Royal Assassin (UK)

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Royal Assassin (UK) Page 45

by Robin Hobb


  As for Regal, his ears had pricked up at the men­tion of Ver­ity leav­ing. He now stood as av­ar­i­ciously alert as a dog beg­ging at table. He spoke just a mo­ment too soon to have any ring of sin­cer­ity to his voice. ‘If someone would ex­plain to me where Ver­ity is go­ing, per­haps I could speak for my­self as to what I might be ready to as­sume.’

  Ver­ity kept his tongue. Clear-browed and si­lent, he looked at his father.

  ‘Your brother,’ the phrase soun­ded a bit heavy to my ears, ‘wishes me to grant him leave for a quest. He wishes to go, and soon, to the Rain Wilds bey­ond the Moun­tain King­dom. To seek out the Eld­er­lings and ob­tain from them the help once prom­ised us.’

  Regal’s eyes went owly. I don’t know if he could not be­lieve in the no­tion of Eld­er­lings, or if he could not be­lieve the quant­ity of good for­tune he had sud­denly been dealt. He licked his lips.

  ‘I, of course, have for­bid­den it.’ Shrewd watched Regal as he said it.

  ‘But why?’ Regal de­man­ded. ‘Surely all courses must be con­sidered …’

  ‘The ex­pense is pro­hib­it­ive. Did not you re­port to me, just a short time ago, that the build­ing of the war­ships and the man­ning and pro­vi­sion­ing of them have all but drained our re­serves?’

  Regal’s eyes flickered as swiftly as a snake’s tongue. ‘But I have had the rest of the har­vest re­ports since then, father. I had not known they would be so good. Funds could be found. Provided he was will­ing to travel simply.’

  Ver­ity breathed out through his nose. ‘I thank you for your con­sid­er­a­tion, Regal. I had not real­ized such de­cisions were your province.’

  ‘I but ad­vise the King, just as you do,’ Regal poin­ted out hast­ily.

  ‘You do not think send­ing an emis­sary would be the more sens­ible thing to do?’ Shrewd probed. ‘What would the people think of their King-in-Wait­ing leav­ing Buck­keep at such a time, and on such an er­rand?’

  ‘An emis­sary?’ Regal ap­peared to con­sider it. ‘I think not. Not for all we must ask. Do not the le­gends say that King Wis­dom went him­self? What do we know of these Eld­er­lings? Do we dare take a chance of send­ing an un­der­ling to of­fend them? In this, no, I be­lieve the son of the king at least is called for. As for his leav­ing Buck­keep … well, you are the King, and you are still here. As would his wife be.’

  ‘My queen,’ Ver­ity growled, but Regal con­tin­ued speak­ing.

  ‘And I. Buck­keep would hardly be aban­doned. And the er­rand it­self? It might cap­ture the people’s ima­gin­a­tion. Or, if you chose, the reason for his go­ing might be kept quiet. It could be seen as a simple visit to our al­lies the Moun­tain folk. Es­pe­cially if his wife went along.’

  ‘My queen re­mains here,’ Ver­ity used her title poin­tedly. ‘To rep­res­ent my reign. And to pro­tect my in­terests.’

  ‘Do not you trust our father to do that?’ Regal asked blandly.

  Ver­ity held his tongue, and looked at the old man in his chair by the fire. The ques­tion in his look was plain to any­one with eyes. Can I trust you? it asked him. But Shrewd, true to his name, replied only with a ques­tion of his own.

  ‘You have heard Prince Regal’s thoughts on this un­der­tak­ing. And mine. You know your own. Given these coun­sels, what do you now wish to do?’

  I blessed Ver­ity then, for he now turned and looked only at Kettricken. No nod, no whis­per passed between them. But he turned back to his father with their ac­cord. ‘I wish to go to the Rain Wilds bey­ond the Moun­tain King­dom. And I wish to leave as soon as pos­sible.’

  As King Shrewd slowly nod­ded, my heart fell into the pit of my belly. But be­hind his chair, the Fool turned back-flips across the room, and then cartwheeled back, to stand as at­tent­ively be­hind him as if he had never moved. Regal was un­settled by this. But as Ver­ity knelt to kiss King Shrewd’s hand and thank him for his per­mis­sion, the smile that spread across Regal’s face was wide enough to en­gulf a shark.

