Assassin's Quest (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  I am hu­man. I temp­ted my­self with her of­fer of golds. I re­flec­ted that if Burrich knew of my situ­ation, he would tell me to go ahead and sell it, that my life and safety were worth more to him than an ear­ring of sil­ver and sap­phire. I could get a horse and go to the Moun­tains and find Ver­ity and put an end to the con­stant nag­ging of his Skill-or­der that was like an itch I could not scratch.

  I stared out over the river and fi­nally con­fron­ted the enorm­ous jour­ney be­fore me. From here I must jour­ney through near desert to get to Blue Lake. I had no idea how I would cross Blue Lake it­self. On the other side, forest trails wound through the foot­hills up into the rugged lands of the Moun­tain King­dom. To Jhaampe the cap­ital city I must go, to some­how ob­tain a copy of the map Ver­ity had used. It had been based on old writ­ings in the Jhaampe lib­rary; per­haps the ori­ginal was still there. Only that map could lead me to Ver­ity some­where in the un­known ter­rit­ory bey­ond the Moun­tain King­dom. I would need every coin, every re­source I could com­mand.

  But des­pite all that, I de­cided to keep the ear­ring. Not for what it meant to Burrich, but what it had come to mean to me. It was my last phys­ical link to my past, to who I had been, to the man who had raised me, even to the father who had once worn it. It was oddly dif­fi­cult to bring my­self to do what I knew was wise. I reached up and un­did the tiny catch that se­cured the ear­ring to my ear. I still had the scraps of silk from my mas­quer­ade, and I used the smal­lest one to wrap the ear­ring well and put it in­side my belt pouch. The trader wo­man had been too in­ter­es­ted in it and marked its ap­pear­ance too well. If Regal did de­cide to send seekers after me, that ear­ring would be one of the ways I’d be de­scribed.

  Af­ter­wards I walked about the city, listen­ing to folk talk and try­ing to learn what I needed to know without ask­ing ques­tions. I loitered in the mar­ket­place, wan­der­ing from stall to stall idly. I al­lot­ted my­self the lav­ish sum of four cop­pers, and spent them on what seemed exotic lux­ur­ies: a small bag of tea herbs, dried fruit, a piece of look­ing glass, a small cook­ing pot and a cup. I asked at sev­eral herb stalls for elf­bark, but either they did not know it or they knew it by an­other name in Far­row. I told my­self it was all right, for I did not ex­pect to have any need for its res­tor­at­ive powers. I hoped I was right. In­stead I du­bi­ously pur­chased some­thing called sun­skirt seeds, which I was as­sured would re­vive a man to wake­ful­ness no mat­ter how weary he might be.

  I found a rag wo­man who let me go through her cart for two more cop­pers. I found a smelly but ser­vice­able cloak and some leg­gings that prom­ised to be as itchy as they were warm. I traded her my re­main­ing scraps of yel­low silk for a head ker­chief, and with many leer­ing re­marks she showed me how to tie it about my head. I did as I had done be­fore, mak­ing the cloak into a bundle to carry my things, and then went down to the slaughter­yards east of town.

  I had never en­countered such a stench as I found there. There was pen after pen after pen of an­im­als, ver­it­able moun­tains of ma­nure, the smell of blood and of­fal from the slaughter­sheds and the harsh stinks of the tan­nery pits. As if the as­sault on my nose was not enough, the air was like­wise filled with the bawl­ing of cattle, the squeal­ing of har­agars, the buzz­ing of the blow­flies and the shouts of the folk mov­ing the an­im­als from pen to pen or drag­ging them off to slaughter. Steel my­self as I would, I could not in­su­late my­self from the blind misery and panic of the wait­ing an­im­als. They had no clear know­ledge of what awaited them, but the smell of the fresh blood and the cries of the other beasts awoke in some of them a ter­ror equi­val­ent to what I had felt as I sprawled on the dun­geon floor. Yet here I must be, for this was where the cara­vans ended, and also where some began. Folk who had driven an­im­als here to sell would most likely be re­turn­ing. Most would be buy­ing other trade goods to take back with them, so as not to waste a trip. I had hopes of find­ing some sort of work with one of them that would gain me the com­pan­ion­ship of a cara­van at least as far as Blue Lake.

  I soon found I was not the only one with such hopes. There was a rag-tag hir­ing fair in a space between two tav­erns that fron­ted on the hold­ing pens. Some of the folk there were her­ders who had come from Blue Lake with one herd, stayed in Land­ing to spend their earn­ings, and now, out of coin and far from home, were look­ing for pas­sage back. For some of them, that was the pat­tern of their lives as drovers. There were a few young­sters there, ob­vi­ously look­ing for ad­ven­ture and travel and a chance to strike out on their own. And there were those who were ob­vi­ously the dregs of the town, folk who could get no steady work, or had not the char­ac­ter to live in one place for long. I did not blend very well with any group, but I ended up stand­ing with the drovers.

