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Richard glanced back at Kahlan. It was her turn. She saw in those dead gray eyes a glimmer of something: rage.
Kahlan knew that his insides were being torn apart the same as were hers.
She found herself before Drefan before she realized it. The first time she tried, her voice wouldn’t come out. It simply wouldn’t. She tried again.
“Drefan, will you… be… my husband?”
His blue, Darken Rahl eyes appraised her without emotion. For some reason, she recalled his hand between Cara’s legs, and she almost vomited.
“As Nadine said, I could do worse than a marriage arranged by the spirits. I don’t suppose there’s any chance you will ever come to love me?”
Kahlan’s jaw trembled as she stared at the floor. Her voice wouldn’t work. She shook her head.
“Well, no matter. We may still have some good times. I’ll do it. I will marry you, Kahlan.”
She was glad that she had never told Richard about what Drefan had done to Cara. If she had, Richard might have lost control when Drefan said he would marry Kahlan and pulled free his sword.
Cara and the legate stepped forward. “It is agreed, then,” they said as one. “The winds are pleased to have the consent of all involved.”
“When?” Richard asked in a hoarse voice. “When will we… when do we… ? And when can I get into the Temple of the Winds? People are dying. I have to help the winds put a stop to it.”
“Tonight,” Cara and the legate said as one. “We will leave immediately for Mount Kymermosst. You will be wed tonight, as soon as we arrive there.”
Kahlan didn’t ask how they would get to a place that wasn’t there anymore. It didn’t really matter to her. The only thing that really mattered to her was that they would be wed that very night.
“I’m sorry about Raina,” Nadine said to Richard. “How is Berdine doing?”
“Not well. She’s up at the Keep.”
Richard turned to Cara. “Can we stop up there on our way? I must tell her what has happened. She will have to stay to guard the sliph until I return. I have to tell her.”
“And I’d like to give her something to help her feel better,” Nadine said.
“It is permitted,” Cara said in that awful, icy voice.
Berdine looked terror-stricken when Richard told her. She threw her arms around him and wept with twin misery. The sliph watched from her well, frowning with curiosity.
Nadine mixed things from pouches in her big bag, giving Berdine instructions on when to take them, promising that it would help her get through her grief. Richard tried to tell Berdine everything he could think of that she might need to know.
Kahlan could almost feel time tingling against her flesh as it flew past, as she plunged and plunged into the black depths.
“We must go,” Cara said, cutting off the stalling. “We must ride hard to arrive before the full moon rises.”
“How will I find the Temple of the Winds?” Richard asked.
“You do not find the Temple of the Winds,” Cara said. “The Temple of the Winds will find you, if the requirements are met.”
Nadine lifted her bag before Richard. “Can I leave this here, then? It’s heavy to carry if we’re coming back here anyway.”
“Of course,” Richard said, his voice a dead monotone.
Kahlan was made to walk behind Richard and beside Drefan as they returned to the horses. Nadine touched Richard’s back as she walked beside him. She was doing a fair job of restraining her joy over her triumph, yet it was a touch meant to send a message: he belonged to her, now.
At the bottom of the Keep road, as they turned away from the city, Kahlan could hear the men with the dead-carts, calling out for people to bring out their dead. Soon, that would be ended, as the suffering and death of the plague was ended. Only in that, did she find any solace. The children, their parents, would live.
If only it had come in time for Raina. Berdine hadn’t said that, but Kahlan knew that that thought was screaming in her head.
Richard had ordered all their guards to remain. When Ulic and Egan had seen the look on his face, they hadn’t argued. Only Richard and Nadine, Kahlan and Drefan, Cara, the legate, and his six wives rode out for Mount Kymermosst.
Kahlan didn’t know how any of it was going to work, getting into the Temple of the Winds, nor did Richard. She didn’t have the slightest curiosity about it. The only thing she could think about was Richard marrying Nadine. Kahlan was sure that Richard could think of nothing but her marrying Drefan.
As they rode, Drefan told stories, trying to keep everyone entertained, trying to lift their spirits. Kahlan didn’t hear much of it. She watched Richard’s back; her only need was to be looking when he glanced back at her, as he did from time to time.
She couldn’t bear not to look at him, yet meeting his eyes was like a hot knife searing into her heart.
She took no joy in the mountainous country they rode into, the greening grass, unfurling ferns, budding trees. The day was warm, compared to what the weather had been for spring, so far, but the sky brooded with dark clouds. Before the day was out, she expected they would encounter a storm. The Andolians cringed every time their eyes turned up.
Kahlan pulled her cloak tighter around herself. She thought about her blue wedding dress back in her room that she planned to wear when she married Richard.
She felt herself getting angry at him. He had seduced her into thinking she could have love, could have happiness. Seduced her into forgetting she had only duty. Seduced her into loving him.
When she realized she was angry at him, the tears came again, running down her face in a silent torrent. This wasn’t happening just to her, it was happening to him, too. They shared this torment.
She thought about the first time she saw him. It seemed so long ago that she had been running from Darken Rahl’s assassins, and Richard had helped her. She thought about all the things they had done together, all the times she stood watch while he slept, and she gazed at him, imagining being just a normal woman who could fall in love, instead of a Confessor who had to keep her feelings secret and live a loveless life of duty.
Richard had found a way, though, found a way that she, a Confessor, could have love. And now it was in ashes.
Why would the spirits do this to them? The answer came when she remembered her talk with Shota, and with the spirit. There were not only good spirits, but evil spirits, too. Those evil spirits had a hand in this. They were the ones who wanted this, who demanded it as the price of the path.
The spirits who demanded that price were worse than evil.
Late in the morning, they stopped to rest the horses and eat. Nadine and Drefan talked with their mouths full. The legate sat back as his wives fed him. He had a hard time, what with his cut lip. They rubbed their legs against his, giggling as he took food from their fingers. They ate between offering him bites. Cara ate in silence. Kahlan didn’t notice what any of them had to eat.
She and Richard didn’t eat. They both sat on the sunny rocks like deadwood, silent, sullen, staring at nothing.
When the others had finished with their meal, Richard watched as they all mounted up again. Even though none of the others noticed it, Kahlan could see the smoldering rage in his eyes. The spirits had chosen Drefan to wound him. They could have done nothing worse.
“How’s the arm?” Nadine asked Drefan as they all started out again.
Drefan held it up and flexed his fingers in demonstration.
“Nearly good as new.”
Kahlan ignored their conversation. All morning, they had chattered. In her silent world, it was barely noticed.
“What is wrong with your arm, master Drefan?” one of the six sisters asked.
“Oh, some miscreant didn’t like the way I try to purge the world of sickness.”
Big black eyes blinked at him. “What did he do to you?”
Drefan straightened haughtily in his saddle. “Cut me with his knife. Tried to kill me, the filthy scum.?
?
“Why did he not succeed?”
Drefan dismissed the incident with an arrogant wave. “Once I showed him some steel, he ran for his life.”
“I sewed his wound,” Nadine told the amazed sisters. “And a deep one it was, too.”
Drefan cast a glance at Nadine that seemed to make her shrink in her saddle. “I told you, Nadine, it’s nothing. I don’t want sympathy. A lot of people are in much greater need than I.”
He relented when he saw the sheepish look on her face. “But you did a good job. As fine as any of my healers would have done. You did a fine job, and I appreciate it.”
Nadine smiled as they rode on.
Drefan pulled up the broad hood of his flaxen cloak. Dear spirits, she thought, that is to be my husband. For the rest of my life, this is to be my partner in life.
