Blood of the Fold

by Terry Goodkind

  Richard made her scoot aside, and at last found pens and ink in a drawer he would have opened first had she not been in the way. “You’re right, she cares greatly for me. But as to surrendering her land, well, I haven’t told her that part, yet.”

  Cara’s arms unfolded. “You mean to say that you have yet to demand her surrender, as you have done tonight with the others?”

  Richard wiggled the stopper from the ink bottle. “That’s one reason I must write this letter at once, to explain my plan to her. Why don’t you three be quiet, and let me write?”

  Raina, a look of true concern in her dark eyes, squatted beside his chair. “What if she calls off the wedding? Queens are proud; she may not wish to do such a thing.”

  A ripple of worry surged through his gut. It was worse than that. These women didn’t really understand what he was asking Kahlan to do. He was not asking a queen to surrender her land; he was asking the Mother Confessor to surrender all of the Midlands.

  “She is as committed to defeating the Imperial Order as am I. She has fought with determination that would make a Mord-Sith blanch. She wishes the killing to stop as much as do I. She loves me, and will understand the benevolence of what I’m asking.”

  Raina sighed. “Well, if she doesn’t, we will protect you.”

  Richard fixed her with such a deadly glare that she rocked back on her heels as if he had struck her. “Don’t you ever, ever, even think of harming Kahlan. You will protect her the same as you would me, or you can leave right now and join the ranks of my enemies. You are to hold her life as dear as mine. Swear it on your bond to me. Swear it!”

  Raina swallowed. “I swear it, Lord Rahl.”

  He glared at the other two women. “Swear it.”

  “I swear it, Lord Rahl,” they said together.

  He looked to Ulic and Egan.

  “I swear it, Lord Rahl,” they said as one.

  He let slip his belligerent tone. “All right, then.”

  Richard placed the paper on the desk before himself and tried to think. Everyone thought she was dead; this was the only way. They couldn’t let people know she was alive, or someone might try to finish what the council had thought they had accomplished. She would understand if he could just explain it properly.

  Richard could feel the figure of Magda Searus, overhead, glaring down at him. He feared to look up, lest her wizard, Merritt, send down a bolt of lightning to punish him for what he was doing.

  Kahlan had to believe him. She had told him once that she would die to protect him, if necessary, in order to save the Midlands, that she would do anything. Anything.

  Cara sat back on her hands. “Is the queen pretty?” Her mischievous smile returned. “What does she look like? She won’t try to make us wear dresses once you’re married, will she? We’ll obey her, but Mord-Sith don’t wear dresses.”

  Richard sighed inwardly. They were only trying to lighten the mood by acting mischievous. He wondered how many people these “mischievous” women had killed. He reprimanded himself; that wasn’t fair, especially coming from the bringer of death. One of them had died this very day trying to protect him. Poor Hally never had a chance against a mriswith.

  Neither would Kahlan.

  He had to help her. This was the only thing he could think of, and every minute that passed could be a minute too late. He had to hurry. He tried to think of what to say. He couldn’t let it out that Queen Kahlan was really the Mother Confessor. If the letter fell into the wrong hands…

  Richard looked up when he heard the door squeak open. “Berdine, where do you think you’re going?”

  “To find a bed of my own. We will take turns standing watch over you.” She put one hand on a hip, and with the other spun the Agiel on the chain at her wrist. “Control yourself, Lord Rahl. You will have a new bride in your bed soon enough. You can wait until then.”

  Richard couldn’t help smiling. He liked Berdine’s wry sense of humor. “General Reibisch said there were a thousand men standing guard, there is no need—”

  Berdine winked. “Lord Rahl, I know you like me the best, but stop thinking about my behind as I walk, and write your letter.”

  Richard tapped the glass-handled pen against a tooth as the door closed.

  Cara’s brow wrinkled in a frown. “Lord Rahl, do you think that the queen will be jealous of us?”

  “Why should she be jealous?” he mumbled as he scratched the back of his neck. “She has no reason.”

  “Well, don’t you think we’re attractive?”

