Death's Mistress

by Terry Goodkind

  CHAPTER 78

  Panting and weary, Nathan came to stand at the top of the pass and inhaled a deep breath of the cold, thin air. The splendor of the view struck him like a physical blow. “Kol Adair—dear spirits, it’s magnificent!”

  Since escaping from the Palace of the Prophets, he had witnessed many sights, experienced grand and dramatic events, but he had never before beheld a panorama that inspired in him such absolute awe. From here, they could see forever.

  The sun shone down upon the high mountain valley through the lens of a perfectly transparent blue sky. Regimented black crags spread out in a fiercely beautiful barrier, their peaks capped with snow. Dramatic couloirs cradled glaciers that dispatched pearly white ribbons of meltwater over cliffs in a chain of thundering waterfalls. The cascades sent up a wondrous spray that spawned rainbows. Mountain lakes in hanging valleys glittered like jewels, the purest turquoise blue, some crusted with broken white ice still unmelted in midsummer.

  Bannon plodded up beside him, wheezing, too weary to do anything but stare at his boots. When he lifted his head to take in the view, though, he gasped.

  Nathan continued to drink in the visceral beauty around him. The sweeping meadows were lush and green, spangled with so many bright and colorful alpine flowers it looked like a meteor shower of blossoms. Even from this distance, he could hear the soothing roar of the waterfalls that tumbled down the black cliff faces. Bluebirds darted about in the spray or swooped down to snatch insects among the wildflowers.

  On the saddle, Mrra paced around the open terrain, staying close to Nicci. None of the three spoke as they absorbed the sight.

  Nathan filled his lungs with the brisk air and extended his arms to his sides, just reveling in the beauty, the uplifting spectacle. Was this what the witch woman Red had wanted him to see? Although he gloried in the vista, Nathan wondered if this very place was supposed to restore his gift. He stretched out his arms, flexed his fingers, wondered if he felt whole again.

  Restless and not sure what they were supposed to do now that they had arrived, Nicci wandered across the open, flat area. She explored the low grasses, pincushion mounds of pink flowers, and lichen-spattered boulders.

  Nathan knew there had to be something more if the witch woman had sent them here, if the command had been written in an old life book and chiseled in the stones of a cairn a continent away. He had to have come here to Kol Adair for a reason.

  Nathan could survive just fine without his gift of prophetic misery, but living without his magic was different. He had drawn great satisfaction from the spells he could work, the magical weapons he could wield—and he could have been a valuable asset in fighting both the Lifedrinker and Victoria. When he and Nicci had begun their journey, leaving the People’s Palace and heading into the Dark Lands, Nathan had believed that the two of them would be invincible, a wizard and a powerful sorceress. He needed to be able to do his part again. He needed his magic back.

  And this was the place he should be. But he felt no different.

  “Look, another cairn!” Bannon said. To mark the top of the pass, some other traveler had piled up a tall cairn of stones, even more imposing than the one they had seen on the windswept Phantom Coast. He set off, but plodded slowly because he was out of breath.

  Nicci reached the rocks first. She circled slowly, searching for a message such as what they had found before. She stopped, looked at the rocks, and frowned. “Nathan, come here.”

  Hurrying up to her, he felt a surge of hope, longing to feel his Han again, to control his gift and become a useful wizard once more. He needed to be made whole again!

  Nathan looked down at the base of the cairn. Among the stacked rocks, like a grave marker, was a flat stone tablet devoid of pervasive lichens. Words had been chiseled into the flat granite surface: Wizard, behold what you need to make yourself whole again.

  Nathan felt a surge of delight. He had seen that phrase before. “So the witch woman was here. Red communicated those words. And they’re written in my life book … just as they were engraved on that other cairn.”

  “Either Red was here in person, or she foresaw it,” Nicci said. “Someone left these words, and the witch woman knew about this from the time before prophecy was banished from the world. Kol Adair has been waiting for you for some time, Nathan Rahl.”

  “But what does it mean?” Bannon asked. “How will you get your magic back?” He turned a hopeful look to the wizard.

  Nathan didn’t want to admit that he had no idea of the answer. His brows knitted in concentration, and he made a grandiose gesture to indicate the astonishing vista, trying to convince himself. “Perhaps it is something about this place. Look around you, a sight so marvelous that it’s enough to wash away the darkness in the world.” He gave Nicci a meaningful look. “After killing the Lifedrinker and Victoria, and after the tragic loss of that poor little Thistle, maybe this is what we all need to restore ourselves.” He closed his eyes and drew in another deep, satisfied breath of the clear air.

  Nicci turned from the cairn. “I need more than a pretty view to heal the darkness inside me. I am strong enough to do that for myself. I already have a strong purpose.”

  Nathan swept his gaze across the waterfalls, hanging valleys, snowcapped peaks. His skin tingled, his pulse raced, and he felt a wondrous energy that he drew from the earth itself.

  “This must be a magical place, a nexus of power springing from the world, just as the bones of a dragon carry a certain kind of power,” Nathan said. “Simply by being here, I do feel myself restored! Yes, dear spirits, this is what I needed. It was worth the entire journey.”