  My tale was that my mother had re­cently died and turned over her es­tates to my older sis­ter, who had little use for me. And so I had set out to travel to my uncle, who lived past Blue Lake, but my coin had run out be­fore I had reached there. No, I’d not been a drover be­fore, but we’d been wealthy enough to have horses, cattle and sheep, and I knew the ba­sic care of them and, so some said, ‘had a way’ with dumb beasts.

  I was not hired that day. Few were, and night found most of us bed­ding down right where we had stood all day. A baker’s ap­pren­tice came among us with a tray of left-over wares, and I par­ted with an­other cop­per for a long loaf of dark bread stud­ded with seeds. I shared it with a stout fel­low whose pale hair kept creep­ing out of his ker­chief and over his face. In re­turn, Creece offered me some dried meat, a drink of the most ap­palling wine I’d ever tasted, and a great deal of gos­sip. He was a talker, one of those men who take the most ex­treme stance on any topic and have, not con­ver­sa­tions, but ar­gu­ments with their fel­lows. As I had little to say, Creece soon needled the other folk about us into a con­ten­tious dis­cus­sion of the cur­rent polit­ics in Far­row. Someone kindled a small fire, more for light than any need for warmth, and sev­eral bottles were passed about. I lay back, my head pil­lowed on my bundle and pre­ten­ded to be doz­ing as I listened.

  There was no men­tion of the Red Ships, no talk at all of the war that raged along the coast. I un­der­stood ab­ruptly how much these folk would re­sent be­ing taxed for troops to pro­tect a coast they’d never even seen, for war­ships to sail an ocean they could not even ima­gine. The arid plains between Land­ing and Blue Lake were their ocean, and these drovers the sail­ors who trav­elled on it. The Six Duch­ies were not by nature six re­gions of land bound into a whole, but were a king­dom only be­cause a strong line of rulers had fenced them to­gether with a com­mon bound­ary and de­creed them to be one. Should all of the Coastal Duch­ies fall to the Red Ships, it would mean little for these folk here. There would still be cattle to herd, and loath­some wine to drink, there would still be grass and the river and the dusty streets. In­ev­it­ably I must won­der what right we had to force these folk to pay for a war so far from their homes. Tilth and Far­row had been conquered and ad­ded to the duch­ies; they had not come to us ask­ing for mil­it­ary pro­tec­tion or the be­ne­fits of trade. Not that they hadn’t prospered, freed of all their petty in­land herd­lords and given an eager mar­ket for their beef and leather and rope. How much sail­cloth, how many coils of good hemp rope had they sold be­fore they were part of the Six Duch­ies? But it still seemed a minor re­turn.

  I grew weary of such thoughts. The only con­stant to their con­ver­sa­tion was com­plaint about the trade em­bargo with the Moun­tains. I had be­gun to doze off when my ears pricked up to the words, ‘Pocked Man’. I opened my eyes and lif­ted my head slightly.

  Someone had men­tioned him in the tra­di­tional way, as the har­binger of dis­as­ter, laugh­ingly say­ing that Hen­cil’s sheep had all seen him, for they were dy­ing in their pen be­fore the poor man could even sell them. I frowned to my­self
at the thought of dis­ease in such close quar­ters, but an­other man laughed and said that King Regal had de­creed it was no longer bad luck to see the Pocked Man, but the greatest good that could be­fall one. ‘If I saw that old beg­gar, I’d not blanch and flee, but tackle him and take him to the King him­self. He’s offered one hun­dred golds to any man can bring him the Pocked Man from Buck.’

  ‘Was fifty, only fifty golds, not a hun­dred,’ Creece in­ter­rup­ted jeer­ingly. He took an­other drink from his bottle. ‘What a story, a hun­dred golds for a grey old man!’

  ‘No, it’s a hun­dred, for him alone, and an­other hun­dred for the man-wolf that dogs his heels. I heard it cried anew just this af­ter­noon. They crept into the King’s Man­sion at Trade­ford, and slew some of his guard with Beast ma­gic. Throats torn right out that the wolf might drink the blood. He’s the one they want bad now. Dresses like a gen­tle­man, they said, with a ring and a neck­lace and a sil­ver dangle at his ear. Streak of white in his hair from an old battle with our king, and a scar down his face and a broken nose from the same. Yes, and a nice new sword-slash up his arm is what the King gave him this time.’

