Her arms rose slowly into the air, her fists to the sky. Her head rolled back.

She let out an unearthly scream. It went through Zedd like a thousand needles of ice, it echoed against the hills, through the valleys, against the trees all around, making them vibrate. Zedd’s breath was taken away. Nass and the other two men stumbled back a few paces.

If he had not already been frozen to stone, he would be now, at the fear of what she was doing. Kahlan should not be able to do this.

She took a deep breath, her fists getting tighter, tears streaming from her face.

Kahlan screamed again. Long, piercing, otherworldly. The sound avalanched through the air. Pebbles danced on the ground. Water danced in the lakes around. The very air danced, and began to move. The men covered their ears. Zedd would have, too, had he been able to move.

She took another deep breath. Her back arched as she stretched to the sky.

The third scream was worse. The magic of it tore through the fabric of the air. Zedd felt as if it would pull his body apart. The air began to turn about her, dust rising at its passing.

Darkness began to gather, the magic of the scream taking the very light away, pulling the darkness as it was pulling the wind. Light and dark moved around the Mother Confessor as she released ancient magic into the scream.

Zedd nearly choked with the fear of what she was doing. He had seen this being done only once before, and it came to no good end. She was joining the Confessor’s magic, the additive, the love, with its counterpart from the underworld, the subtractive, the hate.

Kahlan stood screaming in the center of a maelstrom. The light was sucked to her. Darkness fell all about. Where Zedd stood, it was black as night. The only light was around Kahlan. Night around day.

Lightning tore violently across the blackness of the sky, flashing rapidly in every direction, forking, doubling, over and over until the sky burned. Thunder rolled through the countryside, coalescing into a continuous fury, mixing with the scream, becoming part of it.

The ground shook. The scream went beyond sound, to something else entirely. All about, the ground cracked open in jagged, ferocious tears. Shafts of violet light shot upward from the cracks. The bluish purple curtains of light vibrated, danced, and with gathering speed were pulled into the vortex, sucked to Kahlan. She was a glowing form of light in a sea of darkness. She was the only thing in existence—all else was nothingness, devoid even of light. Zedd could see nothing but Kahlan.

There was a horrific impact to the air all about. In a brief, tremendous flash of light, Zedd saw the trees around them suddenly stripped of pine needles, as every one of them was blown back in a cloud of green. A wall of dust and sand hit his face, feeling as if it would take the skin from his bones in its explosive passing.

The ferocity of the concussion tore the darkness away. The light was returned.

The joining was complete.

Zedd saw Chase standing next to him, watching, his arms still tied behind his back. Boundary wardens, Zedd thought, were tougher than they had a right to be.

Pale blue light coalesced into a jagged egg shape around her, gathered in intensity, purpose, and somehow, violence. Kahlan turned. One arm, the broken one, came down to her side. The other arm stopped halfway down, her fist reaching toward the wizard. The blue light bled from the ring that surrounded her into one spot, where her fist was. It seemed to fuse and in a sudden release, blasted in a line of light through the space between them.

With a solid strike, it hit him, lighting him at contact, as if he were connected to Kahlan by a thread of living light. It bathed him in the pale blue glow. The wizard felt the familiar touch of additive magic and the unfamiliar tingle of the subtractive, underworld magic. He was thrown back a step—the web that held him shattered. He was free. The line of light extinguished itself.

Zedd turned to Chase and parted the ropes with a quick spell. Chase gave a grunt of pain at having his arms free.

“Zedd,” he whispered, “what in the name of the prophets is going on? What has she done?”

Kahlan ran her fingers through the pale blue light that vibrated around her, stroking it, caressing it, bathing in it. Demmin Nass and one of his men watched her, but held their ground, waiting. Her eyes gazed at things they couldn’t see. Her eyes were in another world. Her eyes, Zedd knew, were seeing the memory of Richard.

“It’s called the Con Dar. The Blood Rage.” Zedd looked slowly from Kahlan to the boundary warden. “It’s something only a few of the strongest Confessors can do. And she should not be able to do it at all.”

Chase frowned. “Why not?”

“Because it must be taught by her real mother—only the mother can teach how to bring it on, if there be call enough. It’s an ancient magic, ancient as the Confessor’s magic, part of it, but rarely used. It can only be taught after the daughter reaches a certain age. Kahlan’s mother died before she could teach her. Adie told me. Kahlan should not be able to do this. Yet she has. That she could do it without having been taught, by instinct and desire alone, speaks to very dangerous things in the prophecies.”

“Well, why didn’t she do it before? Why didn’t she put a stop to what was happening before now?”

“A Confessor can’t invoke it for herself, only on behalf of another. She has invoked it on behalf of Richard. On the rage at his murder. We are in a great deal of trouble.”

“Why?”

“The Con Dar is invoked for vengeance. Confessors who invoke it rarely survive—they give their lives over to the goal, give their lives to carry out the vengeance. Kahlan is going to use her power on Darken Rahl.”

Chase stared in shock. “You told me her power can’t touch him, can’t take him.”

“It couldn’t before. I don’t know if it can now, but I doubt it. Nonetheless, she is going to try. She is in the grip of the Con Dar, the Blood Rage. She doesn’t care if she dies. She is going to try, she is going to touch Darken Rahl even if it’s futile, even if it kills her. If anyone gets in her way, she will kill them. Without a second thought.” He put his face closer to Chase to make his point. “That includes us.”

Kahlan was curled almost into a ball against the ground, her head bowed, her hands on opposite shoulders, the pale blue light tight around her. She stretched slowly to her feet, pushing through the light, as if she were emerging from an egg. She stood naked, blood still throbbing from her wounds. Blood, still wet and fresh, dripped from her chin.

But her face showed the pain of wounds other than the ones on her body. And then even that expression was gone, and she showed nothing but a Confessor’s face.

Kahlan turned a little, to one of the two men who had held her. The other one was nowhere to be seen. She calmly lifted a hand toward him. He was a dozen feet away.

There was an impact to the air, thunder with no sound. Zedd felt the pain in his bones.

“Mistress!” the man called out as he fell to his knees. “What do you command of me? What do you wish of me?”

She regarded him coolly. “I wish for you to die for me. Right now.”

He convulsed and fell over, face first, into the dirt, dead. Kahlan turned and stepped to Demmin Nass. He had a smile on his face—his arms were folded. Kahlan’s broken arm hung at her side. She put her other hand against his chest with a sharp slap. The hand stayed there as their eyes locked together. He towered over her.

“Very impressive, bitch. But not only have you used your power, I am also protected by Master Rahl’s spell. You cannot touch me with your power. You still have a lesson to learn, and I’m going to teach you as I have never taught anyone before.” His hand came up and grabbed her tangled, matted hair. “Bend over.”