fic: storm born - chapter forty-three
Title: Storm Born
Author: Morgen
Summary: It was supposed to be their one chance to be together. Instead it plunged them straight into a nightmare.
Disclaimer: I don't own LOTS or profit from it in any way. Just worship it from afar.
Rating: PG-14
XLIII. UNNAMED
Over the next eight days and nights, Richard saw no more of the elaborate fortress city of Isham than he had on his arrival. He spent his time confined to Kahlan’s chambers, pacing back and forth from one end of the gray stone room to the other. A cot had been brought in for him, and a little, humble cradle for his daughter, with many apologies for their simplicity. But this was a military base, and there had been no need for ornate cribs or silk bed sheets here before.
Richard did not mind though. He waved off the apologies with a forced smile and a quiet word of thanks. While his daughter often slept in her cradle, he never used the cot. He couldn’t recall sleeping at all since he’d first taken up watch at Kahlan’s bedside, though he must have dozed now and then. He had cricks in his neck enough to prove it. Most hours he sat on the stool at Kahlan’s side and watched her sleep. He still called it sleeping, because that was better than the other words he could think of to describe what was happening to her.
He’d been given a new shirt, but beyond that, he hadn’t changed his clothes or bathed at all. The beginnings of a beard now covered his face, and his hair was limp with grease. Richard knew he made a frightful sight, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. His days were empty and long.
In the beginning, when his daughter fussed he’d helped her to latch onto Kahlan’s breast, quickly getting over some of the embarrassment he’d felt that first night. But Kahlan couldn’t eat, and her milk supply had dwindled rapidly. Jessica now had to come by several times a day to nurse the baby, the meager mouthfuls she got from her mother not being near enough to sustain her. When she came, Jessica always brought a tray of food with her, encouraging him to eat while she nursed the baby. He always forced down a few mouthfuls. The one time he’d refused to touch any of it, Jessica had taken the tray away without a word. But an hour later, Cara had knocked on his door, accompanied by General Nox. The two of them had all but force fed him a five course meal.
Kahlan, on the other hand, was starving slowly. There was water that he dribbled into her mouth a few drops at a time, waiting until she swallowed reflexively before giving her more. And there was a thin gruel the kitchen staff made, which he fed to her in the same manner. But he could work at it all afternoon and get her to swallow no more than the equivalent of a spoonful. The result was that she looked frighteningly gaunt. Her cheeks were sunken; her skin a sallow, sickly color. All the extra softness her body had gained for their daughter’s sake was melting away, and he could count far too many ribs through the thin fabric of her nightgown.
The only other visitor he allowed was his grandfather. Every day Zedd came and asked the baby’s name, and every day she had none. Always Richard asked to see the poison in Kahlan’s veins, and always it was the same. Bitter, spreading black throughout her body, and she would not wake. Would never wake. It seemed he’d run out of tears. He felt as brittle as an eggshell, and with just as many sharp, jagged bits as one that had already cracked.
On the ninth day, Zedd came to visit him earlier than usual. He gave a perfunctory knock on the door before pushing it open and stepping inside. Richard was crouched on the stool, winding a strand of Kahlan’s hair around his finger. He didn’t look up.
“Where’s my great-granddaughter?” asked Zedd, the cheerful note in his voice ringing harsh and wrong against Richard’s ears.
“In her cradle,” he muttered.
“And what shall I call her today? Elsa? Loralin? Kora? Or has her father at last thought her a name?”
“Not today, Zedd. Call her what you like. She has none.” Richard glanced over his shoulder to where the old wizard stood, lifting the infant out of her cradle and up into his arms. He babbled nonsense to her, and Richard turned back to Kahlan. He smoothed back a stray strand of hair from her brow. She was no longer cold as ice, but she remained cool and clammy to the touch.
Zedd settled down in his usual chair, still blathering nonsense to the infant, who stared up at him raptly. Richard ignored the wizard’s game as long as he could, but eventually the jarringly happy sounds made him want to scream. He held out his arms. “I’ll have my child now,” he said, not able to care that he sounded petulant and cruel.
