Assassin's Quest (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  ‘Hey!’

  We both hal­ted in our play. I got up slowly from the ground. It was one of Nik’s men, stand­ing far up the ri­verb­ank and star­ing at us. He car­ried his bow. ‘Get some wood and come back now,’ he ordered me. I glanced about, but could see no reason for the edgy tone to his voice. Nev­er­the­less, I gathered my scattered arm­load of wood and headed back to the huts.

  I found Kettle squint­ing at a scroll by the fire­light, ig­nor­ing those who were try­ing to cook around her. ‘What are you read­ing?’ I asked her.

  ‘The writ­ings of Cabal the White. A prophet and seer of Kimoalan times.’

  I shrugged. The names meant noth­ing to me.

  ‘Through his guid­ance, a treaty was wrought that put an end to a hun­dred years of war. It en­abled three folk to be­come one people. Know­ledge was shared. Many kinds of foods that once grew only in the south­ern val­leys of Kimoala came into com­mon us­age. Ginger, for in­stance. And kim-oats.’

  ‘One man did that?’

  ‘One man. Or two, per­haps, if you count the gen­eral he per­suaded to con­quer without des­troy­ing. Here, he speaks of him. “A cata­lyst was DarAles for his time, a changer of hearts and lives. He came not to be hero, but to en­able the hero in oth­ers. He came, not to ful­fil proph­ecies, but to open the doors to new fu­tures. Such is ever the task of the cata­lyst.” Above, he has writ­ten that it is in every one of us to be a cata­lyst in our own time. What do you think of that, Tom?’

  ‘I’d rather be a shep­herd,’ I answered her truth­fully. Cata­lyst was not a word I cher­ished.

  That night I slept with Nighteyes at my side. Kettle snored softly not far from me, while the pil­grims huddled to­gether in one end of the hut. Starling had chosen to sleep in the other hut with Nik and some of his men. For a time, the sound of her harp and voice were oc­ca­sion­ally borne to me on gusts of wind.

  I closed my eyes and tried to dream of Molly. In­stead I saw a burn­ing vil­lage in Buck as the Red Ships pulled away from it. I joined a young lad as he put on sail in the dark, to ram his dory into the side of a Red Ship. He flung a burn­ing lan­tern on board her and fol­lowed it with a bucket of cheap fish oil such as poor folk burned in their lamps. The sail blazed up as the boy sheered away from the burn­ing ship. Be­hind him the curses and cries of the burn­ing men rose with the flames. I rode with him that night, and felt his bit­ter tri­umph. He had noth­ing left, no fam­ily, no home, but he had spilled some of the blood that had spilled his. I un­der­stood the tears that wet his grin­ning face only too well.

  SEV­EN­TEEN

  River Cross­ing

  The Outis­landers have al­ways spoken mock­ingly of the Six Duch­ies folk, de­clar­ing us slaves of the earth, farm­ers fit only for grub­bing in the dirt. Eda, the mother god­dess who is thanked for plen­ti­ful crops and mul­tiply­ing flocks, is dis­dained by the Outis­landers as a god­dess for a settled folk who have lost all spirit. The Outis­landers them­selves wor­ship only El, the god of the sea. He is not a deity to of­fer thanks to, but a god to swear by. The only bless­ing he sends his wor­ship­pers are storms and hard­ships to make them strong.

  In this they mis­judged the people of the Six Duch­ies. They be­lieved folk who planted crops and raised sheep would soon come to have no more spirit than sheep. They came amongst us slaughter­ing and des­troy­ing and mis­took our con­cern for our folk for weak­ness. In that winter, the small folk of Buck and Bearns, Rip­pon and Shoaks, the fish­er­folk and her­ders, goose-girls and pig-boys, took up the war that our wrangling nobles and scattered armies waged so poorly and made it their own. The small folk of a land can only be op­pressed so long be­fore they rise up in their own de­fence, be it against out­landers or an un­just lord of their own.

  The oth­ers grumbled the next morn­ing about the cold and the need for haste. They spoke long­ingly of hot por­ridge and hearth-cakes. There was hot wa­ter, but little more than that to warm our bel­lies. I filled Kettle’s teapot for her and then went back to fill my cup with hot wa­ter. I squin­ted my eyes against the pain as I dug in my pack for my elf­bark. My Skill-dream of the night be­fore had left me feel­ing sick and shaky. The very thought of food made me ill. Kettle sipped her tea and watched as I used my knife to scrape shav­ings from a lump of bark into my mug. It was hard to make my­self wait for the li­quid to brew. The ex­treme bit­ter­ness of it flooded my mouth, but al­most im­me­di­ately I felt my head­ache ease. Kettle ab­ruptly reached a claw-like hand to pluck the chunk of bark from my hand. She looked at it, sniffed it and, ‘Elf­bark!’ she ex­claimed. She gave me a look of hor­ror. ‘That’s a vi­cious herb for a young man to be us­ing.’

