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[ComputerMKII]

Bodycount: 0
Sexy Time Count: 1, if you count implication.

Thanks for including this. There's not much else I'm interested in in his books now.

Although this was a fun scene, it also shows that Goodkind has NO sense of rhythm. It feels awkward to read.

Also: sorry but having giving up at the beginning of Book 5, I can't even follow what's going on in your summaries. Thanks for providing them anyway.

 

[JORMBO]

I'm going to see if Target has it on my lunch break. Hope they do and I'll start reading through it tonight.

 

[Salazar]

Although this was a fun scene, it also shows that Goodkind has NO sense of rhythm. It feels awkward to read.

He lacks rhythm in a larger sense, too. I suspect that every single one of these (really small) chapters is going to end on a DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNN note.

Book really seems pretty stand-alone at this point. Terry's publisher might have delicately sent him the message that there are a whole lot of people who stopped reading after the first 4 or 5.

I hold out hope that someone will die horribly before Chapter 10.

 

[Salazar]

Zedd asks Richard for reassurance that nobody else can get into the Temple of the Winds - because this language of Creation (far from being irrelevant, as he had scoffed) is probably some really dangerous juju). Richard says yes, but he doesn’t sound sure. What a dick.

They talk a little bit more about the bewildering difficulty of the cataloguing project, in view of the fact that books about magic, and especially about prophecy, are either bullshit or appear to be bullshit to anybody not fearsomely trained or gifted in peculiar ways. Nathan pipes up and says he will help where he can - too damn right he will. Richard tells him about the blind lady who told his fortune, and Nathan affirms that she is called Sabella and that she is “the real deal”.

Nathan held his thumb and forefinger apart. “Little ones. She has only a very small amount of genuine ability. Most of what she says is pure embellishment, telling people what they want to hear so she can earn her way in life. A lot of what she does is to make the most likely future sound as if she had seen it in a vision. For instance, she might tell a young woman that she sees marriage in her future. Hardly divination, as most young women will marry”

[Fraud. I fucking knew it. Boot her out.]

Nathan elaborates that there are a few people with a smattering of prophetic capacity around the palace. One of them, Lauretta, apparently has an omen she has been wanting to talk to Richard about [Oh fuck, this is ominous]. Nathan didn’t want to bother Richard about it, which seems like a pretty stupid decision in retrospect. Nathan is a weak goddamn link.

Richard tells him about the “roof falling in” prophecy, and Nathan initially dismisses it as being too specific. Prophecies need to be sonorously vague. But then he points out a volume on a catalogue sheet called End Notes, which is a collection of prophetic fragments. “Random bits of longer prophecies that have been lost over the ages”. It also has the secondary meaning of referring to THE END OF THE WORLD. He marches down the aisle, hums a bit and picks out the volume, opens it to a page and

Richard stared at the words as if he was having trouble believing what he was seeing.

“What does it say ?” Kahlan finally had to ask. [Dat female agency]

Richard’s gray eyes turned up to her. “It says the roof is going to fall in”

Daaamn. And Nathan suggests that the fact that Sabella mumbled this fragment today has activated it - the time for it to be realised has potentially arrived. A palace official talks to Rikka, and she comes over to hurry Lord Rahl to a reception for Benjamin (what a boss, marrying a Mord Sith) and Cara.

-------------------------------

This is some bullshit coincidence stacking. Pretty sure there are magic folks powerful enough to get into the Temple if Richard hasn't locked it up. SO MANY OMENS. Start detonating the things, ffs. Omens become interesting when they eventuate, dammit.

Body Count: 0 - This MUST change.
Sexy Time Count: 0.5 - I'm already forgetting it happened.

 

[ComputerMKII]

Fantasy writers really need to fucking stop using prophecies. It's the most annoying plot device in the world. I'd rather Goodkind used even more McGuffins than a single prophecy.

 

[Salazar]

Fantasy writers really need to fucking stop using prophecies. It's the most annoying plot device in the world. I'd rather Goodkind used even more McGuffins than a single prophecy.

True.

Or at least have the prophecy daubed in blood somewhere, or spoken by a corpse, or spelled out in lightning.

Not dished out by a kitchen maid or picked up on the street for a silver coin.

I mean, Darken Rahl cut open Richard's foster Dad and read his guts. That was style.

 

[Salazar]

No fucking and no killing? The hell is this?

Spoiler: Two deaths in Chapter 7.

No fucking, but it is midday after all.

 

[mre]

You can't turn that down.

Someone on the TG forum who has speed-read it says the plot is "weird".

Does that really say "The omen turns out to be . . . ominous."?

 

[Salazar]

Does that really say "The omen turns out to be . . . ominous."?

Pretty sure a monkey at TOR typed that, so no discredit to Terry.

I suspect that the roof that falls in is going to be that of an underground chamber. Which is an elegant feint, really.

 

[ComputerMKII]

Does that really say "The omen turns out to be . . . ominous."?

 

[mre]

Pretty sure a monkey at TOR typed that, so no discredit to Terry.

On the one hand I agree that this is likely true, but on the other hand Goodkind really comes off as kind of a control-freak, so I can't completely discredit the possibility that he wrote it.

 

[The Technomancer]

Maybe its because I'm not reading the book itself but this just seems poorly structured. So we have both the Kharga Trace hook and the spooky stolen book hook?
If I'm reading the summary right Richard read the spooky stolen book because Bordine said "hey Richard, I found this random book that doesn't really relate to the plot but you should look at it"

 

[Alfarif]

Maybe its because I'm not reading the book itself but this just seems poorly structured. So we have both the Kharga Trace hook and the spooky stolen book hook?
If I'm reading the summary right Richard read the spooky stolen book because Bordine said "hey Richard, I found this random book that doesn't really relate to the plot but you should look at it"

Hahah Salazar, baller ass chapter reviews. I feel like I'm reading the book without bumbling through Goodkind's repetitive as hell writing style (I can't believe I emulated it at one time - vomit) or being very annoyed that Zedd has become nothing more than an angry, stupid wizard by the time the original series was over. Glad to see that sauve mofo Nathan is back doing his thing on those nice as hell outfits.

This got me thinking: does anyone else just make up what people look like in their heads regardless of what is written on the page? For me, Nathan is black with long, silver gray hair. Just real cool and collected. Zedd was like an original Harry Potter movie Dumbledore at first but he's morphed into the guy from the show now eve since TGK destroyed his sensible character. A lot of the Mord Sith are black and Asian except Cara. Verna = black chick. Nicci = reddish blonde instead of straight up platinum blonde.

 

[Clevinger]

Zedd isn’t convinced that you can classify books; that is, he thinks the entire business of classification is bunk.

"Especially fantasy," Zedd said. "Fuck that shit."



edit: And that is insane and depressing that the first book's manuscript sold for $275,000 (before they knew the series would sell like gangbusters). Fucking hell.

 

[Salazar]

Richard walks into the Grand Hall, with a lot of shit [TOO MANY PLOTLINES, FFS] on his mind. Kahlan slips her arm around him and tells him to be polite and focus on Benjamin and Cara’s special day. Richard agrees.

”That’s the Richard I love”, she whispered with a smile.

[If you try to whisper while smiling, you grimace]

Cara picked out sky blue as the colour for the catering staff. They mill around handing out finger food. Zedd is chatting away to Kahlan, telling her that Aydindril - location of his (First Wizard of the Midlands) office and of her Confessor palace has been all fixed up, after being fucking trashed by heaps of things - including reptile creatures called mriswith - in previous books.

Although there were hundreds of women all dressed in their finest dresses[He writes like he is concussed], Richard didn’t think that any of them looked anywhere near as stunning as Kahlan. Her white Mother Confessor dress, cut square at the neck and elegant in its simplicity, caressed her perfect form. It made her long brown hair look all the more luxurious [que ?] and her green eyes even more bewitching.

Yes, but he likes her most for her intelligence. Waking every morning and looking into her clever green eyes makes him feel like he is still dreaming. Zedd is still talking to Kahlan, talking about a boom in prophecy [MORE FUCKEN PROPHECIES] in Aydindril, with lots of people wanting to know the future and lots of charlatans moving in to capitalise on their anxiety. Richard doesn’t think it’s anything to be worried about [these feeble common folk need their entertainments: fuck em], but Zedd is a bit concerned. Not just on a social level, but with respect to magic shit. Richard is determined not to succumb to worry, but the day’s events are nagging at him. Cara being watched, the freak child, Sabella the crap prophet, the End Notes book.

Richard asks Zedd if Nathan’s talk about prophecies being ‘activated’ is legit. Zedd says he doesn’t know much about prophecy at all [well he’s fucked in this book, then], but there is some truth to it. A strong-jawed D’Haran soldier hurries in and talks to Benjamin, who straightens up and looks serious - like a general more than a recently married man. The soldier comes next to Richard, salutes, and apologises for interrupting. They haven’t been able to find the brat prophet Henrik.

Richard thought that sounded a little too definite. “He has to be somewhere down there. He’s sick, he couldn’t have gone too far. Keep looking, I’m sure your men will find him”.

