by Robin Hobb
Starling’s clever tongue. She’d left him no way to feel right about himself. Hap looked at me now, his mismatched eyes loyal as a hound’s, and waited for me to pass judgement on him. I told him the truth. ‘I’d rather know the truth from you than have you watch me be deceived.’
‘Have I hurt you, then?’
I shook my head slowly. ‘I’ve hurt myself, boy.’ And I had. I’d never been a minstrel; I had no right to a minstrel’s ways. Those who make a living with their fingers and tongues have flintier hearts than the rest of us, I suppose. Sooner a kindly wolverine than a faithful minstrel, so the saying goes. I wondered if Starling’s husband paid heed to it.
‘I thought you would be angry. She warned me that you might get angry enough to hurt her.’
‘Did you believe that?’ That stung as sharply as the revelation.
He took a quick breath, hesitated again, then said quickly, ‘You’ve a temper. And I’ve never had to tell you something that might hurt you. Something that might make you feel stupid.’
Perceptive lad. More so than I had thought. ‘I am angry, Hap. I’m angry at myself.’
He looked at the fire. ‘I feel selfish, because I feel better now.’
‘I’m glad you feel better. I’m glad things are easy between us again. Now. Set all that aside and tell me about the rest of Springfest. What did you think of Buckkeep Town?’
So he talked and I listened. He’d seen Buckkeep and Springfest with a boy’s eyes, and as he spoke I realized how greatly both castle and town had changed since my days there. From his descriptions, I knew the city had managed to grow, clawing out building space from the harsh cliffs above it, and expanding out onto pilings. He described floating taverns and mercantiles. He talked, too, of traders from Bingtown and the islands beyond it, as well as those from the Out Islands. Buckkeep Town had increased its stature as a trade port. When he spoke of the Great Hall of Buckkeep and the room where he had stayed as Starling’s guest, I recognized that a great deal had changed up at the keep as well. He spoke of carpets and fountains, rich hangings on every wall, and cushioned chairs and glittering chandeliers. His descriptions put me more in mind of Regal’s fine manor at Tradeford than the stark fortress I had once called home. I suspected Chade’s influence there as much as Kettricken’s. The old assassin had always been fond of fine things, not to mention comfort. I had already resolved never to return to Buckkeep. Why should it be so daunting to learn that the place I recalled, that grim stronghold of black stone, did not really even exist any more?
Hap had other tales, too, of the towns they had passed through on their way to Buckkeep and back again. One he told me put a cold chill in my belly. ‘I got scared near to death one morning at Hardin’s Spit,’ he began, and I did not recognize the name of the village. I had known, dimly, that many folk who had fled the coast during the Red Ship years had returned to found new towns, not always on the ashes of the old. I nodded as if I knew of the place. Probably the last time I had been through it, it had been no more than a wide place in the road. Hap’s eyes were wide as he spoke, and I knew he had, for the moment, forgotten all about Starling’s deception.
‘It was on our way to Springfest. We had spent the night at the inn there, Starling singing for our supper and a room, and they were all so kind and well spoken to us there that I thought Hardin’s Spit a very fine place. In the common room, when Starling was not singing, I heard angry talk about a Witted one who had been taken for magicking cows so they would not yield, but I paid little attention to it. It just seemed men talking too loud after too much beer. The inn gave us an upstairs room. I woke up early, much too early for Starling, but I could not sleep any more. So I sat by the window and watched the folk come and go in the streets below. Outside, in the square, folk began to gather. I thought it might be a market or a Spring fair. But then they dragged a woman out there, all bruised and bloody. They tied her to a whipping post, and I thought they would flog her. Then I noticed that some of those gathered had brought full baskets of stones. I woke Starling and asked her what it was all about, but she bid me be quiet, there was nothing either of us could do about it. She told me to come away from the window, but I did not. I could not. I could not believe it could happen; I kept thinking someone would come and make them all stop. Tom, she was tied there, helpless. Some man came up and read from a scroll. Then he stood back, and they stoned her.’