  ‘It calms my head­aches,’ I told her. I took a breath to steel my­self, then drank off the rest of the mug. The gritty rem­nants of bark stuck to my tongue. I forced my­self to swal­low them, then wiped out my mug and re­turned it to my pack. I held out my hand and she gave back the chunk of bark, but re­luct­antly. The look she was giv­ing me was very strange.

  ‘I’ve never seen any­one just drink it down like that. Do you know what that stuff is used for, in Chalced?’

  ‘I’ve been told they feed it to gal­ley slaves, to keep their strength up.’

  ‘Strength up and hopes down. A man on elf­bark is eas­ily dis­cour­aged. Easier to con­trol. It may dull the pain of a head­ache, but it dulls the mind as well. I’d be wary of it, were I you.’

  I shrugged. ‘I’ve used it for years,’ I told her as I put the herb back in my pack.

  ‘All the more reason to stop now,’ she replied tartly. She handed me her pack to put back in the wagon for her.

  It was mid-af­ter­noon when Nik ordered our wag­ons to a halt. He and two of his men rode ahead, while the oth­ers as­sured us all was fine. Nik went ahead to ready the cross­ing place be­fore we ar­rived there. I did not even need to glance at Nighteyes. He slipped away to fol­low Nik and his men. I leaned back on the seat and hugged my­self, try­ing to stay warm.

  ‘Hey, you. Call your dog back!’ One of Nik’s men com­man­ded me sud­denly.

  I sat up and made a show of look­ing around for him. ‘He’s prob­ably just scen­ted a rab­bit. He’ll be back. Fol­lows me every­where, he does.’

  ‘Call him back now!’ the man told me threat­en­ingly.

  So I stood up on the wagon seat and called Nighteyes. He did not come. I shrugged an apo­logy at the men and sat down again. One con­tin­ued to glare at me, but I ig­nored him.

  The day had been clear and cold, the wind cut­ting. Kettle had been miser­ably si­lent all day. Sleep­ing on the ground had awakened the old pain in my shoulder to a con­stant jab. I did not even want to ima­gine what she was feel­ing. I tried to think only that we would soon be across the river, and that after that the Moun­tains were not far. Per­haps in the Moun­tains I would fi­nally feel safe from Regal’s co­terie.

  Some men pull ropes by the river. I closed my eyes and tried to see what Nighteyes did. It was dif­fi­cult, for he dir­ec­ted his eyes at the men them­selves, while I wished to study the task they did. But just as I dis­cerned they were us­ing a guideline to re­string a heav­ier rope across the river, two other men on the far side began en­er­get­ic­ally dig­ging through a pile of drift­wood in the curve of a bank. The con­cealed barge was soon re­vealed, and the men went to work chop­ping away the ice that had formed on it.

  ‘Wake up!’ Kettle told me ir­rit­ably, and gave me a poke in the ribs. I sat up to see the other wagon already in mo­tion. I stirred the mare’s reins and fol­lowed the oth­ers. We trav­elled a short way down the river-road be­fore turn­ing off it onto an open sec­tion of bank. There were some burned-out huts by the river that had ap­par­ently per­ished in the fires years ago. There was also a crude ramp of logs and mor­tar, much de­cayed now. On the far side of the river, I could see the re­mains of the old barge, half sunken. Ice covered parts of it, but de
ad grass also stuck up from it. It had been many sea­sons since it had floated. The huts on the other side were in as poor re­pair as the ones over here, for their thatched roofs had col­lapsed com­pletely. Be­hind them rose gentle hills covered in ever­greens. Bey­ond them, tower­ing in the dis­tance, were the peaks of the Moun­tain King­dom.

