XXXVII. SACRIFICE

Richard rode at the front of his men, the army kicking up a sand cloud behind him. On learning of Rile's death and Kahlan's capture, he'd delayed only long enough on his way to the rift to gather the D'Harans. He would need them now, their steel and their strength, especially if the Sisters of the Dark had taken Kahlan in any great number.

They were drawing nearer to the rift. Nox had called over that there was less than an hour left to ride, and they'd been pushing hard all day, working their mounts to the brink of exhaustion. Two horses had collapsed already. Richard didn't even have the luxury of feeling sorry for the poor creatures. All he could think of was what awaited him at the rift. His mind was racing as he rode, trying to come up with a strategy, but he had no idea what to expect. At least he'd killed the Keeper's hound. Getting to Kahlan would have been nigh impossible if that monster still lived to ravage his men and protect her captors.

She had to be so scared. Kahlan was the strongest woman he knew, but their child had changed her in so many ways. She would be frightened and exhausted now, with no way to fight back. He tried not to think of what she suffered; no doubt wondering where he was and what took him so long. But they had ridden a long way in the wrong direction on their way to Isham, and all that could be done now was to double back as fast as possible. It was already late afternoon, the sun far in the west preparing to set. If he thought of how long she'd been their prisoner, the grief would overwhelm him.

He focused only on going forward. Richard urged his horse to gallop faster, taking still more from the creature. Cara and Nox rode even with him, Zedd trailing a little ways behind them with the bulk of his men. Already he was thinking of them as his men; already he was asking them to quite possibly die for him this day.

A sudden flash of light blazed brilliant white across the sky, blinding him. He could see nothing as his horse reared, and all around him D'Harans shouted to one another in confusion, equally blinded by the light. Instinctively Richard reached for his sword as something hurtled just past his cheek. He flinched and rubbed at his eyes, his vision returning in blurry patches.

Gradually the blinding light faded, and he saw. They had been surrounded by a ring of red; an ambush out of the very sky. It was not just a few Sisters of the Dark, but several hundred women surrounding his army, the air burning up with their spells. Dacras were flying wild, and his men, still dazed and blinking, were slowly drawing weapons. Behind him, he could hear Nox shouting orders. There was a flash of silver, and instinct brought his sword up just in time to knock a dacra off its collision course with his head.

Steadying himself, Richard turned into the battle, striking down the nearest sister. She crumpled in a heap of long black hair and red robes, leaving him with an unpleasant, niggling feeling, as if he'd seen her somewhere before. He killed four more women before he remembered where he'd seen that pale face and midnight eyes. She'd been a companion to Sister Isobel the day their paths had crossed after escaping Ashkari. And then, in a sudden rush of understanding, he knew just how the Sisters of the Dark had captured Kahlan. Not by force, but by the crueler route of someone she had trusted. Someone she even, he believed, loved. His heart ached for her. Richard let out an anguished cry as he blocked another dacra. This was wasting time that Kahlan didn't have.

He had to get to the rift, but that was impossible now. They were surrounded. He killed his sixth sister, then a seventh, and the blood seemed lost far, far away, locked beneath his misery. An eighth lay motionless at his feet, when suddenly he caught sight of Nox fighting towards him like a giant above the crowd. His matted blonde hair was flecked with blood.

"Lord Rahl," he called the moment he gained the briefest respite. "You've got to get out of here! Get to her!"

Richard nodded, feeling a surge of hope. Here was a man who understood. But it was impossible. "There's no way out," he shouted back. "The fighting's too thick." And the sisters were pressing him hardest of all. If he turned tail and fled for the rift, he'd take a dacra to the head almost immediately. And he'd be of no use to Kahlan then.

"I've ordered some of the men to cut a path for you." Richard stared up at the huge general, wondering how he'd managed that in the madness of battle. He could barely hear his own thoughts above the shouts and the clang of steel on steel. And he knew nothing of the signals the men used to direct each other. Though the soldiers were sworn to him, he realized then just how disadvantaged he'd be without General Nox to communicate with them during battle. He took in the bloodied axe in Nox's massive fist. This was a man born to lead armies.

