When she first saw Philip, she thought he must be the most serious man in all the world. His young face looked to her as if it had never once smiled. That first night after meeting him, she had cried herself to sleep over thoughts of sharing her life with so solemn a man. She thought her life caught up on the sharp tines of grim fate.
Abby came to find that Philip was a hardworking man who looked out at life through a great grin. That first day she had seen him, she only later learned, he had been putting on his most sober face so that his new family would not think him a slacker unworthy of their daughter. In a short time, Abby had come to know that Philip was a man upon whom she could depend. By the time Jana had been born, she had come to love him.
Now Philip, and so many others, depended upon her.
Abby brushed her hands clean after putting her mother’s bones to rest once more. The fences Jana had watched Philip so often mend, she saw, were all broken down. Coming back around the house, she noticed that barn doors were missing. Anything an animal or human could eat was gone. Abby could not recall having ever seen her home looking so barren.
It didn’t matter, she told herself. It didn’t matter, if only Jana would be returned to her. Fences could be mended. Pigs could be replaced, somehow, someday. Jana could never be replaced.
“Abby,” Zedd asked as he peered around at the ruins of her home, “how is it that you weren’t taken, when your husband and daughter and everyone else were?”
Abby stepped through the broken doorway, thinking that her home had never looked so small. Before she had gone to Aydindril, to the Wizard’s Keep, her home had seemed as big as anything she could imagine. Here, Philip had laughed and filled the simple room with his comfort and conversation. With charcoal he had drawn animals on the stone hearth for Jana.
Abby pointed. “Under that door is the root cellar. That’s where I was when I heard the things I told you about.”
Zedd ran the toe of his boot across the knothole used as a fingerhold to lift the hatch. “They were taking your husband, and your daughter, and you stayed down there? While your daughter was screaming for you, you didn’t run up to help her?”
Abby summoned her voice. “I knew that if I came up, they would have me, too. I knew that the only chance my family had was if I waited and then went for help. My mother always told me that even a sorceress was no more than a fool if she acted one. She always told me to think things through, first.”
“Wise advice.” Zedd set down a ladle that had been bent and holed. He rested a gentle hand on her shoulder. “It would have been hard to leave your daughter crying for you, and do the wise thing.”
Abby could only manage a whisper. “You speak the spirits’ own truth.” She pointed through the window on the side wall. “That way—across the Coney River—lies town. They took Jana and Philip with them as they went on to take all the people from town. They had others, too, that they had already captured. The army set up camp in the hills beyond.”
Zedd stood at the window, gazing out at the distant hills. “Soon, I hope, this war will be ended. Dear spirits, let it end.”
Remembering the Mother Confessor’s admonition not to repeat the story she told, Abby never asked about the wizard’s daughter or murdered wife. When on their swift journey back to Coney Crossing she spoke of her love for Jana, it must have broken his heart to think of his own daughter in the brutal hands of the enemy, knowing that he had left her to death lest many more die.
Zedd pushed open the bedroom door. “And back here?” he asked as he put his head into the room beyond.
Abby looked up from her thoughts. “The bedroom. In the rear is a door back to the garden and the barn.”
Though he never once mentioned his dead wife or missing daughter, Abby’s knowledge of them ate away at her as a swelling spring river ate at a hole in the ice.
Zedd stepped back in from the bedroom as Delora came silently slipping in through the front doorway. “As Abigail said, the town across the river has been sacked,” the sorceress reported. “From the looks of it, the people were all taken.”
Zedd brushed back his wavy hair. “How close is the river?”
Abby gestured out the window. Night was falling. “Just there. A walk of five minutes.”
In the valley, on its way to join the Kern, the Coney River slowed and spread wide, so that it became shallow enough to cross easily. There was no bridge; the road simply led to the river’s edge and took up again on the other side. Though the river was near to a quarter mile across in most of the valley, it was in no place much more than knee-deep. Only in the spring melt was it occasionally treacherous to cross. The town of Coney Crossing was two miles beyond, up on the rise of hills, safe from spring floods, as was the knoll where Abby’s farmyard stood.
