This prophecy where Richard disappears into oblivion."

She knew Nathan well enough to know by his agitation that he hadn't told her everything, that he thought he was being gallant by sparing her worry. With a sober expression, he gazed into her eyes for a time before he finally spoke.

"There is a Slide on that fork of prophecy."

Ann frowned as she turned her eyes up in thought. "A Slide. A Slide,"

she muttered to herself, trying to recall the name. It sounded familiar. "A Slide. ." She snapped her fingers. "A Slide." Her eyes went wide. "Dear Creator."

"I don't think the Creator had anything to do with this."

Ann impatiently waved in protest. "That can't be. There has to be something wrong with this new prophecy you found. It has to be defective.

Slides were created in the great war. There couldn't be a Slide on this link of prophecy-don't you see? The prophecy must be out of phase and long ago expired." Ann chewed her lower lip as her mind raced.

"It isn't out of phase. Don't you think that was my first thought, too?

You think me an amateur at this? I worked through the chronology a hundred times. I ran every chart and calculation I ever learned-even some I invented for the task. They all came out with the same root. Every link came out in order. The prophecy is in phase, chronology, and all its aspects are aligned."

"Then it's a false link," Ann insisted. "Slides were conjured creatures. They were sterile. They couldn't reproduce."

"I'm telling you," Nathan growled, "there is a Slide on this fork with Richard and it's a viable prophetic link."

"They couldn't have survived to be here." Ann was sure of what she was saying. Nathan knew more about prophecy than she, there was no doubt of that, but this was one area where she knew exactly what she was talking about-this was her area of expertise. "Slides weren't able to beget children."

He was giving her one of those looks she didn't like. "I'm telling you, a Slide walks the world again."

Ann tsked. "Nathan, soul stealers can't reproduce."

"The prophecy says he wasn't born, but born again a Slide."

Ann's flesh began to tingle. She stared at him a time before finding her voice. "For three thousand years there have been no wizards born with both sides of the gift but Richard. There is no way anyone…"

Ann paused. He was watching her, watching her finally realize what had to be. "Dear Creator," she whispered.

"I told you, the Creator had nothing to do with this. The Sisters of the Dark mothered him."

Shaken to her core, Ann could think of nothing to say.

There was no worse news she could have heard.

There was no defense against a Slide.

Every soul was naked to a Slide's attack.

Outside the second door, Nyda waited in the hall, her face as grim as ever, but not as grim as Ann's. The hall was dark but for the dim light coming from the still flames of a few candles. No breath of wind ever made it this deep into the palace. The only color among the dark rock soaking up that small bit of light was the blood red of Nyda's red leather.

Being pulled along by the hand, feeling a jumble of emotions, Ann leaned toward the woman and vented a pent-up fiery scowl. "You told him what I said to tell him, didn't you?"

"Of course," Nyda answered as she fell into step behind the two of them.

Turning halfway around, Ann shook a finger at the Mord-Sith. "I'll make you sorry you told him."

Nyda smiled. "Oh, I don't think so."

Ann rolled her eyes and turned back to Nathan. "By the way, what are you doing wearing a sword? You, of all people-a wizard. Why are you wearing a sword?"

Nathan looked hurt. "Why, Nyda thinks I look dashing with a sword."

Ann fixed her eyes on the dark passageway ahead. "I just bet she does."

CHAPTER 31

Standing at the edge of a narrow rim of rock, Richard looked down on the ragged gray wisps of clouds below. Out in the open, the cool damp air that drifted over him carried the aromas of balsam trees, moss, wet leaves, and saturated soil. He inhaled deeply the fragrant reminders of home. The rock, mostly granite, cracked and weather-worn into pillowed blocks, looked much the same as that in his Hartland woods. The mountains, however, were far larger. The slope rising up behind him was dizzying.

To the west before him, far below, lay a vast stretch of fractured ground and ever-rising rugged hills carpeted in forests. To his left and right, because he knew what he was looking for, he could just make out the strip of ground, devoid of trees, where the boundary had been. Farther off to the west rose up the lesser mountains, mostly barren, that bordered the wasteland. That wasteland, and the place called the Pillars of Creation, was no longer visible. Richard was happy to have left it far behind.

The sky was empty of black-tipped races-for the moment, anyway. The huge birds most likely knew that Richard, Kahlan, Cara, Jennsen, Tom, and Owen were heading west.

Richard had shot the last five races as they had begun gathering in their circling behavior, surprising them by being high up the side of the mountain above the others in his group, closer to where the races flew.

After killing the races, Richard had led the rest of his small company into denser woods. He didn't think that the races they'd been seeing up until then had spotted them since. Now that they were traveling through forests of towering trees Richard thought that, if he was careful, they might be able to lose their watchers.

If this man, Nicholas, had seen them through the eyes of those five races, then he knew they had been headed west. But, now that they were hidden, he couldn't assume that they would continue west. If Richard could disappear from where the birds would look for him, and failed to appear where they would expect him, then Nicholas might have second thoughts. He might realize they could have changed direction and gone north, or south.

Nicholas might then begin to realize that they had used that period of confusion to run away somewhere else, to flee him.

It was possible that Richard could keep them hidden under the cover of the trees and in so doing keep Nicholas from discovering them. Richard didn't want the man to know where they'd gone, or to have any idea where they were at any given time. It was hardly a certainty that he could deceive Nicholas in this way, but Richard intended to try.

Shielding his eyes with the flat of his hand, Richard scanned the rise of dense forest before them in order to get the lay of the land fixed in his mind before he headed back in under the thick vegetation where the others waited. The trailers of clouds below were but the tattered castoffs of the churning blanket of gloom above them. The mountainside ascended sharply into that wet overcast.

As Richard evaluated the rock, the slope, and the trees, he finally found what he sought. He studied the ascent of the mountain one last time before scanning the sky again to make sure it was clear. Seeing no races-or any other birds, for that matter-he headed in to where the others waited.

He knew that just because he didn't see any birds didn't mean that they weren't there watching him. There could be a few dozen races sitting in trees where he would likely never spot them. But, for the moment, he was still where they would expect him, so he wasn't greatly concerned.

He was about to do what they would not expect.

Richard climbed back up the slick bank of moss, leaves, and wet roots.

If he fell, he would have only the one chance to grab the small ledge where he'd been standing before he would tumble out into the clear air and a drop of several thousand feet. The thought of that drop made him hold tighter to the roots to help him climb, and made him test carefully every score in the rock where he placed his boot before committing his weight to it.