The Third Kingdom

Ester took a deep breath. “Well, it’s a long story, Mother Confessor. You’ve only just now woken up. I don’t want to throw it all at you at once. Sip the water. I should get you some soup. You look like skin and bones. You need to eat.”

Kahlan looked down at herself. She did look to have lost some weight, but not a lot.

“The Hedge Maid had me…” she said, trying to orient herself in the world, trying to understand how she had come to be in this strange, stone room.

“Jit,” Ester said.

Kahlan looked up. “Yes, that’s right. Jit.” She squinted, trying to remember. “Richard … I think Richard was there…”

Ester was nodding. “Yes, he told us that he went there to get you away from that awful woman. The Hedge Maid was an evil creature. Unfortunately, Jit captured Richard as well, but then he killed her—”

“Richard killed Jit?” Kahlan put a hand to her forehead, trying to remember such an important event, but she couldn’t.

“Yes, but, but there was trouble in that.”

Kahlan shook her head. “Trouble? I’m confused.” It all felt like so long ago. “I’m sorry, Ester, but I don’t understand what you’re talking about. I don’t understand what’s going on. I don’t know who you are or where I am or how I got here.”

Ester looked toward the door. The voices were getting closer. Besides the tension in Ester’s face, Kahlan, too, recognized that the voices did not sound friendly. She thought she heard a man demanding something.

Ester finally turned back. “Lord Rahl—and Henrik—”

“Henrik.” She remembered Henrik. “Is he here? He’s all right, then?”

“Yes, yes,” Ester said as she nodded. “Lord Rahl and Henrik told us most of what has happened. Not all of it, I expect, but much of it. Lord Rahl had to go, though, so he wanted me to explain it to you—to let you know what had happened.”

“Go? Where did he go?” That didn’t sound like Richard, leaving her somewhere when she was unconscious. “Why would Richard leave me here?”

Ester put a hand on Kahlan’s shoulder when she saw how frustrated she was getting with trying to understand.

“Mother Confessor, I will explain it all in more detail once you have had something to eat and you get your bearings. All right? For now, what you need to know is that Richard went to rescue you, and he killed Jit. But as she died, she touched you both with death.”

CHAPTER

54

Kahlan put her fingers to her forehead. She wasn’t sure that she had heard correctly. She frowned as she leaned toward the woman.

“What?”

“You both have the touch of death in you from the Hedge Maid. Apparently, the Hedge Maid released death itself from within her as she screamed. That’s what killed her, as I understand it. That sound would have killed anyone nearby. It would have killed you and Lord Rahl as well, but he was able to do something that protected you both from the worst of it. While it didn’t kill you both, it did still leave death’s touch in you both—you worse than he.

“You were both in a very grim way, not only from the wounds you received when being held captive by the Hedge Maid, but also from that touch of death in you. Your friends, a man named Zedd, and some others—a sorceress Nicci, and another woman…”

Ester put a finger to her lip and looked up, trying to remember the name.

“Cara?” Kahlan guessed.

Ester snapped her fingers. “That’s the woman. Cara. Anyway, your friends and a lot of soldiers had come to help. They got you and Richard out of Jit’s lair and were on the way to take you both back to the palace when they were all attacked by half people from the third kingdom.”

Confused, Kahlan put her open fingers back over her face. She felt like she had just lost the thread of the story.

“The what people from where?”

“The half people from the third kingdom,” Ester said, as she glanced toward the voices again, listening for a moment. The voices were still an indecipherable drone. As Kahlan again started to object, Ester waved a hand for patience so that she could explain.

“You, your friends, and the soldiers were attacked. Everyone but you and Lord Rahl were either killed or captured. The attackers didn’t see you two because the woman—Cara—put a tarp over you both to hide you in the back of a wagon. It worked, but the rest of them were all killed or captured.”

Kahlan covered her mouth in shock. Her heart pounded out of control at the news. She wasn’t so sure she hadn’t awakened to a world gone crazy.

“Do you know if any of them are safe? Do you know if any of them who were captured are still alive?”

“Sorry, we don’t know. Apparently, after you and Richard were being taken from Jit’s lair, the people with you were trying to heal your wounds, but they didn’t have time before they were attacked. It appeared that least some of them who weren’t killed in the attack may have been carried off. Lord Rahl doesn’t know who is dead, and who might be held captive.