The captain cleared his throat. “Lord Rahl, two of my men, two of the men who went after the boy, were found dead just a short while ago” [DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNN]

Richard’s heart sank at the thought that these brave men [You didn’t know them] who had fought so long and suffered so much had died now that peace had finally arrived.

“Dead ? How did they die ?”

The man shifted his weight. “I don’t know, Lord Rahl. There were no wounds or anything like that. They had not drawn their weapons. Their faces showed no last indication of trouble. They were simply lying peacefully in a narrow passage behind rows of tents. They was no sign of any kind of struggle [He means there, I’m sure.]

Richard’s fingers tightened around the hilt of his sword. “And they had no wounds ?” [YES, THAT’S WHAT THE MAN SAID. PAY ATTENTION]

“No, Lord Rahl. They were just plain dead”

-----------------------------------------------

Ok. The land is swamped in prophecies, some right, some wrong. This dilutes the intrigue of the book in general. I am sure Terry will prove me wrong in the next few chapters. He is going to rein in this narrative. He has the skills.

Two men dead. Unimportant men, to be sure. Richard has loads of troops, especially after telling the diverse duchies of the Midlands that he would fuck them up if they didn't swear allegiance to his ultimate rule. Possibly at the “clawed, rabbit-like hands” of Henrik, who, although small, is clearly running on crazy power. He could have choked them, leaving only some bruising that the soldiers might have missed. That, or the soldiers accepted some spiked honey cakes [FOOOOOOOLS] from street vendors. It is also possible that this Jit is protecting Henrik from afar with magic, or that she has trained Henrik in some spooky self-defence.

Body Count: 2
Sexy Time Count: 0.5, and nobody’s getting lucky any time soon.

 

[Salazar]

Although men have died mysteriously, Richard can’t (or won’t) just storm out into the city to see what’s up, as he would have done in previous books. He sends the captain to go and collect more men to step up the search for Henrik. [I am rooting for Henrik. Kill em all, little guy.] A crowd of diplomats gather around Richard and Kahlan, expressing gratitude for the securing of peace and “asking questions about trade policy and the establishment of uniform laws”.

Richard let Kahlan[Ugh] assure them that there would be no restrictions on trade, and that they needn’t fear special favors to some that would put others at a disadvantage.

Kahlan lets these folks know that the People’s Palace is now the hub of power in the Midlands, and that they (or select delegates) are going to have to establish permanent residence here. “Everyone seemed not merely relieved to hear this, but genuinely pleased”. Nathan breaks up this polite tedium (Richard is inwardly marveling at Kahlan’s confident grace) by walking up, grabbing hold of Richard’s arm, and saying “I need to speak with you”. He has a copy of End Notes, with a finger holding his place at a certain page. The babbling crowd has gone quiet.

Nathan leaned in and spoke confidentially. “You told me that the boy you encountered down in the market today told you something about darkness in the palace”

Richard makes his excuses to the diplomats, and he, Nathan, Zedd, and Kahlan move out of earshot. Henrik’s gabbling, “Darkness is seeking darkness” is also in End Notes.

”That’s[NO, THOSE ARE. Fuck, Terry.] the boy’s exact words”, Kahlan said, a tone of concern clearly evident in a low voice.

Nathan doesn’t know what the fuck is going on. Neither does Richard, but he has an acute sense that it is something really, really bad. Richard thinks to himself about how people call him “the pebble in the pond” [ta’veren, basically], and this seems like another case of events of great magnitude being drawn to his person.

He decides that he really does need to see this Lauretta woman who has an omen for him. Fuck, what’s one more omen. Bring em all in. Nathan says that when he feels like a stroll [NO, YOU PRATS. GO NOW. IT’S URGENT], they can go and talk to her. He repeats his belief that this is all more than likely nothing to be worried about. Prophecy is silly.

----------------------------------

Alright. People in town are repeating prophecies from a particular book. NONE of them have come true yet. NONE of them make any particular sense, apart from sounding like they might mean something bad. I’m hoping Lauretta has something more to offer than another fucking vague-as-hell poeticism from End Notes. Man, fuck the people on the internet who said this book started really quickly and excitingly.

Body Count: 2
Sexy Time Count: 0.5

 

[Salazar]

Richard goes back to his guests. What a dick. He deserves everything awful that happens from this point on. GO AND SORT STUFF OUT. You’re a War Wizard.

Nathan, being the only living prophet as well as a Rahl, was well known to just about everyone at the palace. That, and his flamboyant nature, made him a celebrity of sorts. He dressed the part, with a ruffled shirt and a fashionable green cape. Elaborate engraving covered the gold scabbard and sword at his hip.

[Motherfucker, we know what he is wearing. You told us.]

Nathan wears this gaudy shit to pull women. “Despite being somewhere near to a thousand years old, Nathan often approached life with the glee and wonder of a child”. This makes some people like him. It makes others think he is a douche. Most acknowledge that he is, as a prophet, surpassingly dangerous. He can start wars, ruin lives, do all kinds of cool things. He can also do the magic shit that Richard can: “Nathan didn’t need a sword to reduce someone to ash” - which is a good thing, because reducing someone to ash with a sword sounds fucking difficult.

A stocky guy asks Richard if “we may know if there is some prophetic event lying ahead for us”. Everyone in the hall leans in to hear Richard’s answer. Richard says “what do you mean ?” [stalling like a boss.] The guy answers that Richard, Zedd, and Nathan MUST have prophetic insights, being such powerful wizards. [This dick is a troublemaker. I would have killed him already.] Richard has had enough, and says:

”There will be a spring storm the likes of which has not been seen for many years. Those of you who wish to return home sooner rather than later should leave at once. Those who delay too long will shortly be stranded here for a number of days.”

This doesn’t satisfy the mob. It’s not real prophecy, they say. A woman uneasily asks if they can hear some of the real shit, the dark shit. A man weaves his way to the front, an Abbot wearing a rimless square hat, and he says he has been hearing all kinds of fucked-up predictions and warnings from soothsayers and diviners. Richard asks him what kind of crazies he has been listening to, and the Abbot tells him about folks who read smoke and animal entrails.

Richard is angry now. Diplomats better back the fuck up. He tells them that their future is what they make it. Nathan steps in before blood is spilled and says that prophecy is for prophets - that is, for him. People moan at this, and say that it shouldn’t be a secret. A queen moans loudest.

Nathan smiled. “Since you are not a prophet, Your Majesty, how can you know that there is a prophecy that is relevant, one that you would need to know about ?”

She fingered a long jeweled necklace, the unseen end of which was located somewhere down in her cleavage.[rofl] “Well, I suppose...”

Kahlan tells the people to calm the fuck down. Richard’s got this. The queen quibbles, and Richard can see that Kahlan is angry. Cara steps forward and says that magic is the Lord Rahl’s province and EVERYBODY BETTER STEP BACK. This finally has the desired effect.

Out of the corner of his eye, Richard sees a serving woman step up to Kahlan and put a hand on her arm. Richard is already on full fucking alert. You don’t touch the Mother Confessor. As turns and looks closer, the serving woman has blood down her front and has haunted eyes.

He was already moving when he saw the knife in her other hand sweeping around toward Kahlan’s chest.

-------------------------------------------------

YESSSSSSS. Blood, boobs, querulous diplomats. We’re not full-throttle, but this is an improvement.

Body Count: 2, and possibly more if the blood on this assassin is anything to go by.
Sexy Time Count: 0.5

 

[Salazar]

Time stops as the knife plunges. Mord Sith are beginning to react [so time hasn’t really stopped]. Cara’s Agiel flips up into her hand. Zedd lifts his arm to fling some magic. Soldiers (lol, feeble soldiers) put their hands on their swords.

Richard knows that none of them will be quick enough.

Into that silent void in time, thunder without sound [rofl, what ?] suddenly ignited[rofl, WHAT ?] Time crashed back in a headlong rush as the force of the concussion exploded through the confined space of the banquet hall. The impact to the air [dat physics] raced outward in a circle.

So Kahlan has used her Confessor power on the assassin, who was dumb enough to grab hold of Kahlan’s arm. Even Richard is blown back by the force of her power; he drops to one knee, feeling his head ache. The glass in all the windows shatters. Pieces of food and cutlery go everywhere.

The assassin, now under confessor control, is of average build, with curly dark hair. She doesn’t look very assassin-like to Richard. Kahlan starts to question her, and the woman says - in a dispassionate voice - that she has killed her children. Richard kneels down and takes the knife away from her - she is incapable of using it now that Kahlan has zonked her, but it still feels better to take it from her. Kahlan asks her why she would do such a thing.

The woman’s face turned up to Kahlan. “I had to. I didn’t want them to face the terror of it.”

“The terror of what ?”

“Of being eaten alive, Mistress”, the woman said, as if it was obvious”

It emerges that this is a kitchen maid with prophetic talents. She had been having visions of her children being eaten alive, ripped by the fangs of dark things, feral things. The vision instructed her to kill them, so she slit their throats. She says that this was a merciful way to do it, a gentle way.

Kahlan is mad. “Are you trying to tell me they didn’t suffer, didn’t struggle ?” She has cut throats herself, you see, and people usually don’t want her to and try to stop her.

