Assassins Apprentice Read online

  He sat still on his horse. Bigger and bulkier than Regal, he still always sat a horse better. I think it was the soldier in him. He looked at me in silence for a moment. Then he said, “Yes. My brother’s dead. ” He granted me that, my uncle, that instant of kinship, and I think that ever after it changed how I saw the man. “Up behind me, boy, and I’ll take you back to the keep,” he offered.

  “No, thank you. Burrich would take my hide off for riding a horse double on this road. ”

  “That he would, boy,” Verity agreed kindly. Then: “I’m sorry you found out this way. I wasn’t thinking. It does not seem it can be real. ” I caught a glimpse of his true grief, and then he leaned forward and spoke to his horse and it sprang forward. In moments I was alone on the road again.

  A fine misting rain began and the last natural light died, and still I stood there. I looked up at the keep, black against the stars, with here and there a bit of light spilling out. For a moment I thought of setting my basket down and running away, running off into the darkness and never coming back. Would anyone ever come looking for me? I wondered. But instead I shifted my basket to my other arm and began my slow trudge back up the hill.

  7

  An Assignment

  THERE WERE RUMORS OF poison when Queen Desire died. I choose to put in writing here what I absolutely know as truth. Queen Desire did die of poisoning, but it had been self-administered, over a long period of time, and was none of her king’s doing. Often he had tried to dissuade her from using intoxicants as freely as she did. Physicians had been consulted, as well as herbalists, but no sooner had he persuaded her to desist from one than she discovered another to try.

  Toward the end of the last summer of her life, she became even more reckless, using several kinds simultaneously and no longer making any attempts to conceal her habits. Her behaviors were a great trial for Shrewd, for when she was drunk with wine or incensed with smoke, she would make wild accusations and inflammatory statements with no heed at all as to who was present or what the occasion was. One would have thought that her excesses toward the end of her life would have disillusioned her followers. To the contrary, they declared either that Shrewd had driven her to self-destruction or poisoned her himself. But I can say with complete knowledge that her death was not of the King’s doing.

  Burrich cut my hair for mourning. He left it only a finger’s width long. He shaved his own head, even his beard and eyebrows, for his grief. The pale parts of his head contrasted sharply with his ruddy cheeks and nose; it made him look very strange, stranger even than the forest men who came to town with their hair stuck down with pitch and their teeth dyed red and black. Children stared at those wild men and whispered to one another behind their hands as they passed, but they cringed silently from Burrich. I think it was his eyes. I’ve seen holes in a skull that had more life in them than Burrich’s eyes had during those days.

  Regal sent a man to rebuke Burrich for shaving his head and cutting my hair. That was mourning for a crowned king, not for a man who had abdicated the throne. Burrich stared at the man until he left. Verity cut a hand’s width from his hair and beard, as that was mourning for a brother. Some of the keep guards cut varying lengths from their braided queues, as a fighting man does for a fallen comrade. But what Burrich had done to himself and to me was extreme. People stared. I wanted to ask him why I should mourn for a father I had never even seen, for a father who had never come to see me, but a look at his frozen eyes and mouth and I hadn’t dared. No one mentioned to Regal the mourning lock he cut from each horse’s mane, or the stinking fire that consumed all the sacrificial hair. I had a sketchy idea that meant Burrich was sending parts of our spirits along with Chivalry’s; it was some custom he had from his grandmother’s people.

  It was as if Burrich had died. A cold force animated his body, performing all his tasks flawlessly but without warmth or satisfaction. Underlings who had formerly vied for the briefest nod of praise from him now turned aside from his glance, as if shamed for him. Only Vixen did not forsake him. The old bitch slunk after him wherever he went, unrewarded by any look or touch, but always there. I hugged her once, in sympathy, and even dared to quest toward her, but I encountered only a numbness frightening to touch minds with. She grieved with her master.

