Chainfire (Sword of Truth 9)

“Well, I was only successful because I used Subtractive Magic.”

No one said anything. They all just stared at her.

“Wait a minute,” Nicci said, looking from one person to the next, “are you suggesting that I again somehow use Subtractive Magic on Richard?”

“That’s exactly what we’re suggesting,” Zedd told her.

Ann flicked a hand out toward Zedd and Nathan. “If one of us could do it, we would, but we can’t. We need you to do it.”

Nicci folded her arms. “Do what, exactly? I don’t understand what it is you expect me to do.”

Ann laid the hand on Nicci’s arm. “Nicci, listen to us. We don’t know what is causing Richard’s malady. We have no way of trying to cure something when we don’t know what it is. Even if we knew for sure that it was a glamour spell that had tainted that arrow, short the one who cast such a web, or absent the arrow, none of the three of us could eliminate the spell.

“But we can’t be certain it was such a spell, or an entirely different kind of spell, or if it’s simply delirium brought on by the injury. We don’t know the cause. We may never know.

“What must be done, now,” she said in a serious manner that no longer tried to be anything but straightforward and honest, “is is to eliminate the obsession—whatever its origin. It doesn’t matter if it was brought about by a spell, a dream, or by some sudden onset of insanity. The memory of this woman, Kahlan, is a false memory that is distorting his thinking and therefore must be eliminated from his mind.”

Nicci was stupefied by what she was hearing. She looked from the former prelate to Zedd. “Are you seriously suggesting that I use Subtractive Magic on your grandson’s mind? You want me to eliminate a part of his consciousness? A part of who he is?”

“No, not part of who he is—never. I would never want that.” Zedd licked his thin lips. His voice came out sounding helpless and despairing. “I want you to heal him. I want Richard back, the Richard I know, the Richard we all know—the real Richard, not the Richard with these foreign notions taking over his mind and destroying him.”

Nicci shook her head. “I can’t do that to the man I—” She closed her mouth before she finished the sentence.

“I would have back the Richard I love,” Zedd said in soft supplication. “The Richard we all love.”

Nicci backed away a step, shaking her head, unable to think of what to say to such desperation. There had to be another way to bring Richard to his senses.

“Show her,” Nathan said to Ann, his voice suddenly sounding very much like the towering prophet he was, the Rahl he was.

Ann nodded in resignation and pulled something from her pocket. She held it out to Nicci. “Read this.”

When Ann dropped it into Nicci’s hand, she saw that it was a journey book. She looked up at Nathan, Ann, and finally Zedd.

“Go on,” the prophet said. “Read the message Ann received from Verna.”

Journey books were incredibly rare. In fact, Nicci had thought they had all been destroyed at the Palace of the Prophets. She knew that what was written in one of the matched pair of twinned books would appear in the other. The stylus kept in the spine that was used to write in the book was also used to wipe away old messages. In that way the journey books never wore out or became obsolete. Nicci opened the invaluable product of ancient magic and turned to the writing.

Ann, it began in a clear hand, I fear to report that things are not going well with our forces. Where is Richard? Have you found him yet? I apologize for pressing you yet again for I know you are traveling with all due haste, but the problems with the army grow more serious every day. Men have deserted—not a great many, mind you—but we are in D’Hara now, and the whispers are growing that Lord Rahl will not lead them in a battle that they all believe will be suicide. Richard’s continuing absence only confirms this fear for them. Day by day they grow to feel they have been abandoned by their Lord Rahl. None of the men believe that they have a chance against the enemy if Richard is not with his own troops to lead them.

General Meiffert and I grow more desperate by the day as to what to tell disheartened men. Even if there was a good reason, it is still difficult enough for men knowing they face death not to have word from the first leader in their lives whom they truly believed in.

Please, Ann, as soon as you reach Richard, tell him how much all these brave young men, who have borne the brunt of defending our cause for so long and have suffered so much, need him. Please find out how soon he will join us. Ask him to please hurry.

Urgently awaiting word,

Yours in the Light,

Verna.

The book lowered in Nicci’s hands. Tears stung her eyes.

Ann lifted the journey book from Nicci’s trembling fingers. “What would you have me tell Verna? What would you have her say to the troops?” Ann asked in a quiet, even gentle, tone.

