Confessor: Chainfire Trilogy Part 3

Chapter 33

Her heart heavy, Kahlan watched as Richard knelt beside his fallen right wing man. The horn blew. The men from Jagang’s team quickly left their victim slumped on his side to return to their end of the field to be ready to defend.

“Is he dead?” Jillian asked.

Kahlan circled an arm around the shoulders of the girl pressed in against her left side. “I’m afraid so.”

“Why would they deliberately do such a thing?”

“It’s the way the Order plays Ja’La dh Jin. Killing is a means to get what they want.”

Kahlan could see the tears in Richard’s eyes as his men hooked their arms under his and dragged him back away from the body. If he didn’t go back to play immediately he would be ejected for delaying the game. Referee’s assistants quickly set to work dragging the lifeless form of the big man off the field.

Kahlan could hear Jagang, half a dozen paces ahead of her, chuckle.

Nicci, at his side, briefly glanced back over her shoulder. Kahlan didn’t quite know what to make of the liquid look in her blue eyes. It seemed part sadness for Richard, part bottled rage, and, somehow, part warning to Kahlan.

Kahlan hadn’t been able to speak with Nicci again since that night after she had been so terribly hurt. Ever since Jagang had made his bet with Commander Karg he had been moody and short-tempered.

Last evening, as Nicci waited in the bedchamber and Kahlan waited in the outer room of his tent, he’d met outside with some of the members of his team. Kahlan hadn’t heard everything, but it had sounded like he had given them orders that he wanted them to see to it that the point man for Karg’s team didn’t cause them any trouble.

Kahlan had had a sleepless night, worried that Richard might not live to see morning. Whatever had been planned had Jagang in a lusty mood for Nicci. Kahlan and Jillian had been ordered to stay where they were on the floor in the outer room. He wanted to be alone with his Slave Queen, as he called her.

Kahlan hadn’t known what Jagang was doing to her. No matter what he was doing to her, Nicci never screamed. In his bed she always seemed to simply go numb, staring unblinking at nothing in this world as he went about his business. Kahlan understood what Nicci was doing. It was the only defense she had. As she drew inward, her outward indifference was her protection for her sanity. It would do her no good to let herself pay attention to everything that the brute was doing to her. On the other hand, her indifference enraged Jagang, often sending him into fits of violence.

Kahlan wondered if, when he started in on her, she would have the strength Nicci had.

That morning, Kahlan had wondered if the Sisters were going to have to be called yet again to save Nicci, or to heal her at least. When Jagang had emerged from the bedchamber, though, he had Nicci by her hair. He tossed her to the floor in front of him, looking pleased with himself, with her helplessness. Kahlan had been relieved that, while she looked a bit battered and bruised, at least she hadn’t appeared grievously injured.

Out on the field Richard’s team gathered, preparing for the next play. Kahlan glanced around as legions of men still cheered their satisfaction at the man’s death. Others, though, yelled in anger, shaking fists at the emperor’s team. The air fairly crackled with tension. As the game quickly went back into action, the crowd began to settle down, at least to a degree.

Kahlan could sense, though, that the mood of the onlookers had changed. What had been universal approval of the match at hand finally getting under way had turned restless and was even in some ways beginning to look malcontent. It had started to change when Jagang had intervened over the last point Richard had scored. Jagang had overruled the referees, saying the goal had been made after the horn blew. The referees had acquiesced and voided the point, but everyone knew that the broc had clearly gone in before the horn.

None of that mattered, though. The emperor had made the call.

The red team seemed determined to play on as if they hadn’t just lost their biggest man. Out on the field they muscled their way through a line of blockers. Richard deftly sidestepped several attempts to snare him. A number of other men, though, were closing in.

Richard abruptly halted on the safe square, a place that was rarely used, preventing the man who had been about to tackle him from doing so. It was the man who had broken the wing man’s neck.

