Confessor: Chainfire Trilogy Part 3

Her voice was weak but, despite that, it still carried the same silken grace as before. It was a voice that matched the rest of her perfectly. Kahlan would never have guessed that such a lovely voice could also carry such righteous contempt as she'd shown Jagang.

"Nothing any of us can do," Nicci whispered as her eyelids slid closed. "Except maybe Richard."

Kahlan studied the woman's blue eyes a moment. "You really think that Richard Rahl can do something?'

Nicci smiled to herself. "Sorry. I didn't realize that I'd said the last part aloud. Where's Jagang?"

Kahlan checked and saw that the wound under the cloth she had pressed to Nicci's head had at last stopped the bleeding.

"You didn't hear him when he left?" she asked as she set the blood-soaked cloth aside?

Nicci rocked her head side to side to say that she hadn't. Kahlan lifted the waterskin in question. Nicci nodded. She winced as she swallowed, but she drank.

"Well," Kahlan said when Nicci finished drinking, "someone called out for him. He went to the doorway and a man spoke to him in a low voice. I couldn't hear all of it, but it sounded like he said that they'd found something. Jagang came back and put on his clothes. As fast as he got dressed, he was obviously in a hurry to have a look at the discovery. He told me to stay where I was.

"Then he put one knee on the bed, leaned over you, and whispered to you that he was sorry."

Nicci huffed a laugh, but it was cut short when she winced in pain. "He isn't capable of feeling sorry for anyone but himself."

"You'll get no argument from me," Kahlan said. "Anyway, he promised to bring back a Sister to heal you. He ran a hand down your face and again said that he was sorry. Then he paused, looking down at you with a worried look. He leaned a little closer to you and said, 'Please don't die, Nicci.' After that he rushed away, telling me again to stay on the floor.

"I don't know how long he will be gone, but I suspect that a Sister, at least, will be in at any moment."

Nicci nodded, not seeming to really care if she was healed or not. Kahlan could understand, in a way, how Nicci would rather slip into the dark forever of death than face what would be her life from now on.

"I'm terribly sorry that you've been caught up by him, but you don't know how good it is to have another person be able to see me-someone who isn't with them."

"I can only imagine," Nicci said.

"Jillian said that she's seen you before. With Richard Rahl. She told me a little about you. You're as beautiful as she said you were."

"My mother used to tell me that being beautiful was only useful to whores. Perhaps she was right."

"Perhaps she was jealous of you. Or just a fool."

Nicci smiled so broadly that it looked like she might laugh. "It was the latter. She hated life."

Kahlan's gaze drifted away from Nicci as she picked at a loose thread on the bedcover.

"So you know Richard Rahl pretty well, then?"

"Pretty well," Nicci said.

"Are you in love with him?"

Nicci looked over, gazing into Kahlan's eyes for a long moment. "It's more complicated than that. I have responsibilities."

Kahlan smiled a little. "I see." She was glad that Nicci hadn't tried to lie by denying it.

"You have a beautiful voice, Kahlan Amnell," Nicci whispered as she stared at Kahlan. "You really do."

"Thank you, but it doesn't seem beautiful to me. Sometimes I think I sound like a frog."

Nicci smiled. "Hardly."

Kahlan frowned. "You know me, then?"

"Not really."

"But you know my name. Do you know anything about me? About my past? Who I really am?"

Nicci's blue eyes watched her in a most curious fashion. "Just what I've heard."

"And what have you heard?"

"That you are the Mother Confessor."

Kahlan hooked some hair behind her ear. "I heard that myself."

She checked the doorway again and, seeing the hanging still in place and hearing no voices close, turned back to Nicci. "I'm afraid that I don't know what it means. I don't know very much at all about myself. As I'm sure you can probably imagine, it's pretty frustrating. Sometimes, I get so dispirited by not being able to remember anything . . ."

Kahlan's voice trailed off as Nicci's eyes closed against a pang of agony. She was having trouble breathing.

Kahlan laid a hand on the woman's shoulder. "Hold on, Nicci. Please hold on. A Sister will be in to heal you any moment. I've been hurt by them before-hurt terribly-and they healed me, so I know they can do it. You'll be all right after they get in here."

Nicci nodded slightly, but she didn't open her eyes. Kahlan wished that one of the Sisters would hurry. In the absence of anything she could do, Kahlan gave Nicci another drink, then wet the piece of cloth again and gently mopped her brow.