Kahlan pressed her fingers to her forehead, pausing for a moment. She couldn’t begin to fathom what he was talking about.
“You’re saying that the reason we have prophecy is because Regula is here in this world.”
Richard gave her a single, firm nod. “Yes.”
Kahlan couldn’t believe he was serious. At the same time it was frightening that she could see he was. She flicked a hand toward the scroll.
“Richard, it sounds to me like what it says in those ancient scrolls is just myth–you know, a form of morality tale set down on ancient scrolls. You’ve heard such fables before from people in the wilds, remember?”
She circled a hand in the air, gesturing toward the sky, weaving the story the way people in the wilds always did. “Stories about how the sun and the moon were once lovers, and they created the grasslands as a secret, sacred place where they could be together. They say that is how the world came to be–it was a place created where the sun and the moon could lie down alone together, away from the stars.
“That’s why the people there, like the Mud People, have such reverence for those plains, believing that the grasslands are sacred because they have been kissed by the sun and the moon. Their story about the sun and the moon and the grasslands beneath them is a fable meant to teach innocent children to respect the land. It’s a morality tale. They don’t believe it literally happened.”
Kahlan swept a hand toward the scroll. “That’s what this sounds like to me, like a cautionary tale, a fable. A caution to beware of prophecy and not let it rule your life. I bet that’s all the scrolls really are, Richard–fables.”
He stared at her for a moment. “The scrolls talk about the ancient power of Orden.”
“Probably in fable form as well–”
“No, not in fable form, but explicitly,” he said, cutting her off. “It explains what happened–what I did. It explains how Orden works, what I was going to do, and why I did it. The power of Orden apparently predates the scrolls, and yet they talk about it, about the events that would surround it into the future, and they talk about me.”
Kahlan leaned toward him, her eyes widening. “These ancient scrolls speak of you?”
“Well,” he said with an offhanded gesture, “not specifically, but yes. They don’t mention me by name, exactly, but they are talking about me. Remember the prophecies that spoke of me as the bringer of death?”
“Of course.”
“It’s like that. They use names like that for me, names we’ve seen before like the pebble in the pond, names that can only refer to me. For example they say that the bringer of death will use the power of Orden to initiate a phase change–”
“A what? What’s a phase change?”
Richard paused to gather his thoughts. “The power of Orden predates these scrolls, but the people who wrote the scrolls knew a great deal about the subject. Among other tools, they used prophecy, extracted from the underworld, to help them in the understanding of the structure of Orden and all it touches.
“They explain that the power of Orden can bend the nature of existence. Remember the book on Ordenic theory that I found? Remember that it mentioned the power of Orden held in those boxes had the power to distort the nature of existence?”
Kahlan cocked her head. “You mean, the way you bent existence to bring worlds together into the same time and place in order to banish the followers of the beliefs of the Imperial Order to their own world without magic?”
“Yes, exactly.” Richard flattened one side of the scroll on the desk and tapped a place on it near the far end. “It calls that event a spectral fold.” He looked up at her. “The power of Orden initiates a spectral fold, meaning it distorts the nature of existence. That’s how I was able to bring places together in the same place at the same time. It’s called a spectral fold.”
Kahlan shrugged. “Well, that was a good thing, right? It ended the war.”
Richard shook his head. “It bought us time in one phase of events. It ended that war–and that was a good thing, a necessary thing–but in so doing it started a greater war. Through the series of events caused by the initiation of that spectral fold, the great war from back in Magda and Merritt’s time was fully reignited. That war was not merely a war between the New World and the Old World, but more importantly a war between the world of life and the world of death.
“Those were the battlefields, those were the factions involved. The war we fought and won was with the remnants of that conflict. We were only fighting at the fringes of the greater war between the worlds of life and death.
“I used the power of Orden to end that particular war with the Imperial Order in that particular manner, but a spectral fold touches all of existence, not only what I did to banish the followers of the Imperial Order. That spectral fold that I initiated may have been absolutely necessary, but it is still in force.
“The Cerulean scrolls call this spectral fold a star shift, because it shifts the nature of everything, the very nature of existence, of the world of existence–which encompasses the whole world of life. I used the power contained in those boxes, releasing it to end the war. In so doing, I initiated a spectral fold, a star shift.
“That was what the creator of the sword knew had to be done, despite the cost. That was why he made the key. They knew it would initiate a star shift, and they knew the cost would be the spectral fold that would bring about the final battle that I would also have to fight. It was, in a way, a prophecy that had been pulled from the underworld in order to create the situation needed to force the event.”
“They created a self-fulfilling prophecy?”
“In a way, but only as a tool for the power of Orden so it could do what it was meant to do.”
Kahlan felt like her head was spinning. “What else? What else does this power, this star shift, affect?”
“The veil.”
Kahlan felt goose bumps raise the hairs on her arms. “The veil.”
