Assassin's Quest (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  ‘I spy at least a dozen of these things,’ the Fool an­nounced. ‘And, be­hind those trees, I found an­other carved column such as we have seen be­fore.’ He set a curi­ous hand to the skin of the sculp­ture, then al­most winced away at the cold con­tact.

  ‘I can­not be­lieve they are life­less stone,’ I told him.

  ‘I, too, have never seen such real­istic de­tail in a carving,’ he agreed.

  I did not try to tell him he had mis­un­der­stood me. In­stead, I stood pon­der­ing a thing. Here, I sensed life, but there was only cold stone un­der my hand. It had been the op­pos­ite with Forged ones; sav­age life ob­vi­ously mo­tiv­ated their bod­ies, yet my Wit-sense re­garded them as but cold stone. I groped for some sort of con­nec­tion but found only the odd com­par­ison.

  I glanced about me but found my com­pan­ions scattered through­out the forest, mov­ing from sculp­ture to sculp­ture, and call­ing to one an­other in de­light as they dis­covered new ones un­der clam­ber­ing ivy or en­gulfed in fallen leaves. I drif­ted after them slowly. It seemed to me that this might be the des­tin­a­tion marked on the map. It al­most cer­tainly was, if the old map­maker had had his scale cor­rect. And yet, why? What was im­port­ant about these statues? The sig­ni­fic­ance of the city I had seen at once; it might have been the ori­ginal hab­it­a­tion of the Eld­er­lings. But this?

  I hastened after Kettricken. I found her by a winged bull. He slept, legs fol­ded un­der him, power­ful shoulders bunched, heavy muzzle dropped to his knees. It was a per­fect rep­lica of a bull in every way, from its wide sweep of horns to its tufted tail. His cloven hooves were bur­ied be­neath the forest loam, but I did not doubt they were there. She had stretched her arms wide to span the sweep of his horns. Like all the oth­ers, he had wings, fol­ded in re­pose on his wide black back.

  ‘May I see the map?’ I asked her, and she star­ted out of her rev­erie.

  ‘I’ve already checked it,’ she told me quietly. ‘I am con­vinced this is the marked area. We passed the re­mains of two stone bridges. That cor­res­ponds to what is shown on the map. And the mark­ing on the column the Fool found cor­res­ponds to one you copied in the city for this des­tin­a­tion. I think we are on what were once the shores of a lake. That is how I’ve been read­ing the map, any­way.’

  ‘The shores of a lake.’ I nod­ded to my­self as I con­sidered what Ver­ity’s map had shown me. ‘Per­haps. Per­haps it sil­ted in and be­came swamp. But then, what do all these statues sig­nify?’

  She made a vague ges­ture around at the forest. ‘A garden or park of some kind, per­haps?’

  I looked around us and shook my head. ‘Not like any garden I’ve ever seen. The statues seem ran­dom. Should not a garden pos­sess unity and theme? At least, so Pa­tience taught me. Here I see only sprawled statues, with no sign of paths or beds or … Kettricken? Are all the statues of sleep­ing creatures?’

  She frowned to her­self for a mo­ment. ‘I be­lieve so. And I think that all are winged.’

  ‘Per­haps it is a grave­yard,’ I ven­tured. ‘Per­haps there are tombs be­neath these creatures. Per­haps this is some strange her­aldry, mark­ing the burial places for dif­fer­ent fam­il­ies.’

  Kettricken looked about us, con­sid­er­ing. ‘Per­haps it is so. But why would that be marked on the map?’

  ‘Why would a garden?’ I countered.

  We spent the rest of the af­ter­noon ex­plor­ing the area. We found a great many more an­im­als. There were all kinds and a vari­ety of styles, but all were winged and sleep­ing. And they had been here a very long time. A closer ex­am­in­a­tion showed me that these great trees had grown around the statues, the statues had not been placed around them. Some were al­most cap­tured by the en­croach­ing moss and leaf mould. Of one, little re­mained to be seen save a great toothed snout pro­ject­ing from a boggy bit of ground. The bared teeth shone sil­ver and the tips were sharp.

  ‘Yet I found not a single one with a chip or a crack. Every one looks as per­fect as the day it was cre­ated. Nor can I de­cide how the col­ours were put to the stone. It does not feel like paint or stain, nor does it ap­pear weathered by the years.’