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  The winter storms cut and snarled around the cliffs. The days possessed a lifeless cold that denied any possibility of spring. Chivalry was buried at Withywoods. There was a Grieving Fast at the keep, but it was brief and subdued. It was more an observation of correct form than a true Grieving. Those who truly mourned him seemed to be judged guilty of poor taste. His public life should have ended with his abdication; how tactless of him to draw further attention to himself by actually dying.

  A full week after my father died I awoke to the familiar draft from the secret staircase and the yellow light that beckoned me. I rose and hastened up the stairs to my refuge. It would be good to get away from all the strangeness, to mingle herbs and make strange smokes with Chade again. I needed no more of the odd suspension of self that I’d felt since I’d heard of Chivalry’s death.

  But the worktable end of his chamber was dark, its hearth was cold. Instead, Chade was seated before his own fire. He beckoned to me to sit beside his chair. I sat and looked up at him, but he was staring at the fire. He lifted his scarred hand and let it come to rest on my quillish hair. For a while we just sat like that, watching the fire together.

  “Well, here we are, my boy,” he said at last, and then nothing more, as if he had said all he needed to. He ruffled my short hair.

  “Burrich cut my hair,” I told him suddenly.

  “So I see. ”

  “I hate it. It prickles against my pillow and I can’t sleep. My hood won’t stay up. And I look stupid. ”

  “You look like a boy mourning his father. ”

  I was silent a moment. I had thought of my hair as being a longer version of Burrich’s extreme cut. But Chade was right. It was the length for a boy mourning his father, not a subject mourning a king. That only made me angrier.

  “But why should I mourn him?” I asked Chade as I hadn’t dared to ask Burrich. “I didn’t even know him. ”

  “He was your father. ”

  “He got me on some woman. When he found out about me, he left. A father. He never cared about me. ” I felt defiant finally saying it out loud. It made me furious, Burrich’s deep wild mourning and now Chade’s quiet sorrow.

  “You don’t know that. You only hear what the gossips say. You aren’t old enough to understand some things. You’ve never seen a wild bird lure predators away from its young by pretending to be injured. ”

  “I don’t believe that,” I said, but I suddenly felt less confident saying it. “He never did anything to make me think he cared about me. ”

  Chade turned to look at me and his eyes were older, sunken and red. “If you had known he’d cared, so would others. When you are a man, maybe you’ll understand just how much that cost him. To not know you in order to keep you safe. To make his enemies ignore you. ”

  “Well, I’ll “not know’ him to the end of my days, now,” I said sulkily.

  Chade sighed. “And the end of your days will come a great deal later than they would have had he acknowledged you as an heir. ” He paused, then asked cautiously, “What do you want to know about him, my boy?”

  “Everything. But how would you know?” The more tolerant Chade was, the more surly I felt.

  “I’ve known him all his life. I’ve . . . worked with him. Many times. Hand in glove, as the saying goes. ”

  “Were you the hand or the glove?”

  No matter how rude I was, Chade refused to get angry. “The hand,” he said after a brief consideration. “The hand that moves unseen, cloaked by the velvet glove of diplomacy. ”

  “What do you mean?” Despite myself, I was intrigued.

  “Things can be done. ”
Chade cleared his throat. “Things can happen that make diplomacy easier. Or that make a party more willing to negotiate. Things can happen. . . . ”

  My world turned over. Reality burst on me as suddenly as a vision, the fullness of what Chade was and what I was to be. “You mean one man can die, and his successor can be easier to negotiate with because of it. More amenable to our cause, because of fear or because of . . . ”

  “Gratitude. Yes. ”

  A cold horror shook me as all the pieces suddenly fell into place. All the lessons and careful instructions and this is what they led to. I started to rise, but Chade’s hand suddenly gripped my shoulder.