Well, maybe a bit, the woman admits. But it was better than being eaten. She says that the reason she came to kill Kahlan was because Kahlan is doomed to the same fate as her children.

Richard’s knees felt like they might give out.[pussy]

The woman asks if she can kill Kahlan now. Kahlan says no, and stops her heart. She apologises to Cara for spoiling her reception, and Cara says no, don’t worry, it was a blast.

------------------------------------------

Yes, yes. We are getting somewhere. Monsters and magic. Kahlan in danger. Richard had better activate fuck-shit-up mode soon.

Body Count: 5 (two soldiers, at least two children, one assassin).
Sexy Time Count: 0.5

 

[Salazar]

Kahlan is chilling after unleashing her Confessor power - it is not only physically exhausting, but it takes a severe emotional toll. Richard is now convinced that there is some general pattern to all of this crazy shit. “Something sinister was going on”. It wasn’t just a lone individual acting on dysfunctional impulses.

Zedd notes that it is strange that the assassin dropped dead. [I thought Kahlan had killed her, but apparently not.]

Zedd rubbed a bony finger back and forth along his jaw. “Could be that the woman understood how utterly repulsed Kahlan was by her killing her children and so she thought that Kahlan would want her dead”

“I don’t know, Zedd. That doesn’t make a lot of sense to me [NOTHING DOES; THIS WHOLE WORLD IS CRAZY]. The whole purpose of a Confessor is to obtain confessions from killers, to find out the truth of what happened, of what terrible things they’ve done. They aren’t repulsed by confessing their crimes. On the contrary, they’re usually overjoyed that they can please a Confessor by telling her the truth when she asks for it. They want to live so that they can please her”.

Cara says she’s not moving until Kahlan is back on her feet and feeling ok. Richard orders Benjamin to stay with Cara, and Benjamin mentions that he found the assassin’s children, with their throats slit just as she described. Richard says that there is one thing Benjamin could do: find Nicci (a Sister of the Dark turned to the Good Side; has been desperate to fuck Richard for several years; has beast powers and is liable to blow melon-sized holes in people she dislikes). Benjamin departs.

Richard tells Nathan that it would be a good idea for them to go and see Lauretta - the woman with an omen for Richard. [I thought she was the assassin, but, sadly, she seems to still be around. More omens incoming.] They take a path around public areas; Richard doesn’t feel like dealing with squabbling and demands and common people problems. He is worried about “dark things”, dark things with fangs, coming for Kahlan. A storm, with “greenish gray” clouds [wtf ? Green ?] is building. There are snowflakes dancing about, too.

Richard sees fear on bystanders’ faces, but also love for Kahlan. He recalls Zedd’s words that “there is nothing as dangerous as peacetime”. [lol, what bullshit. Time for Zedd to retire/die.]

--------------------------------------------------

Transitional chapter. It’s good that Nicci is around. She is a death/sex magnet. Richard sounds like he’s got his serious face on. I ain't never seen a green storm.

Body Count: 5
Sexy Time Count: 0.5

 

[Salazar]

Richard, Zedd, and Nathan arrive at the staff quarters to see Lauretta. Each door is “decorated with painted flowers, or country scenes, or colourful designs, giving each place an individual, homey feel”. They knock a few times, and a hag appears.

“Lord Rahl ! You came !” She grinned as she licked her tongue out between missing front teeth.

Ugh. Let’s be done with this woman. She is dressed in grubby rags and she waddles around her home, delighted that the Lord Rahl has graced it with his presence. The interior is filled with yarn contraptions hanging from the roof, intended to ward off evil spirits. Richard snickers to himself at her superstition. You have to cut demons up and blast spirits with magic; yarn does nothing.

She offers them some tea and sweet crackers. The whole place is jammed with paper; Lauretta has written down all of her predictions. All of them. Every thing that comes into her head.

”Mmmmmm”, Zedd moaned in ecstasy, waving a sweet cracker, “cinnamon, my favourite. These are quite good”

Lauretta flashed him a toothless grin. “Made them myself”.

BEWARE GIFTS OF FOOD FROM CRAZY WOMEN, YOU MORONS. THIS IS BASIC SHIT.

Zedd cuts to the chase, and asks where the prophecy for Richard is. They fumble around for a bit and discuss how hard it is to organise things, and just before they give up and leave:

she gasped.

“Here it is. I’ve found it. Right where it belonged”.

“So what does it say, then ?” Richard asked.

She shuffled over to him, paper in hand. She tapped it with a finger as she gazed up at him. “It says, ‘People will die’”.

Richard impatiently demurs as to its significance. People die all the time. Usually when he chops them up. Lauretta finds another Richard-related one. “The sky is going to fall in”. Not the roof, the sky. She has neat handwriting. The third one she has for him is “Queen takes pawn”. Nobody knows what this could mean either. Richard is really fucking fed up by this time, and it is a strain for him to keep being polite. He does a kind thing for Lauretta, though, and tells her that all her prophecies should go in a special room at the new library they are organising, so that prophets can give them the attention they deserve.

Nathan catches Richard’s sleeve as they are walking away, and tells him that the last Lauretta prophecy, the “Queen takes pawn” one, is there word for word in End Notes. I am past caring. START RESOLVING SOME OF THESE THINGS.

--------------------------------------

Ugh. More stupid prophecies. Really now.

Body Count: 5. Lauretta was pushing her luck, though.
Sexy Time Count: 0. Lauretta has erased anything sexy that has happened so far.

 

[Salazar]

Kahlan wakes suddenly, conscious that someone is watching her. She had been sleeping a little restlessly, trying to put the assassin and the prophecy out of her mind. The lamp in the room leaves some shadows in its farthest reaches. She knows it isn’t Richard or Cara, because they would have said something when she woke up. Whoever, whatever it is, just wants to lurk.

She jumps up, knife in her hand, bare thighs prickling in the chilly air [hell yeah] and stands poised.

It felt like someone was staring back.

She is still wearing knee-high leather boots [why ? I dunno.], and she thumps over to the lamp and turns it up to get rid of the shadows. She sees herself, mostly naked and holding a knife, in a mirror. Nothing and nobody else, but she can’t shake that apprehension. She throws on a clean dress, thinks angrily about the assassin killing her children, and then contemplates that it was actually all rather neat: the assassin confessed, conveyed the prophecy, and then died. Too neat.

At the thought of Richard, she smiled. Thinking of him always lifted her heart

Baaawwwwwww

Cara and Nyda, another Mord Sith and a “statuesque blonde with the same single braid as all the other Mord Sith”, are outside the bedroom when Kahlan opens the door. Kahlan confesses to Cara that she felt queasy and thought there was someone else in the room, and Cara and Nyda storm in and investigate. They find nothing, of course, but they decide that Kahlan should move to another room. They set off to find Richard.

---------------------------------------

Ok. I’m satisfied that the ‘watcher’ thing is going to come to a head soon. Probably this night. It had better be something awesome. If a demon wreathed in green flames steps out of a mirror, I will be content. This was barely a single scene, though. I have no idea what Terry is doing with these micro-chapters.

Body Count: 5
Sexy Time Count: 0.5 - Kahlan naked except for boots and holding a knife is kind of sexy.

 

[Salazar]

Richard stands when Kahlan enters. He wants to have a private moment, but there’s no time. She smiles and says she is fine, but he can tell by looking into her eyes that something is up.

Kahlan had on a pristine white Mother Confessor’s dress.

Cara was wearing red leather.

[This means that both of them are ready to kill/psychically destroy, btw.]

The Abbot from earlier is in the room, wearing a fake-looking smile. Benjamin introduces him as “Abbot Ludwig Dreier, from Fajin Province”. Aha. Where the Kharga Trace is. Richard doesn’t shake his hand. Dreier thanks Richard for seeing him, and Richard thinks to himself: “lol, I summoned you.” Nathan is back in the library helping Berdine with her work, and Richard has sent the guards out of the room. He figures Cara can handle anything that arises.

Richard asks Ludwig to tell him about Fajin Province, because frankly, he doesn’t know anything - and Ludwig should be well informed about the place he rules. Ludwig blushes and says he doesn’t rule Fajin - he is a humble functionary. He helps to serve the prophetically gifted of Fajin. Richard is sick to fucking death of prophecy at this point. The main ruler of Fajin, Dreier explains, is Bishop Hannis Arc [AHA. BADASS ENTERS THE NARRATIVE], who collects the shreds of prophecy from around the province to help him in his decisions. He’s not a religious man - he just chose the title Bishop because it sounds important.

In fact, the people of Fajin don’t worship the Creator like other folks do; they think it is immodest to do so directly. They revere prophecy instead. Kahlan is tired and angry and she snaps:

”So”, she said, “the Creator gives people these visions so that they will cut their children’s throats ?”

lol. Zing.

Dreier stammers a bit. Kahlan presses on, accusing him of being “sorry that I am alive”. Dreier licks his lips nervously, his eyes dart around the room. He says that Fajin prophets predicted that Cara and Benjamin’s festivities would be marred by a tragedy, which is why Hannis Arc decided not to come in person. Kahlan gives him another burst of majestic rudeness, and hands over to Richard.

