The Pillars of Creation

  “A very agitated official came to see me,” the Mord-Sith said in a quiet, silken voice. Her deadly glare moved very deliberately from Sebastian to Jennsen. “He thought I needed to come down here and see what was going on. He mentioned a woman with red hair. He seemed to think she might be trouble of some sort. What do you think he was so worried about?”

  The captain, who was behind Jennsen, stepped out to the side. “There’s nothing going on that you need concern yourself—”

  With a flick of her wrist, the Agiel spun up into her fist and was pointing at the captain’s face. “I didn’t ask you. I asked this young woman.”

  The glare turned back to Jennsen. “Why do you suppose he would say that I needed to come down here? Hmm?”

  Jennsen.

  “Because,” Jennsen said, unable to look away from the cold blue eyes, “he’s a pompous dolt and he didn’t like it that I wouldn’t pretend he wasn’t, just because he wore white robes.”

  The Mord-Sith smiled. It was not humor, but grim respect for the veracity of what Jennsen had said.

  The smile evaporated as she glanced at Sebastian. When her gaze returned to Jennsen, it looked as if it could cut steel. “Pompous or not, that doesn’t change the fact that there is a prisoner being released for no more cause than your word.”

  Jennsen.

  “My word is sufficient.” Jennsen irritably lifted the knife at her belt and flashed the handle at the woman. “This backs my word.”

  “That,” the Mord-Sith said in her silken hiss, “means nothing.”

  Jennsen could feel her face going red. “It means—”

  “Do you think we’re stupid?” The Mord-Sith’s skintight red leather creaked as she leaned closer. “That if you come in here and merely wave that knife handle in our faces, that our faculty of reason will evaporate?”

  The tight leather outfit revealed a body as shapely as it was powerful. Jennsen felt small and ugly before this flawless creature. Worse, she felt totally inadequate faking a story before a woman as confident as this woman was, a woman who seemed able to see right through their invented tale, but Jennsen knew that if she dared to waver now, she and Sebastian were as good as dead.

  Jennsen put as much of an edge to her voice as she could manage. “I carry this knife for Lord Rahl, in his name, and you will yield to it.”

  “Really. Why?”

  “Because this knife shows the trust Lord Rahl has placed in me.”

  “Ah. So just because you happen to carry it, we’re supposed to believe that Lord Rahl gave it to you? That he trusts you? How are we to know you didn’t find the knife? Hmm?”

  “Find it? Are you out of your—”

  “Or perhaps you and this prisoner, here, ambushed the knife’s true owner—murdered him—for no reason but to get your hands on a coveted object, hoping it would give you credibility.”

  “I don’t know how you can possibly believe such a—”

  “Or maybe you’re a coward and murdered the knife’s owner in his sleep? Or maybe you didn’t even have that much courage, and you bought if from cutthroats who murdered him. Is that what you did? Simply got it from the real murderer?”

  “Of course not!”

  The Mord-Sith leaned closer yet, until Jennsen could feel the woman’s breath on her own face. “Maybe you enticed the man it belong to into lying between your sweet legs while your partner, here, stole it. Or maybe you’re just a whore and it was the gift of a murderous thief in exchange for your womanly favors?”

  Jennsen backed away. “I—I wouldn’t—”

  “Showing us such a weapon proves nothing. The fact is, we don’t know who the knife belongs to.”

  Surrender.

  “It’s mine!” Jennsen insisted.

  The Mord-Sith straightened and lifted an eyebrow. “Really.”

  The captain folded his arms. Sebastian, standing to Jennsen’s side, didn’t move. Jennsen fought to contain tears of panic trying to surface. She endeavored to show a defiant face, instead.

  Jennsen. Surrender.

  “I have important business on behalf of Lord Rahl,” Jennsen said through gritted teeth. “I don’t have time for this.”

  “Ah,” the Mord-Sith mocked, “business on behalf of Lord Rahl. Well, that does sound important.” She folded her arms. “What business?”

  “It’s my affair, not yours.”

  The cool smile returned. “Magic business? That it? Magic?”

  “It’s not any of your concern. I’m doing Lord Rahl’s bidding and you would do well to remember that. He’d not be pleased to know you were meddling.”