  A team of men had at­tached the re­vealed barge and were work­ing it across the river to us. The bow was poin­ted into the cur­rent. The barge was tightly bridled to the pul­ley-line; even so the angry river strove to tear it loose and wash it down­stream. It was not a large ves­sel. A wagon and team was go­ing to be a snug fit. There were rail­ings down the side of the barge, but other than that it was simply a flat, open deck. On our side, the ponies that Nik and his men had been rid­ing had been har­nessed to pull on the barge’s tow-line while on the other side a team of pa­tient mules backed slowly to­ward the wa­ter. As the barge came slowly to­ward us, her bow rose and fell as the river pushed against it. The cur­rent foamed and churned around its sides, while an oc­ca­sional dip of the bow al­lowed a surge of wa­ter to fly up and over. It was not go­ing to be a dry ride across.

  The pil­grims muttered amongst them­selves anxiously, but one man’s voice sud­denly rose to quell them. ‘What other choice do we have?’ he poin­ted out. There­after si­lence fell. They watched the barge come to­ward us with dread.

  Nik’s wagon and team were the first load across. Per­haps Nik did it that way to give the pil­grims cour­age. I watched as the barge was brought up snug to the old ramp and se­cured stern-in. I sensed the dis­pleas­ure of his team, but also that they were fa­mil­iar with this. Nik him­self led them onto the barge and held their heads while two of his men scrambled about and tied the wagon down to the cleats. Then Nik stepped off, and waved his hand in sig­nal. The two men stood, one by each horse’s head, as the mule team on the other side took up the slack. The barge was cast off and moved out into the river. Laden, it sat more deeply in the wa­ter, but it did not bob as freely as it had. Twice the bow lif­ted high and then plunged back deeply enough to take a wash of wa­ter over it. All was si­lence on our side of the river as we watched the barge’s pas­sage. On the other side, it was pulled in and se­cured bow-first, the wagon un­fastened, and the men drove it off and up the hill.

  ‘There. You see. Noth­ing to worry about.’ Nik spoke with an easy grin, but I doubted that he be­lieved his own words.

  A couple of men rode the barge back as it came across. They did not look happy about it. They clung to the rail­ings and winced away from the fly­ing spray off the river. Nev­er­the­less they were both soaked by the time the barge reached our side and they stepped off. One man ges­tured Nik to one side and began to con­fer with him an­grily, but he clapped him on the shoulders and laughed loudly as if it were all a fine joke. He held out his hand and they passed him a small pouch. He hef­ted it ap­prov­ingly be­fore hanging it from his belt. ‘I keep my word,’ he re­minded them, and then strode back to our group.

  The pil­grims went across next. Some of them wished to cross in the wagon, but Nik pa­tiently poin­ted out that the heav­ier the load, the lower the barge rode in the river. He her­ded them onto the barge and made sure that each per­son had a good place to grip along the rail. ‘You, too,’ he called, mo­tion­ing to Kettle and Starling.

  ‘I’ll go across with my cart,’ Kettle de­clared, but Nik shook his head.

  ‘Your mare isn’t go­ing to like this. If she goes crazy out there, you don’t want to be on the barge. Trust me. I know what I’m do­ing.’ He glanced at me. ‘Tom? You mind rid­ing across with the horse? You seem to handle her well.’

  I nod­ded, and Nik said, ‘There, now, Tom’ll see to your mare. You go on, now.’

  Kettle scowled, but had to own the sense of that. I helped her down, and Starling took her arm and walked her to the barge. Nik stepped onto the barge and spoke briefly to the pil­grims, telling them to simply hold on and not fear. Three of his men boarded the barge with them. One in­sis­ted on hold­ing the smal­lest pil­grim child him­self. ‘I know what to ex­pect,’ he told the anxious mother. ‘I’ll see she gets across. You just have a care to your­self.’ The little girl began to cry at that and her shrill wail­ing could be heard even over the rush­ing of the river wa­ter as the barge was pulled out onto the river. Nik stood be­side me watch­ing them go.

  ‘They’ll be fine,’ he said, as much to him­self as to me. He turned to me with a grin. ‘Well, Tom, a few more trips and I’ll be wear­ing that pretty ear­ring of yours.’

  I nod­ded to that si­lently. I’d given my word on the bar­gain but I was not happy about it.

  Des­pite Nik’s words, I heard him sigh with re­lief when the barge reached the other side. The drenched pil­grims scuttled off even as the men were se­cur­ing it. I watched Starling help Kettle off, and then some of Nik’s men hur­ried them up the bank and into the shel­ter of the trees. Then the barge was com­ing back to us again, bear­ing two more men. The pil­grims’ empty wagon went next, along with a couple of ponies. The pil­grims’ horses were not at all pleased. It took blind­folds and three men tug­ging to get them onto the barge. Once there and tied down, the horses still shif­ted as much as they could, snort­ing and shak­ing their heads. I watched them cross. On the other side, the team needed no ur­ging to get the wagon swiftly off the barge. A man took the reins and the wagon rattled up the hill and out of sight.