  There was little more to the coun­cil. Ver­ity wished to leave in seven days. Shrewd ac­cep­ted it. He wished to choose his own en­tour­age. Shrewd ac­cep­ted that, though Regal looked thought­ful. I was not pleased when the King fi­nally dis­missed all of us, to note how Regal dawdled be­hind, to con­verse with Wal­lace in the sit­ting room as we filed out. I found my­self won­der­ing if Chade would al­low me to kill Wal­lace. He had already for­bid­den my solv­ing Regal that way, and I had since prom­ised to my king I would not. But Wal­lace had no such im­munity.

  In the hall­way, Ver­ity thanked me briefly. I dared to ask why he had wanted me present.

  ‘To wit­ness,’ he said heav­ily. ‘Wit­ness­ing some­thing is much more than hear­ing about it af­ter­wards. To keep in your memory all the words that were said, so they may not be for­got­ten.’

  I knew then to ex­pect a sum­mons from Chade that night.

  But I could not res­ist go­ing to Molly. See­ing the King as a king again had fanned my fail­ing hope. I prom­ised my­self my visit would be brief, just to talk to her, to let her know I ap­pre­ci­ated all she did. I would be in my cham­bers be­fore the small hours Chade fa­voured for our con­ver­sa­tions.

  I knocked on her door furt­ively, she let me in quickly. She must have seen how driven I was, for she came im­me­di­ately into my arms, without ques­tions or qualms. I stroked her shin­ing hair, I looked down into her eyes. The pas­sion that came over me sud­denly was like a spring flood that bursts sud­denly down a creek, fling­ing all winter’s debris out of its way. My in­ten­tions of quietly talk­ing were swept away. Molly gasped as I held her to me fiercely, then sur­rendered her­self to me.

  It seemed months rather than days since we had last been to­gether. When she kissed me hun­grily, I felt sud­denly awk­ward, un­cer­tain as to why she would de­sire me. She was so young and so beau­ti­ful. It seemed van­ity to be­lieve she could want someone as battered and worn down as me. She did not al­low me to keep my doubts, but drew me down on top of her without hes­it­a­tion. Deep in that shar­ing, I fi­nally re­cog­nized the real­ity of the love in her blue eyes. I glor­ied in the pas­sion­ate way she pulled me to her and clasped me in her strong, pale arms. Later, I would re­call glimpses of golden hair spread across a pil­low, the scents of hon­ey­wood and moun­tain­sweet on her skin, even the way she threw back her head and gave soft voice to her fer­vour.

  Af­ter­wards, Molly whispered in amazement that my in­tens­ity made me seem a dif­fer­ent man. Her head was pil­lowed on my chest. I kept si­lent, and stroked the dark hair that smelled al­ways of her herbs. Thyme and lav­ender. I closed my eyes. I knew I had war­ded well my thoughts. It had long ago be­come a habit when I was with Molly.

  Ver­ity, then, had not.

  I had not willed what had happened. I doubted that any­one had. Per­haps, I hoped, I was the only one who had sensed it fully. Then there might be no real harm done, as long as I never spoke of it. As long as I could blot forever from my mind the sweet­ness of Kettricken’s mouth, and the soft­ness of her white, white skin.

  NINE­TEEN

  Mes­sages

  King-in-Wait­ing Ver­ity de­par­ted Buck­keep at the be­gin­ning of the third winter of the Red Ship Wars. He took with him a small group of hand-picked fol­low­ers who would ac­com­pany him on his quest, as well as his per­sonal guard who would travel with him as far as the Moun­tain King­dom, and re­main there to await his re­turn. His reas­on­ing was that a smal­ler ex­ped­i­tion needed a smal­ler bag­gage train, and trav­el­ling through the moun­tains in winter de­man­ded that all food sup­plies be car­ried with him. He had also de­cided that he did not wish to con­vey a mar­tial as­pect to the Eld­er­lings. His real mis­sion was dis­closed to few ex­cept his com­pan­ions. Os­tens­ibly he went to the Moun­tain King­dom to treat with his queen’s father, King Eyod, about pos­sible mil­it­ary su
p­port against the Red Ships.

  Of those he asked to ac­com­pany him, there are sev­eral worth not­ing. Hod, Arms­master for Buck­keep, was one of the first he se­lec­ted. Her grasp of tac­tics was not ex­ceeded by any within the realm and her prowess with weapons was still re­mark­able des­pite her years. Charim, Ver­ity’s body-ser­vant, had been with him so long and ac­com­pan­ied him on so many cam­paigns, it was un­think­able to either of them that he be left be­hind. Chest­nut, brown as his name, had been a mem­ber of Ver­ity’s mil­it­ary guard for over a dec­ade of years. He was miss­ing an eye and most of an ear, but des­pite that seemed twice as alert as any other man. Keef and Kef, born twins and, like Chest­nut, mem­bers of Ver­ity’s hon­our-guard for years, went also. One other, Burrich, the mas­ter of stables at Buck­keep, joined the party of his own ac­cord. When his leav­ing Buck­keep was pro­tested, he poin­ted out that he left an able man in charge of Buck­keep’s stables, and that the party would need a man who was know­ledge­able of an­im­als in or­der to get the beasts alive through the moun­tains in mid-winter. His abil­it­ies as a healer, and his ex­per­i­ence as a King’s Man to Prince Chiv­alry were also qual­i­fic­a­tions he poin­ted out, but this last one was known to but a few.

