Blood of the Fold

Richard cautiously reached toward the light. It brightened. He touched a finger to it, and the bluish green cast changed to a warmer yellow color.

Since touching it seemed to cause no harm, Richard carefully lifted it from the bracket. It was heavier than he expected. Rather than being a hollow sphere of blown glass, it seemed to be solid. In his hand, it threw off a warm, useful light.

Richard could see that far off down the tunnel-like hall there were other such spheres in brackets. In the distance, the closest barely glowed with bluish green light. As they passed tnem, each brighleneo at his approach, and dimmed as he moved on with the one he had taken.

At an intersection, the hall joined a wider, more welcoming corridor. Light pink stone ran in a band down both sides, and at places the passageway opened into cavernous rooms with padded benches.

Opening the wide, double doorways in one of the corridor's big rooms, he discovered a library. The library looked cozy and inviting with its polished wood floor, paneled walls, and whitewashed ceiling. There were tables beside the rows of shelves, and comfortable-looking chairs. Glassed windows at the far side overlooked the city of Aydindril and made the room bright and airy.

He moved on to the next cavernous chamber in the hall, and discovered that it, too, had a library off of it. It appeared that the corridor ran parallel to the the face of the Keep, and along a whole row of libraries. They found another two dozen of the huge library rooms by the time they reached the end of the corridor.

Richard had never imagined that this many books existed. Even the vaults at the Palace of the Prophets, with all the books it held, seemed sparse to him after seeing this many volumes. It would take a year just to read all the titles. He felt suddenly overwhelmed. Where was he to start?

"This must be what you were looking for," she said.

Richard frowned. "No, it's not. I don't know why, but this isn't it. This is too ordinary,"

Berdine walked beside him as they moved on through passageways and down several stories when they came to a stairwell, her Agiel swinging on the chain at her wrist, and ever at the ready. At the bottom of the stairs stood an ornate, gold-leafed doorframe before a chamber beyond that, rather than stonework, had been excavated from inky rock, perhaps once a cave that had been enlarged. In places where the rock had been broken away, it left behind glossy, sharp facets. Fat columns looked to have been left in places as the rock had been carved out in order to support a low, craggy ceiling.

At the gold doorway Richard encountered a shield for the fourth time since he had entered the Keep, but this was different than the first three. The fast three all had the same feel; this was nothing like the others. As he put his hand through, the vertical plane between the doorframe glowed red from no visible source, and the sensation, instead of the tingling, was hot where the red light touched him. It was the most uncomfortable shield he had ever felt. He feared it might singe the hair off his arm, but it didn't.

Richard pulled his arm back. "This one is different. If it's more than you want to do, you stop me." He put his arms around Berdine to better protect her. She tensed. "Don't worry, I'll stop if you want me to."

She nodded, and he shuffled into the doorway. When the red light touched the red leather on her arm, she flinched. "It's all right," she said. "Keep going." He pulled her through, and released her. Only after he took his arms from around her did she seem to relax.

The glow of the sphere Richard held out cast sharp shadows among the columns, and he could see that there were small recesses carved in the stone all around the room. At the wall around the edge of the room, there were perhaps sixty or seventy such niches. Though he couldn't make out what was in them, he could tell that each held objects of different sizes and shapes.

Richard felt the hairs on the back of his neck stiffen as his gaze swept over the nooks from a distance. He didn't know what the things were, but he instinctively knew that they were more than dangerous.

"Stay close to me," he told her. "We want to stay away from the walls." He pointed with his chin across the vast room, "Over there. That passageway is where we want to go."

"How do you know?"

"Look at the floor," The rough, natural stone was worn smooth in a winding track cutting across the center of the chamber. "We'd better stay on this path."

Her blue eyes glanced up in unease. "You be careful. If anything happens to you I'll never get out of this place to get help from the others. I'll be trapped down here."

Richard smiled and then started out across the dead silent cavern. "Well, that's the risk you take for being my favorite."

Her unease didn't diminish at his attempt to lighten the mood. "Lord Rahl, do you really think that I believe I am your favorite."