The Omen Machine

CHAPTER 39

As he ran down the service hallway, Richard could smell the smoke. Such a familiar smell when it came from campfires had always offered warmth and protection, but in the palace such an acrid smell carried terrifying implications. When he slid around the last corner he saw it billowing up thick and dark from under a door down the hall.

Berdine clutched his sleeve in one hand to prevent him from getting ahead of her. Whenever there was even a hint of trouble, all of the Mord-Sith did what ever they could to stay as close as possible to him. Berdine had lost her bubbly demeanor, turning as implacable as any of the Mord-Sith when there was a threat. From time to time as she ran, she spun her Agiel up into her fist, as if to reassure herself that it was there at the ready.

Down the hallway beyond the smoke, Richard spotted men of the First File running in from the other direction. Several of them had buckets. Water slopped out as they ran, splashing across the wood floor. Several women, awakened at the early hour by the commotion, had come out of their rooms to stand in their doorways, clutching nightgowns at their throats in fright as they watched soldiers racing past.

“What is it?” Nathan asked as he rounded the corner and caught up. Zedd was right on his heels.

Richard pointed. “It’s Lauretta’s place. It’s on fire.”

Lauretta stumbled to a halt, gasping for breath. Her short, rapid gait had left her face bright red and her hair in disarray.

“My room!” She swallowed, trying to get enough air. She pressed her hands to the sides of her head. “My prophecies!”

The soldiers with the buckets kicked open the door. Black smoke laced with crackling sparks and burning pieces of paper rolled out into the hall and along the ceiling. Flags of flame unfurled out along the ceiling of the hallway. The soldiers heaved water in through the open doorway. From the amount of smoke and the heat from the flames, Richard didn’t think their buckets of water were going to be anywhere near enough.

Lauretta screamed when she saw the soldiers throwing water into her room. She pushed past Zedd and Nathan. “No! You’ll ruin my prophecies!”

Richard knew that it was too late to worry about that. Besides, water was not the real threat to her prophecies. He caught Lauretta’s arm and dragged her to a halt. He knew that if left to her own devices she would run into the burning room to try to save her precious prophecies. As thick as the smoke was, and as heavily as she was breathing, she would have been overcome in mere seconds.

The heat, even at a distance, was withering. Richard was relieved that the palace was made mostly of stone. Still, parts of it, like the floors under them and beams above, were wood. They needed to put out the fire as quickly as possible.

More soldiers raced up with yet more buckets of water. They ran in toward the door, turned their faces away from the heat, and heaved the water in. Angry, hot flames licked out through the open door in defiance of the water. As Richard had suspected, such an effort was hopelessly in effective.

Zedd knew it, too. He rushed past Richard and down the hall, ducking under the lowering black smoke hugging the ceiling to make his way toward the doorway into the inferno.

Urging soldiers back out of the way with one arm, he cast the other out toward the open door as yet more smoke and flames poured out. Richard could see the air waver before Zedd’s hand, forcing the smoke back into the room, but more flames boiled out of the doorway, as if to chase the wizard away. The heat drove Zedd back.

“Bags! My gift is too weak in this place.”

Nathan caught up with Zedd and lifted his palms out toward the smoke-filled doorway, adding his gift to the effort. He, too, caused the air to waver, but it also slowed the amount of smoke as the flames withdrew back into the room. At last the smoke coming out the doorway was choked off entirely, confining it to the room inside, leaving the hallway in a dark and pungent haze.

Nathan was a Rahl. His gift wasn’t hampered by the palace’s spell. He stepped in closer, holding the flats of his hands out toward the doorway again. As Richard restrained Lauretta, he watched Nathan gradually circle his palms, sealing off the room, suffocating the fire at its source. After a few tense moments, the fire died out and the prophet spun a web that cooled the remains of Lauretta’s home.

As Nathan entered the room, checking that it was safe, Richard let go of Lauretta, allowing her to follow. Weeping in misery, she rushed into the room behind Nathan.

She lifted her arms in distress. “My prophecies! Dear Creator! My prophecies are ruined!”

Richard could see that she was right. There looked to be some stacks in the farthest reaches that might not have been totally destroyed, but the blackened, wet mess covering the floor was all that was left of most of them.

