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“Simply amazing, Dalton. You are a wonder.” She turned her palms up. “And you didn’t even have to cheat. Imagine that.”
Dalton made two fists of excitement. “Thank you, Hildemara. Thank you for bringing me the news. If you’ll excuse me, I must go straightaway and tell Teresa. I’ve been so busy, I’ve hardly seen her for weeks. She’ll be so glad to hear the news.”
He started to move, but Hildemara put a restraining finger to his chest. Her smile had that deadly edge to it again.
“Teresa already knows, I’m sure.”
Dalton frowned. “Who would have told her before I was told?”
“Bertrand told her, I’m sure.”
“Bertrand? What would he be doing telling Teresa news like this?”
Hildemara made a little simper. “Oh, you know how Bertrand talks when he’s between the legs of a woman he finds thrilling.”
Dalton froze. Alarm bells chimed in his head as he began recalling all the times he had been absent from Teresa since Bertrand had been named Sovereign, recalling how taken Teresa was with the figure of Sovereign. He recalled how she had spent the night up in prayer after meeting the old Sovereign. He recalled her awe at Bertrand becoming Sovereign.
He made himself stop speculating in such a fashion. Such speculation was an insidious enemy that could eat you away from inside. Hildemara, knowing how busy he had been, was probably just hoping to give him a fright, or cause trouble. That would be like her.
“That isn’t the least bit amusing, Hildemara.”
Propping one hand on the desk, she leaned toward him and ran a finger of the other hand down his jaw. “Not meant to be.”
Dalton stood silent, carefully trying to keep from making the wrong move before he knew what was really going on. This could still be a foolish trick of hers, just to make him angry at Tess, thinking it would somehow drive him into her own arms, or it could be nothing more than news she misunderstood. He knew, though, that Hildemara was not likely to get news like this wrong. She had her own sources and they were as reliable as Dalton’s.
“Hildemara, I don’t think you should be repeating slanderous rumors.”
“Not a rumor, my dear Dalton. A fact. I’ve seen your good wife coming from his room.”
“You know Teresa, she likes to pray—”
“I’ve overheard Bertrand brag to Stein about having her.”
Dalton nearly staggered back. “What?”
The smirk spread in deadly perfection.
“Apparently, from what Bertrand tells Stein, she is quite the unrestrained courtesan, and enjoys being a very bad little girl in his bed.”
Dalton felt the blood go to his face in a hot rush. He considered killing Hildemara where she stood. As his finger touched the hilt of his sword, he considered it very seriously. Finally, instead, he kept himself under control, although he could feel his knees trembling.
“I just thought you should know, Dalton,” she added. “I found it quite sad: my husband is humping your wife and you don’t know anything about it. It could be… awkward. You could inadvertently embarrass yourself, not knowing.”
“Why, Hildemara?” he managed to ask in a whisper. “Why would you get so much satisfaction from this?”
At last her smile bloomed into true pleasure. “Because I always hated your smug superiority about your vows of fidelity—the way you looked down your nose, believing yourself and your wife better than all the rest of us.”
By sheer force of will, Dalton restrained himself. In times of trial or exigency, he was always able to become analytical in order to apply the best solution to the situation that confronted him.
With ruthless resolve, he did that now.
“Thank you for the information, Hildemara. It could indeed have been embarrassing.”
“Do me a favor and don’t go all gloomy about it, Dalton. You have reason to be enormously pleased. This is the Sovereign we’re talking about. It is, after all, an honor for any man to provide his wife for as reverend and sublime a figure as the Sovereign of Anderith. You will be loved and respected all the more because your wife is giving the Sovereign release from the stresses of his high calling.
“You should know that, Dalton. After all, you made the man who he is: the Creator’s advisor in this world. Your wife is simply being a loyal subject.” She chuckled. “Very loyal, from what I’ve overheard. My, but it would take quite the woman to match her.”
She leaned close and kissed his ear. “But I’d like to try, Dalton, dear.” She looked him in the eye as she straightened. “I’ve always been fascinated by you. You are the most devious, dangerous man I’ve ever met, and I’ve met some real pieces of work.”