Zedd handed her over without comment, and Richard pressed a fierce kiss to the top of her head before settling her against his chest. She’d worked an arm free of her swaddling cloth, and grasped for his pendant with a clumsy little hand. Richard closed his eyes and breathed. Holding her was the only time he felt alive.
“You need to get some sleep, Richard,” said Zedd softly. “I’ll sit with Kahlan while you rest.”
“Can’t.” It was suddenly hard to make his voice work, and he held his daughter tighter.
“Come on, my boy. You can barely see straight.”
“No!” His voice came out too loud, and the silence that followed was absolute. He forced himself to look over at his grandfather. “No,” he said again. “If this is all I get with her, then I want it all. Every last minute. I’ll sleep when she’s dead.”
Tears swam in the old wizard’s eyes, and he didn’t push the subject. They sat in silence a long time before Richard spoke again. “Show me,” he said quietly. Zedd nodded. It had become a ritual of sorts. Wordlessly, he reached over and stroked Kahlan’s arm. The poison sprang to life, spreading like a spider web across her skin. Richard stared and stared until Zedd made it fade, but it was still there, still lurking inside her.
“I spoke to General Nox this morning,” said Zedd after he’d set her arm back down on the bed, and tucked the blanket over it. “The D’Harans in the camp are anxious to know how best to serve you.”
“I just want to be left alone.”
“There is a whole country left ravaged by Darken Rahl and the Keeper’s minions. They are all looking to you for guidance.”
He traced the tip of his daughter’s ear. “I have none to give them.”
Zedd leaned forward, resting a hand on Richard’s arm. “That doesn’t sound like the Richard I know.”
He shrugged the hand off with a rough jerk of his shoulder. “The Richard you knew has just lost the best part of himself. I don’t expect him to return. I have nothing for them.” He scooted his stool closer to Kahlan’s bed. “Tell the D’Harans to leave their Lord Rahl alone if they want to please him. He’s in mourning.” In mourning for the living dead. Kahlan’s chest still rose and fell with every breath even as she faded away to nothing.
“They know,” said Zedd. “They walk around this place on tiptoe, they are so afraid of upsetting you.”
Richard scowled. “I’m not my brother. I won’t have anyone hanged for closing a door too loudly, but I cannot be their Lord Rahl. Not now. Not today.” He groaned and rubbed a hand over his face. “Tell Nox to do whatever he judges to be right. If he wants guidance as to my wishes, have him seek it from Cara. Whatever she approves, I approve.”
Zedd nodded. “I’ll see that it is done.” He ran his finger along a seam in his robe. “There is another matter I want to discuss with you, Richard.” The sudden hesitancy in his voice set Richard on edge. He lifted an eyebrow.
“What?”
When the wizard spoke again, it was very quietly. “It can take weeks for a person to starve to death. It is a cruel, painful way to go. Aydindril outlawed it as an execution method in the Midlands over a century ago, on the grounds that it is too inhumane a punishment to be allowed for any crime.”
Richard stiffened. “What are you saying, Zedd?” His heart began to beat faster, his voice taking on an edge like the Sword of Truth.
“There are potions, ways to make it swifter and painless…”
Richard shot to his feet, the stool toppling. It clattered against the stone floor, and he kicked it away. “You want to poison Kahlan? She’s already dying from poison, and it’s just not working fast enough for you? So how about we poison her again?” His daughter began to fuss, and he patted her back perhaps a little too roughly, glaring down at his grandfather.
Zedd sat calm in his chair, and Richard hated him for it. “You know that’s not what I mean, my boy.”
“No, it is what you mean. And don’t you dare call me ‘your boy.’ Not when you’re trying to kill Kahlan!”
The wizard stood then, towering over his grandson. He gripped him by the shoulders, pale eyes boring into him. “Do you think this is what she wants? If Kahlan could choose how to die, would she want to waste away to a skeleton, while you sit by her side and go mad with grief?”
Richard shook. It felt as if his heart was coming apart inside his chest. “Get out,” he said, his voice very low.
Zedd nodded, but he did not move. His eyes dimmed with sorrow. “You owe that child a name.”
“Get out,” Richard repeated, his voice growing louder.
He didn’t budge. “And you owe Kahlan a name for her daughter. You owe it to her to be brave enough to name that little girl and love her, without her at your side to do the same.”
