Kahlan felt dizzy and hot. She feared she might be sick. The way she swayed in her saddle only made her nausea worse. The stench of death and charred flesh followed them in the bright sunshine as they rode among the hills on the far side of the city. The smell was so pervasive that it felt as if it had saturated her clothes and was even coming out in her sweat.

She doubted that she would ever again sleep without nightmares.

Kahlan didn't know what the name of the city had been, but it was no more. There hadn't been a single person left alive. Anything of any value had either been destroyed or looted. From the number of corpses, as vast as they had been, she knew that many of the city's inhabitants, mostly the women, the ones of the right age, anyway, had been taken as slaves. After seeing what had happened to the women left dead in the city, Kahlan could vividly imagine what would happen to the women taken away.

The broadening plane and the hills to either side for as far as Kahlan could see had been trampled by what had to be well beyond mere hundreds of thousands of men. The grasses had not simply been flattened by countless boots, hooves, and wagon wheels, but had been ground to dust under the weight of unthinkable numbers. The sight put into perspective the magnitude of the masses that had passed through the city, and in a way was more horrifying than the ghastly scenes of death. A force of men this huge bordered on a force of nature itself, like some terrible storm that cut a swath across the face of the land, mercilessly destroying everything in its path.

Later in the day, as they approached the crest of a hill, the Sisters carefully maneuvered into a position that put the sun low at their backs so that anyone ahead would have to stare into the sun to see them. Sister Ulicia slowed and stood in her stirrups, stretching for a careful look, then signaled the rest of them to dismount. They all tied their horses to the carcass of a scraggly old pine split in two by lightning. Sister Ulicia told Kahlan to stay close behind them.

At the edge of the hill, as they crouched silently in the weedy grass, they finally caught their first glimpse of what had come through the fallen city. In the dim distance, spread across the hazy horizon, was what at first appeared to be a muddy, brown sea, but was actually the dark taint of an army of such numbers that it was beyond counting. Carried on the wind, in the quiet, late-day air, Kahlan could just make out the distant, bloodcurdling sounds of howls, women's screams, and men's raucous laughter coming from the massive mob.

The sheer weight of such multitudes would have crushed the defenses of any city. Any armed opposition would hardly have been noticed by an army as vast as this one. Men gathered in such numbers could not be halted by anything.

But as much as this army seemed to be a mass, a mob, a thing, she knew that it was wrong to think of it in those terms; this was a group of individuals. These men had not been born monsters. Each had once been a helpless babe cradled in a mother's arms. Each had once been a child with fears, hopes, and dreams. While an occasional aberrant individual could, because of a sick mind, grow up to be a remorseless killer, this many individuals had not. Each was a killer by conviction to a cause, a killer by choice, all united under a banner of perverse beliefs that gave sanction to their savagery.

These were all individuals who when confronted with the choice had willfully cast away the inherent nobility of life, and chose instead to be servants of death.

Kahlan had been horrified at the butchery she'd seen back in the city, nauseated by the things she had seen. For a time she'd hardly been able to breathe, not just from the stench of death, but from her tearful despair at such mindless brutality, at such monumental and intentional depravity. She felt a sense of sickening dread for those helpless souls yet to face the horde and a crushing loss of any hope that life could ever be worth living, that it could ever be reasoned and secure, much less joyous.

But now, at the sight of the source of the slaughter, the great force of men who had all willingly perpetrated such atrocities, all those desolate feelings melted away. In their place smoldering anger ignited, the kind of inner rage she didn't think a person very often felt in their life. Remembering the old people who had been hacked apart, the infants dispatched by bashing in their brains, and the savage treatment of the women, Kahlan could think of little else but her burning desire for vengeance for the silent dead.

That sense of rage seethed through her, a rage so terrible that it seemed to forever change something within her. In that moment, she felt a profound affinity with the small statue she'd had to leave in Richard Rahl's peaceful garden, an understanding of its spirit that she hadn't had before.

"It's Jagang, all right," Sister Cecilia finally said in a bitter voice.

Sister Armina nodded. "And we have to get past him if we're to get to Caska."

Sister Ulicia gestured to the wall of mountains to the left. "Their army, with all their horses, wagons, and supplies, can't cross the narrow passes between those peaks, but we can. As slow as Jagang moves, we can easily get over the passes and then to Caska long before they can travel south to get past the mountains and then move up into D'Hara."

Sister Cecilia stared off to the horizon. "The D'Haran army doesn't stand a chance against that."

"That's not our problem," Sister Ulicia said.

"But what about our bond to Richard Rahl?" Sister Armina asked.

"We're not the ones attacking Richard Rahl," Sister Ulicia said. "Jagang is the one going after him, seeking to destroy him, not us. We are the ones who will wield the power of Orden and then we will grant Richard Rahl what only we will have the power to grant. That is enough to preserve our bond and protect us from the dream walker. Jagang and his army are not our problem and what they aim to do is not our responsibility."

Kahlan remembered being at the People's Palace and wondering what the man was like. Even though she didn't know him, she feared for him and his people having to face what was coming for them.

"It will be our problem if they get to Caska before us," Sister Cecilia said. "Besides catching up with Tovi, Caska is the only other central site we can get into for now."

Sister Ulicia dismissed the notion with a flick of her hand. "They're a long way from Caska. We can easily cut the distance and outpace them by going over the mountains rather than down, around, and then back up as they will have to do."

"You don't think they might quicken their pace?" Sister Armina asked. "After all, Jagang might be eager to finally finish off Lord Rahl and the D'Haran forces."

Sister Ulicia huffed at the very idea. "Jagang knows the D'Haran army has nowhere else to go — Richard Rahl has no choice now but to stand and fight. The matter is as good as decided. It's only a matter of time.

"The dream walker is in no hurry, nor could he be — not with an army that huge and unwieldy. And even if they could quicken their pace they have to travel a much greater distance so that still wouldn't get him to Caska before we can get there. Besides, Jagang's army is the same now as it has been since they first took over the Old World, decades ago, and as it has been throughout this entire war. They never hurry their pace. They are like the seasons — they move with great force, but very slowly."

She cast a meaningful look at the other two Sisters. "Besides, they've just stripped the city of women. Jagang's men will be eager to enjoy their new spoils."

The blood drained from Sister Armina's face. "Don't we know the truth of that."

"Jagang and his men never tire of the use of captive women," Sister Cecilia said, half to herself.