  Richard blinked up at her. He pointed at the door. “Both of you, go stand by the doors and make sure no one can get in here to kill your Lord Rahl. If you’re quiet, like Egan and Ulic here, and let me write this letter, you may remain on this side of the door, if not, then you will guard from the other side.”

  They rolled their eyes, but both had smiles as they headed across the room, apparently enjoying the fact that their nettling had finally gotten a reaction from him. He guessed Mord-Sith must be hungry for playful banter, it was something they got precious little of, but he had more important things on his mind.

  Richard stared at the blank piece of paper and tried to think through the haze of weariness. Gratch put a furry paw on his leg and snuggled against his side as Richard dipped the pen in the ink bottle.

  My Dearest Queen, he began with one hand, while patting the paw in his lap with the other.

  15

  Tobias scanned the snowy darkness as they slogged through the deepening drifts. “Are you sure you did as I instructed?”

  “Yes, my lord general. I told you, they be spelled.”

  Behind, the lights of the Confessors’ Palace and the surrounding buildings of the city’s center had long ago faded into the swirling snowstorm that had swept down out of the mountains while they had been inside listening to Lord Rahl deliver his absurd demands to the representatives of the Midlands.

  “Then where are they? If you lose them and they freeze to death out here, I will be more than displeased with you, Lunetta.”

  “I know where they be, Lord General,” she insisted. “I will not lose them.” She stopped and lifted her nose, sniffing the air. “This way.”

  Tobias and Galtero looked at each other and frowned, then turned to follow her as she scurried off into the darkness behind Kings Row. Occasionally he could just make out the dark shapes of the palaces looming in the storm. They provided ghosts of lights and guidance in the directionless void of falling snow.

  In the distance he could hear the passing clank of armor. It sounded like more men than a simple patrol. Before the night was out, the D’Harans would probably make a move to consolidate their grip on Aydindril. That’s what he would do if he were in their place: strike before your opponents have time to digest their options. Well, no matter, he wasn’t planning on staying.

  Tobias blew the snow from his mustache. “You were listening to him, weren’t you?”

  “Yes, Lord General, but I told you, I could not tell.”

  “He be no different than anyone else. You must not have been paying attention. I knew you weren’t paying attention. You were scratching your arms and you weren’t paying attention.”

  Lunetta cast him a quick look over her shoulder. “He be different. I do not know why, but he be different. I have never felt magic like his before. I could not tell if he be telling every word true, or every word a lie, but I think he be telling it true.” She shook her head to herself in wonder. “I can get past blocks. I always can get past blocks. Any kind: air, water, earth, fire, ice, any kind. Even spirit. But his…?”

  Tobias smiled absently. It didn’t matter. He didn’t need her filthy taint to tell. He knew.

  She mumbled on about the strange aspects of Lord Rahl’s magic, and how she wanted away from it, away from this place, and how it made her skin itch like never before. He only half listened. She would have her wish to be away from Aydindril after he took care of a few matters.

  “What are you s
niffing at?” he growled.

  “Midden, my lord general. Kitchen midden.”

  Tobias gripped a fistful of her colored rags. “Midden? You left them at a midden heap?”

  She grinned as she waddled along. “Yes, Lord General. You said you didn’t want people around. I not be familiar with the city, and did not know a safe place I could send them, but I saw the midden heap on our way to the Confessors’ Palace. No one will be there in the night.”

  Midden heap. Tobias harrumphed. “Loony Lunetta,” he muttered.

  She lost a stride. “Please Tobias, do not call me—”

  “Then where are they!”

  She lifted her arm, pointing, and hurried her step. “This way, Lord General. You will see. This way. Not far.”

  He thought about it as he trudged through the drifts. It made sense. It did make sense; a midden heap was the perfect justice.

  “Lunetta, you be telling me the truth about Lord Rahl, aren’t you? If you lie to me about this, I will never forgive you.”

  She stopped and looked up at him. Tears welled in her eyes as she clutched her colored rags. “Yes, my lord general. Please. I be telling the truth. I tried everything. I tried my best.”

