Assassin's Quest tft-3

by Robin Hobb

  "He should not have even brought up such a topic," Starling suddenly exclaimed angrily. "How can he expect you to have heart for whatever you must do, when you believe it will be your death?"

  I shrugged my shoulders at her silently. I had refused to think of it the whole time we had been hunting. Instead of going away, the feelings had only built up. The misery I suddenly felt was overwhelming. Yes, and the anger, too. I was furious at the Fool for telling me. I forced myself to consider it. "The tidings are scarcely his doing. And I cannot fault his intent. Yet it is hard to face one's death, not as a thing that will happen someday, somewhere, but as something that will likely occur before this summer loses its green." I lifted my head and looked around the verdant wild meadow that surrounded us.

  It is amazing how different a thing appears when you know it is the last one you will have. Every leaf on every limb stood out, in a multitude of greens. Birds sang challenges to one another, or winged by in flashes of color. The smells of the cooking meat, of the earth itself, even the sound of Nighteyes cracking a bone between his jaws were all suddenly unique and precious things. How many days like this had I walked through blindly, intent only on having a mug of ale when I got to town or what horse must be taken for shoeing today? Long ago, in Buckkeep, the Fool had warned me that I should live each day as if it were significant, as if every day the fate of the world depended on my actions. Now I suddenly grasped what he had been trying to tell me. Now, when the days left to me had dwindled to where I might count them.

  Starling put her hands on my shoulders. She leaned down and put her cheek against mine. "Fitz, I am so sorry," she said quietly. I scarcely heard her words, only her belief in my death. I stared at the meat cooking over the flames. It had been a live kid.

  Death is always at the edge of now. Nighteyes' thought was gentle. Death stalks us, and he is ever sure of his kill. It is not a thing to dwell on, but it is something we all know, in our guts and bones. All save humans.

  With shock, I beheld what the Fool had been trying to teach me about time. I suddenly wished to go back, to have again each separate day to spend. Time. I was trapped in it, fenced into a tiny piece of now that was the only time I could influence. All the soons and tomorrows I might plan were ghost things that might be snatched from me at any moment. Intentions were nothing. Now was all I had. I suddenly stood up.

  "I understand," I said aloud. "He had to tell me, to push me. I have to stop acting as if there is a tomorrow when I can put things right. It all has to be done now, right away, with no concern for tomorrow. No belief in tomorrow. No fears for tomorrow."

  "Fitz?" Starling drew back from me a little way. "You sound as if you are going to do something foolish." Her dark eyes were full of worry.

  "Foolish," I said to myself. "Foolish as the Fool is. Yes. Could you watch the meat, please?" I asked Starling humbly.

  I did not wait for her reply. I stood as she stepped free of me and went into the yurt. Kettle sat by the Fool, simply watching him sleep. Kettricken was mending a seam in her boot. They both glanced up as I came in. "I need to talk to him," I said simply. "Alone, if you would not mind."

  I ignored their puzzled glances. I already wished I had not told Starling what the Fool had told me. Doubtless she would tell the others, but just now I did not want to share it with them. I had something important to tell the Fool, and I would do it now. I did not wait to watch them leave the yurt. Instead I sat down beside the Fool. I touched his face gently, feeling the coolness of his cheek. "Fool," I said quietly. "I need to talk to you. I understand. I think I finally understand what you've been trying to teach me all along."

  It took me several more efforts before he stirred to wakefulness. I finally shared some of Kettle's concern. This was not the simple sleep of a man at a day's end. But finally he opened his eyes and peered up at me through the gloom. "Fitz? Is it morning?" he asked.

  "Evening. And there is fresh meat roasting, and soon it will be done. I think a good meal will help put you right." I started to hesitate, then recalled my new resolution. Now. "I was angry at you earlier, for what you told me. But now I think I understand why. You are right, I have been hiding in the future and wasting my days." I took a breath. "I want to give Burrich's earring over to you, into your keeping. Af… afterward, I'd like you to take it to him. And tell him I did not die outside some shepherd's hut, but keeping my oath to my king. That will mean something to him, it may pay him back a bit for all he has done for me. He taught me to be a man. I don't want that left unsaid."