  The eyebrow lifted again. “Meddling? My dear young lady, it is impossible for a Mord-Sith to meddle. If you were who you say you are, you would know that much, at least. Mord-Sith exist only to protect Lord Rahl. It would be a dereliction of my duty, don’t you think, were I to ignore such curious goings-on?”

  “No—I told you—”

  “And if Lord Rahl finds himself bleeding his life away, and asks me what happened, before he dies I can tell him that a girl with a pretty knife danced in here and demanded to have a very suspicious and tight-lipped prisoner released, and, well, we were so dazzled by the knife and by her big blue eyes that we all just thought we ought to let her have her way. That about it?”

  “Of course you have to—”

  “Do some magic for me.” The Mord-Sith reached out and tested some of Jennsen’s red hair between a finger and thumb. “Hmm? A bit of magic to prove yourself. A spell, a charm, a dazzling show of your craft. Call some lightning down, if you will. If not that, maybe then just a simple flame fluttering in midair?”

  “I don’t—”

  “Do some magic, witch.” Her voice was a deadly command.

  Surrender.

  Angry at the voice, but more so at the Mord-Sith, Jennsen slapped the hand away from her hair. “Stop it!”

  Faster than seemed possible, Sebastian went for the woman. Faster yet, her Agiel spun into her hand. She rammed the tip against Sebastian’s shoulder as he was still flying at her.

  Sebastian cried out as the weapon stopped him cold. The woman calmly pressed the Agiel against his shoulder, driving him to the ground. Sebastian screamed as he lay crumpled on the floor.

  Jennsen rushed toward the Mord-Sith. In one swift movement, the woman stood and had the Agiel before Jennsen’s face, halting her. At their feet, Sebastian writhed in agony.

  Thinking only of Sebastian, only of getting to him, only of helping him, Jennsen grabbed the Agiel, pushing it and the woman’s hand away. She went to one knee beside Sebastian. He had rolled to his side, holding himself, trembling, as if he’d been struck by lightning.

  He calmed under her gentle touch as she told him to lie still. As he recovered somewhat and tried to sit up, Jennsen put an arm behind his shoulders and helped him. He leaned against her, panting, clearly suffering the lingering effect of the pain of the weapon. He blinked, trying to clear his watering eyes, struggling to focus his vision. Jennsen, horrified by what the touch of the Agiel could do, stroked a hand down Sebastian’s face. She lifted his chin, trying to see if he recognized her, if he was all right. He could hardly sit up on his own, but he gave her a little nod.

  “Stand up.” The Mord-Sith towered over them. “Both of you.”

  Sebastian couldn’t, yet. Jennsen shot to her feet, defiantly facing the woman. “I’ll not tolerate this! When I tell Lord Rahl about this, he’ll have you horsewhipped!”

  The woman was frowning. She held the Agiel out. “Touch it.”

  Again, Jennsen seized the weapon and shoved it aside. “Stop it!”

  “It works,” the Mord-Sith muttered to herself, “I know it does—I can feel it.”

  She turned and experimentally pressed the awful thing to the captain’s arm. He cried out and went to his knees.

  “Stop it!” Jennsen caught hold of the red rod, pulling it back away from the captain.

  The Mord-Sith stared. “How do you do that?”
>
  “Do what?”

  “Touch it without being hurt? No one is immune to the touch of an Agiel—not even Lord Rahl himself.”

  Jennsen realized then that something unprecedented had happened. She didn’t understand it, but she knew that while the situation was confused, she had to seize the opportunity.

  “You wanted to see magic—you saw it.”

  “But how—”

  “Do you think that Lord Rahl would allow me to carry the knife if I wasn’t competent?”

  “But an Agiel—”

  The captain was coming to his feet. “What’s the matter with you? I fight for the same cause as you.”

  “And that cause is protecting Lord Rahl,” the woman snapped. She held her Agiel up. “This is my means of protecting him. I have to know what’s wrong lest I fail him.”

  Jennsen reached up and curled her fingers around the weapon, holding it tight as she met the Mord-Sith’s gaze. She told herself that she had to remember who she was supposed to be and to maintain the pretense. She tried to think of what she would do if she really were one of Lord Rahl’s elite.

