Assassin's Quest (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  I looked at her ma­gic-coated arms and hands. ‘What have you done?’ I asked her.

  ‘Only what was ne­ces­sary. Ver­ity took me to the river in the city. Now our work will pro­ceed more swiftly. What happened to you?’

  I did not an­swer her. In­stead I pinned Ver­ity with a glare. ‘You sent me off so I would not fol­low you! You knew I could not wake the dragons, but you wanted me out of the way!’ I could not con­ceal the out­rage and be­trayal I felt.

  Ver­ity gave me one of his old grins, deny­ing all re­grets. ‘We know one an­other very well, don’t we?’ was all he offered by way of apo­logy. Then his grin grew wider. ‘Yes, it was a fool’s er­rand I sent you on. But I was the fool, for you did it. You woke one, or stirred him at least.’

  I shook my head at him.

  ‘Yes, you did. You must have felt it, that rip­pling of Skill, just be­fore I reached you. What did you do, how did you stir him?’

  ‘A man died on the stone boar’s tusks,’ I said flatly. ‘Per­haps that is how you rouse these dragons. With death.’ I can­not ex­plain the hurt I felt. He had taken what should have been mine and given it to Kettle. He owed that Skill-close­ness to me, no other. Who else had come so far, given up so much for him? How could he deny me the carving of his dragon?

  It was Skill-hun­ger, pure and simple, but I did not know it then. At that time, all I could feel was how per­fectly linked he was with Kettle, and how firmly he re­pulsed me from join­ing that link. He walled me out as tightly as if I were Regal. I had for­saken my wife and child and crossed all of the Six Duch­ies to be of ser­vice to him, and now he turned me away. He should have taken me to the river, been be­side me as I had that ex­per­i­ence. I had never known my­self cap­able of such jeal­ousy. Nighteyes came back from frisk­ing about Kettricken to push his head un­der my arm. I rubbed his throat and hugged him. He, at least, was mine.

  She un­der­stood me, he re­peated anxiously. I made her un­der­stand, and she told him he must go.

  Kettricken, com­ing to stand be­side me, said, ‘I had the strongest feel­ing you needed help. It took much ur­ging, but fi­nally Ver­ity left the dragon and went for you. Are you much hurt?’

  I got to my feet slowly, dust­ing my­self off. ‘Only my pride, that my king would treat me as a child. He might have let me know he pre­ferred Kettle’s com­pany.’

  A flash of some­thing in Kettricken’s eyes made me re­call to whom I spoke. But she hid her twin hurt well, say­ing only, ‘A man was killed, you say?’

  ‘Not by me. He fell on the stone boar’s tusks in the dark and gut­ted him­self. But I saw no stir­ring of dragons.’

  ‘Not the death, but the spilled life,’ Kettle said to Ver­ity. ‘That might be it. Like the scent of fresh meat rous­ing a dog starved near to death. They are hungry, my king, but not past rous­ing. Not if you find a way to feed them.’

  ‘I like not the sound of that!’ I ex­claimed.

  ‘It is not for us to like or dis­like,’ Ver­ity said heav­ily. ‘It is the nature of dragons. They must be filled, and life is what fills them. It must be given will­ingly to cre­ate one. But dragons will take what they need to sus­tain them, once they rise in flight. What had you sup­posed that King Wis­dom offered them in re­turn for de­feat­ing the Red Ships?’

  Kettle poin­ted a scold­ing fin­ger at the Fool. ‘Pay heed to that, Fool and un­der­stand now why you are so weary. When you touched her with Skill, you linked with her. She draws you to her now, and you think you go out of pity. But she will take from you whatever she needs to rise. Even if it is your whole life.’

  ‘No one is mak­ing any sense,’ I de­clared. Then, as my own scattered wits re­turned to me, I ex­claimed, ‘Regal has sent sol­diers. They are on the march here. They are no more than a few days away at most. I sus­pect they push them­selves and travel swiftly. The men guard­ing the pil­lars are placed there to pre­vent Ver­ity’s es­cape.’

  It was much later that night be­fore I had it all sor­ted out. Kettle and Ver­ity had in­deed gone to the river, al­most as soon as I left. They had used the pil­lar to get down to the city, and there they had laved Kettle’s arms in the stuff and re­newed the power in Ver­ity’s. Every glimpse of that sil­ver­ing of her arms woke in me a Skill-hun­ger that was al­most a lust. It was some­thing I masked my­self and at­temp­ted to hide from Ver­ity. I do not be­lieve he was de­ceived, but he did not force me to con­front it. I masked my jeal­ousy with other ex­cuses. I told them both hotly it was only the purest luck they had not en­countered the co­terie there. Ver­ity had calmly replied that he had known the risk and taken it. Some­how it hurt me all the more that even my an­ger left him so un­moved.