  The night be­fore Ver­ity was to leave, he summoned me to his study. ‘You don’t ap­prove of this, do you? You think it’s a fool’s er­rand,’ he greeted me.

  I had to smile. In­ad­vert­ently, he had ex­actly stated what I thought. ‘I am afraid I have ser­i­ous doubts,’ I agreed cau­tiously.

  ‘As do I. But what else is left to me? This, at least, is a chance for me to ac­tu­ally do some­thing my­self. Other than sit in that be­damned tower and Skill my­self to death.’

  He had painstak­ingly re­copied Kettricken’s map over the last few days. As I watched, he rolled it care­fully and slid it into a leather case. The dif­fer­ence the last week had made in the man amazed me. He was still grey, his body still worn and sadly dwindled from too many months of sit­ting. But he moved with en­ergy, and both he and Kettricken had graced the Great Hall every even­ing since the de­cision had been made. It had been a pleas­ure to watch him eat with an ap­pet­ite, and once more linger over a glass of wine while Mel­low or an­other of the min­strels en­ter­tained us all. The re­newed warmth between Kettricken and him was an­other ap­pet­ite he had re­covered. Her eyes sel­dom left her lord’s coun­ten­ance when they were at table. While the min­strels en­ter­tained, her fin­gers were al­ways rest­ing on the back of his fore­arm. She glowed in his pres­ence like a burn­ing candle. Shield my­self as I might, I was all too aware of how much they en­joyed their nights. I had at­temp­ted to hide from their pas­sions by im­mers­ing my­self in Molly. I ended up feel­ing guilty that Molly was so pleased with my re­newed ar­dour. How would she feel if she knew my ap­pet­ites were not en­tirely my own?

  The Skill. I had been warned of its powers and pit­falls, of how it might call to a man, and drain him of everything ex­cept a hun­ger for its use. This was one trap I had never been warned about. In some ways, I was look­ing for­ward to Ver­ity leav­ing so I could call my soul my own again.

  ‘What you do in that tower is not a lesser task. If folk could but un­der­stand how you burn your­self for them …’

  ‘As you un­der­stand only too well. We’ve grown close this sum­mer, boy. Closer than I’d ever have thought pos­sible. Closer than any man has been to me since your father died.’

  Closer even than you might sus­pect, my prince. But I did not ut­ter those words. ‘We have.’

  ‘I’ve a fa­vour to ask you. Two, ac­tu­ally.’

  ‘You know that I won’t re­fuse you.’

  ‘Never say that so eas­ily. The first is that you look after my lady. She has grown wiser in Buck­keep ways, but she is still far too trust­ing. Keep her safe un­til I re­turn.’

  ‘That is al­ways yours without ask­ing, my prince.’

  ‘And the other.’ He took a breath, sighed it out. ‘I wish to try to stay here, as well. In your mind. For as long as I can.’

  ‘My prince.’ I hes­it­ated. He was right. This was not a thing I wished to grant him. But I had already said I would. I knew that, for the sake of the king­dom, it was a wise thing to do. But for my­self? Already I had felt the bound­ar­ies of my self erod­ing be­fore Ver­ity’s strong pres­ence. We were not talk­ing about a con­tact of hours now, or days, but of weeks and likely months. I wondered if this was what happened to co­terie mem­bers, if even­tu­ally they ceased hav­ing sep­ar­ate lives. ‘What of your co­terie?’ I asked quietly.

  ‘What of them?’ he re­tor­ted. ‘I leave them in place, in the watchtowers and on my ships for now. Whatever mes­sages they must send, they can send to Se­rene. In my ab­sence, she will take them to Shrewd. If there is any­thing they feel I must know, they can Skill me.’ He paused. ‘There will be other sorts of in­form­a­tion that I would seek through you. Things I would prefer kept private.’