  I unfastened the catch of the earring and drew it from my ear.

  I pressed it into the Fool's lax hand. He lay on his side, listening silently. His face was very grave. I shook my head at him.

  "I have nothing to send Molly, nothing for our child. She'll have the pin Shrewd gave me so long ago, but little more than that." I was trying to keep my voice steady, but the importance of my words was choking me. "It may be wisest not to tell Molly that I lived past Regal's dungeons. If that can be managed. Burrich would understand the reason for such a secret. She has mourned me as dead once, there is no sense in telling her otherwise. I am glad you will seek her out. Make toys for Nettle." Against my will, tears stung my eyes.

  The Fool sat up, his face full of concern. He gripped my shoulder gently. "If you want me to find Molly, you know I will, if it comes to that. But why must we think of such things now? What do you fear?"

  "I fear my death." I admitted it. "But fearing it will not stop it. So I make what provisions I can. As I should have, long ago." I met his smoky eyes squarely. "Promise me."

  He looked down at the earring in his hand. "I promise. Though why you think my chances are better than yours, I do not know. Nor do I know how I will find them, but I will."

  I felt great relief. "I told you earlier. I know only that their cottage is near a village called Capelin Beach. There is more than one Capelin Beach in Buck, that is true. But if you tell me you will find her, I believe you will."

  "Capelin Beach?" His eyes went distant. "I think I recall… I thought I had dreamed that." He shook his head and almost smiled. "So I am now a party to one of the closest-held secrets in Buck. Chade told me that not even he knew precisely where Burrich had hidden Molly away. He had only a place to leave a message for Burrich, so Burrich might come to him. 'The fewer who know a secret, the fewer can tell it,' he told me. Yet it seems to me I have heard that name before. Capelin Beach. Or dreamed it, perhaps."

  My heart went cold. "What do you mean? Have you had a vision of Capelin Beach?"

  He shook his head. "Not a vision, no. Yet a nightmare toothier than most, so that when Kettle found and woke me, I felt I had not slept at all, but had been fleeing for my life for hours." He shook his head again slowly and rubbed at his eyes, yawning. "I do not even recall lying down to sleep outside. But that is where they found me."

  "I should have known something was wrong with you," I apologized. "You were by the hot spring, speaking to me of Molly and… things. And then you suddenly lay down and went to sleep. I thought you were mocking me," I admitted sheepishly.

  He gave a tremendous yawn. "I do not even recall seeking you out," he admitted. He sniffed suddenly. "Did you say there was meat roasting?"

  I nodded. "The wolf and I got a kid. It's young and should be tender."

  "I'm hungry enough to eat old shoes," he declared. He threw back his bedding and left the tent. I followed him.

  That meal was a better time than we had had in days. The Fool seemed weary and pensive, but had abandoned his barbed humor. The meat, though not tender as fat lamb, was better than anything we had had in weeks. By the end of the meal, I shared Nighteyes' sleepy satiation. He curled up outside by Kettricken to share her watch while I sought my blankets in the tent.

  I had half expected the Fool to be wakeful after he had slept so much of the afternoon away. Instead he was first to his blankets and deeply asleep before I had even dragged my boots off. Kettle set out her gamecloth and gave me
a problem to consider. I lay down to get what rest I could while Kettle watched over my sleep.

  But I got small rest that night. No sooner had I dozed off than the Fool began to twitch and yip in his sleep. Even Nighteyes poked his head in the tent door to see what it was about. It took Kettle several tries to rouse him, and when he dozed off again, he slipped right back into his noisy dreams. That time I reached over to shake him. But when I touched his shoulder, awareness of him surged through me. For an instant, I shared his night terror. "Fool, wake up!" I cried out to him, and as if in answer to that command, he sat up.

  "Let go, let go!" he cried desperately. Then, looking round and finding that no one held him, he dropped back to his bedding. He turned his eyes to meet mine.

  "What were you dreaming?" I asked him.

  He thought, then shook his head. "It's gone, now." He took a shuddering breath. "But I fear it waits for me, should I close my eyes. I think I shall see if Kettricken wants some company. I would rather be awake than face… whatever it was I was facing in my dreams."

