Temple of the Winds (84 page)

Kahlan found her feet steady at last. “If we had known the sliph was awake, and had been guarding her before, then Marlin wouldn’t have been able to come to try to assassinate Richard, and the Sister wouldn’t have been able to start the plague.”

Kahlan’s chest constricted with a hot, cutting pang of regret. They could have prevented the whole thing. All the awful things she had learned would not be threatening her people, her world, and her love. The realization of the chance lost left her nauseous.

“
Lord Rahl also wanted us to wait until your return from the witch woman, in case you needed help.”

“
Richard knew where I went?”

“
The sliph wouldn’t tell him, but he said he knew anyway. He said you went to the witch woman.”

“
He knew, and he didn’t chase after me?”

Cara pulled her long blond braid over her shoulder. “I was surprised, too. I asked him why he wouldn’t go after you. He said that he loved you; he did not own you.”

“
Really? Richard said that?”

“
Yes.” A smirk tightened Cara’s lips. “You are training him well, Mother Confessor. I approve. And then he kicked a chair. I think he hurt his foot, but he denies it.”

“
So, Richard is angry with me?”

Cara rolled her eyes. “Mother Confessor, this is Richard we are talking about. The man is fool in love with you. He wouldn’t be angry with you if you told him to marry Nadine instead of you.”

Kahlan swallowed at the renewed twist of pain. “Why would you say that?”

Cara frowned. “I only meant he could never be angry with you, no matter what. You were supposed to laugh, not jump like I had poked you with my Agiel. Mother Confessor, he loves you; he is worried sick, but he is not angry with you.”

“
What about kicking the chair?”

Cara stroked her long blond braid and smirked again. “He claimed the chair gave him just cause.”

“
I see.” Kahlan couldn’t seem to find pleasure in Cara’s sense of humor. “How long have I been gone?”

“
Not quite two days. And I expect you to tell me how you managed to slip past those D’Haran guards out there by the bridge.”

“
It was snowing. They didn’t see me.”

Cara didn’t look to believe it. She was giving Kahlan that odd look again.

“
And did you kill the witch woman?”

“
No.” Kahlan changed the subject. “What has Richard been doing while I was gone?”

“
Well, first he asked the sliph to take him to the Temple of the Winds, but she said she didn’t know that place and couldn’t take him there, so he rode to Mount Kymermosst—”

“
He went there?” Kahlan snatched Cara’s arm. “What did he find?”

“
Nothing. He said that there was nothing to find. He said that if the Temple of the Winds was once there, it is now gone.”

Kahlan released Cara’s arm. “He went to Mount Kymermosst, and he’s back already?”

“
You know Lord Rahl; when he gets something in his head, he charges after it. The men who went with him said they rode hard. They slept little and rode much of the night. Lord Rahl expected you to return last night and wanted to be back for you. When you did not return as expected, he paced and fretted, but still he did not go after you. Whenever he looked like he was about to change his mind, he read your letter again, and went back to pacing instead.”

“
I guess my letter was a little strong,” Kahlan said as she glanced down at the floor.

“
Lord Rahl showed it to me.” Cara’s face was unreadable. “Sometimes it is necessary to threaten men, or they get to thinking that they are the ones who say what will be. You dissuaded him of that idea with your threats.”

“
I didn’t threaten him.” Kahlan thought that her tone sounded too much like a plea.

Cara watched Kahlan’s eyes for a moment. “You are probably right. The chair must have given Lord Rahl cause, as he said.”

“
I did what I had to do. Richard would understand that. I guess I’d better go explain it to him.”

Cara gestured behind, to the door. “You just missed him. He was here not long ago.”

“
He came to see if I was back? He must be worried sick.”

“
Berdine told him about the book you were searching for. He came here and found it.”

Kahlan blinked in astonishment. “He found it? But we looked. It wasn’t there. How did he find it?”

“
He went to a place he called the First Wizard’s enclave, and found it there.”

Kahlan’s jaw dropped. “He went in there? He went into the First Wizard’s enclave? Alone, without me? He shouldn’t have gone there! That’s a dangerous place!”

“
Really.” Cara folded her arms. “And of course you would never do anything so foolish as to get it in your head to go run off alone to a dangerous place. Maybe you should reprimand Lord Rahl for his impulsive behavior, since you are so prudent and above such reckless conduct yourself.”

The echo of Cara’s voice lingered uncomfortably before it died out. Kahlan understood. Even though Richard did as she had asked by not coming after her, Cara had tried. Even though she didn’t like magic, Cara had tried to go to protect Kahlan.

“
Cara,” she said in a meek voice, “I’m sorry, I tricked you, too.”

Cara shrugged, but still showed no emotion. “I am just a guard. You have no obligation to me.”

“
Yes, I do. You are not ‘just a guard.’ You may be our protector, but you are more. I consider you my friend. You are a sister of the Agiel. I should have told you what I was doing, but I feared that if I did, Richard would be angry with you for not stopping me. I didn’t want that.”

Cara said nothing. Still, she showed no emotion. Kahlan breached the uncomfortable silence. “Cara, I’m sorry. I guess I was afraid you would try to stop me. I tricked you. You’re a sister of the Agiel; I should have trusted you and taken you into my confidence. Please, Cara, I was wrong. I beg you forgive me.”

