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seriousficTitle: We're a long way from home and home is a long way from us
Fandom: Legend of the Seeker
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3,259
Characters/Pairings: Cara/Triana, Cara/Dahlia, Richard/Kahlan, Berdine/Raina
Author’s notes: Betaed by the lovely and talented![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
susurrusnight
Previous: Part 12
Next: Part 14
Summary: Cara has a habit of falling in love with the wrong person. It's an odd flaw for a Mord'Sith to have.
Once again, Dahlia found she didn’t know what to do with herself. The feeling usually passed quickly. This time it didn’t. She added wood to the fire, but it didn't warm her. Nor did the sight of Cara sleeping. She had to tell her something, give her some last comfort to take with her to Darken Rahl. It was weak and pathetic, but it was how she felt.
Morning came faster than Dahlia could've believed. Despite her insomnia, she didn't feel tired. She was in a haze that was beyond sleep, but through it, she could sense Cara waking up, a subtle feeling like the temperature had gone up five degrees.
Cara opened her eyes, already focused on Dahlia. "Good morning."
Dahlia kept her eyes on the rabbit she was cooking, not wanting the image of a sleeping, peaceful Cara to fade. "Morning."
Cara levered herself up, eyes scanning for disturbances, mouth a different story. "I had a dream last night."
"Oh?" Dahlia's brow furrowed. Was Cara trying to psych her out or was this… smalltalk?
"I dreamed that on the day I was taken, you were taken too. We became Mord'Sith together. We were never parted."
"What a nightmare."
Cara crossed over to the fire-pit. "Dahlia, look at me." She did. Cara smoothed the dress over her body. She didn't look as uncomfortable in it as she had last night. "I don't want to be a Mord'Sith. I want to be gentle. I want to be in love."
Dahlia stood. It didn't help. Cara's gaze was more pressing and direct than Dahlia had ever seen it. "I can't help you."
"You already have." She stepped closer, body melding with Dahlia's, her eyes inescapable. "You'll die someday. Serve the Keeper then. For now, live. Renounce the Keeper. Serve the Creator. Serve me."
Dahlia didn't know what to say. So she just stood there as Cara kissed her.
The kiss really wasn't like Cara at all. Dahlia wondered if Kahlan had taught it to her.
Cara pulled back and looked at Dahlia. That same look Dahlia had seen so many times, Cara probing for weaknesses, but different now. Everything was different now.
"Don't say anything," Cara told her. "Not if you don't have to. Other people say things in the heat of the moment; they make promises they can't keep. We're smarter than that." But as she gathered her things, Dahlia could see there was something she'd wanted to hear.
She gave Cara the next best thing. "The Keeper came to me in a dream. He told me where to go."
***
Dahlia mollified the knowledge that soon she would be parted from Cara by attempting to learn as much about her, from her, as she could while Cara was still with her. It was an idiosyncratic process. Little of what she learned was applicable, but it still struck her as vastly important.
Take the way Cara ran, for instance. When Dahlia ran, she kept her eyes on the distance, smoothly ferreting out possible obstacles and making lithe course corrections to avoid them while still keeping to the shortest distance between her origin and her destination.
Cara didn't. She seemed to run straight and true, and everything just seemed to get out of her way. Then she stopped. They'd come to a cut-off in the woodlands, a bluff overlooking a long expanse of grassland. Cara climbed onto a rocky outcropping and added to the rip she'd made in her skirt to run. Dahlia watched the sweat glisten on her legs and hated the Creator for making such an imperfect world.
"Are we close?" Cara asked, taking a drink from a waterskin before offering it to Dahlia.
Dahlia took it. "Very close." She drank, feeling Cara's eyes on her as her thirst died away. "What did you do, Cara? When Darken Rahl asked you to do all those things that made you a monster, what did you do?"
Cara looked at her like it was the most foolish question in existence. "I obeyed. Because he was the Lord Rahl, and I trusted him. And then I spent a few years hating myself and not knowing why. And one day I realized I could’ve said no. After that, the only way to live with myself was to start saying no."
Like a building crumbling after its support beams snapped, Dahlia fell upon Cara. Her arms winded around Cara and her face burrowed into pale, exposed skin now browning in the sun after so much time under leather.
Dahlia felt Cara tense, as if she knew the embrace for the trap it was, but then she gave in.