Kahlan couldn’t imagine what Richard was up to. Being on that square prevented him from being attacked as long as he remained there, but it also trapped him on an island that was swiftly being surrounded by opponents. While temporarily safe, he couldn’t score from that spot. He would eventually have to move, but with every passing moment the territory all around him was becoming ever more unhealthy.

As the man turned to check on his teammates, who were quickly closing in, Richard shouted something to get his attention. The man turned back.

Richard, holding the broc pressed back against his chest, with his hands on either side of it, suddenly released it in an explosive throw. The heavy broc smashed squarely into the man’s face so hard that it rebounded back into Richard’s hands.

The blow had been powerful enough to partially cave in the man’s face. With his nose completely driven back into his skull, the man went limp and dropped straight down in a heap.

The crowd gasped at the unexpected turn of events.

In a rage, another man to Richard’s right lunged, even though Richard was on the safe square. The referee didn’t look inclined to step in to call a foul. Richard rolled the broc back under his left arm as he ducked to that side a little. Turning all the while to keep faced to the attack, he swung his right arm. The thick bone of his forearm chopped the man across the throat. The man grabbed for his throat as he stumbled back and collapsed. One leg kicked reflexively as he desperately gasped for air. His windpipe apparently crushed, his face began turning from red to blue.

Without pause, another towering man charged in from the left with a fist raised. Richard twisted toward him, going inside the punch and the opening in the man’s defenses, and used his momentum to help him thrust straight in with lightning speed. The powerful strike focused in the heel of his hand hit he man right over his heart. The blow was enough to stagger him back. The big man clutched his chest, looking dazed and confused, and then, as his eyes began to roll back, he crumpled to the ground.

Without any help, Richard had taken out three men who were all considerably bigger than him. She could easily see why there were so many arrows around the field pointed at him at all times.

Kahlan couldn’t begin to imagine what would happen if Richard ever got his hands on a blade.

Richard wasted no time. He bolted through the opening he had just created and headed for the goals. His men looked to have been prepared for the move. They were already stationed along his route, ready to block the tacklers going after him. Everywhere across the field men crashed together.

Kahlan could see all the faces on the entire hillside across on the other side of the field turn in unison as they watched Richard running toward the opponent’s goals, dodging some men, his blockers knocking others out of his way.

Richard, with no one close enough to bring him down, raced into the scoring zone. In the clear, he heaved the broc into the net, scoring another point. His team was once again ahead.

The crowd was swept up in the frenzy of the fast-paced action. Even Jagang had stepped forward, closer to the edge of the field, to watch, one hand fisted in anxiety at his side. His guards, too, all leaned out to watch as Richard’s team, still with time on their turn, got the broc from the referee and started another charge.

As they made it into their opponent’s territory, Richard cut left, only to be tackled. Kahlan thought that it almost looked deliberate. It reminded her of way he had fallen in the mud so that no one would recognize him that first time they had gone to see his team.

When Richard hit the ground the broc shot from his arms. This, too, looked to her to be a little less than natural. It struck her that it looked to be part of a scheme. His left wing man, who was racing up the field, just happened to be in the right place at the right time. He dipped and scooped up the broc as it rolled past. In an instant he was in the scoring zone and took the throw. With Richard down, it was a legal play for a wing man to attempt a score.

The broc went in the goal, setting off thunderous cheers.

The wing man threw his arms up in joy at having scored. It was something that wing men rarely had the chance to attempt, and even more rarely accomplished. While Kahlan knew that it was permitted, she’d never actually seen it done before.

As the horn blew, signaling the end of the timed turn, Richard caught up with his left wing man and, with a proud smile, clapped him on the back. Judging by the way the wing man looked at Richard, Kahlan thought that recognition from Richard had meant just as much to the man as the goal.

The wing man was an Imperial Order soldier, not a captive like some of the other members of Richard’s team. She wondered why Richard would be so amiable with an Order soldier. Every time she started to have hopeful confidence in the man, something would happen that made her caution return.

