Phantom: Chainfire Trilogy Part 2

He lay back on the stone and stared up at the canopy of limbs and leaves above and, beyond them, the stars. He smiled, mocking himself, thinking that maybe a falling star would answer his wishes. He pushed aside the thoughts of wishes and put his mind to the task at hand.

He'd run the whole thing through his mind a hundred times and it still made no sense. Baraccus said, through the message left with the sliph, that he didn't have the answers that would save Richard. Baraccus believed, though, that Richard had within him what was needed to succeed. Baraccus told Richard to believe in himself, and wanted him to know that he believed in Richard, although he hadn't used Richard's name, specifically.

The message, Richard reasoned, had been meant for the one who would be born with the Subtractive side of the gift that Baraccus had seen to it was released from the Temple of the Winds, but Baraccus didn't know that person's name, didn't know, specifically, who that person would be. At least, Richard didn't think he did. It made more sense that Baraccus simply spoke directly, personally, without using names. The message had been clear enough without having to use the name of the person who would eventually hear it. That gave it the sound of a direct address.

How could that be a test? How could Richard fail it?

He sighed in frustration as he pulled a long stalk of grass growing from one of the missing mortar joints off to the side. As he considered the issue, he flattened the soft base of the stalk of grass with his front teeth.

Could it be that the sliph somehow had been given some power by Baraccus, like the power he'd given her to act in an emergency, so that she could see whether or not Richard had what it took to succeed? Could it be that this insight given the sliph told her that Richard fell short in some way?

The source. As he stared up at the stars, Richard mulled that over in his mind. He'd told the sliph that he had heard those words before from Shota and then, all of a sudden, the sliph had been done with him.

Could the sliph know Shota? Maybe, in Baraccus's view, Richard should not be associating with a witch woman. Maybe that was the reason Richard had failed — because he hadn't been doing things on his own, by himself. He made a face. He had difficulty imagining that Baraccus wouldn't want him to work with people, to find answers, to solve problems.

He ran over the words in his mind, as best as he could recall them, anyway.

I am sorry. I don't know the answers that would save you. If I did, please believe that I would give them eagerly. But I know the good in you. I believe in you. I do know that you have within you what you must to succeed. There will be times when you doubt yourself. Do not give up. Remember then that I believe in you, that I know you can accomplish what you must. You are a rare person. Believe in yourself.

Know that I believe you are the one who can do it.

That was what the sliph had said was the message from Baraccus. Richard recalled, though, that those had been the same words Shota had told him not very long ago, the last time he had seen her, just before she left.

Richard didn't really believe in coincidence. In this case, he certainly didn't. Shota could not have said by chance the same words that Baraccus had told the sliph to say. The message was too long and too detailed, with characteristics that were far too idiosyncratic.

If that was the case, that it had not been coincidence, and Richard was sure it wasn't, then why would Shota have used the exact same words that Baraccus had? Was it a message of some kind? Was she trying to tell him something? Warn him about something?

If the witch woman had wanted to help him, then why didn't she warn him about the test, and tell him? If she could not tell him the answer, she could at least have told him what the test would be. Zedd had often said, though, that a witch woman never told you what you wanted to know without telling you something you didn't. Could that be it? He doubted it, since she had told him a great many terrible things that day — things, it turned out, that had helped him finally grasp what he had to do with the army, rather than allowing them to fight Jagang in a final battle.

The thing that was itching at him, though, was that there were phrases in the message that were unique: answers that would save you; give them eagerly; know the good in you; you have within you what you must to succeed; know that I believe you are the one. Those were all slightly uncommon patterns in the way people spoke. They were not drastically different, but they were a bit eccentric, almost childlike, and yet rather formal in a simplistic way. Richard sighed. He couldn't seem to put his finger on it, but there was something distinctly unconventional in the use of language within that message.

With an icy shock of realization, he remembered.