Страница:
A silver smile widened in what seemed to be recognition. «Master, you called me?»
The sliph's eerie, feminine voice echoed around the room, but her lips hadn't moved.
Richard stepped closer, ignoring Nicci and Rikka's wide-eyed astonishment. «Yes. Sliph, thank you for coming. I need you.»
A silver smile was pleased. «You wish to travel, Master?»
«Yes, I wish to travel. We all do. We all need to travel.»
The smile widened. «Come, then. We will travel.»
Richard herded everyone close to the wall. Liquid metal formed into a hand that reached out to touch each of the three women in turn.
«You have traveled before,» the sliph said to Cara after only brief contact with her forehead. «You may travel.»
The glistening hand gently brushed a palm across Nicci's brow, lingering for a bit longer. «You have what is required. You may travel.
Rikka lifted her chin, ignoring her distaste for magic, and stood her ground as the sliph touched her forehead.
«You may not travel,» the sliph said.
Rikka looked indignant. «But, but, if Cara can-why can't I?»
«You do not have both sides required,» said the voice.
Rikka folded her arms defiantly. «I must go with them. I'm going, too. That's all there is to it.»
«It is your choice, but if you try to travel in me, you will die, and then you will not be with them either.»
Richard laid a hand on Rikka's arm before she could say anything else. «Cara captured the power of someone who had an element of the required magic; that's why she can travel. There is nothing to be done about it. You have to stay here.»
Rikka didn't look at all happy, but she nodded. «The rest of you had better get going, then.»
«Come,» the sliph said to Richard, «and we will travel. To which place do you wish to travel?»
Richard almost said it aloud, but then stopped himself. He turned to Rikka.
«You can't come with us. I think you had better leave now, so that you don't even hear where I'm going. I don't want to take the chance that if you know, then the others might somehow find out. My grandfather can be clever when he wants to be and pull tricks to get his way.»
«You don't need to tell me.» Rikka sighed in resignation. «You're probably right, Lord Rahl.» She smiled at Cara. «Protect him.»
Cara nodded. «I always do. He's pretty helpless without me.»
Richard ignored Cara's boast. «Rikka, I need you to tell Zedd something for me. I need you to give him a message.»
Rikka frowned as she listened intently.
«Tell him that four Sisters of the Dark have captured Kahlan, the real Mother Confessor, not the body buried down in Aydindril. Tell him that I intend to come back as soon as I can and I will bring him the proof. I ask that when I return, before he tries to cure me, he allow me to show him the evidence I will bring. And tell him that I love him and understand his concern for me, but that I'm doing as the Seeker must do, as he himself charged me to do when he gave me the Sword of Truth.»
When Rikka had gone, Cara asked, «What evidence?»
«I don't know. I haven't found it yet.» Richard turned to Nicci. «Don't forget what I told you before. You have to breathe in the sliph once we go under. At first you'll want to hold your breath, but that just isn't possible. Once we arrive and come up out of the sliph, you must let her out of your lungs and again breathe in the air.»
Nicci was looking more than a little nervous. Richard took her hand. «I'll be with you, as will Cara. We've both done this before. I won't let go of you. It's hard to make yourself breathe in the sliph for the first time, but once you do, you will see that it's quite a remarkable experience. It's rapture to breathe the sliph.»
«Rapture,» Nicci repeated with more than just a little incredulity.
«Lord Rahl is right,» Cara said. «You'll see.»
«Just remember,» Richard added, «when it ends you will not want to let go of the sliph and breathe air again-but you must. If you don't, you'll die. Do you understand?»
«Of course,» Nicci said with a nod.
«Come on then.» Richard started to climb up on the wall, pulling Nicci up with him.
«Where will we travel, Master?»
«I think we should go to the People's Palace, in D'Hara. Do you know the place?»
«Of course. The People's Palace is a central site.»
«A central site?»
If living quicksilver could be said to look puzzled by a question, the sliph looked puzzled. «Yes, a central site. Like this place here is a central site.»
Richard didn't understand, but didn't think it was relevant and so didn't press the issue. «I see.»
«Why the People's Palace,» Nicci asked.
Richard shrugged. «We have to go somewhere. We'll be safe at the Palace. But more importantly, they have libraries there with rare ancient books. I'm hoping that maybe we can find something about Chainfire. Since the Sisters have Kahlan, I'm thinking that Chainfire might have something to do with some kind of magic.
«From what we've heard, the D'Haran army is somewhere in the vicinity on their way south. What's more, the last time I saw Berdine, another Mord-Sith, was when I left her here in Aydindril, so she will probably be either close to our troops or the palace. I need her to help me translate some of the material from the books I'm bringing along. Besides that, she has Kolo's journal and she may already know something helpful.»
He glanced at Cara. «Maybe we can see General Meiffert and see how things are going with the troops.»
Cara's face lit with surprise and a broad grin.
Nicci nodded thoughtfully. «I guess all that makes sense, and I guess it's as good a place as any. It gets you out of immediate danger and that's what matters most right now.»
«All right, sliph,» Richard said, «we wish to travel to the People's Palace in D'Hara.»
A liquid silver arm came up and slipped around all three of them. Richard felt the warm, undulating grip compressing to get a firm grasp on him. Nicci had his hand in a death grip.
«Lord Rahl?» Cara asked.
Richard held up the hand that wasn't holding Nicci's to halt the sliph before she could lift them into the well. «What?»
Cara bit her lip before finally speaking. «You're holding Nicci's hand. Will you hold my hand, too? I mean, I wouldn't want the three of us to get separated.»
Richard tried not to smile at the worry on her face. Cara feared magic, even if she had already done this before.
«Sure,» Richard said as he took her hand. «I wouldn't want us to get separated.»
A sudden thought struck him.
«Wait!» he said, stopping the sliph before she could start.
«Yes, Master?»
«Do you know a person named Kahlan? Kahlan Amnell, the Mother Confessor?»
«This name means nothing to me.»
Richard sighed in disappointment. He hadn't really expected the sliph to know Kahlan. No one else did, either.
«Would you happen to know a place called the Deep Nothing?»
«I know several places in the Deep Nothing. Some have been destroyed, but some still exist. I can travel to them if you wish.»
Richard's heart quickened in surprise. «Are any of these places in the Deep Nothing also a central site?»
«Yes, one of them,» the sliph said. «Caska, in the Deep Nothing, is a central site. Would you like to travel there?»
Richard glanced to both Nicci and Cara. «Do either of you know this place, Caska?»
Nicci shook her head.
Cara was frowning. «I think I remember hearing something about it when I was little. I'm sorry Lord Rahl, but I don't remember exactly what-just that the name sounds familiar from old legends.»
«What do you mean, legends?»
Cara shrugged. «Old D'Haran legends — something about dream casters. Stories people told. Something about the history of D'Hara. It seems like Caska is a name from olden times.»
Olden times. Dream casters. Richard remembered that when he'd skimmed through some of the book Gegendrauss that he'd found back in the shielded room, he had seen something about casting dreams, but he hadn't translated the passage. Even though Richard was the leader of the D'Haran Empire, he knew very little about the mysterious D'Hara.
Even if Cara didn't know more, Richard still felt as if he had just taken a step closer to finding Kahlan.
«We wish to travel,» he said to the sliph. «We wish to travel to Caska, in the Deep Nothing.»
It had been a long time since Richard had traveled in the sliph and he felt a bit apprehensive. But his excitement that he was finally making connections to find the answers that had for so long eluded him swept away any concern.
«We travel to Caska, then,» the sliph said, her voice echoing around the stone room where once Kolo had died standing guard over her as the great war had come to an end. At least, everyone thought it had come to an end, but those ancient conflicts had not ended so easily and now they had again flared to life.
The arm lifted all three of them off the wall and plunged them down into the silver froth. Nicci's grip on his hand tightened and she gasped in a breath before going under.
CHAPTER 60
CHAPTER 61
CHAPTER 62
The sliph's eerie, feminine voice echoed around the room, but her lips hadn't moved.
Richard stepped closer, ignoring Nicci and Rikka's wide-eyed astonishment. «Yes. Sliph, thank you for coming. I need you.»
A silver smile was pleased. «You wish to travel, Master?»
«Yes, I wish to travel. We all do. We all need to travel.»
The smile widened. «Come, then. We will travel.»
Richard herded everyone close to the wall. Liquid metal formed into a hand that reached out to touch each of the three women in turn.
«You have traveled before,» the sliph said to Cara after only brief contact with her forehead. «You may travel.»
The glistening hand gently brushed a palm across Nicci's brow, lingering for a bit longer. «You have what is required. You may travel.
Rikka lifted her chin, ignoring her distaste for magic, and stood her ground as the sliph touched her forehead.
«You may not travel,» the sliph said.
