Wasteland Read online

  Richard couldn’t miss the troubled expressions. “Obviously, you do. What do you know about M111-B?”

  “Darken Rahl used to call it the Wasteland,” Rikka said.

  Richard had never heard of an indoor place with such a name. “The Wasteland? Why did he call it that?”

  Rikka shared another look with some of the others. “He didn’t understand the place and didn’t care to. It’s a vast, remote, isolated area. He didn’t know why it was here in the palace. He rarely if ever went down there.”

  “He was afraid of it,” Nyda added when Rikka didn’t say it.

  Richard’s gaze shifted to her. “Why?”

  For a moment, Nyda seemed to search for a way to explain it. “M111-B is a strange, surreal place. It’s kind of self-contained labyrinth of confusing passageways and dead ends. It would be easy to become lost in there and never find your way out.”

  “It’s so dangerous that it’s not merely restricted,” Rikka explained. “The whole area is closed off behind a series of locked doors. We can take you there, but if there is a witch man down in there, it is going to be beyond merely dangerous. Unlike Darken Rahl, Michec had a certain … fascination with the Wasteland. He used it often. As Berdine can attest, Michec is a very sadistic man. Some called him Michec the Butcher.”

  When Richard looked to her, Berdine reluctantly spoke. “The Wasteland is a place you wouldn’t ever want Moravaska Michec to take you. When Darken Rahl ruled, the Wasteland was a kind of refuge for Michec. He used to take people in there where he wouldn’t be disturbed. None of those people he took in there ever came back. If he took Vika in there…”

  Richard gripped Berdine’s arm and leaned close. “We’re going to get Vika back. That’s a promise.”

  Berdine swallowed her emotion. “I know you will try, Lord Rahl. But you don’t understand Michec … or the Wasteland.”

  “Lord Rahl,” Harris said, “M111-B is more than a confusing and simply dangerous place. I can’t imagine the purpose of it, or why it’s down there, but I’ve heard that in the past somehow people have accidentally managed to get in there. Only a couple ever made it out. I don’t really know about them, but the rest must have died in there. Anyone who knows it fears that place.” He gestured at the Mord-Sith. “As they say, Darken Rahl may have been afraid of the place, but Michec used to go in there.”

  Richard wondered why there would be a labyrinth of any kind down in the lower reaches of the palace. In the Keep, yes, there were any number of such places, some of them so complex that it had been a thousand years since people had set foot in some of the confusion of rooms, but those areas had a defensive purpose as traps for intruders. He had never seen anything of the kind at the People’s Palace, and even if it was somehow meant to be defensive, he couldn’t imagine any strategic reason for it to be down in a lower area of the palace.

  “With a witch man casting webs down there,” Shale said, “that is only going to make it all the more dangerous, especially when we don’t know the layout of this Wasteland place. He would be able to use that to his advantage to trap us and kill us.”

  Richard tapped his thumb on the scabbard at his hip. “A labyrinth of confusing halls and rooms is a real problem by design. We could get really lost in there. Since we don’t know the layout of the maze, we won’t know where we are once we’re in there.”

  “I can help with that much, at least,” Harris said, lifting a hand to break into the conversation. “We have maps of every area in the palace. There would be diagrams of M111-B. That number is a charting designation.”

  Richard frowned. “You think you have a diagram showing a layout of that place, M111-B? The Wasteland?”

  Harris nodded with conviction. “I haven’t seen that specific one myself, but there are plans of every part of the palace. They are necessary for a variety of reasons, from repair work to locating sources of leaks and every other sort of malfunction that needs to be addressed. I’m sure there would be one of M111-B.”

  “Show us,” Richard said.

  Going for the door without a word, Edward Harris wove his way among the soldiers as they started for Mr. Burkett.

  9

  As they left Mr. Burkett’s apartment, Kahlan felt shock and dismay over the discovery of how disloyal the man had been. In his position he had uncaringly put the lives of everyone in the palace at risk. His betrayal had led to Vika being taken, and she was now in the hands of the shadowy Moravaska Michec. With a gifted man possessing such powers holed up inside the palace, and in a perilous place, no less, it was now a situation beyond merely dangerous.

