The man looked back over his shoulder. "Any night you're stationed on watch up here at the Keep is a terrible night."

Kahlan smiled. "The Keep looks sinister, soldier, but it's not so bad as it looks." "If you say so. Mother Confessor. Myself, I think I'd just as soon stand guard over the underworld itself." "No one has tried to get in the Keep, have they?"

"If they had, you'd have heard about it, or found our bodies. Mother Confessor." Kahlan urged her big stallion on. Nick snorted and surged ahead on the slick snow. She trusted him in such conditions and let him lead the way. Cara and Berdine both swayed easily in their saddles as they followed behind. Back in the stables, Cara had snatched her horse's bit, looked the animal in the eye, and ordered it not to give her any trouble. Kahlan had the odd feeling that the bay mare understood the warning.

Kahlan could just see the stone walls at the sides of the bridge. Just as well that the horses couldn't see the chasm beyond. She knew Nick wouldn't spook, but she wasn't sure about the other two. The sheer rock walls of the yawning abyss dropped for thousands of feet. Unless you had wings, there was only this one way into the Wizard's Keep. In the snowy darkness, the vast Keep, its soaring walls of dark stone, its ramparts, bastions, towers, connecting passageways, and bridges all blended into the inky darkness of the side of the mountain into which it was built. To those without magic or those who didn't understand magic, the Keep presented an unmistakable spectacle of sinister menace.

Kahlan had grown up in Aydindril and had been up to the Keep uncountable times, more often than not, alone. Even as a child, she had been allowed to go alone to the Keep, as were the other young Confessors. When she was little, wizards had tickled her and chased her through the halls, laughing with her. The Keep was a second home to her: comfortably safe, welcoming, and protective.

She knew, though, that there were dangers in the Keep, just as in any home. A home could be a safe, welcoming place, as long as one wasn't foolish enough to walk into the hearth. There were places in the Keep you didn't walk into, either.

It was only when she was older that she no longer went to the Keep alone. When a Confessor became older, it was dangerous to go anywhere alone. After a Confessor had begun taking confessions, it wasn't safe for her to be without the protection of her wizard.

When she was older, a Confessor earned enemies. Family of the condemned rarely believed that a loved one had committed violent crimes, or they blamed Confessors for the man's death sentence, even though she was only the means of confirming its justice.

There were always attempts on the lives of Confessors. There was no shortage of people, from commoners to kings, wanting a Confessor dead.

"How are we going to go through the shields without Lord Rahl?" Berdine asked. "His magic enabled us to pass through, before. We won't be able to get through the shields."

Kahlan smiled assurance to the two Mord-Sith. "Richard didn't know where he was going. He just blundered through the Keep, going where he needed to go on instinct. I know the ways to go that don't require magic to pass. There may be a few mild shields that will keep people out, but I can pass those. If I can pass, then I can get you through them by touching you when you pass through, the same way Richard took you through the more powerful shields."

Cara grunted disagreeably. She had been hoping that the shields would stop them.

"Cara, I've been in the Keep thousands of times. It's perfectly safe. We're just going to the libraries. Just as you are my protector out in the world, in the Keep I will be yours. We are sisters of the Agiel. I won't let you get anywhere near dangerous magic. Trust me?"

"Well. . I guess you are a sister of the Agiel. I can trust a sister of the Agiel." They passed under the huge portcullis and onto the Keep grounds. Once inside the massive outer walls, the snow melted as it touched the ground. Kahlan pushed back her hood. Inside the walls, it was warm and comfortable.

She shook the snow from her cloak and took a deep breath of the spring-fresh air, filling her lungs with the familiar, soothing scent. Nick whinnied agreeably.

Kahlan led the two Mord-Sith across the stretch of gravel and stone chips to the arched opening in the wall that tunneled under part of the Keep. As they passed through the long passageway, the lamps hanging from Cara and Berdine's saddles lit the arched stone around them in an orange glow.

"Why are we going through here?" Cara asked. "Lord Rahl took us in that big door back there."

"I know. That's one reason you're afraid of the Keep. That was a very dangerous way to go in. I'm taking us to the way I usually enter. It's much better. You'll see.

"It's not the way visitors entered, either, but the way used by those who lived and worked here. The public came in at a different door. a place where they were greeted by a guide who saw to their wants."

Beyond the tunnel, all three horses eyed the expansive paddock lush with grass. The gravel road ran beside the wall that held the main entrance to the Keep, with a fence on the other side of the road enclosing the paddock. To the left. part of the paddock was bounded by the walls of the Keep rather than a fence. At the rear were stables.

Kahlan dismounted and opened the gate. After removing saddles and tack, all three of them turned their horses loose in the paddock, where they could crop grass and frisk in the mild air if they wished.

A dozen wide granite steps, worn smooth and swayback over the millennia, led up into a recessed entryway, to the simple but heavy double doors into the Keep proper. Cara and Berdine followed behind with the lamps. The anteroom swallowed the lamplight into its vast space, only allowing the weak flames to hint at the columns and arches.

"What's that?" Berdine asked in a low whisper. "It sounds like a storm drain." "There aren't. . rats in here, are there?"

"Actually, it's a fountain," Kahlan said, her voice echoing into the distance. "And yes, Cara. there are rats in the Keep, but not where I'm taking you. Promise. Here, give me your lamp. Let me show you the bones of this menacing dungeon."

Kahlan took the lamp and strode to one of the key lamps on the wall to the right. She could walk there without the aid of the lamp, she had done it so often, but she needed the lamp's flame. She found the key lamp, tilled back the tall chimney, and lit it with the flame from Cara's lamp.

The key lamp took to flame. With a succession of whooshing sounds, the rest of the lamps in the room lit-hundreds of them-two at a time. in pairs, one to each side. Each whoosh was followed almost simultaneously by another, as the lamps around the huge room took to flame from the key lamp. The light in the room grew: the effect was like turning up the wick on a lamp.

In a span of seconds, the anteroom was nearly as bright as day, bathed in the mellow yellow-orange glow of all the flames. Cara and Berdine stood slackjawed at the sight.

A hundred feet overhead the glassed roof was dark, but in the day, it flooded the room with warmth and light. At night, if the sky was clear, you could turn down the lamps and gaze at the stars, or let the moonlight wash the room.

In the center of the tiled floor stood a clover leaf-shaped fountain. Water shot fifteen feet into the air above the top bowl, to cascade down each successive tier into ever wider, scalloped bowls, finally running from evenly spaced points in the bottom one in perfectly matched arcs into the lower pool. An outer wall of variegated white marble was wide enough to act as a bench.

Berdine stepped down one step of the five that ringed the room. "It's beautiful," she whispered in astonishment.