AN: This will be a C/K fic, but for the first two chapters the spotlight will be on different characters. Cara is not a Mord'Sith, and Kahlan is not a Confessor.

Prologue

1 week ago

Her hands trembled as she fought to maintain her resolve, as she removed all her personal belongings. Watch, earrings, Swiss army knife, cell phone. All of it. Anything with her fingerprints or what could be recognized as hers had to be wiped down and packed up. She wasn't to exist, not until she was told to, not until it was safe. Dennee didn't live past this moment. Six months, six damn months she had spent hiding in plain sight, under the nose of a man she was told was extremely dangerous. A man who was deceiving her country and killing her fellow citizens without ever pulling a trigger. She was told he was a monster, a mastermind, a brain that needed to be detached from the body, and that she was to steal from him… and stole she did. Six months she wormed, lied, smiled and had lunch with people who willingly or unknowingly worked for a very bad man. This was how she was going to earn her wings.

But why? That question rolled through her mind every day as she sat at the desk that was hers in her fake life. As she stood in front of the hotel bathroom mirror, she still had no answer. Dennee didn't know if she'd ever have an answer. She didn't know what this guy did, she didn't know what was in all those files she downloaded, and she didn't even know why she had been chosen to do this. She was good enough at what she did, but she knew she wasn't the best. She pushed buttons, typed words, hacked, cracked and decoded. She was smart but there had to be others, others who were smarter, trickier, others who wouldn't shake in fear. Dennee gripped the sink's edge 'til her knuckles turned white as she stood in the cold hotel bathroom, stripped to her barest.

She had been trained for this, she had been taught how to act and talk and dress the part, but all of that meant shit if you couldn't control your nerves. It had made her sick at first and then she settled into the job, taking up a daily routine. The routine was key, she was told over and over. Be normal, blend in, be a nobody. Get to work, grab coffee, say hello, check messages, open Excel, multi-task, enter data in one window, hunt in another. Back and forth she had trained herself to the routine. Get faster, type faster, break in faster, hack the code faster, but don't get caught. There were so many numbers that Dennee couldn't even decipher it as code, but she began to recognize it. 3 came before 6 which came after 9. Over and over, until she could be in and out of a locked file in three minutes flat. It was normal for five months and twenty seven days, playing her code game every day. Break in, back out, and break back in.

And then she got the call.

It was time. She had to continue to pretend however, just this one last time for as long as it took. It was the hardest thing she ever had to do. It was all right there in front of her, access at her fingertips, all she had to do was type and click and steal away with secrets that weren't hers. Time to play her game one last time, this one last time for everything she was worth. For the first time, Dennee's hand shook as she hit enter.

That was an hour ago.

Dennee picked up the pair of scissors as she stared herself down in the mirror. A long, blonde lock fell silently into the sink, another followed, and another. Dennee had to disappear, run away and keep nothing that was hers. She had been someone else for six months and now it was time to change again, this time to someone who didn't wear skirts to work or have long blonde hair. The cut would do. It would do well enough that anyone who might have known her once wouldn't recognize her at first glance. Dennee ran her fingers through the short strands, to shake away loose hair, turned off the light and left the bathroom. Idly she took the clothes left for her from the closet and laid them on the bed. The clock flashed, it was 12:37. She should be getting back from lunch in twenty three minutes but instead Dennee was sitting on the edge of a hotel bed, hands on her bare knees, breathing in the silence of her freedom and condemnation.

Money, safety, heroism, Dennee took it all but never stopped to think of what she had to give up in return for it. This moment she was to leave it all behind, but what was all of it? The last six months had been a fucking lie, but it was her life. For half a year, it was her life and now she was supposed to forget it all like it never happened, like she had never made friends she was now betraying, and like she wasn't stealing from a man who could kill her by making a phone call. Dennee's fingers went numb at the thought and she struggled to button up the black top left for her. What if he found out?

She chanced a glance back over to the clock. 12:45. Dennee wondered how long it would take someone to notice her absence. Perhaps they would over look the first ten minutes, but after that? Would they call her cell phone which was already cut off? Maybe try calling her apartment - which had been empty for three days now, all of her things taken to "somewhere safe". Would they look for her? How long will it take them to notice something is out of place? How far would he go to get back what she had taken? What was it worth to him?

