Assassin's Quest (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  Even after his coron­a­tion, Regal re­mained jeal­ous of his title. He sent mes­sen­gers far and wide, seek­ing word of where Queen Kettricken and the un­born heir might be. His sus­pi­cions that she might have sought shel­ter with her father, King Eyod of the Moun­tain King­dom, led him to de­mand her re­turn of him. When Eyod replied that the where­abouts of the Queen of the Six Duch­ies was no con­cern for the Moun­tain folk, Regal an­grily severed ties with the Moun­tain King­dom, cut­ting off trade and at­tempt­ing to block even com­mon trav­el­lers from cross­ing the bound­ar­ies. At the same time, ru­mours that al­most cer­tainly began at Regal’s be­hest began to cir­cu­late that the child Kettricken car­ried was not of Ver­ity’s get­ting and hence had no le­git­im­ate claim to the Six Duch­ies throne.

  It was a bit­ter time for the small folk of Buck. Aban­doned by their king and de­fen­ded only by a small force of poorly-pro­vi­sioned sol­diers, the com­mon folk were left rud­der­less on a stormy sea. What the Raid­ers did not steal or des­troy, Lord Bright’s men seized for taxes. The roads be­came plagued with rob­bers, for when an hon­est man can­not make a liv­ing, folk will do what they must. Small crofters gave up any hope of mak­ing a liv­ing and fled the coast, to be­come beg­gars, thieves and whores in the in­land cit­ies. Trade died, for ships sent out sel­dom came back at all.

  Chade and I sat on the bench in front of the hut and talked. We did not speak of portent­ous things, nor the sig­ni­fic­ant events of the past. We did not dis­cuss my re­turn from the grave or the cur­rent polit­ical situ­ation. In­stead, he spoke of our small shared things as if I had been gone on a long jour­ney. Slink the weasel was get­ting old; the past winter had stiffened him, and even the com­ing of spring had not en­livened him. Chade feared he would not last an­other year. Chade had fi­nally man­aged to dry pen­nant plant leaves without them mil­dew­ing, but had found the dried herb to have little po­tency. We both missed Cook Sara’s pastries. Chade asked if there was any­thing from my room that I wanted. Regal had had it searched, and had left it in dis­ar­ray, but he did not think much had been taken, nor would be missed if I chose to have it now. I asked him if he re­called the tapestry of King Wis­dom treat­ing with the Eld­er­lings. He replied that he did, but that it was far too bulky for him to drag up here. I gave him such a stricken look that he im­me­di­ately re­len­ted and said he sup­posed he could find a way.

  I grinned. ‘It was a joke, Chade. That thing has never done any­thing save give me night­mares when I was small. No. There’s noth­ing in my room that’s im­port­ant to me now.’

  Chade looked at me, al­most sadly. ‘You leave be­hind a life, with what, the clothes on your back and an ear­ring? And you say there’s noth­ing there you’d wish brought to you. Does that not strike you as strange?’

  I sat think­ing for a mo­ment. The sword Ver­ity had given me. The sil­ver ring King Eyod had given me, that had been Rurisk’s. A pin from Lady Grace. Pa­tience’s sea-pipes had been in my room – I hoped she had got them back. My paints and pa­pers. A little box I had carved to hold my pois­ons. Between Molly and me there had never been any tokens. She would never al­low me to give her any gifts, and I had never thought to steal a rib­bon from her hair. If I had …

  ‘No. A clean break is best, per­haps. Though you’ve for­got­ten one item.’ I turned the col­lar of my rough shirt to show him the tiny ruby nestled in sil­ver. ‘The stick­pin Shrewd gave me, to mark me as his. I still have that.’ Pa­tience had used it to se­cure the grave­cloth that had wrapped me. I set aside that thought.

  ‘I’m still sur­prised that Regal’s guard didn’t rob your body. I sup­pose the Wit has such an evil repu­ta­tion they feared you dead as well as alive.’

  I reached to fin­ger the bridge of my nose where it had been broken. ‘They did not seem to fear me much at all, that I could tell.’

  Chade smiled crookedly at me. ‘The nose both­ers you, does it? I think it gives your face more char­ac­ter.’

  I squin­ted at him in the sun­light. ‘Really?’

  ‘No. But it’s the po­lite thing to say. It’s not so bad, really. It al­most looks as if someone tried to set it.’

  I shuddered at the jagged tip of a memory. ‘I don’t want to think about it,’ I told him hon­es­tly.

