Severed Souls

  CHAPTER

  48

  Richard couldn’t believe what he was hearing, especially from Zedd. It made him feel very lonely, and very lost.

  It made the world seem too big, too overwhelming.

  “After all you’ve taught me, Zedd, how can you give me such advice?”

  “I am First Wizard Zeddicus Zu’l Zorander, that’s how. I, too, have lived—and live now again—for duty, as you do now. Perhaps I can see better from the perspective of my age what matters in life, what slips away from us when we aren’t paying attention, when we’re fighting all the time for others.”

  “Zedd, I’m sorry, but I just don’t know how you can suggest such a thing. Would you advise me to let everyone die? I can understand you telling me that I need to remember to live life along the way, but how can you suggest that I let Hannis Arc and Emperor Sulachan go on unchecked? They will kill countless people and very possibly destroy all of mankind in their crazy scheme to rule everything.”

  Zedd smiled sadly. “There is always someone who wants to rule the world, my boy, someone who wants power, someone who is willing to kill everyone they need to kill in order to get what they want. Wizard’s rule, remember? There have always been those who hate, and there always will be.

  “Is it your responsibility to save everyone from them?”

  Richard searched for words. “It kind of is, Zedd. I’m Lord Rahl. I’m the head of the D’Haran Empire. I took on that responsibility because I want people to be able to live in peace and safety. I am the Lord Rahl who is the magic against magic, the holder of the bond, the one who is duty-bound to protect those people.”

  “Your duty.” Zedd sadly shook his head. “Duty is overrated. And as for your bond, that sickness in you has taken that away.”

  Richard ran his fingers back through his hair. “I know, but if I don’t—”

  “What did Magda Searus tell you?” He rolled a finger. “In that second emblem, what did she tell you?”

  Richard thought a moment and then repeated the words. “Know that you are the only chance life has, now. Know, too, that you are balanced between life and death. You have the potential to be the one to save the world of life or end it. You are not destined for anything. You make your own destiny.”

  Zedd arched an eyebrow at Richard. “It seems to me she is giving you the same advice I’m giving you. You have the potential to be the one to save the world of life or end it. You are not destined for anything. You make your own destiny. That means that by interfering, trying to help, since you have the touch of death in you, you might inadvertently be the one who causes the world of life to be ended. When she said that you are the only chance life has now, maybe she meant that you must walk away in order to give the world of life that chance.”

  “I had that same thought,” Richard admitted. “But I could also be the one to save it. What if it means that by giving up, and not trying, then life will be destroyed. That would make it my fault.”

  Richard recognized the mistake before he’d finished saying it.

  Zedd didn’t miss it either. “Don’t blame the victim for the crime. It is not your fault for what others choose to do. Don’t let people hang guilt on you if you decide, after all you have done for everyone, after all the sacrifices you have made, to finally live your own life.”

  Richard nodded. “I know. But if I have the ability to help and I don’t, then I don’t know how I could live with myself.”

  “Look, Richard,” his grandfather said with a sigh, “it’s not like I don’t understand. I’ve been in your place, where half the world depended on me to save them while the other half was trying to kill me and those I loved. I carried the weight of the world on my shoulders, much as you do now.”

  Richard shared a long look with his grandfather. “So what did you do?”

  “After the world had knocked some sense into me, I did the same as I’m advising you to do. I left—quit everything—and went off to live my own life.”

  “You mean when you fled to Westland and let everyone think you were dead?”

  Zedd nodded as he stared off into the memories. “I gave it all up and took your mother to Westland where we lived our lives in peace and happiness. We had a good life until she died. Then, after that, I mostly had the joy of raising you, away from that call of duty and those who would harm you, away from those who needed me.

  “We had a good life, didn’t we? Didn’t we have the best time?”

  Richard couldn’t help smiling at the memory. “We did. The best life ever. At least until the boundary failed and Darken Rahl came after me. I miss it, that time when it was you and me. I miss Hartland.”

