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“My sword,” Samuel hissed.
“And what do you think Shota would say?”
The bloodless lips widened with his smile. “Mistress not here.”
Like a wraith materializing out of the substance of the shadows themselves, a dark shape appeared behind Samuel. It was Cara, her dark cloak billowing in the wind, giving her the aspect of a vengeful spirit. Richard realized that she had probably followed his rolling trail down through the snow. What with the blustery wind in his ears and, more importantly, his gaze riveted on Richard’s predicament, Samuel didn’t notice Cara looming behind him.
In a single glance she took in the ominous sight of Samuel gripping Richard’s sword, standing above Richard as he clung to the edge of the cliff. Richard had learned in the past that Samuel’s attention and actions were pretty firmly ruled by his rampant emotions; his feet just followed. With the gleeful distraction of having the object of his rabid hatred at the point of a sword he’d once carried and to this day coveted, Samuel was too busy gloating to watch for the Mord-Sith showing up behind him.
Without a word, Cara unceremoniously rammed her Agiel into the base of Samuel’s neck at the back of his skull. With the slippery conditions, she couldn’t maintain the contact.
Samuel shrieked in pain and sudden, confused terror as he dropped the sword and toppled back into the snow. Writhing in agony, not understanding what had happened, he pawed frantically at the back of his neck where Cara had pressed her Agiel. He squealed as he flopped in the snow like a fish in sand. Richard knew that the horrifying shock of pain from an Agiel when applied in that spot felt like a lightning strike.
Richard recognized the look on Cara’s face as she started to lean over the squirming figure. She intended to used her Agiel to finish Samuel.
Richard wouldn’t really care if she killed the treacherous companion to the witch woman, but he had far more urgent problems right then.
“Cara! I’m hanging on the edge of a cliff. I can’t hold on. I’m slipping.”
She immediately snatched up the sword from beside a thrashing Samuel so that he couldn’t get at it as she ran to help Richard. Stabbing the blade in the ground beside herself, she dropped down, braced her boots against the rocks, and seized his arms. She had not been an instant too soon.
With her help, Richard was able to get a better grip on the rocks. With both of them struggling in the difficult conditions, he at last managed to hook his arm over the outcropping. Once he had a firm hold with an arm he was finally able to swing a leg up and hook it over the rocks. Cara grabbed his belt and helped haul him up. Straining with effort, he dragged himself up and over the slippery outcropping.
Richard sagged over onto his side, gasping, trying to get enough of the thin air. “Thanks,” he managed.
Cara glanced back over her shoulder, keeping an eye on Samuel. Richard quickly gathered his strength and staggered back to his feet. As soon as he had his footing at the brink of the cliff, he pulled up his sword from where Cara had stuck it in the ground.
He could hardly believe that Samuel had managed to catch him off guard that way. Ever since Richard and Cara had left their camp that morning, he’d been watching for Samuel to show up unexpectedly. He knew, though, that despite expecting such an attack, it was impossible to forestall it every moment—much as it had been impossible to stop every arrow that morning that Kahlan had disappeared.
Richard brushed some of the snow off his face. The tumbling fall, the sudden plunge, and hanging by his fingers over a cliff had left him shaken but, more than anything, angry.
Samuel, still lying crumpled in the snow, wriggling and squirming, puled to himself, mumbling something Richard couldn’t hear over the sound of the wind.
When Samuel saw Richard stalking toward him, he scrambled awkwardly to his feet, still suffering from the lingering pain. Despite that pain, though, he saw what he wanted.
“Mine! Gimme! Gimme my sword!”
Richard lifted the point toward the disgusting little fellow.
Seeing the point of the blade approaching, Samuel lost his courage and scuttled a few steps backward up the slope. “Please,” he whined, holding his hands out to ward Richard’s wrath, “no kill me?”
“What are you doing here?”
“Mistress sends me.”
“Shota sen
t you to kill me, did she?” Richard mocked. He wanted Samuel to admit the truth.
Samuel vigorously shook his head. “No, not to kill you.”
“So then that was all your idea.”
Samuel didn’t answer.
“Why, then?” Richard pressed. “Why did Shota send you?”
Samuel eyed Cara as she moved to the side, halfway hemming him in. Samuel hissed at her, showing his teeth. Cara, unimpressed, showed him her Agiel. His eyes grew big with fear.
“Samuel!” Richard yelled.
Samuel’s yellow eyes turned back to Richard and they again turned hateful.
“Why did Shota send you?”
“Mistress…” he whimpered as his anger flagged. He stared off longingly in the direction of Agaden Reach. “She sends companion.”
“Why!”
Samuel flinched when Richard yelled and took an aggressive stride forward.
Samuel, trying to keep watch on both of them, pointed a long finger at Cara. “Mistress say for you to bring pretty lady.”
This was a surprise—for two reasons. “Pretty lady” was what Samuel had always called Kahlan.
Secondly, Richard would never have expected that Shota would want Cara to come down into Agaden Reach with him. He found that somehow troubling.
“Why does she want the pretty lady to come with me?”
“Don’t know.” Samuel’s bloodless lips pulled back in a grin. “Maybe to kill her.”
Cara waggled her Agiel for him to see. “If she tries, maybe she will get a lot more than you got. Maybe I’ll kill her, instead.”
Samuel squealed in horror, his bulging eyes going wide. “No! No kill mistress!”
“We didn’t come to harm Shota,” Richard told him. “But we will defend ourselves.”
Samuel pressed his knuckles to the ground as he leaned toward Richard. “We will see,” he growled with contempt, “what mistress does with you, Seeker.”
