Creatures in The Sword of Truth

This article is about the characters in Terry Goodkind's epic fantasy series The Sword of Truth.

Kahlan Amnell
Kahlan Amnell is the Mother Confessor and the last living Confessor after Darken Rahl had hunted all the others down. She has green eyes, long brown hair, and typically wears a flowing white dress when acting as the Mother Confessor - a position akin in its power to a pope or empress. Like other Confessors, she needs time to restore her power after it has been used but recovers quicker than they, taking only a couple of hours to do so. As indicative of her position as the Mother Confessor, her Confessor's power is also the strongest among the Confessors. Kahlan is the love interest of the series' protagonist Richard Rahl. After their wedding, they combine their domains to rule a full three-quarters of the known world, but their expanded empire proves infinitely difficult to protect. She has a kind and generous soul, remarkable for its resolution and devotion to her people, but only the brutal Mord Sith have less pity for their enemies than does the Mother Confessor.

Richard Rahl
Richard Rahl is introduced to the series as Richard Cypher, an adopted son of George Cypher and the younger stepbrother of Michael Cypher. He grew up as a woods guide in Westland and as a friend of the wizard Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander. Over the course of the series, he learns more of his heritage and his gift, facilitating his role as the Seeker of Truth and the master of D'Hara.

Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander
Zeddicus "Zedd" Zu'l Zorander is a main character in the series. He is the grandfather of Richard Rahl and thinks of Kahlan as something of a granddaughter. Zedd is a wizard of the First Order, the most powerful class of wizards. He has a romantic relationship with the sorceress Adie. When traveling incognito, Zedd prefers to use the alias Ruben Rybnik.

Darken Rahl
Darken Rahl is the primary antagonist in the first book of the series Wizard's First Rule. He is the leader of the D'Haran Empire and the son of Panis Rahl, a ruthless dark wizard who had been killed by a wizard of the First Order Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander. He is also revealed to be the father of Richard Cypher, the primary protagonist in the story.

Drefan Rahl
Drefan Rahl is Richard's half brother introduced in The Temple of the Winds. He was raised by the Raug'Moss, a secret group of healers from D'Hara, and is the son of Darken Rahl and a D'Haran prostitute. Drefan arrives in Aydindril claiming to be the leader of the Raug'Moss. In Richard's absence, Drefan attempts to seize control of the D'Haran forces in Aydindril. When Richard returns from the Temple of the Winds, he is forced to kill Drefan in order to save Kahlan's life. Later, a group of Raug'Moss reveals that Drefan was not their leader, but was a dangerous and disturbed criminal that had escaped their custody.

Jennsen Rahl
Jennsen is the half-sister of Richard Rahl, and has spent her whole life fleeing from her father Darken Rahl with her mother knowing that if captured she would be tortured and killed. She is what ancient texts refer to as a "pillar of creation" or "a hole in the world", meaning that Jennsen is completely magically ungifted. Unlike everyone else who has at least a spark of the gift, Jennsen does not have that spark and so therefore is not affected by any magic or spell. In addition, she cannot see magic being used.

Jennsen was first introduced in the novel The Pillars of Creation. After finding a dead D'Haran soldier, she encounters a man named Sebastian who says he is the strategist for Emperor Jagang of the Imperial Order. After the murder of her mother, Sebastian leads Jennsen through D'Hara to the Old World to meet the Emperor Jagang and help defeat Richard Rahl, whom she believes is seeking to kill her just as her father, Darken Rahl, was. At the end of the story, Jennsen Rahl meets up with Richard Rahl who tells her not to blame him for his father's actions. Jennsen learns the dead D'Haran she encountered at the beginning of the novel was really an Imperial Order soldier who was disguised and then murdered by Sebastian. Furthermore, she learns that Sebastian sent the quad, also dressed as D'Haran soldiers, to kill her mother. In the end Sebastian kills himself.

After realizing that the Imperial Order was the real enemy and that Richard Rahl was nothing like her father, Jennsen joins Richard and Kahlan Amnell in their fight against Jagang. Jennsen Rahl also has another half-brother, the equally ungifted Oba Rahl, who believes that he is Darken Rahl's rightful heir.

Nathan Rahl
Nathan Rahl is a powerful wizard and an ancestor of Richard Rahl. He is tall, has broad shoulders, and has shoulder length white hair. Despite his extreme old age (nearly 1000 years old), Nathan is still a handsome man, and is in excellent physical condition. Nathan is clever and sometimes deceitful, but his intentions are always pure. He is also a Prophet, a form of wizards that can partially see the future and lay down ways that events could occur, as such had been kept prisoner in the Palace of the Prophets for nearly a thousand years until he and the Prelate of the Sisters of the Light faked their deaths and escaped.

After Richard destroyed the Palace of the Prophets to keep it from falling into the hands of the Imperial Order, Nathan escaped from the control of the Prelate and has since appeared in different places, such as the Peoples Palace in D'Hara, throughout the course of the series, apparently following his own path dictated by the prophecies he envisions. In the Phantom, he was appointed as Lord Rahl because Richard had his gift sealed by Six and Violet.

