Warheart

CHAPTER 22

Richard was at a loss as to why the witch woman so suddenly believed the tower was about to fall, but it was clear that she did. As he allowed her to lead him away he glanced back at the unassuming tower constructed of heavy stone blocks. Constructed back at the same time as the citadel, during the great war, it was as solid as the rock it was made from. It had stood on that spot for thousands of years, watching over the road up from Saavedra below. A couple of other towers on the other side of the citadel watched over the trackless dark forest beyond.

Like so many things in this part of the Dark Lands, it was part of the precautions having to do with the barrier to the third kingdom. This particular guard tower had been invaluable in alerting the men of the First File of the attack by the half people. No doubt that had been a part of its ancient intent. He had trouble imagining why the solidly built tower that had stood for so long would abruptly fall over. But he knew enough about witch women in general to take her seriously.

Richard didn’t really know much about this particular witch woman. Kahlan had gone without him to see Red before, so he had met her only after returning from the underworld. She had helped Nicci in that journey into darkness to come and help find a way for him to return.

“Hurry!” Red growled at them, not satisfied at how fast he was moving as she dragged him away. “Move back!”

When he saw that the soldiers were not moving, and looked confused, Richard signaled with his free arm. “Back! Everyone move back!”

Confused men finally scattered at his command.

“What is it?” Kahlan asked as she followed Richard and Red hurrying away from where they had been standing beside the funeral pyre.

Before Red could answer, Richard felt the ground beneath the cobblestones beginning to tremble. The delicate lacework of ash from the funeral pyre collapsed inward, sending sparks and smoke spiraling up into the damp air.

One of the stone blocks at the base of the guard tower suddenly exploded, sending shards of rock and debris out across the square. Pieces of rock tumbled and bounced across the cobblestones, narrowly missing Richard’s group as dust boiled up. Richard heard the distinctive sound of granite cracking, and another block at the base of the tower exploded. Fragments of rock whistled past them. A cloud of granite flakes and chunks filled the air, pelting them with small pieces.

“Get out!” Commander Fister yelled up at the two men in the tower. “Hurry! Get out now!”

Richard looked up just in time to see the tower begin to sway as the two men disappeared to race down the interior spiral stairs. With two of the blocks at the base shattered, the tower groaned as its great weight slowly began to keel over.

The two men dashed out of the narrow doorway as fractures crackled up from the corners of the opening. The men raced for their lives across the square.

Another explosion blew apart a third foundation block beside the first two and with a loud grating of rupturing stone the falling tower suddenly gathered speed and came crashing down. With a thunderous roar it toppled across the square right over the top of Cara’s funeral pyre. Many of the stone blocks the tower had been constructed from broke apart on impact. Pieces large and small tumbled and rolled away, but most of it disintegrated into a heap of rubble.

It had happened so quickly. One moment it was standing, the next the blocks exploded and the tower lay scattered across the square. Clouds of dust rolled across the ground and up through the damp late-day air.

Had they not moved in time, they would all have been killed. As it was, some of the soldiers had been cut by sharp fragments of flying rock. One man was on his knees, holding his hands over a bloody wound on his head. Had Richard not moved, he would have been directly under the falling tower and now buried under the debris.

When he turned to her, the witch woman was looking into his eyes. “The flow of time.”

He knew enough about witch women and the flow of time they dealt in to understand what she meant. It had been a form of prophecy.

“It would be helpful,” he said, “if the next time you could look a little farther ahead in that flow.”

“It was an eddy that had only just swirled into existence. Events around you tend to be unpredictable and chaotic in that way.”

Commander Fister planted his fists on his hips. He looked perplexed as he peered at the rubble. “Lord Rahl, how did you know the tower was going to fall?”

Richard frowned at the question. “Red told me.”

The commander cocked his head. “Red?”

“The witch woman,” Richard said.

The commander glanced around. “Witch woman? What are you talking about?”

“The woman with the red hair.”

The commander’s frown drew tighter as he took another look around. “There was a witch woman here yesterday, but I’ve seen no woman with red hair.”

Richard looked for himself. The witch woman was gone. She had been quiet during the ceremony and as they watched the pyre burn. In fact, she hadn’t spoken all afternoon until she had told Richard to move because the tower was going to fall on him.

Richard frowned over at Kahlan. “She’s gone.”

She gave him a look as if to say that she had expected as much. “She told me that witch women have to stay out of events, lest they create havoc in those events. She’s leaving what must be done now to us.”