“Get out now!” Richard roared. He slammed the heel of his hand against his grandfather’s chest, and Zedd stumbled backwards. “Leave,” he shouted as the baby became frightened by the noise and began to wail, her face scrunching up and turning red. “Go away,” Richard hissed, tears streaming down his face.
Zedd regained his footing, and stood there staring at him a moment, sad and silent, before walking out the door. Richard kicked the door shut behind him. He began to pace a narrow loop up and down the length of the room, rocking his screaming daughter in his arms.
She was still crying hysterically an hour later when Jessica showed up to nurse her. Richard said nothing, handing her the screaming infant in silence. She sat down in the chair at the far corner of the room for the feeding, and Richard returned to the stool at Kahlan’s side. He didn’t so much as glance at the tray of food Jessica had brought him the entire time.
“Take it away,” he said in a hollow voice as she was lowering his daughter back into her cradle. “All of it.”
Jessica did, and he bolted the door behind her. When Cara came pounding on his door a little while later, he didn’t answer. She kept knocking, and so he shouted her away, much as he’d done with Zedd. This time, the baby slept through the noise.
In the end, it was painfully silent in Kahlan’s bedchamber. He sat beside her and told her disjointed tales from his childhood in Westland, while working all afternoon and most of the evening to get her to swallow the equivalent of a few thimbles full of water.
When Jessica came late in the dark hours of the night to give his daughter another feeding, he finally gave up on trying to get Kahlan to swallow more. After the maid had finished and left him alone, he knelt down next to the bed. “I miss you,” he whispered into the lank knots of Kahlan’s hair. And for the very first time, he pulled off his boots and padded back to the cradle, lifting their daughter into his arms. Her eyelids were heavy with sleep, and she murmured little sounds as he eased himself onto the bed beside Kahlan. Carefully, he nestled the babe like a treasure between them, and, leaning over them both, he stroked Kahlan’s cheek.
“This is how it should have been,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to her lifeless lips. And then Richard curled up beside her, and for the first time in over a week, he fell into a sound and dreamless sleep.
---
He awoke to a gentle, golden dawn, and Kahlan’s faint, fragile breathing. She lay there just as before, pale and hollowed out from the inside. But their daughter was awake and wriggling in a sunbeam. For the first time ever, he thought he saw flecks of gold in the dark depths of her eyes. She waved her arms about and gurgled at him, and he watched her enraptured as the sky streaked golden and violet in the east. Only when dawn had faded to the blue of day did he speak.
“Amara.” He whispered the name at first, then said it a little louder. “Amara…Kahlan, her name is Amara.” Amara responded by cramming four fingers into her mouth and sucking on them, a line of drool dripping down her chin. Richard chuckled despite himself before turning back to Kahlan. “Amara Amnell. I will tell her of her mother every day. How brave and kind and beautiful she was. That she was selfless enough to save the world, even though it meant losing it for herself.”
He paused then to draw a shaky breath, and wipe away the tears that had begun to drip down his cheeks. “I know I’m not a Confessor, but I’ll teach her about her power as best I can. I’ll tell her about all the good you did as Mother Confessor, so that she will never hate her magic, or feel alone because of it.”
Kahlan lay there motionless, but he imagined that she could somehow hear him and understand. He wove their fingers together, rubbing his thumb back and forth across her hand. “The Underworld is a safe place now,” he said, staring down at their joined hands. “You don’t have to be afraid to die. You’ll be with the Creator, and your mother and Dennee. Your little nephew. And I won’t go mad, Kahlan, if you have to go. If you can’t come back from this. I’ll understand.” He drew in a deep, shuddering breath. “I just want you to be okay, to be at peace.”
With their daughter between them, he bent down and kissed her lips. “And I will always love you, Kahlan Amnell. Know that that will never change. Should I live a thousand years, I’d still be there, loving you. And we’ll be together again, someday. In the afterlife. I believe that. I have to believe that.”
He kissed his fingertip, and pressed it to her lower lip a last time before sitting up. Her hair was so full of his tears it shone like dew drops on a spider web. Richard slid from the bed and lifted up Amara, who was busy exploring all the fingers on her left hand. He settled her in her cradle, and stood there a long time, watching as she moved her exploration of her fingers from left hand to right. He would have to talk to Zedd, but he wasn’t ready. Not yet.