Rikka looked indignant. «But, but, if Cara can-why can't I?»
«You do not have both sides required,» said the voice.
Rikka folded her arms defiantly. «I must go with them. I'm going, too. That's all there is to it.»
«It is your choice, but if you try to travel in me, you will die, and then you will not be with them either.»
Richard laid a hand on Rikka's arm before she could say anything else. «Cara captured the power of someone who had an element of the required magic; that's why she can travel. There is nothing to be done about it. You have to stay here.»
Rikka didn't look at all happy, but she nodded. «The rest of you had better get going, then.»
«Come,» the sliph said to Richard, «and we will travel. To which place do you wish to travel?»
Richard almost said it aloud, but then stopped himself. He turned to Rikka.
«You can't come with us. I think you had better leave now, so that you don't even hear where I'm going. I don't want to take the chance that if you know, then the others might somehow find out. My grandfather can be clever when he wants to be and pull tricks to get his way.»
«You don't need to tell me.» Rikka sighed in resignation. «You're probably right, Lord Rahl.» She smiled at Cara. «Protect him.»
Cara nodded. «I always do. He's pretty helpless without me.»
Richard ignored Cara's boast. «Rikka, I need you to tell Zedd something for me. I need you to give him a message.»
Rikka frowned as she listened intently.
«Tell him that four Sisters of the Dark have captured Kahlan, the real Mother Confessor, not the body buried down in Aydindril. Tell him that I intend to come back as soon as I can and I will bring him the proof. I ask that when I return, before he tries to cure me, he allow me to show him the evidence I will bring. And tell him that I love him and understand his concern for me, but that I'm doing as the Seeker must do, as he himself charged me to do when he gave me the Sword of Truth.»
When Rikka had gone, Cara asked, «What evidence?»
«I don't know. I haven't found it yet.» Richard turned to Nicci. «Don't forget what I told you before. You have to breathe in the sliph once we go under. At first you'll want to hold your breath, but that just isn't possible. Once we arrive and come up out of the sliph, you must let her out of your lungs and again breathe in the air.»
Nicci was looking more than a little nervous. Richard took her hand. «I'll be with you, as will Cara. We've both done this before. I won't let go of you. It's hard to make yourself breathe in the sliph for the first time, but once you do, you will see that it's quite a remarkable experience. It's rapture to breathe the sliph.»
«Rapture,» Nicci repeated with more than just a little incredulity.
«Lord Rahl is right,» Cara said. «You'll see.»
«Just remember,» Richard added, «when it ends you will not want to let go of the sliph and breathe air again-but you must. If you don't, you'll die. Do you understand?»
«Of course,» Nicci said with a nod.
«Come on then.» Richard started to climb up on the wall, pulling Nicci up with him.
«Where will we travel, Master?»
«I think we should go to the People's Palace, in D'Hara. Do you know the place?»
«Of course. The People's Palace is a central site.»
«A central site?»
If living quicksilver could be said to look puzzled by a question, the sliph looked puzzled. «Yes, a central site. Like this place here is a central site.»
Richard didn't understand, but didn't think it was relevant and so didn't press the issue. «I see.»
«Why the People's Palace,» Nicci asked.
Richard shrugged. «We have to go somewhere. We'll be safe at the Palace. But more importantly, they have libraries there with rare ancient books. I'm hoping that maybe we can find something about Chainfire. Since the Sisters have Kahlan, I'm thinking that Chainfire might have something to do with some kind of magic.
«From what we've heard, the D'Haran army is somewhere in the vicinity on their way south. What's more, the last time I saw Berdine, another Mord-Sith, was when I left her here in Aydindril, so she will probably be either close to our troops or the palace. I need her to help me translate some of the material from the books I'm bringing along. Besides that, she has Kolo's journal and she may already know something helpful.»
He glanced at Cara. «Maybe we can see General Meiffert and see how things are going with the troops.»
Cara's face lit with surprise and a broad grin.
Nicci nodded thoughtfully. «I guess all that makes sense, and I guess it's as good a place as any. It gets you out of immediate danger and that's what matters most right now.»
«All right, sliph,» Richard said, «we wish to travel to the People's Palace in D'Hara.»
A liquid silver arm came up and slipped around all three of them. Richard felt the warm, undulating grip compressing to get a firm grasp on him. Nicci had his hand in a death grip.
«Lord Rahl?» Cara asked.
Richard held up the hand that wasn't holding Nicci's to halt the sliph before she could lift them into the well. «What?»
Cara bit her lip before finally speaking. «You're holding Nicci's hand. Will you hold my hand, too? I mean, I wouldn't want the three of us to get separated.»
Richard tried not to smile at the worry on her face. Cara feared magic, even if she had already done this before.
«Sure,» Richard said as he took her hand. «I wouldn't want us to get separated.»
A sudden thought struck him.
«Wait!» he said, stopping the sliph before she could start.
«Yes, Master?»
«Do you know a person named Kahlan? Kahlan Amnell, the Mother Confessor?»
«This name means nothing to me.»
Richard sighed in disappointment. He hadn't really expected the sliph to know Kahlan. No one else did, either.
«Would you happen to know a place called the Deep Nothing?»
«I know several places in the Deep Nothing. Some have been destroyed, but some still exist. I can travel to them if you wish.»
Richard's heart quickened in surprise. «Are any of these places in the Deep Nothing also a central site?»
«Yes, one of them,» the sliph said. «Caska, in the Deep Nothing, is a central site. Would you like to travel there?»
Richard glanced to both Nicci and Cara. «Do either of you know this place, Caska?»
Nicci shook her head.
Cara was frowning. «I think I remember hearing something about it when I was little. I'm sorry Lord Rahl, but I don't remember exactly what-just that the name sounds familiar from old legends.»
«What do you mean, legends?»
Cara shrugged. «Old D'Haran legends — something about dream casters. Stories people told. Something about the history of D'Hara. It seems like Caska is a name from olden times.»
Olden times. Dream casters. Richard remembered that when he'd skimmed through some of the book Gegendrauss that he'd found back in the shielded room, he had seen something about casting dreams, but he hadn't translated the passage. Even though Richard was the leader of the D'Haran Empire, he knew very little about the mysterious D'Hara.
Even if Cara didn't know more, Richard still felt as if he had just taken a step closer to finding Kahlan.
«We wish to travel,» he said to the sliph. «We wish to travel to Caska, in the Deep Nothing.»
It had been a long time since Richard had traveled in the sliph and he felt a bit apprehensive. But his excitement that he was finally making connections to find the answers that had for so long eluded him swept away any concern.
«We travel to Caska, then,» the sliph said, her voice echoing around the stone room where once Kolo had died standing guard over her as the great war had come to an end. At least, everyone thought it had come to an end, but those ancient conflicts had not ended so easily and now they had again flared to life.
The arm lifted all three of them off the wall and plunged them down into the silver froth. Nicci's grip on his hand tightened and she gasped in a breath before going under.
CHAPTER 60
With an arrow's speed, Richard flew through the silken silence of the sliph, yet at the same time he glided with the slow grace of a raven riding the stilled currents above towering trees on a moonlit night. There was no heat, no cold. In the silence, sweet sounds filled his mind. His eyes beheld light and dark together in a single, spectral vision, while his lungs swelled with the sweet presence of the sliph as he breathed her into his soul.
It was rapture.
Abruptly, it ended.
Grainy darkness exploded in his sudden vision. There seemed to be blocky shapes all around as he broke the surface. Nicci's hand gripped his in terror.
Breathe, the sliph told him.
Richard let out the sweet breath, emptying his lungs of the rapture. With a needful gasp, he sucked in the alien air. Cara, too, gasped in the hot, dusty air.
Nicci floated face down, rocking gently in the silver fluid.
Richard threw an arm over the stone wall at the side of the sliph, pulling Nicci with him. He took his bow off his back to get it out of his way and quickly set it against the outside of the wall. With the sliph's help, he hopped up on the wall, and then with the sliph lifting her, pulled the dead weight of Nicci up enough to get her shoulders and head up into the warm, dark air.
Richard slapped her on the back. «Breathe, Nicci. Breathe. Come on, you have to let go of the sliph and breathe. Do it for me.»
At last she did. She gasped in the air, her arms flailing in terror at being confused and lost in such strange surroundings. Richard pulled her close as he helped her get her arms over the side and, panting, climb up on the wall.
Brackets on the walls nearby held glass spheres, like back at the Keep, that glowed brighter as he climbed out of the well.
«What do you think this place is?» Cara asked as she peered around in the dim light.
«That was — rapture,» Nicci said, still under the sway of the experience.
«I told you,» Richard said as he helped her climb out.
«It looks like we're in a stone room of some kind,» Cara said as she walked around the perimeter of the room.
