Phantom

  With a growing sense of urgency, Richard tried to move, to shift his balance, so that he could scramble to his feet and defend himself. It was then that he realized his wrists were bound behind his back with what felt like leather thongs. When he tried to twist out of the tightly wound bindings, the leather cut deeper into his flesh. He ignored the scaring pain and strained with all his might, but he could not break free. An old dread of being helpless with his hands tied welled up in him.

  All around him towered hulking soldiers, some in armor made of leather, or out of rusty metal discs, or chain mail, while still others wore nothing more protective than crude hide vests. Their weapons hung from wide belts and studded straps. None of the weapons were ornate. They were simple tools of their trade: knives with homemade wooden handles riveted onto the heels of the blades; swords with leather wound around wooden grips to hold them to the tangs; maces made of crudely cast iron atop a stout hickory handle or wrought-iron bar. Their coarse construction made them no less effective for their task. If anything, the lack of adornment served to emphasize their only purpose and in so doing only made them look all the more sinister.

  The greasy hair of those who didn't shave their heads was matted by the steady rain. Some soldiers had multiple rings or sharpened metal posts in their ears and nose. The grime layering their faces appeared impervious to the rain. Many a man had a swath of a dark tattoo across his face. Some of the tattoos were almost like masks, while others swept over cheek and nose and brow in wild, snaking, dramatic designs. The bold tattoos made the men look all the less human, all the more savage. The eyes of the soldiers flicked back and forth, seldom pausing on any one thing, giving the men the look of restless animals.

  Richard had to blink the rainwater out of his eyes to see. He tossed his head, flicking strands of his wet hair back off his face. It was then that he saw men to his left as well, some weeping helplessly as soldiers held up those who would not, or could not, kneel upright in the sloppy mud. The sense of panic was palpable. The floodwaters of that panic spread to Richard, rising up through him, threatening to drown him.

  This wasn't real, he knew… but, somehow, it was. The rain was cold. His clothes were soaked. An occasional shiver rattled through him. The place stank worse than anything he could ever remember, a combination of acrid smoke, stale sweat, excrement, and putrefying flesh. The cries of those around him were all too real. He didn't think he would have been able to imagine moans so devoid of hope and at the same time so desperately frightened. Many of the men trembled uncontrollably, and it wasn't from the cold rain. Richard realized, as he stared at them, that he was one of them, much the same as them, just one of the many on their knees in the mud, one of many with their hands bound behind their backs.

  It was so impossible that it was disorienting; somehow he was there. Somehow Shota had sent him to this place. He could not conceive of how such a thing could be possible; he had to be imagining it.

  A rock hidden beneath the mud dug painfully into his left knee. Such an unforeseeable, trivial detail seemed like it had to be real. How could he possibly imagine something so unexpected? He tried to shift his weight, but it was difficult to balance. He managed to push his knee to the side a little, off the sharp rock. He couldn't be imagining such a thing.

  He began to wonder if it was everything else that he had actually been imagining. He wondered if it all had just been a dream, a diversion, a trick of his mind. He began to wonder if it could be possible that the Chainfire spell had somehow made him forget what was really happening, or if reality was just so terrifying that he had somehow blocked it out of his mind, withdrawing to an imaginary world, and now, suddenly, under the stress of the situation, he had snapped back to what was real. He began to realize that, even if he didn't know exactly what was going on or how he could be so confused, what really mattered was that this actually was real and somehow he was only now awakening to it. In fact, that's just what it felt like to him, like he had just awakened, disoriented and confused.

  If he had been confused before, now he was desperately trying to remember, to understand how he had come to be where he found himself, how he had ended up on his knees in the mud among Imperial Order soldiers. It seemed like he could almost remember how he had gotten there, almost recall it all, but it remained just out of reach, like a forgotten word that was lost somewhere in the dark well of the mind.