  There was a low mut­ter of ad­mir­a­tion from sev­eral of them at this. Even I had to ad­mire Regal’s au­da­city at claim­ing that, even as I turned my face back into my bundle and bur­rowed down as if to sleep. The gos­sip con­tin­ued.

  ‘Sup­posed to be Wit-bred, he is, and able to turn him­self into a wolf whenever the moon is on him. They sleep by day and prowl by night, they do. It’s said it’s a curse put on the King by that for­eigner queen he chased out of Buck for try­ing to steal the crown. The Pocked Man, it’s told, is a half-spirit, charmed from the body of old King Shrewd by her Moun­tain ma­gic, and he travels all the roads and streets, any­where in the Six Duch­ies, bring­ing ill wherever he goes, and wear­ing the face of the old King him­self.’

  ‘Dung and rot,’ Creece said dis­gustedly. He took an­other swig him­self. But some of the oth­ers liked this wild tale and leaned closer, whis­per­ing for him to go on, go on.

  ‘Well, that’s what I heard,’ the storyteller said huffily. ‘That the Pocked Man is Shrewd’s half-spirit, and he can’t know any rest un­til the Moun­tain queen that poisoned him is in her grave as well.’

  ‘So, if the Pocked Man is Shrewd’s ghost, why is King Regal of­fer­ing a hun­dred golds re­ward for him?’ Creece asked sourly.

  ‘Not his ghost. His half-spirit. He stole part of the King’s spirit as he was dy­ing, and King Shrewd can know no rest un­til the Pocked Man is dead so the King’s spirit can be re­joined. And some say,’ and he dropped his voice lower, ‘that the Bas­tard was not killed well enough, that he walks again as a man-wolf. He and the Pocked Man seek ven­geance against King Regal, to des­troy the throne he could not steal. For he was in league to be king to the Vixen’s queen once they’d done away with Shrewd.’

  It was the right sort of night for such a tale. The moon was swollen and or­ange and rid­ing low in the sky, while the wind brought us the mourn­ful low­ing and shift­ing of the cattle in their pens mixed with the stench of rot­ting blood and tan­ning hides. High tattered clouds drif­ted from time to time across the face of the moon. The storyteller’s words put a shiver up my back, prob­ably for a dif­fer­ent reason than he thought. I kept wait­ing for someone to nudge me with a foot, or cry out, ‘Hey, let’s have a bet­ter look at him.’ No one did. The tone of the man’s tale had them look­ing for wolf eyes in the shad­ows, not for a weary work­man sleep­ing in their midst. Non­ethe­less, my heart was thud­ding in my chest as I looked back down my trail. The tailor where I’d traded clothes would re­cog­nize that de­scrip­tion. Pos­sibly the ear­ring wo­man. Even the old rag wo­man who had helped me tie the ker­chief over my hair. Some might not want to come for­ward, some might want to avoid deal­ing with the King’s guards. Some would, though. I should be­have as if they all would.

  The speaker was go­ing on, em­broid­er­ing his tale of Kettricken’s evil am­bi­tions and how she had lain with me to con­ceive a child we could use to claim the throne. There was loath­ing in the storyteller’s voice as he spoke of Kettricken, and no one scoffed at his words. Even Creece at my side was ac­qui­es­cent, as if these bizarre plots were com­mon know­ledge. Con­firm­ing my worst fears, Creece spoke up sud­denly.

  ‘You tell it like it’s all new, but all knew her big belly came not from Ver­ity but from the Wit-Bas­tard. Had Regal not driven off the Moun­tain whore, we would even­tu­ally have had one like the Piebald Prince in line for the throne.’

  There was a low mur­mur of as­sent to this. I closed my eyes and lay back as if bored, hop­ing that my still­ness and lowered lids could con­ceal the rage that threatened to con­sume me. I reached up to tug my ker­chief more snugly about my hair. What could be Regal’s pur­pose in let­ting such evil gos­sip be noised about? For I knew this kind of poison must come from him. I did not trust my voice to ask any ques­tions, nor did I wish to ap­pear ig­nor­ant of what was evid­ently com­mon know­ledge. So I lay still and listened with sav­age in­terest. I gathered that all knew Kettricken had re­turned to the Moun­tains. The fresh­ness of the con­tempt they had for her sug­ges­ted to me that this was re­cent news. There was mut­ter­ing too that it was the fault of the Moun­tain witch that the passes were closed to hon­est Tilth and Far­row traders. One man even ven­tured to say that now that trade with the coast was shut down, the Moun­tains saw a chance to fence Far­row and Tilth in and force them to come to terms or lose all trade routes. One man re­coun­ted that even a simple cara­van es­cor­ted by Six Duch­ies men in Regal’s own col­ours had been turned back from the Moun­tain bor­der.

