Assassins Quest

by Robin Hobb

  Yes, and fire makes you warmer, right up until the time it burns you.

  I had no reply to that. Instead I walked alongside Kettle for a way. After days of traveling single file on the narrow trail, this seemed easier and more companionable. We walked all the rest of the afternoon on the ancient road. It climbed ever upward, but always angling across the faces of the hills, so that the going was never too steep. The only things that ever marred the smooth coat of snow on its surface were occasional dead branches dropped from trees above, and most of these were decaying into sawdust. Not once did I see any animal tracks, either on the road or crossing it.

  Not even a sniff of any game, Nighteyes confirmed woefully. I shall have to range this night to find fresh meat for myself.

  You could go now, I suggested.

  I trust you not alone upon this road, he informed me sternly.

  What could harm me? Kettle is right here beside me, so I would not be alone.

  She is as bad as you are, Nighteyes insisted stubbornly. But despite my questions, he could not explain to me what he meant.

  Yet as afternoon deepened into evening, I began to have notions of my own. Time and again, I caught my mind drifting in vivid daydreams, musings so engrossing that coming out of them was like waking with a start. And like many a dream, they popped like bubbles, leaving me with almost no recall of what I had been thinking. Patience giving military commands as if she were Queen of the Six Duchies. Burrich bathing a baby and humming as he did so. Two people I did not know, setting charred stones upon one another as they rebuilt a house. Foolish, bright-colored images they seemed, but edged so vividly that almost I believed my own musings. The easy walking on the road that had seemed so pleasant at first began to seem an involuntary hurrying, as if a current urged me on independent of my own will. Yet I could not have been hurrying much, for Kettle kept pace with me all the afternoon. Kettle broke in often on my thoughts, to ask me trivial questions, to draw my attention to a bird overhead, or to ask if my back was bothering me. I endeavored to answer, but moments later I could not recall what we had been talking about. I could not blame her for frowning at me, so muddle-witted was I, but neither could I seem to find a remedy for my absent mind. We passed a fallen log across the road. I thought of something odd about it, and intended to mention it to Kettle, but the thought fled before I could master it. So caught up was I in nothing at all that when the Fool hailed me, I startled. I peered ahead, but could not even see the jeppas anymore. Then, “FitzChivalry!” he shouted again, and I turned around, to find I had walked past not only him, but our whole expedition. Kettle at my side muttered to herself as she turned back.

  The others had halted and were already unloading the jeppas. “Surely you don’t mean to pitch the tent in the center of the road?” Kettle asked in alarm.

  Starling and the Fool looked up from where they were stretching out the goat leather shape of the yurt. “Fear ye the hurrying throngs and carts?” the Fool asked sarcastically.

  “It’s flat and level. Last night, I had a root or a rock under my bedding,” Starling added.

  Kettle ignored them and spoke to Kettricken. “And we’d be in full view for anyone who stepped onto this road for quite a way in both directions. I think we should move off and camp under the trees. ”

  Kettricken glanced about. “It’s nearly dark, Kettle. And I do not think we have a great deal to fear from pursuit. I think . . . ”

  I flinched when the Fool took my arm and walked me to the edge of the road. “Climb up,” he told me gruffly when we got to the edge of the forest. I did, scrambling up to stand once more on forest moss. Once I was there, I yawned, feeling my ears pop. Almost right away, I felt more alert. I glanced back to the road where Starling and Kettricken were gathering up the yurt hides to move them. Kettle was already dragging the poles off the road. “So, we’ve decided to camp off the road,” I observed stupidly.

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  “Are you all right?” the Fool asked me anxiously.

  “Of course. My back is no worse than usual,” I added, thinking he referred to that.

  “You were standing there, staring off up the road, paying no heed to anyone. Kettle says you’ve been like that most of the afternoon. ”

  “I’ve been a bit muddled,” I admitted. I dragged off my mitten to touch my own face. “I don’t think I’m getting a fever. But it was like that . . . bright-edged fever thoughts. ”

  “Kettle says she thinks it’s the road. She said that you said it was Skill-wrought. ”

  “She said I said? No. I thought that was what she said when we came onto it. That it was Skill-wrought. ”

  “What is “Skill-wrought’?” the Fool asked me.

