Chapter 26
"Reports of the Lord Rahl's death are greatly exaggerated."
- D'Haran Ambassador Jarik Ross as quoted in Feppendreau's Guide to the Mysterious.
The cool breeze tugged at her clothing, making it snap and flutter around her frame. The chill seeped underneath her outer cloak from time to time to cool her skin despite the wool, linen and fur wraps she wore underneath. The pages of her journal fluttered slightly. A hint of sulfur touched the humid air, the last remnants of the ever receding fiery cliffs of the Skaaldren. It added to the slightly bitter tang from the icy water as the ship sliced through the placid waves with ease.
Kahlan was at peace. Perhaps not joyful, but she was hopeful for the future. Cara had successfully revived Richard and though he was in immense pain, Kahlan had been brought to tears of happiness. Happiness that did not pass even as Richard quickly distanced himself from Zedd and herself, relying on Cara and the wolf, Nokai, in the weeks after their defeat of the Eternal.
They stayed for a time with the Fulani Skaaldren to negotiate a peace between the Fulani and the Hekana as well as to sit in judgment over the trial of the Fulani Pyraad who had started the war. All present had insisted as Mother Confessor she sit in judgment over the Pyraad. She had been surprised that the Hekana demanded no punishment beyond being provided supplies to support their people until the next harvest and fishing season so they could have time to rebuild their ships. It was the remaining Fulani clans that had demanded the entire Pyraad Clan be slaughtered to erase the dishonor they had cast upon their huntlands.
The lone Drakon sent to watch the proceedings for her race showed little interest in the trial, sitting off away from the crowds near a cluster of trees by the open air court. Richard would often watch the proceedings from there as well, Minder Laire and Nokai at his side, while Cara patrolled around his position with rare stops to speak with him.
Zedd explained to her the Drakon were a distant race to dragons, which explained the similar scaly hide glisten a silvery grey-blue. Unlike the dragons of the Midlands and D'Hara the Drakon were much smaller, lither, with large delicate wings and narrower head full of multiple razor sharp teeth on their expressive faces. More than once she caught herself curiously watching the large reptile's sinuous neck arch down to Richard to speak with him. Even being smaller than other dragon's, the creature made the tall trees seem small.
The Pyraad elders were defiant and unremorseful in initiating the war. Kahlan condemned them to death for their crimes. Once confessed their reasons were simple and clear: greed. They wanted the Hekana lands and waters for themselves. The Pyraad clan itself was ordered restitution to the Hekana, a judgment deemed fair by the new elders and the other Fulani. The Drakon stayed long enough to watch the executions before turning to Kahlan bowing once with its head and wishing her a long life. It then turned to Richard speaking to him in a language Kahlan did not understand only recognizing Richard's name before it gracefully launched itself into the air and swiftly headed for a distant mountain range in the east.
She never asked Richard what the Drakon said but she could tell he had at least understood it. Since then, when not resting to recover from his wounds Richard wore a thoughtful expression on his drawn face for the rest of the time they spent at the Skaaldren Hearth gathering supplies for their return through the Skaaldren to the Midlands.
The journey back to Rang'Shada Mountains went without incident. Much of the time Richard rested on the makeshift cot wrapped in furs and blankets to keep warm, sleeping through the most painful time of his healing wounds thanks largely to the potions provided to them by the grateful healers of the Skaald huntsmen. When awake he would have brief conversations with Cara or simply stroke the fur of the ever present Nokai.
Kahlan was concerned over his lack of interaction with her and Zedd, but took the old wizard's advice in allowing Richard to recover and come to them on his own terms. More frightening than the silence was the often blank expression on his face. His eyes were sometimes devoid of even recognition on the rare occasions she directly spoke with him. She heeded Zedd's words and kept their interactions at a minimum, choosing to simply be nearby, allowing him to know she was there without being intrusive.
The slower return afforded her a great deal of time to appreciate the land they had so quickly passed through previously and found herself taking to writing of the wonders and sites they saw. Every day seemed to bring a new wonder to her eyes. The first sunset of the midnight sun, the impressive geysers of the Skaald as they left the lands of Fulani behind, the towering islands of ice and snow as they crossed on an ice ship over the sea, and the fiery majesty of the Skaaldren as rivers of fire and molten earth sloughed into seas below immense dark mountains that lit the far mountain ridge were but a few of these.
She glanced over to her right to find Richard watching the volcanoes and lava flows of the Skaaldren with wonder, a smile clearly present on his face. The fur of the hat he wore ruffled in the brisk breeze. Nokai sat beside him, tail lazily waving as the animal looked out over the scene with apparent interest as well. She felt herself smile at the sight and turned her gaze back to the vista for a moment, before dipping her pen into the inkwell and attempt to describe the sight before them as she had been doing for weeks.
She wanted to reclaim some of the lost connection, the lost history between the people of the Northlands and the Confessors. So she wrote of everything she could remember seeing, every thought, describing the lands, the people, and the events. Mostly she wrote of her own fears, fears winding their way into her heart, tainting her thoughts which each day bringing them closer to Bale Orken's home, to the Rang'Shada Mountains and the journey home to Aydindril.