He was still watching Amara mouth her pinky finger, when he heard a faint sound rather like a moan, coming from somewhere behind him. Richard froze, his ears straining, hardly daring to hope. He couldn’t bear to turn around and check, for fear he was imagining things. But then he heard it again, followed by a soft, whispering sound, like someone turning their head ever so slightly against a pillow.
Richard spun around to see Kahlan moving her head, her lips parting to suck in a deeper breath. Her eyelids fluttered, then opened slightly. Her eyes looked preternaturally blue against the dark shadows beneath them, and for a moment she seemed not to see him. But then their eyes locked, and he went racing to her bedside so fast he tripped over one of his boots and nearly went sprawling.
“Kahlan,” he said, touching trembling fingertips to her cheek. She was still as cool to the touch as before, but her eyes tracked his every move. “Kahlan, thank the spirits you’re awake. You’re awake…” He wiped away his tears, unable to stop grinning.
She blinked. Her mouth opened and closed several times before she managed to form a word, and then it was less than a whisper.
“Water?”
He lunged for the pitcher, his hands shaking as he filled the little silver cup with water. He sloshed half of it down his front on his way back to her bedside, but it didn’t matter. He lifted her head and held the cup to her lips, but she only managed a few swallows before she stopped drinking and sagged against him, looking utterly exhausted.
“That’s good, Kahlan,” he promised. “You did really good. There’s more when you want it. Don’t try to talk yet. Just rest.” He set the cup down, and picked up her hand to hold. “The rift is sealed. You’re safe. Everyone’s safe. It’s all okay now.”
There was a faint lift to her lips that might have been a smile, it was hard to tell. Already her eyes were drooping shut again, but the hand he was holding exerted a feeble pressure against his own, as if she meant to pull him closer. He squeezed back and settled down at her side to wait with renewed energy. His heart pounding in his chest sounded to him like some sort of joyous drum. If she asked it, he felt quite certain he could fly. Kahlan had opened her eyes.
Author: Morgen
Summary: It was supposed to be their one chance to be together. Instead it plunged them straight into a nightmare.
Disclaimer: I don't own LOTS or profit from it in any way. Just worship it from afar.
Rating: PG-14
XLIII. UNNAMED
Over the next eight days and nights, Richard saw no more of the elaborate fortress city of Isham than he had on his arrival. He spent his time confined to Kahlan’s chambers, pacing back and forth from one end of the gray stone room to the other. A cot had been brought in for him, and a little, humble cradle for his daughter, with many apologies for their simplicity. But this was a military base, and there had been no need for ornate cribs or silk bed sheets here before.
Richard did not mind though. He waved off the apologies with a forced smile and a quiet word of thanks. While his daughter often slept in her cradle, he never used the cot. He couldn’t recall sleeping at all since he’d first taken up watch at Kahlan’s bedside, though he must have dozed now and then. He had cricks in his neck enough to prove it. Most hours he sat on the stool at Kahlan’s side and watched her sleep. He still called it sleeping, because that was better than the other words he could think of to describe what was happening to her.
He’d been given a new shirt, but beyond that, he hadn’t changed his clothes or bathed at all. The beginnings of a beard now covered his face, and his hair was limp with grease. Richard knew he made a frightful sight, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. His days were empty and long.
In the beginning, when his daughter fussed he’d helped her to latch onto Kahlan’s breast, quickly getting over some of the embarrassment he’d felt that first night. But Kahlan couldn’t eat, and her milk supply had dwindled rapidly. Jessica now had to come by several times a day to nurse the baby, the meager mouthfuls she got from her mother not being near enough to sustain her. When she came, Jessica always brought a tray of food with her, encouraging him to eat while she nursed the baby. He always forced down a few mouthfuls. The one time he’d refused to touch any of it, Jessica had taken the tray away without a word. But an hour later, Cara had knocked on his door, accompanied by General Nox. The two of them had all but force fed him a five course meal.