  Richard looked down the line to his left and saw a soldier grab a fistful of man's hair and yank his head upright. The man screamed—short, terror-choked sounds driven by a heaving chest. Richard could easily see that despite the man's frantic effort, he had no chance of escape. The sounds of his tearful pleas raised goose bumps on Richard's arms. The soldier behind the kneeling man brought a long, thin knife around in front of the man's exposed throat.

  Again, Richard tried to tell himself that he had been right before, that it wasn't real, that he was somehow just imagining it. But he could see the chip in the blade of the crudely honed knife, see the man swallowing over and over in panting panic, see the grim grin on the soldier's smug face.

  When the knife sliced deep across the man's throat, Richard flinched in shock at the sight, as the man flinched with the shock of pain.

  The man thrashed, but the soldier holding him by the hair had no trouble restraining his victim. The rain-slicked muscles of his powerful arm bulged as he exerted more effort to cut down through the man's throat a second time, far deeper, and nearly all the way around. Blood, shockingly crimson in the gray light, gushed out with each beat of the man's still throbbing heart. Richard winced as the fresh smell of it made his nostrils flare.

  He tried to tell himself that it wasn't real, yet, somehow, as he watched the man weakly twisting, watched as a bib of blood grew down the front of his shirt, soaked down the crotch of his pants, it was all too real. With one final effort, his neck gaping open, the man kicked his right leg out to the side. The soldier, still holding the man by the hair, heaved him back into the pit. Richard heard the dead weight splash down heavily in the bottom.

  Richard's heart pounded against his chest wall so hard that he thought it might burst. He felt sick. He thought he might vomit. He strained frantically to wrench his hands free, but the leather only cut deeper into his flesh. The rain was washing sweat into his eyes. The leather thongs had been in place for so long that just moving against them burned painfully enough into the raw wounds to bring fresh tears to his eyes. That didn't stop him, though. He grunted with effort, putting all his muscle into the struggle to break his bonds. He could feel the leather rasping against the exposed tendons in his wrists.

  And then Richard heard his name called out. He instantly recognized the voice.

  It was Kahlan.

  His whole life hammered to a halt when he looked up, across the way and into her dazzling green eyes. Every emotion he had ever had washed through him in an instant, leaving behind a kind of weak and terrible agony that ached all the way down to the marrow of his bones.

  He had been separated from her for so long…

  Seeing her, seeing every detail of her face, seeing the little arch in the wrinkle in her brow that he had forgotten about, seeing the exact way her buck curved as she stood turned slightly, seeing the way her hair parted naturally under the weight of the rain, seeing her eyes, her beautiful green eyes, told him that he could not possibly be imagining it.

  Kahlan stretched out an arm. "Richard!"

  The sound of her voice paralyzed him. It had been so long since he had heard her singular voice, a voice that from the first time he'd met her had riveted him with its intelligence, its clarity, its grace, its bewitching charm. But now there was none of that in her voice. All those qualities had been stripped away until all that was left was anguish beyond bearing.

  Matching the distress in her voice, Kahlan's exquisite features twisted in horror at seeing him kneeling in the mud. Her eyes were rimmed with red. Tears streamed down her cheeks along with the rain.

  Rich
ard knelt frozen in terror, frozen at the sight of her, right there, so close yet so far. Frozen to discover that she was there, in the middle of thousands upon thousands of enemy troops.

  "Richard!"

  Her arm desperately stretching for him again. She was trying to get to him, but she couldn't.

  She was being held back by a burly soldier with a shaved head.

  Richard noticed for the first time that the buttons on Kahlan's shirt were gone, ripped off, so the shirt hung open, exposing her to the leers of the soldiers.

  But she didn't care. She only wanted Richard to see her, as if that was all that mattered in life, as if that single sight of him was her whole life. As if she needed only that to live.

  A painful knot swelled in his throat. Tears welled up. Richard whispered her name, too shocked by the sight of her to bring forth more.

  Frantic, Kahlan again reached out for him, straining against the restraint of the soldier's meaty hand. His tight grip left white prints of his fingers in the flesh of her arm.