"I'll take that as a yes."
Then Cara felt Dahlia's head shake against her shoulder. Dahlia pulled back, paused, then moved in. Her lips parted as they approached Cara's.
“I’m sorry.”
The arrow hit Cara in back of the shoulder, just aside her spine. She stiffened, breath retreating from her lungs, eyes opening to show all their whites. Her hands had already grasped her Agiels, but before they could be drawn, a war wizard tackled her to the ground.
Dahlia knelt down beside her, unstrapping the Agiels and pulling away their holsters.
On the other side of Cara, Darken Rahl knelt down to pry the arrow from her flesh. "I must admit, I was always a little bemused by the efficiency of my Mord'Sith. All it takes is a sharp piece of rock and a little distraction, and here we are."
Dahlia flung the Agiels over the bluff. Hateful things. “Make it quick. You owe her that much.”
“Owe?” Rahl tapped the war wizard on the shoulder and gestured for him to pull Cara up. “I’ll give her exactly what she’s owed.”
***
They'd already picked out a spot. Two trees grew close enough together for Cara to be strung up between them. Darken Rahl tied her up himself, tightening the ropes until they cut off her circulation. Cara murmured as her skin was rubbed raw, but her eyes stayed locked on Dahlia.
Dahlia watched Rahl as he tied each knot with monomaniacal precision. This wasn’t about D'Hara and the Midlands, it was about him and her. It was a blood feud. And this wasn’t an execution either. It was vengeance. Cara had hurt Rahl, and now Rahl would return that pain. Dahlia wished she could be surprised.
"It's not too late, you know," Rahl said, testing the rope for any slack. "We can go back to the way things were."
Cara smiled at him like he was the one in bondage. "And how would you be sure I wouldn't put an Agiel in your back first chance I get?"
"I have ways."
Cara's smile was fixed. "Kill me. Just kill me."
Rahl let out a long-suffering sigh and moved away. "I'll leave you two alone," he said to Dahlia, bringing her to Cara's attention. "I have some guests to attend to."
As he walked away, green light flashed; his magic taking him away. Dahlia didn't watch. Her eyes were on Cara.
They were alone, except for the war wizard, who didn't count. He stared off into the distance, and every few minutes a tree burst into flame near him. His eyes, glazed over as they were, seemed to follow the smoke.
Cara stood there, not pulling against the ropes but sagging in their grip. It hurt, having her arms extended, but she was tired of standing on her feet. And pain was something it looked as if she would have to get used to, all over again.
Betrayed by Dahlia. Captured by Darken Rahl. Déjà vu. And what a flaw for a Mord'Sith to have, anyway. Always managing to fall in love with the wrong person.
She looked at Dahlia. Still beautiful. Not smug in her victory, but as remorseful as a martyr. A fanatic's sorrow, that the sinful world had driven her to this.
"If you ever loved me," Cara said. "You'd put your dacra through my heart right now. I'd consider it a personal favor."
Dahlia, thrown off-balance, launched into speech without preamble. "Rahl is going to hurt you. There is no changing that, you've angered him profoundly. But once you've gotten past that…"
"Once I've gotten past being broken again? You'll pick up the pieces and sew me back together and have a nice little Cara-doll to play with. And you and me and Darken Rahl will be one happy family. I'll die first, Dahlia. I'll make him kill me."
Dahlia stepped out of Cara's view, only to return from behind, wrapping her arms around Cara's waist and pulling her up so her arms weren't under strain. Cara closed her eyes against the intimacy of it all.
"Please," Dahlia pleaded. "Please come back to me. Please don't give up."
"I haven't given up," Cara said, no anger in her voice. No anything in her voice. "I've learned."
***
Dahlia walked away. For ten minutes she strolled through the forest, until she couldn't smell the smoke off the trees her ally was burning just for the flames. She thought of how wonderful it would be once Cara… was cured of her stubbornness. Whatever reward the Keeper bestowed upon her for her service, she would split it with Cara. Being together would almost be a life worth living. As close as a breathing soul could come to a perfect world.
She walked back. Cara was once more a dead weight on her bonds, breathing hard now with the effort of filling her lungs. Dahlia pulled her up to her feet and Cara mercifully stayed there, staring at Dahlia
"I'm sorry," Dahlia said.