Richard made his way toward the darkness at one end and two larger spheres in tall iron brackets brightened with an eerie green glow. He saw that they flanked steps. The steps, though, marched up to the ceiling.
«That's pretty strange,» Cara said as she stood on the second step, inspecting the dark ceiling.
«Here,» Nicci said. She was leaning over to the side of the steps. «There's a metal plate.»
It was the kind of metal plate Richard had seen in other places. They were trigger plates for shields. Nicci tapped her palm against it but nothing happened.
Richard pressed his hand to the icy cold plate and stone started grating as it moved. Dust came down in streamers.
The three of them ducked back as they all peered around in the gloomy light, trying to figure out what, exactly, was moving. The ground trembled. It felt like the whole room might be shifting and somehow changing shape. Richard then realized that it was actually the ceiling that was pulling aside.
A growing patch of moonlight fell across the steps.
Richard had no idea where they were, other than down in a stone room that appeared to be buried. He didn't know where Caska was, other than the sliph said that it was in the Deep Nothing, and he didn't know where that was, so he didn't really know what to expect. He felt decidedly uneasy.
He reached for his sword.
The sword wasn't there. For what felt like the thousandth time, he felt the sinking regret of realizing why and where it now was.
He drew his long knife instead as he started up the steps in a crouch, ducking low not only so as not to hit his head on the ceiling before it had moved out of the way, but out of caution for who might be outside and have heard stone sliding aside. Cara, seeing him draw his knife, spun her Agiel up into her fist. She tried to get out ahead of him, but he held his arm out, keeping her behind to the left. Nicci was close behind to his right.
As he came up out of the ground, he saw the shadowed shapes of three people standing not far ahead. He knew that from being in the sliph, until he fully recovered, his vision was more acute than ordinary. He could probably see them better than they could see him.
With that sharp vision, Richard saw that the big man in the middle was holding a slender girl back against him. He had one hand over her mouth. He could see the girl squirming. Moonlight gleamed off the blade he held to her throat.
«Drop your weapons,» the man holding the girl growled, «and surrender to the Imperial Order, or you will die.»
Richard flipped the knife into the air, let it make a half turn, and caught it by the tip. An inky shape suddenly swooped atop the man's head. The bird let out a piercing caw. The man flinched. Richard didn't take the time to wonder at such an unexpected assault. He heaved the knife.
On broad wings, the bird lifted into the air. The blade hit the man in the center of his face with a solid thunk. Richard knew that the blade was long enough to have penetrated all the way through the man's brain and that the tip would have pierced the back of the skull. The man dropped straight down behind the trembling girl-dead before he could think to do her harm.
Before the men to either side of the girl could take a half a step, Nicci unleashed a scything whisper of power that took the heads off the other two men. The only noise it made was the sound of the heads hitting the ground with twin, dull thuds. The bodies toppled to either side of the girl.
The night was still but for the drone of cicadas.
The girl hesitantly stepped closer and dropped to her knees. She bent forward before the steps until her forehead touched the stone at his feet.
«Lord Rahl, I am your humble servant. Thank you for coming and protecting me. I live only to serve. My life is yours. Command me as you will.»
Even as the girl was still speaking in a quavering voice, Cara and Nicci were spreading out to the sides, searching for other threats. Richard crossed his lips with a finger to let them know to be quiet about it so as not to alert any other troops that might be near. Both saw his signal and nodded.
Richard waited, listening for any threat. Since the girl was on the ground, he let her stay there, out of harm's way. He heard the whisper of feathers against air as the raven landed on a nearby limb and then the soft rustle as it folded in its wings.
«It's clear,» Nicci announced in a quiet voice as she returned from the shadows. «My Han tells me there are no others in the immediate vicinity.»
Relieved, Richard let the tension go out of his muscles. When he heard the girl weeping in quiet terror, he sat down on the top step right near her. He suspected her terror was fear that she might be killed just as the three men had been. Richard wanted to assure her that she was not going to die.
«It's all right,» he told her as he gently grasped her shoulders and urged her up. «I'm not going to hurt you. You're safe, now.»
As she came up he gathered the frightened girl into his arms, embracing her protectively, holding her head to his shoulder when she glanced to the three dead men as if they still might jump up and snatch her away. She was a slender lithesome creature, the kind of girl on the brink of being a woman, yet looking as frail as a bird about to leave the nest. Her slender arms came gratefully around Richard as she wept with relief.
«The bird a friend of yours?» he asked.
«Lokey,» she confirmed with a nod. «He watches over me.»
«Well, he did a good job tonight.»
«I thought you weren't going to come, Master Rahl. I thought it was my fault, that I wasn't a good enough priestess for you.»
Richard ran a hand down the back of her head. «How did you know I was coming here?»
«The tellings say it is so. But I already waited so long that I thought they might be wrong. I was near to despairing that you would find us not worthy, and then I feared it was my failing»
He surmised that the «tellings» must mean prophecy of some sort. «You are a priestess, you say?»
She nodded as she pulled back to look up at his smile. Richard saw then that her big copper-colored eyes peered out from a dark mask painted in a band around her face. It was a disturbing visage.
«I am the priestess of the bones. You have returned to help me. I am your servant. I am the one meant to cast the dreams.»
«Returned?»
«To life. You have come back from the dead.»
Richard could only stare.
Nicci squatted down beside the girl. «What do you mean, he returned from the dead?»
The girl pointed behind them, at the structure from where they had emerged. «From the world of the dead — back to we the living. It says his name there, on his tomb.»
Richard turned and indeed did see his name carved in the monument. The thing that came immediately to mind was seeing Kahlan's name carved in stone, too. Both of them were alive, despite their graves.
The girl glanced at Cara and then at Nicci. «The tellings say that you will come back to life, Lord Rahl, but they did not say that you would bring your spirit familiars.»
«I haven't come back from the dead,» Richard told her. «I came through the sliph-down there, in that well.»
She nodded. «The well of the dead. The tellings mention such mysterious things, but I never knew their meaning.»
«Do I call you 'priestess,' or by your name?»
«You are Master Rahl; you can call me as it pleases you. My name is Jillian, though. I have had that name my whole life. I'm afraid I have not been a priestess a long time, and so I'm not very good at it, I don't think. My grandfather said that when it is time, it matters not how old I am, but that it is time.»
«How about if I call you Jillian, then?» he asked with a smile.
She appeared still too frightened to return the smile. «I would like that, Master Rahl.»
«My name is Richard. I'd like it if you called me Richard.»
She nodded, still with that look of awe filling her round eyes. Richard didn't know if her awe was at the Master Rahl, or a dead man returned to life and walking up out of his grave.
«Now look, Jillian, I don't know anything about your tellings, yet, but you need to understand that I haven't returned from the dead. I traveled here because I have trouble and I'm looking for answers.»
«You have found the trouble, then. You killed three of them. The answer is for you to help me cast the dreams so that we might drive these evil men away. They have driven most of my people into hiding. The older ones are down there.» She pointed down the dark slope. «They tremble in fear that these men will kill them if they do not find what they seek.»
«What are they looking for?» Richard asked.
«I'm not sure. I have been hiding among the spirits of our ancestors. The men must have made someone down there tell them of me because they knew my name when they finally chased me down, today. I have been staying out of their grasp for a long time. Today they were hiding where I had cached some food. The men grabbed me and wanted me to show them where the books are.»
«These aren't the regular Imperial Order troops,» Nicci explained to the frowning look on his face. «They're advance scouts.»
Richard glanced at the bodies. «How do you know?»
«Because regular Imperial Order troops would never ask you to put down your weapons and surrender. Only the scouts, searching routes through strange lands and hunting for any information they can uncover would take prisoners. They question people. Those who won't talk are sent back to be tortured. These scouts are the men who first find stashes of books that are then collected for the emperor to see. Scouts like this find not only the best routes for the troops, but they are meant to find something even more important for the emperor: knowledge, especially that in books.»
Richard knew the truth of that. Jagang seemed to be an expert on history and what had been done in ancient times. He used that information to great advantage. It seemed like Richard was always trying to catch up with what Jagang already knew.
«Have these men found any of the books, yet?» Richard asked Jillian.
Her copper-colored eyes blinked. «My grandfather has told me about books, but I know of none that are here. The city has been abandoned since ancient times. If there were books, they have long ago been looted along with anything else of value.»
That was not what Richard had hoped to hear. He had been hoping that maybe there would be something here that would help answer the questions he had. After all, Shota had told him that he must find the place of the bones in the Deep Nothing. The graveyard all around him certainly was a place of bones.
«This place is called the Deep Nothing?» he asked her.
Jillian nodded. «It is a vast land where little lives. None but my people can scrape a life from this forbidding place. People have always feared to come here. The bleached bones of those who do venture here are out there, in this place and to the south, before the great barrier. The land is called the Deep Nothing.»
