"I don't know. That's what I'm checking." She held up a finger. "Let me read just a little of this part…"

After a moment she looked up as she tapped the page. "Yes, I was right. This warns that to use this book, the key must be used. Otherwise, without the key, everything that has come before will not only be sterile, but fatal. It says that within one full year the key must complete what has been wrought with this book."

"Key," Richard repeated in a flat tone.

He glanced to Berdine.

" 'They will tremble in fear at what they have done and cast the shadow of the key among the bones, " she quoted from Yanklee's Yarns. "You think that could be the key this book is talking about?"

Something stirred in the dark fringes of his consciousness.

With a lightning-swift spark of comprehension, Richard understood.

His whole body flashed icy cold. His arms and legs went numb.

"Dear spirits…" he whispered.

Nicci frowned at him. "Richard, what's wrong. You've gone as pale as chalk."

Richard had trouble making his voice work. Finally, he heard himself say "I've got to get back to Zedd."

Nicci reached out and laid a hand on his arm. "What's wrong?"

"I think I know what the key is."

Richard began to pant as his heart pounded out of control. Everything he knew was turning upside down and all the pieces were coming apart. It felt like he couldn't get his breath.

They will tremble in fear at what they have done and cast the shadow of the key among the bones.

"Well, what do you think — "

"I'll explain when we get there. We have to go — now."

Worried, Nicci slipped the book into a pocket in the black skirt of her dress. "I'll do my best, Richard. I'll figure this out — I promise."

He nodded absently as his mind raced to try to fit all the pieces back together. He felt as if he were only watching himself begin to move.

He seized Berdine by the arm. "Baraccus had a secret place — a library. I need you to try to find out where it was."

Berdine nodded at his urgency. "All right, Lord Rahl. I'll see what I can learn. I'll do my best."

She glanced down at the white knuckles on his hand gripping her arm. Richard realized that he must be hurting her and let go.

"Thank you, Berdine. I know I can count on you." The others were all staring at him. "I've got to get back to Zedd. I've got to talk to him right away. I've got to know where he got it."

"Got what?" Nicci pressed a hand to his chest, stopping him before he went through the door. "Richard, what's so important that — "

"Look, I'll explain it when we get back there," he said, cutting her off. "Right now I need to think this through."

Nicci shared a troubled look with Cara. "All right, Richard. Calm down. We'll be back to the Keep soon enough."

He snatched a fistful of Cara's red leather outfit and pushed her through the doorway ahead of him. "Get us back to the sliph — the shortest route."

All business, now, Cara spun her Agiel up into her fist. "Come on, then."

He turned back to Berdine, trotting backward after Cara. "I need you to find out everything you possibly can about Baraccus. Everything!"

Berdine raced along just ahead of Nicci. "I will, Lord Rahl."

He pointed back at her. "Verna will be here soon. Tell her that I said I need her to help you. Have her Sisters help you, too. Go through every book in the entire palace if you have to, but find out everything you can about Baraccus — where he was born, where he grew up, what he liked, what he didn't. He was First Wizard, so there should be information of some kind. I want to know who cut his hair, who made his clothes, what his favorite color was. Everything, no matter how trivial you think it is. While you're at it, see if you can find out anything more about what the half-wits from Yanklee's Yarns did."

"Don't worry, Lord Rahl, if there is any information to be had, I will have it. I'll figure it out and have an answer when you return."

Richard snatched Nicci's hand to make sure she kept up and then turned toward Cara. "Hurry."

Berdine, Agiel in her fist, ran after them, guarding the rear. Richard was only dimly aware of the flashes of light off polished armor and weapons, and the jangle of gear, as the soldiers took up the chase as if the Keeper himself were after the Lord Rahl.

As his mind raced as fast as his feet, Richard resolved that he had better go to Caska first.

The more he considered that idea, and as pieces of the puzzle started fitting together, he reconsidered the idea. With the sliph, he could travel swiftly back to Caska from the Keep.

It was more urgent that he get to Zedd.

As they ran through the labyrinth of halls, rooms, and passageways, Richard heard the distant toll of the bell, calling people to the devotion to the Lord Rahl.

He wondered if they would all soon be kneeling before the Keeper of the underworld, and saying their devotions to him.

CHAPTER 30

Six abruptly stood. Without a word she took three long strides to the wall of the cave that held Violet's expansive drawing. The woman carefully pressed her bony hands against the chalk symbols that Violet had drawn there days before. Those symbols had suddenly begun to glow, the yellow chalk glowing with yellow light, the red chalk with red light, and the blue with blue light. The eerie illumination from the flaring colors shimmered over the walls of the cave the way light reflected off rippling water.

Rachel glanced over at Violet, sitting on a squat, purple-tufted stool she'd had Rachel carry in for her days before. The bored queen picked with her fingernail at flaking stone on the wall behind her. Rachel had come to think of Violet as the queen of the cave, since that was where they spent more and more of their time.

Violet didn't like sitting on rock when she wasn't drawing. A filthy old rock, she'd said, was more than good enough for Rachel, but not for a queen. Six hadn't cared at all about the stool. She appeared to always have more consequential matters on her mind than cushions for sitting. Violet, though, got tired of waiting while Six thought about those consequential matters, and so she'd had Rachel lug the heavy stool to the cave.

Now, the queen of the cave, under the flickering light of torches and glowing symbols, sat upon her tufted purple throne waiting for her advisor to advise her as to what needed to be done next.

"He comes," Six hissed. "Again he comes through the void."

It was clear to Rachel that the woman wasn't really talking to Violet, but to herself. The queen might as well not have been there.

Violet glanced up. She didn't look inclined to bother to stand unless Six told her that it was necessary that she do more drawings, but it was clear that her interest had been roused. This was, after all what she wanted and the whole reason she bothered to go to all the work of making such complex drawings down in a dank and dingy cave when she could just as well be trying on dresses and jewels or attending grand feasts where guests fawned over the young queen.

Six seemed in a world of her own as her hands glided over the drawing. She put the side of her face against the stone and at the same time reached an arm back.

"Come, my child."

A scowl creased Violet's round features. "You mean, 'my queen. "

Six either didn't hear her, or didn't care to correct herself. "Hurry. It is time to begin the links."

Violet stood. "Now? It's long past dinnertime. I'm starving."

Six, stroking her cheek against the chalk drawing of Richard like a cat rubbing the side of its face against a person's legs, didn't seem at all interested in dinner.

She rolled her long fingers, beckoning Violet. "It must be now. Hurry. We must not waste such a rare opportunity. Such links as we need will take time and there is no telling how much time we may have."