Oba Rahl
Oba Rahl is a half-brother of Richard Rahl introduced in The Pillars of Creation. When he was very young his mother took Oba, fled the Peoples Palace, and went into hiding from Darken Rahl. Since Oba was ungifted, Darken Rahl considered Oba and his kind to be a threat to the world of magic. Oba is often mentally unstable at times. Oba eventually learns his heritage from a potion-maker named Lathea, who is Althea's sister, before he kills her. Oba is ungifted and, furthermore, not affected by magic. Oba is large and very strong. Oba feels that he is indestructible, mostly because he is guided and protected by a voice in his head (The Keeper) He believes that his mother and Lathea were purposely trying to keep him from his inheritance, the D'Haran Empire, as well as trying to kill him.

After killing his mother, Oba sets out to claim his inheritance and finds that it is already under the reign of Richard Rahl. Oba encounters Richard Rahl and his wife Kahlan Amnell, the Mother Confessor. Rather than kill Richard immediately, Oba is ordered by the Keeper to kidnap Kahlan and take the Sword of Truth. Using his link with the sword, Richard pursues Oba to the Pillars of Creation, where Richard encounters Jennsen Rahl, his half-sister who is also ungifted and immune to magic. Jennsen was going to kill Richard's wife because she had been taught by Emperor Jagang that the Mother Confessor was evil. The Keeper's plan was for Richard to kill Jennsen at the Pillars of Creation and open a gate between the Keeper's realm and the real world. However, Richard and Jennsen recognize the goodness in one another and the plan is foiled.

Oba is killed when massive stones fall upon him and slowly suffocate him.

Panis Rahl
Panis Rahl appears in Debt of Bones, a prequel to The Sword of Truth series, as a ruthless ruler of D'Hara. Using power and treachery he turned his attention to seizing control of the Midlands. Panis Rahl threw the might of D'Hara against the Midlands and war raged for many years. As his legions were finally slowed and halted, Panis became more ruthless and brutal in his use of magic, killing thousands and wiping out whole villages, towns, and cities. He used Mord-Sith to capture wizards and sorceresses, and extract everything they knew about his enemies' plans. At that time, the great wizard Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander sided with the Midlands against Rahl and was able to hold Rahl's magic in check. Zedd cast a spell that held Panis Rahl in his palace in D'Hara, blunting his magic. Enraged by Zedd, Rahl sent a quad after Zedd's wife, Erilyn, and eventually capturing Zedd's daughter. Rahl continued to send all kinds of vile people to kill Zedd, even Mord'Sith. Rahl's legions were driven back into D'Hara. An impassable boundary was put up by Zedd between the Midlands and D'Hara to keep the forces of D'Hara at bay.

Panis Rahl knew of the boxes of Orden and the Book of Counted Shadows but was not well enough studied to use them. Instead, he groomed his son Darken Rahl to take and open the Boxes of Orden. Panis Rahl died from a blast of Zedd's wizard fire infused with the underworld when he was fifty-seven years old, just as the boundary was going up. His son, Darken Rahl, who was also injured in the blast, succeeded him on the throne of D'Hara.

Mord-Sith
The following characters are Mord-Sith, an elite group of women warriors,who capture others by capturing their magic, created to protect the Lord Rahl of D'Hara.

Berdine
Berdine is described to have blue eyes like Cara, and a loose braid of wavy brown hair. She is the only known Mord'Sith to understand High D'Haran,a little known dialect of the language spoken in Old D'Hara. She helps Richard to translate journals written by a wizard named Koloblicin (who they call Kolo) that lived nearly 3000 years ago. It helped Richard to find the Temple of the Winds and the sliph, which can transport anyone with both sides of the magic anywhere they have been to. Berdine is revealed to be a lesbian in the third book of the series Blood of the Fold when she tells Richard that she and Raina are in love. She goes on to explain to Richard that she has always taken more of a liking to girls since childhood and saying "boys didn't interest me that way".

Cara
Cara is described as a woman of remarkable beauty with ice-blue eyes and long blond hair that is kept up in the traditional french braid worn by all Mord Sith. She is also described to be tall and the same height as Kahlan Amnell. Her training as Mord Sith provided her with a thin and very muscular form. She was taken for training as Mord Sith at a very young age as was customary, and is still haunted by her fears of rats from early childhood training when they used to let the rats in the dungeons nibble on the girl's appendages every night.

One of the more characteristic functions of Cara is her comic relief through her sharp wit and sense of humor that manifests itself in quick-witted remarks of sarcasm and wryness. Cara is often quick to state the obvious nature of their predicament and lament the fact that if Richard had listened to her, "none of this would ever have happened". As with most Mord Sith, Cara usually wears her red leather, as she seems to always be expecting trouble. In one of the later books, Cara tries to conceal that she was one of the Mord Sith that had tortured Richard when he was held captive by Darken Rahl; she was crushed to find he already knew.