Richard realized that it must be a place much like the wilds in the Midlands.
«The great barrier?» Cara asked, suspiciously.
Jillian looked up at the Mord-Sith. «The great barrier that protects us from the Old World.»
«This has to be southern D'Hara,» Cara told him. «That's why I heard stories about Caska when I was a child-because it's in D'Hara.»
Jillian pointed. «This is the place of my ancestors. They were destroyed by those from the Old World back in ancient times. They, too, were ones who cast dreams.» She looked off into the darkness to the south. «But they failed and were destroyed.»
Richard didn't have time to try to figure it all out. He had enough problems.
«Have you ever heard of Chainfire?»
Jillian frowned. «No. What is Chainfire?»
«I don't know.» He tapped a finger against his bottom lip as he thought about what to do next.
«Richard,» Jillian said, «you must help me cast the dreams that will drive these men away so that my people will be safe again.»
Richard glanced up at Nicci. «Any ideas how I can do such a thing?»
«No,» she said. «But I can tell you that the rest of the men will sooner or later come looking for these three dead men. These aren't your average Imperial Order soldiers. They may be brutes, but they are the smartest of them. I imagine that casting dreams is something that involves your gift — not an advisable thing to be doing,» she added.
Richard stood up and put one hand on a hip as he stared off at the dark city on the headland.
«Seek what is long buried.» he whispered to himself. He turned back to Jillian. «You said that you were a priestess of the bones. I need you to show me everything you know about the bones.»
Jillian shook her head. «First you must help me cast the dreams so that I can chase the strangers away and my grandfather and the rest of our people will be safe.»
Richard sighed in frustration. «Look, Jillian, I don't know how to help you cast dreams and I don't have time to figure it out. But I would imagine, as Nicci said, that it involves magic, and I can't use magic or it very well could call a beast that could kill all of your people. This beast has already killed a lot of my friends who were with me. I need you to show me what you know about what is long buried.»
Jillian wiped at her tears. «Those men have my grandfather and others down there. They will kill him. You must save my grandfather first. Besides, he is a teller. He knows more than me.»
Richard put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. He could not imagine how he would feel if someone whom he thought was powerful refused to help save his grandfather.
«I have an idea,» Nicci said. «I'm a sorceress, Jillian. I know all about these men and how they work. I know how to handle them. You help Richard, and while you do that I'll go down there and see to getting rid of these men. When I'm done they will no longer be a danger to you or your people.»
«If I help Richard, you will help my grandfather?»
Nicci smiled. «I promise.»
Jillian looked up at Richard.
«Nicci keeps her word,» he told her.
«All right. I will show Richard everything I know about this place while you make those men leave us be.»
«Cara,» Richard said, «go with Nicci and watch her back.»
«And who will watch yours?»
Richard put a boot on the head of the man he had killed and yanked his knife free. He pointed with the weapon. «Lokey will watch our backs.»
Cara did not look amused. «A raven is going to watch your back.»
He wiped the blade clean on the man's shirt, then returned the knife to its sheath at his belt. «The priestess of the bones will watch over me. After all, she's been here waiting all this time for me to come here. Nicci is the one who will be in danger. I'd appreciate it if you protected her.»
Cara glanced at Nicci as if grasping some greater meaning. «I will protect her for you, Lord Rahl.»
It was rapture.
Abruptly, it ended.
Grainy darkness exploded in his sudden vision. There seemed to be blocky shapes all around as he broke the surface. Nicci's hand gripped his in terror.
Breathe, the sliph told him.
Richard let out the sweet breath, emptying his lungs of the rapture. With a needful gasp, he sucked in the alien air. Cara, too, gasped in the hot, dusty air.
Nicci floated face down, rocking gently in the silver fluid.
Richard threw an arm over the stone wall at the side of the sliph, pulling Nicci with him. He took his bow off his back to get it out of his way and quickly set it against the outside of the wall. With the sliph's help, he hopped up on the wall, and then with the sliph lifting her, pulled the dead weight of Nicci up enough to get her shoulders and head up into the warm, dark air.
Richard slapped her on the back. «Breathe, Nicci. Breathe. Come on, you have to let go of the sliph and breathe. Do it for me.»
At last she did. She gasped in the air, her arms flailing in terror at being confused and lost in such strange surroundings. Richard pulled her close as he helped her get her arms over the side and, panting, climb up on the wall.
Brackets on the walls nearby held glass spheres, like back at the Keep, that glowed brighter as he climbed out of the well.
«What do you think this place is?» Cara asked as she peered around in the dim light.
«That was — rapture,» Nicci said, still under the sway of the experience.
«I told you,» Richard said as he helped her climb out.
«It looks like we're in a stone room of some kind,» Cara said as she walked around the perimeter of the room.
Richard made his way toward the darkness at one end and two larger spheres in tall iron brackets brightened with an eerie green glow. He saw that they flanked steps. The steps, though, marched up to the ceiling.
«That's pretty strange,» Cara said as she stood on the second step, inspecting the dark ceiling.
«Here,» Nicci said. She was leaning over to the side of the steps. «There's a metal plate.»
It was the kind of metal plate Richard had seen in other places. They were trigger plates for shields. Nicci tapped her palm against it but nothing happened.
Richard pressed his hand to the icy cold plate and stone started grating as it moved. Dust came down in streamers.
The three of them ducked back as they all peered around in the gloomy light, trying to figure out what, exactly, was moving. The ground trembled. It felt like the whole room might be shifting and somehow changing shape. Richard then realized that it was actually the ceiling that was pulling aside.
A growing patch of moonlight fell across the steps.
Richard had no idea where they were, other than down in a stone room that appeared to be buried. He didn't know where Caska was, other than the sliph said that it was in the Deep Nothing, and he didn't know where that was, so he didn't really know what to expect. He felt decidedly uneasy.
He reached for his sword.
The sword wasn't there. For what felt like the thousandth time, he felt the sinking regret of realizing why and where it now was.
He drew his long knife instead as he started up the steps in a crouch, ducking low not only so as not to hit his head on the ceiling before it had moved out of the way, but out of caution for who might be outside and have heard stone sliding aside. Cara, seeing him draw his knife, spun her Agiel up into her fist. She tried to get out ahead of him, but he held his arm out, keeping her behind to the left. Nicci was close behind to his right.
As he came up out of the ground, he saw the shadowed shapes of three people standing not far ahead. He knew that from being in the sliph, until he fully recovered, his vision was more acute than ordinary. He could probably see them better than they could see him.
With that sharp vision, Richard saw that the big man in the middle was holding a slender girl back against him. He had one hand over her mouth. He could see the girl squirming. Moonlight gleamed off the blade he held to her throat.
«Drop your weapons,» the man holding the girl growled, «and surrender to the Imperial Order, or you will die.»
Richard flipped the knife into the air, let it make a half turn, and caught it by the tip. An inky shape suddenly swooped atop the man's head. The bird let out a piercing caw. The man flinched. Richard didn't take the time to wonder at such an unexpected assault. He heaved the knife.
On broad wings, the bird lifted into the air. The blade hit the man in the center of his face with a solid thunk. Richard knew that the blade was long enough to have penetrated all the way through the man's brain and that the tip would have pierced the back of the skull. The man dropped straight down behind the trembling girl-dead before he could think to do her harm.
Before the men to either side of the girl could take a half a step, Nicci unleashed a scything whisper of power that took the heads off the other two men. The only noise it made was the sound of the heads hitting the ground with twin, dull thuds. The bodies toppled to either side of the girl.
The night was still but for the drone of cicadas.
The girl hesitantly stepped closer and dropped to her knees. She bent forward before the steps until her forehead touched the stone at his feet.
«Lord Rahl, I am your humble servant. Thank you for coming and protecting me. I live only to serve. My life is yours. Command me as you will.»
Even as the girl was still speaking in a quavering voice, Cara and Nicci were spreading out to the sides, searching for other threats. Richard crossed his lips with a finger to let them know to be quiet about it so as not to alert any other troops that might be near. Both saw his signal and nodded.
Richard waited, listening for any threat. Since the girl was on the ground, he let her stay there, out of harm's way. He heard the whisper of feathers against air as the raven landed on a nearby limb and then the soft rustle as it folded in its wings.
«It's clear,» Nicci announced in a quiet voice as she returned from the shadows. «My Han tells me there are no others in the immediate vicinity.»
Relieved, Richard let the tension go out of his muscles. When he heard the girl weeping in quiet terror, he sat down on the top step right near her. He suspected her terror was fear that she might be killed just as the three men had been. Richard wanted to assure her that she was not going to die.
«It's all right,» he told her as he gently grasped her shoulders and urged her up. «I'm not going to hurt you. You're safe, now.»