Kahlan, on the other hand, was starving slowly. There was water that he dribbled into her mouth a few drops at a time, waiting until she swallowed reflexively before giving her more. And there was a thin gruel the kitchen staff made, which he fed to her in the same manner. But he could work at it all afternoon and get her to swallow no more than the equivalent of a spoonful. The result was that she looked frighteningly gaunt. Her cheeks were sunken; her skin a sallow, sickly color. All the extra softness her body had gained for their daughter’s sake was melting away, and he could count far too many ribs through the thin fabric of her nightgown.
The only other visitor he allowed was his grandfather. Every day Zedd came and asked the baby’s name, and every day she had none. Always Richard asked to see the poison in Kahlan’s veins, and always it was the same. Bitter, spreading black throughout her body, and she would not wake. Would never wake. It seemed he’d run out of tears. He felt as brittle as an eggshell, and with just as many sharp, jagged bits as one that had already cracked.
On the ninth day, Zedd came to visit him earlier than usual. He gave a perfunctory knock on the door before pushing it open and stepping inside. Richard was crouched on the stool, winding a strand of Kahlan’s hair around his finger. He didn’t look up.
“Where’s my great-granddaughter?” asked Zedd, the cheerful note in his voice ringing harsh and wrong against Richard’s ears.
“In her cradle,” he muttered.
“And what shall I call her today? Elsa? Loralin? Kora? Or has her father at last thought her a name?”
“Not today, Zedd. Call her what you like. She has none.” Richard glanced over his shoulder to where the old wizard stood, lifting the infant out of her cradle and up into his arms. He babbled nonsense to her, and Richard turned back to Kahlan. He smoothed back a stray strand of hair from her brow. She was no longer cold as ice, but she remained cool and clammy to the touch.
Zedd settled down in his usual chair, still blathering nonsense to the infant, who stared up at him raptly. Richard ignored the wizard’s game as long as he could, but eventually the jarringly happy sounds made him want to scream. He held out his arms. “I’ll have my child now,” he said, not able to care that he sounded petulant and cruel.
Zedd handed her over without comment, and Richard pressed a fierce kiss to the top of her head before settling her against his chest. She’d worked an arm free of her swaddling cloth, and grasped for his pendant with a clumsy little hand. Richard closed his eyes and breathed. Holding her was the only time he felt alive.
“You need to get some sleep, Richard,” said Zedd softly. “I’ll sit with Kahlan while you rest.”
“Can’t.” It was suddenly hard to make his voice work, and he held his daughter tighter.
“Come on, my boy. You can barely see straight.”
“No!” His voice came out too loud, and the silence that followed was absolute. He forced himself to look over at his grandfather. “No,” he said again. “If this is all I get with her, then I want it all. Every last minute. I’ll sleep when she’s dead.”
Tears swam in the old wizard’s eyes, and he didn’t push the subject. They sat in silence a long time before Richard spoke again. “Show me,” he said quietly. Zedd nodded. It had become a ritual of sorts. Wordlessly, he reached over and stroked Kahlan’s arm. The poison sprang to life, spreading like a spider web across her skin. Richard stared and stared until Zedd made it fade, but it was still there, still lurking inside her.
“I spoke to General Nox this morning,” said Zedd after he’d set her arm back down on the bed, and tucked the blanket over it. “The D’Harans in the camp are anxious to know how best to serve you.”
“I just want to be left alone.”
“There is a whole country left ravaged by Darken Rahl and the Keeper’s minions. They are all looking to you for guidance.”
He traced the tip of his daughter’s ear. “I have none to give them.”
Zedd leaned forward, resting a hand on Richard’s arm. “That doesn’t sound like the Richard I know.”
He shrugged the hand off with a rough jerk of his shoulder. “The Richard you knew has just lost the best part of himself. I don’t expect him to return. I have nothing for them.” He scooted his stool closer to Kahlan’s bed. “Tell the D’Harans to leave their Lord Rahl alone if they want to please him. He’s in mourning.” In mourning for the living dead. Kahlan’s chest still rose and fell with every breath even as she faded away to nothing.
“They know,” said Zedd. “They walk around this place on tiptoe, they are so afraid of upsetting you.”
