Assassin's Quest (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  Around me, when I ques­ted out softly, were only the muzzy dreams of the sleep­ing an­im­als. All were at peace save me. Thoughts of Chade came to niggle and worry at me. He was an old man in many ways. When King Shrewd had lived, he had seen to all Chade’s needs, so that his as­sas­sin might live in se­cur­ity. Chade had sel­dom ven­tured forth from his con­cealed room, save to do his ‘quiet work’. Now he was out on his own, do­ing El knew what, and with Regal’s troops in pur­suit of him. I rubbed vainly at my aching fore­head. Wor­ry­ing was use­less, but I could not seem to stop.

  I heard four light foot scuffs, fol­lowed by a thud, as someone climbed down from the loft and skipped the last step on the lad­der. Prob­ably one of the wo­men headed for the back­house. But a mo­ment later I heard Honey’s voice whis­per, ‘Cob?’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked un­will­ingly.

  She turned to­ward my voice, and I heard her ap­proach in the dark­ness. My time with the wolf had sharpened my senses. Some little moon­light leaked in at a badly-shuttered win­dow. I picked out her shape in the dark­ness. ‘Over here,’ I told her when she hes­it­ated, and saw her startle at how close my voice was. She groped her way to my corner, and then hes­it­antly sat down in the straw be­side me.

  ‘I daren’t go back to sleep,’ she ex­plained. ‘Night­mares.’

  ‘I know how that is,’ I told her, sur­prised at how much sym­pathy I felt. ‘When, if you close your eyes, you tumble right back into them.’

  ‘Ex­actly,’ she said, and fell si­lent, wait­ing.

  But I had noth­ing more to say, and so sat si­lent in the dark­ness.

  ‘What kind of night­mares do you have?’ she asked me quietly.

  ‘Bad ones,’ I said drily. I had no wish to sum­mon them by speak­ing of them.

  ‘I dream Forged ones are chas­ing me, but my legs have turned to wa­ter and I can­not run. But I keep try­ing and try­ing as they come closer and closer.’

  ‘Uhm.’ I agreed. Bet­ter than dream­ing of be­ing beaten and beaten and beaten … I reined my mind away from that.

  ‘It’s a lonely thing, to wake up in the night and be afraid.’

  I think she wants to mate with you. Will they ac­cept you into their pack so eas­ily?

  ‘What?’ I asked, startled, but it was the girl who replied, not Nighteyes.

  ‘I said, it’s lonely to awake at night and be afraid. One longs for a way to feel safe. Pro­tec­ted.’

  ‘I know of noth­ing that can stand between a per­son and the dreams that come at night,’ I said stiffly. Ab­ruptly I wanted her to go away.

  ‘Some­times a little gen­tle­ness can,’ she said softly. She reached over and pat­ted my hand. Without in­tend­ing to, I snatched it away.

  ‘Are you shy, pren­tice-boy?’ she asked coyly.

  ‘I lost someone I cared for,’ I said bluntly. ‘I’ve no heart to put an­other in her place.’

  ‘I see.’ She rose ab­ruptly, shak­ing straw from her skirts. ‘Well. I’m sorry to have dis­turbed you.’ She soun­ded in­sul­ted, not sorry.

  She turned and groped her way back to the loft lad­der. I knew I had of­fen­ded her. I did not feel it was my fault. She went up the steps slowly, and I thought she ex­pec­ted me to call her back. I didn’t. I wished I had not come to town.

  That makes two of us. The hunt­ing is poor, this close to all these men. Will you be much longer?

  I fear I must travel with them for a few days, at least as far as the next town.

  You would not mate her, she is not pack. Why must you do these things?

  I did not try to form it into words for him. All I could con­vey was a sense of duty, and he could not grasp how my loy­alty to Ver­ity bound me to help these trav­el­lers on the road. They were my people be­cause they were my king’s. Even I found the con­nec­tion so tenu­ous as to be ri­dicu­lous, but there it was. I would see them safely to the next town.

  I slept again that night, but not well. It was as if my words with Honey had opened the door to my night­mares. No sooner had I dipped down into sleep than I ex­per­i­en­ced a sense that I was be­ing watched. I cowered low in­side my cell, pray­ing that I could not be seen, keep­ing as still as I pos­sibly could. My own eyes were clenched tight shut, like a child who be­lieves that if he can­not see, he can­not be seen. But the eyes that sought me had a gaze I could feel; I could sense Will look­ing for me as if I were hid­ing un­der a blanket and hands were pat­ting at it. He was that close. The fear was so in­tense that it choked me. I could not breathe, I could not move. In a panic, I went out of my­self, side­ways, slip­ping into someone else’s fear, someone else’s night­mare.