Dennee tied off the issued black high tops in a quick knot. She couldn't let her mind get carried away with too much thinking. She was going to psych herself out before she completed her job. It was time to go. Money, heroism, money, heroism. Dennee repeated the mantra in her head as she grabbed the light weight, black jacket and shoved her arms into the sleeves. Dennee didn't know why she checked the pockets, habit she guessed, she found nothing. Of course there was nothing, she wasn't supposed to have anything on her… well that wasn't true. There was one thing, the small blue flashdrive that sat on the bedside table. Dennee grabbed it and left the room, everything else stayed, her old clothes, her personal items, someone would pick them up later.

Fumbling with the tiny brick of stolen goods in her pocket, Dennee walked briskly through the hotel lobby and out the revolving door. A cool breeze hit her face as she stepped into the sunlight and it was the best thing that had happened all day. It was suddenly a sensory overload, a rush of light and noise shaking Dennee from any thought that might be plaguing her. She stood still, her mind blank and her body frozen, frozen save for her fingers that grazed over a billion dollars worth of trouble in her pant pocket. Trouble that had some place to be other than with her. Dennee's nostrils flared as she took a deep stinging breath of cold air and pushed her legs forward. Take a cab. Dennee remembered the odd and blunt little notes always left for her. Sometimes she wasn't sure if her employers were women of few words or just had too little time to give detailed instructions. Lucky for Dennee the hotel was popular amongst tourists and the flow of taxicabs was abundant. What she wasn't told was which one. Dennee wondered if it would be like in the movies, where a cab would zip out of nowhere driven by someone who was involved in the plot and whisk her back to the secret base. That didn't seem to be happening however; all the cabbies sat waiting for a fare, none of them seeming to take any special interest in her. Any one seemed just as good as another, but what to do after she got in? Dennee approached one of the sitting taxis when she heard a voice over shoulder.

"Going uptown?" Dennee knew that voice and who it belonged to. A tall woman in her middle forties with honey colored hair who unsurprisingly wore sunglasses and a crisp white suit, the type synonymous with ball busting, stood just behind her left shoulder. She carried a briefcase of glossy leather today, so much different than the small clutch Dennee was used to seeing. Dennee nodded her response to the woman she had come to know so well over the past year and opened the cab door. The Confessor slid in first.

"After you, Lorna," Dennee sighed. Yes, she had grown to know Lorna quite well in her short time conditioning for this job. Handler was generally the term Dennee remembered hearing from movies and TV shows about spies and secret agents. Lorna insisted that all the Confessors called each other sister. Dennee thought "sister" made it sound like a cult, then again the Confessors could be considered one. They recruited those they thought had promise the same way the CIA might do, plucking fledglings straight out of college with little detail given. Dennee had been with them for near two years, at first just doing small time work, hacking databases and setting up dummy files for the field workers. This was her first solo job, her first job period.

Before Dennee could buckle her seatbelt the cab was pulling away as the Lorna leaned forward to snap out directions through the small window in the Plexiglas wall separating the cabbie from his passengers. "The White Building at 37th and Bracken. Oh, and don't bother trying to fight the traffic, we're not in a hurry."

The cab driver's accent was heavy, "That's all the way up town, midday traffic is heavy."

"That's fine, the fare will be taken care of." The driver seemed satisfied with this answer and turned back around as the Confessor slid the small plastic partition closed and turned her attention to Dennee, who was too focused on her deep breathing then the Confessor sitting next to her.

"You can relax now, Dennee, the hard part is over. Take a deep breath. You've done a good job and a great service to your country and its citizens."

"That sounded rehearsed," Dennee said as she stared out the window watching the faceless people zip past on the way to their lives.

The Confessor smiled. "It's more memorized, you don't know how many times I've had to say that to girls who look like they'd rather jump out of the cab than head to its destination. So I commend you, it's nice to see you've kept some composition. Most of the first timers I'm sent to pick up burst into tears."

Dennee turned to Lorna and gave her a hard look, one that she had been working on while at her fake job where it was important to look as unamused as possible. "If you all hadn't stressed how important it was to get a grip, I'd bawl my eyes out." At that the confessor's face screwed up into a half sympathetic smile. "It's not funny."

"I know. I felt the same way after my first, like death trying to rise anew. I spent three years posing as an assistant to a senator who was funding torture with tax payer money. I didn't speak for a week after I was out." Lorna spoke all too carefree, and it wasn't making Dennee feel any better about the situation.

"And after that?"

"After?"

"Yeah, after. Did they plug you into machines or drug you up or what? What happened after your cab ride? I'm just trying to figure out what's going to happen to me. No one ever told me what happens after."