He stopped speaking. He knew that in the villages there were harsh punishments for horse thieves and murderers. He’d heard of floggings and hangings. But he’d never had to watch one. He swallowed in the silence between us. Cold crept through me. Nighteyes whined, and I set a hand to him.
It could just as well be you.
I know.
Hap took a deep breath. ‘I thought I should go down there, that someone should do something, but I was too scared. I was shamed to be so scared, but I couldn’t make myself move. I just stood there and watched, and the stones hit her. And she kept trying to hide her head in her arms. I felt sick. Then I heard a sound such as I had never heard before, as if a river rushed through the air. The morning sky dimmed, as if storm clouds were blowing in, but there was no wind. It was crows, Tom, a flood of black birds. I’d never seen so many, cawing and screeching, just as they do when they find an eagle or a hawk and set out to roust it. Only they weren’t after an eagle. They rose out of the hills behind the town and filled the sky, like a black blanket flapping on a clothesline. Then they suddenly fell on the crowd, diving and cawing. I saw one land in a woman’s hair and strike at her eyes with his beak. People were running in every direction, screaming and slapping at the birds. They spooked a team and the horses went crazy, dragging their waggon right through the crowd. Everyone was screaming. Even Starling got up to come to the window. Soon the streets were empty of everything save the birds. They perched everywhere, on roofs and window ledges, and they filled the trees so that the branches drooped with their weight. The woman who had been tied, the Witted one, she was gone. Just the bloody ropes were left there, tied to the post. Then all at once, all the birds just lifted and took flight. And then they were gone.’ His voice dropped to a hush. ‘Later that morning, the innkeeper said that he deemed she had just turned into a bird and flown off with the others.’
Later, I told myself. Later I would tell him that wasn’t true, that she might have called the birds down to help her escape but that not even Witted ones could change their shapes like that. Later I would tell him he was not a coward for not going down there, that they would only have stoned him alongside her. Later. This story he was telling now was like poison running from a wound. Best to let it drain unhindered.
I picked up the trail of his words again. ‘… And they call themselves Old Blood. The innkeeper said they’ve begun to have high ideas of themselves. They’d like to come to power, he says, like they did in the days when the Piebald Prince ruled. But if they do, they’ll take vengeance on us all. Those that don’t have the Wit-magic will be their slaves. And if any try to defy them, they’ll be thrown to the Witted ones’ beasts.’ His voice died away to a whisper. He cleared his throat. ‘Starling told me that that was stupid, that Witted folk aren’t like that. She said that mostly they just want to be left alone to live quietly.’
I cleared my throat. I was surprised at the rush of gratitude I felt towards Starling. ‘Well. She’s a minstrel. They know many kinds of folk, and have many odd corners of knowledge. So you can believe what she told you.’
He had given me far too much to think about. I could scarcely keep my mind on the rest of his tales. He was intrigued by some wild story that Bingtown was hatching dragons and that soon towns could buy a Bingtown dragon for a watch beast. I assured him that I had seen real dragons, and that such tales were not to be believed. More realistic were the rumours that Bingtown’s war with Chalced might spread to the Six Duchies. ‘Would a war come here?’ he wanted to know. Young as he was, he had only vague but frightening memories of our war with the Red Ships.
Still, he was a boy, and a war seemed as interesting an event as Springfest.
‘Sooner or later, there is always war with Chalced,’ I quoted the old proverb to him. ‘Even when we are not at war with Chalced, there are always border skirmishes and a certain amount of piracy and raiding. Don’t let it worry you. Shoaks and Rippon Duchies always take the brunt of it, with relish. Shoaks Duchy would like nothing better than to carve themselves another chunk out of the Duke of Chalced’s lands.’
So the conversation moved to safer and more prosaic news of his Springfest. He told of jugglers who hurled flaming clubs and bare blades hand to hand, recounted the best jests from a bawdy puppet show he’d seen, and told me of a pretty hedgewitch named Jinna who had sold him a charm against pickpockets and promised some day to visit us here. I laughed aloud when he told me that within the hour, the charm had been plucked from him by a sneak-thief. He’d eaten pickled fish and liked it very much until he had too much wine one evening and vomited them together. He swore he’d never be able to eat it again. I let him talk on, glad he was finally taking pleasure in sharing his Buckkeep adventures with me. Yet, every story he told me showed me more plainly that my simple life was no longer suitable for Hap. It was time I found him an apprenticeship and let him strike out on his own.