  I crouched be­hind a bar­rel of pickled fish in old man Hook’s store. Out­side, the dark­ness was splintered by the rising flames and shrieks of the cap­tured or dy­ing. I knew I should get out. The Red Ship Raid­ers were cer­tain to loot and torch the store. It was not a good place to hide. But there was no good place to hide, and I was only el­even, and my legs were shak­ing be­neath me so that I doubted I could stand, let alone run. Some­where out there was Mas­ter Hook. When the first cries arose, he had grabbed his old sword down and rushed out the door. ‘Watch the store, Chad!’ he had called after him, as if he were just go­ing next door to hob­nob with the baker. At first I had been happy to obey him. The up­roar was far down the town, down­hill by the bay, and the store seemed safe and strong around me.

  But that had been an hour ago. Now the wind from the har­bour car­ried the taint of smoke, and the night was no longer dark, but a ter­rible torch-lit twi­light. The flames and the screams were com­ing closer. Mas­ter Hook had not come back.

  Get out, I told the boy in whose body I hid. Get out, run away, run as far and as fast as you can. Save your­self. He did not hear me.

  I crawled to­ward the door that still swung open and wide as Mas­ter Hook had left it. I peered out of it. A man ran past in the street and I cowered back. But he was prob­ably a towns­man, not a Raider, for he ran without look­ing back, with no other thought than to get as far away as he could. Mouth dry, I forced my­self to my feet, cling­ing to the door jamb. I looked down on the town and har­bour. Half the town was aflame. The mild sum­mer night was choked with smoke and ash rising on the hot wind off the flames. Ships were burn­ing in the har­bour. In the light from the flames, I could see fig­ures dart­ing, flee­ing and hid­ing from the Raid­ers who strode al­most un­chal­lenged through the town.

  Someone came about the corner of the pot­ter’s store at the end of the street. He was car­ry­ing a lan­tern and walk­ing so cas­u­ally I felt a sud­den surge of re­lief. Surely if he could be so calm, then the tide of the battle must be turn­ing. I half rose from my crouch, only to cringe back as he blithely swung the oil lan­tern against the wooden store­front. The splash­ing oil ig­nited as the lamp broke, and fire raced gaily up the tinder-dry wood. I shrank back from the light of the leap­ing flames. I knew with a sud­den cer­tainty that there was no safety to be gained by hid­ing, that my only hope was in flee­ing, and that I should have done it as soon as the alarms soun­ded. The res­ol­u­tion gave me a small meas­ure of cour­age, enough that I leaped to my feet and dashed out and around the corner of the store.

  For an in­stant, I was aware of my­self as Fitz. I do not think the boy could sense me. This was not my Skilling out but his reach­ing to me with some rudi­ment­ary Skill sense of his own. I could not con­trol his body at all, but I was locked into his ex­per­i­ence. I was rid­ing this boy and hear­ing his thoughts and shar­ing his per­cep­tions just as Ver­ity had once rid­den me. But I had no time to con­sider how I was do­ing it, nor why I had been so ab­ruptly joined to this stranger. For as Chad dar­ted into the safety of the shad­ows, he was snatched back sud­denly by a rough hand on his col­lar. For a brief mo­ment he was para­lysed with fear, and we looked up into the bearded grin­ning face of the Raider who gripped us. An­other Raider flan
ked him, sneer­ing evilly. Chad went limp with ter­ror in his grasp. He gazed up help­lessly at the mov­ing knife, at the wedge of shin­ing light that slid down its blade as it came to­wards his face.

  I shared, for an in­stant, the hot-cold pain of the knife across my throat, the an­guished mo­ment of re­cog­ni­tion as my warm wet blood coursed down my chest that it was over, it was already too late, I was dead now. Then as Chad tumbled heed­lessly from the Raider’s grasp into the dusty street, my con­scious­ness came free of him. I hovered there, sens­ing for one aw­ful mo­ment the thoughts of the Raider. I heard the harshly gut­tural tones of his com­pan­ion who nudged the dead boy with his booted foot, and knew that he re­buked the killer for wast­ing one who could have been Forged in­stead. The killer gave a snort of dis­dain, and replied some­thing to the ef­fect that he had been too young, not enough of a life be­hind him to be worth the Mas­ters’ time. Knew too, with a queasy swirl­ing of emo­tions, that the killer had de­sired two things: to be mer­ci­ful to a lad, and to en­joy the pleas­ure of a per­sonal kill.

  I had looked into the heart of my en­emy. I still could not com­pre­hend him.