  "Richard! Richard, I love you! Dear spirits, I love you!"

  As she tried to tear away, to lunge toward him, the soldier circled a powerful arm around her middle, inside her open shirt, holding her back. The man reached around and, with a finger and thumb, seized Kahlan's nipple, twisting it as he glanced up, grinning with meaning, making sure that Richard saw what he was doing.

  A small cry of surprised pain escaped Kahlan's throat, but otherwise she ignored the soldier, instead screaming Richard's name in abject terror.

  Fired by rage, Richard furiously tried to get to his feet. He had to get to her. The soldier laughed as he watched Richard struggle. There was no way another chance would come along. This was it; this would be his only chance.

  As he began to force his way to his feet, a guard rammed a boot into Richard's gut so hard that it doubled him over. Another soldier kicked him in the side of the head for good measure, stunning him nearly senseless. The world dimmed. Sound melted together into a dull drone. Richard struggled to remain conscious. He didn't want to lose sight of Kahlan. There was no sight in the whole world that meant more to him than the sight of her.

  He had to find a way to get her out of the middle of this nightmare.

  As he fought to regain his breath, the big hand of a soldier seized his hair and yanked him upright. Richard gasped, trying to draw a breath against the stupefying pain of the blows. He felt warm blood running down the side of his face, washing cold mud down his neck.

  As his head was pulled upright, Richard's gaze fell on Kahlan again, on her long hair now tangled and matted by the rain. Her green eyes were so beautiful that he thought his heart might burst with the pain of seeing her again but not being able to hold her in his arms.

  He wanted so badly to hold her in his arms, to comfort her, to protect her.

  Instead, another man was holding her in his arms. She tried to squirm away. He cupped her breast, squeezing until Richard could see that it was hurting her. She beat at him with her fists, but he held her fast. He laughed at her futile efforts as his gaze again slid to Richard.

  Kahlan fought him, but at the same time ignored what he was doing, ignored the distraction. What he was doing was not what mattered most to her. Richard was what mattered most. Her arms frantically stretched out toward him.

  "Richard, I love you! I've missed you so much!" She was overcome with sobs of sheer misery. "Dear spirits, help him! Please! Somebody help him!"

  To his left, the next man in line tried with all his might to back away as his throat was sliced deep. Richard could hear the man's frantic gasps gurgling through the gash that opened up his windpipe.

  Richard felt faint with panic. He didn't know what to do.

  Magic. He should call his gift. But how was he to do that? He didn't know how to call forth magic. And yet, in the past he had been able to do it.

  Rage.

  In the past his gift had always worked through his anger.

  Seeing the soldier holding Kahlan, hurting her, provided him with more than enough anger. Seeing another of those monsters come in close to her, leering down at her, touching her intimately, only fanned the wild flames of his anger.

  His world went red with rage.

  With every fiber of his being Richard tried to ignite his gift with the essence of that fury. He clenched his jaw, gritting his teeth with the monumental concentration of his wrath. He shook with rage, expecting an explosion of power to match that rage. He saw what he needed to do. It seemed so close. He imagined it cutting down the soldiers. He held his breath against the storm that was about to be unleashed.

  It felt like falling unexpectedly, without any ground below him to catch his fall.

  The rain continued to plunge from the gray sky as if to drown his effort. No magic arced through the empty space between Richard and the man who held Kahlan. No conjured lightning erupted. No justice was at hand.

  In all his life, if there was anything there, this was the moment it would have come—that much he knew beyond any doubt. There could be no more urgent need, no more desire, no more wrath for the woman he loved. But no power was there, no redemption at hand.

  He might as well have been born without the gift.

  He had no gift. It was gone.

  It felt to Richard as if the world was caving in around him. He wanted everything to slow down, to give him time to find a solution, but everything swirled in a terrible rush. It was all happening too fast. It was so unfair to have to die like this. He hadn't had a chance to live, to have a life with Kahlan. He loved her so much and he hadn't really been able to be with her, just the two of them, living in peace. He wanted to smile and laugh with her, to hold her, to go through life with her. Just to sit in front of a fire with her on a cold, snowy night, holding her close to him, safe and warm, as they talked about the things that mattered to them, about their future. They should have a future.

