Royal Assassin (UK) Page 33

  I could not res­ist the tempta­tion to feign sleep. She sat be­side me and the bed gave sweetly with her warm weight. She leaned over me and as I lay per­fectly mo­tion­less she set her soft mouth upon mine. I reached out and drew her to me, mar­vel­ling. Yes­ter­day, I had been a man sel­dom touched: the clap of a friend on my shoulder, or the cas­ual jost­ling of a crowd, or, too of­ten lately, hands seek­ing to throttle me. That had been the ex­tent of my per­sonal con­tact. Then, last night, and now this. She fin­ished the kiss and then lay be­side me, gently ar­ran­ging her­self against me. I took a deep breath of her scent and kept still, sa­vour­ing the places where her body touched mine and made warmth. The sen­sa­tion was like a soap bubble float­ing on the wind; I feared even to breathe lest it van­ish.

  Nice, agreed Nighteyes. Not so much alone­ness here. More like pack.

  I stiffened and pulled slightly away from Molly.

  ‘New­boy? What’s wrong?’

  Mine. This is mine, and not a thing to share with you. Do you un­der­stand?

  Selfish. This is not a thing like meat, made more or less by shar­ing.

  ‘Just a mo­ment, Molly. I’ve cramped a muscle.’

  Which one? Smirk­ing.

  No, it is not like meat. Meat I would al­ways share with you, and shel­ter, and al­ways I will come to fight be­side you if you need me. Al­ways I will let you join me in the hunt, and al­ways I will help you hunt. But this, with my … fe­male. This I must have to my­self. Alone.

  Nighteyes snorted, scratched at a flea. You are al­ways mark­ing off lines that do not ex­ist. The meat, the hunt, the de­fend­ing of ter­rit­ory and fe­males … these are all pack. When she bears cubs, shall I not hunt to feed them? Shall I not de­fend them?

  Nighteyes … I can­not ex­plain this to you just now. I should have spoken with you earlier. For now, will you with­draw? I prom­ise we shall dis­cuss it. Later.

  I waited. Noth­ing. No sense of him at all. One down, one to go.

  ‘New­boy? Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine. I just … need a mo­ment.’ I think it was the hard­est thing I have ever done. Molly was be­side me, sud­denly hes­it­ant, on the point of pulling away from me. I had to con­cen­trate on find­ing my bound­ar­ies, on pla­cing my mind in the middle of my­self and set­ting lim­its to my thoughts. I took the breaths and let them out evenly. Ad­just­ing har­ness. That was what it al­ways re­minded me of, and the im­age I al­ways used. Not loose enough to slip, not tight enough to bind. Con­fin­ing my­self to my own body, lest I startle Ver­ity awake.

  ‘I heard the ru­mours,’ Molly began, then stopped. ‘I’m sorry. I should not have come. I thought per­haps you might need … but maybe what you need is to be alone.’

  ‘No, Molly, please, Molly, come back, come back,’ and I flung my­self across the bed after her and man­aged to catch the hem of her skirt as she stood.

  She turned back to me, still full of un­cer­tainty.

  ‘You are al­ways ex­actly what I need. Al­ways.’

  A smile ghos­ted across her lips and she sat on the edge of the bed. ‘You seemed so dis­tant.’

  ‘I was. Some­times I just need to clear my mind.’ I stopped, un­cer­tain of what else I could say without ly­ing to her. I was de­term­ined to do that no longer. I reached and took her hand into mine.

  ‘Oh,’ she said after a mo­ment. There was an awk­ward little pause as I offered no fur­ther ex­plan­a­tion. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked care­fully after a few more mo­ments had slipped by.

  ‘I’m fine. I didn’t get in to see the King today. I tried, but he wasn’t feel­ing well, and …’

  ‘Your face is bruised. And scratched. There were ru­mours …’

  I took a si­lent breath. ‘Ru­mours?’ Ver­ity had en­joined the men to si­lence. Burrich wouldn’t have spoken, nor Blade. Per­haps none of them had spoken to any­one who hadn’t been there. But men will al­ways dis­cuss what they have wit­nessed to­gether, and it wouldn’t take much for any­one to over­hear them.

  ‘Don’t play cat and mouse with me. If you don’t want to tell me, then say so.’

  ‘The King-in-Wait­ing asked us not to speak of it. That isn’t the same as not want­ing to tell you about it.’