”What can you tell me about a woman named Jit ?” Richard asked.

Ludwig looked up at the change in subject. “Jit” ?

“Richard could see in the man’s eyes that he knew the name. “Yes, Jit. The Hedge Maid”

Dreier says he knows hardly anything of her. She lives in an awful, inaccessible, inhospitable place. She cures people, sometimes. She’s not a prophet, so far as he knows.
Sleet hammers at the windows. “It was going to be a cold, black night” [YESSS, hopefully murder will be done.] Dreier tells Richard that he can’t eliminate prophecy. People are going to tell it, and people are going to want to hear it.

-----------------------------------------

I don’t think Dreier is going to play a major role. He might get killed. I think he has done his job by just telling Richard a bit about Hannis Arc. Who could still be pretty cool - providing that he has some powers and doesn’t just fiddle around with omens. The ‘watcher’ shit is DEFINITELY going down tonight. Weather don’t lie. Better chapter than the last one.

Body Count: 5 - but it’s going to be an interesting night.
Sexy Time Count: 0.5 - but it’s going to be an interesting night.

 

[Salazar]

Richard spots Nicci in the corridor after the meeting with Dreier has concluded.“With her black dress and long blond hair flowing out behind her she looked like nothing so much as a vengeful spirit come to vent her wrath”. Good, Nicci. Vent it on Richard. Fire him up. Nicci is also infuriated by the popular enthusiasm for prophecy [AS ARE WE ALL, DAMMIT.] People have been hassling her all week. Now they want to know “about the omen that caused the woman to kill her children”, and they refuse to accept that nobody really knows what’s going on.

Richard asks how Nicci knows about the woman killing her children - she wasn’t at the reception. Nicci says “Hear about it ? I was there”.

“So I was down in the market when the first one hit.”

The creases in Richard’s brow deepened. “What do you mean, when the first one hit ? First what ?”

“Richard, aren’t you listening ? I was there when the first child hit the ground.”

Richard’s jaw dropped. “What ?”

“It was a girl, not ten years old. She came down on a log wagon, on one of the upright stake poles. That pole was bigger than my leg. She came down face-first, shrieking all the way. It went right through her chest.”

[Daaaaaamn. That’s what I’m talking about.]

Apparently another prophecy-motivated woman threw her four children over the city wall to their deaths. Nicci saw all four land, and she locked up the mother instead of killing her because she thought Richard or Kahlan might want to ask some questions. Nicci was able to find out that the mother had experienced the same vision as the would-be assassin.

They fill Nicci in on all the prophecies and End Notes. Nicci is able to tell them that the “Queen takes pawn” phrase refers to a move in an obscure game called chess[Terry, you are so funny], played in Fajin Province.

Zedd let out a frustrated sigh. “I’ve never heard of such a game”

Richard tells Nicci that he had been asking Dreier about a Hedge Maid, and Nicci goes bananas, slamming her hand into his chest [watch it, lady] and telling him to stay the hell away from Hedge Maids. They have magic he can’t counter. If you leave them alone, they’re fine. If you poke them, they will fuck you up in an instant. Richard asks her how she knows all this, and she reminds him (in slightly offended tones) that she is a badass, an ex-Sister of the Dark, ex-Mistress of the Keeper.

----------------------------------

Good. If Hannis Arc turns out to be a disappointment, a bureaucrat, this Hedge Maid should remain an interesting threat. If Richard can’t get at her with magic, he’ll have to chop her up with the sword.

Body Count: 9 (two soldiers, one assassin, six children). We’re cooking now.
Sexy Time Count: 0.5

 

[Rubashov]

These updates are amazing, thank you. The blurbs are almost better than the book.

I wonder when Terry picked up the technique that lets you "write certain things that are going to be missed by people who skim the book." I mean it's hard to slip things by someone who knocks out a book in 3 minutes.

But the way he mention the Wizard's Rule. Has been adding a new rule with each book?

 

[Salazar]

Richard asks Kahlan how her hand is. They are watching the storm, black with violent slashes of snow, rage outside. Henrik’s scratches have left angry red marks [Thatta boy] on both Kahlan and Richard’s hands. They agree that they have more important things to think about.

What ever the cause, Kahlan could feel in the pit of her stomach that it was going to overshadow everything else. She wanted to scream against the unseen darkness that was descending on them, but that would do no good.

Richard dabs some salve on Kahlan’s hand. Richard knows how to make stuff from plants, having grown up as a woods guide. But now the world has changed, and is slipping once again into DARKNESS. Richard pulls Kahlan to him and runs his hand through her hair, “I know”, he said softly, “I know”. He promises he won’t let “whatever is coming” take him away from her.

Kahlan admits that she felt something watching her in the other room.

”But if you think I’m taking my clothes off tonight, Lord Rahl, you have another think [smh] coming”.

She just wants him to hold her. “She couldn’t believe that she was going to lose him to darkness seeking darkness” [Fuck this rambling bullshit. Bring on monsters.]

Kahlan wakes to the sound of Richard drawing the Sword of Truth. He has slipped out of her “loose embrace” (no sex, just holding) and he is staring really fucking hard into the shadows. He believes her now. There is/was something there. But it goes away, and he looks out at the worsening storm. Cara, Nathan, and Benjamin are outside - the Thing didn’t watch Cara and Benjamin during the night.

One of the dickheads who were hassling Richard about prophecy before the assassin struck had a prophetic vision in the morning. Immediately after telling his aides, and still dressed in his bedclothes, he walked to the edge of the plateau and jumped off to his death. Benjamin suggested to Nathan that they go and check on other folks with prophetic gifts, and when they did, a man had his wife down on the floor trying to cut her open - his three children huddling in terror. He had experienced a vision telling him that thieves were coming to torture his family, so he figured he would kill them first.

Soldiers also found a boy out on the plains around the market, partially eaten.

”Yes, Lord Rahl. His insides had been eaten out. His face had been chewed off. The skull had long gouge marks from teeth. One arm and the other hand were missing. Animals had feasted on him, tore him open, and mostly ate out his innards”.

Richard thinks that this has to be Henrik, but it’s apparently not. Which leads him to suppose that Henrik is still out there, lost, alone, freezing in the storm and subject to animal predation. [They think Henrik is dead, but I think Henrik has a range of fucked-up powers. I’m not even convinced it wasn’t him that ate the other boy.]

------------------------------------------------

I think someone is sending these visions as a lethal prank/tactic of terrorism. It’s a pretty fucking good one. Also, no way Henrik is dead. I’m hoping that whatever ate that boy wasn’t just a wolf-pack or bears or even gars. It’s got to be something magical and evil. Also, lol, Chapter 16 was about three and a half pages. Craziness.

Body Count 11 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, one aristocrat.
Sexy Time Count 0.5

 

[Salazar]

Richard makes his way down to the dungeons to question the crazy woman who threw her children off the walls. He has sent Kahlan to deal with the diplomats and representatives, because he doesn’t trust himself to keep his temper in check. He wishes that Verna (a Sister of the Light, a pretty goddamn boring character from previous books) were around to explain how dumb it is for average people to think that they can use/grasp prophecy. But she is at the Wizard’s Keep at Aydindril, training youngsters who show flickers of magical power.

It stinks down in the dungeon. Nyda, a Mord Sith, is down there with him, and she insists on going in before him - Mord Sith often just do whatever the fuck they want. The prisoners in cells either side of the walkway cower when they see her. They reach a magically shielded cell, and Nyda again enters first.

The woman talks some predictable bullshit.

”My children are safe now. They are in the hands of the good spirits”

Nyda wants to shock her with her Agiel, but Richard (why, I dunno) stops her. She settles for threatening the psycho, who rambles on about how Richard is a shitty Lord Rahl because he won’t protect the people from prophecy.

“And what is going to happen ?”
“Terrible things !”
“What terrible things ?”
The woman opened her mouth to tell him. She seemed surprised to realize that she had nothing to say.
“Terrible things, that’s all”, she finally said.

She then convulses and dies, a red froth burbling from her lips. Nyda complains that Richard should have let her use her Agiel.

----------------------------------

More evidence that all this prophecy stuff is just some junk that a malign power (Hannis Arc, Jit) is sending to fuck with Richard’s head/leadership. Which adds strength to the argument that Richard should just drop everything and ride/teleport over to Fajin Province and gut some bitches. But we know that won’t happen. At least not yet.

Body Count: 12 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman.
Sexy Time Count: 0.5

 

[Arcblade]

So... when is Kahlan going to get almost raped again?

 

[Salazar]

So... when is Kahlan going to get almost raped again?

She is in a foul mood. I think she would wipe out anything that tried. But we'll see.

Richard moves on to the next crazy person, the guy who tried to cut up his wife. Nyda goes in first, and she has to throat-chop the prisoner with her Agiel as he leaps at Richard.

He fell back with a shriek, pressing his hands to his throat as he gasped in agony. This time Richard didn’t protest Nyda’s use of her Agiel. The man had given her ample cause.

The man, eyes bulging, talks the same variety of crap. Richard is dooming the populace because he doesn’t care about prophecy.