  It had been on their re­turn that they had dis­covered the Fool chip­ping at the stone that mired Girl-on-a-Dragon. He had cleared an area around one foot, and be­gun on the other. The foot it­self re­mained a shape­less chunk of stone but the Fool in­sis­ted that he could feel the foot, in­tact in­side it. He felt cer­tain that all she wished from him was that he chop the dragon free of that which mired it. He had been shak­ing with ex­haus­tion when they found him. Kettle had in­sis­ted he go right to bed. She had taken the last piece of of­ten-boiled elf­bark and ground it down fine, to make one last dose of tea for him. Des­pite the drug, he re­mained de­tached and weary, scarcely even ask­ing a ques­tion as to what had happened to me. I felt deep un­eas­i­ness for him.

  The news I had brought of Regal’s men stirred every­one to ac­tion. After food, Ver­ity sent Starling, the Fool, and the wolf to the mouth of the quarry, to keep watch there. I sat by the fire for a time, with a cold wet rag wrapped around my swollen and dis­col­oured knee. Up on the dragon dais, Kettricken kept her fires burn­ing, and Ver­ity and Kettle worked the stone. Starling, in help­ing Kettle search for more elf­bark, had dis­covered the car­ris seeds that Chade had give me. Kettle had ap­pro­pri­ated them and brewed them up into a stim­u­lant drink she and Ver­ity were shar­ing. The noise of their work had taken on a fright­en­ing tempo.

  They had also found the sun­skirt seeds I had bought so long ago as a pos­sible sub­sti­tute for elf­bark. With a sly grin, Starling asked me why I was car­ry­ing those. When I ex­plained, she had snorted with laughter, and fi­nally man­aged to ex­plain they were re­garded as an aph­ro­dis­iac. I re­called the herb-seller’s words to me and shook my head to my­self. A part of me saw the hu­mour, but I could not find a smile.

  After a time of sit­ting alone by the cook fire, I ques­ted to­ward Nighteyes. How goes it?

  A sigh. The min­strel would rather be play­ing with her harp. The Scent­less One would rather be chip­ping at that statue. And I would rather be hunt­ing. If there is danger com­ing, it is a long way away.

  Let us hope it stays there. Keep watch, my friend.

  I left the camp and gimped up the scree of stone to the dragon dais. Three of its feet were free now, and Ver­ity worked on the fi­nal front foot. I stood for a time be­side him, but he did not deign to no­tice me. In­stead he went on chip­ping and scrap­ing, and all the while muttered old nurs­ery rhymes or drink­ing songs to him­self. I limped past Kettricken list­lessly tend­ing her fires back to where Kettle was smooth­ing her hands over the dragon’s tail. Her eyes were dis­tant as she called for the scales, and then deepened their de­tail and ad­ded tex­ture to them. Part of the tail also re­mained hid­den in the stone. I star­ted to lean on the thick por­tion of the tail to take weight off my bruised knee, but she im­me­di­ately sat up and hissed at me. ‘Don’t do that! Don’t touch him!’

  I straightened away from him. ‘I touched him be­fore,’ I said in­dig­nantly. ‘And it did no harm.’

  ‘That was be­fore. He is much closer to com­ple­tion now.’ She lif­ted her eyes to mine. Even in the fire­light, I could mark how thickly rock dust coated her fea­tures and clung to her eye­lashes. She looked dread­fully tired and yet an­im­at
ed by some fierce en­ergy. ‘As close as you are to Ver­ity, the dragon would reach for you. And you are not strong enough to say no. He would pull you in com­pletely. That’s how strong he is, how mag­ni­fi­cently strong.’ She all but crooned the last words as she stroked her hands again down the tail. For an in­stant, I saw a sheen of col­our right be­hind their pas­sage.

  ‘Is any­one ever go­ing to ex­plain any of this to me?’ I asked petu­lantly.

  She gave me a be­mused look. ‘I try. Ver­ity tries. But you of all people should know how wear­i­some words are. We try and try and try to tell you, and still your mind does not grasp it. It is not your fault. Words are not big enough. And it is too dan­ger­ous to in­clude you in our Skilling now.’