  The two men who rode back that time had the worst cross­ing yet. They were halfway across the river when an im­mense snag came in sight, bear­ing dir­ec­tly down on the barge. The claw­ing roots looked like a mon­strous hand as the log bobbed in the fierce cur­rent. Nik shouted at our ponies and all of us sprang to help them haul on the rope, but even so the log struck the barge a glan­cing blow. The men on board yelled as the im­pact shook them from their grips on the rail­ing. One was nearly flung off, but man­aged to catch a second post and hung on for dear life. Those two came off glar­ing and curs­ing, as if they sus­pec­ted the mis­hap had been de­lib­er­ate. Nik had the barge se­cured and him­self checked all the lines fasten­ing her to the pul­ley-rope. The im­pact had knocked one rail­ing loose. He shook his head over that, and warned his men about it as they drove the last wagon aboard it.

  Its cross­ing was no worse than any of the oth­ers. I watched with some trep­id­a­tion, know­ing that my turn was next. Fancy a bath, Nighteyes?

  It will be worth it if there’s good hunt­ing on the other side, he replied, but I could sense he shared my nervous­ness.

  I tried to calm my­self and Kettle’s mare as I watched them fasten the barge to the land­ing. I spoke sooth­ingly to her as I led her down, do­ing all I could to as­sure her that she would be fine. She seemed to ac­cept it, step­ping calmly onto the scarred tim­bers of the deck. I led her out slowly, ex­plain­ing it all as I went. She stood quietly as I tied her to a ring set in the deck. Two of Nik’s men roped the cart down fast. Nighteyes leapt on, then sank down, belly low, his claws dig­ging into the wood. He didn’t like the way the river tugged at the barge greed­ily. Truth to tell, neither did I. He ven­tured over to crouch be­side me, feet splayed.

  ‘You go on across with Tom and the cart,’ Nik told the soaked men who had already made one trip. ‘Me and my boys will bring our ponies on the last trip. Stay clear of that mare, now, in case she de­cides to kick.’

  They came aboard war­ily, eye­ing Nighteyes al­most as dis­trust­fully as they watched the mare. They clustered at the back of the cart, and held on there. Nighteyes and I re­mained at the bow. I hoped we’d be out of reach of the mare’s hooves there. At the last mo­ment, Nik de­clared, ‘I think I’ll ride this one over with you.’ He cast the barge off him­self with a grin and a wave at his men. The mule team on the other side of the river star­ted up, and with a lurch we moved out into the river.

  Watch­ing some­thing is never the same as do­ing it. I gasped as the first
slash­ing spray of river-wa­ter struck me. We were sud­denly a toy in the clutches of an un­pre­dict­able child. The river rushed past us, tear­ing at the barge and roar­ing its frus­tra­tion that it could not drag us free. The furi­ous wa­ter near deafened me. The barge took a sud­den plunge and I found my­self grip­ping the rail­ing as a surge of wa­ter flowed over the deck and clutched at my ankles in passing. The second time a plume of wa­ter smacked up from the bow and drenched us all, the mare screamed. I let go of my grip of the rail­ing, in­tend­ing to take hold of her head­stall. Two of the men seemed to have the same idea. They were work­ing their way for­ward, cling­ing to the cart. I waved them away and turned to the mare.

  I will never know what the man in­ten­ded. Per­haps to club me with the pom­mel of his knife. I caught the mo­tion from the corner of my eye and turned to face him just as the barge gave an­other lurch. He missed me and staggered for­ward against the mare. The horse, already anxious, pan­icked into a frenzy of kick­ing. She threw her head wildly, slam­ming it against me so that I staggered away. I had al­most caught my bal­ance when the man made an­other flail­ing try at me. On the back of the cart, Nick was strug­gling with an­other man. He an­grily shouted some­thing about his word and his hon­our. I ducked my at­tacker’s blow just as a crash of wa­ter came over the bow. The force of it washed me to­ward the centre of the barge. I caught hold of a cartwheel and clung there, gasp­ing I clawed my sword half-free just as someone else grabbed me from be­hind. My first at­tacker came at me, grin­ning, his knife blade-first this time. Sud­denly a wet furry body streaked past me. Nighteyes hit him squarely in the chest, slam­ming him back against the rail­ing.