Wizard's First Rule - Terry Goodkind [377]
Chase stared in shock. “You told me her power can’t touch him, can’t take him.”
“It couldn’t before. I don’t know if it can now, but I doubt it. Nonetheless, she is going to try. She is in the grip of the Con Dar, the Blood Rage. She doesn’t care if she dies. She is going to try, she is going to touch Darken Rahl even if it’s futile, even if it kills her. If anyone gets in her way, she will kill them. Without a second thought.” He put his face closer to Chase to make his point. “That includes us.”
Kahlan was curled almost into a ball against the ground, her head bowed, her hands on opposite shoulders, the pale blue light tight around her. She stretched slowly to her feet, pushing through the light, as if she were emerging from an egg. She stood naked, blood still throbbing from her wounds. Blood, still wet and fresh, dripped from her chin.
But her face showed the pain of wounds other than the ones on her body. And then even that expression was gone, and she showed nothing but a Confessor’s face.
Kahlan turned a little, to one of the two men who had held her. The other one was nowhere to be seen. She calmly lifted a hand toward him. He was a dozen feet away.
There was an impact to the air, thunder with no sound. Zedd felt the pain in his bones.
“Mistress!” the man called out as he fell to his knees. “What do you command of me? What do you wish of me?”
She regarded him coolly. “I wish for you to die for me. Right now.”
He convulsed and fell over, face first, into the dirt, dead. Kahlan turned and stepped to Demmin Nass. He had a smile on his face; his arms were folded. Kahlan’s broken arm hung at her side. She put her other hand against his chest with a sharp slap. The hand stayed there as their eyes locked together. He towered over her.
“Very impressive, bitch. But not only have you used your power, I am also protected by Master Rahl’s spell. You cannot touch me with your power. You still have a lesson to learn, and I’m going to teach you as I have never taught anyone before.” His hand came up and grabbed her tangled, matted hair. “Bend over.”
Kahlan’s face showed no emotion. She said nothing.
There was an impact to the air, thunder with no sound. Again, Zedd felt the ache of it in his bones. Demmin Nass’s eyes went wide. His mouth fell open.
“Mistress!” he whispered.
Chase leaned over. “How did she do that! She wasn’t even touching the first one, and Confessors can only use their power once, and then must rest and recover it!”
“Not anymore. She is in the Con Dar.”
“Stand there and wait,” she said to Nass.
With graceful smoothness, Kahlan walked to the wizard. She stopped, and lifted her broken arm to him.
Her eyes had a glaze to them. “Fix this for me, please. I need it.”
Zedd took his eyes from hers and looked down at the arm. He reached out and took it gently, speaking softly to distract her mind from the pain while he gripped above and below the break, pulling, setting the bone. She didn’t cry out, or even flinch. He wondered if she even felt it. Tenderly, his fingers surrounded the damage, letting the warmth of the magic flow into her, taking the cold pain into himself, feeling it, suffering with it, tolerating it with resolve.
His breathing stopped momentarily with the sharpness of the hurt. He felt all of her hurt; it mixed with his own pain, threatening to overwhelm him, until he was able to put it down at last. He felt the bone knit together, and added more magic to protect and strengthen it until it could heal the rest of the way on its own. He removed his hands from her at last, finished. Her green eyes came up to his, and the cold anger in them was frightening.
“Thank you,” she said softly. “Wait here.”
She returned to Demmin Nass, who stood where he had been told to wait.
There were tears in his eyes. “Please, Mistress, command me.”
Kahlan pulled a knife from his belt, ignoring his request. With her other hand, she unfastened the flanged