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CHAPTER 1

Kahlan stood quietly in the shadoatching, as evil knocked softly on the door Huddled under the s, off to the side, she hoped that no one would answer that knock As ht in out of the rain, she didn't want trouble to visit innocent people She knew, though, that she had no say in the matter

The light of a single lantern flickered weakly through the slender s to either side of the door, reflecting a pale, shin overhead, hung by two iron rings, grated and squealed each ti back and forth in the wind-borne rain Kahlan was able to make out the spectral white shape of a horse painted on the dark, wet sign The light froh to enable her to read the name, but because the other three women with her had talked of little else for days, Kahlan knew that the name would be the White Horse Inn

By the sed that one of the dark buildings nearby had to be a stable In the sporadic displays of distant lightning, she could justlike ghosts beyond the billowing sheets of rain Despite the steady roar of the deluge and the rue was sound asleep Kahlan could think of no better place to be on such a dark and wretched night than bundled up under bed covers, safe and warm

A horse in the nearby stable whinnied when Sister Ulicia knocked a second ti herself to be heard over the riot of rain, yet not so loud as to sound hostile Sister Ulicia, a wo a deliberately restrained approach Kahlan didn't knohy, but iined that it had to do with the reason they were there It also, the woerous but unpredictable Kahlan couldn't always tell exactly when Sister Ulicia would lash out, and just because she so far hadn't didn't mean that she wouldn't Neither of the other two Sisters was in any bettertheir teh the three of the the reunion

Lightning flashed close enough that the blinding but halting incandescence briefly revealed a whole street of buildings crowded close around the h the round beneath their feet

Kahlan wished that there was sos otherwise hidden in the obscurity of night—that could help illuht as concealed by theto be free of the Sisters, a burning desire to live her own life—to knohat her life really was That much she knew about herself She knew, too, that her convictions had to be founded in experience It was obvious to her that there had to be so there—people and events—that had helped ht to recall them, they were lost to her

That terrible day she stole the boxes for the Sisters, she had promised herself that someday she would find the truth of who she was, and she would be free

When Sister Ulicia knocked a third time, a muffled voice came from inside

"I heard you!" It was a man's voice His bare feet thuht there! A moment, please!"

His

annoyance at having been awakened in the ht was layered over with forced deference to potential customers

Sister Ulicia turned a sullen look on Kahlan "You know that we have business here" She lifted a cautionary finger before Kahlan's face "Don't you even think of giving us any trouble, or you'll get what you got the last time"

Kahlan sed at the reminder "Yes, Sister Ulicia"

"Tovi had better have gotten us a room," Sister Cecilia complained "I'm in no mood to be told the place is full"

"There will be roo off Sister Cecilia's habit of always assu the worst

Sister Ar and attractive as Sister Ulicia To Kahlan, though, their looks were insignificant in light of their inner nature To Kahlan, they were vipers

"One way or another," Sister Ulicia added under her breath as she glared at the door, "there will be room"

Lightning arced through the greenish, roiling clouds, releasing an earsplitting boom of thunder

The door opened a crack The shadowed face of a man peered out at thehtshirt He moved his head a little to each side so that he could take in the strangers

Judging theerous, he pulled open the door and with a sweeping gesture ushered them inside

"Come on in, then," he said "All of you"

"Who is it?" A woman called out as she descended the stairs to the rear She carried a lantern in one hand and held the hehtdress up with the other so that she wouldn't trip on it as she hurried down the steps

"Four woht," the ht of such a practice

Kahlan froze in midstride He'd said "four women"

He had seen all four of theh to say so As far as she could recall, such a thing had never happened before No one but her masters, the four Sisters—the three with her and the one they had co her

Sister Cecilia shoved Kahlan in ahead of her, apparently not catching the significance of the remark

"Well for goodness' sake," the woman said as she hurried between the two plank tables She tsked at the foul weather as the wind drove a rattle of rain against the s "Do get them in out of that aeather, Orlan"

Strea a patch of pine floor The man's ainst a wet gust and then dropped the heavy iron bar back in the brackets to bolt the door

The woathered up in a loose bun, lifted her lantern a little as she peered at the late-night guests Puzzled, she squinted as her gaze swept over the drenched visitors and then back again Her et what she had been about to say

Kahlan had seen that blank look a thousand ti three callers No one could ever reood as invisible Kahlan thought that maybe because of the darkness and rain the man, Orlan, had merely made a mistake when he'd said to his wife that there were four visitors

"Coet yourselves dry," the woman said as she smiled in earnest war her into the s room "Welcome to the White Horse Inn"

The other two Sisters, openly scrutinizing the rooave the thele dark doorway at the back, beside the stairs A fireplace made of stacked, flat stones took up ht The air in the di aro frolowed out from under a thick layer of feathery ashes