  I drif­ted down the street be­hind them, bod­i­less and sub­stance­less. I had felt an ur­gency the mo­ment be­fore. Now I could not re­call it. In­stead, I roiled like fog, wit­ness­ing the fall and the sack­ing of Grims­mire Town in Bearns Duchy. Time after time, I was drawn to one or an­other of the in­hab­it­ants, to wit­ness a struggle, a death, a tiny vic­tory of es­cape. Still I can close my eyes and know that night, re­call a dozen hor­rendous mo­ments in lives I briefly shared. I came fi­nally to where one man stood, great sword in hand, be­fore his blaz­ing home. He held off three Raid­ers, while be­hind him his wife and daugh­ter fought to lift a burn­ing beam and free a trapped son, that they might all flee to­gether. None of them would for­sake the oth­ers, and yet I knew the man was weary, too weary and weakened by blood-loss to lift his sword, yet alone wield it. I sensed, too, how the Raid­ers toyed with him, bait­ing him to ex­haust him­self, that they might take and Forge the whole fam­ily. I could feel the creep­ing chill of death seep­ing through the man. For an in­stant his head nod­ded to­ward his chest.

  Sud­denly the be­lea­guered man lif­ted his head. An oddly fa­mil­iar light came into his eyes. He gripped the sword in both hands and with a roar sud­denly sprang at his at­tack­ers. Two went down be­fore his first on­slaught, dy­ing with amazement still prin­ted plain on their fea­tures. The third met his sword blade to blade, but could not over­match his fury. Blood dripped from the towns­man’s el­bow and sheened his chest, but his sword rang like bells against the Raider’s, bat­ter­ing down his guard and then sud­denly dan­cing in, light as a feather, to trace a line of red across the Raider’s throat. As his as­sail­ant fell, the man turned and sprang swiftly to his wife’s side. He seized the burn­ing beam, heed­less of the flames, and lif­ted it off his son’s body. For one last time, his eyes met those of his wife. ‘Run!’ he told her. ‘Take the chil­dren and flee.’ Then he crumpled into the street. He was dead.

  As the stony-faced wo­man seized her chil­dren’s hands and raced off with them, I felt a wraith rise from the body of the man who had died. It’s me, I thought to my­self, and then knew it was not. It sensed me and turned, his face so like my own. Or it had been, when he had been my age. It jol­ted me to think this was how Ver­ity still per­ceived him­self.

  You, here? He shook his head in re­buke. This is dan­ger­ous, boy. Even I am a fool to at­tempt this. And yet what else can we do, when they call us to them? He con­sidered me, stand­ing so mute be­fore him. When did you gain the strength and tal­ent to Skill-walk?

  I made no reply. I had no an­swers, no thoughts of my own. I felt I was a wet sheet flap­ping in the night wind, no more sub­stan­tial than a blow­ing leaf.

  Fitz, this is a danger to both of us. Go back. Go back now.

  Is there truly a ma­gic in the nam­ing of a man’s name? So much of the old lore in­sists there is. I sud­denly re­called who I was, and that I did not be­long here. But I had no concept of how I had come here, let alone how to re­turn to my body. I gazed at Ver­ity help­lessly, un­able to even for­mu­late a re­quest for help.

  He knew. He reached a ghostly hand to­ward me. I felt his push as if he had placed the heel of his hand on my fore­head and given a gentle shove.

  My head bounced off the wall of the barn, and I saw sud­den sparks of light from the im­pact. I was sit­ting there, in the barn be­hind the Scales inn. About me was only peace­ful dark­ness, sleep­ing beasts, tick­ling straw. Slowly I slid over onto my side as wave after wave of gid­di­ness and nausea swept over me. The weak­ness that of­ten pos­sessed me after I had man­aged to use the Skill broke over me like a wave. I opened my mouth to call for help, but only a word­less caw es­caped my lips. I closed my eyes and sank into ob­li­vion.

  I awoke be­fore dawn. I crawled to my pack, pawed through it, and then man­aged to stag­ger to the back door of the inn, where I quite lit­er­ally begged a mug of hot wa­ter from the cook there. She looked on in dis­be­lief as I crumbled strips of elf­bark into it.

  ‘’S not good for you, you know that,’ she warned me, and then watched in awe as I drank the scald­ing, bit­ter brew. ‘They give that to slaves, they do, down in Chalced. Mix it in their food and drink, to keep them on their feet. Makes them des­pair as much as it gives them stay­ing power, or so I’ve heard. Saps their will to fight back.’

  I scarcely heard her. I was wait­ing to feel the ef­fect. I had har­ves­ted my bark from young trees and feared it would lack po­tency. It did. It was some time be­fore I felt the steel­ing warmth spread through me, steady­ing my trem­bling hands and clear­ing my vis­ion. I rose from my seat on the kit­chen’s back steps, to thank the cook and give her back her mug.