"No, you're not!" Cara snapped. Then, with that same fire, "If I get out of these ropes, then you will be."
"The way you kissed me…" Dahlia said, and that shut Cara up. "The way you loved me. I'm not worthy of that love."
Cara looked away, tired of talk. Dahlia stepped closer to her.
"No one is, Cara. Not one soul. Wouldn't it be better for everyone if we all just stopped hurting each other and… went to sleep?"
Cara looked Dahlia in the eye. "Kahlan deserves love. Richard deserves love. And if you hate the world so much, cut me loose. I'll help you leave."
A strand of hair had fallen over Cara's face. To busy herself, Dahlia tucked it behind Cara's ear. "Soon, you’ll thank me for this. You’ll love me for this."
She turned away to take another break from Cara's stare.
"I loved you before," Cara said.
***
Hours passed until… Green flames. A whisper of robes. Darken Rahl strode back into the clearing, turning a simple Agiel over in his hands. "Hello again, Cara. Emperor Jagang sends his regards."
Cara muttered under her breath. It was only when Rahl got closer that he heard what she was saying. He beckoned Dahlia closer to hear it too.
"Master Rahl guide us. Master Rahl teach us. Master Rahl protect us. In your light we thrive. In your mercy we are sheltered. In your wisdom we are humbled. We live only to serve. Our lives are yours."
Dahlia brightened, a genuine smile blooming under her veil.
Rahl reached out to caress Cara's face. "My child."
She looked up sharply, breaking the chant. "I wasn't talking to you."
Unshaken, Rahl pulled his hand back and let it swing from side to side, catching Cara at the apex of its arc. Her head rocked to the side. She began the chant again.
Darken Rahl turned to the war wizard, stopping him before he added to the collection of ashes where once there'd been a copse. "Leave us. This is D'Haran business."
Green flame obliterated the war wizard from sight, throwing Rahl's smile into sick relief.
"She was working for you all along," Cara said, pointedly not looking at Dahlia.
"No. I was working for the Keeper all along. Really now, how did you expect him to take the land of the living? You used the Stone of Tears. You sealed the rifts. Destroying the world is no longer an option. But ruling it, in his name, by his mandate…" Rahl spread his arms wide. "Well. Better some souls than none at all. And this way, there will always be someone to fear the Keeper."
"You used me," Cara said. "Once I got her into the castle, she let in the soul sylphs."
"Yes. And now I have my arch-enemy in chains, my queen waiting to be wed… you call her Mother Confessor, but Lady Rahl will be a much greater honor… and you. Cara. Just waiting to be shown the light."
Cara looked him in the eye. "Rahl. Kill me now. Because when I claw and scratch and dig my way out of the Underworld to kill you, I won't be able to cause as much pain to you as I will alive."
Rahl smirked and held up the Agiel. "Do you know what this is, Cara?"
"Better than you could possibly imagine."
"Then imagine, for a moment, that this had more power than the simple spell cast on a simple leather rod. Imagine if it was enhanced by all the spirits of all the lives you've taken. All the people who've died, in pain, in violence, because of you. Just imagine if they had a chance for revenge." He moved in close, whispering in her ear like a lover. "You'll break. You won't have a choice."
He extracted a scroll from his sleeve and handed it to Dahlia. "Read. Invest your Han in it."
Holding the scroll up so it blocked Cara's face, Dahlia read the words even as they seemed to squirm on the vellum, like butterflies pinned to a collection. "Udun, udun oda—udun oda ada, malfis…"
The Agiel floated out of Rahl's hand. Where the light hit it, it now seemed to give off a faintly green glow.
Cara stared at Rahl steadfastly. "You should kill me now. I bore easily."
"I would, only you people have the stubborn habit of getting better. So I'm breaking you, Cara. I'm breaking you like I should've done when you were a child."
"You should do comedy more often. You're good at it."
"Keep going," Rahl said calmly; this directed at Dahlia, who had faltered uncertainly. She'd felt the sting of an Agiel before. They were meant to break people. What would an Agiel meant to break Mord'Sith feel like? How much would it hurt?
She started to read again.
"Can I ask a question, Darken? Before you break me?" Cara's last words were full to the brim with sarcasm.
Rahl smiled indulgently at her. "Anything."