She often risks her life and almost dies in multiple attempts to save Richard, most notably being tortured in a horrific way involving rats that brings out her unbridled terror in Temple of the Winds. She cares deeply for Richard as his bodyguard, and would die for him, not simply because he is the Lord Rahl, but because he is her friend and she understands and agrees with what he stands for and why he fights. Having earned that respect and trust from Richard, she has become the closest protector to Richard, due to her ability to travel in the sliph after taking the magic of the messenger, and is considered the unofficial leader of the Mord Sith.

Cara, having proven her loyalty and sincere respect not only for Richard, but for Kahlan as well, has come to be considered not so much a friend as a member of the family. She carries great respect for Kahlan, who wears the Agiel of Denna, Richard's former Mord Sith mistress. She is the only outsider at Richard and Kahlan's wedding, and unreservedly moves to Westland in Faith of the Fallen when Richard gives up hope. Cara is among the most affected by Richard's new rule, in that she has learned to truly love others and to be willing to openly show her affection - after a lot of trial and error by using Richard and Kahlan as practice. At the end of the last book in the series Confessor, Cara finally admits openly that she is in love with the D'Haran army's commanding officer General Benjamin Meiffert and becomes the first Mord Sith ever to get married. At her wedding, Cara wears white leather in commemoration of their fight, of hope and of new life, of the pride of being a Mord Sith, and out of respect for customs and a sense of equality to her new husband.

Constance
Constance was first introduced when Denna invited her to torture Richard Rahl with her Agiel. She is described as having a husky voice, a head shorter the Denna with a stout figure and dull brown hair. Denna would not leave Constance alone with him though, for fear that she might kill him with her brutal style of torturing, but when Constance betrays Denna to Darken Rahl, Richard promises to kill her because of her actions. She hates men because of what Rustin did to her. Shortly after killing Denna, Richard keeps his promise and kills her with Denna's agiel.

Denna
Denna is described as having long auburn hair, almost as tall as Richard and brown eyes with the hardness of steel in them. Denna was assigned to torture Richard by Darken Rahl so he would be compliant and provide the text from the Book of Counted Shadows, which would allow Rahl to open the Boxes of Orden and unleash the Keeper, thus granting himself immortality. Denna falls in love with Richard, due to his insistence on showing her compassion despite the way she treated him. She eventually asks him to kill her to free both himself from Darken Rahl's clutches and herself from her role as a Mord-Sith. She gives Richard her Agiel as a token of her love right before he kills her. After the second tearing of the veil of the underworld, Denna returns as a spirit to save Richard from both his own gift and from the mark of the Keeper placed on him by Darken Rahl. She removed the mark by taking it on herself, meaning that she will suffer for eternity at the hands of the Keeper of the underworld. However, her act of sacrifice on Richard's behalf "disgusted" the Keeper and he refused to take her, thus allowing her to join the ranks of the good spirits. When Richard and Kahlan are later separated and seek to know if the other is alright, Denna appears and causes a rift in time to briefly reunite the lovers. After Richard enters the Temple of the Winds, he is visited by many spirits. Denna is one of them. She helps Richard finally decide to leave the temple and return to world of the living. She does this by forcing Richard to remember the events and emotions of what it was like to be under her control during the events in the first book, Wizard's First Rule.

Her last appearance in the series occurs in the book Confessor, when Richard summons her to the Gardens of Life to begin his journey into the Underworld as a step to reversing the effects of Chainfire, where she acts as his spirit guide but is sent away when the Beast follows Richard into the Underworld.

Hally
In Blood of the Fold, Hally is one of the four Mord-Sith who travelled to Aydindril to protect Richard Rahl. She is described as blond-haired, blue-eyed and tall, similar to Cara. Like all Mord-Sith, she wears blood red leather from head to toe. She is killed by the Mriswith who invaded General Reibisch's office while Richard was trying to prove to the General that he is the new Lord Rahl. After her death, Richard had all D'Harans in Aydindril to perform a devotion in her memory.

Raina
Along with Berdine, Cara, and Hally, Raina followed Richard to Aydindril to protect him. She has dark hair and eyes that seem to examine someone for every nuance of strength, weakness, and power. She is shorter than Hally and Cara. During Richard's stay in Aydindril, she continued to serve as Richard's bodyguard along with Cara and Berdine until she died in his arms at the hands of Emperor Jagang, who started the plague. She took great care in taming chipmunks, always giggling when they ate out of her hands. Along with that and her and Berdine's secret love, Raina, under Richard's new rules, learned to put aside the hardships of being Mord-Sith and let her emotions free.

Rikka
Is described as tall, attractive, piercing blue eyes and her long blond hair. One of twelve Mord-Sith who came to Aydindril at the end of Temple of the Winds. She is surprised that a Lord Rahl is in love. Rikka appears in Naked Empire where she helps rescue Zedd from Jagangs camp.

Nyda
Sent to question prisoners in the people's palace. She was almost raped by Oba Rahl.

Solvig
Who is this charactor, i dont remember her mentioned in the books.