  Molly con­sidered a mo­ment. ‘I sup­pose not. And I shouldn’t listen to gos­sip, I know. But the ru­mours were so strange … and they brought bod­ies back to the keep, for burn­ing. And there was a strange wo­man, weep­ing and weep­ing in the kit­chen today. She said that Forged ones had stolen and killed her child. And someone said you had fought them to try and get the baby back, and an­other said, no, that you’d come upon them just as a bear at­tacked them. Or some­thing. Someone said you had killed them all, and then someone who had helped burn the bod­ies said that at least two of them had been mauled by an an­imal of some kind.’ She fell si­lent and looked at me. She res­ted on her side, bare inches away from me, her eyes look­ing dir­ectly into mine. I didn’t want to think about any of it. I didn’t want to lie to her, nor even to tell her the truth. I couldn’t tell any­one the com­plete truth. So I just looked into her eyes and wished that things were sim­pler for us.

  ‘FitzChiv­alry?’

  I would never get used to hear­ing that name from her. I sighed. ‘The King asked us not to speak of it. But … yes, a child was killed by Forged ones. And I was there, too late. It was the ugli­est, sad­dest thing I have ever wit­nessed.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry. It’s just so hard, not know­ing.’

  ‘I know.’ I reached out to touch her hair. She leaned her head against my hand. ‘I told you once that I had dreamed of you, at Silt­bay. I jour­neyed from the Moun­tain King­dom, all the way back to Buck­keep, not know­ing if you had sur­vived. Some­times I thought the burn­ing house had fallen on the cel­lar; at other times, I thought the wo­man with the sword had fin­ished you …’

  Molly looked at me lev­elly. ‘When the house fell, a great wind of sparks and smoke whooshed to­wards us. It blinded her, but my back was to it. I … I killed her with the axe.’ She sud­denly star­ted to tremble. ‘I told no one of it. No one. How did you know?’

  ‘I dreamed it.’ I pulled gently at her hand and she came down on the bed be­side me. I put my arms around her, and felt her trem­bling still. ‘I have true dreams, some­times. Not of­ten,’ I told her quietly.

  She drew back a little from me. Her eyes searched my face. ‘You would not lie to me about this, New­boy?’

  The ques­tion hurt, but I de­served it. ‘No. This is not a lie. I prom­ise you that. And I prom­ise that I shall never lie …’

  Her fin­gers stopped my lips. ‘I hope to spend the rest of my life with you. Make me no prom­ises that you can­not keep for the rest of your days.’ Her other hand went to the la­cing of my shirt. It was my turn to tremble.

  I kissed her fin­gers. And then her mouth. At some time, Molly got up and latched and barred my door. I re­mem­ber send­ing up a fer­vent prayer that this would not be the night that Chade fi­nally re­turned from his jour­ney­ing. It was not. In­stead I jour­neyed afar that night, into a place that was be­com­ing ever more fa­mil­iar, but none the less won­drous to me.

  She left me in the deep of the night, shak­ing me awake to in­sist that I latch and bar the door after her. I wanted to dress and walk her back to her room, but she re­fused me in­dig­nantly, say­ing she was per­fectly cap­able of go­ing up some stairs, and that the less we were seen to­gether, the bet­ter. Re­luct­antly I con­ceded her lo­gic. The sleep I fell into then was deeper than any the va­lerian had in­duced.

  I awoke to thun­der and shout­ing. I found my­self on my feet, dazed and con­fused. After a mo­ment, the thun­der turned to pound­ing on my door, and the shout­ing was Burrich’s re­pe­ti­tion of my name. ‘A mo­ment!’ I man­aged to call back. I ached every­where. I dragged on some clothes and staggered to the door
. It took a long time for my fin­gers to man­age the catch. ‘What’s wrong?’ I de­man­ded.

  Burrich just stared at me. He was washed and dressed, hair and beard combed, and car­ry­ing two axes.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Ver­ity’s tower room. Hurry up, we’re already late. But wash first. What is that scent?’

  ‘Per­fumed candles,’ I ex­tem­por­ized. ‘They’re sup­posed to bring rest­ful dreams.’

  Burrich snorted. ‘That’s not the kind of dreams that scent would bring me. It’s full of musk, boy. Your whole room reeks of it. Meet me up in the tower.’

  And he was gone, strid­ing pur­pose­fully down the hall. I went back into my room, grog­gily real­iz­ing that this was his idea of early morn­ing. I washed my­self thor­oughly with cold wa­ter, not en­joy­ing it, but lack­ing the time to warm any. I dug about for fresh clothes and was drag­ging them on when the pound­ing at my door began again. ‘I’m nearly there,’ I called out. The pound­ing went on. That meant Burrich was angry. Well, so was I. Surely he could un­der­stand how badly I ached this morn­ing. I jerked the door open to con­front him and the Fool slipped in as smoothly as a waft of smoke. He wore a new mot­ley of black and white. The sleeves of his shirt were all em­broidered with black vines crawl­ing up his arms like ivy. Above the black col­lar, his face was as pale as a winter moon. Win­ter­fest, I thought dully. To­night was the first night of Win­ter­fest. The winter had already been as long as any five oth­ers I had known. But to­night we would be­gin to mark the mid-point of it.