  I was ex­pound­ing my thoughts slowly to the oth­ers as we sat about our camp­fire that even­ing. I was try­ing to work Kettricken’s comb through my wet hair. In the late af­ter­noon, I had slipped away from the oth­ers, to wash thor­oughly for the first time since we had left Jhaampe. I had also at­temp­ted to wash out some of my clothes. When I re­turned to camp, I had found that all of the oth­ers had had much the same ideas. Kettle was moodily drap­ing wet laun­dry on a dragon to dry. Kettricken’s cheeks were pinker than usual and she had reb­raided her wet hair into a tight queue. Starling seemed to have for­got­ten her earlier an­ger at me. In­deed, she seemed to have for­got­ten en­tirely about the rest of us. She stared at the flames of the camp­fire, a mus­ing look on her face, and I could al­most see the tum­bling words and notes as she fit them to­gether. I wondered what it was like, if it was like solv­ing the game puzzles that Kettricken set for me. It seemed odd to watch her face, know­ing a song was un­fold­ing in her mind.

  Nighteyes came to lean his head against my knee. I do not like den­ning in the midst of these liv­ing stones, he con­fided to me.

  ‘It does seem as if at any mo­ment they might awaken,’ I ob­served.

  Kettle had settled with a sigh to the earth be­side me. She shook her old head slowly. ‘I do not think so,’ she said quietly. She al­most soun­ded as if she grieved.

  ‘Well, as we can­not fathom their mys­tery, and what re­mains of the road has ended here, we shall leave them to­mor­row and re­sume our jour­ney,’ Kettricken an­nounced.

  ‘What will you do,’ the Fool asked quietly, ‘if Ver­ity is not at the last map des­tin­a­tion?’

  ‘I do not know,’ Kettricken con­fided to us quietly. ‘Nor shall I worry about it un­til it hap­pens. I still have an ac­tion left to take; un­til I have ex­hausted it, I shall not des­pair.’

  It struck me then that she spoke as if con­sid­er­ing a game, with one fi­nal move left that might yet lead to vic­tory. Then I de­cided that I had spent too much time fo­cus­ing on Kettle’s game prob­lems. I yanked a last snarl from my hair and pulled it back into a tail.

  Come hunt with me be­fore the last light is gone, the wolf sug­ges­ted.

  ‘I think I shall hunt with Nighteyes to­night,’ I an­nounced as I stood and stretched. I raised one eye­brow at the Fool, but he seemed lost in thought and made no re­sponse. As I stepped away from the fire, Kettricken asked me, ‘Are you safe, alone?’

  ‘We are far from the Skill road. This has been the most peace­ful day I’ve known in some time. In some ways.’

  ‘We may be far from the Skill road, but we are still in the heart of a land once oc­cu­pied by Skill-users. They have left their touch every­where. You can­not say, while you walk these hills, that you are safe. You should not go alone.’

  Nighteyes whined low in his throat, anxious to be gone. I longed to go hunt with him, to stalk and chase, to move through the night with no hu­man thoughts. But I would not dis­count Kettle’s warn­ing.

  ‘I’ll go with him,’ Starling offered sud­denly. She rose, dust­ing her hands on her hips. If any­one be­sides my­self thought it was strange, no one made sign of it. I ex­pec­ted at least a mock­ing farewell from the Fool, but he con­tin­ued to gaze off into the dark­ness. I hoped he was not get­ting sick again.

  Do you mind if she goes with us? I asked Nighteyes.

  In reply he gave a small sigh of resig­na­tion, and trot­ted away from the fire. I fol­lowed him more slowly and Starling fol­lowed me.

  ‘Shouldn’t we catch up with him?’ she asked me sev­eral mo­ments later. The forest and the deep­en­ing dusk were clos­ing in around us. Nighteyes was nowhere to be seen, but then, I did not need to see him.

  I s
poke, not in a whis­per, but very low. ‘When we hunt, we move in­de­pend­ently of one an­other. When one of us starts up some game, the other comes swiftly, either to in­ter­cept, or to join in the chase.’

  My eyes had ad­jus­ted to the dark. Our quest led us away from the statues, into a forest night in­no­cent of man’s work­ings. Spring smells were strong, and the songs of frogs and in­sects were all around us. I soon struck a game trail and began to move along it. Starling came be­hind me, not si­lently, but not awk­wardly either. When one moves through the forest by day or by night, one can either move with it or against it. Some people know how to do it in­stinct­ively; oth­ers never learn. Starling moved with the forest, duck­ing un­der hanging branches and sidestep­ping oth­ers as we wove our way through the night. She did not try to force her way through the thick­ets we en­countered, but turned her body to avoid be­ing caught on the twiggy branches.

  You are so aware of her, you will not see a rab­bit if you step on it! Nighteyes chided me.

