Wizard's First Rule - Terry Goodkind [138]
Demmin diverted his eyes to the ground. “Yes, Master Rahl.” He looked back up. “Please know that I only bring my concerns to you because I want success for you. You are rightfully the master of all the lands. We all need you to guide us. I wish only to be part of delivering you victory. I fear nothing but that I should fail you.”
Darken Rahl put his arm around Demmin’s big shoulders, looking up at the pockmarked face, the streak of black hair through the blond. “That I had more like you, my friend.” He took his arm away and picked up the bowl. “Go now and tell Queen Milena of our alliance. Don’t forget to summon the dragon.” His hint of a smile came back. “And don’t let your little diversions make you late in returning.”
Demmin bowed his head. “Thank you, Master Rahl, for the honor of serving you.”
The big man left through a back door as Rahl went out the one into the garden. The guards stayed in the small, hot, forge room.
Picking up the feeding horn, Rahl went over to the boy. The feeding horn was a long brass tube, small at the mouthpiece, large at the other end. The big end was held up to shoulder height by two legs, so the gruel would slide down. Rahl set it down so the mouthpiece was in front of Carl.
“What’s this thing?” Carl asked, squinting up at it. “A horn?”
“Yes, that’s right. Very good, Carl. It’s a feeding horn. It’s a part of the ceremony you will be in. The other young men who have helped the people in the past have thought it a most fun way to eat. You put your mouth over the end there, and I serve you by pouring the food in the top.”
Carl was skeptical. “Really?”
“Yes.” Rahl smiled reassuringly. “And guess what, I got you a fresh blueberry pie, still warm out of the oven.”
Carl’s eyes lit up. “Great!” He eagerly put his mouth over the end of the horn.
Rahl passed his hand in a circle over the bowl three times to change the taste, then looked down at Carl. “I had to mash it up so it will go through the feeding horn, I hope that’s all right.”
“I always mash it up with my fork,” Carl said with a grin, then put his mouth back over the horn.
Rahl poured a little gruel into the end of the horn. When it reached Carl’s mouth, he ate it eagerly.
“It’s great! The best I ever had!”
“I’m so pleased,” Rahl said with a shy smile. “It’s my own recipe. I feared it wouldn’t be as good as your mother’s.”
“It’s better. Can I have more?”
“Of course, my son. With Father Rahl, there is always more.”
CHAPTER 21
Wearily, Richard searched the ground where the trail resumed at the end of the slide, his hopes fading. Dark clouds scudded low overhead, occasionally bringing a few fat drops of cold rain to splatter on the back of his head as he hunted. It had occurred to him that maybe Kahlan had made it through the Narrows, that she had only become separated from him, and had continued on. She was wearing the bone Adie had given her, and it should have kept her safe. She should have been able to make it through. But he was wearing the tooth, and Adie had said he couldn’t be seen either, yet the shadows had come for them anyway. It seemed odd; the shadows hadn’t moved until it was dark, at the split rock. Why didn’t they come for them before?
There were no tracks. Nothing had been through the Narrows for a long time. Fatigue and despair enveloped him again as fits of icy wind flapped his forest cloak around him, seeming to urge him on, away from the Narrows. All hope gone, he turned once more to the path, toward the Midlands.
He had taken only a few steps when a thought brought him to a sudden halt.
If Kahlan had become separated from him, if she thought the underworld had taken him, if she had thought she had lost him and was alone, would she have continued on, to the Midlands? Alone?