As she came up he gathered the frightened girl into his arms, embracing her protectively, holding her head to his shoulder when she glanced to the three dead men as if they still might jump up and snatch her away. She was a slender lithesome creature, the kind of girl on the brink of being a woman, yet looking as frail as a bird about to leave the nest. Her slender arms came gratefully around Richard as she wept with relief.
«The bird a friend of yours?» he asked.
«Lokey,» she confirmed with a nod. «He watches over me.»
«Well, he did a good job tonight.»
«I thought you weren't going to come, Master Rahl. I thought it was my fault, that I wasn't a good enough priestess for you.»
Richard ran a hand down the back of her head. «How did you know I was coming here?»
«The tellings say it is so. But I already waited so long that I thought they might be wrong. I was near to despairing that you would find us not worthy, and then I feared it was my failing»
He surmised that the «tellings» must mean prophecy of some sort. «You are a priestess, you say?»
She nodded as she pulled back to look up at his smile. Richard saw then that her big copper-colored eyes peered out from a dark mask painted in a band around her face. It was a disturbing visage.
«I am the priestess of the bones. You have returned to help me. I am your servant. I am the one meant to cast the dreams.»
«Returned?»
«To life. You have come back from the dead.»
Richard could only stare.
Nicci squatted down beside the girl. «What do you mean, he returned from the dead?»
The girl pointed behind them, at the structure from where they had emerged. «From the world of the dead — back to we the living. It says his name there, on his tomb.»
Richard turned and indeed did see his name carved in the monument. The thing that came immediately to mind was seeing Kahlan's name carved in stone, too. Both of them were alive, despite their graves.
The girl glanced at Cara and then at Nicci. «The tellings say that you will come back to life, Lord Rahl, but they did not say that you would bring your spirit familiars.»
«I haven't come back from the dead,» Richard told her. «I came through the sliph-down there, in that well.»
She nodded. «The well of the dead. The tellings mention such mysterious things, but I never knew their meaning.»
«Do I call you 'priestess,' or by your name?»
«You are Master Rahl; you can call me as it pleases you. My name is Jillian, though. I have had that name my whole life. I'm afraid I have not been a priestess a long time, and so I'm not very good at it, I don't think. My grandfather said that when it is time, it matters not how old I am, but that it is time.»
«How about if I call you Jillian, then?» he asked with a smile.
She appeared still too frightened to return the smile. «I would like that, Master Rahl.»
«My name is Richard. I'd like it if you called me Richard.»
She nodded, still with that look of awe filling her round eyes. Richard didn't know if her awe was at the Master Rahl, or a dead man returned to life and walking up out of his grave.
«Now look, Jillian, I don't know anything about your tellings, yet, but you need to understand that I haven't returned from the dead. I traveled here because I have trouble and I'm looking for answers.»
«You have found the trouble, then. You killed three of them. The answer is for you to help me cast the dreams so that we might drive these evil men away. They have driven most of my people into hiding. The older ones are down there.» She pointed down the dark slope. «They tremble in fear that these men will kill them if they do not find what they seek.»
«What are they looking for?» Richard asked.
«I'm not sure. I have been hiding among the spirits of our ancestors. The men must have made someone down there tell them of me because they knew my name when they finally chased me down, today. I have been staying out of their grasp for a long time. Today they were hiding where I had cached some food. The men grabbed me and wanted me to show them where the books are.»
«These aren't the regular Imperial Order troops,» Nicci explained to the frowning look on his face. «They're advance scouts.»
Richard glanced at the bodies. «How do you know?»
«Because regular Imperial Order troops would never ask you to put down your weapons and surrender. Only the scouts, searching routes through strange lands and hunting for any information they can uncover would take prisoners. They question people. Those who won't talk are sent back to be tortured. These scouts are the men who first find stashes of books that are then collected for the emperor to see. Scouts like this find not only the best routes for the troops, but they are meant to find something even more important for the emperor: knowledge, especially that in books.»
Richard knew the truth of that. Jagang seemed to be an expert on history and what had been done in ancient times. He used that information to great advantage. It seemed like Richard was always trying to catch up with what Jagang already knew.
«Have these men found any of the books, yet?» Richard asked Jillian.
Her copper-colored eyes blinked. «My grandfather has told me about books, but I know of none that are here. The city has been abandoned since ancient times. If there were books, they have long ago been looted along with anything else of value.»
That was not what Richard had hoped to hear. He had been hoping that maybe there would be something here that would help answer the questions he had. After all, Shota had told him that he must find the place of the bones in the Deep Nothing. The graveyard all around him certainly was a place of bones.
«This place is called the Deep Nothing?» he asked her.
Jillian nodded. «It is a vast land where little lives. None but my people can scrape a life from this forbidding place. People have always feared to come here. The bleached bones of those who do venture here are out there, in this place and to the south, before the great barrier. The land is called the Deep Nothing.»
Richard realized that it must be a place much like the wilds in the Midlands.
«The great barrier?» Cara asked, suspiciously.
Jillian looked up at the Mord-Sith. «The great barrier that protects us from the Old World.»
«This has to be southern D'Hara,» Cara told him. «That's why I heard stories about Caska when I was a child-because it's in D'Hara.»
Jillian pointed. «This is the place of my ancestors. They were destroyed by those from the Old World back in ancient times. They, too, were ones who cast dreams.» She looked off into the darkness to the south. «But they failed and were destroyed.»
Richard didn't have time to try to figure it all out. He had enough problems.
«Have you ever heard of Chainfire?»
Jillian frowned. «No. What is Chainfire?»
«I don't know.» He tapped a finger against his bottom lip as he thought about what to do next.
«Richard,» Jillian said, «you must help me cast the dreams that will drive these men away so that my people will be safe again.»
Richard glanced up at Nicci. «Any ideas how I can do such a thing?»
«No,» she said. «But I can tell you that the rest of the men will sooner or later come looking for these three dead men. These aren't your average Imperial Order soldiers. They may be brutes, but they are the smartest of them. I imagine that casting dreams is something that involves your gift — not an advisable thing to be doing,» she added.
Richard stood up and put one hand on a hip as he stared off at the dark city on the headland.
«Seek what is long buried.» he whispered to himself. He turned back to Jillian. «You said that you were a priestess of the bones. I need you to show me everything you know about the bones.»
Jillian shook her head. «First you must help me cast the dreams so that I can chase the strangers away and my grandfather and the rest of our people will be safe.»
Richard sighed in frustration. «Look, Jillian, I don't know how to help you cast dreams and I don't have time to figure it out. But I would imagine, as Nicci said, that it involves magic, and I can't use magic or it very well could call a beast that could kill all of your people. This beast has already killed a lot of my friends who were with me. I need you to show me what you know about what is long buried.»
Jillian wiped at her tears. «Those men have my grandfather and others down there. They will kill him. You must save my grandfather first. Besides, he is a teller. He knows more than me.»
Richard put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. He could not imagine how he would feel if someone whom he thought was powerful refused to help save his grandfather.
«I have an idea,» Nicci said. «I'm a sorceress, Jillian. I know all about these men and how they work. I know how to handle them. You help Richard, and while you do that I'll go down there and see to getting rid of these men. When I'm done they will no longer be a danger to you or your people.»
«If I help Richard, you will help my grandfather?»
Nicci smiled. «I promise.»
Jillian looked up at Richard.
«Nicci keeps her word,» he told her.
«All right. I will show Richard everything I know about this place while you make those men leave us be.»
«Cara,» Richard said, «go with Nicci and watch her back.»
«And who will watch yours?»
Richard put a boot on the head of the man he had killed and yanked his knife free. He pointed with the weapon. «Lokey will watch our backs.»
Cara did not look amused. «A raven is going to watch your back.»
He wiped the blade clean on the man's shirt, then returned the knife to its sheath at his belt. «The priestess of the bones will watch over me. After all, she's been here waiting all this time for me to come here. Nicci is the one who will be in danger. I'd appreciate it if you protected her.»
Cara glanced at Nicci as if grasping some greater meaning. «I will protect her for you, Lord Rahl.»
CHAPTER 61
As Nicci and Cara started down toward where Jillian said the rest of the Imperial Order soldiers were, Richard went back into his tomb and recovered the smallest of the glass spheres. He slipped it into his pack so that it wouldn't interfere with his night vision, but would be handy if they had to go into any of the buildings of the city. Searching ancient decaying buildings in the dark was not a prospect he relished.
Jillian was like a cat that knew every nook and cranny of the ancient city on the headland. They went through streets that had nearly disappeared under rubble and wreckage of walls long since fallen. Some of the debris had collected weather-borne dust and dirt that had eventually filled it in, making small hills where trees now grew among the buildings. There were a number of buildings Richard didn't want to enter because he could see that they were ready to collapse if the wind blew the wrong way. Others were still in relatively good condition.