  “I understand your concern,” Jennsen said with resolve, determined not to miss her unexpected chance, even if she didn’t fully understand it herself. “I know you want to protect Lord Rahl. We share that devotion and sacred duty. Our lives are his. I have vital business doing the same as you—protecting Lord Rahl. You don’t know all that’s involved in this and I don’t have the time to even begin to explain it to you.

  “I’ve had enough of this. Lord Rahl’s life is in danger. I have no more time to spare. If you don’t let me do my job of protecting him, then you are imperiling him and I will remove you as I would any threat to his life.”

  The Mord-Sith considered Jennsen’s words. What she could be thinking, Jennsen had no idea, but that very notion—thought—was one Jennsen had never ascribed to the Mord-Sith. She had always considered them to be mindless killers. In this woman’s eyes, Jennsen could see cognition.

  Finally, the Mord-Sith reached down and with a hand under Sebastian’s arm, helped him to his feet. When he was standing steadily, she turned back to Jennsen.

  “I’d gladly suffer the horsewhipping—and far worse—if it would help protect this Lord Rahl. Get going—and be quick about it.” She gave Jennsen a small but warm smile and then a firm clap on the side of the shoulder. “May the good spirits be with you.” She hesitated. “But, I need to know how it is that you don’t feel the power of an Agiel. Such a thing is simply not possible.”

  Jennsen was taken aback that a person this evil dared to invoke the name of the good spirits. Jennsen’s mother was a good spirit, now. “I’m sorry, but that’s part of what I have no time to begin to tell you, and besides, Lord Rahl’s safety hinges on me keeping it secret.”

  The woman stared long and hard. “I am Nyda,” she said at last. “Swear to me, personally, that you will do as you say, and protect him.”

  “I swear, Nyda. Now, I have to go. I can’t spare any more time—not for anything.”

  Before Jennsen could move, the Mord-Sith seized a fistful of her dress and cloak at her shoulder. “This is one Lord Rahl we cannot afford to lose, or we all lose everything. If I ever find out you’re lying to me, I promise you two things. First, there will never be a hole deep enough for you to hide in that I won’t find you, and, second, your death will be beyond anyone’s worst nightmare. Do I make myself clear?”

  Jennsen could only nod dumbly at the look of fierce resolve in Nyda’s eyes.

  The woman turned and started up the steps. “Get going, then.”

  “Are you all right?” the captain asked Sebastian.

  Sebastian brushed dirt off his knees as he headed for the steps. “I’d have rather had the horsewhipping than that, but I guess I’ll live.”

  The captain grimaced his sympathy as he comforted his own arm. “I have your things up there, locked away. Your weapons and your money.”

  “Lord Rahl’s money,” Sebastian corrected.

  Jennsen wanted nothing so much as to be out of the palace. She hurried up the steps, forcing herself not to break into a dead run.

  “Oh,” the Mord-Sith called back down the steps. She had paused, her hand on the rusty rail as they rushed up after her. “I forgot to tell you.”

  “Forgot to tell us what?” Jennsen asked. “We’re in a hurry.”

  “That official who came to get me? The one in white robes?”

  “Yes?” Jennsen asked as she reached the woman.

  “After he came for me, he was going to go looking for Wizard Rahl, to bring him down to see you, too.”

  Jennsen felt the blood drain from her face.

  “Lord Rahl is far to the south,” the captain scoffed as he came up the stairs behind them.

  “Not Lord Rahl,” Nyda said. “Wizard Rahl. Wizard Nathan Rahl.”

  Chapter 28

  Jennsen remembered that name, Nathan Rahl. Althea had said she met him in the Old World, at the Palace of the Prophets. He was a real Rahl, she said. She said he was powerful and inconceivably dangerous, so they kept him locked away behind impenetrable shields of magic where he could cause no harm, yet he sometimes still managed it. Althea had said that Nathan Rahl was over nine hundred years old.

  Somehow, the old wizard had escaped those impenetrable shields of magic.

  Jennsen seized the Mord-Sith by the elbow. “Nyda, what’s he doing here?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve not met him.”

  “It’s important he not see us.” Jennsen nudged Nyda ahead, urging her to hurry. “I don’t have time to explain, but he’s dangerous.”