  Pain for me clouded his face sud­denly. I looked away from it, un­able to bear his pity. The re­col­lec­tions of the beat­ings I had en­dured were more bear­able if I could pre­tend that no one else had known of them. I felt shamed at what Regal had done to me. I leaned my head back against the sun-soaked wood of the cabin wall and took a long breath. ‘So. What is hap­pen­ing down there where people are still alive?’

  Chade cleared his throat, ac­cept­ing the change in topic. ‘Well. How much do you know?’

  ‘Not much. That Kettricken and the Fool got away. That Pa­tience may have heard Kettricken got safely to the Moun­tains. That Regal is angry with King Eyod of the Moun­tains and has cut his trade routes. That Ver­ity is still alive, but no one has heard from him.’

  ‘Whoa! Whoa!’ Chade sat up very straight. ‘The ru­mour about Kettricken … you re­mem­ber that from the night Burrich and I dis­cussed it.’

  I looked aside from him. ‘In the way that you might re­mem­ber a dream you once had. In un­der­wa­ter col­ours, and the events out of or­der. Only that I heard you say some­thing about it.’

  ‘And that about Ver­ity?’ The sud­den ten­sion in him put a chill of dread down my spine.

  ‘He Skilled to me that night,’ I said quietly. ‘I told you then that he was alive.’

  ‘DAMN!’ Chade leaped to his feet and hopped about in rage. It was a per­form­ance I had never wit­nessed be­fore and I stared at him, caught between amazement and fear. ‘Burrich and I gave your words no cre­dence! Oh, we were pleased to hear you ut­ter them, and when you ran off, he said, “Let the boy go, that’s as much as he can do to­night, he re­mem­bers his prince”. That’s all we thought it was. Damn and damn!’ He hal­ted sud­denly and poin­ted a fin­ger at me. ‘Re­port. Tell me everything.’

  I fumbled after what I re­called. It was as dif­fi­cult to sort it out as if I had seen it through the wolf’s eyes. ‘He was cold. But alive. Either tired or hurt. Slowed, some­how. He was try­ing to get through and I was push­ing him away so he kept sug­gest­ing I drink. To get my walls down, I sup­pose …’

  ‘Where was he?’

  ‘I don’t know. Snow. A forest.’ I groped after ghostly memor­ies. ‘I don’t think he knew where he was.’

  Chade’s green eyes bored into me. ‘Can you reach him at all, feel him at all? Can you tell me he still lives?’

  I shook my head. My heart was start­ing to pound in my chest.

  ‘Can you Skill to him now?’

  I shook my head. Ten­sion tightened my belly.

  Chade’s frus­tra­tion grew with every shake of my head. ‘Damn it, Fitz, you must!’

  ‘I don’t want to!’ I cried out sud­denly. I was on my feet.

  Run away! Run away fast!

  I did. It was sud­denly that simple. I fled Chade and the hut as if all the dev­ils of the Outis­lander hell-is­lands were after me. Chade called after me but I re­fused to hear his words. I ran, and as soon as I was in the shel­ter of the trees, Nighteyes was be­side me.

  Not that way, Heart of the Pack is that way, he warned me. So we bolted up­hill, away from the creek, up to a big tangle of brambles that over­hung a bank where Nighteyes sheltered on stormy nights. What was it? What was the danger? Nighteyes de­man­ded.

  He wanted me to go back, I ad­mit­ted after a time. I tried to frame it in a way that Nighteyes would un­der­stand. He wanted me to … be not a wolf any more.

  A sud­den chill went up my back. In ex­plain­ing to Nighteyes, I had brought my­self face to face with the truth. The choice was simple. Be a wolf, with no past, no fu­ture, only today. Or a man, twis­ted by h
is past, whose heart pumped fear with his blood. I could walk on two legs, and know shame and cower­ing as a way of life. Or run on four, and for­get un­til even Molly was just a pleas­ant scent I re­called. I sat still be­neath the brambles, my hand rest­ing lightly on Nighteyes’ back, my eyes star­ing into a place only I could see. Slowly the light changed and even­ing deepened to dusk. My de­cision grew as slowly and in­ev­it­ably as the creep­ing dark. My heart cried out against it, but the al­tern­at­ives were un­bear­able. I steeled my will to it.

  It was dark when I went back. I crept home with my tail between my legs. It was strange to come back to the cabin as a wolf again, to smell the rising wood smoke as a man’s thing, and to blink at the fire’s glow through the shut­ters. Re­luct­antly I peeled my mind free of Nighteyes’.

  Would you not rather hunt with me?

  I would much rather hunt with you. But I can­not this night.

  Why?

