Soul of the Fire (15 page)

It occurred to her that Richard was doing that very thing: searching alone, because no one believed him.

Reluctantly, the men agreed and scattered in different directions, vanishing into the darkness. Without cumbersome boots, they didn’t have the time she did navigating the mud.

Kahlan pulled off her boots and tossed them back by the door to the spirit house. She smiled to herself at having outwitted that much of the mud.

There were any number of women back in Aydindril, from nobility, to officials, to wives of officials, who, if they could have seen the Mother Confessor at that moment, barefoot, ankle deep in mud, and soaked to the skin, would have fainted.

Kahlan slopped out into the mud, trying to imagine if Richard would have any method to his search. Richard rarely did anything without reason. How would he go about searching the entire village by himself in the dark?

Kahlan reconsidered her first thought, that he was searching for the chicken. Maybe he realized that the things she, Zedd, and Ann said made sense. Maybe he wasn’t looking for a chicken. But then what was he doing out in the middle of the night?

Rain pelted her scalp, running down her neck and back, making her shiver. Her long hair, which she had so laboriously dried and brushed, was now again loaded with water. Her shirt clung to her like a second skin. A miserably cold one.

Where would Richard have gone?

Kahlan paused and held up the candle.

Juni.

Maybe he went to see Juni. She felt a stab of heartache; maybe he had gone to look at the dead baby. He might have wanted to go grieve for both.

That would be something Richard would do. He might have wanted to pray to the good spirits on behalf of the two souls new to the spirit world. Richard would do that.

Kahlan walked under an unseen streamlet of icy cold runoff from a roof, gasping as it caught her in her face, dousing the front of her. She pulled back wet strands of hair and spat some out of her mouth as she moved on. Having to hold up the candle in the frigid rain was numbing her fingers.

She searched carefully in the dark, trying to tell exactly where she was, to confirm she was going the right way. She found a familiar low wall with three herb pots. No one lived anywhere near; they were the herbs grown for the evil spirits housed not far away. She knew the way from there.

A little farther and then around a corner she found the door to the house for the dead. Fumbling with unfeeling fingers, she located the latch. The door, swollen in the rain, stuck enough to squeak. She stepped through the doorway and eased closed the door behind her.

“
Richard? Richard, are you in here?”

No answer. She held up the candle. With her other hand she covered her nose against the smell. She could taste the stink on her tongue.

Light from her candle’s little window fell across the platform with the tiny body. She stepped closer, wincing when she felt a hard bug pop under her bare foot, but the tragedy lying there on the platform before her immediately deadened her care.

The sight held her immobilized. Little arms were frozen in space. Legs were stiff, with just an inch of air under the heels. Tiny hands cupped open. Such wee little fingers seemed impossible.

Kahlan felt a lump swell in her throat. She covered her mouth to stifle the unexpected cry for the might-have-been. The poor thing. The poor mother.

Behind, she heard an odd repetitious sound. As she stared at the little lifeless form, she idly tried to make sense of the soft staccato smacking. It paused. It started. It paused again. She absently dismissed it as the drip of water.

Unable to resist, Kahlan reached out. She tenderly settled her finger into the cup of the tiny hand. Her single finger was all the palm would hold. She almost expected the fingers to close around hers. But they didn’t.

She stifled another sob, feeling a tear roll down her cheek. She felt so sorry for the mother. Kahlan had seen so much death, so many bodies, she didn’t know why this one should affect her so, but it did.

She broke down and wept over the unnamed child. In the lonely house for the dead, her heart poured out for this life unlived, this vessel delivered into the world without a soul.

The sound behind at last intruded sufficiently that she turned to see what disturbed her prayer to the good spirits.

Kahlan gasped in her sob with a backward cry.

There, standing on Juni’s chest, was a chicken.

It was pecking out Juni’s eyes.

Kahlan wanted to chase the chicken away from the body, but she couldn’t seem to make herself do so. The chicken’s eye rolled to watch her as it pecked.

Thwack thwack thwack. Thwack. Thwack. That was the sound she had heard.

“
Shoo!” She flicked a hand out toward the bird. “Shoo!”

It must have come for the bugs. That was why it was in there. For the bugs.

Somehow, she couldn’t make herself believe it.

“
Shoo! Leave him alone!”

Hissing, hackles lifting, the chicken’s head rose.

Kahlan pulled back.

Its claws digging into stiff dead flesh, the chicken slowly turned to face her. It cocked its head, making its comb flop, its wattles sway.

“
Shoo,” Kahlan heard herself whisper.

There wasn’t enough light, and besides, the side of its beak was covered with gore, so she couldn’t tell if it had the dark spot. But she didn’t need to see it.

“
Dear spirits, help me,” she prayed under her breath.

The bird let out a slow chicken cackle. It sounded like a chicken, but in her heart she knew it wasn’t.

In that instant, she completely understood the concept of a chicken that was not a chicken. This looked like a chicken, like most of the Mud People’s chickens. But this was no chicken.

This was evil manifest.

She could feel it with visceral certitude. This was something as obscene as death’s own grin.

With one hand, Kahlan wrung her shirt closed at her throat. She was jammed so hard back against the platform with the baby’s body she wondered if she might topple the solid mortared mass.