  With his bony fingers, Zedd gripped Richard’s shoulder. “My advice is that you do the same, now, Richard, as I did. Take your precious wife and go off somewhere all alone with her. Find a safe place where you can be lost to everyone else. Leave the world to work out its own problems while you love Kahlan, maybe raise a family of your own. Leave mankind to work it out, to either survive or drive itself into oblivion.

  “Maybe your destiny, your way of saving everyone, is to have children and teach them as I have taught you.”

  Richard felt a tear rolling down his cheek at such a thought. He remembered when Kahlan had been hurt so badly that he didn’t know if she would live. She had lost her child to those brutes. She had almost lost her life. How could he live without her? Life would not be worth living without her.

  When she had been hurt so terribly, he had quit everything and taken her back deep into Westland, where no one lived, and built a small home where they could live in peace as she recovered. It was one of the happiest times of his life. It had been life as Zedd was telling him to live it now.

  He wondered if Zedd could be right, if he was not only throwing away his own life on a hopeless quest to save mankind from itself, but was also throwing away Kahlan’s life. After all, Cara had eventually found happiness, and while she and her husband had been doing their duty, fighting those who lusted to destroy life, she had lost him and lost her chance at happiness. And for what? Was the world any better off?

  He felt sick and dizzy at the implications. He felt lost and confused.

  “Zedd, with so many good people depending on you, how could you make such a decision? I mean, how were you able to do it?”

  Zedd thought for a time. “It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. At the same time, it was easy because I was doing it out of love for your mother, and for you, even though you hadn’t been born, yet. I wanted you both to have a life away from any duty but to live for the joy of living. In that time and place, while I had quit and was lost to the rest of the world, you learned what made you the man you are today.

  “After all is said and done, Richard, perhaps Magda Searus was telling you the exact same thing, that you can’t really save the world of life, and in fact your attempt to do so may be what ends it. Maybe she also saw in the Twilight Count that you needed to take your own beloved Confessor, and go make your own destiny.

  “Maybe ending prophecy meant to quit being a slave to it.”

  With his left hand Richard gripped the hilt of the Sword of Truth sheathed at his hip. He spoke softly, but firmly.

  “I’m fighting for the kind of world I want to live in, Zedd, the kind of world where people can live their lives for themselves, where they can work, create, trade, and live without the threat of others taking everything from them—much like the world you fled to and where you raised me.”

  “That’s the kind of world I would wish to live in, too, Richard, but it is nothing more than a wish.

  “For those reasons and more, I know that I have grown tired of life. I am weary of struggling against such endless depravity. It seems to me that there is less and less to live for all the time. The two people I love most in the world, you and Kahlan, seem condemned to lives of endless fighting and war that is gradually destroying everything good in the world.

  “I ask myself all the
time, what is there to live for anymore? I can’t live in peace. My whole life, until I quit and fled to Westland, was spent in a life-and-death struggle with that evil. It never ends. I am tired of it, tired of the struggle, tired of the withering plague of hatred, tired of everything.

  “That is why I say you need to quit and enjoy what you can of your life while you have it, while you still can.

  “Give it up, Richard. Go and live for yourself. Forget the rest of the world. Let the inevitable happen as it will. In the meantime, turn your back to all the hate, take the joy you can, and live for yourselves. Just as I did, you will find that after a time the savage streak in mankind becomes a distant memory and unimportant. Let it become unimportant to you and Kahlan.”

  Richard fell back on what was most important to him. “But fighting this struggle has also won me Kahlan.”

  Zedd shot him a look. “Then take what you have won and walk away before you end up losing it.

  “When we get that poison out of you, just walk away, Richard. That’s my advice. Walk away before you lose it all.

  “I will miss you, and may die of a broken heart not to have you close to me, but I will be able to die happy knowing that you are happy and at peace somewhere with Kahlan. I will fight on, knowing that you two are safe and living life.

