The Third Kingdom

Richard asked the question to which he already knew the answer, but couldn’t help asking. “Do you see any hope for us, any way to get this sickness out of us and save our lives, other than what Henrik overheard must be done?”

Samantha glanced back over her shoulder, as if she could see Kahlan lying back there. When she looked back at him her eyes looked considerably older than her years. There was no doubt or uncertainty in her young features, or her sorceress eyes.

She shook her head. “I’m afraid not, Lord Rahl. The Mother Confessor is very sick. I’m hoping that with what I was able to do for her she will soon recover enough strength to wake and be able to eat and drink, but she is deathly sick. So are you, even if you don’t yet feel its full effect. You soon will. She will die if that death within her is not removed. She does not have a lot of time left. You will last a little longer, but not much. The path for both of you is set, unless something is done to change it.”

Richard nodded, unable to say anything, unable to stop himself from imagining Kahlan lying dead.

“I’m sorry, Lord Rahl, but I don’t think you are the kind of man who would want me to tell you anything other than the truth.”

Richard stared into Samantha’s dark eyes. “No, I wouldn’t. Only the truth can help us. That’s why I need to translate this message. I need to see if there is any information here that can help us.”

He couldn’t say out loud that if Kahlan died, he would not want to live. Life held nothing for him without Kahlan. Life held nothing but imminent death for both of them if he couldn’t find Zedd and Nicci. To do that, he needed to go to the third kingdom, but first he had to learn what he faced.

He looked briefly at the account on the wall highlighted in the eerie light of the sphere. “Maybe I can find something here that will help us, give us some answers we can use.”

She nodded solemnly. “I hope so.”

He turned back to the language of Creation and read to himself for a moment. It was grim reading.

“Naja’s account says that the dead are always plentiful and more corpses were animated as needed, often in vast numbers. Oftentimes they used their own soldiers who had been killed. She says that as part of its function the magic that possesses them forestalls the decay process, but because such dark forces are used in the world of life, the magic invested in the dead has limits. For one, because everything in the world of life breaks down over time, so does this magic. As it does, its effectiveness degrades and the dead it possesses will begin to resume natural decomposition. She advises that while they know that the magic animating the dead eventually fails, she doesn’t know how long that process takes.”

“Great. So these killers, these walking dead who don’t rot for ages, are plentiful and now they’re escaping the third kingdom to walk among us.”

“It would seem so,” Richard said in desolate agreement.

Samantha shook her head in dismay. “Even Jit stayed in her lair. As dangerous as the rest of the Dark Lands can be, we’ve never before had to face anything as terrifying as these walking dead. I can’t imagine anything worse.”

Richard, still reading ahead in Naja’s account, lightly skimmed his fingers over the next line written in the language of Creation inscribed in the wall.

“It says here that the half people are far worse.”

CHAPTER

26

“Lord Rahl, your face just turned white. What’s wrong? What in the world are half people? Does it say what they are?” Samantha leaned in. “Lord Rahl, answer me. What’s wrong?”

Richard pressed his fingertips to his forehead a moment as he double-checked the translation. He ran it through his head again while trying to grapple with such an alien concept.

“It says that the half people are living people who have been stripped of their souls.”

“Stripped of their souls?” She cocked her head toward him. “Are you serious?”

Richard couldn’t help scanning it yet again before going on to read the following section of the sobering account. He finally backed away, staring at the writing on the wall.

“I’m afraid so.” He pointed out a complex symbol. “This is the part here where it warns that those beyond the barrier have no souls.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. How can people not have a soul? Our souls are part of us all. They are ‘us.’ It’s like saying…” She cast about, trying to find the words. “… that, that living people aren’t alive.”

“I’m afraid that in a way that’s exactly what it’s saying. Naja says that the half people aren’t exactly human, but they almost are. She says they are somewhere in between human and not human.”

Samantha’s nose wrinkled as she made a face. “How can that be?”

“Apparently, the dead and the half people share certain things in common and that’s what keeps the half people from being fully human. At least not in the accepted sense.”

Samantha leaned in with a look of dismay. “Accepted sense? What does that mean?”