Stone of Tears

“She said she had to wait for a wizard named Zedd. To help you.”

Richard’s eyes closed as pain tightened in his chest. “And so they caught her while she waited.”

“No. That’s not how it happened.” Richard stared at the grain patterns on the wood floor while she went on. The wizard she waited for returned. He is the one who turned her in.”

Richard’s head came up. “What? Zedd came here? Zedd wouldn’t turn Kahlan over to be executed.”

Her back stiffened. “Turn her in he did. He stood on the platform before the cheering crowd and ordered it done. I watched as that vile man gave the nod to the axeman.”

Richard’s mind spun in confusion. “Zedd? A skinny, old man, with long, wavy, white hair sticking out in every direction?”

“That is he. First Wizard Zeddicus Zu’l Zorander.”

For the first time, a spark of hope ignited in him. He didn’t know everything about Zedd, but he did know him capable of similar things. Could it be?

He grabbed her by her shoulders. “Where is she buried?”

Mistress Sanderholt took him out into the dusk, to the secluded courtyard where Confessors were buried. She told him that Kahlan’s body had been burned in a funeral pyre, supervised by the First Wizard. Then she left him to be alone with the immense marker stone over her ashes.

Richard ran his fingers over the letters carved in the gray granite. KAHLAN AMNELL. MOTHER CONFESSOR. SHE IS

NOT HERE, BUT IN THE HEARTS OF THOSE WHO LOVED HER.

“She is not here,” he said aloud, quoting from the marker. Could it be a message? Could she be alive? Had it been a trick by Zedd to save her life? Why would he do it? Maybe, maybe, to keep them from chasing after her.

Richard fell to his knees in the snow before the monument. Dare he hope, just to have his hopes crushed?

He put his trembling hands together and bowed his head.

“Dear spirits, I know I have done wicked things, but I have always tried to do right. I have fought to help people and to uphold your principles of honesty and right.

“Please, dear spirits, help me.

“I’ve never prayed to you in earnest for anything before. Not like this. I’ve never meant anything like this before. Please, if you never again help me, help me this one time.

“Please, dear spirits, I can’t go on if I don’t know. I’ve given up everything to see right done. Please grant me this. Let me know if she is alive.”

His head hanging, tears dripping from his face, he saw flickers of light on the ground before him.

Richard looked up. A glowing spirit towered over him.

When he recognized who it was, he went rigid.

Kahlan had walked around the garden countless times. Part of her hesitation was dread that she might be granted confirmation of her fear. Finally, she she knelt down and folded her hands together on a rock before her. She bowed her head.

“Dear spirits, I know I am not worthy, but please grant this. I must know if Richard is all right. If he still loves me.”

She swallowed back the burning sensation in her throat. “I must know if I will ever see him again.

“I have been disrespectful, I know, and I have no excuse but my own failing as a good person. If you grant me this, I will do whatever the good spirits require of me.

“But please, dear spirits, I must know if I will ever see my Richard again.”

Her head hung as he cried. Tears dripped from her face. Before her, on the ground, flickers of light danced.

Kahlan looked up, into the face of the glowing spirit towering over her. She felt the warmth of the calm smile from the face she knew.

Slowly, involuntarily, Kahlan rose to her feet.

“Is it really… you?”

“Yes, Kahlan, it is I, Denna.”

“But… you went to the Keeper. You took the mark Darken Rahl put on Richard. You went to the Keeper in Richard’s place.”

The glowing smile of peace swelled Kahlan’s heart with joy.

The Keeper was repulsed by what I had done. He rejected me. I went instead to be with what you think of as the good spirits.

“In much the same way that what I did earned me peace I never expected, the sacrifices you and Richard have self-lessly made for others, and each other, have merited the granting of this peace to the two of you. Because you each possess both sides of the magic, and are linked to me by deeds, before I pass beyond the veil I am empowered to bring you together, for a brief time, in a place between the worlds.”

Denna, draped in long, flowing robes, spread her arms wide. The luminous folds hung from her arms all the way to the ground.

“Come, child. Come into my arms, and I will take you to Richard.”

Trembling, Kahlan stepped under Denna’s outstretched arm.

Richard stood under the illumination of Denna’s arm as it came tenderly around him. The world vanished into the radiance. He didn’t know what to expect, only that he wanted to see Kahlan more than life itself.

The overpowering, white blaze dimmed to a mellow glow.

Kahlan appeared before him. She gasped, and then threw herself into his arms. She wailed his name as she clutched him.