  At that mo­ment, a hare star­ted from a bush right be­side my path. I sprang after it, go­ing doubled over to fol­low it on the game trail. It was far faster than me, but I knew it would most likely circle. I also knew that Nighteyes was mov­ing swiftly to in­ter­cept it. I heard Starling hur­ry­ing after me but had no time to think of her as I kept the hare in sight as it dodged around trees and un­der snags. Twice I nearly had it, and twice it doubled away from me. But the second time it doubled, it raced straight into the jaws of the wolf. He sprang, pinned it to the earth with his front paws, then seized its small skull in his jaws. As he stood, he gave it a sharp shake, snap­ping its neck.

  I was open­ing its belly and spill­ing its en­trails out for the wolf when Starling caught up with us. Nighteyes snapped the guts up with rel­ish. Let’s find an­other, he sug­ges­ted, and moved swiftly off into the night.

  ‘He al­ways gives up the meat to you like that?’ Starling asked me.

  ‘He doesn’t give it up. He lets me carry it. He knows that now is the best hunt­ing, and so he hopes to kill again swiftly. If not, he knows I will keep meat safe for him, and that we will share later.’ I se­cured the dead hare to my belt. I star­ted off through the night, the warm body flop­ping lightly against my thigh as I walked.

  ‘Oh.’ Starling fol­lowed. A short time later, as if in an­swer to some­thing I’d said, she ob­served, ‘I do not find your Wit-bond with the wolf of­fens­ive.’

  ‘Neither do I,’ I replied quietly. Some­thing in her choice of words nettled me. I con­tin­ued to prowl along the trail, eyes and ears alert. I could hear the soft pad, pad, pad of Nighteyes’ feet off to my left and ahead of me. I hoped he would scare game to­ward me.

  A short time later, Starling ad­ded, ‘And I will stop call­ing the Fool “she”. Whatever I may sus­pect.’

  ‘That’s good,’ I told her non­com­mit­tally. I did not slow my pace.

  I truly doubt you will be much good as hunter this night.

  This is not of my choos­ing.

  I know.

  ‘Do you want me to apo­lo­gize as well?’ Starling asked in a low strained voice.

  ‘I … uh,’ I stammered, and fell si­lent, un­sure of what this was all about.

  ‘Very well then,’ she said in an icily de­term­ined voice. ‘I apo­lo­gize, Lord FitzChiv­alry.’

  I roun­ded on her. ‘Why are you do­ing this?’ I de­man­ded. I spoke in a nor­mal voice. I could sense Nighteyes. He was already top­ping the hill, hunt­ing alone now.

  ‘My lady queen bid me stop spread­ing dis­cord within the com­pany. She said that Lord FitzChiv­alry car­ried many bur­dens I could not know of, and did not de­serve to bear also my dis­ap­proval,’ she in­formed me care­fully.

  I wondered when all this had come to pass, but dared not ask it. ‘None of this is ne­ces­sary,’ I said quietly. I felt oddly shamed, like a spoiled child who had sulked un­til the other chil­dren gave in. I took a deep breath, de­term­ined simply to speak hon­es­tly and see what came of it. ‘I do not know what made you with­draw your friend­ship, save that I dis­closed my Wit to you. Nor do I un­der­stand your sus­pi­cions of the Fool, or why they seem to an­ger you. I hate this awk­ward­ness between us. I wish we could be friends, as we were be­fore.’

  ‘You do not des­pise me, then? For giv­ing my wit­ness that you claimed Molly’s child as your get?’

  I groped in­side me after the lost feel­ings. It had been long since I had even thought about it. ‘Chade already knew of them,’ I said quietly. ‘He would have found a way, even if you had not ex­is­ted. He is very … re­source­ful. And I have come to un­der­stand that you do not live by the same rules that I do.’

  ‘I used to,’ she said softly. ‘A long time ago. Be­fore the keep was sacked and I was left for dead. After that, it was hard to be­lieve in the rules. Everything was taken from me. All that was good and beau­ti­ful and truth­ful was laid waste by evil and lust and greed. No. By some­thing even baser than lust and greed, some drive I could not even un­der­stand. Even while the Raid­ers were rap­ing me, they seemed to take no pleas­ure in it. At least, not the kind of pleas­ure … They mocked my pain and strug­gling. Those who watched were laugh­ing as they waited.’ She was look­ing past me into the dark­ness of the past. I be­lieve she spoke as much to her­self as me, grop­ing to un­der­stand some­thing that de­fied mean­ing. ‘It was as if they were driven, but not by any lust or greed that could be sated. It was a thing they could do to me, so they did it. I had al­ways be­lieved, per­haps child­ishly, that if you fol­lowed the rules, you would be pro­tec­ted, that things like that would not hap­pen to you. Af­ter­wards, I felt … tricked. Fool­ish. Gull­ible, that I had thought ideals could pro­tect me. Hon­our and cour­tesy and justice … they are not real, Fitz. We all pre­tend to them, and hold them to us like shields. But they guard only against folk who carry the same shields. Against those who have dis­carded them, they are no shields at all, but only ad­di­tional weapons to use against their vic­tims.’