“Yes. The veil is the power–the force–that keeps the world of life and the world of the dead separate. It’s that line in the Grace that separates life and death. Those worlds can’t be allowed to mix. The veil prevents that from happening.
“That power is what Adie knew as the skrin. Remember her telling us about the skrin? The power of the skrin is the power contained in the veil that keeps the spirits on that side. It keeps the dead, dead.
“But the spectral fold, initiated through the power of Orden, not only weakened time and space in order to bring the two separate worlds together so I could banish the people of the Imperial Order to that other world, it also weakened the veil as well. In a way, what I did with the separate worlds coming together in time and space, is the same thing that is also happening with the world of life and the world of the dead.
“The only difference is that the veil is a much larger force because it separates existence from nonexistence, so it has taken it longer to begin to show the signs of this weakening. That, and also, since the underworld is involved, that time factor is distorted. Time is meaningless in the underworld.
“That weakening of the veil is what allowed Hannis Arc to bring Emperor Sulachan back from the dead. That weakening of the veil is also what enables Sulachan to reanimate the dead.” Richard tapped a finger against the scroll. “Hannis Arc learned what the results of the weakening would be from these scrolls. The creators of these scrolls learned what would take place from prophecy, which they extracted from the underworld. In turn, the scrolls predict what Hannis Arc and Sulachan would do as a result of what I did with the power of Orden.”
Kahlan was having trouble fitting it all together and even more trouble grasping all the implications. “Dear spirits” was all she could say.
“Yes, but all things work toward balance, and that is the important takeaway from what the scrolls are saying. Events can fall off toward one side of that balance or toward the other because the contrasting sides work toward balancing each other.”
�
��How?” was all she could ask.
“The balance to the harm that Hannis Arc has the potential to do is that the weakening of the power of the veil because of this spectral fold also allowed me to travel to the underworld in order to send your spirit back to the world of life. It allowed Nicci to come into the underworld to get help for me. It allowed Zedd and all the others already there to help find me and free me from Sulachan’s dark ones. And it allowed me to return to the world of life.
“It balanced out the things Hannis Arc does because I am the force meant to balance what he and Sulachan are doing. The balance to Sulachan coming back to the world of life is me being able to return as well to be here to fight him.
“And, in a larger sense, it’s all part of a greater balance. There is prophecy in the Cerulean scrolls–”
“Wait–I thought you said that prophecy came from the world of the dead. How can the scrolls contain prophecy if they predate Regula and thus prophecy being in this world?”
“Because they draw information directly from the world of the dead as well as the world of life. They are celestial scrolls, so, in a manner of speaking, they draw from the void of the night sky as well as the daytime sky. In other words, they draw from both sides, from all there is on both sides of the veil, from both worlds.
“Just as wizards of old had Additive Magic as well as Subtractive Magic, the gifted back then, the ones who wrote these scrolls, had abilities beyond what you or I can fathom. They had not only regular Additive and Subtractive Magic, but it was combined with the opposite of occult magic. They wielded power in both worlds. They drew from a world where time exists, and from where it doesn’t.
“Cerulean, meaning ‘celestial,’ also refers to the star shift, which is this spectral fold initiated by the use of the power of Orden. I’m the one who initiated its spark.”
“You mean it’s kind of like starting a campfire to keep you warm and cook your dinner, and that much is good, but then a big gust of wind comes up and blows sparks everywhere and catches the entire forest around you on fire, so what started off good turns into something very bad.”
Richard grimaced a little. “That’s one way to put it. But in this instance, the entire world is on fire.”
Kahlan pressed her hands to the sides of her head. “This is giving me a headache.”
Richard grunted a brief chuckle. “You don’t know the half of it. I’ve only scratched the surface. It’s a lot more complex than I’m making it sound, and so far I’ve only given you a few of the meaningful highlights.”
Kahlan lowered her hands and stared at him. “You mean to say that there’s more?”
“I’m afraid so,” Richard said. “And it gets worse.”
CHAPTER
29
“You see,” Richard said, “Hannis Arc knew all this. He apparently got his hands on some of these scrolls long ago and read in them about initiating the power of Orden to create this spectral fold. He collected more of these scrolls over time and has been using what he was able to learn in them to start shaping events to his own objectives. He saw from what he read that this was his opportunity to bring Sulachan back.”
“Hannis Arc is the one who gave Darken Rahl the last box of Orden,” Kahlan said, trying to keep track of it all in her head. “You mean he did that to help start this prophecy to unfold? The prophecy he plays a central part in and that he would benefit from?”
“Exactly. He has been moving the pieces around like pieces on a chessboard in order to bring about the events the scrolls talk about. It’s as if he sees prophecy of himself doing these things, and then does them to make the prophecy reality. Mohler said that he was a master chess player, and from what I’ve learned about the game, much of the thinking in the game carries over to making moves in life.
