Just beyond him, the eyes of the man with the broken nose went wide as he, too, stiffened with shocked surprise. Kahlan used the knife planted in the chest of the first man as an anchor, for leverage. With that grip to help her, she spun around the man already stabbed. At the same time, she brought the knife in her right hand around with her, in an arc. The blade slashed open the throat of the man with the broken nose. In two beats of her hammering heart she had killed them both.
Kahlan drove her left boot into the first man as he fell, in order to pull free the embedded knife and to spring herself in the opposite directiontoward the officers. On the third beat of her heart she hit the first officer like a Ja'La tackle. As she flew into him, she plunged the knife in her right hand deep into his belly, jerking up as she did so to rip him open.
At the same time she stabbed the other knife square into the throat of the man immediately to the side and a little behind the first officer. He had been the ranking officer and the one she was really targeting. She hit him with such force that the blade not only drove through the man's throat but, hitting the space between the vertebrae, pierced all the way through his neck. His spinal cord cut, his entire dead weight dropped straight down so fast that Kahlan's grip on the knife twisted her off balance and pulled her with him.
At the same time, before she could catch herself or yank the knife back, the power from the collar hit Kahlan like a lightning bolt.
At the same time, the other three special guards tackled her, taking her the rest of the way off her feet and ramming her face-first into the soft ground. With the collar making her arms numb and useless, and her legs unable to respond to her wishes, the men had no trouble disarming her.
When Jagang shrieked the order, they hauled her to her feet. Kahlan panted from the effort of the brief battle. Her heart still raced. Even if she had failed to escape, she wasn't entirely disappointed. She hadn't really thought that her chances of making it were that good to begin with. She had expected, though, to at least kill a couple of officers, and she had accomplished that. She was disappointed only that the special guards had not killed her rather than capture her.
Jagang dismissed the confused officers, explaining that it was a bit of magic that had gotten loose. He assured them that he had everything well in hand. They were men used to violence and seemed to take the sudden death of two fellow officers by an invisible hand, if not in stride, at least with a level of self-control, reassured by the demeanor of their emperor.
As they made their way out of the emperor's compound, they collected a number of men who rushed in to remove the bodies. The guards who came to see what the commotion was all about were dismayed to see such a murder within their layers of defenses. They all glanced to Jagang to gauge his mood and, seeing him calm, swiftly went about the business of carrying off the four dead men.
Once they had departed, Jagang finally turned a glare on Kahlan. "I see that you were closely watching the games. You appear to have been paying more attention to the strategy than the bare flesh of muscular men."
Kahlan met the gazes of the three special guards holding her. "Just keeping a promise."
Jagang slowly let out a deep breath, as if trying to keep from murder himself. "You are quite a remarkable woman—and a formidable opponent."
"I'm the bringer of death," she told him.
He glanced at the four bodies being carried out into the night. "So you are."
He turned his intense attention to the three men holding Kahlan. "Is there a reason that I should not send you three off to be tortured?"
The men, who had been smug about having taken her down, suddenly didn't seem so smug. They glanced nervously at one another.
"But Excellency," one of them said, "The two men who failed you paid With their lives. The three of us stopped her. We didn't let her escape."
"I am the one who stopped her," he said through barely restrained rage. "I stopped her with the collar she wears around her neck." He considered them silently for a moment, letting his flash of rage calm down a little. "But I am called Jagang the Just for good reason. I will allow you three to live for the time being, but let this be a lesson to you. I warned you that she was dangerous. Now, perhaps, you can see that I know what I'm talking about."
"Yes, Excellency," the three said over one another.
Jagang clasped his hands behind his back. "Release her."
He passed a withering glare over each man before taking Kahlan's arm and leading her back toward the opening of the tent. She was still reeling from the shock of the collar. Her joints ached, her legs and arms burned from inside.
She had wondered if Jagang had been telling the truth that he could use the collar without the Sisters needing to be present. Now she knew. Without that collar she might have stood a good chance of breaking free; with it, she didn't. She dared not take Jagang's ability lightly from now on. At least now she knew. Sometimes, it was worse to wonder if something would have been possible.
"I want you three to guard outside my tent tonight. If she comes out without me, you had better stop her."
The three soldiers bowed. "Yes, Excellency."
They no longer looked at all smug. They looked like what they weremen who had just escaped a death sentence.
As the men took up their posts, Jagang turned a grim look on Kahlan. "The last time you only went for a walk among the men. It was a short walk. You saw only a small sampling of my army. Tomorrow, you are going to have a much better chance to see a great many more of my men. And a lot more of those men are bound to see you.
"I don't know what the anomaly is that Ulicia spoke of, or its cause, but it doesn't really matter to me. What matters is that, like in all things, I intend to use it to my advantage. I intend to see to it that you are well guarded. You will ride again tomorrow and we will take a tour through the troops, but you are going to do it without your clothes. In that way, you will help find us a goodly supply of new special guards. It should be quite an exciting day."