  Tobias stared at her a long moment as a tear ran down her plump cheek. It didn’t matter; he knew.

  He flicked his hand impatiently. “All right then, get going. You better not have lost them.”

  Suddenly beaming, she wiped her cheek, turned back to the way she had been going, and darted off. “This way, Lord General. You will see. I know where they be.”

  Sighing, Tobias started after her again. The snow was piling up, and at the rate it was coming down it looked like it was going to be a bad one. No matter, things were turning his way. Lord Rahl was a fool if he thought Lord General Tobias Brogan of the Blood of the Fold was going to surrender like a baneling under hot iron.

  Lunetta was pointing. “Over here, Lord General. They be here.”

  Even with the wind howling at their backs, Tobias could smell the midden heap before he could see it. He shook the snow off his crimson cape when they reached the dark hump lit by the faint lights from palaces beyond the wall in the distance. The snow melted off in places as it fell on the steaming heap, leaving much of its dark shape devoid of even the pretense of purity.

  He put his fists on his hips. “So? Where are they?”

  Lunetta moved close to his side, hiding herself in his lee from the wind-driven snow. “Stand here, Lord General. They will come to you.”

  He looked down and saw a well trodden path. “A circle spell?”

  She cackled softly as she pulled some scraps up around her red cheeks against the cold. “Yes, Lord General. You said you did not want them to get away, or you would be angry with me. I did not want you to be angry with Lunetta, so I cast them a circle spell. They cannot get away, now, no matter how fast they go.”

  Tobias smiled. Yes, the day was ending well after all. It had provided obstacles, but with the Creator’s guidance he would overcome them. Now matters were in his command. Lord Rahl was going to find out that no one dictated to the Blood of the Fold.

  Emerging from the darkness, he first saw the swish of her yellow skirts as her wrap was pulled open by a gust. Duchess Lumholtz, the duke a half step behind and to her side, trod purposefully toward him. When she saw who was standing beside the path, a glower darkened her painted face. She tugged closed her snow encrusted wrap.

  Tobias greeted her with a broad smile. “We meet again. A good evening to you, madam.” He tilted his head in a slight nod. “And to you, too, Duke Lumholtz.”

  The duchess sniffed her disapproval and lifted her nose. The duke eyed them with a stern glare, as if he were placing a barrier he defied them to cross. Both marched past without a word, and off into the darkness. Tobias chuckled.

  “You see, my lord general? As I promised, they wait for you.”

  Tobias hooked both thumbs in his belt as he straightened his shoulders, letting his crimson cape billow open in the wind. There was no need to pursue the pair.

  “You did well, Lunetta,” he murmured.

  Before long, the yellow of her skirts appeared again. This time, when she saw Tobias, Galtero, and Lunetta standing beside her well-trodden path, a look of shock drew up her eyebrows. She really was an attractive woman, despite the superfluous paint: not girlish at all, though still young, but mature of face and figure, ripe with the proud poise of full womanhood.

  With deliberate menace the duke rested a steady hand on the hilt of his sword as the pair approached. Though ornate, the duke’s sword, Tobias knew, was, the like Lord Rahl’s, not mere decoration. Kelton made some of the best steel in the Midlands, and all Keltans, especially nobility, prided themselves on knowing well its use.

  “General Bro—”

  “Lord General, madam.”

  She looked down her nose at him. “Lord General Brogan, we are on our way home to our palace. I suggest you stop following us, and return to yours. It’s a foul night to be out.”

  From beside him, Galtero watched the lace at her bosom rise and fall in ire. When she noticed, she snatched her wrap closed. The duke noticed, too, and leaned toward Galtero.

  “Keep your eyes off my wife, sir, or I’ll cut you to pieces and feed you to my hounds.”

  Galtero, a treacherous smile spreading on his lips, looked up at the taller man, but said nothing.

  The duchess huffed. “Good night, General.”

  The pair marched off again to make another circuit of the midden heap, thoroughly convinced they were headed toward their destination, straight as an arrow flies, but in the haze of a circle spell they went nowhere except around and around. He could have stopped them the first time, but he relished the consternation in their eyes as they tried to grasp how he could repeatedly show up ahead of them. Their spelled minds would be able to make no sense of it.