Zedd took Delora by the elbow. “Ride back and tell everyone to hold station. If anything goes wrong … well, if anything goes wrong, then they must attack. Anargo’s legion must be stopped, even if they have to go into D’Hara after them.”
Delora did not look pleased. “Before we left, the Mother Confessor made me promise that I would be sure that you were not left alone. She told me to see to it that gifted were always near if you needed them.”
Abby, too, had heard the Mother Confessor issue the orders. Looking back at the Keep as they had crossed the stone bridge, Abby had seen the Mother Confessor up on a high rampart, watching them leave. The Mother Confessor had helped when Abby had feared all was lost. She wondered what would become of the woman.
Then she remembered that she didn’t have to wonder. She knew.
The wizard ignored what the sorceress had said. “As soon as I help Abby, I’ll send her back, too. I don’t want anyone near when I unleash the spell.”
Delora gripped his collar and pulled him close. She looked as if she might be about to give him a heated scolding. Instead she drew him into an embrace.
“Please, Zedd,” she whispered, “don’t leave us without you as First Wizard.”
Zedd smoothed back her dark hair. “And abandon you all to Thomas?” He smirked. “Never.”
The dust from Delora’s horse drifted away into the gathering darkness as Zedd and Abby descended the slope toward the river. Abby led him along the path through the tall grasses and rushes, explaining that the path would offer them better concealment than the road. Abby was thankful that he didn’t argue for the road. Her eyes darted from the deep shadows on one side to the shadows on the other as they were swallowed into the brush. Her pulse raced. She flinched whenever a twig snapped underfoot.
It happened as she feared it would, as she knew it would.
A figure enfolded in a long hooded cloak darted out of nowhere, knocking Abby aside. She saw the flash of a blade as Zedd flipped the attacker into the brush. He squatted, putting a hand back on Abby’s shoulder as she lay in the grass panting.
“Stay down,” he whispered urgently.
Light gathered at his fingers. He was conjuring magic. That was what they wanted him to do.
Tears welled, burning her eyes. She snatched his sleeve. “Zedd, don’t use magic.” She could hardly speak past the tightening pain in her chest. “Don’t—”
The figure sprang again from the gloom of the bushes. Zedd threw up a hand. The night lit with a flash of hot light that struck the cloaked figure.
Rather than the assailant going down, it was Zedd who cried out and crumpled to the ground. Whatever he had thought to do to the attacker, it had been turned back on him, and he was in the grip of the most terrible anguish, preventing him from rising, or speaking. That was why they had wanted him to conjure magic: so they could capture him.
The figure standing over the wizard glowered at Abby. “Your part here is finished. Go.”
Abby scuttled into the grass. The woman pushed the hood back, and cast off her cloak. In the near darkness, Abby could see the woman’s long braid and red leather uniform. It was one of the women Abby had been told about, the women used to capture those with magic:
the Mord-Sith.
The Mord-Sith watched with satisfaction as the wizard at her feet writhed in choking pain. “Well, well. Looks like the First Wizard himself has just made a very big mistake.”
The belts and straps of her red leather uniform creaked as she leaned down toward him, grinning at his agony. “I have been given the whole night to make you regret ever having lifted a finger to resist us. In the morning I’m to allow you to watch as our forces annihilate your people. Afterward, I am to take you to Lord Rahl himself, the man who ordered the death of your wife, so you can beg him to order me to kill you, too.” She kicked him. “So you can beg Lord Rahl for your death, as you watch your daughter die before your eyes.”
Zedd could only scream in horror and pain.
On her hands and knees, Abby crabbed her way farther back into the weeds and rushes. She wiped at her eyes, trying to see. She was horrified to witness what was being done to the man who had agreed to help her for no more reason than a debt to her mother. By contrast, these people had coerced her service by holding hostage the life of her child.