  “Shaped by the Skill,” I replied, then added, “I suppose. I’ve never heard of the Skill used to make or shape something. ” I looked wondering back at the road. It flowed so smoothly through the forest, a pure white ribbon, vanishing off under the trees. It drew the eye, and almost I could see what lay beyond the next fold of the forested hillside.

  “Fitz!”

  I jerked my attention back to the Fool in annoyance. “What?” I demanded.

  He was shivering. “You’ve just been standing there, staring off down the road since I left you. I thought you’d gone to get firewood, until I looked up and saw you standing here still. What is the matter?”

  I blinked my eyes slowly. I had been walking in a city, looking at the bright yellow and red fruit heaped high in the market stalls. But even as I groped after that dream, it was gone, leaving only a confusion of color and scent in my mind. “I don’t know. Perhaps I am feverish. Or just very weary. I’ll go get the wood. ”

  “I’m going with you,” the Fool announced.

  By my knee, Nighteyes whined anxiously. I looked down at him. “What’s the matter?” I asked him aloud.

  He looked up at me, the fur between his eyes ridged with worry. You do not seem to hear me. And your thoughts are not . . . thoughts.

  I’ll be all right. The Fool is with me. Go and hunt. I can feel your hunger.

  And I feel yours, he answered ominously.

  He left then, but reluctantly. I followed the Fool into the woods, but did little more than carry the wood he picked up and handed to me. I felt as if I could not quite wake up. “Have you ever been studying something tremendously interesting, only to suddenly look up and realize hours have passed? That is how I feel just now. ”

  The Fool handed me another stick of wood. “You are frightening me,” he informed me quietly. “You speak much as King Shrewd did in the days he was weakening. ”

  “But he was drugged then, against pain,” I pointed out. “And I am not. ”

  “That is what is frightening,” he told me.

  We walked together back to camp. We had been so slow that Kettle and Starling had gathered some fuel and got a small fire going already. The light of it illuminated the dome-shaped tent and the folk moving around it. The jeppas were shadows drifting nearby as they browsed. As we piled our wood by the fire for later use, Kettle looked up from her cooking.

  “How are you feeling?” she demanded.

  “Better, somewhat,” I told her.

  I glanced about for any chores that needed doing, but camp had been set without me. Kettricken was inside the tent, poring over the map by candlelight. Kettle stirred porridge by the fire while, strange to say, the Fool and Starling conversed quietly. I stood still, trying to recall something I’d meant to do, something I’d been in the middle of doing. The road. I wanted another look at the road. I turned and walked toward it.

  “FitzChivalry!”

  I turned, startled at the sharpness in Kettle’s call. “What is it?”

  “Where are you going?” she asked. She paused, as if surprised by her own question. “I mean, is Nighteyes about? I haven’t seen him for a bit. ”

  “He went to hunt. He’ll be back. ” I started
toward the road again.

  “Usually he’s made his kill and come back by now,” she continued.

  I paused. “There’s not much game near the road, he said. So he’s had to go farther. ” I turned away again.

  “Now, there’s a thing that seems odd,” she went on. “There’s no sign of human traffic on the road. And yet the animals avoid it still. Doesn’t game usually follow whatever path is easiest?”

  I called back to her, “Some animals do. Others prefer to keep to cover. ”

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  “Go and get him, girl!” I heard Kettle tell someone sharply.

  “Fitz!” I heard Starling call, but it was the Fool who caught up with me and took me by the arm.

  “Come back to the tent,” he urged me, tugging at my arm.

  “I just want to have another look at the road. ”

  “It’s dark. You’ll see nothing now. Wait until morning, when we’re traveling on it again. For now, come back to the tent. ”

  I went with him, but told him irritably, “You’re the one who is acting strange, Fool. ”

  “You’d not say that, had you seen the look on your face but a moment ago. ”

  The rations that night were much the same as they had been since we left Jhaampe: thick grain porridge with some chopped dried apple in it, some dried meat, and tea. It was filling, but not exciting. It did nothing to distract me from the intent way the others watched me. I finally set down my tea mug and demanded, “What?”

