The enigma resurfaced. It was somehow linked to this.

"The spell that protects a person's mind from the dream walker works only for those loyal to me. You can't expect to be safe from Jagang if you do this. It's an act of treachery."

"Jagang does not frighten me. Don't fear for my mind, Richard. I'm quite safe from His Excellency. In time, perhaps you will come to see how wrong you have been in so many things."

"You're deceiving yourself, Nicci."

"You only see part of it, Richard." She lifted an eyebrow in a cryptic manner. "At heart, your cause is the cause of the Order. You are too noble a person for it to be otherwise."

"I may die at your hands, but I will die hating everything you and the Order stand for." Richard's fists tightened. "You'll not get what you want, Nicci. Whatever it is, you'll not get it."

She regarded him with great compassion. "This is all for the best, Richard."

Nothing he said seemed to hold any sway with her, and he could make no sense of the things she said. The fury inside boiled up. The magic of the sword fought him for control. He could barely contain it. "Do you really expect me to ever come to believe that?"

Nicci's blue eyes seemed to be focused somewhere beyond him.

"Possibly not."

Her gaze fixed on him once more. She put two fingers between her lips as she turned and whistled. In the distance, a horse whinnied and trotted out of the woods.

"I have another horse for you, waiting up on the other side of the pass."

Terror clawed at his bones. Kahlan's fingers tightened on his arm.

Cara's hand touched his back. Memories of being captured before and all it meant, all the things he had endured, made his pulse race and his breath come in rapid pulls. He felt trapped. Everything was slipping through his fingers and there didn't seem to be anything he could do about it.

He wanted more than anything to fight, but he couldn't figure how. He wished it were as simple as striking down his adversary. He reminded himself that reason, not wishing, was his only chance. He seized the calm center within, and used it to quell the rising storm of panic.

Nicci stood tall, her shoulders square, her chin up. She looked like someone facing an execution with courage. He realized then that she truly was prepared for whichever way it was to go.

"I have given you your choice, Richard. You have no other options.

Choose."

"There is no choice to make. I'll not allow Kahlan to die."

"Of course not." Nicci's posture eased almost imperceptibly. A small smile of reassurance warmed her eyes. "She will be fine."

The horse slowed from its trot as it approached. When the handsome dappled mare halted beside her, Nicci took ahold of the reins near the bit.

Its gray mane ruffled in the cold breeze. The mare snorted and tossed her head, uneasy before strangers, and eager to be away.

"But. . but," Richard stammered as Nicci stepped up into the stirrup. "But, what am 1 allowed to take?"

Nicci swung her leg over the horse's rump and settled into the saddle.

She squirmed herself into position and adjusted her shoulders, setting them back. Her black dress and blond hair stood out in stark relief against the iron sky.

"You may bring anything you like, as long as it isn't a person." She clicked her tongue, urging her horse around to face him. "I suggest you take clothes and such. Whatever you wish to have with you. Take all you can carry, if you want."

Her voice took on an edge. "Leave that sword of yours, though. You won't be needing it." She leaned down, her expression for the first time turning cold and threatening. "You are no longer the Seeker, or Lord Rahl, leader of the D'Haran empire, or for that matter, you are no longer the husband of the Mother Confessor. From now on, you are nobody but Richard."

Cara stepped out beside him, a thunderhead of dark fury. "I am Mord-Sith. If you think I'm going to allow you to take Lord Rahl, you're crazy. The Mother Confessor has already stated her wishes. My duty, above all else, is to kill you."

Nicci curled three fingers around the reins, her thumbs holding them tight. "Do as you must. You know the consequences."

Richard held out a restraining arm to prevent Cara from going up after Nicci and dragging her off the horse. "Take it easy," he whispered. "Time is on our side. As long as we're all still alive, we have the chance to think of something."

The strain of Cara's weight against his arm eased. She reluctantly backed a step.

"I have to get some things," Richard said to Nicci, trying to buy that time. "Wait, at least, until I can get my pack together."

Nicci laid the reins over and stepped her horse back toward him. She rested her left wrist across the saddle's pommel.

"I'm leaving." With a long graceful finger of her other hand, she pointed. "You see that pass up there? You be with me by the time I'm at the top, and Kahlan will live. If I cross over and you aren't with me, Kahlan will die. You have my word."

It was all happening too fast. He needed to think of a way to stall.

"Then what good will any of this have done you?"

"It will have told me what means more to you." She sat back up in her saddle. "When you think about it, that is quite a profound question. It is yet to be answered. By the time I get to the top of the pass, 1 will have the answer."

Nicci rocked her hips in the saddle, urging the horse ahead into a walk. "Don't forget-top of the pass. You have until then to say your good-byes, pack what you wish to take, and then catch up with me if you wish Kahlan to live.

Or, if you choose to stay, you have until then to say your good-byes before she dies. Understand, though, when making your choice, that the first will be as final as the second."

Kahlan struggled to run toward the horse, but Richard clutched her around her waist.

"Where are you taking him?" she demanded.

Nicci stopped her horse momentarily and gazed down at Kahlan with a look of frightening finality.

"Why, into oblivion."

As she watched Nicci turn her dappled mare toward the pass and the distant blue mountains beyond, Kahlan was still struggling to overcome her dizziness from what the woman had done to her. Off near the distant trees, a doe and her nearly grown fawn, two of the small herd of deer that frequented the meadow, stood at alert, their ears perked, watching Nicci, waiting to see if she might be a threat, Spooked by what they saw when Nicci turned their way, both deer flicked their tails straight up and bounded for the trees.

Kahlan refused to allow herself to give in to the disorientation. But for Richard's iron arms around her waist, she would have thrown herself at the Sister of the Dark. Kahlan had desperately wanted to unleash her Confessor's power. No one had ever deserved it more.

Had her senses not still been floundering in a daze, she might have been able to invoke her power through the Con Dar, the Blood Rage of an ancient ability she possessed. Such rare magic would have bridged the relatively small distance, but, reeling from the lingering force of Nicci's conjuring, the attempt had been futile. It was all Kahlan could do to keep her feet under her and her last meal in her stomach.

It was frustrating, infuriating, and humiliating, but Nicci had surprised her and with magic as swift as Kahlan's Confessor's power had taken her before she could react. Once Nicci's talons clutched her, Kahlan had been powerless.

She had grown up being trained not to be taken by surprise. Confessors were always targets; she knew better. Any number of times in similar situations she had prevailed. Lulled by months of tranquillity, Kahlan had lost her edge. She vowed never to let it happen again. , but that would do her no good now.