Dahlia continued the chant.
Cara smiled back at Rahl. "For the longest time, I thought my father betrayed me. It wasn't until recently that I learned that was a lie told to me by your Mord'Sith."
"Would you like to know if that was my idea? I did come up with so many ways to improve the Mord'Sith. In fact, in another life, I think I'd have made a good one myself."
"No. I don't really care," Cara said. "It's been so long that I've forgotten all that bitterness I used to hold for my father. All I remember now is how he loved me. But your father… he conceived a child solely to kill you."
"Keep going," Rahl said, his voice chilled. Dahlia had faltered again.
"I suppose you can forget about that… your own father, wishing you dead. After all, the House of Rahl is like that. No room for the weak. Kill or be killed. But I met Panis Rahl. He was a good man, trying to make amends for the sins of his youth… and his dying words were about how he wished he had killed you when he had the chance. You. His firstborn son. So, since my father loved me until the very end, I would like to know… what's it like to live without a father's love?"
Rahl stared at her for a moment, expressionless. In fact, it was that very lack of affect that showed her she had skewered him. He was frozen, without answer, without a glib dismissal. The only reply he could make was to stalk over to Dahlia, grab the scroll from her, and read it himself, his voice exploding out every word. "Udun jin portho! Udun bi ononnon!
Cara smiled and bopped her head insouciantly to the spellcasting. At least when she died, she wouldn't have to see that irritating smirk on his face.
The Agiel was green now, almost on fire, but flames were a part of the natural world and whatever energies were possessing it weren't. It was simply green, because green came the closest to the color of something that actually existed. Cara couldn't look at it without a memory coming up, someone she'd killed on Rahl's orders, or in combat, or because she was young and she hadn't yet learned how to break someone without murdering them. She didn't look away. She never had before and she wouldn't now.
The Agiel took on an apocalyptic hue, too bright to look at, then settled to a throbbing intensity.
"Take it, Dahlia," Rahl commanded. "Don't worry. The spirits can only hurt those who've hurt them."
Dahlia obediently took hold of the Agiel. Just touching it filled her with melancholy. The spirits were still grieving their deaths.
"Put it to her breast," Rahl continued. "Don't let up until she screams."
Dahlia held it up to Cara. She didn't flinch. She didn't moan. She didn't even look at the Agiel. She just stared at Dahlia, as if she'd been expecting this for a long time.
Dahlia's hand tightened on the Agiel. "Lord Rahl, I have a question too."
"What is it?" Rahl asked, impatient, but enjoying the suspense.
"You made Cara a Mord'Sith. You gave her orders. You even brought about her service to Richard, leading her to kill those who threatened him. So… shouldn't these spirits want to revenge themselves on you?"
Rahl didn't even have time to scream as Dahlia plunged the Agiel into his chest. Then he had plenty of opportunity to scream. The rest of his life, in fact.
Dahlia left him screaming himself bloodily hoarse to free Cara, cutting her loose with one swipe of her dacras. Cara's hands fell to her sides.
"Come on, we have to go," Dahlia was saying. "Jagang will send his men soon."
Cara pushed her aside. Bent down to pick up the Agiel. It hurt, but not even as much as her own weapons. "It barely hurts." She turned on Dahlia. "Why not?"
"They don't blame you for their deaths, Cara."
"No. No, that's impossible. Someone must—"
"Almost everyone who does, can't recognize you. Cara… it wasn't your fault. And with the good spirits in the Creator's arms, they can see that."
Cara fell to her knees, besides Darken Rahl. She turned to him slowly, becoming aware of him. His breathing, his cringing, his past.
"Cara, we have to go!" Dahlia said.
"Not yet." Cara pulled Rahl out of his fetal position, spreading him out below her. "The day you forced me into the Seeker's arms was the day my life began… and yours ended." With both hands, she raised the Agiel above her head… and buried it in his heart.
As he lay dying, Darken Rahl was in too much pain to even breathe.
"Stay dead this time. Or next time I won't let you off so easy."
Fandom: Legend of the Seeker
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3,259
Characters/Pairings: Cara/Triana, Cara/Dahlia, Richard/Kahlan, Berdine/Raina
Author’s notes: Betaed by the lovely and talented
susurrusnight Previous: Part 12
Next: Part 14
Summary: Cara has a habit of falling in love with the wrong person. It's an odd flaw for a Mord'Sith to have.
