The Omen Machine

The ambassador hung his head. “I’m sorry, Lord Rahl, but it is our lives and we choose to use what ever tools we can to preserve life. This is what we decided, and the reason many of the representatives are leaving. Some are already gone. Some are leaving as we speak. Some are packing now and will be leaving yet tonight.”

“You among them, Ambassador?”

He nodded as he tugged on his beard again. “Yes, Lord Rahl. Please do not think of it as turning away from you, but rather as wanting to open our ears to listen to a man who will reveal the dark secrets of prophecy to us.”

Dark secrets. Richard was at his wits’ end with the darkness that had come into the palace since that day he found the machine that issued prophecy.

Richard stood not far from a dead queen, her death predicted by the prophecy on the metal strip in his pocket. He was filled with a swirl of emotions. He thought it best to keep them to himself, especially the one wishing he could give all this up and go back to Hartland and work as a simple woods guide.

“I understand, Ambassador. I hope that you and the others will one day come to see my reasoning, and why I believe it must be as the Mother Confessor and I have said it must. You and the others are welcome to return to the palace if you have a change of heart.”

The man bowed his head again and then, after one more quick glance at the queen lying dead nearby, turned and left.

On his way out, he passed Nicci on her way in. She looked uncharacteristically gloomy. She cast a brief glance at the dead queen as she was being wrapped in a shroud before being lifted onto a litter and taken away for burial. Out in the hall a quiet group of the cleaning staff were standing solemnly by to come in and scrub the place clean of all the blood.

“I hear that she was killed by a Mord-Sith,” Nicci said.

“I’m happy to have any of us admit to killing,” Cara said, “but only when we have actually done it.”

She was in a foul mood and Richard couldn’t say he blamed her. His own mood wasn’t really any better.

Nicci didn’t look to want to debate the subject. She looked like she had something on her mind.

“What is it?” he asked.

Nicci briefly gazed into his eyes. “First of all, I want you to know that I just came from your room. Kahlan is sleeping peacefully. I personally checked the room for anything out of place, anything out of the ordinary, any traces of magic of any kind, any problem at all. Kahlan slept peacefully through it all. Then I checked all the men guarding the room and the area. Rikka and Berdine were in the corridors. I told them to keep their eyes open for anything that seemed even slightly odd, any sign at all of anything.”

Richard frowned. “What’s going on?”

Her resolute gaze met his. “I was with Zedd, down with the machine, when it started softly, slowly, the way you described. It built speed, then it inscribed a prophecy on a metal strip. The strip came out cool, like you told us it did when the machine then said that it had had dreams. It then went quiet and still again. Zedd is staying down with it in case it issues any more omens. He asked me to bring the strip it inscribed to you. On the way, when I checked on Kahlan, like I told you, I asked Berdine to translate the strip for me.”

Richard was getting seriously suspicious. “So what does this one say?”

She took a breath to steel herself and then handed him the strip. “I would rather you translate it yourself. I don’t wish to be the messenger in this.”

Frowning, Richard took the strip and looked at the one rather simple emblem on the strip, followed by a more complex element.

He felt blood rush to his face in hot rage.

The strip said The hounds will take her from you.

He clenched his jaw. “That’s it, I’ve had it with that machine. I want it destroyed!”

As he headed for the door, Nicci and Cara raced to catch up with him.

CHAPTER 66

Kahlan woke to the feel of warm breath on her face. It made absolutely no sense.

The alarm of her inner voice warned her to keep her eyes closed and to remain perfectly still.

She frantically tried to understand what was going on, but she couldn’t make sense of it. She knew that it wasn’t Richard. He was worried about her and would never do something that would frighten her, especially when she was not feeling well.

Her left arm hurt. She only dimly recalled Zedd putting something on it and wrapping it in bandages. But her arm was not the immediate problem.

Her experience during the war, and even more, her training and experience as a Confessor, automatically took over. She ignored her still-throbbing headache, her nausea, the ache of her arm, and put her full focus on the problem at hand. Without opening her eyes, or moving, or changing her breathing, Kahlan began to take assessment.