  The next time by, their faces went as white as the snow, before flushing to red. The duchess stomped to a halt and, fists on her hips, scowled at him. Tobias watched the white lace right in front of his face lift and fall with the heat of her indignation.

  “Look here, you greasy little nick, how dare you—”

  Brogan’s jaw locked rigid. With a grunt of rage, he snatched the white lace in both fists and ripped the front of her dress down to her waist.

  Lunetta’s hand lifted, accompanied by a short incantation, and the duke, his sword halfway out of its scabbard, stopped, rigid and unmoving, as if turned to stone. Only his eyes moved, to see the duchess cry out as Galtero pinned both her arms behind her back, rendering her as immobile and helpless as he, though without the use of magic. Her back arched as Galtero twisted her arms in his powerful grip. Her nipples stood out stiff in the cold wind.

  Since he had forfeited his knife, Brogan drew his sword instead. “What did you call me, you filthy little whore?”

  “Nothing.” In the clutch of panic, she threw her head from side to side, her black curls whipping across her face. “Nothing!”

  “My, my, lost your spine so easily?”

  “What do you want?” she panted. “I’m no baneling! Leave me go! I’m no baneling!”

  “Of course you be no baneling. You be too pompous to be a baneling, but that makes you no less despicable. Or useful.”

  “Then it’s him you want? Yes, the duke. He’s the baneling. Leave me go, and I’ll recount his crimes.”

  Brogan spoke through clenched teeth. “The Creator does not be served by false, self-serving confessions. But you will serve him, nonetheless.” His cheek twitched with a grim smile. “You will serve the Creator through me; you’ll do my bidding.”

  “I’ll do no such—” She cried out as Galtero tightened his grip. “Yes all right,” she gasped. “Anything. Just don’t hurt me. Tell me what you want, and I’ll do it.”

  She tried unsuccessfully to back away as he put his face within inches of hers. “You will do as I tell you,” he said through gritted teeth.

/>   Her voice was choked with terror. “Yes. All right. You have my word.”

  He sneered derisively. “I wouldn’t take the word of a whore like you: one who would sell anything, betray any principle. You will do my bidding because you have no choice.”

  He backed away, pinched her left nipple between his thumb and the knuckle of his first finger, and stretched it out. As she wailed, her eyes opened wide. Brogan brought the sword up and, with a sawing cut, sliced off the nipple. Her scream drowned out the howl of the wind.

  Brogan placed the severed nipple in Lunetta’s upturned palm. Her stubby fingers closed around it as her eyes closed in a shroud of magic. Soft sounds of an ancient incantation melded with the wind and the sound of the duchess’s shivering shrieks. Galtero held her weight as the wind wheeled around them.

  Lunetta’s chanting rose in pitch as she tilted her head up to the inky sky. With her eyes shut tight, she summoned the spell around herself and the woman before her. The wind seemed to pull the words forth as Lunetta conjured in her streganicha tongue.

  “From earth to sky, from leaves to roots,

  from fire to ice, and soul’s own fruits.

  From light to dark, from wind to water,

  I claim this spirit and Creator’s daughter.

  Till the heart’s blood boils or the bones be ash,

  till the tallow be dust and death’s teeth gnash,

  this one be mine.

  I cast her gnomon into a sunless glen,

  and pull this soul beyond its umbra’s ken.

  Till her tasks be done and the worms be fed,

  till the flesh be dust and the soul has fled,

  this one be mine.”

  Lunetta’s voice lowered to a throaty chant. “Cock’s hen, spiders ten, bezoar then, I make a thrall stew. Ox gall, castor and caul, I make a chattel brew.…”

  Her words drifted away and were lost in the wind, but her squat body bobbed as she went on, shaking her empty hand over the woman’s head, and the other, with the chunk of flesh, over her own heart.

  The duchess shuddered as tendrils of magic coiled around her, snaking into her flesh. She convulsed as its fangs sank into her very soul.