Once again, Dahlia found she didn’t know what to do with herself. The feeling usually passed quickly. This time it didn’t. She added wood to the fire, but it didn't warm her. Nor did the sight of Cara sleeping. She had to tell her something, give her some last comfort to take with her to Darken Rahl. It was weak and pathetic, but it was how she felt.
Morning came faster than Dahlia could've believed. Despite her insomnia, she didn't feel tired. She was in a haze that was beyond sleep, but through it, she could sense Cara waking up, a subtle feeling like the temperature had gone up five degrees.
Cara opened her eyes, already focused on Dahlia. "Good morning."
Dahlia kept her eyes on the rabbit she was cooking, not wanting the image of a sleeping, peaceful Cara to fade. "Morning."
Cara levered herself up, eyes scanning for disturbances, mouth a different story. "I had a dream last night."
"Oh?" Dahlia's brow furrowed. Was Cara trying to psych her out or was this… smalltalk?
"I dreamed that on the day I was taken, you were taken too. We became Mord'Sith together. We were never parted."
"What a nightmare."
Cara crossed over to the fire-pit. "Dahlia, look at me." She did. Cara smoothed the dress over her body. She didn't look as uncomfortable in it as she had last night. "I don't want to be a Mord'Sith. I want to be gentle. I want to be in love."
Dahlia stood. It didn't help. Cara's gaze was more pressing and direct than Dahlia had ever seen it. "I can't help you."
"You already have." She stepped closer, body melding with Dahlia's, her eyes inescapable. "You'll die someday. Serve the Keeper then. For now, live. Renounce the Keeper. Serve the Creator. Serve me."
Dahlia didn't know what to say. So she just stood there as Cara kissed her.
The kiss really wasn't like Cara at all. Dahlia wondered if Kahlan had taught it to her.
Cara pulled back and looked at Dahlia. That same look Dahlia had seen so many times, Cara probing for weaknesses, but different now. Everything was different now.
"Don't say anything," Cara told her. "Not if you don't have to. Other people say things in the heat of the moment; they make promises they can't keep. We're smarter than that." But as she gathered her things, Dahlia could see there was something she'd wanted to hear.
She gave Cara the next best thing. "The Keeper came to me in a dream. He told me where to go."
***
Dahlia mollified the knowledge that soon she would be parted from Cara by attempting to learn as much about her, from her, as she could while Cara was still with her. It was an idiosyncratic process. Little of what she learned was applicable, but it still struck her as vastly important.
Take the way Cara ran, for instance. When Dahlia ran, she kept her eyes on the distance, smoothly ferreting out possible obstacles and making lithe course corrections to avoid them while still keeping to the shortest distance between her origin and her destination.
Cara didn't. She seemed to run straight and true, and everything just seemed to get out of her way. Then she stopped. They'd come to a cut-off in the woodlands, a bluff overlooking a long expanse of grassland. Cara climbed onto a rocky outcropping and added to the rip she'd made in her skirt to run. Dahlia watched the sweat glisten on her legs and hated the Creator for making such an imperfect world.
"Are we close?" Cara asked, taking a drink from a waterskin before offering it to Dahlia.
Dahlia took it. "Very close." She drank, feeling Cara's eyes on her as her thirst died away. "What did you do, Cara? When Darken Rahl asked you to do all those things that made you a monster, what did you do?"
Cara looked at her like it was the most foolish question in existence. "I obeyed. Because he was the Lord Rahl, and I trusted him. And then I spent a few years hating myself and not knowing why. And one day I realized I could’ve said no. After that, the only way to live with myself was to start saying no."
Like a building crumbling after its support beams snapped, Dahlia fell upon Cara. Her arms winded around Cara and her face burrowed into pale, exposed skin now browning in the sun after so much time under leather.
Dahlia felt Cara tense, as if she knew the embrace for the trap it was, but then she gave in.
"I'll take that as a yes."
Then Cara felt Dahlia's head shake against her shoulder. Dahlia pulled back, paused, then moved in. Her lips parted as they approached Cara's.
“I’m sorry.”
The arrow hit Cara in back of the shoulder, just aside her spine. She stiffened, breath retreating from her lungs, eyes opening to show all their whites. Her hands had already grasped her Agiels, but before they could be drawn, a war wizard tackled her to the ground.