Abigail
Abigail is a girl, about the same age as Rachel, from the land of Pendisan Reach. She grew up in the town of Coney Crossing, where she knew every person living in the town. She had fine, dark brown hair that covered her ears, but no more. She often wore a crimson dress and a magic bracelet made of two wires intricately twisted together in interlocking circles, which her mother, Helsa, had given her. The bracelet would often give off an odd tingling sensation and get unusually warm, especially around great magic. Her mother had told her to wear it always and it would someday be of value.

Abby's mother was a sorceress who died before she could see her granddaughter. Abby herself did not inherit the gift (known as a "skip" because the gift skipped her), something that she often felt ashamed about. The people of Coney Crossing depended on her mother. She helped those who were ill or hurt. She advised people on matters of community and those of family. For some she arranged marriages. For some she meted out discipline. For some she bestowed favors available only through magic. She protected the people of Coney Crossing. She was revered openly. By some, she was feared and loathed privately.

While her mother was alive Abby had been shunned in subtle ways; after her mother died the shunning became more overt. It had been expected by the people of Coney Crossing that she would serve as her mother had served. People didn't understand about the gift, that it often wasn't passed onto an offspring; instead they thought Abby selfish.

Abby's father, husband and four year old daughter, Jana, were all captured by D'Haran troops under the command of Anargo. Jana was Abby's last chance at having children after the death of another son at birth. She left for Aydindril to seek help from the First Wizard, Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander.

Adie
Adie is an old and powerful sorceress, described to be a tall fine-looking woman with a strong jaw line. She wears the simple tan robe of a coarse weave denoting her high station as a Sorceress. She has a mix of fine straight black and gray hair of medium length cut in square fashion about her face. Her eyes are completely white having been blinded while being held captive by the Blood of the Fold. She later learns to use her gift to see and with the help of her gift can see more than a sighted person. Her voice is harsh and raspy because the Blood of the Fold poured acid down her throat to keep her from telling her husband Pell that she was not the one who named him a Baneling. She traveled to the Old World and studied with the Sisters of the Light. She also traveled the Midlands and learned a great deal about her gift of magic from other sorceresses and soon learned of how rare her strength of power was. For a good part of her life, she used a crutch, because she had to sever her own foot when a Gripper attached itself to her. Her foot was later restored by Zedd, although he did not grow it quite long enough, so she still walks with a limp.

Adie was born in Nicobarese under the shadow and rule of the Blood of the Fold. Most recently she has lived at the mouth of the pass in King's Port, Westland. Many call her the "bone woman" because of the extensive collection of bones she has gathered from her travels in both the New and the Old World. Adie claims that she lived in the mouth of the pass because she became tired of people coming to her all the time wanting spells and potions. She wanted to be left alone to study her "higher summons"; the actual reason was to hide from the Keeper. Adie's home in Kingsport was destroyed when Zedd attempted to use his magic to study a special bone intricately carved from a dead Skrin. The bones of a skrin Adie had battled in the past came to life, destroying Adie's home in an attempt to capture Adie and Zedd and take them into the Underworld.

Adie is a long-time friend of Chase and is one of Richard and Zedd's most trusted allies.

Anargo
Anargo was a commander of a large military unit of the D'Haran army under the command of Panis Rahl during the first war between D'Hara and the Midlands. His unit was very large, it was rumored it was larger than the annual locust swarm that went through Pendisan Reach every year. At the end of the war, Anargo's unit was stationed in Pendisan Reach, primarily in the town of Coney's Crossing. Like most D'Haran units, Anargo had sorceresses and wizards under his command who used magic to imprison the people of Coney Crossing and the surrounding areas. The D'Haran troops would use these captives as shields, to blunt the deadly magic, spears, and arrows the Midlands army sent against them. They would drive the captives forward, "dulling the enemies' weapons on their own women and children".

The Midlands troops trapped Anargo's unit in Coney's Crossing shortly after Zeddicus Zu'l Zorander developed magical horns that turned the tide of the war. Midlands troops led by Sanderson swept in from the north while troops led by Mardale cut up from the south. General Brainard in the south sent half his troops north along the Kern River to block off their retreat into D'Hara.

Bill
Bill is the proprietor of an inn and dry goods store in the town of Southaven in Westland, near what used to be King's Port. He is a stout man with a shiny, shaved head, curly eyebrows, and curly black hair on his thick, husky, muscled arms that seem to compete with his beard. He typically wears a shirt with no sleeves and an apron that looks like it could never have been white. He often has a dry voice and a toothpick rolling around in his mouth. Unlike the other men of Southaven, Bill keeps his eyes where they belong when he looks at women. He is tough and hardened but doesn't appear devious (although appearances are deceiving). His son, Randy, is a lanky young man who helps him run things.

The inside of his inn reflects the condition of Southaven as a whole: sparse and dirty.

Bill is an approved supplier for government officials needing supplies while near Southaven, and is reimbursed from Hartland. Although most of the residents of Southaven disliked the boundary wardens, Bill appreciated how they kept some of his other customers at bay and brought an income from the government with their business at the Inn and the dry goods store. He is a close acquaintance of Chase.