  Tid­ings of his queen, I thought to my­self. How Regal would em­ploy his powers in his brother’s ab­sence. Gos­sips and in­trigues. In one sense, tri­fling things. In an­other, the de­tail that se­cured Ver­ity’s po­s­i­tion. I wished for the thou­sandth time that I could Skill re­li­ably of my own ac­cord. If I had had that abil­ity, Ver­ity would not have needed to ask this of me. I would have been able to reach out to him at any time. But as mat­ters stood, the touch-im­posed Skill bond we had used over the sum­mer was our only re­source. Through it, he could be aware of what went on at Buck­keep when he chose to, and I could re­ceive in­struc­tions from him. I hes­it­ated, but already knew that I would ac­cede. From loy­alty to him and to the Six Duch­ies, I told my­self. Not from any Skill hun­ger in my­self. I looked up at him. ‘I will do it.’

  ‘Know­ing well that this is how it be­gins,’ he said. It was not a ques­tion. Already, this was how ac­cur­ately we could read one an­other. He did not wait for my an­swer. ‘I will be as in­con­spicu­ous as I can,’ he prom­ised. I walked to him. He lif­ted a hand and touched my shoulder. Ver­ity was with me again, as he had not con­sciously been since the day in his study when he had bid me to shield my­self.

  The day of the de­par­ture was fine, crisply cold, but the skies were clear blue. Ver­ity, true to his word, had kept his ex­ped­i­tion to a min­imum. Riders had been dis­patched the morn­ing after the coun­cil, to pre­cede him on his route and ar­range sup­plies and lodgings in the towns where he would pass. This would al­low him to travel swiftly and lightly through much of the Six Duch­ies.

  As his ex­ped­i­tion set off that chill morn­ing, I alone of the crowd did not bid Ver­ity farewell. He nestled in­side my mind, small and si­lent as a seed wait­ing for spring. As un­noticed, al­most, as Nighteyes. Kettricken had chosen to watch the de­par­ture from the frosty walls of the Queen’s Garden. She had said her farewells to him earlier, and chosen this spot so that if she wept, none would take it amiss. I stood at her side, and en­dured the res­on­ance of what she and Ver­ity had come to share in the last week. I was both glad for her, and heart­sick that what she had so re­cently found must so quickly be taken from her. Horses and men, pack-an­im­als and ban­ners fi­nally passed be­hind a shoulder of hills and out of our sight. Then I felt that which sent a chill up my spine. She Wit-ques­ted after him. Very faintly, it was true, but enough that some­where in my heart, Nighteyes sat up, eyes aflame, and asked, What’s this?

  Noth­ing. Noth­ing to do with us, any­way. I ad­ded, We hunt to­gether soon, my brother, as we have not for too long.

  For a few days after the caval­cade’s de­par­ture, I al­most had my own life again. I had dreaded Burrich’s leav­ing with Ver­ity. I un­der­stood what drove him to fol­low his King-in-Wait­ing, but felt un­com­fort­ably ex­posed with them both gone. That told me much about my­self that I really did not want to know. But the other side of that coin
was that, with Burrich gone and Ver­ity’s pres­ence in­side me coiled tight, Nighteyes and I were fi­nally free to use the Wit as openly as we wished. Al­most every dawn I was with him, miles from the keep. On the days when we sought Forged ones, I rode Sooty, but she did not ever feel com­pletely com­fort­able around the wolf. After a time, there seemed far fewer of them, and no more com­ing into the area. We began to be able to hunt game for ourselves. For that, I went afoot, for we hunted more com­pan­ion­ably that way. Nighteyes ap­proved of my phys­ical im­prove­ment over the sum­mer. That winter, for the first time since Regal had poisoned me, I felt I had the full use of my body and strength again. The vig­or­ous morn­ings of hunt­ing and the deep hours of the night with Molly would have been enough life for any man. There is some­thing com­pletely sat­is­fy­ing about simple things such as these.

  I sup­pose I wanted my life to be al­ways this simple and com­plete. I tried to ig­nore things I knew were dan­ger­ous. The con­tin­ued fine weather, I told my­self, would as­sure Ver­ity a fine start to his jour­ney. I put from my mind whether there would be any end-of-sea­son raids from the Red Ships while we were so un­pro­tec­ted. I avoided, too, Regal and the sud­den round of so­cial oc­ca­sions that filled Buck­keep with his fol­low­ers and kept the torches burn­ing late every night in the Great Hall. Se­rene and Justin were also much more in evid­ence about Buck­keep. I never entered a room where they were but that I felt the ar­rows of their dis­like. I began to avoid the com­mon rooms in the even­ings, where I must either en­counter them, or Regal’s guests who had come to swell our winter court.

 

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