The man jabbed a finger toward Richard. “Because you won’t listen to prophecy”. He had to swallow back the pain and the blood. It was lowering his voice, but not his fury. “You think you’re too important to heed prophecy. You think you know better”

He rants on about visions he’s had, and how some of them have come true. Richard calls him a dick for trying to murder his family, and he leaps at Richard again.

Nyda drops him, plants a boot on his back, and tells him that she will permanently fuck with his body and brain if he tries that again. Richard asks why the man didn’t ask for help, if he thought something bad was going to happen to his wife and kids. The man has no answers. He just goes quiet and looks confused, and then flicks back to angry.

”You do not deserve to be Lord Rahl. Soon, everyone will know that.”

Zing. A popular uprising would be so awesome. Richard would wade into the protesters and blast them into ash and gore.

----------------------------------

Duplicate of the last chapter, except this dude didn’t die. Sounds like he might have had a point, with respect to public sentiment turning against Richard.

Body Count: 12 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman.
Sexy Time Count: 1 - Nyda getting her sadism on is pretty good.

 

[Salazar]

Kahlan has lunch with the representatives. She puts on an elaborate meal, to make them think she likes and respects them. She burns with contempt, and feels pangs of longing for Richard. But she does her duty, circulating and smiling at everybody. They all keep talking about FUCKING PROPHECY. God DAMN it. Kahlan, with Cara by her side, keeps her temper. The wind outside is still quite strong, rattling the windows. Nicci arrives [Fuck yeah, stone-cold hell-witch], and Kahlan prepares to address this pack of morons.

No, wait. She wants to give them another opportunity to express their concerns, even though she knows that they will just spout the same shit. She tells them Richard is doing important stuff. Queen Orneta (same queen as earlier) steps forward and says:

“Our concern....is that prophecy is our most important guide”.

“Prophecy is not our most important guide”, Kahlan said. Reason is our most important guide”

[For once, I can’t argue.]

Queen Orneta doesn’t accept this, but Kahlan doesn’t really give a fuck. She tells everyone that they have powerful folks like Richard, Zedd, Nathan, and Nicci on the case. Orneta [pushing her luck, the inbred freak] takes a sarcastic tone.

The queen held one bony elbow as she casually fingered her jeweled necklace with her other hand. “Mother Confessor, I want what all of us gathered here want. We’ve all heard dark warnings of the future. We want to know what prophecy has to say of such events”

Kahlan says that she doesn’t know what the fuck she is talking about and should pipe down. Experts are handling it. King Philippe, from the Western Midlands, steps forward with his wife Catherine. He is handsome, has a temper, wears a sword and can use it, his wife is pregnant. He pretty much repeats what Orneta gabbled.

Queen Orneta, not keen to cede her informal leadership role in arguing their position, swept a skeletal arm back at the crowd, calling for silence. “Prophecy must be obeyed”

[Ok, this is getting out of hand. Someone needs to die, messily, as an example.]

Kahlan puts on her Confessor face. Everyone goes quiet. She asks them if they’re absolutely certain that they want leadership and lives governed by prophecy. The dimwits all nod.

”You shall have what you demand”, Kahlan said. “You shall hear what prophecy holds in store for you”

-------------------------------

If only Richard had been there instead of Kahlan. That bony Queen would be broken in half. King Philippe and Queen Catherine would have been marched to the edge of the plateau and made to walk off. Sounds like Kahlan has a plan, though.

Body Count: 12 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman.
Sexy Time Count: 1.

 

[The Technomancer]

How the fuck is that 20 chapters in? Like two things of importance have happened. How many pages has it been?

 

[Salazar]

How the fuck is that 20 chapters in? Like two things of importance have happened. How many pages has it been?

Not sure. Kindle edition says that's 31%.

 

[Salazar]

All of the morons inch forward, desperate to hear what Kahlan has to say about prophecy. As Kahlan looks at Nicci, their eyes follow.

”Nicci, would you please bring the book you have with you and read the prophecy we recently discovered that speaks to the issue of our immediate future and the role that all these people here today have to play in it ?”

Nicci nods. The crowd are unnerved by her. They can tell she is mean. Black dress. Blonde hair. Fiery eyes. But they are crazed about prophecy. Nicci picks up a book, tells Kahlan that she did her best to warn these poor muppets, and starts to read. She says that what she has here is dark, dark, dark, dark prophecy that concerns them all. It’s in High D’Haran - she asks if anybody of them know it. Of course they don’t. Only folks like Richard and Berdine can still read it.

”Well”, Nicci said with a cool smile. “I am fluent in High D’Haran, so I will translate what it says for you, rather than speak the prophecy in its original language, if that’s all right with everyone”

Queen Orneta tells her to get a fucking move on, and I sympathise. Nicci stares her down. She says she will have to go slowly, and the crowd grumble impatiently. The prophecy says that in the aftermath of a victory, during a great storm, leaders of many lands will gather, and the winds of change will cast the world into darkness as nasty dark things lurk and strike. That kind of bullshit.

Everyone gasps.

Nicci says that there is something that can be done to avert this awful cataclysm. The crowd lean forward. The lives of the gathered leaders must be sacrificed in order to save the masses.

[rofl, you motherfuckers got played.]

Nicci’s cutting gaze slowly turned up to take in the audience. Her voice made the change from silken to deadly.

“There you have it: prophecy. Prophecy that reveals a dark and terrible future if not heeded. Prophecy that, as you have all insisted, must be heeded. Prophecy that stipulates that all of you must die”

-------------------------------

These dickheads will probably believe it, too. smh

Body Count: 12 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman.
Sexy Time Count: 1

 

[Salazar]

The crowd go very quiet.

”But...but...” Queen Orneta finally stammered.

“But nothing”, Kahlan said in a voice as deadly as Nicci’s had been

If they want to fuck with prophecy, they should expect prophecy to fuck with them. They were warned to leave it to the experts. Now look what’s happened. A Chancellor looks abashed and says that maybe she is right.

King Philippe says [lol] that maybe this prophecy has a hidden meaning. Kahlan gives him a laser stare, the kind she uses on killers, and tells him no. This prophecy is precise, legit, and compelling.

”General”, Kahlan called out...”Do you have the execution teams in place and ready ?”

The crowd start to wobble and mumble in terror. The General says yes, and the crowd go mental. YOU CAN’T BE SERIOUS and all that. Kahlan plays it dead straight. Yep, you guys are fucked. Form an orderly queue. Queen Orneta says that Kahlan should die too, but Kahlan says nope, not happening. Soldiers move in and start seizing people. Kahlan says the executioner does good work - they won’t suffer.

Queen Catherine sobs about her child. Kahlan doesn’t care. The crowd goes even more mental. Then the Chancellor drops to his knees, rests his forehead on the ground, and recites a pledge of allegiance to the Lord Rahl. Everyone else does the same. One of them rises and apologises for being such a cretin. Kahlan forgives her, asks if anybody else feels the same, and they all scream that yes, yes, oh yes, they do.

Kahlan calls off the execution teams. Benjamin says “wow, you had me fooled”. They all talk about how Richard had better solve this shit pronto.
-------------------------------

I think it is obvious that this scene could be improved by Kahlan following through on the prophecy. Fuck em. You own them. You rule their lands. They don’t respect you.

Body Count: 12 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman.
Sexy Time Count: 1

 

[Salazar]

Richard and Kahlan have some time alone. She brushes her hair. He asks her how she handled the representatives, and she says she threatened to chop their heads off. Richard laughs at her little joke, and can’t “help but smile at the sight of her, at the sparkle of life in her beautiful green eyes”. [Fanservice for girls who read this garbage for the romance.]

He tells her what went on down in the dungeons. We break for some description of the room they’ve moved into - a big four-poster with a canopy, ornate chairs, lots of satin and silk. Kahlan has been chilling there for a while and she hasn’t felt anything watching her. She hopes they can get a good night’s sleep.

Richard eats some fruit and strolls around. They talk some more about how none of this shit makes any sense. The assassination attempt was so clumsy. Richard suggests that it wasn’t meant to kill Kahlan, just to heighten public fear of prophecy. Kahlan says nah, the woman probably didn’t have control over what she was doing; it probably actually was a prophetic outcome.

”If prophecy says that a statue will topple, and someone deliberately topples it to make sure that the prophecy is fulfilled, is that actually fulfilling prophecy ? Or is it merely someone wanting to make it look like the prophecy was true ?”

[I don’t give a fuuuuuuck. Get moving.]

They both start to come around to the idea that someone is manipulating all of these events. Richard gets a headache just thinking about it all.

She looked around the room. “I haven’t felt anyone watching and I’ve been here quite a while. Why don’t we get undressed and go to bed like normal ?”

......

Kahlan slipped out of her dress and laid it over a bench against the wall. Richard watched the inviting curves of her liberated form as she quickly crossed the room, climbed onto the bed and slipped under the covers. He didn’t think there was anything in the world as graceful as the way Kahlan moved.

------------------------------------
This is the setup for a Watcher scene. Also a subdued instance of the slasher flick convention whereby sexy time brings the monsters closer.

Body Count: 12 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman

Sexy Time Count: 2. Maybe.

