Temple 20

**Chapter 20**

Zedd saunters into the Jester's Inn, and we learn that he's wearing fancy clothes because Adie made him. Women, amirite? He has a brief conversation with the innkeeper, money changes hands, and he learns that Nathan and a woman are in the room at the end of the hall, and the inn has only one door. Zedd proceeds to kick in the door and paralyze the man and woman in the room, only to discover that the man isn't Nathan.

This takes two and a half pages.

Zedd questions the man (who bears a vague physical resemblance to Nathan), whose name proves to be William. It turns out Nathan paid William a bag of gold to be his magical decoy and let Zedd and Hypocrite chase him, while Nathan himself went elsewhere. We also learn that Nathan transformed the coins with magic, because again, all coins are identical in size, weight, and appearance except for their material composition. Zedd, we're told, only turned things to gold *“if there was no other choice.”*

William gives Zedd a letter from Nathan, which is addressed to Hypocrite. In it, Nathan notes that *“one of our Sisters is going to do something very stupid,”* and Nathan plans to stop her. He says he loves Ann, because Stockholm syndrome, and mentions the red moon. If the moon rises red for three nights, he says Zedd must go to *“the Jocopo treasure,”* because this means that Jagang has invoked *“a bound fork prophecy,”* with the victim of said prophecy being Richard.

Just as Zedd finishes reading, William clubs him over the head, puts a knife to his throat, and starts demanding to know where the treasure is. Before Zedd can answer, a *“middle-aged woman in a dark cloak”* grabs William and flings him aside. She exposits that she followed Hypocrite hoping she and Zedd would lead her to Nathan, and instead she found William. She cuts the nameless whore in half with black anti-lightning, then threatens to do the same to Zedd unless he answers her questions.

Zedd incinerates the letter with magic. Mysterious Woman demands William tell her what it said, and William bolts. Mysterious Woman casts some sort of spell on Zedd, incapacitating him with pain, then takes off in pursuit of William.

There's a big ol' boom, and Zedd realizes the *“light web”* has ignited. This ends the pain spell on Zedd, and also kills William and Mysterious Woman in a gory fashion. It also blows the crap out of the inn, and Zedd notes the moans of the injured, and men digging through the wreckage in search of the injured or dead.

Hypocrite rushes in and quickly exposits that the woman was Sister Roslyn, a Bad Nun, and when Zedd's light web went off, she tried to counter it with Minus Magic. She failed, and Zedd notes that *“I certainly didn't make it that big. Using* [Minus Magic] *on the light spell expanded its power. It cost innocent people their lives.”*

I suppose that's possible, given how magic works in this setting; namely, it does whatever the author wants it to do at any given moment.

Zedd magicks the letter back into existence from the ashes, which I admit is a pretty neat trick, and Hypocrite reads it. They compare notes, and neither has any idea where or what the Jocopo treasure might be. Hypocrite, out of nowhere, informs Zedd that he is still her slave and she is still forcing him to assist her in recapturing her other slave.

Zedd takes off his collar and drops in in Hypocrite's lap.

Okay, I admit: that was cool.

Hypocrite is amazed, saying that should be impossible, and Zedd says he figured out how to remove the collar after two or three days. Why did he keep going along with Hypocrite?

“*I guess I like women who do things out of desperation. Shows character.”*

By this logic, Zedd likes women who mug people for money to buy heroin. Also, \~/ because that's stupid.

Blah blah, prophecies prophecies, end chapter.

Drinks: 1

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