The Pillars of Creation (Sword of Truth 7)

She shook her head. “I think it would be best if you stayed with the wagon and horses. If you drive all night, then you’ll need to get some rest to be ready as soon as I come out. It will save us time.”

He nodded as he considered her words. “That makes sense. But I could still—”

“No. I appreciate the ride, the food and water, and the warm blanket, but I won’t let you risk your life in there, too. It would be the most help if you waited with the wagon and were ready to drive back when I come out.”

She watched the wind in his blond hair as he thought it over. “All right, if those are your wishes. I’m glad you let me help you with my part of it. Where to after you see Althea?”

“Back to the palace,” she said.

“Then, with good fortune, I’ll have you back at the palace day after tomorrow.”

That was three days for Sebastian. She didn’t know if he had three days, or three hours. Or even three minutes. As long as there was a chance he was still alive, though, she had to go into the swamp.

Despite Jennsen’s misgivings about the job ahead of her, the meat pie tasted wonderful. Hungry as she was, nearly anything would have tasted good. She pulled a big piece of meat out of the pie, and, holding it between a finger and thumb, fed it to Tom.

After he chewed, he said, “The moon will be up not long after sundown, so by the time I reach the pass through the mountains, I should be able to see well enough to keep going. There’s plenty of blankets in back. When night comes, you should probably crawl back there and, if you can, get some sleep for tomorrow. You’ll be needing the rest. In the morning, I’ll catch a nap while you go in to see Althea. When you come back, I’ll drive all night and get you right back to the palace. I hope that way we can save enough time for you to help your friend.”

She swayed in the seat along with the big man she had only just met, who was doing all this for a stranger.

“Thank you, Tom. You’re a good man.”

He grinned. “My mama always said so.”

Just as she took another bite, he added, “I hope Lord Rahl thinks so, too. You’ll tell him when you see him, won’t you?”

She didn’t know what he could possibly mean, and feared to ask him. As her mind raced, she chewed, using her mouthful as an excuse to delay. Saying anything might inadvertently get her into trouble. Sebastian’s life was at stake. Jennsen decided to smile and play along. She finally swallowed the mouthful.

“Of course.”

By the slight but sublime smile that lent a curve to the line of his mouth as he tended the reins and watched out ahead, it had been the right answer.

Chapter 20

Light suddenly hurt her eyes. Jennsen held a hand up against the brightness and saw that Tom was pulling the blankets back off her. She stretched and yawned, but then, realizing fully why she was in the back of a wagon, where they were, and why they were there, her yawn cut short. She sat up. The wagon was stopped at the edge of a grassy meadow.

Jennsen put a hand on the side of the wagon, on the coarse plank worn smooth along the top edge, and blinked as she looked about. Behind them, craggy gray rock rose up, holding in its cracks and fissures low stalwart bushes, gnarled and hunkered low, as if against an enduring wind. Her gaze rose up the weathered rock to where it dissolved into mist. Tangled growth lay at the foot of the walls beyond the edges of the meadow and beside the narrow chasm that cut through the rock. Tom had somehow jockeyed the wagon between those steep cliffs. The two big draft horses, still standing in their harnesses, cropped at the shaggy grass.

Ahead, beyond the meadow, the ground descended into the gloom among spreading trees, trailers of vine, and hanging moss. Strange calls, clicks, and whistles came from under the verdant shroud.

“In the middle of winter…” was all she could think to say.

Tom lifted the feed bags from the back of the wagon. “Might be a nice place to spend the winter, too”—he gestured with a nod down the hill, under the tangle of growth—“were it not for what people say comes out of there. If it weren’t true, I’d bet there would be some fool who by now would have tried to give it a go, here. But, if they have, they were pulled in there by some nightmare creature and never made it back out.”

“You mean, you really think here are…monsters, or something, in there?”

He rested his forearms on the wagon’s sides as he leaned in, right over her. “Jennsen, I don’t hold with scaring ladies. When I was a boy, some of the other boys enjoyed waving a wriggling snake at the girls just to hear them scream. I never did. I’m not trying to frighten you.

“But I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I just allowed you to go bounding in there as if it were some lark and then you ended up never coming out. Maybe it’s just talk; I don’t know; I’ve never gone in there. I don’t know anyone who has ever gone in there without being invited in—and that’s from the other side. People say you can’t go in the back and live to tell about it. If anyone would insist on attempting it, it would be you. I know you’re here for an important reason, so I don’t expect you’re going to sit around for days, waiting for an invitation.”

Jennsen swallowed. Her tongue tasted sour. She nodded her thanks, not knowing what to say.

Tom swiped back his fall of blond hair. “I just wanted to tell you the truth of what I know.” He hoisted the feed bags on his way to the horses.

Whatever was in there was in there. She had to go in, that was all there was to it. She didn’t have any choice; if she wanted to get Sebastian away from his captors, she had to go in. If she ever wanted to be free of Lord Rahl, she had to go in.

She reached under her cloak and touched the hilt of her knife. She wasn’t some town girl, scared of her own shadow, unable to defend herself.

She was Jennsen Rahl.

Jennsen pushed the blankets the rest of the way off her and climbed out of the wagon bed, using a rear wheel spoke for a step. Tom was coming back around carrying a waterskin.

“Drink? It’s water—I kept it hooked over the hame so the horses would keep it from freezing.”

The cold had dried her out and she drank eagerly. She saw Tom wipe sweat from his brow and realized only then how warm it really was. She supposed no proper self-respecting swamp full of monsters would allow itself to be frozen over.

Tom pulled back the folds of cloth of something he held in one hand. “Breakfast?”

She smiled at seeing a meat pie. “You’re a thoughtful man, besides being a good man.”

He grinned as he handed her the pie and then turned to undo the trace chains from the horses. “Don’t forget, you promised to tell Lord Rahl,” he called back to her.

Rather than be pulled into any kind of a conversation having to do with her hunter, she diverted him from the subject. “You’ll be right here, then? When I come back, I mean? You’ll be waiting, so we can get back?”

He peered back as he lifted the breaching strap over the horse’s rump. “You have my word, Jennsen. I won’t desert you here.”

By his expression, he was swearing an oath. She smiled her appreciation. “You should get some rest. You’ve driven all night.”

“I’ll try.”