Nicci gestured. “Both of you, lie back.”
Richard lay back; Cara hesitantly complied. Nicci leaned over them, placing a hand just above their heads. Richard felt the warm tingle of magic, but not an uncomfortable sensation like the last time. He could see the soft glow above Cara as well. It struck him how remarkable it was for Nicci to trust Cara enough to use magic on her. Using magic on a Mord-Sith gave them the opportunity to seize that magic in order to control the gifted person. Richard found it even more remarkable that Cara would trust Nicci enough to allow her to use magic on her. Mord-Sith did not like magic one bit.
Nicci’s hands moved slowly downward, just above their bodies. By the time she reached Richard’s boots, he realized that he felt dry. He ran a hand over his shirt, then his pants, and found that both were dry.
“How is that?” Nicci asked.
Cara was scowling. “I’d rather be wet.”
Nicci arched an eyebrow. “I can arrange that, if you like.”
Cara put her hands under her arms to warm them and remained silent. Satisfied that Richard was pleased, Nicci did the same for herself, moving both hands down her dress as if slowly pressing away the water.
When she finished, she was shivering and her teeth were chattering, but she and her black dress were dry.
Concerned by the way she wavered that she might pass out, Richard sat up and gently gripped her arm. “Are you all right?”
“I’m just exhausted,” she admitted. “I’ve not had much sleep for days, on top of the effort of healing you and then the exertion of the traveling we did after the attack today. I’m afraid that it’s all caught up with me. This bit of magic took what strength and warmth I had left. I just need to get some sleep, that’s all. But even if you don’t realize it, Richard, you need it even more. Lie back and sleep, now. Please. If we all lie close we can keep each other warm.”
Dry, but weary and still cold, Richard wriggled into his bedroll. She was right; he did need rest. He couldn’t get help for Kahlan if he wasn’t rested.
Without hesitation, Cara pressed up close on his left to help get him warm. Nicci pushed in on his other side. The warmth was a relief. He hadn’t realized how cold he was until the three of them crowded in tight together. He knew by how he felt that Nicci was right, that he wasn’t fully well yet. At least he only needed rest and not magic.
“Do you think this beast could have taken Kahlan in order to get to me? he asked into the dark and quiet shelter.
Nicci was a moment in answering. “Such a creature needs no perverse method to get to you, Richard. From what the Sister said, and from what I fear I may have done, to say nothing of you having used your gift, the beast will be able to find you. From all those dead men back there, I fear it already has.”
Richard felt the weight of guilt crush down upon him. If not for him, those men would be alive.
He had difficulty swallowing past the lump in his throat. He wished there were some way to undo what was done, some way to give them their lives and their futures back.
“Lord Rahl?” Cara whispered. “I would like to make a confession, if you will swear never to repeat it.”
Richard had never heard her say such an odd thing. “All right. What is it that you wish to confess?”
Her answer was a while in coming, and then it was so soft he would not have been able to hear it were she not so close. “I’m afraid.”
Almost against his better judgment, Richard lifted his arm around her shoulders and held her close. “Don’t be. It’s coming after me, not you.”
She lifted her head and scowled at him. “That is the reason I’m afraid. After seeing what it did to those men, I’m afraid that it’s coming for you and there is nothing I can do to protect you.”
“Oh,” Richard said. “Well, if it makes you feel any better, I’m afraid of that, too.”
Cara laid her head back down on his shoulder, content to stay under the protective comfort of his arm. The surrounding strum of the cicadas somehow made him feel more vulnerable. The seventeen-year cycle of the insects was inescapable, inexorable, unstoppable.
So was Jagang’s beast. How could he hide from such a thing?
“So,” Nicci asked, apparently trying to lighten the somber mood in the shelter, “where did you meet this woman of your dreams?”
Richard didn’t know if she was trying to soften the question with a little humor, or if she was being sarcastic. If he didn’t know better he would have thought it sounded like jealously.
He stared up in the darkness as he thought back to that day. “I was out in the woods, looking for evidence of who had killed my father—the man I grew up thinking was my father, George Cypher, the man who’d raised me. That was when I spotted Kahlan moving along a trail around Trunt Lake.
“Four men were following her. They were assassins sent by Darken Rahl to kill her. He had already killed all the other Confessors. She is the last.”
“So you rescued her?” Cara asked.
“I helped her. Together we were able to kill the assassins.
“She’d come to Westland looking for a long-lost wizard. It turned out that Zedd was the great wizard she had been sent to find—he still held the position of First Wizard, even though he had given up the Midlands and fled to Westland before I was born. The whole time I grew up I never knew that Zedd was a wizard, or my grandfather. I only knew him as my best friend in the world.”
He could sense Nicci looking at him, and feel her warm, soft breath against the side of his face. “Why did she want this great wizard?”
“Darken Rahl had put the boxes of Orden in play. It was everyone’s worst nightmare.” Richard clearly recalled his dread at hearing that news. “He had to be stopped before he opened the correct box. Kahlan had been sent to ask this long-vanished First Wizard to appoint a Seeker. After that first day when I saw her by Trunt Lake, my life was never again the same.”
Into the silence, Cara asked, “So, was it love at first sight?”
They were humoring him, trying to take his thoughts off the men who had been slaughtered by a beast sent by Jagang to kill him, trying to take his mind off the monster now coming for him.
The thought struck him that maybe somewhere back in the woods around where they had camped, somewhere in an undiscovered place where he hadn’t looked, lay Kahlan’s torn remains.
Such a thought was so painful to contemplate that it felt like it was crushing his heart.
Richard didn’t reach up and wipe away the tear that ran down his cheek. But with a gentle touch, Nicci did. Her hand briefly, tenderly, caressed his cheek.
“I think we’d better try to get some sleep,” he said.
Nicci drew back her hand and laid her head against his arm.
In the darkness, Richard couldn’t seem to make his burning eyes close. Before long he could hear Cara’s even breathing as she surrendered to sleep. Nicci softly pressed her cheek against his shoulder as she snugged up close in their shared warmth.
“Nicci?” he whispered.
“Yes?”
“What kind of torture does Jagang use on captives?”
He could feel Nicci take a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Richard, I’m not going to answer that question. I’m sure you have to know that Jagang is a man who needs killing.”
Richard had had to ask the question. He was relieved that Nicci was kind enough not to answer it.
“When Zedd first gave me the sword, I told him that I would not be an assassin. I have since come to understand the principled value of preserving life through the task of killing evil men. I wish that driving the Imperial Order out of the New World was as simple as killing Jagang.”
“I can’t tell you how many times I wished I had killed him when I had the chance, even though you are right about it not ending the war. I wish I could stop thinking about all the opportunities I missed. I wish I could stop thinking about all the things I should have done.”
Richard reached around her and held her trembling shoulders.
He felt her muscles slowly relax. Her breathing finally slowed as she slipped into sleep.
If he was to find Kahlan, Richard had to get the rest he needed. He closed his eyes as another tear leaked out. He missed her so much.
His thoughts lingered on that first day he saw Kahlan in the white, satiny smooth dress that he only much later found out distinguished her as the Mother Confessor. He remembered the way it hugged her shape, the way it made her look so noble. He remembered the way her long hair cascaded down around her shoulders, framing her in the dappled forest light. He remembered looking into her beautiful green eyes and seeing the gleam of intelligence looking back at him. He remembered feeling, from that first instant, from that first shared gaze, as if he had always known her.