  He stretched out his palm, cupped his fingers, and concentrated, remembering what it felt like. He reached for his Han and released a flow of magic, intending to call up a ball of flame. He remembered the last time he had attempted such a spell, on the windswept deck of the Wavewalker, manifesting only feathery flickers that had scattered away in the breeze. Now, he meant to produce a bright blaze cupped in his hand.

  He had reached Kol Adair. His powers should be back.

  Nothing happened.

  He concentrated harder. Nicci and Bannon watched him. But although he strained, he felt no response from his gift. Nothing.

  His heart, which had felt so uplifted in this magnificent place, now sank into dismay. His magic was gone, unraveled and untangled, stripped from him just as his ability of prophecy had gone away.

  “What did I do wrong?” he demanded. “Why haven’t I been restored? I should be made whole here—look at the words on the cairn! What else do I need to do?” He raised his voice in desperation, knowing that neither Nicci nor Bannon would have an answer for him.

  He hung his head. The foundations of the world had changed, and the stars had shifted overhead. “Maybe with the loss of prophecy, Red’s prediction is no longer true after all.”

  CHAPTER 79

  Nicci watched the wizard withdraw into disappointment and defeat. His expression looked as bleak as the patches of glaciers across the mountain valley. “Nothing,” he said, flexing his fingers.

  Nathan Rahl had always been personable, confident, intelligent—a perfect roving ambassador for D’Hara. Nicci had accompanied him on the journey for her own purposes, but along the way she had come to value the wizard’s abilities and knowledge. There was more to the former prophet than was immediately obvious from his demeanor and his personal façade.

  Together, they had come a great distance and endured many hardships to find Kol Adair, all based on the whim of a witch woman. Yes, this immense, virgin land must be filled with resources, incredible wealth to whet the appetite of any ambitious ruler. But there was no magic here for Nathan. He had not found what Red promised.

  Intensely weary, the old wizard folded his legs and sat on the tundra next to the cairn’s piled stones. He opened the leather pouch at his side and sadly removed his new life book. “I wonder if she left me another message.” When he turned back the cover, he saw only the s
ketches and journal entries that he himself had written. Hoping for answers, he skimmed the lines, but the words offered no surprises.

  Future and Fate depend on both the journey and the destination.

  Kol Adair lies far to the south in the Old World. From there, the Wizard will behold what he needs to make himself whole again. And the Sorceress must save the world.

  He closed the cover and tucked it away again. “What should I do and where should I go now? I came to Kol Adair. Why haven’t I been made whole?” Now he only frowned at the spectacular view. “What more am I supposed to behold?”

  Nicci said, “We have the rest of the Old World to explore. Maybe someone else can tell you the answer.”

  Bannon looked down at the carved words in the granite tablet again, as if he had somehow misread the simple sentence. “‘Behold what you need to make yourself whole again.’” He stood up quickly. “Wait, listen to what it says! The witch woman didn’t claim you would be restored just by coming to Kol Adair. She said this is where you would see what you need.” The young man’s freckled face flushed with excitement. “Maybe we just haven’t seen it yet.”

  Nathan struggled to his feet. “That means we have to look for whatever it is I need, my boy.” He pursed his lips. “Maybe some magical artifact, or a spell-form laid out in the rocks here on the pass. The witch woman wouldn’t be so obvious.”

  “A witch woman rarely is,” Nicci said.

  Nathan was grinning with renewed hope. “Dear spirits, there’s still a chance … but what are we even looking for?”

  Bannon bent down to the large cairn and began searching among the mottled rocks, looking for answers. “Maybe something is hidden here. It’s the most obvious thing.” He found a loose stone at the base and rolled it aside, surprised to find a second flat slab with more engraved words. “I don’t think you’re finished yet, Nicci.”

  She felt a chill as she saw the ominous statement carved years—or centuries—ago, but she already guessed what it would say. Sorceress, save the world. “I don’t need some ancient writing to tell me what to do,” she grumbled.

  The cairn held no other messages, no artifacts, no clues. At a loss, standing on the high mountain pass, the companions searched the distance. The grand view encompassed countless miles of breathtakingly beautiful terrain, but nothing at all that might help the wizard regain his magic.

  The wind whistled around them, mocking. Nathan’s azure eyes sparkled with a hint of desperate tears, and he stared as if the very intensity could make his need come true. “We’ve come a very long and difficult way to reach this place.” He shouted, “I would appreciate instructions that are a little less obtuse!”

  Just then the sun shone at an angle from a precise spot up in the sky. The air shimmered on the far side of the mountains like a curtain opening, a veil pulled away—to reveal a sudden, startling vision of a distant plain beyond the mountains.

  Catching a quick breath, Nicci thrust out her arm. “Look there! It’s a … city!”

  Nathan and Bannon turned. The sand panther let out a low growl.

  Bannon cried, “That looks even bigger than Tanimura. It wasn’t there before!”