  To me, such talk was ob­vi­ously stu­pid. The Moun­tains needed the trade with Far­row and Tilth. Grain was more im­port­ant to the Moun­tain folk than the lum­ber and furs of the Moun­tains to these low­landers. Such free trade had been openly ad­mit­ted as a reason for wed­ding Kettricken to Ver­ity. Even if Kettricken had fled back to the Moun­tains, I knew her well enough to be sure she would not sup­port any cut­ting off of trade between her folk and the Six Duch­ies. She was too bon­ded to both groups, so in­tent on be­ing Sac­ri­fice for all of them. If there were a trade em­bargo as I had heard, I was sure it had be­gun with Regal. But the men about me grumbled on about the Moun­tain witch and her ven­detta against the King.

  Was Regal fo­ment­ing a war with the Moun­tains? Had he been at­tempt­ing to send armed troops there un­der the guise of es­corts for traders? It was a fool­ish idea. Long ago my father had been sent to the Moun­tains to form­al­ize bound­ar­ies and trade agree­ments with them, mark­ing the end of long years of bor­der skir­mishes and raids. Those years of battle had taught King Shrewd that no one was go­ing to take and hold the Moun­tain King­dom passes and trails by force. Un­will­ingly I fol­lowed that thought. Regal had been the one to sug­gest Kettricken as a bride for Ver­ity. He had done all the courtier’s work of woo­ing her for his brother. Then, as the time for the wed­ding drew near, he had at­temp­ted to kill Ver­ity, with the aim of se­cur­ing the prin­cess as his own bride. He had failed, and his plots and plans had been re­vealed to only a few. The chance for him to claim Prin­cess Kettricken as his own, and all that went with her, such as her even­tual in­her­it­ance of the Moun­tain crown, had slipped through his fin­gers. I re­called some talk I had once heard between Regal and the trait­or­ous Ga­len. They had seemed to think that Tilth and Far­row would be best se­cured if they could con­trol the Moun­tain ranges and passes that backed them. Did Regal now think to take by force what he had once hoped to claim by mar­riage? Did he think he could rally enough ill will against Kettricken to make his fol­low­ers be­lieve they were wa­ging a just war, one of ven­geance against a Moun­tain witch, one to keep open key trade routes?

  Regal, I re­flec­ted, was cap­able of be­liev­ing any­thing he wished to be­lieve. In
the depths of his cups, head wreathed with his smokes, I did not doubt that he now be­lieved his own wild tales. A hun­dred golds for Chade, and an­other hun­dred for me. I knew well enough what I had done lately to merit such a head-price, but I wondered keenly just what Chade had been up to. In all my years with Chade, he had al­ways worked un­named and un­seen. He still had no name, but his pocked skin and re­semb­lance to his half-brother were known now. That meant he had been seen some­where, by someone. I hoped he was well and safe this night wherever he was. A part of me yearned to turn back, to re­turn to Buck and track him down. As if some­how I could keep him safe.

  Come to me.

  No mat­ter what I longed to do, no mat­ter what I felt, I knew that first I would go to Ver­ity. I prom­ised my­self that over and over and was fi­nally able to drop off into a wary doze. I dreamed, but they were pale dreams, barely touched by the Skill, shift­ing and turn­ing as if blown by the au­tumn winds. My mind seemed to have caught up and jumbled to­gether thoughts of every per­son I missed. I dreamed of Chade tak­ing tea with Pa­tience and Lacey. He wore a robe of red silk pat­terned over with stars, cut in a very old style, and he smiled charm­ingly at the wo­men over his cup and brought laughter even to Pa­tience’s eyes, al­though she looked strangely worn and weary. I then dreamed of Molly peep­ing out of a cot­tage door while Burrich stood out­side it, pulling his cloak tight against the wind and telling her not to worry, he’d not be gone that long and any heavy chores could keep un­til he re­turned, that she should stay within doors and have only a care for her­self. Even of Celer­ity did I dream, that she had taken shel­ter in the fabled ice caves of the Hungry Gla­cier in Bearns, and hid there with what troops she could still rally and many of her folk made home­less by the Raider wars. I dreamed she ten­ded Faith, who lay suf­fer­ing with a fever and a fes­ter­ing ar­row wound in her belly. I dreamed fi­nally of the Fool, his white face turned to ivory as he sat be­fore a hearth and stared into the flames. There was no hope left in his face, and I felt that I was within the flames, look­ing deeply into his eyes. Some­where nearby and yet not very near, Kettricken was weep­ing in­con­sol­ably. My dreams withered in my mind, and then I dreamed of wolves hunt­ing, hunt­ing, run­ning down a buck, but they were wild wolves, and if my wolf was among them, he was theirs and mine no longer.