Dahlia knelt down beside her, unstrapping the Agiels and pulling away their holsters.
On the other side of Cara, Darken Rahl knelt down to pry the arrow from her flesh. "I must admit, I was always a little bemused by the efficiency of my Mord'Sith. All it takes is a sharp piece of rock and a little distraction, and here we are."
Dahlia flung the Agiels over the bluff. Hateful things. “Make it quick. You owe her that much.”
“Owe?” Rahl tapped the war wizard on the shoulder and gestured for him to pull Cara up. “I’ll give her exactly what she’s owed.”
***
They'd already picked out a spot. Two trees grew close enough together for Cara to be strung up between them. Darken Rahl tied her up himself, tightening the ropes until they cut off her circulation. Cara murmured as her skin was rubbed raw, but her eyes stayed locked on Dahlia.
Dahlia watched Rahl as he tied each knot with monomaniacal precision. This wasn’t about D'Hara and the Midlands, it was about him and her. It was a blood feud. And this wasn’t an execution either. It was vengeance. Cara had hurt Rahl, and now Rahl would return that pain. Dahlia wished she could be surprised.
"It's not too late, you know," Rahl said, testing the rope for any slack. "We can go back to the way things were."
Cara smiled at him like he was the one in bondage. "And how would you be sure I wouldn't put an Agiel in your back first chance I get?"
"I have ways."
Cara's smile was fixed. "Kill me. Just kill me."
Rahl let out a long-suffering sigh and moved away. "I'll leave you two alone," he said to Dahlia, bringing her to Cara's attention. "I have some guests to attend to."
As he walked away, green light flashed; his magic taking him away. Dahlia didn't watch. Her eyes were on Cara.
They were alone, except for the war wizard, who didn't count. He stared off into the distance, and every few minutes a tree burst into flame near him. His eyes, glazed over as they were, seemed to follow the smoke.
Cara stood there, not pulling against the ropes but sagging in their grip. It hurt, having her arms extended, but she was tired of standing on her feet. And pain was something it looked as if she would have to get used to, all over again.
Betrayed by Dahlia. Captured by Darken Rahl. Déjà vu. And what a flaw for a Mord'Sith to have, anyway. Always managing to fall in love with the wrong person.
She looked at Dahlia. Still beautiful. Not smug in her victory, but as remorseful as a martyr. A fanatic's sorrow, that the sinful world had driven her to this.
"If you ever loved me," Cara said. "You'd put your dacra through my heart right now. I'd consider it a personal favor."
Dahlia, thrown off-balance, launched into speech without preamble. "Rahl is going to hurt you. There is no changing that, you've angered him profoundly. But once you've gotten past that…"
"Once I've gotten past being broken again? You'll pick up the pieces and sew me back together and have a nice little Cara-doll to play with. And you and me and Darken Rahl will be one happy family. I'll die first, Dahlia. I'll make him kill me."
Dahlia stepped out of Cara's view, only to return from behind, wrapping her arms around Cara's waist and pulling her up so her arms weren't under strain. Cara closed her eyes against the intimacy of it all.
"Please," Dahlia pleaded. "Please come back to me. Please don't give up."
"I haven't given up," Cara said, no anger in her voice. No anything in her voice. "I've learned."
***
Dahlia walked away. For ten minutes she strolled through the forest, until she couldn't smell the smoke off the trees her ally was burning just for the flames. She thought of how wonderful it would be once Cara… was cured of her stubbornness. Whatever reward the Keeper bestowed upon her for her service, she would split it with Cara. Being together would almost be a life worth living. As close as a breathing soul could come to a perfect world.
She walked back. Cara was once more a dead weight on her bonds, breathing hard now with the effort of filling her lungs. Dahlia pulled her up to her feet and Cara mercifully stayed there, staring at Dahlia
"I'm sorry," Dahlia said.
"No, you're not!" Cara snapped. Then, with that same fire, "If I get out of these ropes, then you will be."
"The way you kissed me…" Dahlia said, and that shut Cara up. "The way you loved me. I'm not worthy of that love."
Cara looked away, tired of talk. Dahlia stepped closer to her.