  I watched him leave the tent. Then I lay back in my blankets. I closed my eyes. I found it, faint as a silver shining thread. There was a Skillbond between us.

  Ah. Is that what that is? the wolf marveled.

  Can you feel it, too?

  Only sometimes. It is like what you had with Verity.

  Only weaker.

  Weaker? I think not. Nighteyes considered. Not weaker, my brother. But different. Fashioned more like a Wit-bond than a Skill joining.

  He looked up at the Fool as the Fool came out of the tent. After a time, the Fool frowned to himself and looked down at Nighteyes.

  You see, said the wolf. He senses me. Not clearly, but he does. Hello, Fool. My ears itch.

  Outside the tent, the Fool reached down suddenly to scratch the wolf's ears.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  The Quarry

  There are legends, among the Mountain folk, of an ancient race, much gifted with magic and knowing many things now lost to men forever. These tales are in many ways similar to the tales of elves and Old Ones that are told in the Six Duchies. In some cases, the tales are so similar as to be obviously the same story adapted by different folk. The most obvious example of this would be the tale of the Flying Chair of the Widow's Son. Among the Mountain folk, that Buck tale becomes the Flying Sled of the Orphan Boy. Who can tell which telling was first?

  The folk of the Mountain Kingdom will tell you that that ancient race is responsible for some of the more peculiar monuments that one may chance upon in their forests. They are also credited with lesser achievements, such as some of the games of strategy that Mountain children still play, and for a very peculiar wind instrument, powered not by a man's lungs, but by breath trapped in an inflated bladder. Tales are also told of ancient cities far back in the mountains that were once the dwelling of these beings. But nowhere in all their literature, spoken or written, have I found any account of how these people ceased to be.

  Three days later we reached the quarry. We had had three days of hiking through suddenly hot weather. The air had been full of the scents of opening leaves and flowers and the whistles of birds and the drones of insects. To either side of the Skill road, life burgeoned. I walked through it, senses keen, more aware of being alive than I had ever been. The Fool had spoken no more about whatever he had foreseen for me. For that I was grateful. I had found Nighteyes was right. Knowing it was hard enough. I would not dwell on it.

  Then we came to the quarry. At first it seemed to us that we had simply come to a dead end. The road ramped down into a worked gorge of bare stone, an area twice the size of Buckkeep Castle. The walls of the valley were vertically straight and bare, scarred where immense blocks of black stone had been quarried from it. In a few places, cascading greenery from the earth at the edge of the quarry covered the sheared rock sides. At the lower end of the pit, rainwater had collected and stagnated greenly. There was little other vegetation, for there was precious little soil. Beneath our feet, past the end of the Skill road, we stood on the raw black stone the road had been wrought from. When we looked up at the looming cliff across from us, black stone veined with silver met our eyes. On the floor of the quarry a number of immense blocks had been abandoned amidst piles of rubble and dust. The huge blocks were bigger than buildings. I could not imagine how they had been cut, let alone how they would have been hauled away. Beside them were the remains of great machines, reminding me somewhat of siege engines. Their wood had rotted, their metal rusted. Their remains hunched together like moldering bones. Silence brimmed the quarry.

  Two things about the place immediately caught my attention. The first was the black pillar that reared up in our pathway, incised with the same ancient runes we had encountered before. The second was the absolute absence of animal life.

  I came to a halt by the pillar. I quested out, and the wolf shared my searching. Cold stone.

  Perhaps we shall learn to eat rocks, now? The wolf suggested.

  "We shall have to do our hunting elsewhere tonight," I agreed.

  "And find clean water," added the Fool.

  Kettricken had stopped by the pillar. The jeppas were already straying away, searching disconsolately for anything green. Possessing the Skill and the Wit sharpened my perceptions of other folk. But for the moment, I sensed nothing from her. Her face was still and empty. A slackness came over it, as if she aged before my eyes. Her eyes wandered over the lifeless stone, and by chance turned to me. A sickly smile spread over her mouth.

  "He's not here," she said. "We've come all this way, and he isn't here."

