Stone of Tears

He gestured with disgust. “You provide no leadership, no law; each land proscribes and pronounces as they see fit. What in one place is a crime, in another is virtue. Your alliance shies from bringing order to all. You’re nothing but fragmented tribes, each jealously guarding what’s his, with no thought to the union other than fits their own greed, and in so doing lets all be vincible.”

“You are wrong, that is exactly what the Central Council in Aydindril is for, to bring all lands together for the common defense. The common defense against murderers like you. It is not a feeble union, as you seem to think, but one with teeth.”

A noble ideal. One, in fact, which I share, but one you only give pap to. You bring them together only timidly, not under common canon.” He held his hand out to her, closing it into a fist as he sneered at her. “In so doing, you leave all lands ripe for the squeezing. You are lost souls in search of true leadership and in desperate need of protection.

As soon as the boundaries fell, you were ravaged by Darken Rahl, and he was only halfhearted about it, seeking only his magic! Had he let the generals run as they would, there wouldn’t be even a shell of this play alliance of yours left.”

And who is it we all need protection from?”

He stared off, whispering, almost to himself. “From the horde who will come.”

“What horde?”

He looked up, as if he had just awakened. The horde spoken of in the prophecies.” He frowned at her as if she were hopelessly thick, and then held his hand out to the wizard. “The good wizard here has counseled us on the prophecies. You are one who spent your life with wizards, and you never sought their knowledge?”

“Your eloquent claim to want to join people in peace and law are high-minded words, General Riggs. But your atrocities in Ebinissia put the lie to them. For all time, Ebinissia will bear mute but irrefutable testimony to your true cause. You, and your Imperial Order, are the horde.” Kahlan glowered to the wizard. “What’s your part in this, Wizard Slagle?”

He shrugged. “Why, to assist and facilitate the joining of all people under the rule of common law.”

“Whose law?”

“The law of the victors.” He smiled. “That would be us. The Imperial Order.”

“You have responsibilities as a wizard. Those responsibilities are to serve, not to rule. You will report at once to Aydindril, to take your place in that service, or you will answer to me.”

“You?” he said with a derisive sneer. “You demand that good and decent men whimper and snivel before you, and at the same time you blindly let banelings have a free run of the land.”

“Banelings?” She glowered at Riggs. “I suppose you would be foolish enough to seek council from the Blood of the Fold.”

“They’ve already joined with us,” General Riggs said, offhandedly. “Our cause is theirs, and theirs ours. They know how to expunge those who would serve the Keeper and thus our enemies. We will cleanse the land of all who serve the Keeper. Goodness must triumph.”

“You mean your cause. It is you who would rule.”

“Are you blind, Confessor? I rule here, now, but this is not about me; it’s about the future. I simply fill the post for now, furrow the field so it may produce. It’s not I who is the focus.

“We offer everyone the chance to serve with us, and every man with me has taken that offer. Others have joined our troops in our battle. We are no longer D’Haran troops. They are no longer troops of their homeland. We are all the Imperial Order. Any of right mind can lead us. If I fall in our noble struggle, another will rise up to take my place, until all the lands are joined under united rule, and the Imperial Order can flower.”

Either the man was too drunk to know what he was saying, or he was mad. She glanced about at the dancing, drunken, singing men at campfires all about. Mad as the Bantak. Mad as the Jocopo.

“General Riggs.” He had been muttering angrily under his breath, but stopped and looked up at her. “I am the Mother Confessor. Like it or not, I represent the Midlands. In the name of the Midlands I call upon you to to halt this war immediately and either return to D’Hara, or come to the council with your grievances. You may petition the Central Council with any dispute you have, and it will be heard, but you may not visit war upon my people. You will not like the consequence if you choose not to heed my orders.”

He sneered up at her. “We make no compromises. We’ll annihilate all who don’t join us. We fight to stop the killing, to stop the murdering, as the good spirits have called upon us to do. We fight for peace! Until we win peace, we will have war!”

She frowned. “Who told you this? Who told you that you must fight?”

He blinked at her. “It’s self-evident, you stupid bitch!”

“You cannot possibly be so stupid as to think the good spirits tell you to wage war. The good spirits do not act in such overt ways.”