The pillars of creation

She wanted desperately to see his smile, his blue eyes, his spikes of white hair. She couldn't bear the thought of them torturing him. She had to get him out of their clutches.

But how was she to accomplish such an impossible task? First, she had to get back there, she decided. Hopefully, by then, she would think of a way.

Tom would get her back to the palace. Tom would be waiting, worrying. Tom. Why had Tom helped her? The nugget of that question stuck out in her mind like a landmark to an answer, like the spine of rock lead up and out of the swamp. She just didn't know where it led.

Tom had helped her. Why?

She focused her mind on that question as she trudged up the steep rise. He said he couldn't live with himself if he watched her go out onto the Azrith Plains alone, with no supplies. He said she would die and he couldn't let that happen. That seemed a decent enough sentiment.

She knew there was more, though. He seemed determined to help her, almost as if he was duty bound. He never really questioned what it was she had to do, only her method of going about it, then did what he could to assist her.

Tom said that she should tell Lord Rahl about his help, that he was a good man. That memory kept nagging at her. Even though it had been an offhand comment, he'd been serious. But what had he meant?

She kept turning it over in her mind as she ascended the rise of rock, up among the trees, among the limbs and leaves. Animals, distant strange creatures, called out through the humid air. Others, more distant, answered with the same echoing whoops and whistles. The smell of the swamp rose to her on hot waves of air.

Jennsen recalled that Tom had seen her knife when she'd been looking for her purse that had been stolen. She had pulled back her cloak only to find that the leather thong from her purse of coins had been cut. He had seen the knife then.

Jennsen paused in her climb and straightened. Could it be that Tom thought she was some kind of… some kind of representative, or agent, of the Lord Rahl? Could it be that Tom thought she was on an important mission on behalf of Lord Rahl? Could it be that Tom thought she knew Lord Rahl?

Was it the knife that made him think she was someone special? Perhaps it had been her pressing determination to go on a seemingly impossible journey. He certainly knew how important she thought it was. Perhaps it was that she had told him it was a matter of life and death.

Jennsen moved on, ducking under heavy limbs drooping down close over the rock. On the other side, she stood and looked around, realizing that darkness was quickly descending. With a renewed sense of urgency, she scrambled up the steep slope.

She recalled how Tom had looked at her red hair. People were often worried about her because of her red hair. Many thought she had the gift because of it. She had often encountered people who feared her because of her red hair. She had used that fear deliberately to help herself stay safe. That first night, with Sebastian, she had made him think she had some kind of magical ability to protect her if he harbored hostile intent. She had used people's fear to ward the men at the inn.

All of those things churned together in Jennsen's mind as she climbed ever upward, gasping for breath at the strenuous effort. Darkness was enveloping her. She didn't know if she could still make it through in such conditions, but she knew she had to try. For Sebastian, she had to keep going.

Just then, something dark swept up, right at her face. Jennsen let out a clipped cry and nearly fell as the dark thing fluttered away. Bats. She put a hand over her racing heart. It was beating as fast as their wings. The little creatures had come out to snatch the bugs that were so thick in the air.

She realized, then, that in her surprise, she might easily have stepped back and fallen. It was frightening to think how a lapse of attention in the dark, a fright, a loose rock, or a slip, could put her over an edge from which there could be no return. She knew, though, that remaining in the swamp at night might be just as fatal.

Weary from the day's struggles, the sudden scares, she climbed, stumbling in the dark, feeling the rock, groping her way, trying to stay on the ridge and not wander off what she knew to be steep drops to either side.

She worried, too, what creatures might still come out in the darkness to seize her just as she thought she was nearly free of the swamp.

Althea had said that no one could come into the swamp by the back way. A new worr y gripped her: maybe after dark, Tom would be in danger. Under cover of night, one of the creatures might venture out of the swamp to snatch him. What if she reached the meadow only to discover Tom and his horses mauled by the monsters created out of Althea's magic? What would she do, then?

She had worries enough. She told herself not to come up with new ones.

Jennsen stumbled suddenly out into the open. There was a fire burning. She stared, trying to reconcile it.