  “I love you both and want you to have that life together.

  “That’s what love really is, you know, wanting the best for those you love, no matter how much it may hurt you to let them go.”

  Richard smiled, then. “Zedd, how in the world could I ever be happy without you in my life?”

  “Ah, well, my boy, there is that problem.”

  CHAPTER

  49

  “Kahlan, are you awake?”

  Kahlan looked back over her shoulder and saw that it was Nicci leaning down close.

  She turned and sat up. “What is it?”

  Nicci glanced at the empty bedroll. “Where’s Richard?”

  Kahlan gestured across the encampment. “He said that he wasn’t tired after being unconscious for so long so he wanted to go check on the sentries. He told me to get some rest and he would be back soon. Why, what is it? Is something wrong?”

  Nicci drew her lower lip between her teeth as she briefly glanced to each side. “Can I talk to you? Privately?”

  Kahlan was exhausted and in no mood to talk, but she knew that Nicci had to be just as tired. She also knew that the woman never engaged in idle chitchat. If she wanted to talk, it was because it was important or there was something wrong.

  Kahlan looked around. There were other people not too far away. They had wanted to keep the encampment tight in case there was an attack. Now that everyone was bedded down and quiet they could easily be within earshot. Nicci had said “privately.” Kahlan pointed off to the side of camp.

  “Sure. Let’s go over there. We can sit on that low boulder under the ash trees.”

  Nicci glanced back at the place Kahlan had pointed to. “That works.”

  As it turned out, Kahlan was the one who sat on the rock and covered her yawn with a hand as Nicci paced before her. Kahlan waited, watching Nicci walk back and forth for a while, before she finally decided that the sorceress wasn’t going to talk unless encouraged.

  “Nicci, what is it? What’s wrong?”

  It occurred to Kahlan that it was a pretty open-ended question. There were whole constellations of things that were wrong.

  “I don’t trust Irena.”

  That was not one of the stars that had been twinkling for attention among the constellations of problems in Kahlan’s mind. She would have picked something like her and Richard being on death’s doorway.

  “All right,” Kahlan said in an even tone.

  Nicci stopped pacing and faced her. “Didn’t you hear me? I’m telling you, I don’t trust the woman.”

  Kahlan shrugged. “All right. Why not?”

  Nicci scowled. “Do I need to have a reason?”

  Kahlan thought about it a moment as Nicci stared at her. People usually found such a glare from the bewitching sorceress uncomfortable in the extreme, but Kahlan was not one of those people. She was in no mood for cryptic personal reports in the dead of night. If there was a point, she wanted to hear it.

  “Well, if you’re asking me to cross her off the guest list for the next palace ball, I suppose I don’t need to have your reasons. You’ve got it. Consider it done.

  “But on the other hand, if you are asking me for permission to kill the woman, then I guess I ought to hear your reasons.”

  Nicci folded her arms as she went back to pacing. She huffed a sigh. “Irena said that when the bones washed out of the swamp, she identified them as the remains of her sister.”

  “That’s right. She said that she detected the residue of the gift in them and she recognized it as her sister’s gift.”

  Nicci came to a halt and leaned toward Kahlan, arms still folded. “Kahlan, I’m pretty experienced—I’ve been a Sister of the Light, a Sister of the Dark, and Death’s Mistress—and I’ve never heard of the gift being detectable in bones.”

  That gave Kahlan pause. “You can’t recognize traces of the gift in the bones of a person?”

  “No.”

  Kahlan was surprised, but she was tired and didn’t feel like working out what seemed like a trivial puzzle.

  “Well, just because you never heard of it and you can’t do it, that doesn’t mean it can’t be done.”

  “In this case I’m pretty sure it does.” By her tone of voice, Nicci was in no mood for games, either. She expected her word in this to be taken seriously. “I know a lot about the gift. I used to teach its use. I’ve worked and studied at the Palace of the Prophets for more than four of your lifetimes, plus the lifetimes of Irena and her daughter added in.