  No one said anything at first. Then Kettricken said, bluntly, “Fitz, you don’t have a watch tonight. I want you to stay in the tent and sleep. ”

  “I’m fine, I can stand a watch,” I began to object, but it was my queen who ordered, “I tell you to stay within the tent tonight. ”

  For a moment I fought my tongue. Then I bowed my head. “As you command. I am, perhaps, overly tired. ”

  “No. It is more than that, FitzChivalry. You scarcely ate tonight, and unless one of us forces you to speak you do nothing save gaze off into the distance. What distracts you?”

  I tried to find an answer to Kettricken’s blunt question. “I do not know. Exactly. At least, it is a difficult thing to explain. ” The only sound was the tiny crackling of the fire. All eyes were on me. “When one is trained to Skill,” I went on more slowly, “one becomes aware that the magic itself has a danger to it. It attracts the attention of the user. When one is using the Skill to do a thing, one must focus one’s attention tightly on the intent and refuse to be distracted by the pulling of the Skill. If the Skill user loses that focus, if he gives in to the Skill itself, he can become lost in it. Absorbed by it. ” I lifted my eyes from the fire and looked around at their faces. Everyone was still save for Kettle, who was nodding ever so slightly.

  “Today, since we found the road, I have felt something that is almost like the pull of the Skill. I have not attempted to Skill; actually, for some days, I have blocked the Skill from myself as much as I can, for I have feared that Regal’s coterie may try to break into my mind and do me harm. But despite that, I have felt as if the Skill were luring me. Like a music I can almost hear, or a very faint scent of game. I catch myself straining after it, trying to decide what calls me. . . . ”

  I snapped my gaze back to Kettle, saw the distant hunger in her eyes. “Is it because the road is Skill-wrought?”

  A flash of anger crossed her face. She looked down to her old hands curled in her lap. She gave a sigh of exasperation. “It might. The old legends that I have heard say that when a thing is Skill-wrought, it can be dangerous to some folk. Not to ordinary people, but to those who have an aptitude for the Skill but have not been trained in it. Or to those whose training is not advanced far enough for them to know how to be wary. ”

  “I have never heard of any legends about Skill-wrought things. ” I turned to the Fool and Starling. “Have either of you?”

  Both shook their heads slowly.

  “It seems to me,” I said carefully to Kettle, “that someone as well-read as the Fool should have come across such legends. And certainly a trained minstrel should have heard something about them. ” I continued to look at her levelly.

  She crossed her arms on her chest. “I am not to blame for what they have not read or heard,” she said stiffly. “I only tell you what I was told, a long time ago. ”

  “How long ago?” I pressed. Across from me, Kettricken frowned, but did not interfere.

  “A very long time ago,” Kettle replied coldly. “Back when young men respected their elders. ”

  The Fool’s face lit with a delighted grin. Kettle seemed to feel she had won something, for she set her tea mug in her porridge bowl with a clatter and handed them to me. “It is your turn to clean the dishes,” she told me severely. She got up and stamped away from the fire and into the tent.

  As I slowly gathered the dishes to wipe them out with clean snow, Kettricken came to stand beside me. “What do you suspect?” she asked me in her forthright way. “Do you think she is a spy, an enemy among us?”

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  “No. I do not think she is an enemy. But I think she is . . . something. Not just an old woman with a religious interest in the Fool. Something more than that. ”

  “But you don’t know what?”

  “No. I don’t. Only I have noticed that she seems to know a deal more about the Skill than I expect her to. Still, an old person gathers much odd knowledge in a lifetime. It may be no more than that. ” I glanced up to where the wind was stirring the tree tops. “Do you think we shall have snow tonight?” I asked Kettricken.