Lauretta fell to her knees, scooping up handfuls of the useless, wet ash.

“They’re ruined,” she wept.

Richard laid a hand on her shoulder. “You can write more, Lauretta. You can use the library as a place to write more.”

She nodded absently. He wondered if she even heard him.

Out in the hall, people had gathered to see what was happening. Many of them covered their noses against the stench left from the fire.

Richard saw a number of representatives he recognized at the back of the crowd. They looked grim. The fire was obviously confirmation of the prophecy they had all heard that morning.

Murmuring warnings to one another, the crowd parted. Cara marched through as if the people were not there, expecting everyone to get out of her way. There was never any problem with that. People were only too eager to get out of the way of a Mord-Sith, especially when she looked as angry as Cara looked. The last thing in the world that most people wanted was to cause a Mord-Sith to take notice of them.

“Are you all right?” Cara asked as Richard nodded. “I heard that there was trouble.”

“Lauretta’s prophecies caught fire,” he told her.

Among the crowd, Richard spotted Ludwig Dreier, the abbot from Fajin Province. His face was set in a stony expression as he took in all the activity. He finally moved through the onlookers to come in closer.

“Was anyone hurt?” he asked.

“No,” Richard said. “Lauretta’s place was full of papers. It was a fire waiting to happen.”

Ludwig glanced through the doorway. “Especially since it was foretold in prophecy.”

“Says who?”

The abbot shrugged. “The blind woman for one. Several others had the premonition as well.”

Richard glanced past the abbot to the faces in the crowd and saw a number of representatives watching and listening.

“The woman used open flames in her room,” Richard said. “There were papers everywhere. I told her myself that she had to move all the papers or there was going to be a fire.”

“Nonetheless, it was predicted by prophecy.”

“The man is right,” Lauretta said as she stepped out into the hall, looking heartbroken. “I had the prophecy myself. I wrote it down and gave it to Lord Rahl,” she told the abbot as she wiped tears from her cheeks. “I guess that now we all know what it meant.”

The abbot turned his frown to Richard. “You had a dangerous prophecy about fire in the palace brought directly to you and you told none of us? You kept the prophecy to yourself?”

“I had only just told him about it and he raced right here,” Lauretta said before Richard could answer, unwittingly saving him from having to explain himself. “There was no time to warn anyone, or to do anything to stop the fire in time.”

The abbot let out a troubled breath. “Still, Lord Rahl, you would be well advised to take prophecy more seriously. Especially when the prophecy could have bearing on the lives and safety of others. Your duty, after all, is to protect the subjects of the D’Haran Empire. You are the magic against magic that we all depend on for our safety. Prophecy is magic that the Creator has given us and you need to take it seriously.”

“I think that Lord Rahl takes prophecy quite seriously,” Nathan said, glaring down at the man.

“Good,” Ludwig said. “Good. He needs to take it seriously.” Others back in the crowd added nods of agreement.

Cara spun her Agiel up into her fist. She pointed the red weapon at the abbot’s face. “Lord Rahl does not need you to tell him his responsibility or how to carry it out. Lord Rahl protects us all.”

Cara’s deadly tone was a clear warning that the man was overstepping his place.

His gaze finally left Cara and returned to Richard. “Your sword can’t protect you from prophecy, Lord Rahl. It can’t protect any of us from the future. Prophecy is what protects us. That is why the Creator gave mankind the gift of prophecy.”

Richard’s glare caused the abbot’s gaze to falter and drift to the ground. “That’s enough.”

Ludwig took a hesitant step back as he dipped his head in a deferential bow. “As you command, Lord Rahl.”

Once safely withdrawn, he turned and left, several of the other representatives falling in with him and following behind.

“Let me kill him,” Cara said as she scowled at the man’s back.

“Let me do it,” Berdine said. “I could use the practice.”

Richard watched the departing abbot. “If only it were that simple.”

“Oh, I think it would be pretty simple,” Berdine said.

Richard shook his head as he saw the knot of people disappear down the hall. “Killing people isn’t the way to have peace.”

Cara looked like she agreed with Berdine, but she dropped the subject and went on to other business. “Benjamin would like to see you. I told him that I’d find you and bring you to the Garden of Life.”