As she backed away, Abby saw the knife the Mord-Sith had dropped when Zedd had thrown her into the weeds. The knife was a pretext, used to provoke him to act; it was magic that was the true weapon. The Mord-Sith had used his own magic against him—used it to cripple and capture him, and now used it to hurt him.
It was the price demanded. Abby had complied. She had had no choice.
But what toll was she imposing on others?
How could she save her daughter’s life at the cost of so many others? Would Jana grow up to be a slave to people who would do this? With a mother who would allow it? Jana would grow up to learn to bow to Panis Rahl and his minions, to submit to evil, or worse, grow up to become a willing part in the scourge, never tasting liberty or knowing the value of honor.
With dreadful finality, everything seemed to fall to ruin in Abby’s mind.
She snatched up the knife. Zedd was wailing in pain as the Mord-Sith bent, doing some foul thing to him. Before she had time to lose her resolve, Abby was moving toward the woman’s back.
Abby had butchered animals. She told herself that this was no different. These were not people, but animals. She lifted the knife.
A hand clamped over her mouth. Another seized her wrist.
Abby moaned against the hand, against her failure to stop this madness when she had had the chance. A mouth close to her ear urged her to hush.
Struggling against the figure in hooded cloak that held her, Abby turned her head as much as she could, and in the last of the daylight saw violet eyes looking back. For a moment she couldn’t make sense of it, couldn’t make sense of how the woman could be there when Abby had seen her remain behind. But it truly was her.
Abby stilled. The Mother Confessor released her and, with a quick hand signal, urged her back. Abby didn’t question; she scurried back into the rushes as the Mother Confessor reached out toward the woman in red leather. The Mord-Sith was bent over, intent on her grisly business with the screaming wizard.
In the distance, bugs chirped and clicked. Frogs called with insistent croaks. Not far away the river sloshed and burbled as it always did—a familiar, comforting sound of home.
And then there came a sudden, violent concussion to the air. Thunder without sound. It drove the wind from Abby’s lungs. The wallop nearly knocked her senseless, making every joint in her body burn in sharp pain.
There was no flash of light—just that pure and flawless jolt to the air. The world seemed to stop in its terrible splendor.
Grass flattened as if in a wind radiating out in a ring from the Mord-Sith and the Mother Confessor. Abby’s senses returned as the pain in her joints thankfully melted away.
Abby had never seen it done before, and had never expected to see it in the whole of her life, but she knew without doubt that she had just witnessed a Confessor unleashing her power. From what Abby’s mother had told her, it was the destruction of a person’s mind so complete that it left only numb devotion to the Confessor. She had but to ask and they would confess any truth, no matter the crime they had previously attempted to conceal or deny.
“Mistress,” the Mord-Sith moaned in piteous lamentation.
Abby, first staggered by the shock of the soundless thunder of the Mother Confessor’s power, and now stunned by the abject anguish of the woman crumpled on the ground, felt a hand grip her arm. It was the wizard.
With the back of his other hand he wiped blood from his mouth. He labored to get his breath. “Leave her to it.”
“Zedd … I … I’m so sorry. I tried to tell you not to use magic, but I didn’t call loud enough for you to hear.”
He managed to smile through obvious pain. “I heard you.”
“But why then did you use your gift?”
“I thought that in the end, you would not be the kind of person to do such a terrible thing, and that you would show your true heart.” He pulled her away from the cries. “We used you. We wanted them to think they had succeeded.”
“You knew what I was going to do? You knew I was to bring you to them so that they could capture you?”
“I had a good idea. From the first there seemed more to you than you presented. You are not very talented at being a spy and a traitor. Since we arrived here you’ve been watching the shadows and jumping at the chirp of every bug.”
The Mother Confessor rushed up. “Zedd, are you all right?”