  Nathan looked giddy with excitement. “No, my boy. No, it wasn’t. Why didn’t we see it?”

  Nicci drank in the unbelievable details. The far-off city was a magnificent metropolis, perhaps greater even than Aydindril and Altur’Rang combined. The skyline was a forest of fantastic construction, exotic architecture with high temples and civic buildings, crowded dwellings and elaborate villas. The tall buildings stretched upward, soaring towers built of white stone. Their roofs shone with vibrant enamel tiles; windows flashed with jewel colors of extensive glass mosaics.

  The air around the whole city flickered and blurred, seen through a viewing lens that sharpened details into amazing clarity before they grew fuzzy again. It was as if a huge dome shielded the strange metropolis, hiding it—and for just a brief moment, the magic and the vantage from Kol Adair had revealed it to them. The dome was crumbling, fading.

  “We are seeing it from here, for the first time.” Nathan was breathing hard. “That must be what Red meant! We reached Kol Adair, and from this exact viewpoint, we can see that city. ‘Behold what you need to make yourself whole again.’” He turned to Nicci, his smile bright. “We need to go to that city. The answer lies there. It has to.”

  Nicci had spent most of her time in crowded civilization, and she much preferred a city to the austerities of life on the trail. The flickering mirage intrigued her with its possibilities. “I agree.”

  Before they set off, the air shimmered again—and the entire majestic metropolis simply vanished. On the other side of the mountains, the land appeared completely empty.

  Bannon yelped. “Was it just an illusion?”

  “Not an illusion,” Nathan insisted. “It can’t be an illusion. Maybe the city is hiding itself somehow, camouflaged by a shroud similar to the one that hid Cliffwall for so many centuries.” He nodded, convincing himself as much as the others. “But now we know it’s there. Come, Sorceress! We still have a long journey ahead of us, but at least we realize where we have to go.”

  Mrra continued to rumble with an uneasy growl at the sight, but the wizard would not be deterred. He set off, picking his way down the slope from the pass. They would have to cross many mountain valleys and work their way through the stark snowcapped crags before they reached the site of the mysterious vanishing city.

  As they came over the next ridge, they found a prominent trail from the south, a clear footpath that wound through the mountains. “This is not a game trail,” Nicci said. In one section, the path widened to reveal moss-covered paving stones, an ancient thoroughfare that had been laid down for traffic. But it had obviously been used in recent days.

  “A road!” Nathan could not suppress his optimism. “We are on our way now, Sorceress. That was the sign we needed.”

  Tall, black rocks blocked their view as they descended another convoluted ridge. When they rounded a barren swell, following the narrow road, Nicci stopped as they beheld a startling and repulsive sight. Bannon gasped, sickened.

  Set upon tall spikes on either side of the path were four severed heads, the faces partially crow-pecked, but otherwise preserved by an anti-decay spell. The skin on the faces had slackened in death, but their mouths had been horrifically and distinctively scarred—sliced from the corners of the lips all the way back to the hinge of the jaw, then sewn up and healed. Their cheeks were tattooed with scales to give them the appearance of serpent men.

  Nicci recognized them from their attack on the poor people of Renda Bay.

  Bannon flushed with anger. “Norukai slavers.”

  “It appears they must have offended someone,” Nathan said.

  Nicci stepped forward to scrutinize the appalling heads. “The preservation spell masks how long they’ve been here.”

  Beneath the first stake rested a blood-spattered placard written in strange symbols that Nicci couldn’t read. She did, however, recognize the arcane letters as similar to those branded onto Mrra’s hide.

  The sand panther growled again, long and low.

  Nicci flashed a hard smile and looked along the winding trail that led toward the vanished city. “Yes, that place might be very interesting indeed.”

  ALSO BY TERRY GOODKIND

  Wizard’s First Rule

  Stone of Tears

  Blood of the Fold

  Temple of the Winds

  Soul of the Fire

  Faith of the Fallen

  The Pillars of Creation

  Naked Empire

  Debt of Bones

  Chainfire

  Phantom

  Confessor

  The Law of Nines

  The Omen Machine

  The First Confessor

  The Third Kingdom

  Severed Souls

  Warheart

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Terry Goodkind is a #1 New York Tim
es bestselling author. His books include the eleven-volume Sword of Truth series, beginning with Wizard’s First Rule, the basis for the television show Legend of the Seeker. Goodkind was born and raised in Omaha, Nebraska, where he also attended art school. Alongside a career in wildlife art, he has also been a cabinetmaker and a violin maker, and he has done restoration work on rare and exotic artifacts from around the world -- each with its own story to tell, he says. While continuing to maintain the northeastern home he built with his own hands, in recent years he and his wife Jeri have created a second home in the desert Southwest, where he now spends the majority of his time. You can sign up for email updates here.

  Thank you for buying this

  Tom Doherty Associates ebook.

  To receive special offers, bonus content,

  and info on new releases and other great reads,

  sign up for our newsletters.

  Or visit us online at

  us.macmillan.com/newslettersignup

  For email updates on the author, click here.

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Copyright Notice

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35