Wizard 6

**Chapter 6**

Richard is getting a fever from the “bite” of the vine. He decided not to tell Kahlan because they're almost to Zedd's place. As they travel, Kahlan stops to pick wildflowers and arrange them in a piece of deadwood. Umm...time pressure? Finding the Nameless Wizard? Your bottled friend died to get you here?

Anyway, Richard collects apples, and Kahlan floats her raft of flowers down a nearby brook. It's *“an offering to the spirits of our two mothers,”* she says. Okay, then.

Richard offers her an apple and she nearly kills him. It turns out that, in the Midlands, all red fruit is deadly poison, and Kahlan though he was trying to kill her in the most obvious and lame-brained manner possible: by literally handing her poison and telling her to eat it. \~/

Also, I must point out that not all apples are red. Granny Smith apples are green when ripe. Golden Delicious are yellow. I'm just sayin'.

We come at last to the House of Zedd. It has a *“reason chair,”* which is where Zedd sits when figuring out the reason for whatever he's pondering. He once sat in the reason chair for three days, trying to decide why people were always arguing over how many stars there were (As an aside, has anyone ever argued about this? Ever? Really?). He eventually decided it was because no one could be proven wrong, and then ate for three hours.

Zedd also has a *“cloud rock,”* which is where he stands while watching clouds. It appears Zedd is to be out zany, eccentric, and generally unconventional character.

Zedd is standing on the cloud rock. He has white hair and is spindly. He's also naked.

I shall spare you all the description of naked Zedd. \~/

Zedd says *“bags”* a lot, and this is considered cursing. \~/ I never knew the cashier at the book store was cursing at me when I checked out. Maybe I should start using that curse. Bag you, you bagging bagger!

Nah.

Zedd has been watching the cloud that was following Richard, last referenced in chapter 3. It's been following him for thre weeks, ever since his father George's murder. The cloud is from D'Hara, although I'm not entirely sure how a cloud can be from a country.

We learn Zedd's full name, which is Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander. The “Zu'l” rhymes with...what, exactly? Dull? Full? Tool? Why is there an apostrophe? Apostrophes mean something; they're not just decoration. They usually indicate a missing letter. Is Zedd's middle name a contraction? Is he a Dragonrider or something? \~/

This is as good a place as any to talk about names in general. So far, we have Richard, Michael and George...as well as Kahlan, Darken, Panis and Zeddicus. Now, given that the three people with normal names are from the Westland, this could be taken to indicate their native culture...except that the Westlanders left the Midlands within living memory. Surely their culture hasn't drifted that quickly.

This isn't an example of Paolini-eqsue “cool people have cool names,” where the important characters have weird fantasy names, while the unimportant ones have real-world names. The main character's name is Richard, his best friend is Zeddicus, and the Dark Lord is Darken. This feels random.

(Note: I would be more forgiving and assume that the weirder names are D'Haran or otherwise of some distant culture...except that, in later books, we meet D'Harans with such exotic names as Tom.)

Zedd sees Kahlan and reacts with horror, demanding to know why Richard is with “this creature,” and whether she has touched him. o\_O Zedd apparently recognizes mind vampires on sight, and rightly fears them. Richard insists that she's a friend, and blah blah blah, they go into Zedd's house. The vine that “bit” Richard is called a snake vine. This is Significant! because the snake vine is mentioned in *“the secret book, the Book of Counted Shadows, the book [Richard's] father had him commit to memory before they destroyed it.”*

Dun dun DUNNNNNN!

Drinks: 4

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