Naked Empire

Richard took their advice seriously; he hadn't thought about it, but the men did tend to hunch a lot. He didn't want to stand out. He had to blend in if he didn't want to raise the suspicions of the soldiers. He bent over a little.

"How's that?"

Jennsen screwed up her mouth. "Not much different."

"But I'm bending down."

"Lord Rahl," Cara said in a soft voice as she gave him a meaningful look, "you remember how it was to walk behind Denna, when she held the chain to the collar around your neck. Make yourself like that."

Richard blinked at her. The mental image of his time as a captive of a Mord-Sith hit him like a slap. He pressed his lips tight, not saying anything, and conceded with a single nod. The memory of that forsaken time was depressing enough that he would have no trouble using it to fall into the role.

"We had better be on our way," Anson said. "Now that the sun is falling behind the mountains, darkness comes quickly." He hesitated, then spoke again. "Lord Rahl, the men of the Order will not know you-I mean they probably will not realize you aren't from our town. But our people do not carry weapons; if they see that knife, they will know you are not from our town, and they will send up an alarm."

Richard lifted open the coat, looking at the knife. "You're right." He loosened his belt and removed the sheath holding the knife. He handed it to Cara for safekeeping.

Richard cupped a hand quickly to the side of Kahlan's face as a way of saying his good-bye. She seized the hand in both of hers and pressed a quick kiss to the backs of his fingers. Her hands looked so small and delicate holding his. He sometimes kidded her that he didn't see how she could possibly get anything done with such small hands. Her answer was that her hands were a normal size and perfectly adequate, and his were simply outsized.

The men all noticed Kahlan's gesture of affection. Richard was not embarrassed that they did. He wanted them to know that other people were the same as they in important, human ways. This was what they were fighting for-the chance to be human, to love and cherish loved ones, to live their lives as they wanted.

The light faded quickly as Richard and Anson made their way through the woods running beside fields of wild grasses. Richard wanted to work around to where the forest came in closer to the men out weeding in the gardens and tending to animals. With the nearby mountains to the west being so high, the sun vanished behind them earlier than what would normally be sunset, leaving the sky a swath of deep bluish green and the valley in an odd golden gloom.

By the time he and Anson had reached the place where they would leave the woods, it was still a little too light, so they waited a short while until Richard felt the murky light in the fields was dim enough to hide them. The town was some distance away and since Richard couldn't make out any men outside the gates, he reasoned that if soldiers were watching, then they couldn't see him, either.

As they moved quickly through the field of wild grass, staying low and out of sight, Anson pointed. "There, those men going back to town, we should follow them."

Richard spoke quietly back over his shoulder. "All right, but don't forget, we don't want to catch up with them or they might recognize you and make a fuss. Let them stay a good distance ahead of us."

When they reached the town walls, Richard saw that the gates were no more than two sections of the picket walls. A couple of posts no bigger than Richard's wrist had been tied sideways to stiffen two sections of wall and make them into gates. The ropes that tied the posts together served as the hinges. The sections were simply lifted and swung around to open or close them. It was far from a secure fortification.

In the murky light of twilight, the two guards milling around just inside the gates and watching workers return couldn't really see much of Richard and Anson. To the guards, they would appear to be two more workers.

The Order understood the value of workers; they needed slaves to do the work so that the soldiers might eat.

Richard hunched his shoulders and hung his head as he walked. He remembered those terrible times as a captive when, wearing a collar, he walked behind Denna, devoid of all hope of ever again being free. Thinking of that inhuman time, he shuffled through the open gates. The guards didn't pay him any attention.

Just as they were nearly past the guards, the closest one reached out and snatched Anson's sleeve, spinning him back around.

"I want some eggs," the young soldier said. "Give me some of the eggs you collected."

Anson stood wide-eyed, not knowing what to do. It seemed ludicrous that these two young men were allowed to serve their cause by being bullies.

Richard stepped up beside Anson and spoke quickly, remembering to bow his head so that he wouldn't loom over the man.

"We have no eggs, sir. We were weeding the bean fields. I'm sorry. We will bring you eggs tomorrow, if it pleases you."