Temple of the Winds

"Even a simple herb woman should know to use more caution when dealing with magic."

"Magic." Nadine wilted. "I'm from Westland. I've never seen magic before. I didn't know magic had any effect on healing herbs. I'm sorry."

He ignored the apology and pointed. "Undo the buttons and open the top of her outfit." "Why?" Nadine asked.

"Do it! Or do you favor watching her die? She can't hold on much longer." Nadine leaned forward and began undoing the row of little red leather buttons along the side of Cara's ribs. When she finished, he gestured for her to open it. Nadine glanced up at Kahlan. Kahlan gave her a nod, and she pulled back the supple leather, exposing Cara's chest. "May I ask your name?" Kahlan asked him.

"Drefan." Instead of asking hers, he put an ear to the center of Cara's chest, listening.

He shifted around, forcing Kahlan to scoot out of the way, until he was at Cara's head. He briefly inspected the bloody wound above her left ear, and then, seeming to dismiss it as unimportant, went on to systematically probe the base of her neck.

Kahlan could only see the side of his deep cowl, and nothing of his face. The single torch didn't provide much light, anyway. Drefan leaned forward and gripped Cara's breasts in his big hands. Kahlan sat up straighter. "What do you think you're doing?" "Examining her." "Is that what you call it." He sat back on his heels. "Feel her breasts." "Why?" "To see what I discovered."

Kahlan finally turned from the shadow of his cowl and, rather than grabbing her as he had, put the back of her fingers against the side of Cara's left breast. It was hot-burning with a fever. She felt the other. It was ice cold. When Drefan gestured, Nadine followed suit. "What does it mean?" she asked. "I'd like to reserve judgment until I've finished examining her, but it's not good."

He put his fingers to the side of her neck, feeling her pulse again. He ran his thumbs outward along her forehead. He tent and put his ear to each of hers. He smelled her breath. He carefully lifted her head and rotated it. He spread her arms out to the sides, pulled the red leather outfit open further so that Cara's torso was naked to her waist, and then bent over her and palpated her abdomen and up under her ribs.

With his head bent as if in concentration, he touched his fingers to the front of her shoulders for a moment, the sides of her neck, the base of her skull, her temples, several places on her ribs, and lastly to the palms of her hands.

Kahlan was getting impatient. She was seeing a lot of probing and prodding, but very little healing. "Well?"

"Her aura is seriously snarled," he said, as he brazenly thrust a big hand under the red leather at Cara's waist.

Kahlan watched in stunned disbelief as his hand slid down to her crotch. She could see his fingers under the tight leather as he worked them into her sex.

Hard as she could, Kahlan fisted him on the nerve at the side of his upper arm. He recoiled in pain. He fell to the side of his hip with a groan, covering his arm where she had clouted him.

"I told you, this is an important woman! How dare you grope her like that! I won't have it, do you understand?" "I wasn't groping her," he growled The heat was still in Kahlan's voice "Then what do you call it?" "I was trying to determine what this dream walker has done to her. He's greatly disturbed her auras, her energy flows, confusing her mind's control of her body.

''She's not in convulsions, precisely. She's having uncontrolled muscular contractions. I was checking to make sure that he hadn't triggered the part of her brain that controls excitement. I was making sure that he hadn't put her in a state of continual orgasm. I have to know the extent of the blocks and triggers he's disturbed so that I know how to reverse it."

Nadine, eyes widening, leaned forward. "Magic can do such a thing? Make a person have. . continual…"

He nodded as he flexed his sore arm. "If the practitioner knows what he's doing." "Can you do such a thing?" she breathed.

''No. I don't have the gift, or any other form of magic, but I know how to heal- if the damage isn't too great." The cowl turned toward Kahlan. "Now, do you wish me to continue, or do you want to watch her die?"

"Continue. But if you put your hand down there again, you are going to be a one-handed healer."

"I've already learned what I needed to know." Nadine leaned in again. "Is she. .?" "No." He flicked his hand irritably. "Pull off her boots." Nadine shuffled around and did as he had ordered. He turned a bit toward Kahlan, as if peering at her from the depths of his cowl. "Did you know to hit that particular nerve in my arm with deliberate knowledge, or did you simply get lucky?"

Kahlan studied the shadow, trying to see his eyes. She couldn't. "I was trained to do such things: to defend myself, and others."