Confessor: Chainfire Trilogy Part 3

Something caught Richard's attention. He looked up and could not believe who he thought he saw standing in the darkness behind where the Sister had been only a moment before.

"Adie?"

The old woman smiled.

"Adie-am I ever glad to see you," Richard said as he scrambled to his feet.

"True," she said, nodding.

"What are you doing here?"

"I be headed out to go to the Keep when I saw the strangest Ja'La game with players all painted with very, very dangerous things. That be when I knew it could only be you. Since then, I tried to reach you. It be a bit of trouble."

He could only imagine.

Richard didn't take the time to consider the whole thing or question the old sorceress. He ran to where Nicci lay on the ground convulsing in pain. Her eyes stared up at him in terror, as if pleading for help. She was lost in a world of agony. It was the collar, he knew, that was inflicting the torture. He didn't know what to do.

"Can you help her?" Richard asked over his shoulder.

Adie knelt next to him. She shook her head. "It be the Rada'Han. That not be something I can get off."

"Do you have any idea who can?"

"Nathan, maybe."

"Lord Rahl, we need to hurry," an approaching voice said. "These men are waking up."

Richard frowned up at the man appearing out of the darkness, sword in hand. It was Benjamin Meiffert. He was dressed like one of Jagang's more trusted guards.

"General, what in the world are you doing here?" The recent supply convoy came to Richard's mind. "You're supposed to be down in the Old World laying waste to the Order's ability to keep this army alive."

He was nodding. "I know. I needed to come back to give you a report. We've run into a problem. A big problem."

Richard knew the man well enough to know that the trouble would have to be more than merely serious for him to abandon his mission to return to report to Richard what was going wrong. This was hardly the place to discuss it, though.

"I wasn't sure where I could find you," the general said, "but I figured that the last time I saw you it was near here, so I thought this would be my best bet. I reasoned that if you weren't here, they at least might know where you were. I've been trying to figure out a way to get up into the palace.

"A little while ago Adie and I came across each other. She told me that you were down here in the middle of this mess. I wasn't sure I believed her-believed it was possible. Turns out she was right."

Richard didn't take the time to ask how he'd managed to come up with the uniform of one of Jagang's guards. That uniform was obviously how he had been able to move around in the camp without getting himself captured or killed.

"How did you get down here?" the general asked Adie. "Maybe we can get back in the palace that way."

Adie was shaking her head. "I came down the road. It be dark and I be alone. I used my ability to help hide my presence as I reached the army guarding at the bottom of the road.

"We cannot go back that way. There be too many guards. They have gifted there with webs in place to detect those who try to slip through. Those shields not be powerful, but they be enough to snare us."

"But with your power-"

"No," she said cutting off the general. "My power be weak in the palace. Even near the plateau it still not be as it should. All those with the gift be weaker there, but they use their ability together to make it stronger. I have no other gifted to help me. I could help hide myself from them when I came through, but I not be strong enough to help all of us, especially not with the burden of Nicci in such grave condition. If we try to go back that way, we will die."

"The great inner doors are closed," the man said, thinking out loud as he considered. "They're heavily guarded as well. Even if we could get through we certainly couldn't get those doors opened."

"Nicci said she knew a way to get up into the palace," Richard told them. "She told me that we have to get to the ramp. I don't know what she was talking about, but we need to find a fast way out of this camp before we get caught. I don't think Nicci has much time, either."

Adie, leaning close, touched her slender fingers to Nicci's forehead. "True."

Richard scooped Nicci up in his arms. "Let's go."

General Meiffert stepped forward. "I can carry her, Lord Rahl."

"I've got her." Richard tilted his head. "Get Jillian."

The man hurriedly lifted the groggy girl.

"What I don't understand," Adie said as she smoothed a hand across Nicci's brow, trying to give her some comfort, "is how she was captured in the first place. She be up in the palace, the last we all saw her."

Richard felt the weight of responsibility. "Knowing Nicci, she was probably trying to find me."

"Ann be missing as well," Adie said as she touched the first two fingers of her right hand to the underside of Nicci's chin.

"I haven't seen Ann," Richard said.