Dell "Chase" Brandstone
Dell Brandstone, commonly referred to as Chase, is the leader of the boundary wardens of Westland and an old friend of Richard Rahl. He is also a long-time friend of George Cypher, Zedd, and Adie. He is a big man with a large frame, clean-shaven, with a head of light brown hair that shows no sign of receding but instead gives way to age by going gray at the sides. Despite his size, he is quick when there is need. When outfitted to travel near the boundary or when expecting conflict, Chase wears a chainmail shirt and is strapped with enough armaments to supply a small army.

Chase lives outside of the town of Hartland with his wife, Emma Brandstone, and his large number of children. Chase has a hobby of collecting stones of unique shape, color, and texture during his travels, and would tell anyone who would listen where each had come from, and what sort of trouble he had encountered in retrieving it. He is rarely flustered or surprised. While he is feared by most people with the exception of children, Chase treats everyone he meets with respect. After learning that Richard had been appointed as the Seeker of Truth, Chase dedicated himself to the defense of the Seeker. He continued to fulfill this role until he went home to Westland to be with his family with his adopted daughter, Rachel.

George Cypher
George Cypher was a trader and was married to Richard Rahl's mother, who was also Zedd's daughter, when Richard was young. Although George is mentioned in the series, he makes no appearances since he is murdered three weeks before the start of the series.

George raised Richard as his own in Westland. He is also the father of Michael Cypher. Richard's mother died early in Richard's life, leaving George to raise Richard and Michael by himself. As a trader, George traveled often looking for the chance exotic or rare item. On one of his adventures, George Cypher came across the Book of Counted Shadows, guarded by an intricate web of shields in the Wizard's Keep of Aydindril in the Midlands. With the help of Prelate Annalina Aldurren and Richard's ancestor Nathan Rahl, he retrieved the book from a creature of the Underworld and brought it back to Westland to keep it safe until the keeper of the book came to claim it. He also took a tooth from the creature that he gave to Richard to keep as proof that the book was not stolen but rescued. He had Richard commit the book to memory before they destroyed it, so it could not fall into evil hands.

Richard is ignorant of his parentage for most of his early life, but is brought to a rude awakening when his real father, Darken Rahl, tortures and kills George Cypher in his home in search of the Book of Counted Shadows.

Michael Cypher
Michael Cypher is the son of George Cypher, and adopted brother of Richard Rahl. He is described to be shorter, heavier and softer than Richard. He has a mop of unruly hair and a mustache. In public, he often wore baggy white trousers and his white tunic with bloused sleeves would be cinched at the waist by a gold belt. Michael was a few years older than Richard. Michael and Richard had a strong relationship when they were young but Michael grew distant after the death of their mother. His ambition became politics and his goals focused on becoming someone important. Michael becomes the First Councilor of Westland, a position that would make him responsible for everything and everyone within Westland.

Richard discovers Michael's defection to Darken Rahl when, after having an enemy enchantment cast upon him by Rahl (which makes his friends see him as Rahl and his enemies see him in his true self), Michael recognises him. They find themselves on opposite sides of the struggle. After Darken Rahl's defeat, Richard orders Michael's execution, but sorrows over the necessity of his foster brother's death.

Dennee
Dennee does not appear in the novels but is spoken of by Kahlan Amnell in the first novel, Wizard's First Rule. Like Kahlan, Dennee was a Confessor but her power was weaker than Kahlan's. Dennee and Kahlan were close friends, and considered each other as sisters when Dennee's mother took Kahlan in after the death of Kahlan's mother. Since Dennee despised her Confessor's duties, Kahlan would often do them in her stead. Dennee's death by Darken Rahl's quad made Kahlan swear vengeance against Rahl.

Giller
Giller is a Wizard of the Second Order and appears only in Wizard's First Rule. Giller gave his life to create Wizard's Life Fire, protecting Rachel and the last Box of Orden. He did so right before Darken Rahl could complete the final hook in the cut with which Rahl was performing his anthropomancy, thus depriving Rahl of the knowledge of the carrier of the box. The ashes left by Giller's Life Fire tasted sweet because he had given his life to defend another, instead of for selfish means, such as to spare himself pain.

Queen Milena
Queen Milena was introduced in Wizard's First Rule as the ruler of the nation of Tamarang in the Midlands. She is pompous and arrogant, and is a large, amply-fed woman with long hair and fat arms. She often wore layered silks of garish colors and a cape trimmed in rare spotted fox. When a person upsets her, he/she is ordered to be beheaded, a habit her daughter Princess Violet caught on to very quickly. Queen Milena frequently has a host of ministers about her that she discussed important matters with, as well as her personal wizard Giller, her court artist James, and her barristers, dressed in red-and-yellow pantaloons. She is killed by the Mord-Sith Denna and is succeeded by Six as queen.

Demmin Nass
Demmin Nass is Darken Rahl's most trusted aide and a good friend of his since they were boys. The character is described as a large man with sharply chiseled muscles and blond hair, while his voice was deep and coarse. The weakness for young boys Nass had would occasionally get him into trouble, such as when he had the trader Brophy arrested for the murder of a young boy, but who submitted to a Confessor to prove his innocence. Towards the end of the first novel, Nass is castrated and then killed by Kahlan after he reveals to her the apparent death of Richard.

