Confused, Margaret realized she was laying on the ground, looking up at the stars, pretty stars: the Creator's stars. She couldn't draw a breath. Simply, couldn't.
She thought it odd; she didn't remember the air hitting her. Only her breath being ripped violently from her lungs. She felt cold, but there was something warm against her face. Warm and wet. It was a comfort.
Her legs didn't seem to work. Try as she might, she couldn't make them move. With the greatest of effort, she managed to lift her head a bit. The Sisters hadn't moved, but somehow, they were farther away now. They all watched her. Margaret looked down at herself.
Something was terribly wrong.
Below her ribs, there was mostly nothing there. Just the shredded, wet, remains of her insides, and then nothing. Where the rest of her should have been, there was nothing. Where had her legs gone? They must be somewhere. They had to be somewhere.
There they were. They lay a little distance away, where she had been standing.
So. That was why she couldn't take a breath. Air shouldn't have been able to do that. It was impossible. At least air wielded by a Sister shouldn't have been able to do that. It was a wonder.
Dear Creator, why have you not helped me? I was doing your work. Why have you let this be done.
It should hurt, shouldn't it? Shouldn't it hurt to be ripped in half? But it didn't. It didn't hurt the least little bit.
Cold. She felt only cold. But the warm rope of her guts laying against her face felt good. Warm. She took comfort in the warmth.
Maybe it didn't hurt because the Creator was helping her. That must be it. The Creator had taken her pain. Dear Creator, thank you. I did my best. I am sorry I failed you. Send another.
Boots were near: Jedidiah. Husband Jedidiah; bastard Jedidiah.
"I tried to warn you, Margaret. I tried to keep you away. You can't say I didn't try."
Her arms lay sprawled out to her sides. In her right hand she could feel the little gold flower. She hadn't let go of it. Even as she was torn in half, she never let go. She tried to now, but she couldn't make her hand open. She wished she had the strength to open her hand. She didn't want to die with that in her hand. But she just couldn't open her fingers.
Dear Creator, I have failed in this, too.
Since she couldn't release it, she did the only other thing she could think of. She sent the rest of her power into it. Maybe someone would see, and ask the right question.
Tired. She was so very tired.
She tried to close her eyes, but they wouldn't close. How could a person die, if they couldn't close their eyes?
There were a lot of stars. Pretty stars. There seemed to be fewer than she remembered. Hardly any at all. She thought her mother had told her once how many there were. But she couldn't remember.
Well, she would just have to count them.
One... Two...
21
"How long?" Chase asked.
The seven fierce looking men that were squatted down in a half circle before her and Chase just stared at him and blinked. None of the seven had any weapons except belt knives, and one didn't even have that. But there were a lot of other men standing behind them, and they all had bows or spears, or both.
Rachel tugged her thick, brown, woolen cloak tighter around herself and shifted her weight as she squatted, wiggling her toes, wishing her feet weren't so cold. They were starting to tingle. She stroked her fingers over the big, amber stone hanging on the chain from her neck. Its smooth, teardrop shape felt warm against her fingers.
Chase mumbled something Rachel couldn't understand as he pushed his heavy black cloak back over his shoulders and then pointed with a stick at the two people drawn in the dirt. All the leather belts for his weapons creaked as he leaned forward on boots big enough for any of the other men to fit both of their feet into just one. He tapped his stick on the ground again, then turned and pushed his hand out toward the grassland.
"How long?" He pointed at the drawing and pushed his hand out a few more times. "How long since they left?"
They chattered something Chase and she couldn't understand, and then the man with long silver hair falling down around his sun brown face, the one who didn't have a coyote hide around his shoulders but wore only simple buckskin clothes, drew another picture in the dirt. She could tell what it was easy this time. It was the sun. He made marks under it. Chase watched as the man drew three rows of marks under the picture of the sun. He stopped.
Chase stared at the picture. "Three weeks." He looked up at the man with the long hair. "Three weeks?" He pointed at the sun on the ground and held up most of his fingers three times. "They've been gone three weeks?"
The man gave a nod and made some more of those funny words.
Siddin handed her another piece of flat bread with honey. It tasted wonderful. She tried to eat it slowly, but it was gone before she knew it. She had tasted honey only once before, back at the castle when she lived there as the Princess's playmate. The Princess never let her have honey, said it wasn't for the likes of her, but one of the cooks had given her some once.
Her stomach fluttered at the memory of how mean the Princess had been to her. She never wanted to live in a castle again. Now that she was Chase's daughter, she would never have to. Every night she lay in her blankets, before she went to sleep, and wondered what the rest of her new family was like.
Chase said she would have sisters and brothers. And a real mother. He said she would have to mind her new mother. She could do that. It was easy to mind when someone loved you.
Chase loved her. He never really said it, but it was easy to tell. He put his huge arm around her, and stroked her hair, when she was afraid of sounds in the dark.
Siddin smiled at her as he licked the honey off his fingers. It was nice to see him again. When they had first came here she thought there was going to be trouble. Scary men, all painted with mud, and with grass stuck all over themselves, came up to them when they were still out on the grassland. She didn't even see where they came from. They were just there all of a sudden.
Rachel was afraid at first, becau
se the men pointed arrows at them, and their voices sounded scary and she couldn't understand what they said, but Chase just got off the horse and held her in his arms while he watched them. He didn't even draw his sword or anything. She didn't think anything scared him. He was the bravest man she ever saw. The men had looked at her as she stared at them, and Chase stroked her hair and told her not to be afraid. The men stopped pointing the arrows at them, and led them to the village.
When they got here, she saw Siddin. Siddin knew her and Chase, from before when Kahlan had saved him from Queen Milena back in the castle. Zedd, Kahlan, Chase, Siddin and she had all been together when they were running with the box. She couldn't speak Siddin's language, but he knew them, and told his father who they were. After that, everyone was real nice to them.
Chase pointed with one finger to one of the pictures of a person, the finger of his other hand to the other picture, and then held the fingers together and pointed away, moving his hands like they were going over hills. "Richard and Kahlan left three weeks ago, and they went north? To Aydindril?"
The men all shook their heads and started jabbering again. Siddin's father held up his hand for quiet. He pointed at himself and the other men and held up three fingers, then he pointed at the picture on the ground that had a dress and said Kahlan's name, and then he pointed north.
Chase pointed at the picture of the sun, then the picture of Kahlan, then at the men, holding up three fingers, then north. "Three weeks ago, Kahlan and three of your men went north, to Aydindril?"
The men all nodded and said "Kahlan" and "Aydindril".
Chase put a knee to the ground as he leaned forward, tapping the picture of the other person. "But Richard went, too." He pointed north again. "Richard went to Aydindril too. With Kahlan."
The men all turned to the man with the long silver hair. He looked at Chase and then shook his head. The carved piece of bone hanging from a leather thong around his neck swung back and forth. He pointed down at the picture of the man with a sword, and then pointed in a different direction.