For an instant, it was like standing on the lip of an abyss. I must turn Hap over to a master who could teach him a true trade, and I must set Starling out of my life as well. I knew that if I turned her out of my bed, she would not humble herself to come back to me as a friend. All the simple comfort of their companionship of the last few years would vanish. Hap’s voice pattered on, his words falling around me like a soft rain. I would miss the boy.
I felt the warm weight of the wolf’s head as he set it on my knee. He stared steadily into the fire. Once you dreamed of a time when it would be only you and me.
A Wit-bond leaves very little room for polite deception. I never expected to hunger so for the company of my own kind, I admitted.
A brief lambent glance from his deep eyes. Only we are our own kind. That has always been the problem with the links we sought to forge with others. They were wolves or they were human. But they were never our own kind. Not even those who call themselves Old Blood are as deeply twined as we.
I knew he spoke true. I set my hand to his broad skull and silked his ear through my fingers. I did not think at all.
He could not let it be. Change comes upon us again, Changer. I can feel it at the edge of the horizon, almost smell it. It is like a bigger predator come into our hunting territory. Do not you feel it?
I feel nothing.
But he heard the lie and sighed out a heavy breath.
THREE
Partings
The Wit is a dirty magic, most often afflicting the children of an unclean household. Although it is often blamed on having congress with beasts, there are other sources for this low magic. A wise parent will not allow his child to play with puppies or kittens that are still at suckle, nor permit his offspring to sleep where an animal sleeps. A child’s sleeping mind is most vulnerable to invasion by the dreams of a beast, and hence to taking the tongue of an animal as the language of his heart. Often this foul magic will afflict generations of a household due to their filthy habits, but it is not unknown for a Wit-child to appear suddenly in the midst of families of the best blood. When this happens, the parents must harden their hearts and do what must be done, for the sake of all the family’s children. They should look, too, amongst their servants to see whose malice or carelessness is the source of this contagion, and the offender should be dealt with accordingly.
Sarcogin’s Diseases and Afflictions
Shortly before the first dawn birds began to call, Hap drowsed off again. I sat for a brief time by his fire, watching him. The anxiety was smoothed from his face. Hap was a calm and simple boy who had never enjoyed conflict. He was not a boy for secrets. I was glad that his telling me about Starling had put him at peace with himself. My own route to peace would be a rockier path.
I left him sleeping in the early sunlight by the dying fire. ‘Keep watch over him,’ I told Nighteyes. I could feel the aching in the wolf’s hips, echoing the gnawing pain in my scarred back. Nights in the open were not gentle to either of us any more. Yet, I would have gladly lain down on the cold damp earth rather than go back to my cottage and confront Starling. Sooner is usually better than later when it comes to facing unpleasantness, I told myself. Walking like a very old man, I returned to the cottage.
I stopped at the hen-house for eggs. My flock was already up and scratching. The rooster flew to the top of the mended roof, flapped his wings twice and crowed lustily. Morning. Yes. One I dreaded.
Inside the cottage, I poked up the fire and put the eggs to boil. I took out my last loaf of bread, the cheese that Chade had brought, and tea herbs. Starling was never an early riser. I had plenty of time to think of what I would say, and what I would not say. As I put the room to rights, mostly picking up her scattered belongings, my mind wandered back over the years we had shared. Over a decade it had been, of knowing one another. Of thinking I knew her, I corrected myself. Then I damned myself for a liar. I did know her. I picked her discarded cloak from the chair. Her scent was trapped in its good wool. A very fine quality, I told myself. Her husband provided her with the best. The sharpest part of this was that what Starling had done did not surprise me. I was ashamed only of myself, that I had not foreseen it.