He put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll be fine.” His eyes still held the glaze of terror. “Thank you for not being late. For a moment, I feared …”
“I know.” The Mother Confessor offered a quick smile. “Let us hope your trick was worth it. You have until dawn. She said they expect her to torture you all night before bringing you to them in the morning. Their scouts alerted Anargo to our troops’ arrival.”
Back in the rushes the Mord-Sith was screaming as though she were being flayed alive.
Shivers ran through Abby’s shoulders. “They’ll hear her and know what’s happened.”
“Even if they could hear at this distance, they will think it is Zedd, being tortured by her.” The Mother Confessor took the knife from Abby’s hand. “I am glad that you rewarded my faith and in the end chose not to join with them.”
Abby wiped her palms on her skirts, shamed by all she had done, by what she had intended to do. She was beginning to shake. “Are you going to kill her?”
The Mother Confessor, despite looking bone-weary after having touched the Mord-Sith, still had iron resolve in her eyes. “A Mord-Sith is different from anyone else. She does not recover from the touch of a Confessor. She would suffer in profound agony until she died, sometime before morning.” She glanced back toward the cries. “She has told us what we need to know, and Zedd must have his power back. It is the merciful thing to do.”
“It also buys me time to do what I must do.” Zedd’s fingers turned Abby’s face toward him, away from the shrieks. “And time to get Jana back. You will have until morning.”
“I will have until morning? What do you mean?”
“I’ll explain. But we must hurry if you are to have enough time. Now, take off your clothes.”
Abby was running out of time.
She moved through the D’Haran camp, holding herself stiff and tall, trying not to look frantic, even though that was how she felt. All night long she had been doing as the wizard had instructed: acting haughty. To anyone who noticed her, she directed disdain. To anyone who looked her way, thinking to speak to her, she growled.
Not that many, though, so much as dared to catch the attention of what appeared to be a red-leather-clad Mord-Sith. Zedd had told her, too, to keep the Mord-Sith’s weapon in her fist. It looked like nothing more than a small red leather rod. How it worked, Abby had no idea—the wizard had said only that it involved magic, and she wouldn’t be able to call it to her aid—but it did have an effect on those who saw it in her hand: it made them melt back into the dark
ness, away from the light of the campfires, away from Abby.
Those who were awake, anyway. Although most people in the camp were sleeping, there was no shortage of alert guards. Zedd had cut the long braid from the Mord-Sith who had attacked him, and tied it into Abby’s hair. In the dark, the mismatch of color wasn’t obvious. When the guards looked at Abby they saw a Mord-Sith, and quickly turned their attention elsewhere.
By the apprehension on people’s faces when they saw her coming, Abby knew she must look fearsome. They didn’t know how her heart pounded. She was thankful for the mantle of night so that the D’Harans couldn’t see her knees trembling. She had seen only two real Mord-Sith, both sleeping, and she had kept far away from them, as Zedd had warned her. Real Mord-Sith were not likely to be fooled so easily.
Zedd had given her until dawn. Time was running out. He had told her that if she wasn’t back in time, she would die.
Abby was thankful she knew the lay of the land, or long since she would have become lost among the confusion of tents, campfires, wagons, horses, and mules. Everywhere pikes and lances were stacked upright in circles with their points leaning together. Men—farriers, fletchers, blacksmiths, and craftsmen of all sorts—worked through the night.
The air was thick with woodsmoke and rang with the sound of metal being shaped and sharpened and wood being worked for everything from bows to wagons. Abby didn’t know how people could sleep through the noise, but sleep they did.
Shortly the immense camp would wake to a new day—a day of battle, a day the soldiers went to work doing what they did best. They were getting a good night’s sleep so they would be rested for the killing of the Midlands army. From what she had heard, D’Haran soldiers were very good at their job.
Abby had searched relentlessly, but she had been unable to find her father, her husband, or her daughter. She had no intention of giving up. She had resigned herself to the knowledge that if she didn’t find them, she would die with them.