She turned back from the doorway. “After you come to accept it, you will find it of no importance, Dalton. You’ll see.
“And then, as you suggested to me before, once your vow was broken, I will be the first you come to? Don’t forget, you promised.”
Dalton stood alone in his office, his mind racing, thinking on what he should do.
.
Kahlan laid her arms on his shoulders and leaned over, putting her cheek against his ear. It felt warm and comforting, despite the unneeded distraction. She kissed his temple.
“How is it going?”
Richard stretched with a yawn. Where did one begin?
“This man was bent seriously out of straight.”
“What do you mean?”
“I still have a lot to translate, but I’m beginning to get a picture of what happened.” Richard rubbed his eyes. “The man is sent here to banish the chimes. He at once scrutinizes the problem, and sees a simple solution. The wizards at the Keep thought it was inspired genius, and told him so.”
“He must have been proud,” she said, clearly meaning the opposite.
He understood her sardonic tone, and shared the sentiment. “You’re right, not Joseph Ander. He doesn’t say it here, but from what we’ve read before, I know the way he thinks. Joseph Ander would have felt not pride in himself for understanding it, but contempt for those who had failed to.”
“So,” she said, “he had the solution. Then what?”
“They told him to see to it at once. Apparently they were having problems similar to ours with the chimes, and wanted the threat ended immediately. He complained that if they had the good sense to send him to see to it, then they should stop telling him what to do.”
“Not a good way to treat his superiors at the Keep.”
“They implored him to stop the chimes because of the people dying. Apparently, they knew him well enough to realize they had better not threaten the man, at least not with the rest of the war to worry about. So, they told him to use his best judgment, but to please hurry with a solution so people would be safe from the threat.
“He was much more pleased to get such a message, but used it as a club to start lecturing the wizards at the Keep.”
“About what?
”
Richard ran his fingers back into his hair. It was frustrating to try to put into words what Joseph Ander was about.
“There’s a lot left in here to translate. It’s slow going. But I don’t think this book is going to tell us how to banish the chimes. Joseph Ander just doesn’t think that way—to write it down.”
Kahlan straightened and turned around with her back to the table so she could stand facing him.
She folded her arms. “All right, Richard. I know you better than that. What aren’t you telling me?”
Richard stood and turned his back to her as he pressed his fingers to his temple.
“Richard, don’t you trust me?”
He turned to her. He took up her hand. “No, no, it isn’t that. It’s just… just that some of the things he says, I don’t know where truth leaves off and Joseph Ander’s madness begins. This goes beyond anything I’ve ever heard about, been taught, or believed about magic.”
Now she did look concerned. He guessed, in one way, he was raising her fears wrongly. On the other hand, he couldn’t begin to raise them to the levels of his own fears.
“Joseph Ander,” he began, “thought he was just better than the other wizards.”
“We already knew that.”
“Yes, but he may have been right.”
“What?”
“Sometimes, in madness resides genius. Kahlan, I don’t know where to draw the line. In one way not knowing about magic is a liability, but in another it means I’m not burdened by preconceived notions, the way the wizards at the Keep were, so I might recognize the truth in his words where they did not.
“You see, Joseph Ander viewed magic not so much as a set of requirements—you know, a pinch of this, this word three times while turning round on your left foot, and all that kind of thing.
“He saw magic as an art form—a means of expression.”
Kahlan was frowning. “I don’t follow. Either you cast a spell properly to invoke it, or it doesn’t work. Like I call my power with a touch. Like the way we called the chimes by fulfilling specific requirements of the magic, thereby releasing it.”
He knew that with her magical ability, her background, and her learning about magic, she would have the same problem the other wizards did. Richard felt just a trace of the frustration Joseph Ander must have felt. In that, too, he understood the man that much better—understood a tiny bit of the frustration of having people tell you the hard facts of something when you knew better, yet couldn’t get them to see the abstract concept of the greater whole right before them.
