“So, you see, it wasn’t an attempt to kill you, but instead I went to a great deal of trouble to get you right to the spot where I wanted you. As I have told you, I don’t want to harm you, but to simply eliminate the little monsters you carry.
“Unfortunately, Richard destroyed my winter palace. Now, I want you to finish the journey into my home of Agaden Reach, where you will be taken care of until you give birth. After that, you will be free to go. But like I say, if you are too difficult about it …”
Shota touched a finger to Kahlan’s belly. She gasped with a sudden, powerful contraction. The pain was so intense that it doubled her over as Shota followed her down to continue holding the finger on her swollen belly.
“… then I will simply have you miscarry right here and now and be done with it. So what is it going to be, Mother Confessor? Do you want to finish the journey and give birth in comfort and with help? Or do you want to simply miscarry right here and bleed to death on this mountainside?”
Shota removed her finger. When she did, Kahlan sucked in a breath and a cry of agony. At last, the painful contraction eased.
“All right, you win,” Kahlan said, swallowing between pants as she caught her breath. “I won’t cause any more trouble. I will go willingly.”
Shota stared long and hard into Kahlan’s eyes as if to satisfy herself that Kahlan meant it before slowly nodding.
“Smart girl. Now, no more nonsense. We will not be stopping.” The witch woman lifted an arm to point. “It grows dark, but the tree line is right there. Out of the woods and in the open, with the moonlight reflecting off the snowcaps, there will be plenty of light to allow us to continue.
“We will walk the rest of the night to cross that snowcap, and then in the morning we will reach the swamp that guards my home. Once through that foul place, we will head down into my beautiful home of Agaden Reach. It will be warm, and you will be able to rest until you deliver. But for now, we push on.”
Kahlan was still experiencing stitches of pain, although they were easing. She felt helpless. She feared that what Shota did might harm the babies. She didn’t want her to do anything like it again.
She nodded her agreement.
Shota looked around at all the witches seeming to hang on her every word, Shale among them. Shota gestured with a flick of her hand. “Let’s get moving. Now.”
Kahlan had been well aware that Shota had shown no fear of being within range of her Confessor’s power. More worrisome, she could feel a subtle difference in the restraint that she always had to exert on that power within herself, lest it be unleashed accidentally. The coiled fury of the power felt … muted. It was as if that restraint had clamped down tight when Shota had finally established the coven with all thirteen witches.
When Shota glared at her, waiting, Kahlan grabbed a root for a handhold and started climbing, following after the rest of them, with Nea right behind.
Something fundamental in the back of Kahlan’s mind was bothering her. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but she knew that the pieces didn’t fit. Something didn’t ring true, didn’t add up, didn’t make sense, but she couldn’t quite reach it. Despite her best efforts to pull that question out of the dark reaches of her mind to examine possible answers, it remained just out of her grasp.
She knew, though, that if she thought on it long enough, it would come to her.
34
Not long after dawn, after a long and difficult night of crossing the frigid, windswept lower slopes of the spires that formed the formidable wreath of thorns protecting Agaden Reach, Kahlan and the witches guarding her finally started a difficult descent. Initially, they trudged through deep snow to make their way down the slopes. They had to avoid what looked like easier travel over open rock because it was mostly covered with black ice. The snow at least kept them from slipping and falling out on the sloping granite ledges where they could easily crack their skulls if they fell wrong.
To avoid the danger of the slippery ice-covered rock, they instead had to plow down through the snow that collected between massive fingers of rock jutting up all around. It was not only a more difficult route, but a more dangerous one because of how steep it was in those white rivers of snow. There were times when Kahlan thought she might not survive the steep drops they sometimes had to slide down. A few of the witch women fell during those descents and tumbled a long way before recovering their footing.
Like the rest of them, Kahlan had to aim for the upright columns of rock and then slam her feet against the rock to break the slide and keep from accelerating and being carried over a cliff. Some of the others, like the sour-faced bull of a witch, were quite awkward at it, but they all made it. After using the tall stacks of open rock at the end of each of those runs down, they then had to traverse the slope to make it over to the next one that didn’t end in a sheer drop where they would fall to their death.
Anyone attempting to get into Agaden Reach who didn’t know the proper route through the maze of towering rock outcroppings would have a difficult if not impossible task to find the one true way down the dangerous slopes. Taking a wrong turn on the way down, one that might look good at first, if it didn’t turn out to be a dead end could instead turn out to be a place where it would be impossible to stop, with nothing below for thousands of feet. It was just another of the many hazards protecting Agaden Reach.
Kahlan’s teeth chattered the whole time they were out on the moon-lit, open ledges below the snowpack. But the worst of the cold had been crossing the snow. She had been so cold it made her hurt all over and gave her a crushing headache.
The muscles of her legs burned from the effort of the controlled falls down through the fingers of snow and then, once below them, hiking down off the steeply sloping shelves of open granite, then over and through debris fields of boulders and the jumble of fallen rock. Her ankles felt like they were about to give out, but she knew she had to keep going if she was to have any hope for the twins to survive.
She didn’t know how she would save their lives once they got down into Agaden Reach, she only knew she would have to find a way. She knew she couldn’t count on Richard showing up. It was going to have to be up to her.
When the sun was finally up, they at last entered the dark woods, where they were at least sheltered from the cold wind. As they moved down through the steep, forested mountainside, it gradually began to grow warmer. The farther they went, the warmer it got, until Kahlan’s teeth finally stopped chattering and she didn’t have to hunch her shoulders.
After a few more hours of making their way lower through tangled growths of tightly packed thickets of saplings and snarled vines, they at last reached the flat, swampy area that guarded the entrance to Agaden Reach.
Even though the sun had come up, it was dark and gloomy among the massive trees and vegetation, which grew thicker the farther in they went. Kahlan had always thought of this place as a moat, like those around some fortress castles, except this one protected Shota’s home and was far more dangerous than any simple moat.