Severed Souls(149)

Richard noticed that for some reason, there were sheets hung on the opposite, long wall, covering something.

“This feels too easy,” Kahlan said as she peered around in the dim, flickering light of the torches.

Zedd’s frequent admonishment came to mind.

“Nothing is ever easy,” Richard said.

He lifted his sword a few inches to check that it was clear before letting it drop back into its scabbard.

“Where’s the entrance to the containment field?” Samantha asked as she looked around. “I don’t see it.”

When Nicci stepped into the room, her light sphere went nearly dark. Richard saw a trace of a frown just beginning to grow on the sorceress’s face.

As soon as she was inside, her frown became more troubled. “This isn’t a containment field,” she said, sounding, now, more than a little suspicious.

“This wouldn’t be it,” Samantha told her. “My mother said that it was through this room.”

“I felt the shields,” Kahlan said.

“Me too,” Samantha added, “so it has to be through here. There must be a doorway, but it’s so dark in here with just one torch, I can’t see much.”

“They were shields,” Nicci agreed, “but I don’t recognize them.”

“Being close to the barrier to the third kingdom, maybe they used occult powers in building this place,” Richard suggested.

Nicci shook her head as she looked around. “There is something about this room…”

“Maybe the opening into the containment field is behind one of these sheets,” Samantha said.

Too eager to wait for her mother to bring more light, and dying of curiosity, she yanked down on one of the filthy, dusty sheets hanging along the far wall. As the sheet fell away in a choking cloud of dust, Richard saw that the sheets had been hung over four sets of shackles spaced evenly along the wall. Each of the four sets of three metal bands on short chains were pinned into the stone wall.

“This isn’t a containment field,” Nicci said in sudden alarm. “This is a dungeon. Those are shields to keep the gifted from using their ability. That’s why the light spheres don’t work in here.”

She spun Kahlan and shoved her toward the door. “Get out! Everyone out!”

That was the last thing Richard heard.

His whole body went numb. He didn’t feel pain, but rather a heavy, thick, tingling sensation spreading through his body to the tips of his fingers and toes.

He realized that he was on his knees but didn’t remember falling. He couldn’t hear anything.

His vision dimmed as he felt intense pressure, as if thumbs were being pressed against his eyeballs. It was the only pain he felt. Everything else was numb.

In his fading vision, Richard thought that the room had tilted sideways. He realized, then, that he was lying on his side, curled up in a ball. Kahlan, Nicci, and Samantha were all on the ground, curled into fetal positions, shaking violently from head to toe.

Richard was barely able to discern through shadowy, blurred vision that the dust on the sheet at the end of the room billowed up as it was thrown back.

He tried to pull his sword, but he couldn’t feel his fingers. Worse, his arms didn’t work. Despite his best effort, he couldn’t move them. His whole body was going completely numb and unresponsive. He couldn’t even tell if he still had a body, or if he was being pulled into the world of the dead.

He heard the faintest sound, and realized that he was hearing himself screaming.

He thought he could just see someone at the end of the room.

Then, even the screaming sound ceased to exist as a heavy blackness settled through him. All awareness went dark as he lost consciousness.





CHAPTER

74

When Richard opened his eyes, he couldn’t see anything. He was in total blackness. His eyes hurt from what felt like intense pressure that had been pushing against them. He felt a rising sense of panic, fearing that he had been blinded.

He tried to move, but found that he could only move a little. He was restrained. He looked to the right, but what seemed to be a tall, rough iron collar cut into his flesh under his jaw if he turned his head too far.

His vision gradually began to return. Looking to the side as best he could, he was just able to see Kahlan out of the corner of his eye. Like Richard, she, too, hung by an iron band around her neck and manacles on her wrists. She appeared unconscious. The chains attached to the collars and the manacles were pinned into the stone wall and so short that they only allowed the captive to slump a little, but not sit.

Richard was beside himself with worry at the way Kahlan hung by the collar and manacles. She looked lifeless.

He turned his head the other way, to the left, blinking, trying to clear his vision, and saw that Nicci was similarly restrained. Beyond her, Richard could just make out some black hair and knew that Samantha also hung in the iron restraints.