  I could think of nothing to say to her. Of all the things I might have expected at the end of our quest, an abandoned stone quarry seemed unlikeliest. I tried to think of something optimistic to say. There was nothing. This was the last location marked on our map, and evidently the final destination of the Skill road as well. She sank down slowly to sit flat on the stone at the pillar's base. She just sat there, too weary and discouraged to weep. When I looked to Kettle and Starling, I found them staring at me as if I were supposed to have an answer. I did not. The heat of the warm day pressed down on me. For this, we had come so far.

  I smell carrion.

  I don't. It was the last thing I wanted to think about just now.

  I didn't expect you would, with your nose. But there is something very dead not far from here.

  "So go roll in it and have done with it," I told him with some asperity.

  "Fitz," Kettle rebuked me as Nighteyes trotted purposefully away.

  "I was talking to the wolf," I told her lamely. The Fool nodded, almost vacantly. He had not been at all himself. Kettle had insisted that he continue taking the elfbark, though our small supply limited him to a very weak dose of the same bark brewed over again. From time to time, I thought I caught a brief hint of the Skill-bond between us. If I looked at him, he would sometimes turn and return my look, even across camp. It was little more than that. When I spoke of it to him, he said he sometimes felt something, but was not sure what it was. Of what the wolf had told me, I made no mention. Elfbark tea or no, he remained solemn and lethargic. His sleep at night did not seem to rest him; he moaned of muttered through his dreams. He reminded me of a man recovering from a long illness. He hoarded his strength in many small ways. He spoke little; even his bitter merriment had vanished. It was but one more worry for me to bear.

  It's a man!

  The stench of the corpse was thick in Nighteyes' nostrils. I nearly retched with it. Then, "Verity," I whispered to myself in horror. I set out at a run in the direction the wolf had taken. The Fool followed more slowly in my wake, drifting like down on the wind. The women watched us go without comprehension.

  The body was wedged between two immense blocks of stone. It was huddled as if even in death it sought to hide. The wolf circled it restlessly, hackles up. I halted at some distance, then tugged the cuff of my shirt down over my hand. I lifted it to cover my nose and mouth
. It helped a bit, but nothing could have completely drowned that stink. I walked closer, steeling myself to what I knew I must do. When I got close to the body, I reached down, seized hold of its rich cloak, and dragged it out into the open.

  "No flies," the Fool observed almost dreamily.

  He was right. There were no flies and no maggots. Only the silent rot of death had been at work on the man's features. They were dark, like a plowman's tan, only darker. Fear had contorted them, but I knew it was not Verity. Yet I had stared at him for some moments before I recognized him. "Carrod," I said quietly.

  "A member of Regal's coterie?" the Fool asked, as if there could be another Carrod about.

  I nodded. I kept my shirt cuff, over my nose and mouth as I knelt beside him.

  "How did he die?" the Fool asked. The smell did not seem to bother him, but I did not think I could speak without gagging. I shrugged. To answer I would have had to take a breath. I reached gingerly to tug at his clothes. The body was both stiff and softening. It was hard to examine it, but I could find no sign of any violence on him. I took a shallow breath and held it, then used both hands to unbuckle his belt. I pulled it free of the body with his purse and knife still on it, and hastily retreated with it.

  Kettricken, Kettle, and Starling came up on us as I was coaxing the mouth of his purse open. I did not know what I had hoped to find, but I was disappointed. A handful of coins, a flint, and a small whetstone were all he carried. I tossed it to the ground, and rubbed my hand down my trouser leg. The stench of death clung to it.

  "It was Carrod," the Fool told the others. "He must have come by the pillar."

  "What killed him?" Kettle asked.

  I met her gaze. "I don't know. I believe it was the Skill. Whatever it was, he tried to hide from it. Between those rocks. Let's get away from this smell," I suggested. We retreated back to the pillar. Nighteyes and I came last and more slowly. I was puzzled. I realized I was putting everything I could into keeping my Skill walls strong. Seeing Carrod dead had shocked me. One less coterie member, I told myself. But he was here, right here in the quarry when he died. If Verity had killed him with the Skill, perhaps that meant Verity had been here as well. I wondered if we would stumble across Burl and Will somewhere in the quarry, if they too had come here to attack Verity. Colder was my suspicion that it was more likely we would find Verity's body. But I said nothing to Kettricken of these thoughts.