Captain Ryan smiled and tapped a fist to his heart in salute. Fires would be a luxury, and hot food would do the men good. They deserved it, after the hard march. They were almost home; tomorrow they would be there. Then the worst of the work would begin: taking care of the dead, and putting Ebinissia back to order. Kahlan would not let the Imperial Order's victory over Ebinissia stand. The Midlands would have the city back, and it would live again to strike back.

"Did you take care of Stephens?" she asked the captain.

"Zedd helped us find a place, and the men are taking care of it. Poor Stephens. He fought all through the battles against the Order, when we started with five thousand, saw four of every five of his companions killed, and he ends up dying in an accident after it's over. I know he would have wanted to die defending the Midlands."

"He did," Kahlan said. "It's not over; we won only a battle, though an important one. We are still at war with the Imperial Order, and he was a soldier in that war.

He was helping with our effort, and died in the line of duty, just as much as those men kilted in combat. There is no difference. He died a hero of the Midlands."

Captain Ryan stuffed his hands in the pockets of his heavy, brown wool coat. "I think the men would appreciate hearing those words, and would find courage in them. Before we move on, could you say something over his grave? It would mean a lot for the men to know their queen will miss him."

Kahlan smiled. "Of course. Captain. It would be my honor." Kahlan stared after the captain as he moved off to see to things. "I shouldn't have been pushing on after dark."

Zedd stroked a reassuring hand along the back of her head. "Accidents can happen in broad daylight. This very likely would have happened in the morning, had we stopped sooner, and then it would be blamed on being still half asleep." "I still feel to blame. It just doesn't seem fair." His smile marked no humor. "Fate does not seek our consent."

If there were any bodies at the farm, the men had removed them by the time Kahlan reached it. They had started a fire in the roughly built hearth, but it hadn't had time to thaw the iron chill from the deserted home.

Cyrilla was carefully carried to the remains of a straw mattress in a back bedroom. There was another cramped room with two pallets, probably for children, and the main room with a table and little else. By the broken bits of a cupboard and chest, and the remains of personal items, Kahlan knew the Order had been through here on their way to Ebinissia. She wondered again what the men had done with the bodies; she didn't want to find them in the night if she had to go outside to relieve herself.

Zedd peered around at the room as he rubbed his hands on his stomach.

"How long until dinner is ready?" he asked in a cheery tone.

He wore heavy maroon robes with black sleeves and cowled shoulders. Three rows of silver brocade circled the cuffs of his sleeves. Thicker, gold brocade ran around the neck and down the front, the outfit gathered at the waist with a red satin belt set with a gold buckle. Zedd hated the flashy accoutrements that Adie had insisted he purchase as a disguise. He preferred his simple robes, but they were long gone, as was his fancy hat with the long feather that he had «lost» somewhere along the way.

Kahlan grinned in spite of herself. "I don't know. What are you cooking?"

"Me? Cook? Well, I suppose.."

"Dear spirits, spare us that man's cooking," Adie said from the doorway. "We would be better served to eat bark and bugs."

Adie limped into the room, followed by Jebra, the seer, and Ahern, the coach driver who had carried Zedd and Adie on their recent journeys. Chandalen, who had accompanied Kahlan from the Mud People's village months ago, had departed after Kahlan had been with Richard one wondrous night in a place between worlds. He wanted to return to his home and people. She couldn't blame him; she knew what it was to miss friends and loved ones.

With Zedd and Adie, she felt as if they were almost all together. When Richard caught up with them, then truly they would all be together again. Though it would probably be weeks yet, Kahlan still couldn't help being excited by each breath, because each breath brought her one moment closer to having her arms around him.

"My bones do be too old for this weather," Adie said as she crossed the room.

Kahlan retrieved a simple wooden chair and dragged it along as she took Adie's arm and walked her to the fire. She put the chair close to the flames and urged the sorceress to sit and warm herself. Unlike Zedd's original clothes, Adie's simple, flaxen robes, with yellow and red beads sewn at the neck in ancient symbols of her profession, had survived their journey. Zedd scowled every time he saw them thinking it more than a little odd that her simple robes had managed to make the journey and his had been lost.

Adie always smiled and said it was a wonder and insisted that he looked grand in his fine clothes. Kahlan suspected she really did like him better in his new outfit. Kahlan, too, thought Zedd looked grand, though not so wizardlike as his traditional fashion made him look. Wizards of his high rank wore the simplest robes. There was no rank above Zedd: First Wizard.

"Thank you, child," Adie said as she warmed her hands near the flames.

"Orsk," Kahlan called.

The big man scurried forward. The scar over his missing eye was white in the firelight. "Yes, mistress?" He stood ready to carry out her instructions. What they might be was of no importance to him, his only concern being that he had a chance to please her.

"There's no pot in here. Could you get us one, so we can make some dinner?"

His dark leather uniform creaked as he bowed and turned to hurry from the room. Orsk had been a O'Haran soldier from the Imperial Order's camp. He had tried to kill her, and in the struggle she touched him with her power, the magic of the Confessors destroying forever who he had been and filling him with blind loyalty to her. That blind loyalty and devotion was a wearing presence to Kahlan, a constant reminder of what and who she was.

She tried not to see the man he had been: a D'Haran soldier who had joined with the Imperial Order, one of the killers who had participated in the slaughter of the helpless women and children of Ebinissia. As the Mother Confessor, she had sworn no mercy on any of the men of the Order, and there had been none. Only Orsk still lived. Though he lived, the man who had fought for the Order was dead.

Because of the death spell Zedd had cast over her to aid in their escape from Aydindril, few knew Kahlan as the Mother Confessor. Orsk only knew her as his mistress. Zedd, of course; Adie; Jebra; Ahern; Chandalen; her half brother, Prince Harold; and Captain Ryan knew her true identity, but everyone else thought the Mother Confessor was dead. The men she had fought with knew her only as their queen. Their memory of her being the Mother Confessor had been confused and muddled into remembering her as Queen Kahlan, no less their leader, but not the Mother Confessor.

After snow had been melted, Jebra and Kahlan added beans and bacon, cut up a few sweet roots to toss into the pot, and spooned in some molasses. Zedd stood rubbing his hands as he watched the ingredients being added. Kahlan grinned at his childlike eagerness and, from a pack, retrieved some hard bread for him. He was pleased, and ate the bread while the beans boiled,

While dinner cooked, Kahlan thawed leftover soup they had brought in a small pot and took it in to Cyrilla. She set a candle on a slat she stuck in a crack in the wall and sat on the edge of the bed in the quiet room. She wiped a warm cloth on her half sister's forehead for a while, and was happy to see Cyrilla's eyes open. A panicked gaze darted around the dim room. Kahlan grabbed Cyrilla's jaw and forced her to look up into her eyes.