Free The Pillars of Creation by Terry Goodkind Page A

said.”
    In a better world. Jennsen clung to that idea. Her world held only anguish.
    She moved toward the door, doing as Sebastian said to do. He scanned in every direction. She simply followed, stepping over bodies, over bloody arms and legs. She was too scared to feel anymore, too heartsick to care. Her thoughts seemed completely muddled. She had always prided herself on her clear thinking. Where had her clear thinking gone?
    In the rain, he pulled her by her arm toward the path down.
    “Betty,” she said, digging in her heels. “We have to get Betty.”
    He gazed at the path, then toward the cave. “I don’t think we need bother with the goat, but I should get my pack, my things.”
    She saw he was standing in the downpour without his cloak. He was soaked to the skin. It occurred to her that she wasn’t the only one who wasn’t thinking clearly. He was so intent on escaping that he almost left his things. That would be the death of him. She couldn’t let him die. Betty would help, but there was one other thing that she remembered. Jennsen ran back in the house.
    She ignored Sebastian’s yells. Inside, she wasted no time rushing to a small wooden chest just inside the door. She looked at nothing else as she pulled out two bundled sheepskin cloaks—one hers, one her mother’s. They kept them there, rolled and tied, at the ready, in case they ever had to leave in a hurry. He watched from the doorway, impatient, but silent when he saw what she was doing. Without looking death in the eye, she rushed back out of her house for the last time.
    Together, they ran to the cave. The fire was still crackling hot. Betty paced and trembled but was uncharacteristically silent, as if knowing something was terribly wrong.
    “Dry yourself a bit, first,” she said.
    “We don’t have time! We have to get out of here. The others could come at any moment.”
    “You’ll freeze to death if you don’t. Then what good will running do? Dead is dead.” Her own reasoned words surprised her.
    Jennsen pulled the two rolled sheepskin cloaks from under her wool cloak and started working loose the knots in the thongs. “These will help keep the rain out, but you need to get dry, first, otherwise you won’t stay warm enough.”
    He was nodding as he shivered and rubbed his hands before the fire, the sense of what she said finally overcoming his urgency to be gone. She wondered how he managed to do all he had done with a fever and after having taken herbs. Fear, she guessed. Stark-raving fear. That, she understood.
    Her whole body ached. Not only had she been banged around, but she saw now that her shoulder was bleeding. The cut wasn’t bad, but it throbbed. The sustained level of terror had left her drained and exhausted.
    She wanted only to lie down and cry, but her mother had told her to get away. Only her mother’s words motivated her now. Without those last commands, Jennsen would be unable to function. Now she simply did what her mother had told her to do.
    Betty was beside herself. The distraught goat tried to climb the pen to get to Jennsen. As Sebastian hovered over the fire, Jennsen tied a rope around Betty’s neck. The goat was as thankful to be going as a goat could be.
    They would give Betty a chance to return the favor. When they had gotten away and found at least simple shelter, they would not be able to build a fire on such a wet night. If they could find a dry hole, a spot under a rock ledge, or beneath fallen trees, they would hunker down beside the goat. Betty would keep them both warm so they wouldn’t freeze to death.
    Jennsen understood the plaintive calls Betty made toward the house. The goat’s ears were at attention. Betty was worried for the woman who wasn’t going. Jennsen collected all the carrots and acorns off the shelf, stuffing them in pockets and packs.
    When Sebastian was as dry as he was going to allow himself to get, they donned their wool cloaks and topped them with the sheepskin. With Jennsen