“You’re making clay roofing tiles, aren’t you?” Kahlan had asked him.

“Yes,” he had said with a smile.

“Richard, I have seen thatched roofs that do not leak.”

“So have I.”

“Then why not simply make their grass roofs over properly, so they don’t leak?”

“Do you know how to thatch roofs?”

“No.”

“Neither do I. But I know how to make tile roofs, so that’s what I have to do.”

While he was building the fireplace, and showing Savidlin how to do it, he had other men strip the grass off the roof, leaving a skeleton of poles that ran the length of the building, poles that had been used to tie down each course of grass. Now they would be used to secure the clay tiles.

The tiles spanned from one row of poles to the next, the bottom edge laid on the first pole, the top edge laid on the second, with the holes in the tiles used to lash them tight to the poles. The second course of tiles was laid so its bottom edge overlapped the top of the first, covering the holes that tied the tiles down, and owing to their wavelike form, each interlocked with the one before. Because the clay tiles were heavier than the grass, Richard had first reinforced the poles from underneath with supports running up the pitch of the roof, with cross members bracing them.

It seemed as if half the village was engaged in the construction. The Bird Man came by from time to time to watch the work, pleased with what he saw. Sometimes he sat with Kahlan, saying nothing, sometimes he talked with her, but mostly he just watched. Occasionally he slipped in a question about Richard’s character.

Most of the time while Richard was working, Kahlan was alone. The women weren’t interested in her offers of help—the men kept their distance, watching her out of the corners of their eyes—and the young girls were too shy to actually bring themselves to talk to her. Sometimes she found them standing, staring at her. When she would ask their names, they would only give their shy smiles, and run away. The little children wanted to approach, but their mothers kept them well clear. She wasn’t allowed to help with the cooking, or the making of the tiles. Her approaches were politely turned down with the excuse that she was an honored guest.

She knew better. She was a Confessor. They were afraid of her.

Kahlan was used to the attitude, the looks, the whispers. It no longer bothered her, as it had when she was younger. She remembered her mother smiling at her, telling her it was just the way people were, and it could not be changed, that she must not let it bring her to bitterness—and that she would come to be above it someday. She had thought she was beyond caring, that it didn’t matter to her, that she had accepted who she was, the way life was, that she could have none of what other people had, and that it was all right. That was before she met Richard: before he became her friend, accepted her, talked to her, treated her like a normal person. Cared about her.

But then, Richard didn’t know what she was.

Savidlin, at least, had been friendly to her. He had taken her and Richard into his small home with him, his wife, Weselan, and their young boy, Siddin, and had given them a place to sleep on the floor. Even if it was because Savidlin had insisted, Weselan had accepted Kahlan into her home with gracious hospitality, and did not show coldness when she had the chance, unseen by her husband, to do so. At night, after it was too dark to work, Siddin would sit wide-eyed on the floor with Kahlan as she told him stories of kings and castles, of far-off lands, and of fierce beasts. He would crawl into her lap and beg for more stories, and give her hugs. It brought tears to her eyes now to think of how Weselan let him do that, without pulling him away, how she had the kindness not to show her fear. When Siddin went to sleep, she and Richard would tell Savidlin and Weselan some of the stories of their journey from Westland. Savidlin was one who respected success in struggle, and listened with eyes almost as wide as his son’s had been.

The Bird Man had seemed pleased with the new roof. Shaking his head slowly, he had smiled to himself when he had seen enough to figure out how it would work. But the other six elders were less impressed. To them, a little rain dripping in once in a while seemed hardly enough to become concerned about—it had done so their whole life and they were resentful of an outsider coming in and showing them how stupid they had been. Someday, when one of the elders died, Savidlin would become one of the six. Kahlan wished he were one now, for they could use such a strong ally among the elders.

Kahlan worried about what would happen when the roof was finished, about what would happen if the elders refused to ask to have Richard named one of the Mud People. Richard had not given her his promise that he wouldn’t hurt them. Even though he was not the kind of person to do something like that, he was the Seeker. More was at stake than the lives of a few of these people. Much more. The Seeker had to take that into account. She had to take that into account.

Kahlan didn’t know if killing the last man of the quad had changed him, made him harder. Learning to kill made you weigh matters differently—made it easier to kill again. That was something she knew all too well.

Kahlan wished so much he had not come to her aid when he had—wished he had not killed that man. She didn’t have the heart to tell him it was unnecessary. She could have handled it herself. After all, one man alone was hardly a mortal danger to her. That was why Rahl always sent four men after Confessors: one to be touched by her power, the other three to kill him and the Confessor. Sometimes only one was left, but that was enough after a Confessor had spent her power. But one alone? He had almost no chance. Even if he was big, she was faster. When he swung his sword, she would have simply jumped out of the way. Before he could have brought it up again, she would have touched him, and he would have been hers. That would have been the end of him.

Kahlan knew there was no way she could ever tell Richard that there had been no need for him to kill. What made it doubly bad was that he had killed for her, had thought he was saving her.

Kahlan knew another quad was probably already on its way. They were relentless. The man Richard had killed knew he was going to die, knew he didn’t stand a chance, alone, against a Confessor, but he came anyway. They would not stop, did not know the meaning of it, never thought of anything but their objective.

And, they enjoyed what they did to Confessors.

Even though she tried not to, she couldn’t help remembering Dennee. Whenever she thought of the quads, she couldn’t help remembering what they had done to Dennee.

Before Kahlan had became a woman, her mother had been stricken with a terrible sickness, one no healer was able to turn back. She had died all too quickly of the awful wasting disease. Confessors were a close sisterhood—when trouble struck one, it struck all. Dennee’s mother took in Kahlan and comforted her. The two girls, best friends, had been thrilled that they were to be sisters, as they called themselves from then on, and it helped ease the pain of losing her mother.

Dennee was a frail girl, as frail as her mother. She did not have the strength of power that Kahlan did, and over time, Kahlan became her protector, guardian, shielding her from situations that required more force than she could bring from within. After its use, Kahlan could recover the strength of her power in an hour or two, but for Dennee, it sometimes took several days.

On one fateful day, Kahlan had been away for a short time, taking a confession from a murderer who was to be hanged, a mission that was to have been Dennee’s. Kahlan had gone in her sister’s place because she wanted to spare Dennee the torment of the task. Dennee hated taking confessions, hated seeing the look in their eyes. Sometimes she would cry for days after. She never asked Kahlan to go in her stead, she wouldn’t, but the look of relief on her face when Kahlan told her she would do it was words enough. Kahlan, too, disliked taking confessions, but she was stronger, wiser, more reflective. She understood, and accepted, that being a Confessor was her power—it was who she was, and so it didn’t hurt her the way it did Dennee. Kahlan had always been able to place her head before her heart. And she would have done any dirty job in Dennee’s place.