Kahlan didn't offer an argument—none would have done any good. She could tell by the careful way in which he explained it that he meant for it to make her uncomfortable. She suspected that her humiliation was only just beginning.
Emperor Jagang ushered her in through the opening of his tent as if she were royalty. He was mocking her, she knew. As she moved inside she could feel the power of the collar release its grip on her. She could at last move her feet and arms on her own. The pain, thankfully, began to fade as well.
Inside the tent it was nearly dark, lit only by candles. They gave the tent a warm glow, making it feel cozy and safe, almost like a sacred place. It was anything but.
She felt as if she were being led to her execution.
* * *
CHAPTER 47
The slaves who had prepared a late-night sampling of light foods for the emperor were all dismissed. At seeing the look in his eyes, and after having heard the screams of dying men, everyone was only too happy to leave when he growled at them to get out.
He watched as they all rushed out and then, with a thick finger pressed into the center of her back, Jagang silently steered Kahlan past the table with mugs of wine, platters of meats, loaves of dark bread, bowls of nuts, and arrangements of fruits and sweets, escorting her beyond another tapestry hanging before an opening into an inner bedroom within the tent.
The bedroom was isolated from the rest of the tent and from the outside by what looked to be padded panels, probably to make it quieter. The walls were also covered with hides and fabric hangings of material woven into muted patterns. The room was warmly decorated with exquisite carpets, a few small pieces of fine furniture, glass-fronted bookcases filled with books, and ornate silver and gold lamps. The bed, covered in furs and satin, had spiraled, dark wooden posts at each corner.
Kahlan hid her trembling fingers behind her back as she watched Jagang cross the room and remove his lamb's-wool vest. He tossed it over a chair at a small writing desk. His naked chest and back
were covered in dark, curly hair. He looked like a bear of a man in more ways than one. He looked like anything but a man who would have satin bed coverings. She suspected that he didn't really appreciate such things, but wanted them as a mark of his station. She guessed that he must have forgotten that no one was supposed to be better than anyone else in the Order. She guessed that he never considered whether or not the men out in the grimy tents had satin blankets to sleep under.
Jagang looked up at her. "Well, woman, take off your clothes. Or would you rather I tear them off you. Your choice."
"Whether I take them off, or you rip them off, it is still rape."
He straightened and peered at her for a time in the silence within the tent. The camp outside had quieted down considerably, leaving only the muted sounds of distant words to melt together into a dull hum. The men were tired from the day's long march, as well as the excitement of the Ja'La games, and Jagang had decreed that each day's march would be equally swift until they reached the People's Palace, so most of the men were no doubt in their tents sleeping.
The only one not quieted down for the night was Jagang. If he was in an excited state after the games, then after her killing the four men he was on the edge of a rampage. Kahlan didn't really care. If he beat her senseless, then she wouldn't have to be conscious for what else he was going to do to her.
"You are mine, now," he said in a low, dangerous tone. "You belong to me—to no one else. To me alone. I can do whatever I wish with you. If I choose to cut your throat, then it is your duty to bleed to death for me. If I give you to those three men who can see you, then you will submit to them, whether you like it or not, whether you do so willingly or not.
"You belong to me, now. Your fate is what I choose for you. You have no choice in what happens to you. None. Everything that happens to you is by my choice alone."
"It's still rape."
He crossed the room in three angry strides and backhanded her, knocking her sprawling. He pulled her up by the hair and heaved her at the bed. The world spun as Kahlan tumbled through the air. She only missed the wooden post by inches.
"Of course it's rape! That's what I want it to be! That's what you have coming!"
He charged to the bed like an enraged bull. His black eyes were filled with wild storms of shapes. Before she knew it, he was above her. Kahlan had it all planned out. She wasn't going to try to stop him, to give him the satisfaction of having to use force to have her. But with him right there, on top of her, straddling her hips, those thoughts were lost in the sudden panic of events that she desperately didn't want to happen. She forgot all her plans and desperately tried to push his hands away, but in such a mood there was no stopping him. She had no strength to begin to match him. He didn't even bother to slap her to make her stop resisting. With one yank, he ripped her shirt open.
Kahlan went still as he stopped, her chest heaving from the effort. He stared down at her breasts.
She used the sudden quiet to school herself. She had just killed four brutes. She could do this. This was nothing compared with having a collar around her neck, having her memory stripped away from her, losing her identity, losing who she was, becoming the helpless slave to Sisters of the Dark and an emperor of a mob of thugs.
This was nothing. She was better than to fight him in such a foolish manner, like a schoolgirl trying to slap away the hands of a bully. She didn't fight like that. She wouldn't. She knew better. Yes, she was terrified, but she didn't have to surrender to panic. She was afraid when she'd killed those four men, but she had controlled her fear and acted.
She was better than he was. He was only stronger. He could only have her by force. That knowledge gave her a thread of power over him, and he knew it. He could never have her willingly because she was better than he was, and she deserved better by far. He could never have a woman like her except by force because he was weak and worthless as a man.
"Is your prize of prizes satisfactory, Excellency?" she mocked.
