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As they cautiously rounded an intersection, they encountered a few dozen soldiers hunched in the shadows just inside a small roombloodied, but alive. Four Sisters were there, too. Je
"We're close, girl. Keep that knife out and you'll get your chance."
Sebastian moved off to check other doorways, securing the immediate area, several men moving at his direction when he gave them silent hand signals.
She could hardly believe what she was hearing, or seeing. "Emperor, you have to get out of here."
He frowned at her. "Are you out of your mind?"
"We're being cut to pieces! There are dead soldiers everywhere. I saw Sisters back there, ripped open by something-"
"Magic," he said with a wicked grin.
She blinked at that grin. "Excellency, you have to get out of here before they have you, too."
His grin vanished, replaced by red-faced anger. "This is a war! What do you think war is? War is killing. They've been doing it, and I intend to do it back twice over! If you don't have the guts to use that knife, then put your tail between your legs and run for the hills! But don't ever ask me to help you again."
Je
He huffed in disgust. "Touching." He turned to his men, checking that they were paying attention. "Half take the room on the right, just ahead. The rest stay with me. I want them flushed out into the open." He swept his sword before the faces of the four Sisters. "Two with them, two with me. Don't disappoint me, now."
With that, the men and Sisters split up and quickly moved off, half through the room at the right, half charging after the emperor. Sebastian gestured urgently for her. Je
"There he is!" she heard Jagang call from up ahead. "Here! This way! Here!»
And then there was a thunderous blast so violent it took Je
Men up the hall let out screams of mortal pain. Such unbridled wails sent shivers up Je
There, among the splintered wood, leaning boards, overturned chairs and tables, glass shards, and fallen plaster, they spotted him. Jagang's thigh was laid open to the bone. A Sister stood beside him, her back pressed to the wall. A huge, splintered oak board had been driven through her just below her breastbone, pi
"Dear Creator forgive me. Dear Creator forgive me," she whispered over and over through quivering lips. Her eyes turned to watch them approach. "Please," she whispered, blood frothing from her nose, "please, help me."
She had been close to the emperor. She had probably shielded him with her gift, deflecting whatever power had been unleashed, and saved his life. Now she was shivering in mortal agony.
Sebastian lifted something from under his cloak, behind his back. With a mighty swing, he brought his axe around. The blade slammed into the wall with resounding thunk, and stuck. The Sister's head tumbled down, bouncing through the dusty rubble.
Sebastian yanked once, freeing his axe. As he replaced it in the hanger at the small of his back, he turned and came face-to-face with Je
"If it were you," he said, "would you want me to let you endure such suffering?"
Trembling uncontrollably, unable to answer him, Je
His face streaked with sweat and soot, Jagang pointed with his sword down a side hall. "Sebastian, it's her! She was just right here. I almost had her. Don't let her get away!"
Another Sister, wearing a dusty brown wool dress, came clambering over the rubble, stumbling toward them in the darkness, passing all the groaning soldiers. "Excellency! I heard you! I'm here. I'm here. I can help."
Jagang nodded his acknowledgment, one hand resting on his heaving chest. " Sebastian-don't let her get away. Move!"
"Yes, Excellency." Sebastian took note of the Sister climbing awkwardly over a broken side table, then pressed a hand to Je
Je
She snatched up the end of a strip of a sheer curtain and pulled it out from under the rubble. "You're losing a lot of blood. I need to close this as best I can." She looked up into Emperor Jagang's nightmare eyes. "Can you help hold it closed while I wrap it?"
He gri
Je
Jagang cried out in pain.
"I'm sorry, Excellency," the Sister said. "I have to stop the bleeding or you'll bleed to death."
"Do it, then, you stupid bitch! Don't talk me to death!"
The Sister nodded tearfully, clearly terrified by what she was doing, yet knowing she had no choice but to do it. She closed her eyes and once more pressed trembling hands to Jagang's hairy, blood-soaked leg. Je
There was nothing to see, at first. Jagang gritted his teeth, grunting in pain as the Sister's magic began to do its work. Je
Je
"There he is." Je
Je
He lifted his arms. Between his outstretched hands, fire sprang to life. It wasn't fire like real fire, like the fire in a hearth, but fire like that out of a dream. It was there, but somehow not there; real, but at the same time unreal. Je
Yet, the lethal danger that the wavering flame represented was all too clear.
Frozen in dread, squatted down beside Emperor Jagang, Je
And then he cast that implacable inferno out toward them.
Jagang had said that it was Richard Rahl down at the end of the hall. She could see only a silhouetted figure casting out from his hands that awful fire. Oddly enough, even though the flame illuminated the walls, it left its creator in shadow.
The sphere of seething flame expanded as it flew toward them with ever-gathering speed. The liquid blue and yellow flame looked as if it burned with living intent.
Yet, it was, in some strange way, nothing, too.
"Wizard's fire!" the Sister shrieked as she sprang up. "Dear Creator! No!»
The Sister ran down the dark hall, toward the approaching flame. With wild abandon, she threw her arms up, palms toward the approaching fire, as if she were casting some magic shield to protect them, yet Je
The fire grew as it shot toward them, illuminating the walls, ceiling, and debris as it wailed past. The Sister cast out her hands again.