Faith of the Fallen

The door opened a crack again. The eye glared out with menace.

"Has he a job?"

"No, but-"

"You go away. The both of your I'll report you!"

"For what, might I ask?"

"Look, lady, I got a room, but I got to keep it for people at the top of the list."

"How do you know we're not at the top of the list?"

"Because if you were you would have said so first off and showed me the approval you got with a seal on it. People at the head of the list have been waiting a long time for a place. You're no better than a thief, trying to take the place of a good citizen who's followed the law. Now, go away, or I will take down your names for the lodging inspector."

The door slammed shut again. The threat of having their names taken down appeared to take some of the fight out of Nicci. She huffed a sigh as they walked away, the bowed floor creaking and groaning underfoot. At least they had been able to get in out of the rain for a brief time.

"We will have to keep looking," she told him. "If you had a job, first, it would probably help. Maybe tomorrow you can look for a job while I keep looking for a room."

Out in the cold rain once more, they crossed the muddy street to the cobbled walkway on the other side. There were yet more places to check, though Richard didn't hold out any hope of getting a room. They'd had doors shut in their faces more times than he could count. Nicci wanted a room, though, so they kept looking.

The weather was unusually cold for this far south in the Old World, Nicci had told him. People said the cold spell and rain would soon pass. A few days before it had been muggy and warm, so Richard had no reason to doubt their judgment. It was disorienting for him to see woods and fields of lush green vegetation in the dead of winter. There were some trees with limbs bare for the season, but most were in full leaf.

As far south as they were in the Old World, it never got cold enough for water to freeze. People only blinked dumbly when he spoke of snow. When Richard explained snow as flakes of frozen white water that fell from the sky and covered the ground with a cottony blanket, some people turned huffy, thinking he was making a joke at their expense.

He knew that back home winter would be raging. Despite the turmoil around him, Richard felt an inner tranquillity knowing that Kahlan was most likely to be warm and snug in the house he had built; in that light, nothing in his new life was of enough importance to distress him. She had food to eat, firewood to keep her warm, and Cara for company. For now, she was safe.

Winter was wearing on and in spring she would be able to leave, but, for now, Richard was confident that she was safe. That, and his thoughts and memories of her, were his only solace.

People without rooms huddled in the alleyways, using whatever scrap of solid material they could find to prop up over themselves for a roof. Walls were fashioned from sodden blankets. He supposed that he and Nicci could continue to do the same, but he feared Nicci falling ill in the cold and wet-feared that then Kahlan, too, would fall ill.

Nicci checked the paper she carried. "These places on this register they gave us are all supposed to be available for people newly arrived-not just for people on a list. They need workers; they should be more diligent in seeing to it that places are available. Do you see, Richard? Do you see how hard it is for ordinary people to get along in life?"

Richard, hands shoved in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the wind and rain, asked, "So, how do we get on a list?"

"We will have to go to a lodging office and request a room. They can put us on a housing list."

It sounded simple, but matters were proving far more complex than they sounded.

"If there aren't enough rooms, how will being on a list get us a place to stay?"

"People die all the time."

"There's work here, that's why we came-that's why everyone else has come.

I'll work hard and then we can afford to pay more. We still have a little money. We just need to find a place that wants to rent a room for the right price-without all this list foolishness."

"Really, Richard, are you that inhumane? How would those less fortunate ever get rooms, then? The Order sets the prices to stop profiteers. They make sure there is no favoritism. That makes it fair for all. We just need to get on a list for a room, and then everything will be fine."

Watching the glistening cobbles before him as he walked, Richard wondered how long they would be without a place until their name worked its way to the top of a list. It looked to him as if a lot of people would need to die before his and Nicci's names came up for a room-with more yet waiting in turn for them to die.