Title: Snow
Author: alyse
Fandom: Legend of the Seeker
Spoilers: Set during the last ep of Season 1
Pairings: Kahlan/Rahl, Kahlan/Richard
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Legend of the Seeker (TV) belongs to ABC Studios and Disney. No copyright infringement is intended. This is fanfiction, written solely for the love of the show
Author's Notes: Written for the
legendland snow challenge.
Summary: Richard disappears in the summer, when the days are longest, full of promise.
-o-
Richard disappears in the summer, when the days are longest, full of promise, with the bounty of the autumn harvest to come.
With him gone, all of the light disappears from Kahlan's world. She's frozen long before winter blows in.
The People's Palace is cool even in summer, white marble corridors stretching out in front of her and echoing behind her. She pulls on the pretty velvet slippers that Rahl has bought for her in place of her boots. No matter where she walks now, the ground is cold and hard, unforgiving beneath her feet.
The first swirling snows of winter are a relief. The winds that bring them howl around the Palace's spires, moaning in the dead of night. Rahl's palace cannot shut out all of the drafts, and he fusses and frets over her solicitously, each word that falls from his lips dripping more of his poison, for all his caring façade. If she cared, it would drive her to distraction.
Instead she simply ignores him, staring out of the windows into the darkness. The glass is frosted on the inside, in spite of the fire roaring in every grate. She finds no comfort in the delicate designs that blossom and bloom in the barrenness of winter. She finds no comfort in the warmth of the fire or in Rahl's honeyed, treacherous words.
The snow outside is beautiful, pristine and white, untouched past the palace courtyard. Snow blankets the forests, muffling every sound until it seems as though the very world has taken in a breath and is holding it, waiting for spring, waiting for the thaw.
Kahlan sits and stares at it for hours; in winter the world is deceptively peaceful, all of the landscape's imperfections smoothed out until nothing is left but a rolling carpet of white.
This is what Kahlan finds comfort in, this blanket the muffles every sound, that freezes all who venture out into it, sending them deeply into a sleep from which they'll never awaken.
Rahl's child is already swelling in her belly. Her daughter will bring a storm with her, the likes of which Rahl has never seen, and it will wipe the world clean.