Lorna leaned back, relaxing further. "This is my after. I died eleven years ago and the only time I see the outside world is when I get to come pick up girl scouts like you. They burnt my apartment three weeks before the end, planted a pharmacy's cache of antidepressants in the rubble and in my work desk, and then two days after my alias had been released to the press, "Colby Matthers" drove her car off a bridge leaving only a scribbled note of apology for what she was privy to."

"Jesus." Dennee's shock prevented her from saying more.

"Oh don't worry, you're job wasn't so high profile. The whole damn country saw my face on TV during a national scandal; you only have to worry about two hundred or so passersby in an office. You'll get off easy."

"And what's 'easy'?"

"Fourteen months, give or take, and they'll probably have you at a desk, paper clipping reports together."

"Fourteen months?" Dennee pulled her bottom lip in between her teeth and bit down hard. The worried habit didn't go unnoticed by the confessor.

"Hey now, consider yourself lucky, there are some sisters were the only breeze they've felt in years is that of a desk fan. You'll still get some use out of your sunglasses. A year isn't so bad, it'll give you time to grow your hair back out." Lorna tickled the side of Dennee's head, mussing the short strands. "You're lucky you only had to cut it, I can't begin to tell you hot sweaty your head gets under a wig."

Dennee turned away again to stare out the windshield of the cab which wasn't moving, they had hit the midday traffic, a sea of red break lights ahead of them. "So that's it then? I go and get debriefed or whatever it is you guys call the torturous series of follow up questions and get handcuffed to a desk chair?"

"Yes and no." Lorna placed her briefcase on her lap and flipped it open. Inside was a small netbook and anything else you'd normally find in a briefcase. Dennee was a little disappointed there wasn't a gun or some other sort of high tech gadget. Nothing too odd except for a single blank postcard. The postcard of course is what caught Dennee's attention.

"Who's the postcard from?"

"From you." Lorna handed it over and clicked a ball point pen offering it up to Dennee who took it absent mindedly.

"From me?" Dennee flipped the card over. "Brazil," she asked with a little too much enthusiasm, "you're sending me to Brazil?"

Lorna sighed, "No, Dennee, that's to throw any loose ends off your trail."

Dennee's face sunk, "Loose ends? I-I don't think I catch your meaning."

Lorna paused and took a deep breath. Dennee guessed this next part wasn't memorized. "Your sister, Dennee. Out of all the jobs that I've seen done, family is usually the greatest muddier of the waters. You can't just vanish for months without her wondering where you are. She'll look for you, and by doing that she'll endanger herself and all that you've just gone through."

"So, what- what are you trying to tell me here? That I can't see or talk to my sister for a year and then some because she might ruin your precious mission?" The blood rushed to Dennee's face, the heat making her volatile.

"Yes, that and she might endanger herself."

It was the 'yes' that pushed Dennee over.

"Well, fuck you! I never agreed to that." Dennee crumpled the postcard and tossed it at Lorna's feet. The Confessor closed her eyes and released a heavy sigh; things had gone too smoothly for normal.

"Dennee, I'm not saying it's going to be forever, it may not even be for the whole fourteen months but it'll be for some time, at least for as long as we need you to stay indoors with us." Lorna pulled out another blank postcard and offered it to the angry blonde sitting next to her. This one too was taken and crumpled.

And another.

And another, until, "God dammit, Dennee, stop acting like a child. This is your job and you may not think you agreed to this but it's the damn fine print. Every job has its consequences, just be lucky this is it for you. I know dozens of women who would love to be in your shoes right rather than where they're stuck."

"Yeah, well what if I want out, huh?" Dennee's indignant tone grated on Lorna's nerves. "What if I just want to get out of the car and be done with it?" When Dennee reached for the handle Lorna shot across the seat grabbing her by the wrist, wrestling her back from the door handle.

"You don't want to do that, Dennee."

Dennee struggled to get her arm back and to shove Lorna away. "Like hell I don't. Let go of me." Dennee shoved again, this time hard causing Lorna to grunt when she hit the opposite door. The confessor grabbed for the collar of Dennee's jacket and Dennee kicked out at Lorna's leg.

At this point the driver couldn't ignore the two women fighting in his back seat. He had seen arguments before, he had even handled couples breaking up before, but these two pushed and grabbed at each other like a couple of seven year olds on a long car trip. He pounded on the Plexiglas divider.

