Naked Empire

With her blocking the light he couldn't tell if she was doing as he instructed or not. He squirmed in another inch, then another. His head was almost stuck. He couldn't imagine how she had gotten in as far as she had.

"Je

His fingers stretched forward, reaching, stretching, reaching. His lungs burned for air. He just wanted to take a deep breath. He desperately needed a breath. Not being able to draw one was not only painful, but frightening. His heartbeat pounded in his ears.

As high as they were in the mountains, the air was already thin and it was difficult to get enough air the way it was. Limited to taking shallow breaths was making him light-headed. If he didn't get back to where he could breathe soon, the two of them were going to be forever in this terrible place.

The tips of Richard's fingers caught the edge of the sole of Je

"Push back," he whispered into the dark. It was all he could do to keep his own panic in check. "Je

Je

"Push back," he whispered again. "Use your hands, Je

She was sobbing and crying something he couldn't make out. Richard wedged his boots, top and bottom, in the tight cleft and then pulled with all his might. His arm shook with the effort. He managed to draw her back a few inches.

He wiggled himself back an equal distance and pulled again. With agonizing effort, he slowly, painstakingly, started drawing her out of the dead end she had fled into in a panicked attempt to get out.

At times, she tried to squirm back toward the light. Richard, the rock compressing him tight, kept a firm hold of her boot and muscled her back yet more, not allowing her to take back any of the distance he gained.

He couldn't straighten his head. That made it more difficult to use his muscles to move the both of them. With his head lying on the right, he reached back with his left arm and gripped a small lip of rock in the ceiling, using it to help haul them back. With his right arm, stretched forward and holding her by the boot, he drew her back inch by inch.

As he reached back again for another handhold, Richard saw something not far to his left, down the slope, wedged where the rock narrowed. At first he thought it was a rock. As he struggled to draw Je

As he began to make good progress backward he stretched to the side and managed to get his fingers around the thing. He pulled it to his side and continued to wiggle back.

With great relief, he was finally back far enough to where he was able to get enough air. He lay still for a time, just catching his breath. Almost as much as air, though, he wanted out.

While he talked to Je

With him up beside her, she was a little more cooperative. All the while, he kept reassuring her. "This is the way, Je

I'll not leave you. I'll get you out. This is the way. Just come with me and we'll be out in a few minutes."

When they worked their way up into the dark, tight spot, she began struggling again, trying again to scramble for the light of the opening, but he was blocking her way. He stayed close at her side as he kept them both moving forward. She seemed to find strength in his constant assurances and his firm grip on her wrist. He was not about to let her get away from him again.

When they pushed through to the place where the roof rose up a bit, she started weeping with expectant joy. He knew the feeling. Once the ceiling rose up a foot or two, he hurried as fast as he could to get her to the opening, to the light.

The others were waiting right at the entrance to help pull them out.

Richard held the thing he'd retrieved under his left arm as he helped push Je

"I'm so sorry," she said over and over as she cried. "I'm so sorry, Richard. I was so afraid."

"I know," he comforted as he held her.

He'd been in a similar situation before where he thought he might never get himself out of such a terrifying place, so he did understand. In such a stressful circumstance, where you feared you were about to die, it was easy to be overpowered by the blind need to escape-to live.

"I feel so confused."

"I don't like such tight places, either," he said. "I understand."

"But I don't understand. I've never been afraid of places like that.

Ever since I was very young I've hid in tight little places. Such places always made me feel safe because no one could find me or get to me. When you spend your life ru

"I don't know what came over me. It was the strangest thing. It was like these thoughts that I wouldn't get out, that I couldn't breathe, that I would die, just started coming into my head. Feelings I've never had before just started to seep into me. They just seemed to overwhelm me. I've never done anything like that before."

"Do you still feel these strange feelings?"

"Yes," she said as she wept, "but they're starting to fade, now that I'm out, now that it's over."

Everyone else had moved off a ways to give her the time she needed to set herself straight. They sat not far off waiting on an old log turned silver in the weather.

Richard didn't try to rush her. He just held her and let her know she was safe.

"I'm so sorry, Richard. I feel like such a fool."

"No need. It's over, now."

"You kept your promise," she said through her tears.

Richard smiled, happy that he had.

Owen, his face tense with worry, looked like he couldn't help himself from asking a question. "But Je

"I can't do magic any more than you can."

He rubbed his palms on his hips. "You could if you let yourself. You are one who is able to touch magic."

"Other people might be able to do magic, but I can't. I don't have any ability for it."

"What others think is magic is only themselves tricking their senses and only blinds them to real magic. Our eyes blind us, our senses deceive us-as I explained before. Only those who have never seen magic, only those who have never used, sensed, perceived it, only those who do not have any ability or faculty for it, can actually understand it and therefore only they can be true practitioners of real magic. Magic must be based entirely on faith, if it is to be real. You must believe, and then you truly can see.

You are one who can do magic."

Richard and Je

"Richard," Kahlan said in an odd voice before he could say anything to Owen. "What's that."

Richard blinked at her. "What?"

She pointed. "That, there, under your arm. What is it?"