  Kahlan knew that, in a way, Shale had been right that their purpose of getting to the Wizard’s Keep overrode the life of one person who, after all, had sworn to protect them with her life. Vika was doing just that. She would want them to leave her and get to the safety of the Wizard’s Keep.

  The Mord-Sith always came after her and Richard without question or hesitation. Kahlan hated the thought of her in silent terror, thinking no help would be coming.

  But at the same time, this was also about much more than saving Vika’s life. Evil could not be left to fester and grow inside the House of Rahl. There was no telling what Michec would do once they left for the Keep.

  As they reached the end of the hall where it came out to the balcony area, with Mr. Harris leading the way, Kahlan heard a commotion behind her. Along with everyone else, she turned to look back down the hall. Mr. Burkett suddenly bolted out of his room. Unbelievably, he ran toward them in his stocking feet, fist raised in the air, the three soldiers chasing after him. One of the men stretched out, snatching for Mr. Burkett, but the wiry man twisted away. He was yelling drunken curses at Richard.

  As the four of them raced out into the balcony, everyone turned to the threat. It wasn’t much of a threat, though, so Richard didn’t bother drawing his sword. He looked like he intended to simply hook the man with an arm and turn him over to the soldiers.

  The Mord-Sith weren’t so casual about the threat from an unarmed, skinny, older man. They all had their Agiel to hand and looked like they intended him great violence. As Mr. Burkett charged out of the hall, yelling that Richard had no right to remove him after his years of service, something out of the corner of her eye caught Kahlan’s attention.

  She heard their howls at the same time that she turned and saw them. Four or five Glee, in a tight group, had already materialized and were racing down the hall toward them with alarming speed, steam still trailing off their dark, wet bodies.

  Just as they all turned to confront the threat, another group of the creatures they hadn’t seen materialize crashed through the center of their group from the opposite side, catching them all by surprise. Everyone ducked as claws flashed by and wicked, pointed teeth snapped. With Glee converging on them all from both directions at the same time, several of the Mord-Sith were blindsided and knocked to the floor by the tall, dark creatures going for Kahlan.

  Richard’s arm swept behind, circling Kahlan’s waist. As he spun around, he took her from her feet and to the floor just as a claw swept by right over their heads.

  A claw did catch one of the soldiers by surprise as he charged out of the hall after Mr. Burkett. It ripped through the leather armor and the flesh and bone under it.

  Another one of the dark creatures swung at Mr. Burkett, ripping out his throat so deeply and with such force that the claw hooked his spine and threw the man flying. When he slammed into the short wall, his upper body flipped backward over the wall. Mr. Burkett plummeted to the stone floor far below.

  As the dark, slimy creatures attacked from both sides, the Mord-Sith, after having scrambled to their feet, rammed their Agiel into the center of the tall monsters. Kahlan knew they bled; when she heard the shrieks, she knew that they also felt pain. By the sound of their shrieks, they felt no less pain than any human would under an Agiel.

  Richard grabbed the arm of one as it stormed through the midst of the group, clawing wildly at them. He
twisted the arm around as the creature’s weight carried it on past. Its arm wrenched around with enough force to partially rip it off. When it smacked the floor, the Glee began to dissolve into scribbles. In an instant it had vanished. Others the Mord-Sith caught also vanished before any more damage could be done.

  A soldier swung his sword, taking the head off one Glee just before the wicked claws of another hooked his arm, tearing flesh from bone. Another claw ripped open his middle. The soldier fought in vain as he was being taken down and mauled to death.

  Richard circled a powerful arm around the head of one of the creatures attacking the soldier. With a violent twist, he broke its neck. In such a sudden death, it failed to vanish back into its own world and instead fell sprawling on the floor.

  Some of the creatures went into deep, froglike squats and then sprang up toward them with frightening speed. There seemed to be black shapes flying at them from everywhere. Kahlan ducked back just as jaws snapped, and the creature’s pointed white teeth barely missed her face. She pulled her knife and hooked its leg, slicing to the bone. When it fell, Richard drove his sword through its spine.