Richard scowled. “I’m not my brother. I won’t have anyone hanged for closing a door too loudly, but I cannot be their Lord Rahl. Not now. Not today.” He groaned and rubbed a hand over his face. “Tell Nox to do whatever he judges to be right. If he wants guidance as to my wishes, have him seek it from Cara. Whatever she approves, I approve.”
Zedd nodded. “I’ll see that it is done.” He ran his finger along a seam in his robe. “There is another matter I want to discuss with you, Richard.” The sudden hesitancy in his voice set Richard on edge. He lifted an eyebrow.
“What?”
When the wizard spoke again, it was very quietly. “It can take weeks for a person to starve to death. It is a cruel, painful way to go. Aydindril outlawed it as an execution method in the Midlands over a century ago, on the grounds that it is too inhumane a punishment to be allowed for any crime.”
Richard stiffened. “What are you saying, Zedd?” His heart began to beat faster, his voice taking on an edge like the Sword of Truth.
“There are potions, ways to make it swifter and painless…”
Richard shot to his feet, the stool toppling. It clattered against the stone floor, and he kicked it away. “You want to poison Kahlan? She’s already dying from poison, and it’s just not working fast enough for you? So how about we poison her again?” His daughter began to fuss, and he patted her back perhaps a little too roughly, glaring down at his grandfather.
Zedd sat calm in his chair, and Richard hated him for it. “You know that’s not what I mean, my boy.”
“No, it is what you mean. And don’t you dare call me ‘your boy.’ Not when you’re trying to kill Kahlan!”
The wizard stood then, towering over his grandson. He gripped him by the shoulders, pale eyes boring into him. “Do you think this is what she wants? If Kahlan could choose how to die, would she want to waste away to a skeleton, while you sit by her side and go mad with grief?”
Richard shook. It felt as if his heart was coming apart inside his chest. “Get out,” he said, his voice very low.
Zedd nodded, but he did not move. His eyes dimmed with sorrow. “You owe that child a name.”
“Get out,” Richard repeated, his voice growing louder.
He didn’t budge. “And you owe Kahlan a name for her daughter. You owe it to her to be brave enough to name that little girl and love her, without her at your side to do the same.”
“Get out now!” Richard roared. He slammed the heel of his hand against his grandfather’s chest, and Zedd stumbled backwards. “Leave,” he shouted as the baby became frightened by the noise and began to wail, her face scrunching up and turning red. “Go away,” Richard hissed, tears streaming down his face.
Zedd regained his footing, and stood there staring at him a moment, sad and silent, before walking out the door. Richard kicked the door shut behind him. He began to pace a narrow loop up and down the length of the room, rocking his screaming daughter in his arms.
She was still crying hysterically an hour later when Jessica showed up to nurse her. Richard said nothing, handing her the screaming infant in silence. She sat down in the chair at the far corner of the room for the feeding, and Richard returned to the stool at Kahlan’s side. He didn’t so much as glance at the tray of food Jessica had brought him the entire time.
“Take it away,” he said in a hollow voice as she was lowering his daughter back into her cradle. “All of it.”
Jessica did, and he bolted the door behind her. When Cara came pounding on his door a little while later, he didn’t answer. She kept knocking, and so he shouted her away, much as he’d done with Zedd. This time, the baby slept through the noise.
In the end, it was painfully silent in Kahlan’s bedchamber. He sat beside her and told her disjointed tales from his childhood in Westland, while working all afternoon and most of the evening to get her to swallow the equivalent of a few thimbles full of water.
When Jessica came late in the dark hours of the night to give his daughter another feeding, he finally gave up on trying to get Kahlan to swallow more. After the maid had finished and left him alone, he knelt down next to the bed. “I miss you,” he whispered into the lank knots of Kahlan’s hair. And for the very first time, he pulled off his boots and padded back to the cradle, lifting their daughter into his arms. Her eyelids were heavy with sleep, and she murmured little sounds as he eased himself onto the bed beside Kahlan. Carefully, he nestled the babe like a treasure between them, and, leaning over them both, he stroked Kahlan’s cheek.
“This is how it should have been,” he murmured, pressing a kiss to her lifeless lips. And then Richard curled up beside her, and for the first time in over a week, he fell into a sound and dreamless sleep.