  At the top of the stairs, Nyda looked both ways before meeting Jennsen’s gaze. “Dangerous? Are you sure about this?”

  “Yes!”

  “All right. Come with me, then.”

  “I need my things,” Sebastian said.

  “Here.” The captain pointed at a door not far away.

  While Nyda stood guard, Sebastian followed Captain Lerner inside. Jennsen, her knees trembling, stood in the doorway watching as the captain set the lamp down and unlocked a second door inside. He and Sebastian went into the room beyond, taking the lamp. Jennsen could hear brief words and the sounds of things being dragged off shelves.

  With every passing moment, Jennsen could almost hear the wizard’s footsteps bringing him ever closer. If he caught them, Sebastian’s weapons would do them no good. If Wizard Rahl saw them, he would recognize Jennsen for what she was—a hole in the world, the ungifted offspring of Darken Rahl. There would be no bluffing her way out of that. They would have her at last.

  Sebastian emerged ahead of the captain. “Let’s go.”

  He simply looked like a man in a dark green cloak, the same as before. Few would suspect the collection of weapons he carried. His blue eyes and spikes of white hair made him look different from other people; maybe that was why the guards had stopped him.

  The captain caught Jennsen by the arm. “As she said”—he nodded toward the Mord-Sith—“may the good spirits be with you always.”

  He handed her the lamp. Jennsen whispered her sincere gratitude before rushing to follow the other two down the passageway, leaving the captain of the guards behind.

  Nyda led them down dark halls and through empty rooms. They raced through a narrow cleft without a ceiling—at least, when Jennsen looked up she could see nothing but darkness above. The floor appeared to be bedrock. The wall to the right was rather unremarkable fitted stone. To the left, though, the passageway was lined with colossal, speckled pink granite blocks. Each smooth-faced block was larger than any house Jennsen had ever lived in, yet the joints were so tight that no blade could have slipped between them.

  At the end of the passageway beside the huge stone blocks, they ducked through a low door and out onto a narrow walkway made of iron and laid with planks to cross on. The thread of a footbridge spanned a wide chasm in the bedrock of the plateau. Jennsen could see by the light of her
lamp that the walls of sheer rock to each side dropped straight down, fading away far below. The light of the lamp wasn’t enough for her to see the bottom. Standing there on the slender stretch of walkway suspended over the enormous void made her feel as tiny as an ant.

  The Mord-Sith, a hand on the iron rail as she moved across the bridge, paused and looked back over her shoulder. “Why is Wizard Rahl dangerous?” It was obvious that the question had been playing on her mind. “What trouble can he cause you?” The brittle tone of her voice reverberated off the surrounding rock walls.

  Stopped there in the center of the walkway over the black abyss, Jennsen could feel the bridge swaying underfoot. It was making her dizzy. The Mord-Sith waited. Jennsen tried to think of something to say. A glance back at Sebastian’s blank expression told her that he had no ideas. She quickly decided to mix in some of the truth, in case Nyda knew anything about the man.

  “He’s a prophet. He escaped from a place where he was held, a place where he couldn’t hurt anyone. They had him there because he’s dangerous.”

  The Mord-Sith pulled her long blond braid over her shoulder, drawing her hand down its length as she considered Jennsen’s words. She clearly didn’t intend to move, yet. “I’ve heard he’s quite an interesting man.” In her eyes was awakened challenge.

  “He’s dangerous,” Jennsen insisted.

  “Why?”

  “He can harm my mission.”

  “How?”

  “I’ve already said it—he’s a prophet.”

  “Prophecy could be a benefit. It might help you in your mission to protect Lord Rahl.” The Mord-Sith’s frown darkened. “Why wouldn’t you want such help?”

  Jennsen recalled what Althea said about prophecy. “He might tell me how I’ll die, even the very day. What if you were the one who had to protect Lord Rahl against an approaching threat, and you knew that the very next day you were going to die in some horrifying fashion? Knew the exact hour, the agonizing details. It might put you in a state of paralyzing fear, and in that panic of knowing exactly when and how you were to die, you would naturally be ill suited to protect Lord Rahl’s life.”