Chapter 17

Two horses, each containing a rider was galloping as if their life depended on how fast they could run.

The rider; a woman, young blond rushed her mare forth as she turned her head and looked at the other woman who was sitting on her own horse beside her. The fabric of their scarlet dresses flashed behind them in the air along with their long and untamed hair. Hers blond, her sisters brown.

"Shot her!" A man yelled from behind them and the men holding the two bows shifted in their saddles, lifting them up in the air while controlling their mounts with their knees. "Shot them!" The man roared again to the men who followed his command. "Take them down!"

Aura turned her face back and observed as the arrows on the bows was released with ease. Pushing her mare more she could almost hear the whispering sound of the arrow as it flew past her ear. The color of her dress was waving in the wind behind her as she pushed the mare to the right, along with her beloved sister.

Fleeing was their only option, so pushing their mounts to their limits would save them from certain death. The speed was rapid and the horses lungs was almost bursting from the rapid breathing as their hooves hit the dirt of the forest.

"Shot her," the man commanded again and Kahlan heard the warning of the cry in her sisters voice.

"Kahlan!"

Kahlan ducked and the second arrow passed her head, mere inches from her hair. To close, she decided and closed her eyes for seconds, concentrating hard, letting the mare take control over the ride.

Suddenly the cry of a fallen man suddenly split the air and Kahlan was brought back to the present. She felt the exhaustion floating through her body and she nearly loose the grip on the reins. The burst of powers was something extremely rare among their kind, but it was nevertheless something almost all of them could summon – at need.

Kahlan nudged her mare forth – she wasn't going to let them capture her again, she would rather die then have a man's hands touch her again.

Without looking back Kahlan felt it as if it was her who did the killing – others, more terrified screamed filled the air as a shadow jumped through the air and pushed one more rider of his horse, taking his life from him.

They deserve it, Kahlan thought grimly and glanced to their surroundings. The landscape was slowly turning from pine trees to rocky underground, soon they would reach where the snow lay heavy. Abruptly her attention was turned to their pursuers. They were gaining their speed and soon the riders behind them would have them – imprison them, torture them, misuse them and eventually kill them.

An arrow was loosen and it nearly hit her sister. Kahlan screamed as yet another arrow pierced her skin, leaving an open wound on her bare arm where the sleeve was ribbed from the struggle she had experienced.

"We have to hurry," her sister screamed and ducked as branches hit her beautiful face, leaving cuts on her cheeks.

"How many?" Kahlan shouted the questioned as her and her sister simultaneously maneuvered their horses into another trail.

"Two!" Her sister replied and shifted in the saddle. She raised her arm and received the bird that cried out a warning. A white gyrfalcon settled for a few seconds and Aura leaned forth whispering something to the animal in a strange language. The bird answered and took flight.

Aura was up to something and Kahlan had to wait for it to came. Suddenly green eyes was turned towards Kahlan and she saw her sister smile, "Now..." they waited as Aura halted her words and another man screamed in agony from somewhere behind them, "three."

Kahlan nodded in understanding. The men who hunted them as game was skilled in the art. Having been forced to do so during centuries. Concentrating on the sound behind her Kahlan realized that one of the men had urged on his horse and was reaching out, trying to catch the fabric of her dress.

Suddenly an animal, large and with four paws jumped and took the man from his horse. Kahlan's sister turned her head and smiled, "Four," Aura counted her green eyes ablaze.

Kahlan glanced behind her seeing how the riderless horse fled the opposite way, but other men rushed forth to replace the man who had dropped to the ground. "We need to get away from here – where's the boundary?"

"Only one miles away," her sister answered.

"Good," Kahlan said calmly as she could and ducked as another arrow split the air just beside her right exposed knee, where the dress was pushed up so she could ride like a man. This wasn't the time to be lady-like.. If she only had a weapon other then the animal that jumped for the third time and closed its jaws around a man's arm, pulling him off this horse – biting his throat, taking his life.

"Call him!" Aura screamed as they saw the air shift a few hundred yards away from them. They was pushing the horses to their limits, soon the mounts hearts would burst if they didn't soon allowed them to rest. "Call him!"

Kahlan spoke as word and the animal, her animal, lifted its bloodstained snout and sniffed the air. Pushing itself off from the ground the white tiger leaped, sprinting over the ground, in pursue of its owner.