As he watched, Nox holstered the axe and swung his long bow down from his back. "I'll cover you. On my signal, you get out of here and you find your woman, Lord Rahl."

Richard nodded and gripped his arm a moment, hoping the gesture conveyed some of the bottomless gratitude for which he had neither words nor time to express. All around them, the battle raged on. It looked like little more than an angry red sea to him, but it must have made sense to Nox because, two dead sisters later, he nodded. To Richard's wonder, he saw the D'Harans begin to force an opening through the battle, keeping back the sisters, giving him a way out. Those few who managed to reach him were picked off by arrows from afar before he had any need to draw his sword.

And then, suddenly, he was free. The D'Harans closed ranks, keeping the sisters from following him. He didn't look back, but he wondered how many men had just died to grant him his escape. He vowed not to waste their sacrifice.

The sun was already starting to set, painting the west in crimson and orange as he used the dunes for cover in case anyone was following after. He thought he'd been careful, but it wasn't long before he heard the sound of a rider fast approaching. Richard let a hand lay loosely against his sword as he listened. One horse, no more than that. He pulled the blade free, eager to be done with the threat and on again, but when he wheeled around he found Cara riding towards him in her red leather, her short hair flapping wildly in the wind.

"Cara," he cried out.

She pulled even with him, her expression grave. She bore an angry cut across her cheekbone as if a dacra had glanced off her face.

"How did you make it through?" he asked. The D'Harans had only just been able to force a gap long enough to get him out.

"I could not let you go alone," she said, and Richard nodded, silently acknowledging the risk she had taken in coming after him. He could not find the words to say how glad he was to have her by his side. Instead, they rode.

It was not far, and before long they reached the rift. Charred black earth stood out in sharp contrast against the now orange and violet sky. Shadows loomed long and empty, and there was no one there. It felt as if his heart shuddered to a stop inside his chest. He dropped from his horse, and Cara followed suit. He didn't know what he'd expected to find, but it wasn't this. Not this emptiness.

"Where are you?" he whispered to himself.

Cara moved closer. "Are you sure she's here?"

"I don't…I don't know." He'd been so sure that he'd find her here at this place of greatest evil, but not even a single red-robed sister dotted the horizon. "I thought…" He raked a hand back through his hair as tears filled his eyes. He didn't bother turning away to hide them.

Cara shuffled her feet, hands clenched around her Agiels. "You can track anything," she said. "You'll find her."

But that was the problem; you couldn't track anything. Not in all this wretched sand. He kicked at a rock and then froze, staring at the ground. It bore faint yet obvious indents from his foot. Richard spun around, taking in the black expanse of the rift. It wasn't made of sand at all, but a darker, clumpier substance that bore tracks well.

New hope flared up in him and he started racing along the rift, leaving Cara to bring up the rear with the horses. He knew he'd found what he was looking for the moment he saw it.

There, at the top of a dune where the sands of D'Hara were just beginning to mix with the dark, rocky terrain of the rift, he saw the tracks of five people. By their size, he judged them to be five women. And between them were strange markings in the dirt, as if a sixth person had knelt there in their midst. His gut tightened. Kahlan. He followed the tracks down the hill towards the rift, and a few steps later, he saw it. The unmistakable outline of Kahlan's boot.

Richard dropped to his knees, gently touching the mark in the dirt. Kahlan had been here not long ago, had stood where his hand now pressed. He sucked in a deep, steadying breath. It was obvious that she had been forced along by the other women. Here and there, the tracks showed signs of their having dragged her with them. Richard raced from print to print, following the trail deeper and deeper into the chasm, green smoke now billowing around him.

He wasted no time explaining things to Cara, just kept following the trail down into the gloom until he reached a dead end, rock suddenly closing up the narrow way before him. Richard stopped, pressing his hands against the slab of cold stone.

Cara had caught up with him by then. "What is it? The tracks end?"