  It was so unfair. He wanted to live his life. Instead, it was to end in this miserable place for no good reason. For nothing. He wasn't even able to make his death mean something, to die fighting for life. Instead, he was going to die here in the rain and mud, surrounded by men who hated all that was good in life, while Kahlan was forced to watch it happen.

  He didn't want her to see this. He knew that she would never be able to get the sight of it out of her mind. He didn't want to leave her with that last, horrific memory of him struggling in the bloody throes of death.

  He made another attempt to get up, as did most of the other men. The soldier behind him stepped on his calves, bearing down with all his weight. The pain felt distant. Richard was in a daze.

  He wanted nothing in the world so much as to get Kahlan away from the men who were holding her, groping her. Kahlan screamed in rage at them, clawed at them, swung her fists at them, and at the same time cried in helpless terror for Richard.

  He twisted with all his might against the leather thongs binding his wrists but, rather than part, they only cut deeper. He felt like an animal caught in a trap. His hands had gone numb. He could no longer feel the warm blood dripping off his fingertips.

  He didn't want to die. What was he to do? He had to stop this. Somehow, he had to. But he didn't know how. In the past, anger was the means to reach his gift, to call forth its power. Now, there was nothing but a helpless confusion.

  "Kahlan!"

  He couldn't seem to help himself from being swept up in the terror of it, in the blind panic of it. He couldn't stop the headlong rush of it. Couldn't regain his sense of control over himself. He was being swept away in a river of events he could not control or stop. It was all so senseless. It was all so overwhelmingly pointless, so monumentally brutal.

  "Kahlan!"

  "Richard!" she cried as she again reached out for him. "Richard, I love you more than life! I love you so much. You're everything to me. You always have been."

  Sobs caught her breath, turning them to gasps.

  "Richard… I need you so badly."
/>
  His heart was breaking. He felt that he was failing her.

  A soldier seized Richard by the hair.

  "No!" Kahlan screamed, holding out a hand. "No! Please no! Somebody please help him! Dear spirits, somebody, please!"

  The soldier leaned down, a cruel smile twisting his grime-streaked face.

  "Don't worry, I'll see to her… personally." He laughed in Richard's ear.

  "Please," Richard heard himself say, "please… no."

  "Dear spirit, please, somebody help him!" Kahlan cried to those around her.

  She could do nothing and she knew it. There was no chance for him and she knew it. She was reduced to begging for a miracle. That, in itself, fed the flames of hot dread burning out of control within him. This was, the end of everything.

  "She's a real looker," the soldier said as he leered across the way at Kahlan, proving what Richard knew—that no miracle was at hand.

  "Please… leave her be."

  The soldier behind him laughed. That was what he had wanted to hear.

  Richard was choking on the sob welling up in his throat. He couldn't breathe past it. Tears ran down his face along with the rain. She was the only woman he had ever loved, the one person who meant everything to him, meant more than life itself to him.

  Without Kahlan there was no life, there was only existence. She was his world.

  Without Kahlan life was empty.

  Without him, he knew, Kahlan's life would be just as empty.

  He saw other women not far from Kahlan, all being held by soldiers, all screaming for their men. He saw them saying things much like the things Kahlan was saying, offering the same words of love, the same calls for someone to save them. The soldiers taunted the men kneeling in the mud with vile oaths.

  Seeing the women in the hands of the soldiers, one of the kneeling men to Richard's right struggled hard enough to earn himself a lightning-quick stab to the gut. It didn't kill him, but it was enough to keep him from fighting while he was made to wait his turn. As he knelt stiff and still, his wide eyes stared down at his own pink, glistening insides slowly bulging out of the gash. The screams of the man's wife seemed like they could have split the clouds above.