Terry Goodkind - Wizard's First Rule

Richard recovered and returned to his feet. The fog had cleared from his head. He felt as if he were waking from a dream only to find himself in a nightmare. The rest of him was out of the little locked room in his mind, and he wasn’t putting it away again. He would die with all of his mind, his dignity, intact. He kept the anger choked off, but there was fire in his eyes. Fire in his heart.

“Did the Old One teach you that?” Rahl asked, a curious frown on his face.

“Teach me what?”

“To partition your mind. That was how you kept from being broken.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You put up a partition, to protect the core, sacrificed the rest to what would be done. A Mord-Sith cannot break a partitioned mind. Punish, yes. Break, no.” He turned to Denna. “Once again, I am sorry, my pet. I thought you had failed me. You have not. None but the most talented could have taken him this far. You have done well, but this makes matters altogether different.”

He smiled, licked his fingertips, smoothed them over his eyebrows. “Richard and I are going to have a private conversation now. While he is in this room with me, I wish you to let him speak without the pain of the magic. It interferes with what I may need to do. While he is here, he is to be free of your control. You may return to your quarters. When I am done with him, and if he is still alive, I will send him back to you, as promised.”

Denna bowed deeply. “I live to serve, Master Rahl.”

She turned to Richard, her face crimson, and put a finger under his chin, lifting it a little. “Don’t disappoint me, my love.”

The Seeker smiled. “Never, Mistress Denna.”

He let the anger rage, just to feel it again, as he watched her walk away. Rage at her, and at what had been done to her. Don’t think of the problem, he told himself, think of the solution. Richard turned to face Darken Rahl. The other’s face was calm, and showed nothing. Richard made his do the same.

“You know I want to know what the rest of the book says.”

“Kill me.”

Rahl smiled. “So eager to die, are we?”

“Yes. Kill me. Just like you killed my father.”

Darken Rahl frowned, the smile still on his lips. “Your father? I have not killed your father, Richard.”

“George Cypher! You killed him! Don’t try to deny it! You killed him with that knife at your belt!”

Rahl spread his hands in mock innocence. “Oh, I don’t deny killing George Cypher. But I have not killed your father.”

Richard stood caught off guard. “What are you talking about?”

Darken Rahl strolled around him, watching his eyes as Richard tried to follow him by turning his head. “It’s quite good. It really is. The best I have ever seen. Done by the great one himself.”

“What?”

Darken Rahl licked his fingers and stopped in front of him. “The wizard’s web around you. I’ve never seen one like it. It’s wound around you tight as a cocoon. Been there a good long time. It’s quite intricate—I don’t think even I could untangle it.”

“If you are trying to convince me George Cypher is not my father, you have failed. If you are trying to convince me you are mad, you needn’t bother. That much I already know.”

“My dear boy,” Rahl laughed, “I couldn’t care less who you believe your father to be. Nonetheless, there is a wizard’s web hiding the truth from you.”

“Really? I’ll play along. Who’s my father, if it’s not George Cypher?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Rahl shrugged. “The web hides it. But from what I’ve seen, I have my suspicions.” The smile left. “What does the Book of Counted Shadows say?”

Richard shrugged. “That’s your question? You disappoint me.”

“How so?”

“Well, after what was done to your bastard father, I thought sure you’d want to know the old wizard’s name.”

Darken Rahl glared as he slowly licked his fingertips. “What is the old wizard’s name?”

It was Richard’s turn to smile. He spread his arms wide. “Cut me open. It’s written on my guts. You will have to find it there.”

Richard kept the smirk on his face—he knew he was defenseless and was hoping Rahl would be driven to kill him. If he was dead, the book died with him. No box, no book. Rahl was going to die—Kahlan would be safe then. That was all that mattered.

“In one week, it will be the first day of winter, and I will know the name of the wizard, and have the power to snatch him from wherever he is, and bring his, hide to me.”

“In one week, you will be dead. You have only two boxes.”

Darken Rahl licked his fingers again and smoothed them over his lips. “I have two right now, and the third is on its way here, as we speak.”

Richard tried not to believe him. He let his face show nothing. “A brave boast. But a lie, nonetheless. In one week, you are going to die.”

Rahl raised his eyebrows. “I speak the truth. You have been betrayed. The same one who has betrayed you to me has also betrayed the box to me. It will be here in a few days.”

“I don’t believe you,” Richard said flatly.

Darken Rahl licked his fingertips and turned, walking around the circle of white sand. “No? Let me show you something.”

Richard followed him to a wedge of white stone upon which sat a flat slab of granite held up by two short fluted pedestals. In the center of the slab sat two of the boxes of Orden. One was ornately jeweled like the one Richard had seen before. The other was as black as the night stone, its surface a void in the light of the room: the box itself, its protective covering removed.

“Two of the boxes of Orden,” Rahl announced, holding his hand out to them. “Why would I want the book? The book would be useless to me without the third box. You had the third box. The one who betrayed you told me so. If the box were not on its way, why would I need the book? I would instead cut you open to get the location of the box.”

Richard shook with anger. “Who betrayed me and the box? Tell me the name.”

“Or what? Or you will cut me open and read the name on my guts? I will not betray the name of one who has helped me. You are not the only one with honor.”

Richard didn’t know what to believe. Rahl was right about one thing. He wouldn’t need the book if he didn’t have all three boxes. Someone really had betrayed him. It was impossible, but it must be true.

“Just kill me,” Richard said in a weak voice, turning away. “I’m not going to tell you. You might as well cut me open.”

“First you must convince me you are telling the truth. You could be, deceiving me that you really know the whole book. You may have read just the first page, and burned the rest, or simply be inventing what you have told me of it.”

Richard folded his arms and looked back over his shoulder. “And what possible reason could I have for wanting you to believe me?”

Rahl shrugged. “I thought you cared about this Confessor. Kahlan. I had thought you cared what happened to her. You see, if you can’t convince me that you are telling the truth, then I will have to cut her open, and have a look at her entrails, see if they have anything to say about this.”

Richard glared. “That would be the biggest mistake you could make. You need her to confirm the truth of the book. If you harm her, you destroy your chance.”

Rahl shrugged. “So you say. How would I know you really do know what the book says? It could even be that this is the manner in which she will confirm the truth.”

Richard said nothing, his mind racing in a thousand directions at once. Think of the solution, he told himself, not the problem.

“How did you get the covering off that box, without the book?”