  Berdine jumped onto the back of one of them leaping for Kahlan and pressed her Agiel to the base of its skull. The slimy monster screeched, tipping its head back in agony at the same time as it turned to scribbles. Berdine, on its back with her legs around the middle, suddenly tumbled to the floor when it vanished from right under her. Another one of the monsters saw her at a disadvantage and jumped for her. Berdine managed to flip onto her back on the floor and strike up at the dark shape closing down over her. Caught on her Agiel, it, too, shrieked as it vanished.

  Richard lopped off arms reaching for Kahlan. She could see the rage in his eyes, both his own and the power from the sword. As one of the tall creatures dove for Kahlan, he took a mighty swing at it, slicing it clean in two from one shoulder to the opposite hip. The two halves tumbled across the ground, one to each side of Kahlan. The insides spilled across the marble floor, spreading yet more blood and viscera underfoot.

  Another one of the big Glee, running in with claws held high for a swing at Edward Harris, slipped on the blood. Instead of taking a lethal swipe at the man, it fell and crashed into him. The impact knocked him over the waist-high wall at the side of the balcony. Harris cried out as he tried to grab the edge, but he only was able to catch it with one hand as he fell.

  Richard dove for the wall. At the last instant, as the man’s fingers slipped off, he snatched Edward Harris’s wrist, keeping him from a fall that would have killed him. As Richard held on to the man hanging down over the side of the wall, he stabbed at a Glee coming for him. Kahlan saw the sword erupt from its back. Richard pushed it off the blade with a foot. As the dying creature fell, another going for Richard tripped over it and met the same fate.

  Kahlan reached for a nearby Glee to unleash her power on it. While she didn’t need to touch a person, not knowing how it would work on these creatures, she wanted to make contact with it. Cassia slammed into it first, ramming her Agiel into its middle. The creature shrieked in agony, its head twisting violently, its long, dark, almond-shaped eyes going wide. Even as Cassia twisted her weapon to increase the pain, it was already dissolving back to its own world. Cassia screamed in rage that it got away before she could do more damage.

  The slime from the creatures, which not only dripped off their smooth black skin but splashed across the floor when they fell and smacked down hard, was mixing with the blood to make for slippery footing. In their frenzied attempts to get at them, some of the Glee slipped and fell.

  Richard swung his sword as two of the monsters feinted one way and then the other, trying to find a way past his blade to get at him, knowing he was pinned to the short wall as he held on to the wrist of the man over the edge.

  Shale slipped and fell just as she cast an arm out, sending out another wavering crack of power. It blew the shoulder and arm off one of the creatures trying to get at Richard, throwing black flesh and bloody bone up high into the air. The dark shape stumbled around in shock as it dissolved into scribbles and vanished.

  The remaining soldier slashed through several more of the tall, dark Glee trying to get at Richard. The Mord-Sith had formed a defensive ring around Kahlan. The way Richard was holding on to Edward Harris had him pinned to the short wall so that he couldn’t fight effectively, but he couldn’t let go or Harris would die. The Glee all knew it.

  “Help him!” Kahlan screamed.

  The Mord-Sith reacted to her order and attacked the creatures from behind as they tried to rip into Richard. Here and there the victims screeched in pain briefly before they vanished. Their numbers were being whittled down, making it easier to fight back against them, but if they connected with either claws or teeth, they could do lethal damage.

  Everyone, it seemed, was frantically fighting for their lives. Then, almost as soon as the battle had started, it ended with the last two creatures escaping by vanishing into thin air.

  The bodies of several mangled or decapitated Glee lay sprawled on the floor. Everyone panted in exhaustion after the brief but frenzied fight.

  Richard sheathed his sword as he turned to the man over the edge of the wall to get another hand on him.