  ‘Will you be able to make me un­der­stand after the dragon is fin­ished?’

  She looked at me and some­thing like pity crossed her face. ‘FitzChiv­alry. My dear friend. When the dragon is fin­ished? Rather say that when Ver­ity and I are fin­ished, the dragon will be be­gun.’

  ‘I don’t un­der­stand!’ I snarled in frus­tra­tion.

  ‘But he told you. I said it again when I warned the Fool. Dragons feed on life. A whole life, will­ingly given. That is what it takes to make a dragon rise. And usu­ally not just one. In olden times, when wise men sought out Jhaampe town, they came as a co­terie, as a whole that was more than the sum of its parts, and gave that all over into a dragon. The dragon must be filled. Ver­ity and I must put all of ourselves, every part of our lives, into it. It is easier for me. Eda knows I have lived more than my share of years, and I have no de­sire to go on in this body. It is harder, much harder, for Ver­ity. He leaves be­hind his throne, his pretty, lov­ing wife, his love of do­ing things with his hands. He leaves be­hind rid­ing a fine horse, hunt­ing stags, walk­ing amongst his own people. Oh, I feel them all within the dragon already. The care­ful ink­ing of col­our onto a map, the feel of a clean piece of vel­lum un­der his hands. I even know the smells of his inks, now. He has put them all into the dragon. It is hard for him. But he does it, and the pain it costs him is one more thing he puts into the dragon. It will fuel his fury to­ward the Red Ships when he rises. In fact, there is only one thing he has held back from his dragon. Only one thing that may make him fall short of his goal.’

  ‘What is that?’ I asked her un­will­ingly.

  Her old eyes met mine. ‘You. He has re­fused to al­low you to be put into the dragon. He could do it, you know, whether you willed it or not. He could simply reach out and pull you into him. But he re­fuses. He says you love your life too much, he will not take it from you. That you have already laid down too much of it for a king who has re­turned you only pain and hard­ship.’

  Did she know that with her words she gave Ver­ity back to me? I sus­pect she did. I had seen much of her past dur­ing our Skill-shar­ing. I knew the ex­per­i­ence had to have flowed both ways. She knew how I had loved him, and how hurt I had been to find him so dis­tant when I got here. I stood up im­me­di­ately to go speak with him.

  ‘Fitz!’ she called me back. I turned to her. ‘Two things I would have you know, pain­ful as you may find them.’

  I braced my­self. ‘Your mother loved you,’ she said quietly. ‘You say you can­not re­call her. Ac­tu­ally, you can­not for­give her. But she is there, with you, in your memor­ies. She was tall and fair, a Moun­tain wo­man. And she loved you. It was not her choice to part from you.’

  Her words angered me and diz­zied me. I pushed away the know­ledge she offered me. I knew I had no memor­ies of the wo­man who had borne me. Time and again, I had searched my­self, and found no trace of her. None at all. ‘And the second thing,’ I asked her coldly.

  She did not re­act to my an­ger, save with pity. ‘It is as bad, or per­haps worse. Again, it is a thing you already know. It is sad, that the only gifts I can of­fer you, the Cata­lyst who has changed my liv­ing death to dy­ing life, are things you already pos­sess. But there it is, and so I will say it. You will live to love again. You know you have lost your spring­time girl, your Molly on the beach with the wind in her brown hair and red cloak. You have been gone too long from her, and too much has be­fallen you both. And what you loved, what both of you truly loved, was not each other. It was the time of your life. It was the spring of your years, and life run­ning strong in you, and war on your door­step and your strong, per­fect bod­ies. Look back, in truth. You will find you re­call fully as many quar­rels and tears as you do love-mak­ing and kisses. Fitz. Be wise. Let her go, and keep those memor­ies in­tact. Save what you can of her, and let her keep what she can of the wild and dar­ing boy she loved. Be­cause both he and that merry little miss are no more than memor­ies any more.’ She shook her head. ‘No more than memor­ies.’

  ‘You are wrong!’ I shouted furi­ously. ‘You are wrong!’

  The force of my cries had brought Kettricken to her feet. She stared at me, in fear and worry. I could not look at her. Tall and fair. My mother had been tall and fair. No. I re­called noth­ing of her. I strode past her, heed­less of the wrench of pain my knee gave me at every step. I walked around the dragon, damning it with every step I took, and de­fy­ing it to sense what I felt. When I reached Ver­ity work­ing on the left fore-foot, I crouched down be­side him and spoke in a sav­age whis­per.