A smile finally spread on Cara’s face. “We are sisters of the Agiel. I forgive you.”

Kahlan managed a small smile. “Do you think Richard will be as understanding as you?”

Cara let out an amused grunt. “Well, you have better ways to persuade him to forgive you. It is not so difficult to melt a man’s frown.”

“
I only wish I had good news, so I could bring a smile to his face, but I don’t.” She paused at the doorway. “What has Nadine been up to while I’ve been gone?”

“
Well, I’ve been down here guarding the sliph much of the time, but from what I’ve seen, she has been giving the staff herbs to try to protect them, and to use in smoking the palace. It’s a good thing the place is made mostly of stone or it would have been burned down by now. She has been conferring with Drefan and helping him in talking to the staff and others who come for advice.

“
Lord Rahl asked her to go out to visit herb sellers and such, to make sure they are not hucksters out to swindle people who are in fear for their lives. The city seems to be sprouting shameless mountebanks the way the sudden warmth seems to be bringing green grass. Nadine also gives reports to Lord Rahl, but he has been gone much of the time, and as busy as she seems to be trying to help people, the visits since he returned are short.”

Kahlan tapped the side of her fist against the doorway.

“
Thanks, Cara.” She looked into the other’s blue eyes. “There are rats down here. Are you all right?”

“
There are worse things than rats.”

“
Indeed there are,” Kahlan whispered.

It was late, and with the dark, people on the streets didn’t recognize her. Without her usual escort of guards, they had no reason to give her a second look, no reason to suspect she was the Mother Confessor out among them. Just as well; there were some people who wished the Mother Confessor harm. Mostly, people kept their distance from her, as they did with everyone else, hoping to keep the plague from themselves.

As Cara had said, there were hucksters everywhere, hawking potions to ward off the plague, or to cure your loved ones already stricken. Others strolled the streets with trays, held up on straps over their shoulders, neatly laid out with amulets possessing magic to protect against the plague. Kahlan remembered seeing some of these same people not long ago selling the same amulets as magic to find a husband or wife, or to enthrall an unfaithful spouse. Old women with small carts or simple wooden stands sold carved spell-invested plaques made to hang over the door to a home as a sure way to keep the plague from entering the house. As late as it was, business seemed brisk. Even the vendors selling meats and produce extolled the healthful virtues of their goods and their value in promoting continued health, if eaten regularly, of course.

Kahlan would send the soldiers out to put a stop to some of these swindlers, but she knew that such intervention would likely be viewed with hostility on the part of the buyers. If she tried to use the army to stop such foolish practices, desperate people would concoct theories about those in power wanting to stop the cures so that the decent, working folk would get the plague. Despite common sense, or evidence to the contrary, many people believed that those in power were always scheming to harm them; if they only knew the truth.

If Kahlan were to order the sale of these items stopped, the “cures” would be sold in secret, and for a higher price. No matter how insupportable the claims of these cures, their benefits would be vehemently supported as self-evident truth.

Wizard’s First Rule: people would believe any lie, either because they wanted to believe it was true, or because they feared it was. These people were desperate, and would become more so, yet. Many wanted to believe.

Kahlan tried to imagine what she would do if Richard had the plague. Would she be despairing enough to put her faith in such trickery, hoping against hope that it would save him? Sometimes hope was all people had. Groundless as it was, she couldn’t take that hope away from them; it was all they had, and all they could do.

It was up to Kahlan and Richard to do that which would help these people.

As she made her way through the familiar splendor of the Confessors’ Palace, on her way to find Richard, Kahlan paused at the open double doors to a large room used for formal receptions. The room was a calming blue color, with dark blue drapes over the tall, narrow windows. The granite floor had a starburst pattern of darker and lighter stone radiating out from the center. Lamps on cherrywood stands around the edge of the room lent a mellow light to the gathering hall. The table where small foods were sometimes set out for guests now held only an array of candles.

Kahlan’s attention had been drawn by the sound of Drefan’s voice. He stood to the right, before the table with the candles, speaking to perhaps fifty or sixty people. They sat cross-legged on the floor before him, listening with rapt attention as he spoke of the way of health, of keeping the body sound by being in touch with the inner self.

Most of the people nodded absently as they listened to Drefan explaining how, by defiling their bodies with unhealthy thoughts and actions, people opened the pathway for sickness to enter. He told them that the Creator had endowed them with the ability to fight off things such as the plague, if only they would do as nature provided, by eating the right foods that would strengthen the auras that defended the body, and by using inner reflection to direct the vigor of various energy fields to their proper function in harmony with the whole.

Many of the things he said made sense: not eating foods that you knew gave you headaches, because it interfered with the mind’s ability to regulate the body; not eating foods that you knew caused pains and cramps in the gut, because it interfered with the body’s ability to digest the good foods you needed; not eating heavy meals right before sleeping, because it interfered with your body getting the rest it needed to remain strong, and how all of these things disrupt the auras that give us strength and protect health.

People marveled openly that Drefan could make it all so simple for them to understand. They spoke as if they had been blind, and now for the first time had vision. They watched with unblinking eyes as he went on, telling them that we had within us the power to control our own bodies, and that disease could only afflict us if we allowed it to. He spoke of herbs and foods that purged poisons from the body and left people truly healthy for perhaps the first time since their birth.