  I shook my head. The edge of de­cision was so thin and new, I dared not test it by speak­ing. I stopped at the edge of the woods to brush the leaves and dirt from my clothes and to smooth back my hair and retie it in a tail. I hoped my face was not dirty. I squared my shoulders and forced my­self to walk back to the cabin, to open the door and enter and look at them. I felt hor­ribly vul­ner­able. They’d been shar­ing in­form­a­tion about me. Between the two of them they knew al­most all of my secrets. My tattered dig­nity now dangled in shreds. How could I stand be­fore them and ex­pect to be treated as a man? Yet I could not fault them for it. They had been try­ing to save me. From my­self, it was true, but save me all the same. Not their fault that what they had saved was scarcely worth hav­ing.

  They were at table when I entered. If I had run off like this a few weeks ago, Burrich would have leapt up, to shake me and cuff me when I re­turned. I knew we were past that sort of thing now but the memory gave me a war­i­ness I could not com­pletely dis­guise. How­ever, his face showed only re­lief, while Chade looked at me with shame and con­cern.

  ‘I did not mean to press you that hard,’ he said earn­es­tly, be­fore I could speak.

  ‘You didn’t,’ I said quietly. ‘You but put your fin­ger on the spot where I had been press­ing my­self the most. Some­times a man doesn’t know how badly he’s hurt un­til someone else probes the wound.’

  I drew up my chair. After weeks of simple food to see cheese and honey and eld­er­berry wine all set out on the table at once was al­most shock­ing. There was a loaf of bread as well to sup­ple­ment the trout Burrich had caught. For a time we just ate, without talk other than table re­quests. It seemed to ease the strange­ness. But the mo­ment the meal was fin­ished and cleared away, the ten­sion came back.

  ‘I un­der­stand your ques­tion now,’ Burrich said ab­ruptly. Chade and I both looked at him in sur­prise. ‘A few days ago, when you asked what we would do next. Un­der­stand that I had given Ver­ity up as lost. Kettricken car­ried his heir, but she was safe now in the Moun­tains. There was no more I could do for her. If I in­ter­vened in any way, I might be­tray her to oth­ers. Best to let her stay hid­den, safe with her father’s people. By the time her child came to an age to reach for his throne … well, if I was not in my grave by then, I sup­posed I would do what I could. For now, I saw my ser­vice to my king as a thing of the past. So when you asked me I saw only the need to take care of ourselves.’

  ‘And now?’ I asked quietly.

  ‘If Ver­ity lives still, then a pre­tender has claimed his throne. I am sworn to come to my king’s aid. As is Chade. As are you.’ They were both look­ing at me very hard.

  Run away again.

  I can’t.

  Burrich flinched as if I had poked him with a pin. I wondered, if I moved for the door, would he fling him­self upon me to stop me? But he did not speak or move, just waited.

  ‘Not I. That Fitz died,’ I said bluntly.

  Burrich looked as if I had struck him. But Chade asked quietly, ‘Then why does he still wear King Shrewd’s pin?’

  I reached up and drew it out of my col­lar. Here, I had in­ten­ded to say, here, you take it and all that goes with it. I’m done with it. I haven’t the spine for it. In­stead I sat and looked at it.

  ‘Eld­er­berry wine?’ Chade offered, but not to me.

  ‘It’s cool to­night. I’ll make tea,’ Burrich countered.

  Chade nod­ded. Still I sat, hold­ing the red-and-sil­ver pin in my hand. I re­membered my king’s hands as he’d pushed the pin through the folds of a boy’s shirt. ‘There,’ he had said. ‘Now you are mine.’ But he was dead now. Did that free me from my prom­ise? And the last thing he had said to me? ‘What have I made of you?’ I pushed that ques­tion aside once more. More im­port­ant, what was I now? Was I now what Regal had made of me? Or could I es­cape that?

  ‘Regal told me,’ I said con­sid­er­ingly, ‘that I had but to scratch my­self to find Name­less the dog-boy.’ I looked up and forced my­self to meet Burrich’s eyes. ‘It might be nice to be him.’

  ‘Would it?’ Burrich asked. ‘There was a time when you did not think so. Who are you, Fitz, if you are not the King’s Man? What are you? Where would you go?’

  Where would I go, were I free? To Molly, cried my heart. I shook my head, thrust­ing aside the idea be­fore it could sear me. No. Even be­fore I had lost my life, I had lost her. I con­sidered my empty, bit­ter free­dom. There was only one place I could go, really. I set my will, looked up, and met Burrich’s eyes with a firm gaze. ‘I’m go­ing away. Any­where. To the Chalced States, to Bing­town. I’m good with an­im­als, I’m a de­cent scribe, too. I could make a liv­ing.’