“He wanted to open this gateway through this spectral fold, because he needed Sulachan’s help to conquer the world of life, so he put the boxes in play by giving the third box of Orden to Darken Rahl. He was making moves that had repercussions later on, all down the line. He knew from the scrolls that giving Darken Rahl the last box he needed to put them in play would trigger the events in prophecy. Unlike us, he knew from the scrolls what the power of Orden really was.
“Hannis Arc was moving a pawn, knowing from prophecy that if the boxes were in play, I would defeat Darken Rahl and therefore go on to become the Lord Rahl leading the D’Haran Empire that would then be drawn into the war against the Imperial Order.
“He knew that I would use the power of Orden to end the war with the Imperial Order, which is a part of the larger great war that Sulachan started so long ago. After all, Sulachan created the dream walkers. Emperor Jagang was a descendant of those dream walkers created by Sulachan so that he would start the war that I would end by using the power of Orden that Hannis Arc would then use, once the star shift weakened the veil, to bring Sulachan back from the dead.”
Kahlan pressed her hands to her head. “Dear spirits. And they were using this knowledge of the use of Orden all along?”
Richard nodded. “Hannis Arc had already moved that pawn long ago by giving the box to Darken Rahl to begin the chain of events that would eventually get me to use Orden’s power, because he didn’t have the key to it, but the scrolls said I would, which would in turn get him what he was ultimately after: to be ruler of the world of life. Which would get Sulachan what he wanted by being able to come back from the world of the dead, which he helped engineer by creating the dream walkers, and so on and so forth.”
“But then he was carrying out prophecy that hadn’t happened yet,” she protested. “He was creating prophecy, in effect. He was creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
Richard showed her a smile. “Exactly. You see, prophecy is an underworld power–”
“Wait. How can it be an underworld power? You said that before but I don’t think that can be right. Prophecy comes from prophets predicting the future. Hannis Arc saw that prophecy and took the actions he did in order to make sure everything was in place for it to happen as in the prophecy.”
“But the prophecy itself came from the underworld in the first place,” Richard said. “Prophecy is an artifact of the world of the dead.”
Kahlan shook her head. “Prophecy is given by prophets in this world, not the world of the dead.”
Richard leaned toward her in a meaningful manner. “So we always thought. And that is the key to it all.”
“I don’t follow what you mean.”
Richard gestured to the scrolls. “Prophecy actually originates in the underworld, from the spirits of the dead, and prophets in the world of life are able to channel those prophecies in this world.”
Kahlan took a deep breath to fortify herself against her growing frustration. “I don’t understand. How could they originate there, in the world of the dead, from spirits?”
Richard leaned forward again, almost with delight at what he had discovered. “This is where it starts to get complicated.”
“Starts? Richard, I don’t–”
He held up a hand. “Hear me out, first, and then the bigger picture will all start to make sense.”
She pressed her lips tight and remained silent so he could go on. She knew Richard, and she knew he didn’t go off on pointless tangents.
“The underworld is eternal, which makes it timeless,” he began in a calm voice. “We’ve always understood that much of it. Time has no meaning in an eternal world because there is no beginning and no end of time there, so there is no way to measure a segment of forever. Right?”
Kahlan conceded the point with a nod. “Right.”
“One day or a thousand years is the same because with no beginning and no end there are no units of measure for time there–no limits to measure a day, a year, a century.”
“So?”
“So, in the underworld, where nothing changes and there is no future as such–because there are no boundaries and no units to measure time–the future is the same as now. There can be
no tomorrow, so there can be no future as such.
“The future in the world of the dead takes place in what the scrolls call ‘the eternal now.’”
Kahlan scratched an eyebrow. “The eternal now?”
“That’s right–the eternal now. In the underworld there is only ‘now.’” Richard held up a finger to make a point, reminding Kahlan very much of Zedd when he did so. “Time is a concept that only has relevance in this world, where there are beginnings and ends to things–days, years, lives. In the underworld, a soul never dies. It is eternal.
“The underworld does not have those things needed from which to construct the concept of time. There is no yesterday in the underworld because it’s eternally the same there, eternally unvarying, eternally changeless, so there can be no such thing as yesterday. By the same token, there can be no tomorrow. Right? The sun does not rise and set there. It’s always the same. There are no ‘days’ there, nothing to mark time, no end of time. See what I mean? It’s all an eternal now.
“Since ‘now’ in the underworld is an eternity–the eternal now–there is no future as such there because, in a place with no markers for time, such a thing can’t be delineated. This means that what we would think of as happening in the future, here in our world, in the eternity of the underworld actually happens in this homogeneous soup of the eternal now.
“We think of events happening in our future because in our world we have time–a today and a tomorrow–but you can’t think of it the same way there.”
Kahlan stared off into the memory. “I remember when I was there, in the underworld. I don’t recall any sense of how long. I was only there. Always, forever, unchanging.”
“Exactly,” he said. “In the eternal now of the underworld, those events, which all take place in the eternal now, all happen together and are the purview of a power known as Regula. Regula, you might say, is the sum of everything–everything that can happen, everything that will happen.
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