Chainfire (Sword of Truth 9)

Jaws of men standing all around dropped in stunned astonishment. General Trimack’s eyes went wide. “Stolen…but, who could have stolen them?”

Richard held up the statue and waggled it in front of the man. “My wife.”

General Trimack looked like he didn’t know whether to scream in fury or commit suicide on the spot. He instead rubbed a hand back and forth on his mouth as he thought through everything he’d heard and apparently tried to put it together with any other information he had. He looked up at Richard with the kind of intent look that few men other than generals could muster.

“I get reports all the time, Lord Rahl. I insist that I see all reports—you never can tell what bit of information you might learn that could turn out to be helpful. General Meiffert sends me reports as well. Since he’s now close by, I get them within hours. Soon he and the troops will be moving south and it will take longer, but for now, I get them fresh.”

“I’m listening.”

“Well, I don’t know if it means anything, but the latest report I got early this morning said that they came across a woman, an old woman, who had been stabbed by a sword. She’s in bad shape, according to the report. I don’t know why he sent me a report on such a thing, but General Meiffert is a pretty smart fellow, and I have to think that there was just something bloody odd about it for him to want me to know.”

“How close is he?” Richard asked. “The army, I mean. How close?”

The general shrugged. “By horse? Ride half way hard and they’re not more than an hour or two away.”

“Then get me some horses. Immediately.”

General Trimack clapped a fist over his heart at the same time as he signaled a couple men forward. “Run on ahead and get some horses ready for the Lord Rahl.” He looked at Richard, then glanced at Cara and Nicci. “Three horses?”

“Yes, three,” Richard confirmed.

“And an escort of the First File to show him the way and provide protection.”

The two men nodded and took off at a dead run for the stairs.

“Lord Rahl, I don’t know what to say. I will of course resign—”

“Don’t be silly. This isn’t something you could have done anything about; it was deception by magic. It’s my fault for letting this happen. I’m the Lord Rahl. I’m supposed to be the magic against magic.”

Nicci could only think that he had been trying to be, but no one would believe him.

Without sparing any time to rest, Richard, Cara, and Nicci, escorted by a company of the palace guards, rushed through the grand, wide corridors of Richard’s ancestral home. People along their route scattered out of the way of the wedge of guards coming down the halls. Behind the guards, Cara marched out in front of Richard. Nicci rushed along at his side.

As they made their way down a smaller corridor, with fewer people, Richard slowed and then stopped. The guards stopped far enough away to be handy, but to give him his privacy. As everyone waited, Richard gazed down a side passageway. Cara looked uncomfortable.

“Quarters for Mord-Sith,” Cara explained to Nicci in answer to the unspoken question in her eyes.

“Denna’s room was down that hall.” Richard gestured the other way. “Your room was down there, Cara.”

Cara blinked. “How do you know that?”

He looked at her for a moment, his expression unreadable. “Cara, I remember being there.”

Cara turned as red as her leather outfit. “You remember?” Richard nodded. “You know?” she whispered, panic coming into her eyes.

“Cara,” he said gently, “of course I know.”

Her eyes brimmed with tears. “How did you know?”

He gestured to her right wrist. “When I’ve touched your Agiel, it hurts. An Agiel only hurts when a person touches it if it was used to train them, or if the Mord-Sith intends it to hurt.”

She closed her eyes. “Lord Rahl…I’m sorry.”

“It was a long time ago, when you were a different person, and I was the enemy of your Lord Rahl. Things change, Cara.”

“Are you sure I’ve changed enough?”

“Others made you into who you were. You made yourself into what you have become.” He smiled. “Remember when the beast hurt you, and I healed you?”

“How could I ever forget it?”

“Then you know how I feel.”

She smiled at that.

Richard’s brow drew together. “Touch…” His eyes lit up with sudden recognition.

“The sword.”

“What?” Nicci asked.

“The Sword of Truth. That morning, when I was asleep, I think the Sisters cast a spell to make me sleep more soundly so they could take Kahlan. But I put my hand on the sword. I was touching the Sword of Truth when they took her and made everyone forget Kahlan. The sword protected me from that magic. That’s why I remember her. The Sword of Truth was a countermeasure to what they did.”

Richard started out again. “Come on, we need to get to the encampment and see who that injured woman is.”

Baffled, Nicci followed after him.

Chapter 64

Nicci was surprised by the encampment. She was so used to being among Jagang’s army that she hadn’t really given any thought to how different these men might be. It made sense, of course, but she had just never given it any thought.

Even in the dark, there was still the light of all the fires and she expected to be the center of morbid attention, with men calling out the filthiest things they could think of in an attempt to shock her, or humiliate her, or frighten her. Men in the Order encampment always hooted and hollered at her, made obscene gestures, and laughed uproariously as she passed among them.

These men, to be sure, looked her way. Nicci expected that it was a rare experience to see a woman like her riding into their camp. But they only looked. A glance, an admiring gaze, a smile here and there with a bow of the head in greeting was the most she got. It could be that she was riding in beside the Lord Rahl and a Mord-Sith in red leather, but Nicci didn’t think so. These men were different. They were expected to conduct themselves with respect.

Everywhere when men saw Richard, they were eager to clap a fist to their hearts in salute as they stood in pride, or trotted alone beside his horse for a time. They looke

d overjoyed to see him riding into their camp, to see their Lord Rahl among them again.

The camp was also more orderly as well. That it was dry was a help; there were few things worse than an army camp in the wet. In this camp the animals were confined to areas where they wouldn’t accidentally create trouble. Wagons were out of the main route through the camp. There actually were deliberate routes through the camp.

The men looked weary from the long march, but their tents were set up in a rather systematic manner, not the haphazard, every-man-for-himself method the Imperial Order employed. The fires were small and were only what was needed, not the drunken revelry of men dancing, singing, and brawling around the bonfires.

The other big difference was that there were not any torture tents set up. The Order always had an active area set aside for torture. A steady stream of people flowed in for questioning, and an equal number of corpses flowed out. The constant screams from victims made for a noisy camp.

That was the other thing. It was rather quiet. Men were finishing with meals and bedding down for the night. It was a quiet time. In the Order’s encampment, there wasn’t any time that was quiet.

“There,” one of the men escorting them said as he lifted an arm to point out the command tents in the darkness.

A big blond-headed officer came out of one of the tents when he heard horses nearby. He had undoubtedly already been alerted that the Lord Rahl was on his way.

Richard swung down off the saddle and stopped the man from going to his knees to do a devotion.

“General Meiffert, it’s good to see you again, but we don’t have time for that.”

He bowed his head. “As you wish, Lord Rahl.”

Nicci watched the general’s blue eyes glance to Cara as she came up beside Richard.

He smoothed back his blond hair. “Mistress Cara.”

“General.”

“Life is too short for you two to pretend you don’t care for each other,” Richard said, his anger surfacing. “You ought to realize that every moment you have together is precious and there is nothing wrong with holding someone in high regard. That’s the kind of freedom we’re fighting for. Well, isn’t it?”