  I felt diz­zied for an in­stant. I had never heard a wo­man speak of some­thing like that so dis­pas­sion­ately. Mostly it was not spoken of at all. The rapes that oc­curred dur­ing a raid, the preg­nan­cies that might fol­low, even the chil­dren that Six Duch­ies wo­men bore to the Red Ship Raid­ers were sel­dom spoken of as such. I sud­denly real­ized we had been stand­ing still a long time. The chill of the spring night was reach­ing me. ‘Let’s go back to the camp,’ I sug­ges­ted ab­ruptly.

  ‘No,’ she said flatly. ‘Not yet. I fear I may cry, and if I do, I’d rather do it in the dark.’

  It was get­ting close to full dark. But I led her back to a wider game trail, and we found a log to sit down on. Around us, the frogs and in­sects filled the night with mat­ing songs.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I asked her after we had sat some time in the si­lence.

  ‘No. I am not,’ she said shortly. ‘I need to make you un­der­stand. I did not sell your child cheaply, Fitz. I did not be­tray you cas­u­ally. At first, I did not even think of it that way. Who would not want her daugh­ter to be­come a prin­cess, and even­tu­ally a queen? Who would not want lovely clothes and a fine home for his child? I did not think that you or your wo­man would see it as a mis­for­tune be­fall­ing her.’

  ‘Molly is my wife,’ I said quietly, but I truly be­lieve she did not hear me.

  ‘Then, even after I knew it would not please you, I did it any­way. Know­ing it would buy me a place here, at your side, wit­ness­ing … whatever it is you are go­ing to do. See­ing strange sights no min­strel has ever sung of be­fore, like those statues today. Be­cause it was my only chance at a fu­ture. I must have a song, I must wit­ness some­thing that will as­sure me forever of a place of hon­our among min­strels. Some­thing that will guar­an­tee me my soup and wine when I am too old to travel from keep to keep.’

  ‘Couldn’t you h
ave settled for a man to share your life and chil­dren?’ I asked quietly. ‘It seems to me you have no prob­lem catch­ing a man’s eye. Surely there must be one that …’

  ‘No man wants a bar­ren wo­man to wed,’ she said. Her voice went flat, los­ing its mu­sic. ‘At the fall of Dim­ity Keep, Fitz, they left me for dead. And I lay there among the dead, sure that I would die soon, for I could not ima­gine con­tinu­ing to live. Around me build­ings were burn­ing and in­jured folk were scream­ing and I could smell flesh scorch­ing …’ She stopped speak­ing. When she re­sumed, her voice was a bit more even. ‘But I didn’t die. My body was stronger than my will. On the second day, I dragged my­self to wa­ter. Some other sur­viv­ors found me. I lived, and was bet­ter off than many. Un­til two months later. By then I was sure that what had been done to me was worse than killing me. I knew I car­ried a child fathered by one of those creatures.

  ‘So I went to a healer, who gave me herbs that did not work. I went to her again, and she warned me, say­ing if they had not worked, then I had bet­ter leave it to hap­pen. But I went to an­other healer, who gave me a dif­fer­ent po­tion. It … made me bleed. I shook the child loose from me, but the bleed­ing did not stop. I went back to the heal­ers, both of them, but neither could help me. They said it would stop on its own, in time. But the one told me that it was likely I would never have other chil­dren.’ Her voice tightened, then thickened. ‘I know you think it slat­ternly, the way I am with men. But once you have been forced, it is … dif­fer­ent. Ever after. I say to my­self, well, I know that it can hap­pen to me at any time. So this way, at least I de­cide with whom and when. There will never be chil­dren for me, and hence there will never be a per­man­ent man. So why should not I take my pick of what I can have? You made me ques­tion that for a time, you know. Un­til Moon­seye. Moon­seye proved me right again. And from Moon­seye I came to Jhaampe, know­ing that I was free to do whatever I must do to as­sure my own sur­vival. For there will be no man and no chil­dren to look after me when I am old.’ Her voice went brittle and un­even as she said, ‘Some­times I think it were bet­ter had they Forged me …’