Chainfire: Chainfire Trilogy Part 1

The blue-eyed gaze that looked so much like Nicci's slid to Richard. The smile returned as she studied his features from only inches away.

"This young woman is such a dear friend and loyal protector. Has your dear friend and loyal protector told you what she has all planned out for you, Richard?" She touched his nose. "Such plans, they are, too. She has the rest of your life all thought out and arranged for you. You really should ask her sometime what she is plotting for you."

Cara's face suddenly went slack with understanding and then it went crimson.

Richard grasped Shota by the shoulders and eased her back, forcing her hand to slip off his shoulder. At the same time he renewed his efforts to regain control of himself.

"You've already said it-Cara is my friend. I do not fear what she may want for my life. You see, despite what friends and loved ones want for me, or hope I will achieve, it's my life and I decide what I will try to make of it. People can plan or hope all they want for those they care about, but in the end it is each individual who must take responsibility for their own life and make the choice for themselves."

Her wide smile showed her teeth. "How deliciously innocent you are to think such things." Her fingers combed back his hair. "I would strongly advise you to ask her what she is plotting to do with your heart."

Richard glanced to Cara. She looked at the same time on the verge of both exploding in rage and fleeing in panic. Instead of either she stood her ground and kept quiet. Richard didn't know what Shota was talking about, but he did know that this was not the time or place to find out. He couldn't allow Shota to lead him away from his purpose.

He also noticed that Cara had a white-knuckled fist around her Agiel.

"Shota, enough of this charade. Cara's wishes and intentions are my concern, not yours."

Nicci smiled sadly. "So you think, Richard. So you think."

The hazy air around the woman shimmered and Nicci was no longer Nicci, but Shota. She was no longer a dreamy phantasm, but a clear vision. Her hair, instead of blond, was just as thick but a wavy auburn. Her black dress had changed into a wispy, variegated gray, layered affair, cut just as low, with loose points that lifted ever so slightly in the breeze. She was every bit as beautiful as the valley around her.

As Shota turned her attention to Cara, her expression tightened dangerously. "You hurt Samuel."

"I'm sorry." Cara said with a shrug. "I didn't mean to hurt him." Shota arched an eyebrow over her threatening glare, as if to say she didn't believe a word of it.

"I meant to kill him," Cara said.

Shota's anger melted away. An incandescent smile accompanied a genuine, if brief, laugh. She regarded Richard with a sidelong glance, the smile still on her lips.

"I like her. You can keep her."

Richard recalled that Cara had once made that very same pronouncement to him about Kahlan.

"Shota, I told you, I have to talk to you."

Her bright, clear almond eyes took him in with a sense of wonder. "So you have come offering to be my lover?"

Richard noticed Samuel off through the trees, watching, his yellow eyes glowing with hatred.

"You know I haven't."

"Ah." Her smile returned. "What you mean to say, then, is that you have come because you want something from me." She caught one of the floating points of her dress. "Isn't that right, Richard?"

Richard had to remind himself to stop staring into her ageless eyes. But it was so hard to make himself glance away. It was as if Shota controlled where his gaze rested and he was having trouble keeping it resting in proper places.

Kahlan had told him once that Shota had been bewitching him. Kahlan said that Shota couldn't help it, it was just what witch women did. It came naturally to them.

Kahlan.

That thought of her again jolted his mind.

"Kahlan is missing."

Shota's brow wrinkled ever so slightly. "Who?"

Richard sighed. "Look, something terrible is going on. Kahlan, my wife.»

"Wife! Since when did you take a wife?"

Her expression curdled into a heated glare. By the sudden anger powering her features and the way her cleavage heaved at the brink of the low-cut dress, Richard knew that she was not feigning surprise. She truly didn't remember Kahlan.

Richard ran his own fingers back through his hair as he gathered his thoughts and started again.

"Shota, you've met Kahlan several times. You know her quite well. Something has happened to erase everyone's memory of her. No one remembers her, you included, and.»

"Except you?" she said with incredulity. "You alone remember her?"

"It's a long story."

"Length won't make it true."

"It is true," Richard insisted. He gestured heatedly. "You were at our wedding."

She folded her arms. "I don't think so."

"The first time I came here, you had captured Kahlan and had covered her in snakes.»

"Snakes." Shota smiled. "You're saying I liked this woman and are suggesting that I treated her indulgently?"

"Not exactly. You wanted her dead."