For six years after the Cleansing of Buck, I had moved alone through the world. I made no contact with anyone who had known me at Buckkeep. My life as a Farseer, as Prince Chivalry’s bastard, as Chade’s apprentice assassin, was dead to me. I became Tom Badgerlock, and entered wholeheartedly into that new life. As I had long dreamed, I travelled, and my decisions were shared only with my wolf. I found a sort of peace within myself. This is not to say that I didn’t miss those I had loved at Buckkeep. I did, sometimes savagely. But in missing them, I also discovered my freedom from my past. A hungry man can long for hot meat and gravy without disdaining the simple pleasures of bread and cheese. I put together a life for myself, and if it lacked much of what had been sweet in my old life, it also provided simple pleasures the old life had long denied me. I had been content.
Then, one foggy morning about a year after I had settled into the cottage near the ruins of Forge, the wolf and I returned from a hunt to find change waiting in ambush for us. A yearling deer was heavy on my shoulders, making my old arrow scar ache and twinge. I was trying to decide if the comfort of a long soak in hot water was worth the pain of hauling the buckets and the wait for the water to heat when I heard the unmistakable sound of a shod hoof against stone. I eased our kill to the ground, and then Nighteyes and I ghosted a wide circle around the hut. There was nothing to see but a horse, still saddled, tied to a tree near my door. The rider was likely within our home. The horse flicked her ears as we sidled closer, aware of me, but not yet certain of alarm.
Hang back, my brother. If the horse scents wolf, she will neigh. If I go very softly, I might get close enough to see inside before she gives any warning.
Silent as the fog that cloaked us both, Nighteyes withdrew into a swirl of grey. I circled to the back of our cottage and then glided down to stand close to one wall. I could hear the intruder inside. A thief? I heard the clack of crockery, and the sound of water being poured. A thump was someone tossing a log on my fire. I knit my brows in puzzlement. Whoever it was, he seemed to be making himself at home. An instant later, I heard a voice lift in the refrain of an old song, and my heart turned over in me. Despite the years that had passed, I recognized Starling’s voice.
The howling bitch, Nighteyes confirmed for me. He’d caught her scent. As always, I winced wryly at how the wolf thought of the minstrel.
Let me go first. Despite knowing who it was, I was still wary as I approached my own door. This was no accident. She’d tracked me down. Why? What did she want of me?
‘Starling,�
� I said as I opened the door. She spun to confront me, teapot in hand. Her eyes travelled me swiftly, then met my eyes and, ‘Fitz!’ she exclaimed happily, and lunged at me. She embraced me, and after a moment, I put my arms around her as well. She hugged me hard. Like most Buck women, she was small and dark, but I felt her wiry strength in her embrace.
‘Hello,’ I said uncertainly, looking down at the top of her head.
She tilted her face up at me. ‘Hello?’ she said incredulously. She laughed aloud at my expression. ‘Hello?’ She leaned away from me to set the teapot on the table. Then she reached up, seized my face between her hands and pulled me down to be kissed. I had just come in from the damp and the cold. The contrast between that and her warm mouth on mine was astonishing, as amazing as having a woman in my arms. She held me close and it was as if life itself embraced me again. Her scent intoxicated me. Heat rushed through me and my heart raced. I took my mouth from hers. ‘Starling,’ I began.
‘No,’ she said firmly. She glanced over my shoulder, then took both my hands and tugged me towards the sleeping alcove off the main room. I lurched after her, drunken with surprise. She halted by my bed and unbuttoned her shirt. When I just stared at her dumbly, she laughed and reached up to untie the laces of mine. ‘Don’t talk yet,’ she warned me. And she lifted my chilled hand and set it on one of her bared breasts.
At that moment, Nighteyes shouldered the door open and came into the cabin. Cold billowed into the warm room as fog. For an instant, he just looked at us. Then he shook the moisture from his coat. It was Starling’s turn to freeze. ‘The wolf. I’d almost forgotten … you still have him?’
‘We are still together. Of course.’ I started to lift my hand from her breast, but she caught my hand and held it there.
‘I don’t mind. I suppose.’ She looked uncomfortable. ‘But does he have to … be here?’