Chapter Thirty-One

The next few days of travel had happened with out many life-threatening incidents. A few times Cara had gotten close to the food and everyone had been afraid if they would wake up in the morning, but so far, nothing had happened since the encounter with Leo.

Kahlan had noticed that Richard's eyes had begun to turn brown again. She was a little upset by this. The Richard that had Kahlan had started to fall for had grey eyes. The Richard that had taken her prisoner, and made her life a living hell, had brown eyes.

Richard, for his part, did not seem to notice the changing of his eye color. However, Kahlan was afraid that when his eyes became brown again, he would revert back to his original self, and all three of them would die.

She brought it up with Cara one night when Richard and Benjamin were hunting. "What do you think will happen if Richard's eyes get back to brown?"

Cara stared at her for a second. "I . . . I don't think anything will happen, Mother Confessor. Why?"

"Well, it's just, Richard has been . . . well, different since his eyes turned grey, and I think maybe – "

"You think he will be Lord Rahl again, after his eyes turn brown." Kahlan nodded. "I think you're over reacting to this eye color thing. He wasn't Lord Rahl before that happened. I told something was different."

"Oh, I remember, but I'm still worried. I just want you to be on your guard, Cara. We still don't know why his eyes turned grey." She reminded Cara.

"Well, I think it has something to do with Cara's message from Shota." Richard's voice was heard from out of the clearing, and he walked into it with Benjamin, each carrying a big rabbit.

Kahlan jumped, but Cara only flinched and it was so small Kahlan almost didn't notice it. "What do you mean?" Cara asked.

"I think that it is a side effect of the vision I received when you gave me the message. I've been meaning to ask you about that. Do you know who scout was that gave you the message?" Richard asked.

"Um, it wasn't some one I'd ever heard of, and it wasn't the man who I sent to get the message, but he might have taken some others." Cara said, screwing up her face trying to remember.

"Do you remember his name?" Richard asked. He'd give his rabbit to Kahlan, and she and Benjamin were cooking while he questioned Cara.

"I . . . it's hard to remember, I think it had magic to make me forget what I was doing. I think, that his name was Bradstone. Yes, his name was Dell Bradstone." Cara said looking to Richard.

Richard's sharp intake of breath could be heard of the boiling water. "Are you sure his name was Dell Bradstone?" Richard asked.

"Yes, now that I'm trying to remember, I'm sure that his name was Dell Bradstone." She said, looking at him confused.

"You're sure? Big man, darker skin, short hair, is that him?" She said.

"Yes, that's a good description of him. What is it? Why are you looking at me like that?" She asked.

"Why would Shota be using Chase?" Richard asked himself, ignoring her.

"Chase?" Kahlan asked. "You mean Councilor's Guard from Westland?"

"How do you know him?" Richard asked. "I mean, Zedd didn't introduce you did he?" Richard asked, still unsure of the whole history of this world.

"Well, Chase helped us escape from Westland. The First Councilor was helping a man try and kill me, but Zedd convinced Chase to help us. I think Zedd put a spell on him, because he did whatever Zedd asked, and he just left his family after telling them to run." Kahlan said she didn't seem too sad about it. "Chase was a big help in finding Leo, and he helped us get into the People's Palace."

"Do you know what happened to him?" Richard asked. Chase would never have left his family for Zedd, unless there was a spell involved.

"No, Zedd told him to wait for us outside the palace. Zedd was . . . Zedd had started to blindly follow Leo." Kahlan stopped, and said nothing else.

"You didn't believe in him did you?" Richard asked.

"Well, I . . . Leo was . . . I didn't agree with most of his decisions, and he . . . he just didn't know how to save the world. He could have been great, but he just . . . wasn't." Kahlan had had a very difficult time saying that.

"Wow." Cara said. "From the outside, you and the Seeker looked like a couple. I didn't know you had all these . . . problems with him." Cara said, the surprise evident in her face.

"Yes, the Mother Confessor always seemed to have problems with me!"

Author's Note: I'm going out of town today, and I won't be able to update much. It might be a few days until an update, or there might not be one for a week. I'll try to write a lot while I'm there so I can update everyday when I get back. Sorry about the hiatus.

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