 

[Salazar]

Richard was lost in kissing the soft, sensual curve of Kahlan’s neck when the slightest noise, something alien to the quiet bedroom [what a TERRIBLE bit of writing.], made him look up.

He feels something in a dark alcove, watching him. He can’t make it out, though. He just knows that there is something darker than darkness [lol] watching him. “That presence was cold and evil”. There are battle-hardened guards in the corridor, so he knows it didn’t get in through the door. It is crouching, and is not very large.[I reckon it’s Henrik]

Whatever it was, it was as dark as pitch.
Whatever it was, its gaze was unwavering.
Whatever it was, it was heartless.

Richard thinks it looks a bit like a dog [Henrik theory still good]. He is “afraid” to move. [WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT. AFRAID ?] He eventually starts to shift off Kahlan and move towards his sword. The thing starts to uncurl and rise, making “a brittle sound like sticks, muffled in cloth, snapping" [whatever the fuck that sounds like].

It turns its head towards him, making popping and cracking sounds, as if its body is comprehensively dead and dried. Richard sees a pair of eyes.

”Dear spirits”, Kahlan whispered. “What is that ?”

Richard dunno. He moves for his sword as the Thing leaps towards the bed.

----------------------------

The ringing sound of the Sword of Truth’s steel cut the silence like a scream of rage that sent a shiver rippling across her flesh.

Kahlan ducks, Richard swings the SoT at the Thing. “Razor sharp steel cut through the center of the inky form”.

But the Thing just evaporates into black smoke/dust. One assumes it has escaped. Silence returns, save for the rumble of thunder and the hiss of the lantern. Kahlan looks around the room, but can’t see the Thing, and can’t feel anything watching them either. She asks Richard what it was. He dunno, obviously.

What is clear is that they weren’t imagining it. They don’t know how to fight it. Zedd’s power is weakened in the palace for some reason, but Nathan is still a beast. Kahlan suggests that Nathan hide in a closet or something and pounce out, but Richard doesn’t think that will work. He thinks that the Thing is just a projection of someone outside the palace. What they plan to do until they figure something out is to sleep in the Garden of Life, which has a magic force-field.

A loud shriek issues from the hallway outside. Richard grabs his sword. Heavily armed men are racing towards their room.

Lying against the door at their feet was a big black dog with two pikes sticking from its side. Blood still flowed from several other gaping wounds.

The soldiers, who had been forced to kill the dog, say that it must have run loose from its owner down in the market and somehow got into the palace’s inner chambers. It had been trying to get into Richard and Kahlan’s room. Richard leans over and strokes its wiry fur, sorry that it had to die.

Kahlan thinks it is one of the Dark Things coming to get them. Now she’s falling for this prophecy shit.

---------------------------------------

Better. Mild drama, at least. Another death, even if it is just a dog. Hopefully they will get out of the palace soon.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

 

[Salazar]

Richard, Kahlan, and a contingent of the beefiest D’Haran soldiers head off to the Garden of Life, which lies at the centre of a complex weave of architecturo-magical things. Lots of big granite blocks, laced “with multicolored crystalline veins”. Large golden doors, carved with elaborate scenes. This is where Richard wasted Darken Rahl. Kahlan, remembering this, touches his back in sympathy and support.

Once inside, they were enveloped with a heady fragrance of flowers that grew in great swaths beside the walkway that wandered toward the heart of the room.

There is a ceiling of leaded windows. Seeing the stars through them at night makes Richard feel small and lonely. [I begin to suspect that Richard has lost his manliness.] There is a thick blanket of snow up there now, though. Lightning and thunder continue outside. Richard notices that Henrik’s scratches on Kahlan’s hand are getting worse. They don’t feel anybody watching them, and Richard thinks they should lay out some blankets and take a nap.

They wonder, while lying down, if the roof is in danger of cracking under the weight of the snow. It suddenly seems like a really good idea to get the hell out of there.

Just then, a lightning strike hit the room with a flash and a deafening blast. As Richard shielded Kahlan, turning her away from the blinding illumination, he saw the lacework of lightning arcing and crackling through the heavy metalwork that held the glass over the center of the room.

Glass goes everywhere: Richard catches shards in his shoulder and thigh, Kahlan’s arm gets scratched. The whole roof thumps down onto the floor, and the floor cracks as well.

-----------------------------------

AHA. This is the accident that reveals The Omen Machine hidden under the Garden of Life. After all this fucking time, we finally get to the shit that was promised in the blurb. Vintage Goodkind would have done all this in one chapter, maybe two. Credit where it is due, though. That was a vaguely cool scene.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

 

[Puddles]

Does writing this commentary make your thing rise up?

 

[Salazar]

Does writing this commentary make your thing rise up?

Goddamn minuscule chapters make my Thing rise up. Hard not to feel like you are being trolled [even more] when you flick over about three pages and a "chapter" is done.

 

[Salazar]

Richard and Kahlan duck for cover as glass, snow, metal, lightning continues to go everywhere.

Grass, dirt, and a thick bed of sand poured into the expanding hole, like the sands of an hourglass [these...are the days of our lives] falling inward. Wind whipped in through the opening, swirling sleet and snow down into the room and into the gaping hole in the center of the floor

Richard removes the glass from his leg like a boss. He lights a torch and moves towards the hole - Kahlan tries to stop him, worried for him, but he is ok. He sees some stairs in the hole - there used to be a stairway up to the Garden of Life, but it was covered over. Kahlan says that doesn’t make any sense. Richard goes to a shed and grabs a ladder. He tells Kahlan to stay put, but she insists on coming with him.

It looks like nobody has been down there “in a thousand years. Maybe longer”. They find another staircase that will take them even further down.

-----------------------------

”What in the world could this place be ?” Kahlan asked.
Richard shook his head as he looked around. “I don’t know. Doesn’t look like much of anything. Maybe it’s just an old storage room”.

Snowflakes drift down onto their heads. Kahlan thinks the place is creepy and moves close to Richard. She wouldn’t like to get trapped down here [MAKE IT HAPPEN, TERRY]. Richard finds some stacks of thin strips of metal, numbering in the tens of thousands. The other notable feature of the room is a block of stone in the middle, slightly more than waist high. When Richard rubs some of the dust off, it shoots a beam of light straight up, and emits a mechanical groan. It has, Richard finds, a slit in the side, through which he can see all kinds of gears and shit working inside. It is very complex. The light is projecting something onto the ceiling, apparently. A symbol. Richard recognises the symbols the machine is projecting from the books Berdine was showing him in the library.
--------------------------

The symbols are from a book called Regula. Kahlan’s hand is really hurting now [lol, Henrik MUST have powers. ] It is making her eyes water. She thinks she will get Zedd to heal it.

Regula means ‘regulate’ in High D’Haran, apparently. Kahlan says well, that seems simple. Richard frowns and says no, it’s really complex. He can’t really explain it. All this symbol talk is incomprehensible to her, but Richard knows what’s up.

His gaze returned to her. “Because I understand the language of symbols”

Kahlan wanders about and picks up one of the strips of metal, noticing that it isn’t blank like most of the others. Suddenly, the machine sucks in a strip of metal and starts to churn it through its gears - emitting a flash of “intense orangish white light”. When it spits the strip back out, Richard and Kahlan study it.

”It’s the emblematic representation for fire”

-----------------------------

Well, at least they’ve found the machine and got it to (maybe) work. And “FIRE” isn’t the most boring thing it could have spat out. I assume something will catch fire in the immediate future, or the machine will start talking in complete sentences. Albeit in this Language of Symbols that only Richard can understand. The upside is that Kahlan's hand is fucked. I'm prepared to cut Terry some slack if she turns out to be seriously injured. I have no faith in Zedd's ability to heal anything.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

 

[Salazar]

There are hundreds of guards milling around outside the doors to the Garden of Life when Richard and Kahlan come back out. Kahlan “knew that, despite their worry, none of them, not even a Mord Sith, would dare to enter the Garden of Life while the Lord Rahl was inside unless he invited them in”. So they have just been chilling, while the roof fell in and Richard and Kahlan went and investigated some stuff.

The Garden of Life was, Kahlan thought, once again a place of lethal magic. Nyda, the Mord Sith, is in a bad mood, arms folded. She asks what the hell is going on. Richard ignores her and tells the commander of the guards that NOBODY is to go inside the Garden. Richard turns to Nyda and tells her to go and get Berdine, Zedd, Nicci, Nathan, and Cara. YES, DO IT. EVEN THOUGH IT’S THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT.

Nyda leaned out past Richard to look over at Kahlan. “What’s going on ?”
“The roof fell in”.

---------------------------------

Kahlan’s hand is throbbing. She can’t make her eyes focus. Zedd arrives.

”Bags, Richard. What’s going on ?”
“No need for that kind of language. [“Bags” is a swear word in this universe] I need to see you, that’s all”

Zedd settles down and asks what is going on. Richard begins to tell him. Nathan arrives. He doesn’t think the roof falling in is important enough to justify waking him up. What a dick. Nicci glares at Nathan and Zedd and they pipe down. Richard, with Berdine’s help, tells them about the Omen Machine.