One of the larger buildings Jillian took him to had arches all along the front that at one time had probably held windows, or maybe had even been open to what seemed an inner courtyard. As Richard walked across the floor, small bits of crumbled mortar crunched underfoot. A mosaic made of tiny square colored tiles covered the entire floor. The colors were long since faded, but Richard could still make them out well enough to see that the swirling lines of tiles made up a sprawling picture of trees dotting a landscape surrounded by a wall, with paths through places where there were graves.
«This building is the entrance to a section of the graveyard,» Jillian told him.
Richard frowned as he leaned down a little, studying the picture. There was something odd about it. Moonlight fell across figures in the mosaic that were carrying platters with breads and what looked like meats into the graveyard, while other figures were coming back with empty platters.
Richard straightened when he heard a horrifying cry drift up to them from the far distance, both he and Jillian stood up stock still, listening. More of the distant, faint wails and laments drifted in on the cool night air.
«What was that?» Jillian asked in a whisper, her copper-colored eyes wide.
«I think Nicci is getting rid of the invaders. Your people will be safe once she is finished.»
«You mean she is hurting them?»
Richard could see that such concepts were alien to the girl. «These are men who would do terrible things to your people-including your grandfather. If they are left to come back another day, they will kill your people.»
She turned and looked back out through the arches. «That wouldn't be good. But the dreams would have driven them away.»
«Did casting dreams save your ancestors? Save the people of this city?»
She looked back to his eyes. «I guess not.»
«What matters most is that people who value life, like you, your grandfather, and your people are safe to live their lives. Sometimes that means it's necessary to eliminate those who would do you harm.»
She swallowed. «Yes, Lord Rahl.»
He put a hand on her shoulder and smiled. «Richard. I am a Lord Rahl who wants people to be safe to live as they wish.»
At last she smiled.
Richard looked back to the mosaic, studying the picture. «Do you know what this means? This picture?»
Finally pulling herself away from the distant, ghastly screams of pain that drifted in from the darkness, she looked down at the picture. «See this wall here?» she asked as she pointed. «The tellings say that these walls held the graves of the people of the city. This place, here, is where we are, now. This place is the passage to the dead.
«The tellings say that there were always dead, but only this place to put them within the city walls. The people didn't want their loved ones to be far from them, far from what they considered the sacred place for their ancestors, so they made passages where they could find resting places for them.»
Shota's words echoed around in his memory.
You must find the place of the bones in the Deep Nothing.
What you seek is long buried.
«Show me this place,» he told Jillian. «Take me back there.»
It was more difficult to reach than he had expected it would be. There was a labyrinth of passages and rooms back through the building. Some of it went between walls that were open to the stars, only to reenter the dark depths of the building.
«This is the way of the dead,» Jillian explained. «The deceased were brought in through here. It is said that it was made this way in the hopes that the souls of the dead would be confused by the passages and these new spirits would not be able to wander back out. Instead, confined in this place and unable to come back among the living, they would then go on to be where they belonged in the spirit world.»
They at last came back out into the night. The crescent moon was rising above the ancient city of Caska. Lokey circled above and called down to his friend. She waved back. The graveyard spread out before him was good sized, but seemed inadequate for a city.
Richard walked with Jillian on the path through the crowded graves. Gnarled trees stood in places. In the moonlight it was a peaceful place, with wild flowers spread across the rising and falling contour of the land.
«Where are the passages you spoke of?» he asked her.
«I'm sorry, Richard, but I don't know. The tellings speak of them, but do not say how to find them.»
Richard searched the graveyard, Jillian at his side, as the moon rose higher in the sky, and he could not find any evidence of passages. It all looked like any graveyard he had ever seen. Some of the ground was mounded with a number of markers. The stones for each grave were crowded close. Some yet stood, while others had long since fallen to lie flat on the ground, or be grown over.
Richard was running out of time. He couldn't stay down in Caska, forever listening to the cicadas sing. This was getting him nowhere. He needed to look for answers where he was apt to find them. This ancient place did not appear to be the place.
At the People's Palace in D'Hara there would be valuable books that Jagang had not yet been able to loot. It was more likely that he would find useful information there than in an empty graveyard.
He sat down on the side of a small hillock beneath an olive tree to consider what he might do.
«Do you know of any other place where there would be these passages that were mentioned in the tellings?»
Jillian's mouth twisted as she considered. «I'm sorry, but no. When it is safe, we can go down and talk to my grandfather. He knows many things-much more than me.»
Richard didn't know how much time he had to devote to listening to her grandfather's stories, either. Lokey fluttered down to the ground nearby to feast on the newly emerging cicadas. After the seventeen years they'd lived underground, more of them were emerging-only to be pecked up by the raven.
Richard recalled the prophecy Nathan had read to him. It had mentioned the cicadas. He wondered why. It had said something about when the cicadas awakened, the final and deciding battle was upon them. The world, it said, was at the brink of darkness.
Brink of darkness. Richard glanced down at the cicadas as they emerged. He watched them coming up out of the ground.
As he watched, he realized that they were all coming up through a space in a gravestone laying facedown against the rise of ground. Lokey had noticed, too, and stood eating them.
«That's odd,» he said to himself.
«What's odd?»
«Well, look there. The cicadas aren't coming up through the dirt, they're coming up from under that stone.»
Richard knelt down and pushed his fingers down into the space. It seemed hollow underneath. Lokey cocked his head as he watched. Richard lifted, grunting with the effort. The stone began to lift. As it came up, he realized that it was hinged on the left. It finally gave way and opened.
Richard stared down into the darkness. It wasn't a grave marker. It had been a stone cap to a passageway. He immediately pulled the glass sphere out of his pack. As it began to glow, he held it down in the dark maw.
Jillian gasped. «It's a stairway!»
«Come on, but be careful.»
The stairs were stone, irregular, and narrow. The leading edge of each was swaybacked and rounded from countless feet making the journey. The passage was lined with blocks of stone, making a clear path down deep into the ground. The steps came to a landing and turned right. After another long run, they turned left and went deeper.
When they finally reached the bottom, the passage opened into wider corridors that were carved from the solid but soft rock of the ground itself.
Richard held the glowing globe out in one hand and Jillian's hand in his other as he bent a little to clear the low ceiling as he led them deeper. It wasn't long before they encountered an intersection.
«Do your tellings say anything about finding our way down here?» She shook her head. «How about all those mazes you learned. Do you think they will do you any good down here?»
«I don't know. I never knew this place existed.»
Richard let out a breath as he looked down each of the two passages. «All right, I'll just start going in deeper. If you think you recognize anything, or any of the routes, let me know.»
After she agreed, they started down the left fork. To each side of the narrow passageway they began finding niches that had been carved into the walls. Inside each lay the remains of a body. In places the niches were stacked three or five high. Some had two bodies, probably a husband and wife.
Around some of the recesses, ancient painting still remained. The artwork was vines in some places, people with food in others, and in some places simple designs. From the different styles and the varying quality of the art, Richard guessed that it must have been done by loved ones for a member of their family who had died.
The narrow passageway opened up into a chamber with ten openings tunneling off in various directions. Richard picked one and started down it. It, too, opened into broader spaces, with a warren of branches. The elevation changed, from time to time going down deeper, and occasionally going up a bit.
They soon began encountering the bones.
There were rooms with stacks of similar bones in niches. Skulls had been carefully fit into one niche, leg bones all stacked end out in another, arm bones in another yet. Great stone bins carved in the side walls held smaller bones all laid in neatly. As Richard and Jillian moved through vault after vault, they saw walls of skulls that had to number in the tens of thousands. Knowing that he was seeing only one random passageway, Richard could not imagine how many people had to be interred in the catacombs. Even as startling, and even horrifying, as it was to see so many of the dead, each of their bones looked to have been placed reverently. None were simply cast into a hole or a corner. Each had been carefully placed as if each had been a valued life.
For what had to be well over an hour, they made their way through the maze of tunnels. Each section was different. Some were wide, some narrow, some with rooms to each side. After a time, Richard realized that each spot must have been carved out of the soft rock to make space for a family; that was why the niches seemed to fill every available space in such a haphazard fashion.
And then they came to a section of the passage that had partially collapsed. A huge section of stone had toppled and rubble had fallen in around it.
Richard stopped and looked at the tangle of stone. «I guess this is as far as we go.»
Jillian squatted down, peering under the stone block lying at an angle across the passageway. «I can see a way under here.» She turned to Richard. Her copper-colored eyes looked frightening staring out from the black mask painted across her face. «I'm smaller. Do you want me to go have a quick look?»