Her instinct was to lash out and touch the vile thing with her Confessor’s power. Her magic destroyed forever the essence of a person, creating in the void a total and unqualified devotion to the Confessor. In that way, those condemned to death truthfully confessed their heinous crimes—or their innocence. It was an ultimate means of witnessing the veracity of justice.

There was no immunity to the touch of a Confessor. It was as absolute as it was final. Even the most maniacal murderer had a soul and so was vulnerable.

Her power, her magic, was also a weapon of defense. But it would only work on people. It would not work on a chicken. And it would not work on wickedness incarnate.

Her gaze flicked toward the door, checking the distance. The chicken took a single hop toward her. Claws gripping Juni’s upper arm, it leaned her way. Her leg muscles tightened till they trembled.

The chicken backed a step, tensed, and spurted feces onto Juni’s face.

It let out the cackle that sounded like a laugh.

She dearly wished she could tell herself she was being silly. Imagining things.

But she knew better.

Much as her power would not work to destroy this thing, she sensed, too, that her ostensible size and strength were meaningless against this thing. Far better, she thought, just to get out.

More than anything, that was what she wanted: out.

A fat brown bug scurried up her arm. She let out a clipped cry as she smacked it off. She shuffled a step toward the door.

The chicken leaped off Juni, landing before the door.

Kahlan frantically tried to think as the chicken bawk-bawk-bawked. It pecked up the bug she had flicked off her arm. After downing the bug, it turned to look up at her, its head cocking this way, then that, its wattles swinging.

Kahlan eyed the door. She tried to reason how best to get out. Kick the chicken out of the way? Try to frighten it away from the door? Ignore it and try to walk past it?

She remembered what Richard said.
“Juni spat at the honor of whatever killed that chicken. Not long after, Juni died. I threw a stick at the chicken in the window, and not long after, it attacked that little boy. It was my fault Ungi got clawed. I don’t want to make the same mistake again.”

She didn’t want to make that mistake. This thing could fly at her face. Scratch her eyes out. Use its spur to tear open the carotid artery at the side of her neck. Bleed her to death. Who knew how strong it really was, what it might be able to do.

Richard had been adamant about everyone being courteous to the chickens. Suddenly Kahlan’s life or death hung on Richard’s words. Only a short time before she had thought them foolish. Now, she was weighing her chances, marking her choices, by what Richard had said.

“
Oh, Richard,” she implored in a whisper, “forgive me.”

She felt something on her toes. A quick glance was not enough in the dim light to see for sure, but she thought she saw bugs crawling over her feet. She felt one scurry up her ankle, up under her pant leg. She stamped her foot. The bug clung tight.

She bent to swat at the thing under her pant leg. She wanted it off. She smacked too hard, squashing it against her shin.

She straightened in a rush to swipe at things crawling in her hair. She yelped when a centipede bit the back of her hand. She shook it off. As it hit the floor, the chicken plucked it up and ate it.

With a flap of wings, the chicken suddenly sprang back up on top of Juni. Claws working with luxuriant excess, it turned slowly atop the body to peer at her. One black eye watched with icy interest. Kahlan slipped one foot toward the door.

“
Mother,” the chicken croaked.

Kahlan flinched with a cry.

She tried to slow her breathing. Her heart hammered so hard it felt like her neck must be bulging. Flesh scraped from her fingers as they gripped at the rough platform behind.

It must have made a sound that sounded like the word “Mother.” She was the Mother Confessor, and was used to hearing the word “Mother.” She was simply frightened and had imagined it.

She yelped again when something bit her ankle. Flailing at a bug running under her shirtsleeve, she accidentally swatted the candle off the platform behind her. It hit the dirt floor with a clink.

In an instant, the room fell pitch black.

She spun around, scraping madly at something wriggling up between her shoulder blades, under her hair. By the weight, and the squeak, it had to be a mouse. Mercifully, as she twisted and whirled about, it was flung off.

Kahlan froze. She tried to hear if the chicken had moved, if it had jumped to the floor. The room was dead silent except for the rapid whooshing of her heart in her ears.

She began shuffling toward the door. As she scuffed through the fetid straw, she dearly wished she had worn her boots. The stench was gagging. She didn’t think she would ever feel clean again. She didn’t care, though, if she could just get out alive.

In the dark, the chicken thing let out a low chicken cackle laugh.

It hadn’t come from where she expected the chicken to be. It was behind her.

“
Please, I mean no harm,” she called into the darkness. “I mean no disrespect. I will leave you to your business now, if that’s all right with you.”

She took another shuffling step toward the door. She moved carefully, slowly, in case the chicken thing was in the way. She didn’t want to bump into it and make it angry. She mustn’t underestimate it.

Kahlan had on any number of occasions thrown herself with ferocity against seemingly invincible foes. She knew well the value of a resolute violent attack. But she also somehow knew beyond doubt that this adversary could, if it wanted, kill her as easily as she could wring a real chicken’s neck. If she forced a fight, this was one she would lose.

Her shoulder touched the wall. She slid a hand along the plastered mud brick, groping blindly for the door. It wasn’t there. She felt along the wall in each direction. There was no door.

That was crazy. She had come in through the door. There had to be a door. The chicken thing let out a whispering cackle.