”I believe that the book is what Berdine thought it was from the first, a wordbook, a manual of sorts. I think that the book is the means to decipher the symbols in order to be able to understand what the strips say”

Then hooray that we have the book, says Nathan. But it’s not that simple. Richard hasn’t been able to get the book to work. He looks gloomy.

--------------------------

Zedd asks Richard a bit more about what the machine looks like, and about the symbols. Richard says that the box that you can see is likely just the top of the machine; it seems to go down pretty deep. He also says that some of the symbols are familiar, but others are really, really weird. He says that this is the Language of Creation, and that he feels like he is just missing one tiny little clue to be able to decipher it.

He suspects that the sequence of symbols plays a huge part in determining their meaning. “Parts of them are recognizable as independent symbolic entities”, but they acquire meaning through inter-relation. He was hoping that Zedd and Nathan could go down and have a look at it, because he’s pretty certain that the machine is a) magical, and b) prophetic.

---------------------------

I am a patient man. I can deal with this. Once they know how to read this shit, the machine will be able to deliver its crazy message. At which point the plot, and this collection of aimless, contemptible protagonists, will HAVE to go and do things, some of them magical, some of them violent, and perhaps some of them erotic.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

 

[Salazar]

Richard cudgels his brain a bit more, trying to figure out the Language of Symbols - which he told Kahlan he knew. He focuses on a symbol that appears on the first page of the book and which is also on the machine - a stylised figure 9.

”Why would there be a nine in the center of this ?” Kahlan asked.

Good question, my dear. Zedd says that 9 is important because it is constructed with threes, and threes are cosmically influential. Triangles and all that. Trouble coming in threes. But he scratches his cheek and says he dunno what this 9 means. Nicci leans in and points out that the 9 “ends in a hook”. This apparently acts to “hook”, or connect, the symbols to something or someone.

They ramble on about some shit. Richard: “The nine is Creation, life [I don’t know how]. Life is a cycle. Birth, life, death. Life and Death together...The hook is Death”. Everyone looks up, and Nicci says “very good, Richard”. She knew all along, see. Richard then notices that the 9 is backward.

“It’s backward. Everything in this book is backward.”

Berdine made a face. “Backward ?”

Yes, backward. So we have solved this shit. At last.

------------------------------

Zedd and Nicci pick up on Richard talking about the machine “seeing” the symbols.

”How it sees its own emblem?” Zedd repeated in frustration. “You can’t be serious”.

Zedd is nerfed for this book. I expect nothing interesting or useful from him.

Zedd complains, “You’re making this machine sound alive. It’s gears and levers, you said. A machine”. Yes, but it’s magic too. C’mon old man. Berdine starts inverting symbols and stuff to work with the new Everything Backward regime.

---------------------------

Richard tells Benjamin to organise a team of men to fix the glass roof.

”It needs to be done as soon as possible”

It will take months, you total dickhead.

He asks Zedd, Nathan, and Nicci to go down and check out the machine while he and Berdine work on symbols. He also wants Benjamin to dig up a floor plan, to see how far the machine goes down. Apparently, the bit of the book that was ripped out and taken to the Temple of the Winds was the part that explains what the machine was for.

”That’s not very comforting”, Zedd said.

Richard tells Kahlan to go and get some rest. She’s not much use to anybody. Nicci promises to guard her, and Richard lets Zedd know that he might want to heal Kahlan’s hand. Kahlan hears a distant howl and freaks out. Nobody else seems to have heard it. She fears a little for her sanity. Her hand really, really hurts.

----------------------------------

Still crawling along. Please Terry. Action. No more symbols.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

 

[Puddles]

Approximately what was the highest body count in a SoT book so far?

 

[Salazar]

Approximately what was the highest body count in a SoT book so far?

The Imperial Order were rampaging through countries pretty much non-stop until Richard knocked them over. So there was permanent mass slaughter in the background.

Richard personally killed 30 Baka Ban Mana blademasters in one go. I think that was in Stone of Tears. He went into a trance and just sliced them up.

Which is part of why it seems like bullshit for him to go "weak at the knees".

Edit: YESSSSS ! Next chapter is Hannis Arc.

 

[ComputerMKII]

Approximately what was the highest body count in a SoT book so far?

I think Wizard's First Rule pushed the body count quite far.

 

[Rubashov]

I forgot about the Mord Sith training regimen. I guess you're just screwed if someone like Richard comes along and kills one of your parents during training.

Actually, has he made any decrees about how new more Sith are trained? I don't know if even Richard could go along with that. But I could definitely see Terry just forgetting to bring it up.

 

[Clevinger]

I can't even remember the last time I read a novel.

It shows, motherfucker. It shows.

 

[Salazar]

This chapter begins with the part that was excerpted.

Hannis Arc, working on the tapestry of lines linking constellations of elements that constituted the language of Creation recorded on the ancient Cerulean scroll spread out among the clutter on his desk, was not surprised to see the seven etherial forms billow into the room like acrid smoke driven on a breath of bitter breeze. Like an otherworldly collection of spectral shapes seemingly carried on random eddies of air, they wandered in a loose clutch among the still and silent mounted bears and beasts rising up on their stands, the small forest of stone pedestals holding massive books of recorded prophecy, and the evenly spaced display cases of oddities, their glass reflecting the firelight from the massive hearth at the side of the room.

Since the seven rarely used doors, the shutters on the windows down on the ground level several stories below stood open as a fearless show of invitation. Though they frequently chose to use windows, they didn’t actually need the windows any more than they needed the doors. They could seep through any opening, any crack, like vapor rising in the early morning from the stretches of stagnant water that lay in dark swaths through the peat barrens.

The open shutters were meant to be a declaration for all to see, including the seven, that Hannis Arc feared nothing.

Most of the people where Hannis lives are scared of the “creatures that hunted with fang and claw” out in the night. There are other, incorporeal hunters too. Hannis ain’t scared. He is the master of all evils in this land.

No, unlike most people who inhabited the Dark Lands, Hannis Arc was not himself burdened by fears. Instead he was driven by a ceaseless, smoldering rage, a rage that was like a thing alive inside him [YESSSSSSS. LIKE A THING, EXACTLY LIKE A THING]. That rage left no room for fear to find a foothold

So these seven glowing forms smoke their way into Hannis’s office. Hannis is busy playing chess, that obscure game, with his scribe, Mohler. They have been playing the same game for many, many hours. Hannis is too clever for Mohler. “Checkmate”. Mohler compliments Hannis on his guile, and Hannis says “Leave me”.

”You will have your revenge, Bishop. You will be pleased to see from the latest prophecies that your patience will be rewarded. You will have your rightful place as ruler of D’Hara, I know you will. Prophecy seems to say as much.

[Richard is not going to like these dudes. Not at all.]

Hannis regards Mohler with contempt. Mohler is weak. He needs a strong man like Hannis. He is visited by a flash of memory, of his mother and father being dragged out into a courtyard by D’Haran soldiers,

of the terrible, singular sound made by a single violent blow of a heavy mace studded with spikes caving in his older sister’s skull as she stood in the doorway.

So Hannis’s family were assassinated by Panis Rahl’s men. Darken Rahl’s dad. Unconnected with Richard, but Richard, as the present Lord Rahl, is going to have to deal with some vengefulness. The fires of rage burn bright within Hannis. He doesn’t give a shit that Richard is rumoured [wrongly] to be a nice dude.

Richard has no idea how powerful Hannis Arc is. Hannis doesn’t merely want to kill Richard, though. That wouldn’t make him any friends. He wants to make D’Harans stop believing in Richard, so that he can sashay in and take power. Mohler grovels a bit more. Apparently the seven glowing forms, which are now up around the roof, will report back to Jit, the Hedge Maid. Hannis knows this, Mohler does not.

------------------------------

HANNIS, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ?? Get in the game, son. Seems like Hannis and Jit are allies. Don’t know how Hannis is connected, if indeed he is, to the Machine. He is probably responsible for the Watching Thing, though. I think Henrik is working for Jit.

Body Count:13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5 - Hannis Arc is too furious for sex.

 

[Salazar]

Another Fajin Province chapter.

Mohler leaves, and the seven spirits glide towards Hannis at his desk.

Their flowing robes radiated a supple, bluish grace with a soft, ethereal glimmer to it. They moved with fluid grace, their robes never still, giving him the impression that he was actually looking in at them in another place, seeing them in an ethereal world of continual gentle breezes.

This passage is almost a new low. Ethereal this, ethereal that.

They look half air and half flesh. One of them gets close, and Hannis can see wrinkles, pockmarks, knotted veins, warts, ulcers, “eyes the color of rancid egg yolks”. Daamn.

But Hannis is unafraid. He asks if Jit has done what he asked her to. The creature puts a claw on his desk and asks how he has the nerve to demand things of its mistress.

Hannis Arc whipped his arm around and slammed his knife down with all the force he could muster, pinning the familiar’s disfigured hand to the desktop.

The other six freak out. Hannis is amused. They didn’t think he could touch, let alone hurt, them. When they try and release their companion, lightning shoots through them.

Fuck yes. Hannis is singlehandedly rescuing this book.

The creature says that Jit will punish Hannis for this. Hannis doesn’t like being threatened.

