“Seeing those remains would be more horrific to them than the torment of not knowing what happened to their loved ones. There is nothing we could do that would provide closure for people.”
“So, what are you thinking?”
Richard wiped a hand across his mouth as he briefly considered. As much as he didn’t like the idea of simply leaving the remains down in the lower reaches of the palace, he couldn’t see that there was really any choice. There were catacombs under the palace where a great many people were interred. In a way, the victims were already buried underground.
“Their suffering is over. They are with the good spirits, now,” Richard finally said to the sergeant. “I’d like you to get a group of men together. Have them collect stone and mortar from down in the lower levels. I saw supplies of that kind down there in some of the nearby rooms off the side passageways. Once you have the supplies you’ll need, seal up the entrance to that chamber with the remains.
“Not just a simple wall. Those creatures could probably break through that and go back to using it again. You need to plug up the end of the passageway for a good enough distance that they aren’t ever going to be able to break through it to get back in and use it as a nest. That will be the tomb for all those poor victims.”
Sergeant Barclay nodded. “Then those creatures will know we are on to them, know we have discovered their lair.”
“Good. I want them to know that they aren’t as clever as they thought they were. And at least they won’t be able to continue to hunt in the same way.”
The sergeant tilted his head closer with a serious look. “Lord Rahl, there are many places like that in the lower areas of the palace. They may simply find similar places from which to hunt.”
“Of course they will. We will have to be on the lookout for that now that we know what they were doing. We need to quickly deny them places they use wherever we find them. Maybe we can make them feel like the hunted for a change. We might even be able to kill or capture some of them. In the meantime, seal that chamber as a gravesite.”
The man clapped his fist to his heart. “I will see to it right away, Lord Rahl.”
As the sergeant hurried off through the service area to get a crew to take care of sealing up the tomb, Richard headed in the direction of the double doors that would lead out.
“We need to get up there to meet with the gifted,” he told the others. “They likely will be waiting for us by now.”
“What are you thinking?” Shale asked, sounding suspicious. “What do you want with the gifted?”
Richard paused before opening the doors out of the service area and turned back to the eight grim female faces watching him. Instead of answering her question, he asked her one. “Do you know how to join gifts from different gifted people to create more power?”
He knew that the Sisters of the Light could do it. He had seen it done.
Shale’s smooth brow bunched together a bit. “I’ve never heard of such a thing. But to be fair, the only gifted people I knew were my parents.”
Richard paused in thought for a moment. “That means you may not know how to do what a lot of sorceresses who have been trained are able to do.”
Shale’s lips pursed with displeasure. “Magic is magic.”
“So it is,” he said, offering her a small smile.
Kahlan took his arm and pressed her head against his shoulder as he started off toward the grand staircase. He put an arm around her waist and pulled her close as they went up the first flight to the broad landing where the stairs reversed direction to continue on up.
12
Shale hooked a hand around Richard’s arm to stop him.
“Lord Rahl …” She sounded hesitant. “That sight down there, all those people … it was horrifying.”
Richard frowned, not knowing if she had a point. “It was.”
“Well, the thing is, you hope to be able to stop these predators. In the meantime, our world is steadily heading toward the day when people will be without the protection of your magic and without the Mother Confessor’s magic. If anything should happen to either of you, then the future of our world would be doomed as the protective web of your gift holding all magic together disintegrates.
“The Golden Goddess may never send those of her race to have a big battle in which you can hope to defeat her. She may deny you that opportunity of a conventional war and instead continue to attack as she has been, terrorizing us with continual surprise attacks, maybe even wiping out small towns here and there so that everyone will be in the grip of fear. They will continue to feed on our people. As we wait for an attack that may never come, many more people will go missing, just as those people down in the darkness were missing.
“Your magic is the only thing protecting our world by keeping them cautious. The future survival of this world depends on that magic being preserved. Every day that passes increases the danger that you will be killed and our world would then lose that protection.
“As we learned through Nolo, the Golden Goddess can wait us out. If she chooses, she can wait for you to die of old age. You and the Mother Confessor grow older every day, and with your gifts destined to eventually die out, our world gets closer to dying out with you.”
Richard was absently wondering what kind of gifted might be living at the palace and what abilities they might have that would be able to help them. He was only half listening to Shale ramble on with the obvious. He realized that even though she seemed to be talking a lot without saying much, she was getting at something.
“What of it? What’s your point?” he asked, impatiently, needing to get to the library where the gifted would be gathering.
“Well, to keep any of that from happening, and to have your gifts live on to protect the future of our world, you and the Mother Confessor need to have children. It can’t wait. You must have them now.”
“Children! Now? Are you out of your mind?” Richard blew up in anger, flicking a hand in a gesture toward Kahlan. “I can’t think of anything that could cause us more trouble right now and threaten to bring the sky down on us all, than Kahlan getting pregnant.”
“But—”
“But nothing! You heard what the goddess said about the young and how she lusted to kill them. How can you even suggest that right now?”
“I can suggest it because every day you both get older. Just like everyone else, day by day the time when you can have children dwindles away. You must think of the future. You must have children. I think it’s time.”
“That’s absurd. We’re hardly old enough to suggest that we are running out of time to have children.”
Seeing how angry he was, Shale wisely closed her mouth.
Richard raked his fingers back through his hair, trying to control his temper. “One day? Absolutely. But now? There is nothing that would do more to draw the dedicated ferocity of the Golden Goddess and her kind than us having children.” He shook his head at the very idea, almost too angered by to it speak.
Shale’s prudence ran out. “But Lord Rahl—”
“Tell her!” he suddenly yelled at Kahlan. “Tell her how that would compromise our situation and in all likelihood ensure the destruction of our world! The entire focus of the Golden Goddess would be to hunt down those children and slaughter them. That would unleash such wrath that it would ensure that Kahlan and I would be killed as well. It would be the end of magic in our world. All because of such a foolish impulse at a time like this. Tell her that we can’t put such a notion ahead of us stopping this threat!”