Free The First Confessor by Terry Goodkind Page B

but she couldn’t do that, either. Mostly, she wanted to somehow make the unexpected, savage pain stop.
    She couldn’t endure it for another moment. As much as she wanted to live, she welcomed death if only it would bring her release.
    In that helpless, desolate instant, she knew.
    The initial violence of the pain unexpectedly eased up just a bit. She didn’t know if it was a depraved game, or if the crushing hurt was going to ram back in at her again with even more force. In that brief break, Magda gasped a breath.
    Before she could cry out, the pain slammed into her again, but with immensely more force than the first time. She hadn’t thought it possible for it to hurt more, but it did. The startling power of it left her senseless.
    Staggered, she began to lose her awareness of where she was. Her skull felt as if it were being slowly crushed.
    A powerful blow came out of nowhere like a bolt of lightning, striking her in the middle, doubling her over. Her muscles strained against a force squeezing her chest. She heard snapping and felt her ribs break, sending yet another kind of pain ripping through her.
    In insufferable torment, her eyes wide, she saw Lord Rahl rushing toward her, yet his movements seemed impossibly slow. He almost looked to be a statue, unable to make any headway. At the slow, dreamlike rate at which he appeared to be moving, she didn’t think he would reach her before she was dead.
    She felt something warm and wet running from her ears and down along her jaw. She saw bright blood splattering on the stone floor under her.
    Magda dropped heavily to her knees.
    Her vision narrowed to a dark tunnel. Everything seemed far away. She thought she heard voices but she couldn’t make them out over the piercing, painful, high-pitched noise she was hearing.
    Just at the dark edge of her restricted vision, she saw Lord Rahl’s two big guards draw their swords as they, too, started toward her. She knew that they now saw her as a threat.
    The blood running from her ears and dripping from her chin merged into a wet, red pool on the floor beneath her. She could feel the wet warmth soaking her knees and dress.
    Through the stunning torment, through the paralyzing pain spiking down through her head and ripping up through her abdomen, Magda, like the guards, realized what was happening. As disoriented as she was, she was all too aware of the alien presence roaring out from the dark corners of her mind.
    If the thing within didn’t kill her, the guards surely would. Magda recognized that she had only precious moments to live.
    With that awareness, she realized how desperately she didn’t want to die. Despite how much she wanted the pain to stop, she didn’t want to die. She had never felt so strongly about wanting to live. But she could feel herself slipping ever closer to the dark rim of the underworld.
    Magda remembered then her husband’s last words on the note in her pocket.
    Be strong now, guard your mind, and live the life that only you can live.
    Lord Rahl was right there, right before her, his boots in her blood. He was leaning down, his hands on her shoulders as he yelled something.
    She couldn’t hear him. She could hear only the ripping howl of pain in her ears.
    Magda clutched Lord Rahl’s pant legs in her fists as the pain darkened her vision, threatening to blind her. She knew that in brief moments she would not only lose her vision, she would lose consciousness. She knew that she had only those brief seconds before everything was lost to her.
    She could hear Alric Rahl above her yelling urgently, but she couldn’t make out the distant words. She could feel his powerful fingers grasping her shoulders as he leaned over her.
    She knew that this was her only chance.
    But she didn’t know if she could summon the strength.
    “Master Rahl . . .” she managed in a hoarse voice. Blood dripped from her lips. She could taste it in her mouth.
    Terror tightened her throat. Her heartbeats came weaker and