  ‘Kettle says you are go­ing to die when this dragon is done. That you will put all of your­self into it. Or so, with my feeble un­der­stand­ing of her words, I take it. Tell me I am wrong.’

  He leaned back on his heels and swiped at the chips he had loosened. ‘You are wrong,’ he said mildly. ‘Fetch your broom, would you, and clear this?’

  I fetched my broom and came up be­side him, al­most of a mind to break it over his head more than use it. I knew he sensed my sim­mer­ing fury, but he still ges­tured for me to clear his work-space. I did so with one furi­ous brush. ‘Now,’ he said gently. ‘That is a fine an­ger you have. Po­tent and strong. That, I think, I shall take for him.’

  Soft as the brush of a but­ter­fly’s wing, I felt the kiss of his Skill. My an­ger was snatched from me, flayed whole from my soul and swept away to …

  ‘No. Don’t fol­low it.’ A gentle Skill-push from Ver­ity, and I snapped back to my body. An in­stant later, I found my­self sit­ting flat on the stone while the whole uni­verse swung dizzy­ingly around my head. I curled for­ward slowly, bring­ing up my knees to lean my head against them. I felt wretchedly ill. My an­ger was gone, re­placed by a weary numb­ness.

  ‘There,’ Ver­ity con­tin­ued. ‘As you asked for, I have done. I think you un­der­stand bet­ter now, what it is to put some­thing into the dragon. Would you care to feed it more of your­self?’

  I shook my head mutely. I feared to open my mouth.

  ‘I will not die when the dragon is fin­ished, Fitz. I will be con­sumed, that is true. Quite lit­er­ally. But I will go on. As the dragon.’

  I found my voice. ‘And Kettle?’

  ‘Kestrel will be a part of me. And her sis­ter Gull. But I shall be the dragon.’ He had gone back to his wretched stone chip­ping.

  ‘How can you do that?’ My voice was filled with ac­cus­a­tion. ‘How can you do that to Kettricken? She’s given up everything to come here to you. And you will simply leave her, alone and child­less?’

  He leaned for­ward so that his fore­head res­ted against the dragon. His end­less chip­ping stopped. After a time, he spoke in a thick voice. ‘I should have you stand here and talk to me while I work, Fitz. Just when I think I am past any great feel­ings at all, you stir them in me.’ He lif­ted his face to re­gard me. His tears had cut two paths through the grey rock dust. ‘What choice do I have?’

  ‘Simply leave the dragon. Let us go back to the Six Duch­ies, and rally the folk, and fight the Red Ships with sword and Skill, as we did be­fore. Per­haps …’

  ‘Per­haps we would all be dead be­fore we even reached Jhaampe. Is that a bet­ter end
for my queen? No. I shall carry her back to Buck­keep, and clean the coasts, and she shall reign long and well as Queen. There. That is what I choose to give her.’

  ‘And an heir?’ I asked bit­terly.

  He shrugged wear­ily and took up his chisel again. ‘You know what must be. Your daugh­ter will be raised as heir.’

  ‘NO! Threaten me with that again, and re­gard­less of the risk, I will Skill to Burrich to flee with her.’

  ‘You can­not Skill to Burrich,’ Ver­ity ob­served mildly. He ap­peared to be meas­ur­ing for the dragon’s toe. ‘Chiv­alry closed his mind to the Skill years ago, to keep Burrich from be­ing used against him. As the Fool was used against you.’

  An­other small mys­tery laid to rest. For all the good it did me. ‘Ver­ity, please. I beg you. Do not do this thing to me. Far bet­ter I should be con­sumed in the dragon as well. I of­fer you that. Take my life and feed it to the dragon. I will give you any­thing you ask of me. But prom­ise me that my daugh­ter will not be sac­ri­ficed to the Farseer throne.’

  ‘I can­not make you that prom­ise,’ he said heav­ily.

  ‘If you bore any feel­ings at all for me any more,’ I began, but he in­ter­rup­ted me.

  ‘Can­not you un­der­stand, no mat­ter how of­ten you are told? I have feel­ings. But I have put them into the dragon.’

  I man­aged to stand up. I limped away. There was noth­ing more to say to him. King or man, uncle or friend, I seemed to have lost all know­ledge of who he was. When I Skilled to­ward him, I found only his walls. When I ques­ted to­ward him with the Wit, I found his life flick­er­ing between him­self and the stone dragon. And of late, it seemed to burn brighter within the dragon, not Ver­ity.