Faith of the Fallen

Richard started after one of them, but Nicci suddenly flew at him, restraining him.

"Richard! No!"

In his rage to get at the men, Richard nearly smashed her face, but, when he realized it was her, lowered his fists to his sides as he glared at the crowd.

"Please, my lord, please, my lady;" one of the women wailed, "have mercy on us woeful folk. We's just the Creator's miserable wretches. Have mercy on us."

"You're a bunch of thieves!" Richard yelled. "Thieving from someone who was trying to help you!"

He made an effort to go after the lot of them, but Nicci held his wrists down. "Richard, no!"

The people vanished like mice before a hissing cat.

Nicci let Richard's fists drop. He saw then that she had blood on her mouth.

"What's the matter with you? Giving money to people who would rather rob you than wait for you to hand it to them willingly? Why would you give money to such vermin?"

"That's enough. I'll not stand here and listen to you insult the Creator's children. Who are you to judge? Who are you, with a full belly, to say what's right? You have no idea what those poor people have been through, and yet you are quick to judge."

Richard took a purging breath. He reminded himself yet again of what he had to keep uppermost in his mind. It was not really Nicci he had been protecting.

He pulled a shirtsleeve from the corner of his pack, wet it with water from a waterskin hanging around his waist, and carefully wiped her bloody mouth and chin. She winced as he worked but without protest let him inspect her injury.

"It's not bad," he told her. "Just a cut in the corner of your mouth.

Hold still, now."

She stood quietly as he held her head in one hand while he cleaned the blood off the rest of her face with the other.

"Thank you, Richard." She hesitated. "I was sure one of them was going to cut my throat."

"Why didn't you use your Han to protect yourself?"

"Have you forgotten? To do that, I would have to take power from the link keeping Kahlan alive."

He looked into her blue eyes. "I guess I forgot. In that case, thank you for restraining yourself."

Nicci said nothing as they walked out of the town of Ripply, carrying everything they owned on their backs. As cold as the day was, it wasn't long before his brow was dotted with sweat.

Finally he could stand it no longer. "Do you mind telling me what that was all about?"

Her brow twitched. "Those people were needy."

Richard pinched the bridge of his nose, pausing in an effort to remain civil to her. "And so you gave them all our money?"

"Are you so selfish that you would not share what you have? Are you so selfish that you would ask the hungry to starve, the unclothed to freeze, the sick to die? Does money mean more to you than people's lives?"

Richard bit the inside of his cheek to check his temper. "And the horses? You virtually gave them away."

"It was all we could get. Those people were in need. Under the circumstances, it was the best we could do. We acted with the most noble of intentions. It was our duty to not be selfish and to joyfully give these people what they needed."

There was no road going their way as they walked on into what had not long ago been the wasteland from which no one returned. - "We needed what we had," he said.

Nicci glanced up into his eyes. "There are things you need to learn, Richard."

"Is that right."

"You have been lucky in life. You have had opportunities ordinary people never have. I want you to see how ordinary people must live, how they must struggle just to survive. When you live like them, you will understand why the Order is so necessary, why the Order is the only hope for mankind.

"When we get to where we're going, we will have nothing. We will be just like all the other miserable people of this wretched world-with little chance to make it on our own. You don't have any idea what that's like. I want you to learn how the compassion of the Order helps ordinary people live with the dignity they are entitled to."

Richard returned his gaze to the empty land stretching out before them.

A Sister of the Dark who couldn't use her power, and a wizard who was forbidden from using his. He guessed they couldn't get any more ordinary than that. "I thought it was you who wanted to learn," he said. "I am also your teacher. Teachers sometimes learn more than their students."

CHAPTER 31

Zedd lifted his head when he heard the distant horns. He struggled to regain his senses. He was well past dread, into a world of little more than numb awareness. The horns were those meant to signal the approach of friendly forces. Probably some of the scouting patrols, or perhaps yet more wounded being brought in.

Zedd realized he was slumped on the ground, his legs sprawled out to the side. He saw that he had been sleeping with his head on the burly chest of a cold corpse. In despair, he recalled that he had been trying everything he knew to heal the horribly wounded man. In mournful revulsion, he pushed away from the cold body and sat up.