"No." He crouched down low, straining his eyes to see in the eerie green light of the chasm. "The tracks keep going just as before. The rocks look as if they've fallen in an avalanche, but their steps show no sign of reacting to falling rock. This happened after they passed."

"To keep anyone from following?"

"Maybe." He straightened up. "Or to keep Kahlan from turning back." His heart thudded dread. "They took her into the Underworld," he muttered, a shuddering breath escaping. "Alive." They had not killed her before she'd reached this impasse, and if they'd brought her this far alive, then it meant they needed her that way. For now. He still had some time before the prophecy came true.

But Cara was shaking her head. "That's not possible. I was talking to Nox last night. He's had men go too far into the rift. It starts to age you. Fast. Kahlan would be an old woman before she made it much farther. Why would they want that?"

"I don't know! But they did, and she's there, and I have to get to her. Now. Before the prophecy comes true." Before he lost everything. He realized with cold defeat that he'd stopped thinking of the prophecy as preposterous and begun accepting it as truth. The words haunted him.

The Keeper's daughters hunt the one conceived in sorrow – child of love and fury – for their master lusts for its soul. If he gains it, the one in white will perish and all life shall follow her. But, if by the Creator's grace, the one bound to the blade is given to the world of the dead, the child will be born into a storm that promises hope for the world of the living.

It had happened. The Keeper's daughters had come and claimed her, and now all that was needed was for Kahlan and their child to die, and all the world would fall.

"How?" Cara was saying. "You can't get through here, and even if you do find another opening, you won't live long enough to look for her."

"I don't need to live," he murmured.

"What? What are you talking about?"

Richard shook his head, not listening. If prophecy was true, then it was time he used it as a tool to help him, instead of continually bashing his head against it. He considered the second part of the prophecy, the one that spoke of his death, not Kahlan's.

But, if by the Creator's grace, the one bound to the blade is given to the world of the dead, the child will be born into a storm that promises hope for the world of the living.

He had to die. That was it. He needed the sudden luck of some fatal blow. Some fatal grace to save the day. And then it clicked. Richard gave a shout and started running back up the rift to where the horses waited. The answer had been there all along, resting in his saddlebag. He could hear Cara moving quickly up the hill behind him, shouting questions, but he ignored her. Instead, he opened up his saddlebag, fishing out the black, leather bound book from Ashkari, and thumbing through the pages. Richard read the passage twice to be sure, and then pulled his sword from its scabbard, lifting the blade up to slice the skin on his arm.

Cara grabbed him just before the blade could cut through his flesh. "Are you mad? What are you doing?"

"Read it." Richard thrust the book at her, his mind already busy running over the steps to compose a Fatal Grace.

She straightened up and began reading aloud, in a tone like a child reciting a passage in a schoolroom. "When it was discovered that Jocelyn had journeyed to the Underworld, her father drew from his own blood a Fatal Grace, and fell on his knife before it could claim him."

Cara paused and looked up at him, her eyes full of too many dangerous questions. "Keep reading," he said through gritted teeth.

She sighed and acquiesced. "We thought it was an act of wild grief, but Jocelyn was recovered that next morning. She suffered less madness than the others and spoke plainly, claiming that her father appeared before her in the Underworld, holding off the Ripper long enough for her to return to the world of life. She says the fires of the Underworld had no effect on him, and, unlike the other souls, he could move freely, unbound by the Keeper of the Dead."

She paused again, her mouth a thin little line. "Keep reading, Cara!" he demanded.

She finished in a heavy voice, "It was as if the Creator herself was with him there. Though he is lost to us now, his body remained intact until dawn, when the Fatal Grace at last ripped him apart." She snapped the book shut. "This is suicide, Richard."

"The Keeper has the woman I love and my child." He grabbed the book from her. "Do you think there's anything I won't do to get them back?"

"Die?" Cara snorted in disgust. "How will you help her if you're dead?"

"Because I'll be in the Underworld too. There's no other way to get there so fast, and besides, I won't really be dead. Not if it works. The scholar that did this, he could move around in the Underworld unhindered. That's exactly what I need."