Rachel
Rachel is a young girl and is introduced in the series as a playmate of Princess Violet, the daughter of Queen Milena of Tamarang. She had short hair, like most non-royalty in the Midlands, which was cut jagged while she lived in the palace. Rachel originally grew up in an orphanage with many other children, including her brother. It was at the orphanage that Rachel met Brophy. After Rachel's brother was murdered by Demmin Nass, Queen Milena took her to the palace to be the playmate of her daughter. After living in the palace for a time, the wizard Giller entrusted Rachel with the third Box of Orden and instructed her to flee Tamarang, which she did. Rachel was later found by Richard and Kahlan. She is eventually adopted by Chase.

In Stone of Tears, Rachel is given the important job of holding onto the stone of tears, a powerful magical object sent into the world by the Boxes of Orden. Zedd instructs her to give it to Richard. Wizard Zorander also orders Chase to train her to be a fighter. Rachel doesn't appear again in the series until Naked Empire, the eighth book in the series. After Zedd is taken from the Wizard's Keep and brought to Jagang, Rikka, Chase and Rachel appear to save Zedd shortly after he activates the sunset spell to destroy the Imperial Order camp. Rachel and Chase return to the Keep afterward, where Zedd offers to let them stay at the Keep.

Though she appears in Chainfire, she has a significantly greater role in Phantom. She is captured by Samuel and taken to Tamarang under Princess Violet where she is returned as her "playmate". She escapes and takes the Box of Orden which Samuel stole from Tovi and goes with Chase back to the Keep to give Nicci the Box of Orden. In Confessor Rachel is forced to return to Tamarang by Princess Violet. She alters the pictures Violet has drawn on the caves resulting in Violet dying and Richard Rahl recovering his gift. She is captured by Six and escapes with the aid of Shota (disguised as Rachel's mother) and Gratch. In the book's final chapter, it is revealed that Rachel's ability to alter drawn spells is indicative of her royal blood, and she becomes the Queen of Tamarang.

Shota
Shota is a powerful and feared witchwoman that resides in Agaden Reach. She can take on many different forms, and has the ability to look and sound exactly like anybody’s mother, which she uses many times throughout the series to guide or help Richard, without him knowing it. She says her natural form is an average height attractive brunette that wears a very thin, light, grey dress with many different levels of flaps.

While the mountains and the swamp around her home are dangerous and full of deadly creatures and objects, her home is actually a grand castle in a beautiful valley that seems to be stuck in the season of spring. For the majority of the series, she keeps Samuel with her in her valley as her servant/follower. Zedd snuck into her valley right before he crossed the boundary into Westland to steal the Sword of Truth from Samuel, who had killed the former Seeker of Truth. For this reason, Shota and Zedd do not trust or like each other. Throughout the series, Shota helps Richard and Kahlan through very indirect methods involving her very unique form of prophecies. Some of the most notable are giving him the knowledge he needs to obtain the book left for him by the last living War Wizard, the drive to kill Darken Rahl, killing Six by acting as her mother, and telling Rachel how to have the Mud People save him from dying in the Underworld.

Princess Violet
Princess Violet is introduced to the series as a little girl with stubby fingers, a plump neck, a big nose, and long, dull, brown hair. She is the daughter of Queen Milena and the heir to the throne of Tamarang. She often wore pink or pale blue satin dresses and jewelry that was too large for her. She enjoyed causing pain and misery to her playmate Rachel while she was in the palace, as well as modeling her mother's fine jewelry. She had a high, squeaky, snorting laugh.

After being injured by Richard in Wizard's First Rule, Violet does not appear in the series again until Phantom, where it is revealed that she survived and was later healed by the witch woman Six. She is also revealed to have the gift of using magic in drawings. It is revealed several years after the events in Wizard's First Rule that Six entered Tamarang's royal castle posing as a healer and regrew Violet's tongue and repaired her jaw. Since then Violet and Six ruled Tamarang together with an iron fist, despite the fact that the Imperial Order had conquered most of the Midlands. Eventually, Six grew exasperated with Violet's ingratitude and ill-temper and seized the throne herself, reappointing Violet to the position of court artist. In the caves in Tamarang, Rachel is lured inside where she finds out the "ghosty gobblies" are going to kill her thanks to the drawing made by Violet. With a quick alteration to make Rachel look like Violet, Violet is killed by those phantoms.

Annalina Aldurren
Prelate Annalina "Ann" Aldurren is a main character in The Sword of Truth series. Ann has been the Prelate of the Sisters of the Light for nearly eight-hundred years and is a Sorceress of rare power. She is a short, stout woman who looks to be in her seventies but is actually close to one thousand years old, after living under the spell at the Palace of the Prophets. She often wears plain, black or grey wool dresses, which marks her as the leader of the Sisters of the Light. She and the prophet Nathan Rahl are in love. In the book Confessor she dies at the hands of three Sisters of the Dark.

