you made the antidote that you hid. Make it again.”

Owen shrank back. “We can’t.”

Richard took a patient breath. “Why not?”

Owen pointed off at the small bag he’d brought, now lying to the side—the bag containing the fingers of three girls. “The father of those girls was the man who made the poison and made the antidote. He is the only one among us who knew how to make such complex things with herbs. We don’t know how—we don’t even know many of the ingredients he used.

“There may be others in the cities who could make an antidote, but we don’t know who they are, or if they are still alive. With men of the Order in those places we wouldn’t even be able to find these people. Even if we could, we don’t know what was used to make up the poison, so they would not know how to make an antidote. The only chance you have to live is to recover the three vials of antidote.”

Richard’s head was hurting so much that he didn’t know if he could stand much longer. With only three vials in existence, and all three needed if he was to live, he had to get to them before anything happened to any one of them. Someone could find one and throw it out. They could be moved. They could be broken, the antidote draining away into the ground. With every breath, he felt stitches of pain pull inside his chest. Panic gnawed at the edges of his thoughts.

When Kahlan rested her hand on his shoulder, Richard laid a grateful hand over hers.

“We will help you get the antidote, Lord Rahl,” one of the men said.

Another nodded. “That’s right. We will help you get it.”

The men all spoke up, then, saying that they would all help to get the antidote so that Richard could rid himself of the poison.

“Most of us have been to at least two of these places,” Owen said. “Some of us have been to all three. I hid the antidote, but I told the others the places, so we all know where it is. We know where we have to get in to recover it. We will tell you, too.”

“Then that’s what we’ll do.” Richard squatted down as he studied the stone map. “Where is Nicholas?”

Owen leaned in and tapped the pebble in the center. “Here, in Hawton, is this man Nicholas.”

Richard looked up at Owen. “Don’t tell me. You hid the antidote in the building where you saw Nicholas.”

Owen shrugged self-consciously. “At the time, it seemed like a good idea. Now, I wish I had thought better of it.”

Standing behind Richard, Cara rolled her eyes in disgust. “I’m surprised you didn’t hand it to Nicholas and ask him to hold on to it for you.”

Appearing eager to change the subject, Owen pointed at the pebble representing Northwick. “In this city is where the Wise One is hiding. Maybe we can get help from the great speakers. Maybe the Wise One will give us his blessing and then people will help us in our effort to rid our land of the Imperial Order.”

After all he’d learned about the people who lived beyond the boundary in Bandakar, Richard didn’t think he could count on any meaningful help from them; they wanted to be free of marauding brutes, but condemned their only real means to be free. These men had at least proven a degree of resolve. These men would have to work to change other people’s attitudes, but Richard had his doubts that they would garner much immediate help.

“In order to accomplish what you men rightfully want—to eradicate the Order, or at least make them leave your homes—you are going to have to help. Kahlan, Cara, Jennsen, Tom, and I aren’t going to be able to do it alone. If it’s to work, you men must help us.”

“What is it you wish us to do?” Owen asked. “We already said we will take you to these places where the antidote is hidden. What more can we do?”

“You are going to have to help us kill the men of the Order.”

Instantly, heated protests erupted. All of the men talked at once, shaking his head, warding the notion with his hands. Although Richard couldn’t make out all their words, their feelings about what he said were obvious enough. What words he did hear were all objections that they couldn’t kill.

Richard rose up. “You know what these men have done,” he said in a powerful voice that brought them to silence. “You ran away so you wouldn’t also be killed. You know how your people are being treated. You know what’s being done to your loved ones in captivity.”

“But we can’t harm another,” Owen whined. “We can’t.”

“It’s not our way,” another man added.

“You banished criminals through the boundary,” Richard said. “How did you make them go through if they refused?”

“If we had to,” one of the older men said, “a number of us would hold him, so that he could harm no one. We would tie his hands and bear him to the boundary. We would tell such a banished man that he must go out of our land. If he still refused, we would carry him to a long steep place in the rock where we would lay him down and push him feet first so that he would slide down the rock and go beyond. Once we did this, they weren’t able to return.”

Richard wondered at the lengths these people went to not to harm the worst animals among them. He wondered how many had to suffer or die at the hands of such criminals before the people of Bandakar were sufficiently motivated to take what were to them extreme measures.

“We understand much of what you have told us,” Owen said, “but we cannot do what you ask. We would be doing wrong. We have been raised not to harm another.”

Richard snatched up the bag with the girls’ fingers and shook it at the men. “Every one of your loved ones back there is thinking of nothing but being saved. Can any of you even imagine their terror? I know what it’s like to be tortured, to feel helpless and alone, to feel like you will never escape. In such a situation you want nothing more than for it to stop. You would do anything for it to stop.”

“That’s why we needed you,” an older man said. “You must do this. You must rid us of the Order.”

“I told you, I can’t do it alone.?

? With an arm wrapped in a bloody bandage, Richard gestured emphatically. “Surrendering your will to men of the Order who would do such things as this solves nothing. It simply adds more victims. The men of the Order are evil; you must fight back.”

“But if only you would talk to those men like you talked to us, they would see their misguided ways. They would change, then.”

“No, they won’t. Life doesn’t matter to them. They’ve made their choice to torture, rape, and kill. Our only chance to survive, our only chance to have a future is to destroy them.”

“We can’t harm another person,” one of the men said.

“It’s wrong to harm another,” Owen agreed.

“It’s always immoral to hurt, much less kill, another person,” a middle-aged man said to the mumbled agreement of his fellows. “Those who do wrong are obviously in pain and need our understanding, not our hate. Hate will only invite hate. Violence will only begin a cycle of violence that never solves anything.”

Richard felt as if the ground he had gained with these men was slipping away from him. He was about to run his fingers back through his hair when he saw that they were covered in blood. He dropped his arm and shifted his approach.

“You poisoned me to get me to kill these men. By that act, you’ve already proven that you accept the reality that it’s sometimes necessary to kill in order to save innocent lives—that’s why you wanted me. You can’t hold a belief that it’s wrong to harm another and at the same time coerce me to do it for you. That’s simply killing by proxy.”

“We need our freedom,” one of them said. “We thought that maybe because of your command as a ruler you could convince these men, for fear of you, to leave us be.”

“That’s why you have to help me. You just said it—for fear of me. You must help me in this so that the threat, the fear, is credible. If they don’t believe the threat is real then why would they leave your land?”

One of the others folded his arms. “We thought you might rid us of the Order without violence, without killing, but it is up to you to do such killing if that is your way. We cannot kill. From our very beginning, our ancestors have taught us that killing is wrong. You must do this.”