Severed Souls (Sword of Truth 14)

Irena looked surprised. “Richard, I don’t know the land well enough. I set out from Stroyza by trail and then road when I went to Saavedra that one time. Other than that, I rarely left Stroyza. Since you rescued us from beyond the north wall, we’ve been running all over Creation. I don’t really know for sure exactly where we are, now, at least not well enough to lead us to Saavedra.”

“It’s a big enough city that there will be roads going there,” Richard said. “We know the general direction, so sooner or later we will run into a road that leads to Saavedra.”

“I’ll ask Ned as well,” the commander offered. “I imagine he has a pretty good idea of the direction and how to get there.”

Richard nodded. “I also want double watches tonight.”

Commander Fister clapped a fist to his heart. “Already done, Lord Rahl.”

“And commander,” Richard said, making the man turn back, “I want everyone to stay alert. There is a creature out there in the woods that has been watching us.”

Commander Fister frowned as he scanned the woods briefly. “A creature? What sort of creature?”

Richard gestured in the direction he had last seen the thing, in the woods behind Kahlan.

“It’s back that way. Some kind of mountain cat. Dark spots on its back. It’s been watching us, but I don’t think it means us any harm or it would have already caused it. Just be aware.”

“What color are its eyes?” Kahlan asked.

Richard thought it an odd question. “Green.”

“Leave him be,” she said. “He won’t hurt us. He’s just curious.”

Richard arched an eyebrow at Kahlan. “He?”

“His name is Hunter.” Kahlan smiled at him as she dismissed it with a coy shrug. “Just a little friend I met while you were off visiting the underworld.”

“Hunter. You named him.” It was not a question, but a reminder of what he had told her once before.

She shrugged again. “He brought me three rabbits. Seemed a pretty obvious name.”

“That’s where you got the rabbits for the stew?” the commander asked in astonishment. “I had been wondering.…”

“He slept with me last night,” Kahlan told Richard. “I was upset and afraid for you. The little thing kept me warm and kept me company.”

“You named him,” Richard said again in admonishment.

Kahlan smiled at him. Her own green eyes sparkled.

“He needed a name.”

“Of course he did,” Richard said as he shook his head.

CHAPTER

46

“What are you doing up?” Zedd asked as Richard stepped closer in the darkness.

The flickering light from the low fire in the distance made Zedd’s wavy white hair look a little like it was made of flames.

“I was asleep all day,” Richard reminded him. “I’m not really tired. I want to check on the men standing watch.”

“Ah,” Zedd said with a nod.

“What are you doing up?” Richard asked his grandfather.

Zedd stroked a finger along his lower lip. “I confess that I saw you go by, and I wanted to talk to you. Alone.”

“Ah,” Richard said with a nod. “Maybe something about the bringer of death?”

Zedd smiled in a way Richard knew well. Ever since he had been a boy, when Richard caught on before his grandfather had finished explaining, Zedd would give him that particular smile.

“Well, yes, that was one of the things I wanted to talk to you about. Would you like to tell me about it, or am I going to have to drag it out of you one question at a time?”

Richard held up a hand in surrender. “No, I’ve been wanting to tell you what I’ve learned in the hopes that maybe you could shed some light on it.”

“So what was written in the language of Creation on those walls you found in Stroyza?”

“I found an account written by Naja Moon. She was a sorceress who worked with Magda Searus and Merritt.”

Zedd arched an eyebrow in wonder. “Remarkable. I’ve never read anything from anyone so close to them.”

“It was remarkable to read her account of that time,” Richard said. “She explained how Emperor Sulachan had conjured weapons out of people during the great war, and in the process learned how to animate the dead—in part by drawing their souls back out from the world of the dead.”

Zedd shook his head with a troubled look. “Crossing the boundaries between the worlds of life and death in such a way requires powers I can’t begin to fathom. Had I not seen the dead reanimated with my own eyes I would not believe it true.”

“Naja said that when the half people were originally created, he instilled occult ability in some to enable them to revive the dead, the same as Sulachan and his wizards were able to do. In the process of creating them, the spirits of those original half people were discarded and left to wander forever between worlds.”

Zedd lifted a finger with a sudden thought. “Those people that you said snuck up on you when you were on watch, and then vanished. Do you think…”

Richard was nodding. “I think they very well might have been some of those lost souls who wandered back into this world, looking for where they belong.”

Zedd shook his head. “The poor souls.”

“Indeed. Naja mentioned that some of them show up in this plane of existence and cause trouble. Sometimes they even harm people here.”

“Much like the half people.”

Richard nodded. “The half people want a soul and think that they can get one by devouring the living to get one, and the lost souls want to be able to find the place they belong. Sulachan doomed both to never being at peace.”

The wrinkles in Zedd’s

face deepened with a troubled frown. He idly rubbed a hand back and forth across his mouth as he considered it. His hazel eyes finally turned to Richard.

“And what does the bringer of death have to do with all that?”

Richard rested the palm of his left hand on the hilt of his sword. “According to Naja, despite everything they tried in order to stop Sulachan’s creations, in the end all they could do to keep from being annihilated was to build the barrier to lock that evil away.”

Richard smiled. “I guess they did much the same as you did long ago when you created the boundaries to lock D’Hara and the House of Rahl away so that the Midlands and Westland could live in peace.”

Zedd nodded in thought. “Yes, except that, by comparison, I built a little fence out of sticks while those people back in the great war built a fortress wall out of stone. Mine lasted decades, while theirs lasted thousands of years.”

Richard nodded. “But both were still fated to eventually fail. Naja knew that the barrier, much like the boundaries you put up, wouldn’t last forever and then the people of the New World would once again have to face the evil they had locked away. She said that they could do no more than leave people to stand watch.”

“I know the feeling,” Zedd said, deep in thought. “That’s all I had been able to do—lock evil away for a time. Sometimes, you can’t eliminate evil; you can only keep it contained.”

“Naja also explained, much the same as that Shun-tuk prisoner told us, that Sulachan’s plan is to dissolve the boundary between life and death in order to rule a united world where life and death exist together. It wouldn’t be the world of life anymore, or the world of death, but a third kingdom.”

Zedd looked up from his thoughts. “That’s crazy.”

“Yes, but because of the forces he is using—occult powers that can not only bend but break the elements of the Grace—the mere attempt, no matter how crazy, could very well destroy the world of life.”

Zedd peered at Richard. “Do you think him more powerful than the Keeper of the underworld? That’s like saying that one man is more powerful than all of Creation and he can take over and dictate everything in life, from how fast grass grows to how high birds can fly to how people must serve him. Thinking he can rule life and death is the very definition of delusional.”