Jagang
Jagang is the main antagonist in books 3-11. He is a Dreamwalker and has the power to take over others minds. However, those sworn to the Lord Rahl-master of D'Hara-are protected from the Dreamwalkers power by an ancient enchantment. With this power Jagang managed to become emperor of the Imperial Order, which controls all of the Old World. His most striking and noticeable feature is his eyes, which contain no pupil or iris only grey floating objects. He is described to be a short, but very muscular man with a shaved head and a beard. He wears a gold chain from his left nostril to his left ear.

Nicci
Nicci was introduced as one of Richard's teachers at the Palace of the Prophets and a Sister of the Dark.

Nicci grew up in a fairly wealthy home, with a hard working father who owned his own armor producing factory. Her mother was ensconced with the ideas of The Order and fell sway to the teaching of people such as Brother Narev.

At a relatively young age, Nicci was taken to the Palace of the Prophets where she remained for many years. Upon meeting Richard though, something changed inside her.

To understand this change, she embarked and kidnapped Richard, bringing him to the Old World. There she became his quasi-wife. As the year progressed Nicci began to understand what life was about. Upon seeing the statue Richard carved, she knew that her life was a sham and forever changed.

From that moment on, Nicci became one of Richards closet allies and friends. She was the only sorceress on Richards side to possess Subtractive magic.

Nicci is described as an extremely beautiful and very powerful sorceress.

Before joining Richard, she was part of the Imperial Order and carried the name Death's Mistress. She gave Jagang the name Jagang the Just. She was Jagangs most prized Sister of the Dark. He called her his Slave Queen.

Six
Six is a witchwoman from the Old World, introduced in the tenth book of the series, Phantom. She is one of the few people not affected by the Chainfire spell and her abilities are similar to Shota's. She appears to be even more feared than Shota. She collaborates with Princess Violet, later Queen Violet, to capture Richard Rahl. She concocts an elaborate plan to use the artisan ability introduced in Wizard's First Rule to deprive Richard of his gift. At the end of Confessor, Six is killed by Shota, in disguise of her mother.

For witchwomen, the seventh daughter is special. Her mothers choice of the name Six for her sixth daughter is meant to be derisive. Six kept the name as a display of power.

Verna Sauventreen
Verna Sauventreen is a main character in the series. She is a Sister of the Light and the only Sister, of the three who set out, to return to the Palace of the Prophets after discovering Richard Rahl. She helps Richard escape and fulfill prophecy and becomes one of his closest friends and advisors. Verna later becomes Prelate of the Sisters after Ann fakes her death and then becomes in charge of the gifted forces with the D'Haran Army.

Warren
Warren is a wizard and later prophet from the Old World who lives at the Palace of The Prophets in Tanimura. Richard meets Warren not long after coming to the Palace, who is interested in him because he is the Seeker of Truth and "The Bringer of Death" as described in several prophecies Warren has been studying. Over the duration of Richard's time at the Palace, Warren and Richard became fast friends. After leaving the Palace, Warren, along with the Sisters of Light, helps Richard's fight against the Imperial Order. In 'Faith of the Fallen' he marries Verna. Near the end of Faith of the Fallen Warren is killed by Gadi, an assassin from the old world.

Brophy
Brophy was born a human but was transformed into a wolf after he was found innocent by the Mother Confessor of the crime he was accused of. When Brophy was a man, he sometimes used his large size to persuade people to do as he wished. He also had a bad temper but it only came out when he was wronged and being cheated. He was a trader in things of dubious nature at the gray edges of law - things of magic, such as artifacts, books and living creatures of magic. His business and wealth allowed him to support various orphanages and see to it they had what they needed to take care of the children. Brophy was wrongly accused by Demmin Nass of the murder of a young boy, who was Rachel's brother. Because of his reputation and being seen around orphanages, no one was surprised when he was accused of the murder of a little boy. Brophy submitted to the Mother Confessor, Kahlan Amnell, to prove his innocence. Kahlan's wizard, Giller, then turned Brophy into a wolf in order to allow him to continue to live his life. The change took away some of the magic of the Confessor, and gave him enough concern for himself to start over with a new life.

As a wolf, Brophy is huge with fierce yellow eyes and thick, charcoal-colored fur from the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail. He has a mate, the leader of his pack, in the forest near the Rang'Shada Mountains. Together, they have a litter of six pups, who are almost grown. After sensing Kahlan's presence, Brophy leaves his pack to follow Kahlan and is later killed by Nass after trying to protect Kahlan.

Ghazi
Ghazi was a night wisp that left her kind, and stayed at Richard's house. Richard's mother later died trying to get Ghazi out of the fire that was started by an angry man, believing that Richard's father, George Cypher, had cheated him. The angry man smashed a lamp, liting the house on fire. Richard's mother's screams at being burned alive brought the man back to his sense, and tried, with Richard's father, unsuccessfully, to save her. It is unknown at what happened to Ghazi, but it is a distinct possiblibility that Ghazi died in the fire that consumed the house. The name Ghazi also means "Fire" in the ancient tongue of the night wisps.

