She glanced to the little fire burning in the bowl. The hurt of those words bumed in her chest. Reluctantly, with trembling fingers, she turned the book back over, and read on.

Verna, I know that those words must have broken your heart to hear. I do know that it broke my heart to say them, because they were not true. It must seem to you that you are being used in a nefarious way. It is wrong to lie, but it is worse to let the wicked triumph because you adhere to the truth at the expense of good sense. If the Sisters of the Dark were to ask me what my plans were, I would lie. To do otherwise is to allow wickedness to triumph.

I will now tell you the truth, realizing that you have no reason to believe that this time, my words are true, but I believe in your intelligence and know that if you weigh my words, you will be able to see the truth in them.

The true reason I chose you to go after Richard is because of all the Sisters, you were the one I trusted with the fate of the world. You know, now, the battle Richard won against the Keeper. Without him, we would have all been lost to the world of the dead. A low-priority mission it was not. It was the most important journey any Sister had ever been sent on. I trusted only you.

Over three hundred years before you were born, Nathan warned me of the danger to the world of life. Five hundred years before Richard was born, Nathan and I knew that a war wizard would come into this world. The prophecies told us some of what must be accomplished. The challenge was unlike any we have faced before.

When Richard was bom, Nathan and I traveled by ship, around the great barrier, to the New World. We recovered a book of magic from the Wizard's Keep in Aydindril to keep it out of Darken Rahl's hands and gave the book to Richard's stepfather, securing his promise that he would make Richard learn it. Only through such trials, and events in his life at his home, could this young man be forged into the kind of person with the wits to stop the first threat, Darken Rahl, his real father, and later restore the balance to the world of life. He is perhaps the most important person born in the last three thousand years.

Richard is the war wizard who wilt lead us in the final battle. The prophecies tell us this, but not whether we will prevail. This is a now a battle for mankind. Our only chance was to make sure, above all else, that he was not tainted in his training as a man. In this battle, magic is needed, but heart must rule it.

I sent you to bring him to the palace because you were the only one I could trust to accomplish the task. I knew your heart and soul, and I knew you were no Sister of the Dark.

I'm sure you are now wondering how I could let you search for him for more than twenty years when I knew where he was all the time. I also could have waited, and sent you after him when he was grown, and at last revealed his whereabouts when he triggered his gift. I am shamed to admit that I was using you, too, much as I used Richard.

For the challenges that lie ahead, I needed to teach you things you could not learn at the Palace of the Prophets, while Richard grew and learned some of the essential things he required. I needed you to be able to use your wits, and not the reams of rules that the Sisters at the palace thrive on. I had to let you develop your innate skills in the real world. The battle ahead lies in the real world; the cloistered world of the palace is no place to learn about life.

I don't expect you to ever forgive me. That, too, is one of the burdens a Prelate must bear: the hatred of one she loves like her own daughter.

When I told you those awful words, that, too, was to a purpose. I had to finally break you of the palace's teaching that you must always do as you were trained, and blindly follow orders. I had to make you angry enough to do what you judged was right. Since you were little, I could always count on your temper.

I couldn 't trust that if I told you the reasons, you would understand, or do as was necessary. Sometimes, a person can only properly affect events by using their own moral propriety, and not by carrying out orders. It is so stated in prophecy. I trusted that you would choose right over training, if you came to the conclusion yourself.

The other reason I told you those things in my office was because I suspected that one of my administrators was a Sister of the Dark. I knew my shield would not keep my words from her ears. I let my words betray me so she would attack me, and force their hand. I knew f could very possibly be killed, but I chose that fate over the possibility of the world being plunged into the grip of the Keeper. Sometimes, a Prelate must even use herself.

So far, Verna, you have lived up to my every expectation of you. You have played a vital role in saving the world from the Keeper. With your help, we have thus far succeeded.

The very first time I laid eyes on you, I smiled, because you had an angry scowl on your face. Do you remember why? I will tell you, if you don't. Every nov' brought to the palace was given a test. Sooner or later, we wrongly blamed her fo a small offense of which she was innocent. Most cried. Some pouted. Some bore the shame of guilt with stoic resignation. Only you became angry at the injustice In that, you proved yourself.

Nathan had found a prophecy that said the one we needed would be delivered to us not with a smile, or a pout, or a brave face, but with an angry scowl. When I saw that look on your face, and your little arms folded in a fit, f nearly laughed aloud. At last, you had been delivered into our hands. From that day I have been using you in the Creator's most important work.

! chose you to be the Prelate in the illusion of my death because you are still the one Sister I trust above all others. There is more than a good chance that I wilt be killed on my present journey with Nathan, and if I do die, you will be the Prelate for real. That is the way I wish it.

Your justifiable hatred weighs on my heart, but it is the Creator's forgiveness that is important, and I know I will have that much, at least. I will suffer your scorn as my burden in this life, as I suffer other burdens for which there is no relief. It is the price of being Prelate of the Palace of the Prophets.

Verna pushed the book away, unable to read more of the words. Her head fell to her folded arms as she sobbed. Though she didn't recall Ihe nature of the injustice of which the Prelate spoke, she remembered the sting of it, and her anger. Mostly, she remembered the Prelate's smile, and how it made the world right again.

"Oh, dear Creator," Verna wept aloud, "you truly have a fool for a servant."

If she had felt heartache before, for thinking the Prelate had used her, she now felt agony over the anguish the Prelate had had to endure. When she was finally able to bring her tears to a halt, she pulled the little book back before her and read on.

But the past is past, and we must now go on with what must be done. The prophecies say that the greatest danger now lies before us. The tests that have come before would have ended the world of life in a final, terrible flash. In an instant, all would be irrecoverably lost. Richard passed those tests, and kept us from thai fate.

Now a greater trial is upon us. It is not from other worlds, but from our own. This is a battle for the future of our world, the future of mankind, and the future of magic. In this, in the struggle for the minds and hearts of men, there is no final flash, no instant end, but the inexorable, grinding struggle of war, as the shadow of enslavement slowly creeps across the world, and darkens the spark, of magic, through which comes the Creator's light.

The ancient war, started thousands of years ago, is again aflame. We, in protecting this world from others, have unavoidably brought it to pass. This time, there will be no cessation of war because of the efforts of hundreds of wizards. This time, we have only one war wizard to lead us. Richard.