He slams an axe down on its wrist. Missing a hand, it stumbles shrieking around the room knocking shit over. Hannis asks again: has Jit done what he asked ?

”She watches the one you want watched. She still waits for the one she has summoned. The hounds drive him and will deliver him to her”.

Terry tells us a bit more about just how furious Hannis is. At everything and everyone. All the time.

Hannis says that Jit had better keep obeying him, or he will fuck her up with weapons like the ones he just used against these creatures. Ones that can harm things from the underworld. Weapons made by some nasty folks called the half-people, who Hannis has under his control. He could send them to make Jit’s life miserable if he wanted. The creatures leave. Hannis yanks the knife from the table, a hand still impaled on it. He tells a servant to put it in a display case for visitors to see.

-----------------------

I am thinking that Hannis has underestimated Jit. He might be more powerful, but she probably has the intellectual edge. It's good that he is a warrior type, though. Haven't seen him do any magic, as such, yet. Hoping for an epic duel, like that with Drefan. Richard rips out his spinal column but Hannis, driven by pure rage, fights on. Richard shoves the spinal column back in, down Hannis's throat, but still he keeps going.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Maiming Count: 2. Kahlan’s hand is fucked, Jit Creature missing a hand.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

 

[Keen]

He feels something in a dark alcove, watching him. He can’t make it out, though. He just knows that there is something darker than darkness [lol] watching him. “That presence was cold and evil”. There are battle-hardened guards in the corridor, so he knows it didn’t get in through the door. It is crouching, and is not very large.[I reckon it’s Henrik]



Richard thinks it looks a bit like a dog [Henrik theory still good]. He is “afraid” to move. [WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT. AFRAID ?] He eventually starts to shift off Kahlan and move towards his sword. The thing starts to uncurl and rise, making “a brittle sound like sticks, muffled in cloth, snapping" [whatever the fuck that sounds like].

It turns its head towards him, making popping and cracking sounds, as if its body is comprehensively dead and dried. Richard sees a pair of eyes.



Richard dunno. He moves for his sword as the Thing leaps towards the bed.

----------------------------



Kahlan ducks, Richard swings the SoT at the Thing. “Razor sharp steel cut through the center of the inky form”.

But the Thing just evaporates into black smoke/dust. One assumes it has escaped. Silence returns, save for the rumble of thunder and the hiss of the lantern. Kahlan looks around the room, but can’t see the Thing, and can’t feel anything watching them either. She asks Richard what it was. He dunno, obviously.

What is clear is that they weren’t imagining it. They don’t know how to fight it. Zedd’s power is weakened in the palace for some reason, but Nathan is still a beast. Kahlan suggests that Nathan hide in a closet or something and pounce out, but Richard doesn’t think that will work. He thinks that the Thing is just a projection of someone outside the palace. What they plan to do until they figure something out is to sleep in the Garden of Life, which has a magic force-field.

A loud shriek issues from the hallway outside. Richard grabs his sword. Heavily armed men are racing towards their room.



The soldiers, who had been forced to kill the dog, say that it must have run loose from its owner down in the market and somehow got into the palace’s inner chambers. It had been trying to get into Richard and Kahlan’s room. Richard leans over and strokes its wiry fur, sorry that it had to die.

Kahlan thinks it is one of the Dark Things coming to get them. Now she’s falling for this prophecy shit.

---------------------------------------

Better. Mild drama, at least. Another death, even if it is just a dog. Hopefully they will get out of the palace soon.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Sexy Time Count: 2.5

You missed a golden opportunity to insert a chicken-that-is-not-a-chicken joke!

 

[Salazar]

Richard is busy with “the complexities of translating the symbolic elements”, when he notices that the storm has passed. He is still tremendously edgy, though. Every bit he manages to translate just makes him more nervous.

As his grandfather crossed the library, Richard noticed that Zedd didn’t have the usual spring in his step. He thought at that moment that Zedd looked like nothing so much as an old man, a tired old man.

[Exactly. I’m done with Zedd.]

Richard, Berdine, and Zedd focus on a particular translation - Richard thinks he is really getting the hang of this language, and is impressed with its compact expressiveness. The translation turns out to be “the roof is going to fall in”. Which has happened. Nathan stalks in and says that the blind old prophet woman Sabella is causing trouble. A few of the diplomats went to see her and asked her for prophecy: she told them “FIRE”. That’s all she said.

At that moment, Lauretta - snaggle-toothed prophet woman - runs over with a new prophecy for Richard - “FIRE”. Richard realises that this means there is probably a fire somewhere. Lauretta’s house. He starts running.

----------------------------------------

Black smoke is billowing up from Lauretta’s house, which was still crammed with her crap prophecies.

Lauretta had stumbled to a halt, gasping for breath. Her short, rapid gait had left her face bright red and her hair in disarray.

“My room !” She swallowed, trying to get enough air. She pressed her hands to the sides of her head. “My prophecies !”

lol, let em burn.

They can’t put it out with water. Zedd is too nerfed to put it out with his magic, and it takes Nathan to be able to suck the air out of Lauretta’s house and extinguish it that way. All her prophecies are fucked. Dreier, the Abbot sent by Hannis Arc, gets angry at Richard that he knew about a “FIRE” prophecy and didn’t tell anybody beforehand. He thinks that this is just more evidence that Richard doesn’t care about prophecy.

Cara spun her Agiel up into her fist. She pointed the red weapon at the Abbot’s face.

The Abbot shuts the fuck up. Benjamin apparently wants Richard to come back to the Garden of Life to see something.

-----------------------------------

Work is underway on fixing the roof. Richard doesn’t like to see so many people around the Garden, because he had come to think of it as a private refuge. Kahlan and Nicci are down with the machine. Her hand is looking better. Benjamin tells Richard that they have been able to determine that the machine is FUCKING HUGE.

Richard’s head spun with the dizzying implication. The machine that rose up through the palace to just under the Garden of Life came all the way up through the plateau from the Azrith Plain far below.

---------------------------------------

Richard can’t begin to imagine why the machine is so big, who made it, and so on. He asks Zedd what he has been able to find out about it. Zedd looks sheepish. Nothing. He can detect no magic at work in it. Nathan, who has more power than Zedd when in the palace, can’t figure anything out about it either. Nicci comes up empty too.

In frustration as much as anything, Richard lays a hand on the top of it. It starts working. It spits out a “Pawn takes Queen” prophecy, and then almost immediately spits out another.

He blinked at what he saw.

As he stared, Kahlan put a hand on his arm. “Richard, what’s wrong ?”

“What’s the matter ?” Zedd asked. “What does it say ?”

Richard finally looked up from the strip to his grandfather, and then the others.

“What it says doesn’t leave this room, understand ?”

------------------------------------

Abbot Dreier goes to see Queen Orneta, at her invitation. Saucy bitch.

”Come, sit, Abbot”, she said, as she glided across an expanse of ornate carpeting on her way to one of the couches.

“Please, call me Ludwig”

She pats the couch next to her, and insists that he call her Orneta. She says all the servants have gone home, and pours them both some wine. They chat about prophecy.

Orneta tells him that Kahlan’s threat of execution was just a ruse. Kahlan isn’t that hardcore. Ludwig takes her word for it.

They both think, in varying ways, that prophecy is the communication with lowly earthlings of the Creator. The fact that Richard and Kahlan are fucking with/ignoring/hiding prophecy makes them potential agents of the Keeper. Devil worshippers, basically. Orneta gasps.

---------------------------------------

”That’s preposterous. Lord Rahl and the Mother Confessor are not devoted to the Keeper of the Underworld. I have never known two people who are more devoted to life”

But Ludwig says that they are probably just doing the Keeper’s work without being aware of it.

She fussed with the jewel necklace that disappeared down between her breasts.

[But she is bony ? Why is Terry so interested in her breasts ?]

The fact that Richard keeps Nicci around is further proof, and the fact that he is named “fuer grissa ost drauka”, Bringer of Death, seals the deal. Richard is an evil, evil dude. Ludwig says that Orneta can throw him out if she doesn’t believe him. She grips his arm and tells him to stay. Apparently King Philippe believes Ludwig.

”You are not alone, Orneta”

He leaned in and gently kissed her lips.

She sat stiffly, unmoving, unresponsive to the kiss. He worried that he had miscalculated.

But then she began to give into the kiss and melt easily into his arms. He told himself that he could do far worse than this woman. She was older, but not much. In fact, he was finding her more attractive, more appealing, with every heavy breath they shared.

It was clear that in this moment of vulnerability she was letting her passion take charge. He eased her back onto the couch. She went willingly [Rare, in Terry’s books], surrendering to him, to his hands exploring her, his hands drawing her dress off her shoulders.

----------------------------------------------

Good stuff. Lauretta's prophecies up in smoke. Orneta gets banged. Machine is TOO BIG TO BREAK. Zedd still a weakling. Shame that Kahlan's hand got fixed up.

Body Count: 13 - 2 soldiers, 1 assassin, 7 children, 1 aristocrat, 1 psycho woman, 1 large black dog.
Maimed Count: 1 - Jit Creature’s hand.
Sexy Time Count: 3.5 - Ludwig takes one for the team.