  “Or a man can live, two years or five or a decade longer than any thought he could, and bring the wisdom and tolerance of age to the negotiations. Or a babe can be cured of a strangling cough, and the mother suddenly see with gratitude that what we offer can be beneficial to all involved. The hand doesn’t always deal death, my boy. Not always. ”

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  “Often enough. ”

  “I never lied to you about that. ” I heard two things in Chade’s voice that I had never heard before. Defensiveness. And hurt. But youth is merciless.

  “I don’t think I want to learn anymore from you. I think I’m going to go to Shrewd and tell him to find someone else to kill people for him. ”

  “That is your decision to make. But I advise you against it, for now. ”

  His calmness caught me off guard. “Why?”

  “Because it would negate all Chivalry tried to do for you. It would draw attention to you. And right now, that is not a good idea. ” His words came ponderously slow, freighted with truth.

  “Why?” I found I was whispering.

  “Because some will be wanting to write finis to Chivalry’s story completely. And that would be best done by eliminating you. Those ones will be watching how you react to your father’s death. Does it give you ideas and make you restless? Will you become a problem now, the way he was?”

  “What?”

  “My boy,” he said, and pulled me close against his side. For the first time I heard the possession in his words. “It is a time for you to be quiet and careful. I understand why Burrich cut your hair, but in truth I wish he had not. I wish no one had been reminded that Chivalry was your father. You are such a hatchling yet . . . but listen to me. For now, change nothing that you do. Wait six months, or a year. Then decide. But for now—”

  “How did my father die?”

  Chade’s eyes searched my face. “Did you not hear that he fell from a horse?”

  “Yes. And I heard Burrich curse the man who told it, saying that Chivalry would not fall, nor would that horse throw him. ”

  “Burrich needs to guard his tongue. ”

  “Then how did my father die?”

  “I don’t know. But like Burrich, I do not believe he fell from a horse. ” Chade fell silent. I sank down to sit by his bony bare feet and stare into his fire.

  “Are they going to kill me, too?”

  He was silent a long while. “I don’t know. Not if I can help it. I think they must first convince King Shrewd it is necessary. And if they do that, I shall know of it. ”

  “Then you think it comes from within the keep. ”

  “I do. ” Chade waited long, but I was silent, refusing to ask. He answered anyway. “I knew nothing of it before it happened. I had no hand in it in any way. They didn’t even approach me about it. Probably because they know I would have done more than just refuse. I would have seen to it that it never happened. ”

  “Oh. ” I relaxed a little. But already he had trained me too well in the ways of court thinking. “Then they probably won’t come to you if they decide they want me done. They’d be afraid of your warning me as well. ”

  He took my chin in his hand and turned my face so that I looked into his eyes. “Your father’s death should be all the warning you need, now or ever. You’re a bastard, boy. We’re always a risk and a vulnerability. We’re always expendable. Except when we are an absolute necessity to their own security. I’ve taught you quite a bit, these last few years. But hold this lesson closest and keep it always before you. If ever you make it so they don’t need you, they will kill you. ”

  I looked at him wide-eyed. “They don’t need me now. ”

  “Don’t they? I grow old. You are young, and tractable, with the face and bearing of the royal family. As long as you don’t show any inappropriate ambitions, you’ll be fine. ” He paused, then carefully emphasized, “We are the King’s, boy. His exclusively, in a way perhaps you have not thought about. No one knows what I do and most have forgotten who I am. Or was. If any know of us, it is from the King. ”

  I sat putting it cautiously together. “Then . . . you said it came from within the keep. But if you were not used, then it was not from the King. . . . The Queen!” I said it with sudden certainty.

  Chade’s eyes guarded his thoughts. “That’s a dangerous assumption to make. Even more dangerous if you think you must act on it in some way. ”

  “Why?”

  Chade sighed. “When you spring to an idea, and decide it is truth, without evidence, you blind yourself to other possibilities. Consider them all, boy. Perhaps it was an accident. Perhaps Chivalry was killed by someone he had offended at Withywoods. Perhaps it had nothing to do with him being a prince. Or perhaps the King has another assassin, one I know nothing about, and it was the King’s own hand against his son. ”

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  “You don’t believe any of those,” I said with certainty.