  “I’m telling you, I know about these things and you can’t detect the gift in human remains, much less identify the person they came from. Maybe occult conjuring can do such things, but the gift cannot. She also said that she knew the captive had occult powers. Zedd and I couldn’t detect anything.”

  “Well, I admit that is kind of odd, but maybe, as she explained, living this close to the barrier some people may have begun to accumulate some of those occult abilities.”

  “Maybe,” Nicci admitted under her breath.

  “Is that it? That’s the reason you don’t trust her?”

  Nicci started pacing again. “How did you get to Jit’s lair in Kharga Trace?”

  Realizing that this was far from over, Kahlan pushed some of her hair back away from her face and turned more serious. “I followed the road toward Kharga Trace until it eventually diminished down into a small trail that led out across the swamp. The trail was hard to miss. It was built out of branches and saplings and such to keep you up out of the water. In some places it was like a bridge, spanning long stretches of open water on its way to Jit’s place.”

  “So it was all up above water, where you could see it.”

  “Of course. You must know that, though. You would have had to come in the same way to get Richard and me out.”

  Nicci confirmed with a nod that she did indeed know it.

  “Irena said that none of her people knew where the Hedge Maid’s lair was located in the swamp, so she didn’t know where to look for her sister.”

  Kahlan scratched an eyebrow. “What of it?”

  “You found the way into Jit’s. That boy, Henrik, found his way in. People hoping to be healed found their way in. We found the trail made of branches and vines. It’s the only way into the Hedge Maid’s lair. None of us has ever been in the Dark Lands before and we found it. Stroyza is the nearest village to Kharga Trace. How could Irena not know where Jit’s lair was, or about the trail across the swamp?”

  Kahlan frowned. “I don’t know, Nicci. That does seem a bit strange, but then her people very well might stay close to their cave. The Dark Lands are dangerous. Samantha said that she had never really been anywhere until she we
nt with Richard.

  “Do you really think it’s all that important? Is that reason enough not to trust her?”

  Nicci stopped and gave Kahlan a cold glare. “The woman is in love with Richard.”

  “So are you.”

  Had it been any more light than just the moon through the cloud cover and the distant campfire, Kahlan was sure that she would have seen Nicci’s face go scarlet.

  She went back to pacing for a bit before she spoke again.

  “I don’t know how to answer to that, Kahlan. You know the entire situation better than anyone, except, I guess, for Richard. A lot of people love Richard, and in a lot of different ways. No one loves him the way you do. Richard loves no woman but you—in that way. You know what I mean.”

  Kahlan didn’t answer.

  Nicci flicked her hand in annoyance. “Samantha is in love with Richard as well.”

  “I know that,” Kahlan said.

  Nicci stopped her pacing again and faced Kahlan. “But Samantha is an innocent young woman, and she is merely infatuated with a handsome, strong, wise, older man. It’s innocent enough. Still, I don’t trust her temper.”

  “It may be much the same with Irena, then,” Kahlan offered. “Just an innocent infatuation.”

  “Really?” Nicci paused in her pacing to give Kahlan a look. “The woman’s husband was murdered not that long ago—eaten alive before her eyes. She seems to have gotten over it pretty quickly.”

  “We can’t know that, Nicci. We don’t know if she cries herself to sleep.”

  “I suppose,” Nicci grumbled. She shook her head. “But there is something about Irena that seems off. She tries to get close to Richard in a way I don’t like. She is always putting her hands on him, touching him, fawning over him, keeping herself in his focus, trying to monopolize his attention.” She growled in frustration. “I don’t know how to explain it.”

  “It gives you a knot in your stomach when you see her touching Richard,” Kahlan said.

  Nicci stopped and pointed a finger at Kahlan. “Yes! That’s it.”