The blue-green wall was shining weakly as another command was giving from the man who hunted them. "Stop them! Don't let them pass!"

Kahlan leaned forth over the neck of her horse and so did her sister. The pushed them, forcing them to go faster. She glanced back as they were meters from safety. The pursuers was shouting angrily, kicking and wiping their own horses to run more. A man caught her eye and her heart froze. He would strangle her if he ever were to lay his hands on her again, hopefully he would never get the chance.

His hair was just as blond as her own, his eyes just as blue, but his persona was cruel and inhuman. Her blue eyes met his for a moment and Kahlan narrowed her eyes as an almost silent promise escaped her lips, but he would hear her words nevertheless, "I promise that I will be the one to kill you," and so she turned her attention away.

The men chasing them was only seconds from reaching them, catching them.

"Now!" Aura shouted and pushed herself from the horse.

Kahlan did the same. Feeling the ice-cold wind hitting their faces, splitting their clothes they was caught by an unknown force and carried into safety. Behind them a hissing sound caught their attention as the as the horses crashed into the boundary – their hearts bursting with exhaustion and dying from the impact with a deathly spell.

The men, the army, pulled their horses reins in so they rose to their hindquarters, trying to prevent them to crash into the boundary themselves. Two animals followed the women, landing just beside each of them, forcing up dust from the ground.

Kahlan lifted herself up on shaking arms. She looked over where her sister had landed and sighed before she collapsed; "Never again," she breathed, her pulse refusing to settle down.

Her sister giggled and lifted her brown haired head up on her palm, looking with laughter in her eyes at the ground. "Yes," Aura replied and was drawing a sign into the green grass – searching Kahlan's blue eyes she scolded lightly, "Never get caught again!"

Kahlan shuddered as she agreed to her sisters words. Inside she hoped, really hoped that what had happened during her capture wouldn't be anything other then a nightmare, but she had a small feeling that it was already to late after being held captured for nearly two months - Kahlan glanced down for a brief second on her stomach and sighed loudly.

Aura lifted her eyebrows over the sigh that escaped her sister, "Don't worry. I'm sure that Ademia will be delighted to hear that we found her," she paused for a brief second before she looked at her sister with a stern glance, "oh, and by the way! Don't ever get captured again. I'm not sure I can lure every male away from the tempel by setting their stock on fire."

Kahlan shook her head, agreeing with her sister, "I won't," she whispered, then remembered something. "It was a dangerous move, Aura...you could be captured or worse killed."

"You forget that we look after each other, Kah, and Ademia ordered us to oversee the task – do you really wants to question her authority?" Aura questioned and turned her green eyes so she could look at her sister. Her eyes held a slight worry. "Are you absolutely sure that you are okay and nothing bad happened to you?"

Kahlan shook her head a second time, "How many times does I have to tell you that I'm perfectly okay?" she replied, knowing that her words held a lie.

Aura looked skeptical at her sister, before letting go her suspicion, "Fine," she muttered and turned her attention away, "but never do that again."

The white tiger was licking Kahlan's face and she giggled low, "No – absolutely not. I just wished that I could keep the horse," she said instead of mentioning that she had been tricked and then easily captured. Kahlan looked back to where the men's horses was trudging uneasily back and forth while a commander shouted angry.

Kahlan wrinkled her nose, forgetting her own worries for a moment and shuddered, "I really hope she can stop him. He's scary."

Her sister laughed, "Are you really telling me that you, oh mighty Kahlan, are afraid of a man?"

"Not any man" Kahlan replied eyeing the commander, not the man behind this, before she pushed herself to her feet brushing of the grass that covered her dress, "You haven't meet him or stood face to face with him."

"No," Aura said slowly, "nor do I wish to do so. No one inside the sanctuary knows how he looks like..." her words was cut short by Kahlan.

"Other then Shinko..."

Aura nodded, "And I don't suppose you want to give a detailed describtion of him?" she asked and glanced up at Kahlan.

"No," Kahlan said and offered her hand to her sister who took it. "But I'm hoping so much that our Queen is right about that girl – otherwise we," she turned around and looked into a puzzled face of a man investigating the boundary, that was now invisible from where he stood, he didn't seem to want to touch the line that kept the two worlds apart, "are doomed to live forever in this cursed life."