"Oh, yes." Jagang's wicked smile widened. "Now take off those traveling pants."
When she made no move to comply, he did it for her, opening the buttons one at time as if opening something valuable. She lay with her hands at her sides. He hooked his fingers over the waist of her pants, drew them down her legs, and pulled them inside out getting them off over her feet. He threw them aside as he paused to take in the length of her nearly bare body.
Kahlan silently bit the inside of her cheek to keep from pushing his hand away in a panic as he glided his hand up her leg, feeling the softness of her thigh. Kahlan fought back her tears. She would have given anything not to be there, to be anywhere else but at the mercy of this monster.
"Now, the rest of it," he said in a thick whisper. "Take off those underthings."
She could tell that pulling her clothes off had only excited him even more, so she did as he told her to do, trying to make it look anything but seductive as she did so.
As he watched her following his orders, he sat on the edge of the bed and pulled off his boots. He dropped his pants and kicked them off. As sickened as she was terrified by the sight of him naked, Kahlan gave in to weakness and turned her eyes away from him.
She wondered how she would ever be able to fall in love and let a man touch her after this. She reproached herself. She was never going to have the chance to fall in love. She was fretting over a problem she would never have.
The bed moved under his weight as he climbed up beside her and lay down. He paused to stare at her, to run his hand over her belly. She'd expected it to be a rough touch, a harsh grabbing of her, but instead it was a furtive touch, a slow, measured evaluation of something quite valuable. She didn't expect his gentle approach to last much longer.
"You really are quite extraordinary," he said in a husky voice, almost more to himself than to her. "Perceiving you through the eyes of others just wasn't the same—I can see that now."
His tone had changed. The anger had melted away under the heat of his desire for her. He was on the brink of surrendering to uninhibited lust.
"It's not at all the same… I always knew you were exceptional, but now that I see you, like this… you are a remarkable creature. Just… remarkable."
Kahlan wondered what he meant when he'd said that he had perceived her through the eyes of others. She wondered if he meant that he had watched her through the eyes of the Sisters. She was struck by an unexpected thought that rattled her: it was the thought of him having watched her undressing when she had thought that only a Sister was there. It filled her with an icy rage at such a violation.
He had been there, then, watching her, planning this. But at the same time she got the feeling that he was talking about something else, too. There was more to his words, more meaning in them, something hidden. Something in the way he'd said it made her think that he was talking about something in her life before the Sisters, back before she had lost who she was. She was angry thinking about him watching her through the Sisters, but thinking about him seeing her before, in her life that she couldn't remember, rattled her.
He abruptly rolled over onto her. "You can't imagine how long I've waited to do this to you."
Her breathing, and her heartbeat, had only just started to settle down. Now, it was happening too fast. Her heart was again thumping against her ribs. She wanted to slow him down, to give herself time to think of a way to prevent him from doing this to her. At the feel of his flesh against hers, though, her mind went blank. She couldn't think of any way to stop him. She could only fixate on how badly she didn't want him to do this.
She reminded herself of the promises she had made to herself. She was better than him; she should act like it.
She said nothing. She stared past him up at the roof of the tent illuminated softly in the lamplight.
"You can't imagine how much I've wanted to do this to you," he said in a suddenly menacing voice. "You can't imagine how much you have this coming to you."
She shifted her gaze to mee
t his nightmare eyes. "No, I can't. So just get on with it and spare me a speech that means nothing to me, since I have no idea what you're talking about."
She turned her eyes away to stare off once more. She wanted to show him only indifference. She freed her mind to wander. It wasn't easy with him pressing against her, about to have his way with her, but she did her best to ignore him, to think about other things. She didn't want to give him the satisfaction of a struggle she would only lose. She thought about the Ja'La game, not because it was something she wished to think about, but because it was fresh enough in her mind to be easy to recall in detail.
He abruptly hooked his arms behind her knees and pulled her legs up almost to her chest. It was hard to breathe. It hurt her hip joints to be bent like that, with her legs spread that way, but she swallowed back the scream and tried to ignore the way he was trying to control her, to dominate her as he took her.
"If he knew… this would kill him."
Kahlan's eyes turned to him. She could only pull in half a breath against the weight of him. "Who are you talking about?"
She thought that maybe it was her father—a father she didn't remember. Perhaps she had a father who was a commander in the army, and that was why she seemed to know how to fight with a knife. She couldn't imagine who else he could be talking about.
She wanted to say something to deflate him, but she thought better of it and remained silent, indifferent.
Jagang's mouth was on her ear. His rough stubble scraped painfully against her cheek and neck. His breathing was fast and ragged. He was lost to the lust he was about to unleash on her.
"If only you knew… this would kill you," he said, obviously and profoundly pleased with the thought.
Even more puzzled, she remained silent, her worry building about what he could possibly mean.
She thought he was about to resume his obviously lecherous need, but he rested there, holding her legs open, staring down at her. The length of his hairy body pressed against her, on the brink of his intent. With his weight on her, she could hardly get a breath, but she knew that any protest would only be met with disinterest in what discomfort he might be causing her.