Richard held the glowing sphere down in the opening to light it for her. «All right. But I don't want you to keep going if you think it looks dangerous. There are thousands of tunnels down here, so there are plenty others to look in.»
«But this is the one the Lord Rahl found. It must be important.»
«I'm just a man, Jillian. I'm not some wise spirit returned from the world of the dead.»
«If you say so, Richard.»
At least she smiled when she said it.
Jillian disappeared into the angular hole like a bird going through a thornbush.
«Lord Rahl!» came her echoing voice. «There are books in here.»
«Books?» he called into the hole.
«Yes. A lot of books. It's dark, but it looks like a big room with books.»
«I'm coming in,» he said.
He had to take his pack off and push it out ahead as he crawled in. It turned out not to be as worrisome as he had feared, and he was soon through. When he stood on the other side, he realized that the huge stone block lying at an angle across the passage had once been a door. It looked like it had been designed to slide out of a slot cut into the side of the wall, but at some point the massive door had broken along a fault in the stone, and it had toppled over. As Richard inspected the mess, he brushed the dust away and saw one of the metal plates that activated a shield.
The idea that these books had been behind a shield made his heart race faster.
He turned back to the room. The warm light from the glowing sphere did indeed show a chamber full of books. The room ran at odd angles, seemingly without reason. Richard and Jillian walked along the passageway, looking at all the books. Most of the shelves were carved into the solid rock, the way the resting places for the dead had been cut out to make room.
Richard held the sphere up as he started scanning the shelves.
«Listen,» he said to Jillian, «I'm looking for something specific: Chain-fire. It might be a book. You start on one side, and I'll take the other. Make sure you look at each book's title.»
Jillian nodded. «If it's in here, we will find it.»
The ancient library was discouragingly huge. As they inched along and rounded a corner, they encountered a chamber lined with aisles of shelves. The search was slow going. They had to work in the same area so that they could both see.
For several hours, they painstakingly made their way through the room. Partway through, they encountered side chambers, smaller than the main room, but still full of books. From time to time they each had to blow dust off some of the spines.
Richard was tired and frustrated by the time they came to a spot where he saw another of the metal plates. He pressed the flat of his hand against it and the stone wall in front of them began to move. The door wasn't big, and it quickly pivoted open into blackness. He hoped that the shields keyed off what they recognized of his gift, and didn't actually work by making his power answer some silent, unfelt call. He'd not like to be down in the catacombs and have the beast materialize.
Richard stuck the light into the darkness and saw a small room with books. There was also a table that had long ago collapsed because some of the ceiling had come down on top of it.
Jillian, deep in concentration, ran a finger along the spines of the books as she read each while Richard took five strides across the room to the far wall. He saw another metal plate there and pressed his hand to it.
Slowly, another narrow door in the stone began pivoting away from him into the darkness. Richard crouched lower as he stepped into the doorway and held the light partway in.
«Master, you wish to travel?» a voice echoed.
He was staring at light reflecting back off the sliph's silver face. It was the well room, where they had come in. The doorway was on the opposite side of the steps from where they had found the first metal plate that had opened the ceiling.
They had just spent most of the night going around in a circle, ending up right where they had started.
«Richard,» Jillian said, «look at this.»
Richard turned back around and came face-to-face with the red leather cover of a book she was holding up.
It said Chainfire.
Richard was so stunned that he couldn't talk.
Jillian, grinning with discovery, came into the sliph's room with him as he backed in, taking the book from her hands.
He felt as if he were somewhere else, watching himself hold the book named Chainfire.
Jillian was like a cat that knew every nook and cranny of the ancient city on the headland. They went through streets that had nearly disappeared under rubble and wreckage of walls long since fallen. Some of the debris had collected weather-borne dust and dirt that had eventually filled it in, making small hills where trees now grew among the buildings. There were a number of buildings Richard didn't want to enter because he could see that they were ready to collapse if the wind blew the wrong way. Others were still in relatively good condition.
One of the larger buildings Jillian took him to had arches all along the front that at one time had probably held windows, or maybe had even been open to what seemed an inner courtyard. As Richard walked across the floor, small bits of crumbled mortar crunched underfoot. A mosaic made of tiny square colored tiles covered the entire floor. The colors were long since faded, but Richard could still make them out well enough to see that the swirling lines of tiles made up a sprawling picture of trees dotting a landscape surrounded by a wall, with paths through places where there were graves.
«This building is the entrance to a section of the graveyard,» Jillian told him.
Richard frowned as he leaned down a little, studying the picture. There was something odd about it. Moonlight fell across figures in the mosaic that were carrying platters with breads and what looked like meats into the graveyard, while other figures were coming back with empty platters.
Richard straightened when he heard a horrifying cry drift up to them from the far distance, both he and Jillian stood up stock still, listening. More of the distant, faint wails and laments drifted in on the cool night air.
«What was that?» Jillian asked in a whisper, her copper-colored eyes wide.
«I think Nicci is getting rid of the invaders. Your people will be safe once she is finished.»
«You mean she is hurting them?»
Richard could see that such concepts were alien to the girl. «These are men who would do terrible things to your people-including your grandfather. If they are left to come back another day, they will kill your people.»
She turned and looked back out through the arches. «That wouldn't be good. But the dreams would have driven them away.»
«Did casting dreams save your ancestors? Save the people of this city?»
She looked back to his eyes. «I guess not.»
«What matters most is that people who value life, like you, your grandfather, and your people are safe to live their lives. Sometimes that means it's necessary to eliminate those who would do you harm.»
She swallowed. «Yes, Lord Rahl.»
He put a hand on her shoulder and smiled. «Richard. I am a Lord Rahl who wants people to be safe to live as they wish.»
At last she smiled.
Richard looked back to the mosaic, studying the picture. «Do you know what this means? This picture?»
Finally pulling herself away from the distant, ghastly screams of pain that drifted in from the darkness, she looked down at the picture. «See this wall here?» she asked as she pointed. «The tellings say that these walls held the graves of the people of the city. This place, here, is where we are, now. This place is the passage to the dead.
«The tellings say that there were always dead, but only this place to put them within the city walls. The people didn't want their loved ones to be far from them, far from what they considered the sacred place for their ancestors, so they made passages where they could find resting places for them.»
Shota's words echoed around in his memory.
You must find the place of the bones in the Deep Nothing.
What you seek is long buried.
«Show me this place,» he told Jillian. «Take me back there.»
It was more difficult to reach than he had expected it would be. There was a labyrinth of passages and rooms back through the building. Some of it went between walls that were open to the stars, only to reenter the dark depths of the building.
«This is the way of the dead,» Jillian explained. «The deceased were brought in through here. It is said that it was made this way in the hopes that the souls of the dead would be confused by the passages and these new spirits would not be able to wander back out. Instead, confined in this place and unable to come back among the living, they would then go on to be where they belonged in the spirit world.»
They at last came back out into the night. The crescent moon was rising above the ancient city of Caska. Lokey circled above and called down to his friend. She waved back. The graveyard spread out before him was good sized, but seemed inadequate for a city.
Richard walked with Jillian on the path through the crowded graves. Gnarled trees stood in places. In the moonlight it was a peaceful place, with wild flowers spread across the rising and falling contour of the land.
«Where are the passages you spoke of?» he asked her.
«I'm sorry, Richard, but I don't know. The tellings speak of them, but do not say how to find them.»
Richard searched the graveyard, Jillian at his side, as the moon rose higher in the sky, and he could not find any evidence of passages. It all looked like any graveyard he had ever seen. Some of the ground was mounded with a number of markers. The stones for each grave were crowded close. Some yet stood, while others had long since fallen to lie flat on the ground, or be grown over.
Richard was running out of time. He couldn't stay down in Caska, forever listening to the cicadas sing. This was getting him nowhere. He needed to look for answers where he was apt to find them. This ancient place did not appear to be the place.
At the People's Palace in D'Hara there would be valuable books that Jagang had not yet been able to loot. It was more likely that he would find useful information there than in an empty graveyard.
He sat down on the side of a small hillock beneath an olive tree to consider what he might do.
«Do you know of any other place where there would be these passages that were mentioned in the tellings?»
Jillian's mouth twisted as she considered. «I'm sorry, but no. When it is safe, we can go down and talk to my grandfather. He knows many things-much more than me.»
Richard didn't know how much time he had to devote to listening to her grandfather's stories, either. Lokey fluttered down to the ground nearby to feast on the newly emerging cicadas. After the seventeen years they'd lived underground, more of them were emerging-only to be pecked up by the raven.
Richard recalled the prophecy Nathan had read to him. It had mentioned the cicadas. He wondered why. It had said something about when the cicadas awakened, the final and deciding battle was upon them. The world, it said, was at the brink of darkness.
Brink of darkness. Richard glanced down at the cicadas as they emerged. He watched them coming up out of the ground.