  ‘It’s a bad habit to take up, a young man like you,’ she chided me, and went back to her cook­ing. I de­par­ted the inn to stroll the streets as dawn broke over the hills. For a time, I half ex­pec­ted to find burned store­fronts and gut­ted cot­tages, and empty-eyed Forged ones roam­ing the streets. But the Skill night­mare was eroded by the sum­mer morn­ing and the river wind. By day­light, the shab­bi­ness of the town was more ap­par­ent. It seemed to me there were more beg­gars than we had had in Buck­keep Town, but I did not know if that was nor­mal for a river town. I con­sidered briefly what had happened to me last night, then with a shud­der I set it aside. I did not know how I had done it. Like as not, it would not hap­pen to me again. It heartened me to know Ver­ity was still alive, even as it chilled me to know how rashly still he ex­pen­ded his Skill-strength. I wondered where he was this morn­ing, and if, like me, he faced the dawn with the bit­ter­ness of Elf­bark all through his mouth. If only I had mastered the Skill, I would not have had to won­der. It was not a thought to cheer one.

  When I re­turned to the inn, the min­strels were already up and in­side the inn break­fast­ing on por­ridge. I joined them at table, and Josh bluntly told me he had feared I had left without them. Honey had no words at all for me, but sev­eral times I caught Piper look­ing at me ap­prais­ingly.

  It was still early when we left the inn, and if we did not march like sol­diers, Harper Josh still set a re­spect­able pace for us. I had thought he would have to be led, but he made his walk­ing staff his guide. Some­times he did walk with a hand on Honey’s or Piper’s shoulder, but it seemed more com­pan­ion­ship than ne­ces­sity. Nor was our jour­ney bor­ing, for as we walked he lec­tured, mostly to Piper, on the his­tory of this re­gion, and sur­prised me with the depth of his know­ledge. We stopped for a bit when the sun was high and they shared with me the simple food they had. I felt un­com­fort­able tak­ing it, yet there was no way I could ex­cuse my­self to go hunt with the wolf. Once the town was well be­hind us, I had sensed Nighteyes shad­ow­ing us. It was com­fort­ing to have him near, but I wished it
were just he and I trav­el­ling to­gether. Sev­eral times that day we were passed by other trav­el­lers, on horses or mules. Through gaps in the trees we oc­ca­sion­ally glimpsed boats beat­ing their way up­river against the cur­rent. As the morn­ing passed, well-guarded carts and wag­ons over­took us. Each time Josh called out to ask if we might ride on the wag­ons. Twice we were po­litely re­fused. The oth­ers answered not at all. They moved hur­riedly, and one group had sev­eral surly-look­ing men in a com­mon liv­ery that I sur­mised were hired guards.

  We walked the af­ter­noon away to the re­cit­ing of ‘Cross­fire’s Sac­ri­fice’, the long poem about Queen Vis­ion’s co­terie and how they laid down their lives that she might win a cru­cial battle. I had heard it be­fore, sev­eral times, in Buck­keep. But by the end of the day, I had heard it two score times, as Josh worked with in­fin­ite pa­tience to be sure that Piper sang it per­fectly. I was grate­ful for the end­less re­cit­a­tions, for it pre­ven­ted talk.

  But des­pite our steady pace, the fall­ing of even­ing still found us far short of the next river town. I saw them all be­come un­easy as the light began to fail. Fi­nally, I took com­mand of the situ­ation and told them we must leave the road at the next stream we crossed, and find a place to settle for the even­ing. Honey and Piper fell back be­hind Josh and me, and I could hear them mut­ter­ing wor­riedly to one an­other. I could not re­as­sure them, as Nighteyes had me, that there was not even a sniff of an­other trav­el­ler about. In­stead, at the next cross­ing I guided them up­stream and found a sheltered bank be­neath a ce­dar tree where we might rest for the night.

  I left them on the pre­tence of re­liev­ing my­self, to spend time with Nighteyes as­sur­ing him all was well. It was time well spent, for he had dis­covered a place where the swirl­ing creek wa­ter un­der­cut the bank. He watched me in­tently as I lay on my belly and eased my hands into the wa­ter, and then slowly through the cur­tain of weeds that over­hung it. I got a fine fat fish on my first try. Sev­eral minutes later, an­other ef­fort yiel­ded me a smal­ler fish. When I gave up, it was al­most full dark, but I had three fish to take back to camp, leav­ing two, against my bet­ter judg­ment, for Nighteyes.