  “No. I don’t. Because I have no evidence to declare them truth. Just as I have no evidence to say your father’s death was the Queen’s hand striking. ”

  That is all I remember of our conversation then. But I am sure that Chade had deliberately led me to consider who might have acted against my father, to instill in me a greater wariness of the Queen. I held the thought close to me, and not just in the days that immediately followed. I kept myself to my chores, and slowly my hair grew, and by the beginning of real summer all seemed to have returned to normal. Once every few weeks I would find myself sent off to town on errands. I soon came to see that no matter who sent me, one or two items on the list wound up in Chade’s quarters, so I guessed who was behind my little bouts of freedom. I did not manage to spend time with Molly every time I went to town, but it was enough for me that I would stand outside the window of her shop until she noticed me, and at least exchange a nod. Once I heard someone in the market talking about the quality of her scented candles, and how no one had made such a pleasant and healthful taper since her mother’s day. And I smiled for her and was glad.

  Summer came, bringing warmer weather to our coasts, and with it the Outislanders. Some came as honest traders, with cold lands’ goods to trade—furs and amber and ivory and kegs of oil—and tall tales to share, ones that still could prickle my neck just as they had when I was small. Our sailors did not trust them, and called them spies and worse. But their goods were rich, and the gold they brought to purchase our wines and grains was solid and heavy, and our merchants took it.

  And other Outislanders also visited our shores, though not too close to Buckkeep hold. They came with knives and torches, with bows and rams, to plunder and rape the same villages they had been plundering and raping for years. Sometimes it seemed an elaborate and bloody contest, they to find villages unaware or underarmed and for us to lure them in with seemingly vulnerable targets and then slaughter and plunder the pirates themselves. But if it were a contest, it went very badly for us that summer. My every visit to town was heavy with the news of destruction and the mutterings of the people.

  Up at the keep, among the men-at-arms, there was a collective feeling of doltishness that I shared. The Outislanders eluded our patrol ships with ease and never fell into our traps. They struck where we were undermanned and least expecting it. Most di
scomfited of all was Verity, for to him had fallen the task of defending the kingdom once Chivalry had abdicated. I heard it muttered in the taverns that since he had lost his elder brother’s good counsel, all had gone sour. No one spoke against Verity yet; but it was unsettling that no one spoke out strongly for him either.

  Boyishly, I viewed the raids as a thing impersonal to me. Certainly they were bad things, and I felt sorry in a vague way for those villagers whose homes were torched or plundered. But secure at Buckkeep, I had very little feeling for the constant fear and vigilance that other seaports endured, or for the agonies of villagers who rebuilt each year, only to see their efforts torched the next. I was not to keep my ignorant innocence long.

  I went down to Burrich for my “lesson” one morning, though I spent as much time doctoring animals and teaching young colts and fillies as I did in being taught. I had very much taken over Cob’s place in the stables, while he had gone on to being Regal’s groom and dog man. But that day, to my surprise, Burrich took me upstairs to his room and sat me down at his table. I dreaded spending a tedious morning repairing tack.

  “I’m going to teach you manners today,” Burrich announced suddenly. There was doubt in his voice, as if he were skeptical of my ability to learn such.

  “With horses?” I asked incredulously.

  “No. You’ve those already. With people. At table, and afterward, when folk sit and talk with one another. Those sorts of manners. ”

  “Why?”

  Burrich frowned. “Because for reasons I don’t understand, you’re to accompany Verity when he goes to Neatbay to see Duke Kelvar of Rippon. Lord Kelvar has not been cooperating with Lord Shemshy in manning the coastal towers. Shemshy accuses him of leaving towers completely without watches, so that the Outislanders are able to sail past and even anchor outside of Watch Island, and from there raid Shemshy’s villages in Shoaks Duchy. Prince Verity is going to consult with Kelvar about these allegations. ”