"You have no guarantee that it will work the same way for you." Her voice turned bitterly sarcastic, "That the Creator will come and save you."

"How else can I get to Kahlan?" he cried. "Tell me how to get to her and I'll do it!"

Cara said nothing. The silence on the black cliffs rang very loud. The sky had turned a deep, deep violet, still streaked here and there with orange. "I'll have until dawn before the Fatal Grace destroys me." If it worked at all. "Once Kahlan's safe, you can revive me. Not before."

"Richard…" To his surprise, her voice broke. He looked up. Maybe it was just the odd light, but there were tears swimming in her eyes. "I can't just stand by and watch you die, Lord Rahl."

"Cara, please." Her tears broke through to him like nothing else could. He had never seen her so upset before. He walked towards her and reached out, taking her small, gloved hand in his bare ones. "You have to."

"Are you ordering me to?" The thought had crossed his mind to stand up straight with all the weight of his new title, and order her as Lord Rahl to let him perish. But he couldn't do that to her. Not after all this time.

"No," he said softly. "I'm asking you, Cara, as my friend, to understand why I have to do this. The Keeper has Kahlan, and if she dies…" His voice wobbled, but he kept going. "If she dies, the world dies with her." He no longer meant only the utter devastation he would feel where he used to have a beating heart, but the destruction of all life promised in the prophecy. That was coming too. He believed.

"I have to die, Cara, and I don't know if I get to come back. All I know is it's the only chance we have… Don't stop me. Please."

A tear trickled down Cara's cheek, and he brushed it away for her. She nodded once in stony silence. Richard squeezed her hand and let go, lifting his sword once more as she turned away. She wrapped her arms tight around herself and gave him her back. He drew a deep cut along his left arm, turning the blade to bathe it in the blood that came bubbling out of the wound. The words from the book played over in his mind. He had to get this exactly right. He was so focused on what he had to do that he barely noticed the throbbing of his wounded arm. It would be nothing to what came next anyways.

With the bloodied blade, he began to trace the Grace on the flattest patch of broken ground he could find. He worked quickly, drawing the shape in reverse, beginning with the outermost circle. Blood still trickled down his arm as he worked, carving red grooves in the blackened earth. He slowed as he reached the final lines of the star. So far, he felt nothing. No deadly magic to earn the Fatal Grace its name. He looked up to find Cara had at last turned back to face him. Her Agiels were out.

"No one will touch your body," she said in a low, hoarse voice. "They will die if they so much as try."

So she would stand guard over his corpse. It was a strange and much needed comfort. "Thank you, Cara," he said, and closed the final point in the Fatal Grace.

He straightened up at the very center of the enormous red star, glistening rings of his own blood extending around him. He felt the change instantly. There was a mad, rushing, buzzing sound like a swarm of hornets unleashed, but much, much louder than any swarm he'd ever heard. And there were no insects here in this charred and desolate place. It was the magic come to claim him and tear him apart, and he had to die before it could.

Already his skin tingled with a curious warmth that grew hotter and hotter. It left no time for thought. Richard flipped his sword in his hands so the tip pressed against his stomach, fingers curled tight to keep them from trembling. The buzzing grew louder, and his skin burned hotter as if the sound crawled all over him, leaking inside his ears and down his throat. He locked eyes with Cara. "Goodbye," he whispered and thrust upward into the soft, yielding flesh of his midsection as hard as he could.

The pain was wild and instantaneous, and he dropped to his knees. His hands were a slick, shiny red. He opened his mouth to groan, and something warm and metallic tasting bubbled out. He was vaguely aware that it was his own blood. All around him, Richard could still hear the buzzing, but it was muted now.

Four Cara's wavered in front of him, exchanging places again and again, as if performing some strange and joyless dance. And strangest of all, in the silence of his mind he heard the voice of the old librarian back in the snowbound city, speaking to him of the Creator and sacrifice. He tried to follow what she said, but it was too much. His fingers slipped against the cold steel in his belly, and blackness came rushing at him like a flock of ravens taking wing and he saw no more.