"Hey, if you two do not stop you will have to leave my cab. Do you understand me? You can get out right now." Dennee stopped struggling when the cabbie interrupted, breathing in heavy, short pants she looked pointedly at Lorna who looked heatedly back at her.

"Dennee, if you leave this cab then that's it. You'll be on your own, and on your own you'll have to deal with whatever and whoever finds you. If you walk away we can't protect you, or your sister. It's your choice, walk away from the safety we're offering you or stay here and in a handful of months it'll all be over." Lorna calmly let go of Dennee and scooted back to her seat. Dennee looked stunned as the information sunk in.

"She's all I got, Lorna. I'm all she's got, I can't just leave her. You don't understand, when our parents." Dennee trailed off unable to finish, unwanting to finish. She was sure Lorna knew already anyhow.

"I know, I know. I'm not asking you to leave her, you're going to be right here the whole time, and she's staying were she is, you just can't talk to or see her for a while. I promise you, when this is done, when it's all done I will personally drive you to wherever you want to meet her. Hell, I'll even pay for lunch." Lorna reached for her briefcase which had been discarded to the floor when the tussle began. A fresh postcard was taken out.

"How many of those things to you have?"

Lorna snorted. "Enough for someone like you," she said and handed over the card and pen. "Now while you fill that out I would like to take a look at the info you stole away with."

Dennee took the Brazilian postcard and stared at the blank spot. How was she supposed to say goodbye? To say, 'don't look for me for a few months' while trying to be tactful? She guessed they had chosen the right person; this wouldn't be the first time Dennee randomly took off without warning. Shit, it wouldn't even be the second. Guess she had a habit of doing stupid things like that.

"Dennee?" Lorna gave her a nudge.

"What?"

"The files? May I have them?"

Dennee stared wide eyed for the briefest second before realizing what Lorna had asked for. "Oh, sorry." She thrust her hips up to better reach into her pant pocket. "Here," and all the trouble in the world was handed over. Lorna popped the flashdrive into the USB port. It had only one file and the name made her smirk.

"Book of Secrets?"

"Had to name it something."

Loran 'hmm'ed her agreement and double clicked the file. An explosion of unintelligible numbers and letters filled her screen, rolling and rising like a sea of coded nonsense.

"What the fuck is this?" Lorna growled her frustration. This was bullshit, absolute bullshit. No, it was worse than bullshit.

"It's coded. I have no clue what any of it means, but that's what was locked up the tightest. For all I know it could be dry cleaning receipts. He wears some pretty fancy suits."

"Fuck, fuck, fuck. Can you make any sense of this?" The confessor pinched the bridge of her nose before turning the netbook to face Dennee.

Dennee looked as the wash of gibberish across the screen. Pointing at where a section read '936D59' Dennee said, "That there, it's reoccurring, I came across it a lot. It looks like a hex code."

"Hex code? Please explain, you're talking to someone who can double click things and send email."

"It's basically computer language."

"Like a bunch of 0s and 1s?"

"That's a binary code, this is more like a hexadecimal, which is numbers and letters. This looks like that, but far more complex."

"So you've never seen this before?"

"Before six months ago, no. But look here," Dennee pointed at another bit of coding, "this repeats too. Here, here, and here. But it's in no sort of organization or repeating pattern. This could be anything from a program to a Word document, for all I know."

Lorna was slack jawed. Someone had secrets so big that a whole new language had been created to hide it. "Well, Dennee, you'd better write that postcard quick because I have a feeling you're going right back behind a desk for a good long while."

Dennee flopped back on the cab seat and stared up the roof of the cab. "Fuck my life and fuck that Rahl guy and his stupid fancy suits."

Dennee felt something cold and metal touch her finger, Lorna tapped her with the pen. "I'm serious, Dennee. I think you found something big here, far bigger than what we may have thought. This is going to take time. The sooner you write that card the sooner you can start working on this."

Sighing, Dennee took the pen. This isn't what she wanted to be doing. Going to college and becoming a code monkey wasn't supposed to lead you into corporate spying and ditching your sister with a shity 99 cent postcard. Dennee clicked the pen open and closed a few times while she thought, lowering it when she felt she had something

Dear Ka-

No, she'd never buy that, if Dennee wrote that it'd be a sure sign of something being up.

Hey Sis,

Guess where I am?

I'll give you a hint, it's not my apartment.

Don't get pissed and I love you.

Den

Dennee rested the postcard on her lap and retracted the pen. Looking out the passenger window she knew it was going to be a long couple of months.