Terry Goodkind - The Third Kingdom

As his fingers brushed the names in stone, he looked again at the words saying they left him a reminder.

His fingers drifted to the center between the three symbols, where there was a slight depression. He rubbed with his fingers and the stone dust there began to fall away until it revealed that underneath there was a piece of ancient leather tightly stuffed into a hole in the stone.

He pulled the leather out and opened it in his palm. There, in the center, rested a ring. He and Samantha stared at the silver ring. On the top face of the ring was a Grace. It looked like a ring used for sealing wax on messages.

The message they had sent him was the ring itself. It was a Grace he was to wear to always remind him of what was at stake. He slipped it onto the ring finger of his right hand, the hand he used with the sword. It fit perfectly.

Samantha gave him a look that said more than words could. She was as amazed as he. She knew well the importance of the Grace.

When Richard gestured at last, Samantha pressed her palm to the metal plate and the rock rumbled aside to allow them to pass. Once through, she touched the plate on the other side to shield the doorway.

Samantha didn’t ask to have the message translated. She must have sensed by the look on his face and his silence that the words were for him and no one else.

When he hadn’t said anything for a time as they swiftly made their way through the passageway, she couldn’t remain silent any longer. “So, have you finally come to your senses and realized that you can’t really go in there?”

“Look, Samantha,” he said, “you know as well as I do that you can’t get that deadly touch of the Hedge Maid out of me—only my friends can do that. The only way to save myself and Kahlan, and in turn hope to help everyone else, is to get my friends out of the hands of the Shun-tuk and then get us back to the containment field at the People’s Palace. After they do cure us, then I can work to figure out how to put an end to the threat from the third kingdom before it’s too late. Simple as that.”

“Simple as that? And what if Zedd and Nicci and all the others are dead?”

“Then I’ll soon be dead, too, and soon after that so will everyone else. I need Zedd and Nicci. If there is a chance they’re alive, then I have to try to find them.”

“But, but it’s a land filled with half people and walking dead. And who knows what other unholy monsters might be in the third kingdom. It’s too dangerous.”

“I’m the one, remember?”

“Yes, which is exactly why you can’t go there. We all need you!”

“What’s your plan, then?” He looked down at her. “Hm? How are we going to stop the half people and the dead armies that have come back to life? Without a cure I’ll soon be dead so you’ll have to fight them alone. So, what’s your plan?”

She pressed her lips tight for a moment. “Well,” she finally said, “I guess, there’s good reason you’re the Lord Rahl. But I still don’t like your plan to go in there.”

“I don’t much like it myself, but I can’t help anyone if I’m dead, now can I? Basically, that is what the message back there on the stone door said. It was a message to me, saying that I’m the bringer of death and war is now up to me. I’m a war wizard. This is what I have to do, what only I can do.”

“A war wizard without his gift,” she reminded him.

When he didn’t answer, Samantha sighed in frustration as she replaced the glowing light sphere in the iron bracket on the wall and followed him out of the hallway into the room where Kahlan lay on the mat. There was no one else in the quiet room.

Richard knelt down beside Kahlan, watching her slow but steady breathing. Every time he looked at her he was struck by how beautiful she was. Since the first time he had seen her, he had known that she was the one. Seeing her face always lifted his heart.

She was the one. The only one for him. The last one of her kind. He was going to find a way to help save her life.

Samantha had told him that with some of her injuries healed, and her resting and recovering after the healing, she should soon wake up. The main problem would remain, but she would regain consciousness and at least no longer suffer from all the injuries and blood loss at the hands of the Hedge Maid.

Richard pressed his hand to Kahlan’s forehead. He was relieved to feel that while she was warm, she was not burning up with fever. That was a good sign, he told himself, a sign that she would hopefully wake soon. But he didn’t know how long that would take and time was working against him.

If Zedd and Nicci had been killed by the half people who had captured them, then there could be no hope for Kahlan, for him, or for anyone else. Magda Searus had said that he could save the world of life. Or end it.

“I don’t have any time to waste,” he said in a voice now calmer in the presence of the person he loved more than life itself. “I have to go.”

Samantha sighed unhappily. She considered quietly for a moment before speaking.

“I wish I had some other answer, Lord Rahl. I hate to say it, but I think you may be right.”

“I know I’m right.”

CHAPTER

34

His decision final that he had to go into the third kingdom to look for Zedd, Nicci, and the others, Richard turned his attention to Kahlan, checking to make sure that all of her wounds looked properly healed. Samantha lit a few more of the candles so he could see better and then watched him in silence as he touched her cheek, silently asking the good spirits to watch over her.

“I’ll need some traveling supplies,” he told her as he smoothed back Kahlan’s hair. “Maybe you could get some things together for me?”

Samantha nodded. “All right. I can get us some supplies. I’ll put together some of the things we’ll need for such a journey.”

Richard looked up. “Just supplies for me, Samantha. You’re not going.”

“Yes, I am,” she said in a calm voice laced with iron determination.

“It’s too dangerous. You said so yourself.”

“I know it’s dangerous. That’s why I have to go with you.”

“If it’s too dangerous for me, then it is definitely too dangerous for you. You don’t know anything about dealing with such dangers.”

“I was dealing just fine with those walking corpses that were after me,” she said under her breath as she went to a chest across the room and opened the lid.

Richard didn’t want to argue the point. He turned his attention once more to Kahlan, wishing she would wake before he left. He had so much to tell her. She had no idea of all the things that had happened. The last thing she probably remembered was being Jit’s captive, being bound into those thorn walls, and being bled to death. She wouldn’t know about Zedd, Nicci, and Cara coming to help get them out. She wouldn’t have any idea about the mysterious people who had attacked them and been intent on eating her alive.

He didn’t want to leave her when she was in the dark about everything that had happened. He especially didn’t want to leave her in the dark about where he was going and why. She was also defenseless against such an enemy. But waiting for her to wake up would in reality only further endanger her life. His first duty was to find a way to get the vile contamination of death out of her. To do that, he had to find Zedd and Nicci.

“Your gift doesn’t work,” Samantha said as she rummaged through the contents of the chest. “My gift works. You’ll need me to go with you.”

“I have my sword.”

“Good for you. You still don’t have the use of your gift.” She pulled out a small backpack, then gestured to the hallway at the back of the room. “You couldn’t even get past a shield without me. What are you going to do if you need some kind of simple magic like that? I may be young and inexperienced, and I admit that I have a lot yet to learn, but at least my gift works.”