  ‘What do you want?’ I de­man­ded, in no mood for his sil­li­ness.

  He took a deep ap­pre­ci­at­ive sniff. ‘Some of what you had would be lovely,’ he sug­ges­ted, and then danced back grace­fully at the look on my face. I was in­stantly angry. He leaped lightly to the centre of my tousled bed, then to the other side, put­ting it between us. I lunged across it after him. ‘But not from you,’ he ex­claimed coquet­tishly and fluttered his hands at me in girl­ish re­buke be­fore re­treat­ing again.

  ‘I’ve no time for you,’ I told him dis­gustedly. ‘Ver­ity’s ex­pect­ing me and I can­not keep him wait­ing.’ I rolled off the bed and stood to ad­just my cloth­ing. ‘Out of my room.’

  ‘Ah, such a tone. Time was when the Fitz could handle a jest bet­ter than this.’ He pi­rou­et­ted in the middle of my room, then stopped ab­ruptly. ‘Are you truly angry with me?’ he de­man­ded straight­for­wardly.

  I gaped to hear him speak so bluntly. I con­sidered the ques­tion. ‘I was,’ I said guardedly, won­der­ing if he were de­lib­er­ately draw­ing me out. ‘You made a fool of me that day, with that song, be­fore all those people.’

  He shook his head. ‘Don’t take titles to your­self. Only I am the Fool. And the Fool is al­ways only what I am. Es­pe­cially that day, with that song, be­fore all those people.’

  ‘You made me doubt our friend­ship,’ I said bluntly.

  ‘Ah, good. For doubt not that oth­ers must al­ways doubt our friend­ship if we are to re­main doughty friends.’

  ‘I see. Then it was your end to sow ru­mours of strife between us. I un­der­stand, then. But I still must go.’

  ‘Farewell, then. Have fun play­ing at axes with Burrich. Try not to be dumb-struck with all he teaches you today.’ He put two logs onto my fail­ing fire, and made a great show of set­tling him­self be­fore it.

  ‘Fool,’ I began un­com­fort­ably. ‘You are my friend, I know. But I like not to leave you here, in my room, while I am gone.’

  ‘I like it not when oth­ers enter my room when I am not there,’ he poin­ted out archly.

  I flushed miser­ably. ‘That was long ago. And I apo­lo­gized for my curi­os­ity. I as­sure you, I have never done it again.’

  ‘Nor shall I, after this. And when you come back, I shall apo­lo­gize to you. Shall that do?’

  I was go­ing to be late. Burrich was not go­ing to be amused. No help for it. I sat down on the edge of the rumpled bed. Molly and I had lain here. Sud­denly, it was a per­sonal area. I tried to be cas­ual as I tugged the quilts up over the feather­beds. ‘Why do you want to stay in my room? Are you in danger?’

  ‘I live in danger, Fitzy-fitz. As do you. We are all in danger. I should like to stay here for part of the day, and try to find a way out of that danger. Or at least a way to lessen it.’ He shrugged sig­ni­fic­antly to­ward the scat­ter of scrolls.

  ‘Ver­ity en­trus­ted those to me,’ I said un­eas­ily.

  ‘Ob­vi­ously be­cause he feels you are a man whose judge­ment he trusts. So, per­haps you shall judge it safe to en­trust them to me?’

  It is one thing to trust a friend with one’s own pos­ses­sions. It is an­other to al­low him those an­other has put in your safe­keep­ing. I found I had no doubt of my own trust of the Fool. But. ‘Per­haps it would be wiser to ask Ver­ity first,’ I offered.

  ‘The less con­nec­tion between Ver­ity and me, the bet­ter it is for both of us.’ The Fool spoke flatly.

  ‘You do not care for Ver­ity?’ I was startled.

  ‘I am the King’s Fool. He is the King-in-Wait­ing. Let him wait. When he is king, I shall be his. If he does not get us all killed be­fore then.’

  ‘I will hear noth­ing spoken against Prince Ver­ity,’ I told him softly.

  ‘No? Then you must walk about with your ears closely stoppered these days.’

  I walked to the door, set my hand to the latch. ‘We must leave now, Fool. I am already late.’ I kept my voice steady. His sneer at Ver­ity had cut me as deeply as if aimed at me.

  ‘Do not be the Fool, Fitz. That is my role. Think. A man can serve only one mas­ter. No mat­ter what your lips may say, Ver­ity is your king. I fault you not for that. Do you fault me that Shrewd is mine?’

  ‘I do not fault you. Nor do I make mock of him be­fore you.’

  ‘Nor do you come to visit him, no mat­ter how many times I have urged it.’

  ‘I was at his door just yes­ter­day. I was turned away. They said he was not well.’

