Nicci gasped inwardly. She felt something vital within her being slowly ripped open. The pain of it sang through the marrow of her bones. She saw darkness layered over the room, and knew she was seeing into another world, the dark world where there would be no more pain.
She began to allow herself to drift toward that world.
And then she saw something in the otherworldly shadows. She caught herself, held herself back from the dark brink of death.
Something with glowing eyes, like twin coals, gazed out from the dark shadows. The malevolent intent of that furnace gaze was fixed on Richard.
Nicci struggled desperately to call out a warning. It cleaved her heart that she could not.
“Look,” Richard whispered as he gazed up at her, “there’s a tear running down her cheek.”
Ann sadly shook her head. “Probably because she isn’t blinking, that’s all.”
Richard’s hands fisted in frustration as he moved around the table, trying to decipher the meaning of the lines. “We have to find a way to shut the thing down. There has to be a way.”
Richard’s grandfather laid a hand gently on the back of Richard’s shoulder. “I swear, Richard, I would do as you want if I could, but I know of no method to halt a verification web. And what is it that has you so firedup, anyway? Why the sudden urgency? What is it that you think is contaminating the spell-form?”
Nicci’s attention was locked on the thing watching out from the shadowy world of the dead. Whenever the lightning flared, illuminating the room, the thing with the glowing eyes wasn’t there. Only when darkness again fell over the room could she see it.
Richard’s eyes turned from studying the lines to gaze up at Nicci’s face. She wanted nothing so much as for him to reach out and pull her free of the agony of the spell that had impaled her on lethal shards of magic, but she knew that he could not. Right then, she would have willingly given up her life for one moment in his arms.
Richard’s answer finally came in a soft resignation. “The chimes.”
Ann rolled her eyes. Nathan let out a sigh of relief, as if he now knew that Richard was merely imagining things.
Zedd’s brow lifted. “The chimes? Richard, I’m afraid that this time you’ve gotten it wrong. That simply isn’t possible. The chimes are underworld elements. While they certainly lust to enter our world, they can’t. They’re forever trapped in the underworld.”
“I know very well what the chimes are,” Richard said in a near whisper. “Kahlan freed them. She freed them to save my life.”
“She couldn’t possibly know how to do such a thing.”
“Nathan told her how, told her their names: Reechani, Sentrosi, Vasi. Water, fire, air. Calling them was the only way for her to save my life. It was an act of desperation.”
Nathan’s mouth fell open in surprise but he offered no argument. Ann cast a suspicious glare up at the prophet.
Zedd spread his hands. “Richard, she may have thought she was calling them, but I assure you, such a thing is monumentally complex. Besides, we would know if the chimes were free in our world. Be at ease about this much of it. The chimes are not loose.”
“Not anymore,” Richard said with grim finality. “I banished them back to the underworld. But Kahlan always believed that because she unknowingly brought them into our world it had engendered the beginning of the destruction of magic itself—the cascade effect, as you once described it to us.”
Zedd was taken aback. “The cascade effect…you could only have heard that from me.”
Richard nodded as he stared off into memories. “She tried to convince me that magic had been tainted by the presence of the chimes, and that banishing them back to the underworld would not halt that taint. I never knew whether or not she was right. Now I do.”
He pointed up at that awful place before Nicci, that core of her pain, her agony, her end.
“There is the proof. Not the chimes, but the
She began to allow herself to drift toward that world.
And then she saw something in the otherworldly shadows. She caught herself, held herself back from the dark brink of death.
Something with glowing eyes, like twin coals, gazed out from the dark shadows. The malevolent intent of that furnace gaze was fixed on Richard.
Nicci struggled desperately to call out a warning. It cleaved her heart that she could not.
“Look,” Richard whispered as he gazed up at her, “there’s a tear running down her cheek.”
Ann sadly shook her head. “Probably because she isn’t blinking, that’s all.”
Richard’s hands fisted in frustration as he moved around the table, trying to decipher the meaning of the lines. “We have to find a way to shut the thing down. There has to be a way.”
Richard’s grandfather laid a hand gently on the back of Richard’s shoulder. “I swear, Richard, I would do as you want if I could, but I know of no method to halt a verification web. And what is it that has you so firedup, anyway? Why the sudden urgency? What is it that you think is contaminating the spell-form?”
Nicci’s attention was locked on the thing watching out from the shadowy world of the dead. Whenever the lightning flared, illuminating the room, the thing with the glowing eyes wasn’t there. Only when darkness again fell over the room could she see it.
Richard’s eyes turned from studying the lines to gaze up at Nicci’s face. She wanted nothing so much as for him to reach out and pull her free of the agony of the spell that had impaled her on lethal shards of magic, but she knew that he could not. Right then, she would have willingly given up her life for one moment in his arms.
Richard’s answer finally came in a soft resignation. “The chimes.”
Ann rolled her eyes. Nathan let out a sigh of relief, as if he now knew that Richard was merely imagining things.
Zedd’s brow lifted. “The chimes? Richard, I’m afraid that this time you’ve gotten it wrong. That simply isn’t possible. The chimes are underworld elements. While they certainly lust to enter our world, they can’t. They’re forever trapped in the underworld.”
“I know very well what the chimes are,” Richard said in a near whisper. “Kahlan freed them. She freed them to save my life.”
“She couldn’t possibly know how to do such a thing.”
“Nathan told her how, told her their names: Reechani, Sentrosi, Vasi. Water, fire, air. Calling them was the only way for her to save my life. It was an act of desperation.”
Nathan’s mouth fell open in surprise but he offered no argument. Ann cast a suspicious glare up at the prophet.
Zedd spread his hands. “Richard, she may have thought she was calling them, but I assure you, such a thing is monumentally complex. Besides, we would know if the chimes were free in our world. Be at ease about this much of it. The chimes are not loose.”
“Not anymore,” Richard said with grim finality. “I banished them back to the underworld. But Kahlan always believed that because she unknowingly brought them into our world it had engendered the beginning of the destruction of magic itself—the cascade effect, as you once described it to us.”
Zedd was taken aback. “The cascade effect…you could only have heard that from me.”
Richard nodded as he stared off into memories. “She tried to convince me that magic had been tainted by the presence of the chimes, and that banishing them back to the underworld would not halt that taint. I never knew whether or not she was right. Now I do.”
He pointed up at that awful place before Nicci, that core of her pain, her agony, her end.
“There is the proof. Not the chimes, but the
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