Chainfire: Chainfire Trilogy Part 1

He stepped over to the window again as he went about washing with a soapy cloth. The night was dead quiet but for the ceaseless drone of the cicadas. He couldn't resist staring at the statue. There was so much of Kahlan in it that it made him heartsick. He had to force himself not to think about what horrors she might be facing, what pain she might be enduring. Anxiety constricted his breathing. In an effort to set his worry aside for a while, he did his best to recall Kahlan's smile, her green eyes, her arms around him, the soft moan she sometimes made as she kissed him.

He had to find her.

He dipped the cloth in the water and wrung it out, watching dirty water run back into the basin, and saw that his hands were trembling.

He had to find her.

In another attempt to force his mind onto other things, he rested his gaze on the washbasin, deliberately taking in the vines painted all around the edge. The vines were blue, not green, probably so as to match the blue flowers stenciled on the walls and the blue flowers on the simple curtains and the decorative cover on the bed. Ishaq had done an admirable job of building a warm and inviting inn.

The water in the basin, still as a woodland pool, suddenly trembled for no apparent reason.

Richard stood stock-still, staring at it.

The slack surface abruptly bunched into perfectly symmetrical harmonic waves, almost like the hair on a cat's back standing on end.

And then the whole building shuddered with a hard thump, as if struck with something huge. One of the panes of glass in the window cracked with a bridle pop. Almost instantly, from the far end of the building, came the sound of splintering wood.

Richard crouched, frozen, eyes wide, unable to tell what had caused the incomprehensible sound.

His first thought was that a big tree had fallen on the place, but then he remembered that there were no large trees anywhere nearby.

A heartbeat after the first jolt, came a second thump-louder this time. Closer. The building swayed under the crash of splintering wood. He glanced up, fearing that the ceiling might collapse.

Half a heartbeat later came another thump that shook the building. Shattering, splintering wood let out a high-pitched screech as if crying out in agony as it was being ripped apart.

THUMP. Crash. Louder, closer.

Richard touched the fingers of one hand to the floor to keep his balance as the building quaked under the jolt of the heavy impact. What had Marled at the far end of the building was rapidly coming closer.

THUMP, CRASH. Closer yet.

Splintering shrieks howled through the night air as wood was rent violently apart. The building swayed. Water sloshed in the basin, slopping over the rolled metal edge with the painted blue vines. The sounds of ripping walls and splintering boards melted together into one continuous roar.

Suddenly, the wall to his left, the wall between his and Cara's room, exploded toward him. Clouds of dust billowed up. The noise was deafening.

Something huge and black, nearly the size of the room itself, drove through the wall, splintering lath, sending plaster and debris showering through the air.

The force of the concussion blew the door off its hinges and violently blasted the glass and the mullions out of the window.

Long ragged fragments of boards spun through the room. One smashed the chair that held his sword, another piercing the far wall. His sword tumbled out of reach. One piece whacked Richard's leg hard enough to drop him to one knee.

Animate darkness drove debris before it, sending everything flying, enveloping the light and plunging the flying wreckage into a surreal, swirling gloom.

Icy fright shimmered through Richard's veins.

He saw a cold cloud of his breath as he grunted with the effort of scrambling to his feet.

Darkness, like death itself, plunged toward him. Richard gasped a breath. Frigid air stabbed like icy needles into his lungs. Shock at the pain of the cutting cold clenched his throat shut.

Richard knew that life and death balanced on a razor's edge only an instant wide.

With every ounce of his strength driving him, he dove through the window as if he were diving into a swimming hole. The side of his body brushed past the descending inky darkness. His flesh sizzled with a sharp sensation so cold that it burned.

In midair, plummeting through the window out into the night, fearing the long drop, Richard snatched for the window's frame and only just managed to seize it with his left hand. He held on for dear life. His falling weight whipped him around so hard that his body slammed into the side of the building with enough force to knock the wind from him. He hung by his one hand, dazed by the wallop against the outside wall, trying to gasp in a breath.