Naked Empire

Speaking in a low voice, Jennsen leaned closer to Kahlan. "Vultures can tell you, from a great distance, where a kill lies-by the way they circle and gather, I mean. I guess I can see how the races could be like that-birds that someone could spot from afar in order to know there was something below."

Kahlan didn't say anything. Her head ached, she was hungry, and she just wanted to go to sleep, not to discuss things she couldn't answer. She wondered how many times Richard had viewed her own insistent questions in the same way she now viewed Jennsen's. Kahlan silently vowed to try to be at least half as patient as Richard always was.

"The thing is," Jennsen went on, matter-of-factly, "how would someone get birds to… well, you know, circle around you like vultures over a carcass in order to know where you were?" Jennsen leaned in again and whispered so as to be sure that Richard wouldn't hear. "Maybe they're sent with magic to follow specific people."

Cara fixed Jennsen with a murderous glare. Kahlan idly wondered if the Mord-Sith would clobber Richard's sister, or extend her leniency because she was family. Discussions about magic, especially in the context of its danger to Richard or Kahlan, made Cara testy. Mord-Sith were fearless in the face of death, but they did not like magic and weren't shy about making their distaste clear.

In a way, such hostility toward magic characterized the nature and purpose of Mord-Sith; they were singularly able to appropriate the gifted's power and use it to destroy them. Mord-Sith had been mercilessly trained to be ruthless at their task. It was from the madness of this duty that Richard had freed them.

It seemed obvious enough to Kahlan, though, that if the races really were tracking them it would have to involve conjuring of some sort. It was the questions raised by that assumption that so worried her.

When Kahlan didn't debate the theory, Jennsen asked, "Why do you think someone would be using the races to track you?"

Kahlan lifted an eyebrow at the young woman. "Jennsen, we're in the middle of the Old World. Being hunted in enemy territory is hardly surprising."

"I guess you're right," Jennsen admitted. "It just seems that there would have to be more to it." Despite the heat, she rubbed her arms as if a chill had just run through her. "You have no idea how much Emperor Jagang wants to catch you."

Kahlan smiled to herself. "Oh, I think I do."

Jennsen watched Richard a moment as he filled the buckets with water from barrels carried in the wagon. Richard leaned down and handed one to Friedrich. Ears turned attentively ahead, the horses all watched, eager for a drink. Betty, also watching as her twins suckled, bleated her longing for a drink. After filling the buckets, Richard submerged his waterskin to fill it, too.

Jennsen shook her head and looked again into Kahlan's eyes. "Emperor Jagang tricked me into thinking Richard wanted me dead." She glanced briefly over at the men engaged in their work before she went on. "I was there with Jagang when he attacked Aydindril."

Kahlan felt as if her heart came up in her throat at hearing firsthand confirmation of that brute invading the place where she'd grown up. She didn't think she could bear to hear the answer, but she had to ask. "Did he destroy the city?"

After Richard had been captured and taken from her, Kahlan, with Cara at her side, had led the D'Haran army against Jagang's vast invading horde from the Old World. Month after month, Kahlan and the army fought against impossible odds, retreating all the way up through the Midlands.

By the time they lost the battle for the Midlands, it had been over a year since Kahlan had seen Richard; he had seemingly been cast into oblivion. When at last she learned where he was being held, Kahlan and Cara had raced south, to the Old World, only to arrive just as Richard ignited a firestorm of revolution in the heart of Jagang's homeland.

Before she'd left, Kahlan had evacuated Aydindril and left the Confessors' Palace empty of all those who called it home. Life, not a place, was what mattered.

"He never got a chance to destroy the city," Jennsen said. "When we arrived at the Confessors' Palace, Emperor Jagang thought he had you and Richard cornered. But out in front waited a spear holding the head of the emperor's revered spiritual leader: Brother Narev." Her voice lowered meaningfully. "Jagang found the message left with the head."

Kahlan remembered well the day Richard had sent the head of that evil man, along with a message for Jagang, on the long journey north.»

'Compliments of Richard Rahl. "

"That's right," Jennsen said. "You can't imagine Jagang's rage." She paused to be certain Kahlan heeded her warning. "He'll do anything to get his hands on you and Richard."

Kahlan hardly needed Jennsen to tell her how much Jagang wanted them.

"All the more reason to get away-hide somewhere," Cara said.

"And the races?" Kahlan reminded her.