When she had lived at the castle before, Rachel had thought that Violet was dangerous in the extreme. She'd had no idea at the time just how much more dangerous she would become. Rachel felt a sense of crushing hopelessness.

Violet and Six glanced up when they heard Samuel rushing back in. Fearing that Violet was liable to whack her again, Rachel decided not to turn and look. She could hear Samuel panting, though, as he got close.

Violet swished her hand, commanding Rachel aside and out of the way. Rachel immediately scrambled to comply, only too happy to be out of the reach of Violet's arm, if not her authority.

Samuel had a leather bag held closed with a drawstring. He set the bag down carefully and opened it. He looked up at Six. She rolled her hand, urging him to get on with it.

It appeared to be a box of some kind. When it came out of the bag, Rachel saw that it was as black as doom itself. She thought that they all very well might be sucked into that black void and vanish into the underworld.

With one hand, Samuel held the sinister thing up to Six. Smiling, she lifted it out of his hand.

"As promised," she said to Violet, "I present you with Queen Violet's box of Orden."

Rachel remembered Queen Milena lifting that same box with the same kind of awed reverence. Except that now it wasn't all covered in the silver, gold, and jewels. Zedd had told Rachel that the real box of Orden had been under those jewels. This had to be that box that had all along been inside when Rachel had spirited it away from the castle just as Wizard Giller had asked her to do.

Now Giller was dead, Richard no longer had his sword, and Rachel was back in the clutches of Violet. And now Violet had herself a precious box of Orden, just as her mother had.

Violet smirked. "You see, Rachel? What need have I of those old, useless advisors? Could they have accomplished any of what I have accomplished? You see, unlike those weak people you threw in with, I always persevere until I succeed. That's what it takes to be a queen.

"I have the box of Orden back. I have you back." She waggled the chalk again. "And I will have Richard back to face his punishment."

Six sighed. "Enough of this happy reunion. You have what you asked for. Samuel and I need to go have a talk about his next assignment, and you need to get back to your 'art' lesson."

Violet smiled conspiratorially. "Yes, my lesson." She glared down at Rachel. "There is an iron box waiting for you back at the castle. And then there is the matter of your punishment."

Six bowed her head. "I will be off, then, my queen."

Violet flicked her hand in a gesture of dismissal. Six grasped Samuel's upper arm and started away with him. He had to watch his balance to keep his footing as he stepped over and around rocks. Six seemed to glide through the dim light without any trouble at all.

"Come along," Violet said in the kind of pretend cheerful tone that made Rachel's blood run cold. "You can watch me draw."

As Violet grabbed the torch Rachel stood on wobbly legs, then followed her queen, the light of the flagging flame illuminating walls covered with endless drawings of terrible things being done to people. There was not a spot on the walls that didn't have some sort of horrific scene. Rachel missed Chase something fierce, missed his reassurance, his smile when she had done a lesson well, his comforting hand on her shoulder. She loved him so much. And Samuel had killed him, killed all her hopes and dreams. She felt numb despair as she followed Violet deeper into the darkness, deeper into the madness.

Nicci spotted Richard far off down the long rampart, standing at the crenellated outer wall not far from the base of a soaring tower, gazing out over the deserted city far below. Twilight had muted the colors of the dying day, turning the distant rolling summer-green fields to gray. Cara stood not far from his side, silent but watchful.

Nicci knew Richard well enough that she could easily read the heightened tension in his body. She knew Cara well enough to see the reflection of that stress lurking in her intently calm appearance. Nicci pressed a fist over the knot of anxiety tightening in her middle.

Overhead the slate gray clouds roiled, spitting an occasional fat drop of rain. Distant thunder rumbled through the mountain passes, promising a tempestuous night to come. Despite the dark, seething clouds, the air was strangely still. The heat of the day had abruptly vanished, as if fleeing before the storm that was about to break.

As she came to a stop, Nicci rested a hand on the crenellated wall and took a deep breath of the humid air.

"Rikka said that you needed to see me. She said it was urgent."

Richard looked the match for the brewing storm. "I have to leave. At once."

Nicci had somehow expected just that. She glanced past Richard, to Cara, but the Mord-Sith showed no reaction. Richard had been brooding for days. He'd been quietly distant as he considered everything he had learned from Jebra and Shota. Zedd had advised Nicci to leave him to his deliberation. Nicci had not needed such advise; she probably knew his darker moods better than anyone.

"I'm going with you," she said, making it clear that she was leaving no room for discussion.

He nodded absently. "It will be good to have you with me. Especially for this."

Nicci was relieved not to have him argue, but the knot of anxiety tightened over the last part of what he'd said. There was a palpable sense of danger in the air. At that moment her concern was to insure that — whatever he was about to do — he was as well protected as she could manage.

"And Cara is going too."

Still, he gazed off into the distance. "Of course."

She realized that he was looking south. "Now that Tom and Friedrich are back, Tom will insist on coming along as well. His talents will be valuable."

Tom was a member of an elite corps of protectors to the Lord Rahl. Despite his amiable appearance, Tom was more than formidable in his duty. Men like him were not advanced to such trusted positions of protection to the Lord Rahl because they had nice smiles. Like other D'Haran protectors to the Lord Rahl, Tom had come to feel passionately about his duty to protect Richard.

"He can't come with us," Richard said. "We're going in the sliph. Only Cara, you, and me are able to travel in the sliph."

Nicci swallowed at the thought of such a journey. "And where are we going, Richard?"

At long last, his gray eyes turned to her. He gazed into her eyes with that way he had about him, as if he was looking into her soul.

"I've figured it out," he said.

"You've figured what out?"

"What I must do."

Nicci could feel her fingers tingling with a shapeless dread. The look of terrible resolve in his gray eyes made her knees weak.

"And what is that you must do, Richard?"

He puzzled a moment. "Did I ever tell you thanks for stopping Shota when you did, when she was touching me?"

Nicci was not disconcerted by Richard's abrupt change of topic. She had learned that it was Richard's way. It was especially characteristic when he was greatly troubled. The more agitated he was, it seemed that there were all the more things going on in his head at the same time, as if his thoughts were in a whirlwind of inner activity that pulled everything up into that tumultuous rush of deliberation.

"You told me, Richard."

About a hundred times.

He nodded slightly. "Well, thanks."

His voice had turned absent, distant, as he descended back into the dark depths of some inner equation upon which the future hinged. "She was doing something painful to you, wasn't she."

It was not a question, but a statement that Nicci had come to believe more and more in the days following Shota's visit. Nicci didn't know what Shota had done, but she wished she had not allowed even that brief touch. There was no telling how much the witch woman could have conveyed in that touch, even as abbreviated as it had been. Lightning, after all, was brief as well. Richard had never said what Shota had shown him, but it was ground that Nicci, for some reason, feared to tread upon.