---
He awoke to a gentle, golden dawn, and Kahlan’s faint, fragile breathing. She lay there just as before, pale and hollowed out from the inside. But their daughter was awake and wriggling in a sunbeam. For the first time ever, he thought he saw flecks of gold in the dark depths of her eyes. She waved her arms about and gurgled at him, and he watched her enraptured as the sky streaked golden and violet in the east. Only when dawn had faded to the blue of day did he speak.
“Amara.” He whispered the name at first, then said it a little louder. “Amara…Kahlan, her name is Amara.” Amara responded by cramming four fingers into her mouth and sucking on them, a line of drool dripping down her chin. Richard chuckled despite himself before turning back to Kahlan. “Amara Amnell. I will tell her of her mother every day. How brave and kind and beautiful she was. That she was selfless enough to save the world, even though it meant losing it for herself.”
He paused then to draw a shaky breath, and wipe away the tears that had begun to drip down his cheeks. “I know I’m not a Confessor, but I’ll teach her about her power as best I can. I’ll tell her about all the good you did as Mother Confessor, so that she will never hate her magic, or feel alone because of it.”
Kahlan lay there motionless, but he imagined that she could somehow hear him and understand. He wove their fingers together, rubbing his thumb back and forth across her hand. “The Underworld is a safe place now,” he said, staring down at their joined hands. “You don’t have to be afraid to die. You’ll be with the Creator, and your mother and Dennee. Your little nephew. And I won’t go mad, Kahlan, if you have to go. If you can’t come back from this. I’ll understand.” He drew in a deep, shuddering breath. “I just want you to be okay, to be at peace.”
With their daughter between them, he bent down and kissed her lips. “And I will always love you, Kahlan Amnell. Know that that will never change. Should I live a thousand years, I’d still be there, loving you. And we’ll be together again, someday. In the afterlife. I believe that. I have to believe that.”
He kissed his fingertip, and pressed it to her lower lip a last time before sitting up. Her hair was so full of his tears it shone like dew drops on a spider web. Richard slid from the bed and lifted up Amara, who was busy exploring all the fingers on her left hand. He settled her in her cradle, and stood there a long time, watching as she moved her exploration of her fingers from left hand to right. He would have to talk to Zedd, but he wasn’t ready. Not yet.
He was still watching Amara mouth her pinky finger, when he heard a faint sound rather like a moan, coming from somewhere behind him. Richard froze, his ears straining, hardly daring to hope. He couldn’t bear to turn around and check, for fear he was imagining things. But then he heard it again, followed by a soft, whispering sound, like someone turning their head ever so slightly against a pillow.
Richard spun around to see Kahlan moving her head, her lips parting to suck in a deeper breath. Her eyelids fluttered, then opened slightly. Her eyes looked preternaturally blue against the dark shadows beneath them, and for a moment she seemed not to see him. But then their eyes locked, and he went racing to her bedside so fast he tripped over one of his boots and nearly went sprawling.
“Kahlan,” he said, touching trembling fingertips to her cheek. She was still as cool to the touch as before, but her eyes tracked his every move. “Kahlan, thank the spirits you’re awake. You’re awake…” He wiped away his tears, unable to stop grinning.
She blinked. Her mouth opened and closed several times before she managed to form a word, and then it was less than a whisper.
“Water?”
He lunged for the pitcher, his hands shaking as he filled the little silver cup with water. He sloshed half of it down his front on his way back to her bedside, but it didn’t matter. He lifted her head and held the cup to her lips, but she only managed a few swallows before she stopped drinking and sagged against him, looking utterly exhausted.
“That’s good, Kahlan,” he promised. “You did really good. There’s more when you want it. Don’t try to talk yet. Just rest.” He set the cup down, and picked up her hand to hold. “The rift is sealed. You’re safe. Everyone’s safe. It’s all okay now.”
There was a faint lift to her lips that might have been a smile, it was hard to tell. Already her eyes were drooping shut again, but the hand he was holding exerted a feeble pressure against his own, as if she meant to pull him closer. He squeezed back and settled down at her side to wait with renewed energy. His heart pounding in his chest sounded to him like some sort of joyous drum. If she asked it, he felt quite certain he could fly. Kahlan had opened her eyes.