Since the last game they had attended, when Nicci had seen the man called Ruben and spoke the name Richard, Kahlan knew that Richard was his real name. She hadn’t been able to speak a word with Nicci since then, though, so she couldn’t ask, but she suspected that Richard was really Richard Rahl—Lord Rahl.

She didn’t know if it was true, but it would certainly explain a lot, like why the man fell in the mud that first day, and why he painted his face with wild designs meant to disguise who he was, and why he told people that his name was Ruben.

It just seemed impossible, though—the Lord Rahl himself being a captive of the Imperial Order, playing on a Ja’La team against the emperor’s team.

What really troubled her, though, was that he knew her. He had called out her name that first day he had been in a cage on a wagon in the supply train rolling into camp. She supposed it was possible that the Order had captured him without realizing who they had. The coincidence of it all, though, struck her as pretty far-fetched. She knew, though, there was likely more to it than she realized. Maybe Richard had gotten himself caught, somehow, in order to get close to her. To rescue her.

Now, she told herself, she was just being silly.

Still, she wondered why she kept finding herself at the center of so many things.

She wished she could get a chance to talk with Nicci again so that she could ask if it really was Richard Rahl.

But then, by Nicci’s reaction, by her tears at seeing him, Kahlan didn’t need to ask. Kahlan could see it written on her face.

This was the man Nicci loved.

Out of the corner of her eye, Kahlan kept track of her special guards as they looked between her and the Ja’La field. When the crowd roared, jamming fists in the air with expectant excitement, her guards leaned this way and that to see between the royal guard and out to the field as the emperor’s team took the broc for their turn to try to score. Three of their players, who had just been dragged to the sidelines, had been replaced by substitute players. By the way the three were abandoned off to the side. Kahlan knew that all three had died. Richard had killed three men in a heartbeat without any help.

She didn’t think that was going to be the end of it, either.

The emperor’s team looked to be in a blind rage as they began their charge. Bunched into a gang, they went straight up the middle, determined to mow down anyone who got in their way. Richard’s team parted for them, then from both sides swiftly moved in behind and attacked from the rear, seizing men’s legs. Tackled in that fashion, they fell face-first in the direction they were running, making the impact all the more jarring.

One of the tackles was violent enough to break the ankle of the man on the emperor’s team. He screamed in pain. The point man, hearing the scream, was distracted for a split second. It was just long enough for him to get hit from the side by two men. He was thrown to the ground so viciously that it knocked the wind out of him and rattled his teeth. A brawl broke out over possession of the broc.

As the emperor’s team recovered, they muscled men aside and managed to keep the broc. On their feet again, they fought to get past the defenders. Several men on Richard’s team were left on the ground, rolling in pain. The crowd yelled frenzied encouragement to the emperor’s team. Their point man dodged this way and that, going around some men, knocking others aside.

Kahlan’s guards, hearing the rabid cheering, inched ever forward, trying to see what was happening. That left more empty space back away from the sideline, where Kahlan was. The press of spectators lining the slope behind, all their weight pushing forward, down toward the field, was causing the area reserved for the emperor to be squeezed in from both sides. Toward the front, where Jagang was, the royal guards kept the excited crowds to each side back, but even they were caught up in the frantic struggle on the Ja’La field; they weren’t paying as much attention behind, where the space was slowly shrinking.

Kahlan tightened her left arm protectively around Jillian, keeping her close as the special guards, having less and less space, started to inch forward where there was more room up closer to the action. The ones who had been behind her pressed in close, squeezing past as they slowly, steadily moved toward the front.

Nicci, having been forgotten by the emperor as he became completely caught up in the action, took a step back, out of the way. That allowed Kahlan’s guards space to move forward. It looked natural, like she was merely trying not to interfere with what they wanted.