  “Almost certainly. And we shall be fortunate if it stops by morning. We should gather more firewood, and stack it near the tent’s door. No, not you. You should go within the tent. If you wandered off now, in this darkness and with snow to come, we’d never find you. ”

  I began to protest, but she stopped me with a question. “My Verity. He is more highly trained than you are in the Skill?”

  “Yes, my lady. ”

  “Do you think this road would call to him, as it does to you?”

  “Almost certainly. But he has always been far stronger than I in matters of Skill or stubbornness. ”

  A sad smile tweaked her lips. “Yes, he is stubborn, that one. ” She sighed suddenly, heavily. “Would that we were only a man and a woman, living far from both sea and mountains. Would that things were simple for us. ”

  “I wish for that as well,” I said quietly. “I wish for blisters on my hands from simple work and Molly’s candles lighting our home. ”

  “I hope you get that, Fitz,” Kettricken said quietly. “I truly do. But we’ve a long road to tread between here and there. ”

  “That we do,” I agreed. And a sort of peace bloomed between us. I did not doubt that if circumstances demanded it, she would take my daughter for the throne. But she could no more have changed her attitude about duty and sacrifice than she could have changed the blood and bones of her body. It was who she was. It was not that she wished to take my child from me.

  All I needed do to keep my daughter was to bring her husband safely back to her.

  We went to bed later that night than had become our custom. All were wearier than usual. The Fool took first watch despite the lines of strain in his face. The new ivory cast his skin had taken on made him look terrible when he was cold, like a statue of misery carved from old bone. The rest of us did not notice the cold much when we were moving during the day, but I don’t think the Fool was ever completely warm. Yet he bundled himself warmly and went to stand outside in the rising wind without a murmur of complaint. The rest of us lay down to sleep.

  The storm was, at first, a thing that was happening above us, in the treetops. Loose needles fell rattling against the yurt’s skin and as the storm grew more intense, small branches and occasional dumps of icy snow. The cold grew stronger and became a thing that crept in a
t every gap of blanket or garment. Midway through Starling’s watch, Kettricken called her in, saying the storm would stand watch for us now. When Starling entered, the wolf slunk in at her heels. To my relief, no one objected very loudly. When Starling commented that he carried snow in with him, the Fool replied that he had less on him than she did. Nighteyes came immediately to our part of the tent, and lay down between the Fool and the outer wall. He set his great head on the Fool’s chest and heaved a sigh before closing his eyes. I almost felt jealous.

  He’s colder than you are. Much colder. And, in the city, where hunting was so poor, he often shared food with me.

  So. He is pack, then? I asked with a trace of amusement.

  You tell me, Nighteyes challenged me. He saved your life, fed you from his kills, and shared his den with you. Is he pack with us or not?

  I suppose he is, I said after a moment’s consideration. I had never seen things in quite that light before. Unobtrusively, I shifted in my bedding to be slightly closer to the Fool. “Are you cold?” I asked him aloud.

  “Not so long as I keep shivering,” he told me miserably. Then he added, “Actually, I’m warmer with the wolf between me and the wall. He gives off a lot of heat. ”

  “He’s grateful for all the times you fed him in Jhaampe. ”

  The Fool squinted at me through the tent’s dimness. “Really? I did not think animals carried memories for that long. ”

  That startled me into thinking about it. “Usually, they don’t. But tonight, he recalls that you fed him and is grateful. ”

  The Fool lifted a hand to scratch carefully around Nighteyes’ ears. Nighteyes made a puppy growl of pleasure and happily snuggled closer. I wondered again at all the changes I was seeing in him. More and more often, his reactions and thoughts were a mixture of human and wolf.

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  I was too tired to give it much thought. I closed my eyes and started to sink into sleep. After a time, I realized that my eyes were tightly shut, my jaw clenched, and I was no closer to sleep. I wanted to simply let go of consciousness, so weary was I, but the Skill so threatened and lured me that I could not relax enough to sleep. I kept shifting, trying to find a physical position that was more relaxing, until Kettle on the other side of me pointedly asked me if I had fleas. I tried to be still.