  ‘And if that were to hap­pen at Ver­ity’s door, would you take it so meekly?’

  That made me stop and think. ‘No. I don’t sup­pose I would.’

  ‘Why do you give him up so eas­ily?’ The Fool spoke softly, like a man grieved. ‘Why does not Ver­ity be­stir him­self for his father, in­stead of lur­ing away Shrewd’s men to his side?’

  ‘I have not been lured away. Rather Shrewd has not seen fit to see me. As for Ver­ity, well, I can­not speak for him. But all know it is Regal that Shrewd fa­vours of his sons.’

  ‘Do all know that? Then do all know as well where Regal’s heart is truly set?’

  ‘Some do,’ I said briefly. This was dan­ger­ous talk.

  ‘Re­flect on this. Both of us serve the king we love best. Yet there is an­other that we love least. I do not think we have a con­flict of loy­alty, Fitz, while we are united in who we love least. Come. Con­fess to me that you have scarce had time to set your eyes upon the scrolls, and I shall re­mind you that the time you have not had has fled us all too swiftly. This is not a task that can wait upon your con­veni­ence.’

  I teetered on the de­cision. The Fool came sud­denly closer. His eyes were al­ways hard to meet and harder to read. But the set of his mouth showed me his des­per­a­tion. ‘I will trade with you. I of­fer you a bar­gain you will find nowhere else. A secret I hold, prom­ised to you, after you have let me search the scrolls for a secret which may not even be there.’

  ‘What secret?’ I asked re­luct­antly.

  ‘My secret.’ He turned aside from me and stared at the wall. ‘The mys­tery of the Fool. Whence comes he and why?’ He cast me a side­long glance and said no more.

  The curi­os­ity of a dozen years leaped in me. ‘Freely given?’ I asked.

  ‘No. Offered as a bar­gain, as I said.’

  I con­sidered. Then, ‘I’ll see you later. Latch the door wh
en you leave.’ And I slipped out.

  There were serving-folk mov­ing about in the cor­ridors. I was griev­ously late. I forced my­self into a creak­ing trot, and then to a run. I did not slow for the stairs to Ver­ity’s tower, but rushed up their full length, knocked once and then entered.

  Burrich turned to me, greet­ing me with a frown. The spartan fur­nish­ings of the room had already been pushed to one wall, save for Ver­ity’s win­dow chair. Ver­ity was already en­sconced in it. He turned his head to me more slowly, with eyes still full of dis­tance. There was a drugged look to his eyes and mouth, a lax­ness pain­ful to see when one knew what it meant. The Skill hun­ger gnawed at him. I feared that what he wished to teach me would only feed it and in­crease it. Yet how could either of us say no? I had learned some­thing yes­ter­day. It had not been a pleas­ant les­son, but once learned it could not be un­done. I knew now that I would do whatever I must to drive the Red Ships from my shore. I was not the king, I would never be the king. But the folk of the Six Duch­ies were mine, just as they were Chade’s. I un­der­stood now why Ver­ity spent him­self so reck­lessly.

  ‘I beg par­don that I am late. I was de­tained. But I am ready to be­gin now.’

  ‘How do you feel?’ The ques­tion came from Burrich, asked with genu­ine curi­os­ity. I turned to find him re­gard­ing me as sternly as be­fore, but also with some puz­zle­ment.

  ‘Stiff, sir. A bit. The run up the stairs warmed me up some. Sore, from yes­ter­day. But oth­er­wise I am all right.’

  A bit of amuse­ment quirked at his face. ‘No tremors, FitzChiv­alry? No dark­en­ing at the edge of your vis­ion, no dizzy spells?’

  I paused to think for a mo­ment. ‘No.’

  ‘Be damned.’ Burrich gave a snort of amuse­ment. ‘Evid­ently the cure has been to beat it out of you. I’ll re­mem­ber that the next time you need a healer.’

  Over the next hour, he seemed in­tent on ap­ply­ing his new the­ory of heal­ing. The heads of the axes were blunt ones, and he had bundled them both in rags for this first les­son, but that did not pre­vent bruises. To be hon­est, most of them I earned with my own clum­si­ness. Burrich was not try­ing to land any blows that day, but only to teach me to use the whole weapon, not just the head of it. To keep Ver­ity with me was ef­fort­less, for he re­mained in the same room with us. He was si­lent within me that day, of­fer­ing no coun­sels or ob­ser­va­tions or warn­ings, but merely rid­ing with my eyes. Burrich told me that the axe was not a soph­ist­ic­ated weapon, but was a very sat­is­fact­ory one if used cor­rectly. At the end of the ses­sion, he poin­ted out to me that he had been gentle with me, in con­sid­er­a­tion of the wounds I already bore. Ver­ity dis­missed us, and we both went down the stairs rather more slowly than I had come up.