Gratch
Gratch is a gar stumbled upon by Richard after Gratch's mother attacked Richard, supposedly for a meal. Richard is forced to kill Gratch's mother in self-defense, but cannot bring himself to kill Gratch. Once Richard leaves baby Gratch to fend for himself, Richard believes Gratch to be gone for good. Later, however, Gratch reappears and seems to be following Richard in his mother's stead. Richard then secretly cares for and feeds the young gar while he undergoes training as a wizard. Richard continues this care until Gratch has grown to a respectable age, and in the meantime, Richard and Gratch become very close friends. Eventually, Richard is forced to send Gratch away (for fear of his loved one, Kahlan) but the two are reunited later and fight alongside each other until Gratch finds another gar that he loves. Because Gratch is a short-tailed gar, he has respectable intelligence and is able to communicate with Richard and Richard's friends. People often refer to Gratch as Richard's pet, but Richard says Gratch is his friend. Gratch does numerous things for Richard, such as delivering a letter and flying Zedd around. Gratch loves food and wrestling with a passion.

Gregory
Gregory is the only known offspring of the red dragon Scarlet, who befriends Richard after he rescues the egg (that would hatch into Gregory)that had been stolen and hidden by Darken Rahl in order to control her. In the final novel he is full grown and Richard mistakes him for his mother. Though initially hostile towards Richard, Gregory recognizes him as his mother's friend and helps him.

Samuel
Samuel is a wiry, ashen, putrid-smelling, disgusting little creature with a pallid head, bulging yellow eyes, bloodless white lips, sharp teeth, and a shrill scream, who is obsessed with obtaining the Sword of Truth. Despite his size, Samuel is overwhelmingly strong (stronger than Richard) with big, powerful hands, long, sinewy fingers, and sharp nails. Spaces between his teeth are packed with spongy, gray debris. His heavy breath reeks of rot. Dark patches cover his hairless, waxy head. His feet are as disproportionately large as his hands and arms. His arms are so long that even as he stands erect, he often casually draws lines and circles in the dirt of the road with his fingers. His belly is round and full. There is no hair on him anywhere, and his skin looks like it hasn't seen sunlight in years. Short dark pants held up with straps is all he wears as he bounds along in his odd, skittering gait.

Samuel can speak a basic form of the common language, although his voice is often more of a hissing sound, and his laughter is more of a gurgling sound. Samuel's yellow eyes often change quickly between a taunting grin, greed, fierce hate and wide-eyed fear. They shine like twin lanterns in the dark. From time to time, when left alone, Samuel will occasionally snatch up a stick or rock or any other item and say, "Mine! Gimme!" to no one in particular, only to soon lose interest and drop his latest find. If given the chance, Samuel will slit the throat of those he dislikes without a second thought.

Samuel was the former Seeker of Truth, the direct predecessor of Richard. He lives in the Agaden Reach with his mistress, the witchwoman, Shota. He came to her many years before the start of the series, desperate for help, but she could do nothing for him, besides take pity on him. Zedd traveled to the Agaden Reach and took the Sword of Truth from Samuel and Shota and brought it with him to Westland. He later decided to follow the witchwoman Six, and had the Sword of Truth returned to him. He used this to rescue Kahlan from Sisters of the Dark, and was later killed, in the final novel.

Scarlet
Scarlet is a powerful red dragon, who is actually much larger than her depiction on the cover of Wizard's First Rule. Originally she is the unwilling mount and enforcer of Darken Rahl, who stole and hid her only egg in order to control her. In an effort to find his friends, Richard takes an enormous gamble and seeks her help. A sentient, magical, talking creature, she ambushes Richard, eats his horse and proceeds to 'toy' with Richard before proceeding to eat him as well. Richard saves himself by informing the dragon that he knows the whereabouts of her stolen egg, and will rescue it if she promises to help him find his friends. They agree, though the dragon states Richard's reprieve is only temporary, and that she may later decide to eat him. Richard is released, rescues the egg, and for that she became his friend, and has helped him several times later, both as a ride and with firepower (literally). She gives Richard a magical tooth, which he wears around his neck, and with it he can summon her, but only when he is in great need of her help, she warns. Despite her friendship with Richard, she is still a dangerous predator and thought nothing of devouring the whole village of mud people if she felt like it. She has the greatest respect for Richard as a Seeker, though frequently teased at each subsequent meeting that she might still eat him. She eventually had her son, Gregory, from the rescued egg and she is mentioned in the concluding book, by the same Gregory, though she was weak and ill because of the world's loss of magic. Her ultimate fate is never revealed.

Shar
Shar was a night wisp who served as a guide to Kahlan through the boundary. Shar sacrificed her life to help Kahlan cross the boundary and stop Darken Rahl, who threatened to destroy all magical creatures within the Midlands. Her last wish was that she would be touched by Kahlan's power in order to be relieved from the pain night wisps go through when separated from their kind for so long. She also gave Richard his first test to find the book written by a previous War Wizard which he failed.