"No one is, Cara. Not one soul. Wouldn't it be better for everyone if we all just stopped hurting each other and… went to sleep?"
Cara looked Dahlia in the eye. "Kahlan deserves love. Richard deserves love. And if you hate the world so much, cut me loose. I'll help you leave."
A strand of hair had fallen over Cara's face. To busy herself, Dahlia tucked it behind Cara's ear. "Soon, you’ll thank me for this. You’ll love me for this."
She turned away to take another break from Cara's stare.
"I loved you before," Cara said.
***
Hours passed until… Green flames. A whisper of robes. Darken Rahl strode back into the clearing, turning a simple Agiel over in his hands. "Hello again, Cara. Emperor Jagang sends his regards."
Cara muttered under her breath. It was only when Rahl got closer that he heard what she was saying. He beckoned Dahlia closer to hear it too.
"Master Rahl guide us. Master Rahl teach us. Master Rahl protect us. In your light we thrive. In your mercy we are sheltered. In your wisdom we are humbled. We live only to serve. Our lives are yours."
Dahlia brightened, a genuine smile blooming under her veil.
Rahl reached out to caress Cara's face. "My child."
She looked up sharply, breaking the chant. "I wasn't talking to you."
Unshaken, Rahl pulled his hand back and let it swing from side to side, catching Cara at the apex of its arc. Her head rocked to the side. She began the chant again.
Darken Rahl turned to the war wizard, stopping him before he added to the collection of ashes where once there'd been a copse. "Leave us. This is D'Haran business."
Green flame obliterated the war wizard from sight, throwing Rahl's smile into sick relief.
"She was working for you all along," Cara said, pointedly not looking at Dahlia.
"No. I was working for the Keeper all along. Really now, how did you expect him to take the land of the living? You used the Stone of Tears. You sealed the rifts. Destroying the world is no longer an option. But ruling it, in his name, by his mandate…" Rahl spread his arms wide. "Well. Better some souls than none at all. And this way, there will always be someone to fear the Keeper."
"You used me," Cara said. "Once I got her into the castle, she let in the soul sylphs."
"Yes. And now I have my arch-enemy in chains, my queen waiting to be wed… you call her Mother Confessor, but Lady Rahl will be a much greater honor… and you. Cara. Just waiting to be shown the light."
Cara looked him in the eye. "Rahl. Kill me now. Because when I claw and scratch and dig my way out of the Underworld to kill you, I won't be able to cause as much pain to you as I will alive."
Rahl smirked and held up the Agiel. "Do you know what this is, Cara?"
"Better than you could possibly imagine."
"Then imagine, for a moment, that this had more power than the simple spell cast on a simple leather rod. Imagine if it was enhanced by all the spirits of all the lives you've taken. All the people who've died, in pain, in violence, because of you. Just imagine if they had a chance for revenge." He moved in close, whispering in her ear like a lover. "You'll break. You won't have a choice."
He extracted a scroll from his sleeve and handed it to Dahlia. "Read. Invest your Han in it."
Holding the scroll up so it blocked Cara's face, Dahlia read the words even as they seemed to squirm on the vellum, like butterflies pinned to a collection. "Udun, udun oda—udun oda ada, malfis…"
The Agiel floated out of Rahl's hand. Where the light hit it, it now seemed to give off a faintly green glow.
Cara stared at Rahl steadfastly. "You should kill me now. I bore easily."
"I would, only you people have the stubborn habit of getting better. So I'm breaking you, Cara. I'm breaking you like I should've done when you were a child."
"You should do comedy more often. You're good at it."
"Keep going," Rahl said calmly; this directed at Dahlia, who had faltered uncertainly. She'd felt the sting of an Agiel before. They were meant to break people. What would an Agiel meant to break Mord'Sith feel like? How much would it hurt?
She started to read again.
"Can I ask a question, Darken? Before you break me?" Cara's last words were full to the brim with sarcasm.
Rahl smiled indulgently at her. "Anything."
Dahlia continued the chant.
Cara smiled back at Rahl. "For the longest time, I thought my father betrayed me. It wasn't until recently that I learned that was a lie told to me by your Mord'Sith."
"Would you like to know if that was my idea? I did come up with so many ways to improve the Mord'Sith. In fact, in another life, I think I'd have made a good one myself."
