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“Don’t let the opportunity pass you by, Vika. Once that chance slips away from you, it will be gone forever.”
She was incredulous. “Chance for what?”
“Chance not to be the property of an evil man.”
“He is the Lord Arc, my master.”
“You are your own master. You just don’t know it.”
Her patience gone, her anger exploding to the surface, Vika abruptly rammed her Agiel toward his middle.
Richard caught the weapon in his fist before she could push it into his abdomen. Vika held one end, he the other, enduring the agony the way he had been taught in terrible lessons he thought he would never need.
Now, he needed those lessons.
Now, he was thankful for those lessons.
Now, those lessons were the only thing keeping him standing.
He was inches away from Vika’s face, staring into her blue eyes and she into his, sharing the same pain of the Agiel that she felt, enduring it the same as she endured it.
The Shun-tuk watched without reaction from beyond the doorway, without realizing the full extent of what was happening, what the two of them were feeling, or what they were sharing. The chalky figures with blacked-out eyes made no move to intervene as the two of them stood motionless, face-to-face, sharing the withering agony of her Agiel.
Looking into her eyes, Richard finally saw the shadow of fear.
After he saw that specter of fear in her eyes, after enough time had passed to make sure she understood that he saw it and recognized it, he shoved her back while releasing the Agiel.
As she watched him, panting to get her breath, her smooth brow drew into an emotional frown. “You are a rare person, Richard Rahl, to be able to do that.”
“I am the Lord Rahl,” he told her with quiet authority. “Despite what you may believe, I am in control, not you. Don’t ever forget that or it will cost you your life when you least expect it.”
“I expect to die in battle—”
“Not old and toothless in bed,” he finished.
She frowned. “So, you know more of Mord-Sith than I had thought.”
“Vika, I know more of Mord-Sith than you can imagine. I know that they can choose life again. I know it isn’t too late. I have worn around my neck the Agiel of Mord-Sith who have died. Some of them died fighting me, others, fighting for me. All of them were individuals who had the ability to choose more for their own lives than to be only Mord-Sith. Some chose wisely, some did not.”
Vika looked deeply into his eyes as she weighed his words. She finally lifted her Agiel, pointing it at his face as the iron returned to her expression.
“I am Mord-Sith. You will do as I say, when I say it.”
Richard smiled softly. “Of course, Mistress Vika.” He held his arm out. “Now, get going. You are supposed to come collect me for something. The pathetic excuse for a man who you follow will be angry with you if you delay any longer. That is the way he treats Mord-Sith—no differently, really, than Darken Rahl used to treat them.
“Your choice to go with Hannis Arc instead of Darken Rahl was no improvement. You traded one tyrant for another, that’s all. But at least it should show you that you have the power to choose for yourself what you want for yourself. You made that choice. I hope that you will learn from it and come to make a better choice the next time.”
She did not look pleased. “I hope Lord Arc allows me to kill you.”
“That’s a false hope. It just isn’t ever going to happen.”
Her face turned red with rage. “And what makes you think so?”
“Do you really think that Hannis Arc would go to all the trouble he went to capture me simply in order to let you kill me? I hardly think so.
“He has much bigger plans than your amusement. He wants me for some reason. He is not going to let you kill me, and I expect that he has given you explicit orders to that effect. Isn’t that right?”
“You’re right,” she said in a calmer voice, “you do have a higher purpose than dying by my hand.” She lifted her chin. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t enjoy your fate.”
“Fine, just knock off the empty threats. Now, let’s get going.”
Richard started away when she didn’t. He stepped aside to let her to take the lead as she cut in front of him. He had pushed her enough. If he pushed any more right then it would only harden her.
Richard knew that he could have killed the woman. He knew how to kill Mord-Sith. Most people didn’t, but sadly, he did.
He needed to get away and would have been willing to kill her to do so, but what ultimately prevented him from doing anything right then was the Shun-tuk crowding the corridors outside his dungeon chamber, all watching him, along with maybe a dozen corpses standing behind them.
He knew that she was the only thing keeping him alive right then. If he’d taken her down, they would have flooded into the cell and eaten him alive.
CHAPTER
66
Richard glared at the grim faces watching him follow Vika out of his prison. The dark areas painted in around their eyes, with the chalky white ash smeared all over their shaved heads, made them look like skulls with empty eye sockets. From that inner darkness, they stared out at him the way a predator watched passing prey. And, given the go-ahead, these predators would have ripped into him in a heartbeat.
Richard thought he could see in their empty eyes that they missed some inner spark, some connection to the Grace and therefore to humanity. They were alive, after all, but they were empty, living vessels lacking a soul.
Even so, he had seen the kind of emotion the half people could exhibit when attacking those who did have souls. Then, they could be frenzied, mad, maniacal killers obsessed with devouring human flesh.
With an escort of what looked to be hundreds of Shun-tuk following behind like hungry animals hoping for a meal, Vika led Richard through a maze of chambers and passageways honeycombed through the heavily cratered and pitted rock. Behind them, the silent, ever-present awakened dead followed, lumbering stiffly along, ready to fight on command to stop any threat.
In places the tunnels and passageways through the craggy rock led them lower, descending down into a series of natural caverns that grew in complexity and size. Passages and openings seemed to run in every direction. Some of the smoother passages looked to have been sculpted by flowing water. There seemed to be even more of the silent, ghostly white onlookers in every hole or pocket in the rock.
Passing under a low opening where they had to duck under a leaning slab of rock that had apparently fallen and lodged against the walls to either side, they at last entered a vast chamber that appeared to be their destination. The arched sides and domed roof were different colors of tan, browns, and white struck through with rusty stains. Off in the distance to the sides near networks of holes and crevices riddling the outer walls, immense tapered columns hung from the ceiling above forests of their twins pointing up from below them.
The enormous, hushed chamber was packed full with what must have been thousands of silent half people. The vast numbers of chalky white Shun-tuk stood anywhere they could find space—on rocks, shelves, and ledges—covering every inch of available space. Yet more dark eyes peered out from corridors all around the cavern, or from jagged openings and fissures in the walls. They watched from behind tapered columns of what looked like melted stone. Higher up, Richard could see them looking down from yawning holes leading to other chambers. In the light of hundreds of torches Richard could see some of the walls sparkle as if adorned with shimmering jewels.
The floor of the immense chamber sloped downward toward the center, so that the Shun-tuk all crowded in together created what looked like a vast, white bowl.
Richard could see Hannis Arc, standing out in his dark robes, down in the center of that milky basin.
Even at a distance Richard could see the man’s red eyes watching Vika in her red leather leading Richard into the cavern. The Shun-tuk shuffled back out of the M
ord-Sith’s way as she walked without pause, expecting them to move, as she led Richard downward toward where her master waited.
In the center of the room, behind Hannis Arc, rose a platform to the height of his hips. It looked like a stone altar that had melted into soft yellow and tan shapes, almost like drippings of candle wax that had mounded up over time.
As he got close enough, Richard could see that there was a small, withered corpse lying on the rock platform.
Torches all around, popping and hissing, giving off pungent clouds of smoke, lit the desiccated cadaver. As he got closer, Richard saw that the body was mummified and looked ancient. Dark, hardened skin stretched over the nose and face so that the bones of the skull created a clearly discernible skeletal topography beneath the leathery skin.
The carcass looked like it had ossified over millennia. It was hard to tell from the shrunken husk what the once-living person had actually looked like.