Jagang, like everyone else, cheered, groaned, cursed, and yelled at the teams on the field. Darkness had long ago settled in, lending an otherworldly mood to the event. Torches lining the edge of the field cast flickering light to the open patch of ground surrounded by a sea of black. Between many of the torches archers watched with arrows nocked. But even they were caught up in the emotions of the game, watching the action more than they seemed to be watching the captives.

Kahlan felt as if she were at the center of a boiling, churning, frenzied ritual dedicated to violence. The crowd not only yelled and cheered, but they began to chant, stamping feet in time to those chants as their team raced across the field. The ground shook under those hundreds of thousands of boots all slamming down together. The night, dark and overcast, felt like it was filled with continuous, booming thunder.

The mood was bewitching. It even caught Kahlan up in it.

She, along with all those watching, felt as if she were out there, on the field, running with the men. Her heart pounded as she watched Richard dodge tackles, duck under an outstretched arm, and slip between men diving for him. She winced, half turning away when men were hit. Many of the spectators groaned, almost as if they themselves had taken the blow.

As the hourglass marked the turns, the score went back and forth. As she watched, though, Kahlan saw Richard fail to make scores that she felt sure he could have made. He would seem to slow just enough so that a man could catch and tackle him. One time he threw and missed.

He was falling in the mud again, so to speak. This time, she didn’t know why.

As the game wore on it became ever more clear to her that he was manipulating the score, keeping it close. When the emperor’s team would score, it wouldn’t be long before he would make an answering score to stay even, but then he would fail to follow up and make another—until the emperor’s team scored again. Turn after turn of the hourglass went scoreless. It stood at seven points each.

She could tell by the way he moved that he was not merely holding back for some reason, but he was also saving his energy. The other team was wearing themselves out. Richard did what was necessary but no more.

Such a close match only served to heat the emotions of the hillsides of spectators into fevered expectations. Many of them cheered, clapped, whistled, and yelled for the team they favored, while others shook fists and shouted curses at the team they opposed. Here and there fights broke out among the spectators. They ended up being brief because everyone wanted to watch the game.

Kahlan, having watched Nicci’s slow progress, saw that she had managed to ease herself half a dozen steps behind Jagang. No one was paying any attention to her. Jagang had glanced back twice, only half looking, satisfied that she was close enough at hand.

Kahlan could see women camp followers, out near the edge of the field, just as wildly excited as the vast crowd, beginning to bare their breasts as men ran past. While the territory up close to the sidelines was highly prized, and often fought over, women at the matches were freely allowed access right up to the edge of the field. Throngs of men, knowing how worked up the women were, how eager they were to catch the attention of the players, egged them on. The women seemed to crave the attention. Over the deafening noise of the crowd Kahlan could hear some of the nearby women up at sidelines yell lewd promises for the victors as players ran by.

Ordinarily, women behaving in such a manner among the men of the Order would not be free for long, but the soldiers were far more interested in the game on the field. The conduct of the women only added to the debauched atmosphere. It was all part of Ja’La dh Jin.

When Nicci slipped close enough, Jillian reached out and touched her hand. “Are you all right?” she whispered just loud enough to be heard over the noise of the crowd. “We were so worried for you.”

Cupping the girl’s cheek, Nicci smiled briefly as she nodded in answer.

“He’s up to something,” Nicci said under her breath as she leaned a little closer to Kahlan.

“I know.”

“This may be a chance for you to escape. I’ll do all I can to help you. Be ready.”

With the collar around her neck Kahlan didn’t know what chance she could possibly have to escape. She was heartened by the sentiment, though, even if she thought it was completely unrealistic. While Kahlan didn’t believe that she had any real chance of escape, it might be an opportunity for something else, something that could save others.

When Nicci glanced over again, Kahlan lifted out her hand just a little, hiding what was underneath, in her palm.

“Here. Take this.”

When Nicci only frowned, Kahlan turned the hand over briefly, just long enough for Nicci to see the handle of the knife. The blade was pressed up along Kahlan’s wrist, under the sleeve of her shirt.

“Keep it,” Nicci said. “You may need it.”

