Zedd let out a long breath and nodded. “It is. Richard, if you suspected I was a traitor, weren’t sure, just suspected, and you knew that if it were true, our cause would be lost, would you be able to kill me? If you had no time or way to find the truth, only the strong belief I was a traitor, and only you knew, could you kill me on the spot? Could you come at me, your old friend, with lethal intent? With enough violence to see the job done?”

Zedd’s stare burned into him. Richard was stunned. “I… I don’t know.”

“Well, you had better know that you could, or you have no business going after Rahl. You won’t have the resolve to live, to win. You may be called upon to make a life-and-death decision instantly. Kahlan knows this, she knows the consequences if she fails. She has the resolve.”

“She hesitated, though. From what you’re saying, she made a mistake. I could have overpowered her. She should have killed me before I had a chance to.” Richard frowned. “And she would have been wrong.”

Zedd shook his head slowly. “Don’t flatter yourself, Richard. She had her hand on you. Anything you would have done wouldn’t have been quick enough. All it would have taken is a thought on her part. She was in control and could afford to give you the chance to explain. She made no mistake.”

A little shaken, Richard still wasn’t ready to concede the issue. “But you wouldn’t, you couldn’t be a traitor to us, just as I would never hurt her. I don’t see the point.”

“The point is, even though I wouldn’t, if I did, you have to be prepared to act. You have to have the strength to do even that, if necessary. The point is that even though Kahlan knew you were her friend, and wouldn’t hurt her, when she thought you were trying to, she was prepared to act. If you hadn’t quickly made her believe you, she would have.”

Richard sat in silence for a moment, watching his friend. “Zedd, if it were the other way around, if you thought I was a danger to our cause, well, you know, could you…?”

The wizard leaned back, frowning, and without a hint of emotion in his voice, said, “In a twinkling.”

The answer appalled Richard, but he understood what his friend was telling him, even if the whole idea seemed farfetched—anything less than total commitment could spell their failure. If they faltered, Rahl would not be merciful. They would die. It was that simple.

“Still want to be Seeker?” Zedd asked.

Richard stared out at nothing. “Yes.”

“Scared?”

“To the bone.”

Zedd patted his knee. “Good. Me too. I would worry only if you were not.”

The Seeker gave the wizard an icy glare. “I intend to make Darken Rahl afraid too.”

Zedd smiled and nodded. “You are going to make a good Seeker, my boy. Have faith.”

Richard gave a mental shudder at the thought of Kahlan killing him just for offering her an apple. He frowned. “Zedd? Why are all red fruits in the Midlands deadly poison? It isn’t natural.”

The wizard gave a sorrowful shake of his head. “Because, Richard, children like red fruit.”

Richard’s frown deepened. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

Zedd looked down, pushing a bony finger at the dirt for a moment. “It was about this time of year, in the last war. The harvests were in. I had found a constructed magic. That’s a magic made by wizards of long ago. Something like the boxes of Orden. It was a poison magic, specific to color, and only able to cast one spell, one time. I wasn’t sure how it was used, but I knew it was dangerous.” Zedd took a deep breath and put his hands in his lap. “Anyway, Panis Rahl got his hands on it, and figured out how to make it work. He knew children loved fruit, and wanted to strike a blow at our hearts. He used the magic to poison all red fruit. It’s a little like the poison of the snake vine. Slow at first. It took time for us to realize what caused the fever, and death. Panis Rahl deliberately chose something he could be sure children, not just the adults, would eat.” His voice was barely audible as he looked out into the darkness. “A lot of people died. A lot of children.”

Richard’s eyes were wide. “If you found it, how did he get hold of it?”

Zedd looked into Richard’s eyes with an expression that could have frozen a summer day. “I had a student, a young man I was training. One day I chanced upon him tinkering with something he shouldn’t have been. I had an odd doubt about him. I knew something was wrong, but I was very fond of him and so I didn’t act upon my suspicion. Instead, I decided to think on it for the night. The next morning, he was gone, and so was the constructed magic I had found. He had been a spy for Panis Rahl. If I had acted when I should have, and killed him, all those people, all those children, wouldn’t have died.”

Richard swallowed. “Zedd, you couldn’t have known.” He thought that maybe the old man was going to yell, or cry, or storm off, but instead he only shrugged. “Learn from my mistake, Richard. If you do, then all those lives won’t have been lost for nothing. Maybe their story can be a lesson that will help save everyone from what Darken Rahl will do if he wins.”

Richard rubbed his arms, trying to work a bit of warmth back into them. “Why isn’t the red fruit in Westland poison?”

“All magic has limits. This had a limit of distance from where it was used. It stretched as far as where the boundary between Westland and the Midlands went up. The boundary couldn’t be put up where any of the poison spell was, or Westland would have had magic in it.”

Richard sat in the dark, cold silence and thought for a time. At last he asked, “Is there any way to get rid of it? To make the red fruit no longer poison?”

Zedd smiled. Richard thought it an odd thing to do, but he was glad to see it: “Thinking like a wizard, my boy. Thinking how to undo magic.” He frowned in thought as he looked out into the night again. “There might be a way to remove the spell. I would have to study it and see what I could do. If we can defeat Darken Rahl, I intend to put my mind to the task.”

“Good.” Richard tugged his cloak tighter. “Everyone should be able to eat an apple when they want. Especially children.” He looked over at the old man. “Zedd, I promise I will remember your lesson. I won’t let you down. I won’t let all those people who died be forgotten.”

Zedd smiled and gave Richard’s back an affectionate rub.

The two friends sat in silence, sharing the stillness of the night and the quiet of each other’s understanding, thinking about what they could not know: what was to come.

Richard thought about what needed to be done, about Panis Rahl, and about Darken Rahl. He thought about how hopeless everything seemed. Think about the solution, he told himself, not the problem—you are the Seeker.

“I need you to do something, wizard. I think it is time for us to disappear. Rahl has followed us long enough. What can you do about that cloud?”

“You know, I think you’re right. I only wish I knew how it was hooked to you, so I could unhook it, but I can’t figure it out so, I will have to do something else.” He contemplatively drew his finger and thumb down the sharp sides of his jaw. “Has it rained, or been overcast since it first started following you?”‘

Richard thought back, trying to remember every day. Most of the time he had been in a fog over his father’s murder. It seemed so long ago. “The night before I found the snake vine, it rained in the Ven, but by the time I got there, it had cleared off. No, no rain. I don’t remember it being cloudy since my father’s murder. At least, nothing more than a few high, thin clouds. What does that mean?”

“Well, it means I think there is a way to fool the cloud, even if I can’t unhook it. Since the sky has been clear all that time, that means Rahl probably has been responsible. He has moved the other clouds away so he could easily find this one. Simple, but effective.”