Kahlan heard the air driven from Cara's lungs with a grunt as she slammed into a bookcase on the other side of the room. The men on the other side of the door pounded into it, trying to break it down. The door wasn't budging.

As books across the room were still tumbling and thudding to the floor, Kahlan sprang up and groped for the handle. Her knuckles struck the cold metal of the lever. She slapped her hand over it.

With a shriek, she was thrown back from a sudden flash and landed on her bottom. Like sparks from a flaming log struck with a poker, a shower of flashes from the handle filled the air. Her fingers stung and tingled from touching the shield. Small wonder the men couldn't open the door. As she regained her feet, recovering from the shock, Kahlan could see again by the flickering sparkles of light that still slowly drifted toward the floor.

Suddenly Cara could see, too. She snatched a book and flung it at the man near the center of the small room. He ducked into a squat.

Quick as a slap, Cara spun, catching him off guard. The air resounded with a hard thud as her boot nailed his jaw. The blow drove him backward. Kahlan took aim to leap for him before all the sparks extinguished and it went dark again.

"You die first!" he railed in rage at Cara. "I'll have no more of your trifling interference! You'll taste my power!"

The air at his fingertips lit with glimmering flashes as he leveled his full attention on Cara. Kahlan had to deal with the threat now, before anything else went wrong.

But before she could leap for him, his curled fingers twitched up. With a contemptuous sneer, he thrust one hand toward Cara.

Kahlan expected Cara to be the one on the floor next. Instead, the young man crumpled with a cry. He tried to stand, but collapsed with a shriek, hugging himself as if he had been stabbed in the gut. The room went black again.

Kahlan reached for the door lever, taking a chance that whatever Cara had done to him had broken his shield. Wincing against the pain she feared might still be waiting, she seized the handle. The shield was gone. Relieved, she twisted the lever and yanked the door open. Light from behind the crowd of soldiers pierced into the dark room. Confounded faces peered in.

Kahlan didn't need a roomful of men getting themselves killed while trying to save her from things they didn't understand. She shoved the closest man back.

"He has the gift! Stay out!" She knew that D'Harans feared magic. They depended on the Lord Rahl to fight magic. They were the steel against steel, they often said, and Lord Rahl was supposed to be the magic against magic. "Give me a lamp!"

Men to each side simultaneously snatched lamps from brackets beside the door and held them out. Kahlan grabbed one and kicked the door shut as she turned back to the room. She didn't want a pack of muscle-bound, weapon-wielding men to get in her way.

In the wavering glow from the lamp, Kahlan saw Cara squat down on the crimson carpet beside the man. He clutched his arms across his abdomen as he vomited blood. Her red leather outfit creaked as she rested her forearms on her knees. She was rolling her Agiel in her fingers, waiting.

Once his retching had ceased, Cara snatched a fistful of his hair. Her long blond braid slid across the back of her broad shoulders as she leaned closer.

"That was a big mistake. A very big mistake," she said with silky satisfaction. "You should never have tried to use your magic against a Mord-Sith. You had it right for a moment, but then you let me make you angry enough to use your magic. Who's the fool now?"

"What's… a… Mord-Sith?" he managed between gasps.

Cara twisted his head upward until he cried out. "Your worst nightmare. The purpose of a Mord-Sith is to eliminate threats like you.

"I now command your magic. It's mine to use, and you, my pet, are helpless to do anything about it, as you will soon learn. You should have tried to strangle me, or beat me to death, or to run, but you should never, ever, have tried to use magic against me. Once you use your magic against a Mord-Sith, it's hers."

Kahlan stood transfixed. That was what a Mord-Sith had done to Richard. That was how he had been captured.

Cara pressed her Agiel against the man's ribs. He shivered as he screamed. Blood soaked through his tunic in a spreading stain.

"Now, when I ask a question," she said in a quiet, authoritative tone, "I expect an answer. Do you understand?"

He remained silent. She twisted the Agiel. Kahlan winced when she heard his rib pop. He flinched and gasped, holding his breath, unable to scream.

Kahlan felt as if she were frozen in place, unable to move a muscle. Richard had told her that Denna, the Mord-Sith who had captured him, had liked to crack his ribs. It made each breath agony, and screaming, which she soon provoked, excruciating torture. It also left the victim that much more helpless.

Cara rose. "Stand."

The man staggered to his feet.

"You are about to find out why I wear blood red leather." Unleashing a mighty swing, launched with an angry cry, Cara clouted his face with her armored fist. As he went down, blood sprayed across the bookcase. As soon as he hit the floor, she straddled him, a boot to each side of his hips.

"I can see what you're envisioning," Cara told him. "I saw the vision of what you want to do to me. Naughty boy." She stomped a boot down on his sternum. "That was the least of what you will suffer for that thought. You had better learn real fast to keep ideas of resistance out of your mind. Got it?

She bent and drove her Agiel into his gut. "Got it?"

His scream sent a shiver up Kahlan's spine. She was sickened by what she was watching, having once felt the profoundly painful touch of an Agiel, but worse, knowing that this was what had been done to Richard, and yet she didn't make a move to stop it.

She had offered this man mercy. If he had had his way, he would have killed Richard. He had promised to kill her, too, but it was that threat against Richard that kept her silent, and prevented her from stopping Cara.

"Now." Cara said with a sneer. She jabbed her Agiel against his cracked rib. "What is your name?"

"Marlin Pickard!" He tried to blink away the tears. A sheen of sweat covered his face. Blood frothed at his mouth as he panted.

She pressed her Agiel against his groin. Marlin's feet kicked out helplessly as he wailed.

"The next time I ask a question, don't make me wait for an answer. And you will address me as Mistress Cara."

"Cara," Kahlan said in a quiet tone, still seeing the vision of Richard in place of the man, "there is no need to…"

Cara looked over her shoulder, glaring with cold blue eyes. Kahlan turned away and with trembling fingers wiped a tear as it rolled down her cheek. She lifted the glass chimney of the lamp on the wall and used the one she held to light it. When the wick took to flame, she set her lamp down on a side table and replaced its chimney. It was frightening to see the cold look in those Mord-Sith eyes. Her heart pounded at the thought of how many weeks Richard had seen only cold eyes like that looking back as he begged for mercy.

Kahlan turned back to the pair. "We need answers, nothing more."

"I'm getting answers."

Kahlan nodded. "I understand, but we don't need the screams along with them. We don't torture people."

"Torture? I have not yet even begun to torture him." Cara straightened, casting a glance to the shivering man at her feet. "And if he had managed to kill Lord Rahl first? Would you wish me to leave him be, then?"

"Yes." Kahlan met the woman's eyes. "And then I would have done worse to him myself. Worse than you could even conceive of. But he didn't hurt Richard."

A cunning smile curled the comers of Cara's mouth. "He intended it. The canon of the spirits says that intent is guilt. Failure to successfully carry out the intent. does not absolve the guilt."