  A soldier stood in front of Kahlan with his feet spread, ready to protect her with his life. When he saw that the attackers were gone, the soldier ran to the short wall and leaned over, grabbing the man’s arm to help Richard hold on to him. Together he and Richard hauled Edward Harris up and back over the wall. His shirt soaked with sweat, he flopped down, leaning against the wall to catch his breath.

  Across the broad corridor, on the balcony that mirrored the one they were on, some people were running for their lives while others stood pressed against the short wall, where they had been anxiously watching the fight. People were running for safety down in the expansive corridor below, too, while many more were gathering around the crumpled body of Mr. Burkett and a severed black arm from one of the creatures.

  Kahlan rushed to Richard. Like everyone else, he was breathing heavily.

  She put a hand on his chest, thankful that he was all right. “I think that must have taken a few years off my life.”

  He gave her a knowing smile. “Me too. For a moment there, I thought they had us.” He gestured to the two downed soldiers. “Unfortunately, not all of us survived the attack.”

  Shale shook gore and slime from the hem of her dark dress as she came closer. “I’ve been righteously frightened often enough in the Northern Waste, but life here at the beautiful, glorious People’s Palace is a lot scarier. Those of us still alive still came very close to death today.”

  Richard seemed to understand her meaning. “As soon as we can leave we’ll be a lot safer. Right now the goddess can look through the eyes of any of the thousands of people here and know where we are at any given moment so she can send attacks when we are vulnerable.

  “But we can’t simply leave a threat here that is just as deadly. If we left now, Michec could stab us in the back, so to speak. If he cast a lethal spell that killed Kahlan, hope for the future would end right there. Just because the Glee are a threat doesn’t mean this one isn’t just as dangerous and we can ignore it.”

  Shale nodded with a sigh.

  Kahlan saw soldiers of the First File running in from both directions, weapons drawn.

  Just as Richard turned back to Kahlan, the air of the hall not far off shimmered with a mass of swirling lines that could mean only one thing.

  Kahlan’s eyes went wide. There had to be well over a hundred of them, the steam rising off their glistening black bodies as they suddenly materialized, it seemed, at a dead run.

  10

  In a heartbeat, from not far off down the corridor, a massive mob of the huge, dark creatures with steaming, soft, dark, slippery skin raced toward Richard and his party. They had materialized all bunched together in a writhing, howling mass. At first, all the waving arms reminded him of nothing so much as
a dark mass of wriggling worms. As they ran, gelatinous globs slid off their naked bodies to drip and drop all over the floor.

  Mouths wide, they roared with ravenous intent, their howls echoing through the vast, multilevel corridor.

  Their large, glossy, almond-shaped eyes seemed nearly as black and wet as their soft, moist flesh. When a thin, semitransparent third eyelid blinked in from the inside corner of each eye, the membrane gave their eyes a slightly milky appearance.

  In an instant, Richard’s emotions went from exhausted relief to full fright. He had thought it was over, but now there were suddenly many times the number of Glee as in the attack that had just ended. He took a quick look over his shoulder. None were coming from behind. At least not yet. The soldiers back in that direction were still a long way off. They would never reach Richard and those with him in time.

  All of those claws were terrifying enough, but even more frightening were the nasty, oily faces of the creatures. The thin wet skin wrinkled as their wide mouths gaped open, lips pulling back from long, needle-sharp teeth that glistened with stringy slime. The mouths full of white teeth stood out all the more against the dark mass of the creatures.

  The few dozen soldiers racing to Richard and Kahlan’s defense from that same direction were suddenly beset by the tall dark shapes slashing away at them with hooked claws. They ran through the midst of the soldiers, overwhelming them with sheer numbers and brute force. The soldiers tried to fight back—even taking down a few of the Glee, which were then trampled underfoot—but they were being hopelessly engulfed and overrun.

  Before the Mord-Sith could launch toward them, before Richard had time to think about it, he reacted out of instinct born of white-hot rage.

  He thrust both hands toward the threat.

  Clarity came to him in a frozen instant in time.

  His birthright, that core of his gift deep within that he hadn’t been aware of growing up, but that he had come to know intimately when in the underworld, erupted forth as if it were wild fury brought to life.