“What I want to know is who created that eddy,” Nicci said in a way that betrayed her sense of urgency and ignoring the commander’s confusion over the unseen witch woman.

Richard was already moving. He knew who had interrupted to create that disturbance in the flow at the last instant. He looked back over his shoulder when he heard boot strikes and saw the whole force of men following.

“Wait here. All of you, wait here.”

The soldiers reluctantly slowed to a halt, remaining near the cobblestone square piled with the rubble of the tower. Nicci, Kahlan, and the three Mord-Sith ignored his instructions and followed him without pause. At the moment he needed to catch the person responsible and didn’t want to stop to argue with them, but he knew he couldn’t let them go all the way.

Rather than go down the road, he instead headed in the other direction, around the citadel. She wouldn’t likely be down in the city. She would have come out of the cover of the uninhabited woods.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Kahlan asked as she walked faster to catch up with his big strides.

Richard nodded. “It has to be her.”

“Who?” Cassia asked from behind. “What are you talking about?”

“Samantha,” Nicci said.

The Mord-Sith frowned suspiciously. “Samantha. You mean the young sorceress who stabbed the Mother Confessor?”

“That would be the one,” Richard said without looking back.

“How could she do such a thing?” Cassia asked.

“It’s drizzling and wet,” Nicci said to keep the Mord-Sith from distracting Richard as he scanned all the places she could be hiding. “Samantha can use her ability to heat the moisture in solid objects to make it expand and blow them apart–objects like trees and even rock.”

“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” Cassia said.

“Your Lord Rahl generously taught her how to do it,” Nicci said with obvious displeasure.

“I learned it from you,” Richard reminded her.

Nicci’s mouth twisted with displeasure but she didn’t answer. Richard slowed as he approached the opening in the wall at the edge of the more formal citadel grounds. The gardens were nowhere near as ornate as some of the places Richard had seen, but the maze of hedges, stone walks, and orderly patches of wildflowers were lavish for the small city of Saavedra. Hannis Arc would have had the grounds kept up as a demonstration of his importance, not because he cared about going for a stroll to gaze at wildflowers.

Richard held his arm out as he slowed, stopping all the women. “I want you all to wait here. I mean it. She’s dangerous.”

“Yes, she is,” Nicci said, “and she wants revenge against you.”

“And to get that revenge she would love to kill all of you to get back at me, the same way she stabbed Kahlan to hurt me.”

Kahlan put an imploring hand on his shoulder. “Richard, she has already done that. She stabbed me. Now she will want to kill you.”

“Kahlan is right,” Nicci said. “You shouldn’t be going out there to face her at all, much less alone. That’s what she wants. We can distract her and keep her from–”

“I said stay here.” His harsh tone caused them to fall silent.

They knew he was in no mood to argue with them, and they knew, too, that they couldn’t afford to waste time and let her get away. Once he was sure they weren’t going to argue, he started for the opening in the wall that led to the marshy fields around the citadel grounds that kept the forest back and insured that it would be harder for anyone to sneak up unseen. There was no gate. Hannis Arc was more feared than what was out beyond.

Richard lifted his sword a few inches, checking that it was clear in the scabbard. He let it drop back in place before he moved into the opening, leaning out to check both ways on the far side. Standing under the arch, he gazed out across the field of soggy grasses, looking for anything that didn’t belong.

Richard spotted her in the distance among the rushes.

Samantha stood like a statue among grasses taller than her. She was about halfway across the marshland to the dark forest behind her. Richard turned back and held up a hand to Kahlan, Nicci, and the three Mord-Sith, letting them know that he meant for them to stay put and he would brook no argument.

“If she makes it past me,” he told Nicci, “you make sure you stop her before she can get to Kahlan again. Understand?”

Nicci stared into his eyes a moment before answering. “I didn’t go to the underworld to get you back only to have a girl with a bad temper kill you.”

“I asked if you understood.”

Nicci pressed her lips tight for a moment. Finally she folded her arms. “I understand.”

“Good. Thank you.”

“You came back to the world of life to take care of important matters,” Kahlan warned him. “Samantha isn’t one of them.”

“I can’t do anything about Sulachan if Samantha kills us all first, now can I?”

Kahlan didn’t look at all happy, but she didn’t say anything. She knew he was right. The young woman was the one forcing the issue. It wasn’t like they had a choice.

When he was confident that they would wait where they were, he started out the opening.