“I still have two.”

Nicci stared for a moment in surprise, then tilted her head, indicating that Kahlan should give the knife to Jillian. Jillian pulled her cloak open just enough to show Nicci the knife Kahlan had already given her.

Nicci looked up at Kahlan. “Knives are not my talent.”

“It’s not hard,” Kahlan said as she pressed the handle into Nicci’s hand. “When the time is right, just stick the pointed end somewhere important in someone you really don’t like.”

Nicci’s blue eyes stole a glance at Jagang. “I think I can do that much.”

Kahlan thought that Nicci, standing there in the soft torchlight, her blond hair tumbled down over her strong shoulders, was probably the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. It wasn’t just that she was beautiful, though. Despite what Jagang did to her, she remained undaunted. There was an inner strength about her, a nobility.

“Is he Richard Rahl?” Kahlan asked.

Nicci’s blue eyes turned back to Kahlan and stared for a moment.

“Yes.”

“What’s he doing here?”

The slightest smile curved Nicci’s mouth. “He’s Richard Rahl.”

“Do you know what he’s up to?”

Nicci shook her head the slightest bit as her gaze swept over all the guards, checking to make sure none were paying any attention to either of them. Through gaps they could see men painted with wild red designs race past.

“That’s really Richard out there?” Jillian asked.

Nicci nodded.

“How can you tell? I mean, with the paint all over them, how can you be sure? I know Richard and I can’t tell.”

Nicci glanced down at Jillian. “It’s him.”

Her tone was of such calm certainty that it left no reason to question. Kahlan thought that Nicci would probably be able to recognize the man in total darkness.

“How does he know me?” she asked.

Nicci again stared into Kahlan’s eyes for a long moment. “This is not the place for a conversation. Just be ready.”

“For what?” Kahlan asked. “What do you think he’s going to do? What do you think he can do?”

“If I know Richard, I expect that he’s about to start a war.”

Kahlan blinked in surprise. “All by himself?”

“If he has to.”

Out on the field, the emperor’s team scored a point just before the horn blew, signaling the end of their turn. The crowd went crazy. Kahlan winced at the roar. The level of noise was withering.

Richard’s team was now behind by one point.

Waiting for the men to take their place and the horn to start the play for Richard’s team, the entire crowd started in chanting in a deep, harsh, rhythmic grunt. The horde stamped a boot between each of those grunts.

Who-ah. Thump. Who-ah. Thump. Who-ah. Thump.

It seemed like the whole world moved with each of those Who-ahs. The ground shook with each thump. Even Jagang and his royal guards joined in. It gave the night an eerie, savage, primeval feel, as if everything civilized had been abandoned to the spectacle of raw savagery.

The supporters of the emperor’s team wanted the men to rip the challengers apart rather than let them score. The supporters of Richard’s team wanted their men to crush those trying to stop them.

The chanting was a call for blood.

With only one timed turn left, Richard’s team had to score during this play or they would lose. If they scored only one point during their time at play, though, the game would be tied and go into overtime.

Kahlan caught glimpses of Richard, showing no emotion, as he gathered with his men. He gave them a brief, covert hand signal. As he turned, his gaze swept past. For an instant, their eyes met.

The power in that connection made Kahlan’s heart pound and her knees weak.

Just as fast as it had come, Richard’s scrutiny moved on. No one but Kahlan would have known that he had looked directly at her or, if they had, they wouldn’t have understood why.

Kahlan understood.

He was checking her position.

This was the moment for which he had painted himself with those strange symbols. This was the moment for which he had kept the score even. He had crushed every other team they had come up against so that he could be sure that he was here, in this place, at this moment.

She couldn’t imagine why, but it was for this moment.

He abruptly yelled a battle cry and started the charge.

Seeing him covered in the frightening red symbols, his muscles tense, his raptor glare, his focused power, his fluid movement . . . Kahlan thought that surely her hammering heart might burst.