Nicci blinked at the tears. “You want me to take away his mind? You want me to betray him?”

“No, not at all,” Zedd assured her, gripping her shoulder in his powerful fingers. “We want you to help him…to heal him.”

“We fear to even approach Richard in his present condition,” Ann said. “We fear he may suspect something. I’m afraid I’m partly responsible for that because of my harsh reaction to his delusions. The Creator forgive me, but I have spent my life ruling people’s lives and expecting compliance. Old ways die hard. Now, he thinks I intend to inflexibly force him to follow prophecy. He grows increasingly distrustful of us…but not of you.”

“He would trust you,” Zedd told her. “You could lay a hand on him and he would not suspect anything.”

Nicci stared. “Lay a hand on him…?”

Zedd nodded. “You would have control of him before he ever knew what had happened. He won’t feel a thing. When he wakes up, the memory of Kahlan Amnell will be wiped away and he will be our Richard again.”

Nicci bit her lower lip, unable to trust her voice.

Zedd’s hazel eyes brimmed with tears. “I love my grandson dearly. I would do anything for him. I would do this myself, if I could do as good a job of it as you. I want him to be well. We all need him well.”

He squeezed her shoulder again. “Nicci, if you love him, too, please, do this. Please do what only you can do and heal him one more time.”

Chapter 56

“Master Rahl guide us. Master Rahl teach us. Master Rahl protect us,” Kahlan murmured yet again.

“In your light we thrive. In your mercy we are sheltered. In your wisdom we are humbled. We live only to serve. Our lives are yours.”

Her shoulders ached from kneeling on the floor with her forehead against the tiles, saying the devotion over and over. Despite the aching fatigue, she didn’t really mind it.

“Master Rahl guide us,” Kahlan said as she started in again in harmony with the joined voices that echoed softly through the marble halls.

“Master Rahl teach us. Master Rahl protect us. In your light we thrive. In your mercy we are sheltered. In your wisdom we are humbled. We live only to serve. Our lives are yours.”

In fact, she found it rather pleasant saying the same words over and over. They filled her mind, helping numb the terrible void. The words made her feel not so alone.

So lost.

“Master Rahl guide us. Master Rahl teach us. Master Rahl protect us. In your light we thrive. In your mercy we are sheltered. In your wisdom we are humbled. We live only to serve. Our lives are yours.”

Some of those concepts struck a cord with her and she found them comforting: safe, thriving lives where knowledge and wisdom prevailed. She liked the image of that. Such ideas seemed quite the marvelous dream.

The others with her had been in a hurry, but when they’d seen the soldiers look their way, they had decided that they’d better go with the rest of the people collecting in a square that was open to the overcast sky. Under that cloudy sky lay white sand raked in concentric lines around a dark, pitted rock. On the

top of the rock sat a bell in a stout frame. This was the bell that had rung and called all the people together.

Pillars supported arches on all four sides of the opening in the roof of the square. On the tile floor among the columns, all around Kahlan, people were on their knees, bent forward, with their foreheads touching the tile. In unison, everyone chanted the devotion to the Lord Rahl.

Right near the end of the next repetition, the bell atop the dark, pitted rock rang twice. The voices all around Kahlan trailed off as they all finished together with “Our lives are yours.”

In the sudden quiet, people rose up on their knees, many of them stretching and yawning before getting to their feet. Conversation welled up again as the people began moving off, going back to their business, to whatever they had been doing before the bell had called them to devotion.

When the others with her gestured, Kahlan followed the orders and moved off down the passageway, away from the open square. They passed statues and an intersection before they angled their way over to one side of the broad hall. The other three stopped. Kahlan stood silently as she waited and watched people going past.

The long climb up endless stairs, down miles of corridors, and up random flights of yet more stairs, all after the journey to get there in the first place, had left her dead on her feet. She would have liked to have sat down, but she knew better than to ask. The Sisters didn’t care if she was exhausted. Worse, though, she could tell how tense and edgy they were, especially after the unexpected interruption for the chanting. They would not react sympathetically or kindly to a request to sit down.

With the mood they were in, if Kahlan even asked, she knew they would not have the slightest compunctions about beating her. She didn’t think that they would do it right there, not with all the people around, but they certainly would later. She stood quietly, trying to be invisible and not draw their ire.