As he watched, he realized that they were all coming up through a space in a gravestone laying facedown against the rise of ground. Lokey had noticed, too, and stood eating them.
«That's odd,» he said to himself.
«What's odd?»
«Well, look there. The cicadas aren't coming up through the dirt, they're coming up from under that stone.»
Richard knelt down and pushed his fingers down into the space. It seemed hollow underneath. Lokey cocked his head as he watched. Richard lifted, grunting with the effort. The stone began to lift. As it came up, he realized that it was hinged on the left. It finally gave way and opened.
Richard stared down into the darkness. It wasn't a grave marker. It had been a stone cap to a passageway. He immediately pulled the glass sphere out of his pack. As it began to glow, he held it down in the dark maw.
Jillian gasped. «It's a stairway!»
«Come on, but be careful.»
The stairs were stone, irregular, and narrow. The leading edge of each was swaybacked and rounded from countless feet making the journey. The passage was lined with blocks of stone, making a clear path down deep into the ground. The steps came to a landing and turned right. After another long run, they turned left and went deeper.
When they finally reached the bottom, the passage opened into wider corridors that were carved from the solid but soft rock of the ground itself.
Richard held the glowing globe out in one hand and Jillian's hand in his other as he bent a little to clear the low ceiling as he led them deeper. It wasn't long before they encountered an intersection.
«Do your tellings say anything about finding our way down here?» She shook her head. «How about all those mazes you learned. Do you think they will do you any good down here?»
«I don't know. I never knew this place existed.»
Richard let out a breath as he looked down each of the two passages. «All right, I'll just start going in deeper. If you think you recognize anything, or any of the routes, let me know.»
After she agreed, they started down the left fork. To each side of the narrow passageway they began finding niches that had been carved into the walls. Inside each lay the remains of a body. In places the niches were stacked three or five high. Some had two bodies, probably a husband and wife.
Around some of the recesses, ancient painting still remained. The artwork was vines in some places, people with food in others, and in some places simple designs. From the different styles and the varying quality of the art, Richard guessed that it must have been done by loved ones for a member of their family who had died.
The narrow passageway opened up into a chamber with ten openings tunneling off in various directions. Richard picked one and started down it. It, too, opened into broader spaces, with a warren of branches. The elevation changed, from time to time going down deeper, and occasionally going up a bit.
They soon began encountering the bones.
There were rooms with stacks of similar bones in niches. Skulls had been carefully fit into one niche, leg bones all stacked end out in another, arm bones in another yet. Great stone bins carved in the side walls held smaller bones all laid in neatly. As Richard and Jillian moved through vault after vault, they saw walls of skulls that had to number in the tens of thousands. Knowing that he was seeing only one random passageway, Richard could not imagine how many people had to be interred in the catacombs. Even as startling, and even horrifying, as it was to see so many of the dead, each of their bones looked to have been placed reverently. None were simply cast into a hole or a corner. Each had been carefully placed as if each had been a valued life.
For what had to be well over an hour, they made their way through the maze of tunnels. Each section was different. Some were wide, some narrow, some with rooms to each side. After a time, Richard realized that each spot must have been carved out of the soft rock to make space for a family; that was why the niches seemed to fill every available space in such a haphazard fashion.
And then they came to a section of the passage that had partially collapsed. A huge section of stone had toppled and rubble had fallen in around it.
Richard stopped and looked at the tangle of stone. «I guess this is as far as we go.»
Jillian squatted down, peering under the stone block lying at an angle across the passageway. «I can see a way under here.» She turned to Richard. Her copper-colored eyes looked frightening staring out from the black mask painted across her face. «I'm smaller. Do you want me to go have a quick look?»
Richard held the glowing sphere down in the opening to light it for her. «All right. But I don't want you to keep going if you think it looks dangerous. There are thousands of tunnels down here, so there are plenty others to look in.»
«But this is the one the Lord Rahl found. It must be important.»
«I'm just a man, Jillian. I'm not some wise spirit returned from the world of the dead.»
«If you say so, Richard.»
At least she smiled when she said it.
Jillian disappeared into the angular hole like a bird going through a thornbush.
«Lord Rahl!» came her echoing voice. «There are books in here.»
«Books?» he called into the hole.
«Yes. A lot of books. It's dark, but it looks like a big room with books.»
«I'm coming in,» he said.
He had to take his pack off and push it out ahead as he crawled in. It turned out not to be as worrisome as he had feared, and he was soon through. When he stood on the other side, he realized that the huge stone block lying at an angle across the passage had once been a door. It looked like it had been designed to slide out of a slot cut into the side of the wall, but at some point the massive door had broken along a fault in the stone, and it had toppled over. As Richard inspected the mess, he brushed the dust away and saw one of the metal plates that activated a shield.
The idea that these books had been behind a shield made his heart race faster.
He turned back to the room. The warm light from the glowing sphere did indeed show a chamber full of books. The room ran at odd angles, seemingly without reason. Richard and Jillian walked along the passageway, looking at all the books. Most of the shelves were carved into the solid rock, the way the resting places for the dead had been cut out to make room.
Richard held the sphere up as he started scanning the shelves.
«Listen,» he said to Jillian, «I'm looking for something specific: Chain-fire. It might be a book. You start on one side, and I'll take the other. Make sure you look at each book's title.»
Jillian nodded. «If it's in here, we will find it.»
The ancient library was discouragingly huge. As they inched along and rounded a corner, they encountered a chamber lined with aisles of shelves. The search was slow going. They had to work in the same area so that they could both see.
For several hours, they painstakingly made their way through the room. Partway through, they encountered side chambers, smaller than the main room, but still full of books. From time to time they each had to blow dust off some of the spines.
Richard was tired and frustrated by the time they came to a spot where he saw another of the metal plates. He pressed the flat of his hand against it and the stone wall in front of them began to move. The door wasn't big, and it quickly pivoted open into blackness. He hoped that the shields keyed off what they recognized of his gift, and didn't actually work by making his power answer some silent, unfelt call. He'd not like to be down in the catacombs and have the beast materialize.
Richard stuck the light into the darkness and saw a small room with books. There was also a table that had long ago collapsed because some of the ceiling had come down on top of it.
Jillian, deep in concentration, ran a finger along the spines of the books as she read each while Richard took five strides across the room to the far wall. He saw another metal plate there and pressed his hand to it.
Slowly, another narrow door in the stone began pivoting away from him into the darkness. Richard crouched lower as he stepped into the doorway and held the light partway in.
«Master, you wish to travel?» a voice echoed.
He was staring at light reflecting back off the sliph's silver face. It was the well room, where they had come in. The doorway was on the opposite side of the steps from where they had found the first metal plate that had opened the ceiling.
They had just spent most of the night going around in a circle, ending up right where they had started.
«Richard,» Jillian said, «look at this.»
Richard turned back around and came face-to-face with the red leather cover of a book she was holding up.
It said Chainfire.
Richard was so stunned that he couldn't talk.
Jillian, grinning with discovery, came into the sliph's room with him as he backed in, taking the book from her hands.
He felt as if he were somewhere else, watching himself hold the book named Chainfire.
CHAPTER 62
«Richard?» It was Nicci's voice.
Still startled to actually have found Chainfire, he walked to the steps and looked up. Both Nicci and Cara, silhouetted by dawn light, were peering down at him.
«I found it. I mean, Jillian found it.»
«How did you get down there?» Nicci asked as Richard and Jillian started up the steps. «We just looked in there and you weren't there.»
«Jillian?» It was a man's voice.
«Grandfather!» Jillian raced the rest of the way up the steps and flew into an old man's arms.
Richard climbed the steps after her. Nicci was sitting on the top step. «What's going on?»
«This is Jillian's grandfather,» Nicci said, lifting out a hand in introduction. «He is the teller of these people, the keeper of the old knowledge.»
«Glad to meet you,» Richard said, embracing the old gentleman's hand. «You have a wonderful granddaughter. She just helped me out immensely.»
Still startled to actually have found Chainfire, he walked to the steps and looked up. Both Nicci and Cara, silhouetted by dawn light, were peering down at him.
«I found it. I mean, Jillian found it.»
«How did you get down there?» Nicci asked as Richard and Jillian started up the steps. «We just looked in there and you weren't there.»
«Jillian?» It was a man's voice.
«Grandfather!» Jillian raced the rest of the way up the steps and flew into an old man's arms.
Richard climbed the steps after her. Nicci was sitting on the top step. «What's going on?»
«This is Jillian's grandfather,» Nicci said, lifting out a hand in introduction. «He is the teller of these people, the keeper of the old knowledge.»
«Glad to meet you,» Richard said, embracing the old gentleman's hand. «You have a wonderful granddaughter. She just helped me out immensely.»