"No. I don't really care," Cara said. "It's been so long that I've forgotten all that bitterness I used to hold for my father. All I remember now is how he loved me. But your father… he conceived a child solely to kill you."
"Keep going," Rahl said, his voice chilled. Dahlia had faltered again.
"I suppose you can forget about that… your own father, wishing you dead. After all, the House of Rahl is like that. No room for the weak. Kill or be killed. But I met Panis Rahl. He was a good man, trying to make amends for the sins of his youth… and his dying words were about how he wished he had killed you when he had the chance. You. His firstborn son. So, since my father loved me until the very end, I would like to know… what's it like to live without a father's love?"
Rahl stared at her for a moment, expressionless. In fact, it was that very lack of affect that showed her she had skewered him. He was frozen, without answer, without a glib dismissal. The only reply he could make was to stalk over to Dahlia, grab the scroll from her, and read it himself, his voice exploding out every word. "Udun jin portho! Udun bi ononnon!
Cara smiled and bopped her head insouciantly to the spellcasting. At least when she died, she wouldn't have to see that irritating smirk on his face.
The Agiel was green now, almost on fire, but flames were a part of the natural world and whatever energies were possessing it weren't. It was simply green, because green came the closest to the color of something that actually existed. Cara couldn't look at it without a memory coming up, someone she'd killed on Rahl's orders, or in combat, or because she was young and she hadn't yet learned how to break someone without murdering them. She didn't look away. She never had before and she wouldn't now.
The Agiel took on an apocalyptic hue, too bright to look at, then settled to a throbbing intensity.
"Take it, Dahlia," Rahl commanded. "Don't worry. The spirits can only hurt those who've hurt them."
Dahlia obediently took hold of the Agiel. Just touching it filled her with melancholy. The spirits were still grieving their deaths.
"Put it to her breast," Rahl continued. "Don't let up until she screams."
Dahlia held it up to Cara. She didn't flinch. She didn't moan. She didn't even look at the Agiel. She just stared at Dahlia, as if she'd been expecting this for a long time.
Dahlia's hand tightened on the Agiel. "Lord Rahl, I have a question too."
"What is it?" Rahl asked, impatient, but enjoying the suspense.
"You made Cara a Mord'Sith. You gave her orders. You even brought about her service to Richard, leading her to kill those who threatened him. So… shouldn't these spirits want to revenge themselves on you?"
Rahl didn't even have time to scream as Dahlia plunged the Agiel into his chest. Then he had plenty of opportunity to scream. The rest of his life, in fact.
Dahlia left him screaming himself bloodily hoarse to free Cara, cutting her loose with one swipe of her dacras. Cara's hands fell to her sides.
"Come on, we have to go," Dahlia was saying. "Jagang will send his men soon."
Cara pushed her aside. Bent down to pick up the Agiel. It hurt, but not even as much as her own weapons. "It barely hurts." She turned on Dahlia. "Why not?"
"They don't blame you for their deaths, Cara."
"No. No, that's impossible. Someone must—"
"Almost everyone who does, can't recognize you. Cara… it wasn't your fault. And with the good spirits in the Creator's arms, they can see that."
Cara fell to her knees, besides Darken Rahl. She turned to him slowly, becoming aware of him. His breathing, his cringing, his past.
"Cara, we have to go!" Dahlia said.
"Not yet." Cara pulled Rahl out of his fetal position, spreading him out below her. "The day you forced me into the Seeker's arms was the day my life began… and yours ended." With both hands, she raised the Agiel above her head… and buried it in his heart.
As he lay dying, Darken Rahl was in too much pain to even breathe.
"Stay dead this time. Or next time I won't let you off so easy."
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no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:04 pm (UTC)So many heartbreaking feelings in such an excellent writing. WOW! WOW! WOW!
*...is speechless...*
Great and awesome chapter! Thank you!
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:40 pm (UTC)Thanks for the update!
no subject
Date: 2011-07-08 06:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-09 12:19 am (UTC)Loved this line to describe Dahlia's dilemma:
A fanatic's sorrow, that the sinful world had driven her to this.
Great update! I thank you!
Austin
no subject
Date: 2011-07-09 08:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-21 10:51 am (UTC)The banter and rivalry you've had between dahlia and cara is fantastic and now I just really want them to get it on! C/D are totally my OTP now.