  ‘No doubt of it. But a liv­ing is not a life,’ Burrich poin­ted out.

  ‘Well, what is?’ I de­man­ded, sud­denly and truly angry. Why did they have to make this so hard? Words and thoughts sud­denly gouted from me like poison from a fes­ter­ing wound. ‘You’d have me de­vote my­self to my king and sac­ri­fice all else to it, as you did. Give up the wo­man I love to fol­low a king like a dog at his heels, as you did. And when that king aban­doned you? You swal­lowed it, you raised his bas­tard for him. Then they took it all away from you, stable, horses, dogs, men to com­mand. They left you noth­ing, not even a roof over your head, those kings you were sworn to. So what did you do? With noth­ing else left to you, you hung onto me, dragged the Bas­tard out of a coffin and forced him back to life. A life I hate, a life I don’t want!’ I glared at him ac­cus­ingly.

  He stared at me, bereft of words. I wanted to stop, but some­thing drove me on. The an­ger felt good, like a cleans­ing fire. I clenched my hands into fists as I de­man­ded, ‘Why are you al­ways there? Why do you al­ways stand me up again, for them to knock down? For what? To make me owe you some­thing? To give you a claim on my life be­cause you don’t have the spine to have a life of your own? All you want to do is make me just like you, a man with no life of my own, a man who gives it all up for my king. Can’t you see there’s more to be­ing alive than giv­ing it all up for someone else?’

  I met his eyes and then looked away from the pained as­ton­ish­ment I saw there. ‘No,’ I said dully after a breath. ‘You don’t see, you can’t know. You can’t even ima­gine what you’ve taken away from me. I should be dead, but you wouldn’t let me die. All with the best of in­ten­tions, al­ways be­liev­ing you were do­ing what was right, no mat­ter how it hurt me. But who gave you that right over me? Who de­creed you could do this to me?’

  There was no sound but my own voice in the room. Chade was frozen, and the look on Burrich’s face only made me an­grier. I saw him gather him­self up. He reached for his pride and dig­nity as he said quietly, ‘Your father gave me that task, Fitz. I did my best by you, boy. The last thing my prince told me. Chiv­alry said to me, “Raise him well.” And I …’

  ‘Gave up the next dec­ade of your life to rais­ing someone else’s bas­tard,’ I cut in with sav­age sar­casm. ‘Took care of
me, be­cause it was the only thing you really knew how to do. All your life, Burrich, you’ve been look­ing after someone else, put­ting someone else first, sac­ri­fi­cing any kind of a nor­mal life for someone else’s be­ne­fit. Loyal as a hound. Is that a life? Haven’t you ever thought of be­ing your own man, and mak­ing your own de­cisions? Or is a fear of that what pushes you down the neck of a bottle?’ My voice had risen to a shout. When I ran out of words, I stared at him, my chest rising and fall­ing as I panted out my fury.

  As an angry boy, I’d of­ten prom­ised my­self that someday he would pay for every cuff he had given me, for every stall I’d had to muck out when I thought I was too tired to stand. With those words, I kept that sulky little prom­ise ten­fold. His eyes were wide and he was speech­less with pain. I saw his chest heave once, as if to catch a breath knocked out of him. The shock in his eyes was the same as if I had sud­denly plunged a knife into him.

  I stared at him. I wasn’t sure where those words had come from, but it was too late to call them back. Say­ing ‘I’m sorry’ would not un-ut­ter them, would not change them in the least. I sud­denly hoped he would hit me, that he would give both of us at least that much.

  He stood un­evenly, the chair legs scrap­ing back on the wooden floor. The chair it­self teetered over and fell with a crash as he walked away from it. Burrich, who walked so stead­ily when full of brandy, wove like a drunk as he made it to the door and went out into the night. I just sat, feel­ing some­thing in­side me go very still. I hoped it was my heart.

  For a mo­ment all was si­lence. A long mo­ment. Then Chade sighed. ‘Why?’ he asked quietly after a time.

  ‘I don’t know.’ I lied so well. Chade him­self had taught me. I looked into the fire. For a mo­ment, I al­most tried to ex­plain it to him. I de­cided I could not. I found my­self talk­ing all around it. ‘Maybe I needed to get free of him. Of all he’d done for me, even when I didn’t want him to do it. He has to stop do­ing things I can never pay him back for. Things no man should do for an­other, sac­ri­fices no man should make for an­other man. I don’t want to owe him any more. I don’t want to owe any­one any­thing.’