by Robin Hobb
"Somewhat," I hedged.
"Somewhat." He sighed. "I could teach you to Skill, had I but the time. I do not. But tell me this-were your lessons going well, before he tested you?"
"No. I never had any aptitude ... wait! That's not true! What am I saying, what have I been thinking?" Though I was sitting, I swayed suddenly, my head bounding off the arm of Verity's chair. He reached out a hand and steadied me.
"I was too swift, I suppose. Steady now, boy. Someone had misted you. Befuddled you, much as I do Red-Ship navigators and steersmen. Convince them they've taken a sighting already and their course is true when really they are steering into a cross current. Convince them they've passed a point they haven't sighted yet. Someone convinced you that you could not Skill."
"Galen." I spoke with certainty. I almost knew the moment. He had slammed into me that afternoon, and from that time nothing had been the same. I had been living in a fog, all those months ....
"Probably. Though if you Skilled into him at all, I'm sure you've seen what Chivalry did to him. He hated your father with a passion, prior to Chiv turning him into a lapdog. We felt badly about it. We'd have undone it, if we could have figured out how to do it, and escape Solicity's detection. But Chiv was strong with the Skill, and we were all but boys then, and Chiv was angry when he did it. Over something Galen had done to me, ironically. Even when Chivalry was not angry, being Skilled by him was like being trampled by a horse. Or ducked in a fast-flowing river, more like. He'd get in a hurry, and barge into you and dump his information and flee." He paused again and reached to uncover a dish of soup on his tray. "I guess I've always assumed you knew all this. Though I'm damned if there's any way you could have. Who would have told you?"
I seized on one piece of information. "You could teach me to Skill?"
"If I had time. A great deal of time. You're a lot like Chiv and I were, when we learned. Erratic. Strong, but with no idea how to bring that strength to bear. And Galen has ... well, scarred you, I suppose. You've walls I can't begin to penetrate, and I am strong. You'd have to learn to drop them. That's a hard thing. But I could teach you, yes. If you and I had a year, and nothing else to do." He pushed the soup aside. "But we don't."
My hopes crashed again. This second wave of disappointment engulfed me, grinding me against stones of frustration. My memories all reordered themselves, and in a surge of anger, I knew all that had been done to me. Were it not for Smithy, I'd have dashed my life out at the base of the tower that night. Galen had tried to kill me, just as surely as if he'd had a knife. No one would even have known of how he'd beaten me, save his loyal coterie. And while he'd failed at that, he had taken from me the chance to learn Skilling. He'd crippled me, and I would ... I leaped to my feet, furious.
"Whoa. Be slow and careful. You have a grievance, but we cannot have discord within the keep itself right now. Carry it with you until you can settle it quietly, for the King's sake." I bowed my head to the wisdom of his counsel. He lifted the cover from a small roast fowl, dropped it again. "Why would you want to learn this Skill anyway? It's a miserable thing. No fit occupation for a man."
"To help you," I said without thinking, and then found it true. Once it would have been to prove myself a true and fit son to Chivalry, to impress Burrich or Chade, to increase my standing in the keep. Now, after watching what Verity did, day after day, with no praise or acknowledgment from his subjects, I found I only wanted to help him.
"To help me," he repeated. The storm winds were slackening. With exhausted resignation, he lifted his eyes to the window. "Take the food away, boy. I've no time for it now."
"But you need strength," I protested. Guiltily, I knew he had taken time with me that he should have taken for food and sleep.
"I know. But I have no time. Eating takes energy. Odd to realize that. I have none extra to give to that just now." His eyes were questing afar now, staring through the sheeting rain that was just beginning to slacken.
"I'd give you my strength, Verity. If I could."
He looked at me oddly. "Are you sure? Very sure?"
I could not understand the intensity of his question, but I knew the answer. "Of course I would." And more quietly: "I am a king's man." "And of my own blood," he affirmed. He sighed. For a moment he looked sickened. He looked again at the food, and again out the window. "There is just time," he whispered. "And it might be enough. Damnation to you, Father. Must you always win? Come here, then, boy."
There was an intensity to his words that frightened me, but I obeyed. When I stood by his chair, he reached out a hand. He placed it on my shoulder, as if he needed assistance to rise.
I looked up at him from the floor. There was a pillow under my head, and the blanket I had brought up earlier had been tossed over me. Verity stood, leaning out the window. He was shaking with effort, and the Skill he exerted was like battering waves I could almost feel. "Onto the rocks," he said with deep satisfaction, and whirled from the window. He grinned at me, an old fierce grin, that faded slowly as he looked down on me.
"Like a calf to the slaughter," he said ruefully. "I should have known that you didn't know what you were talking about."
"What happened to me?" I managed to ask. My teeth chattered against each other, and my whole body shook as with a chill. I felt I would rattle my bones out of their joints.
"You offered me your strength. I took it." He poured a cup of the tea, then knelt to hold it to my mouth. "Go slowly. I was in a hurry. Did I say earlier that Chivalry was a bull with his Skill? What must I say about myself then?"
He had his old bluff heartiness and good nature back. This was a Verity I had not seen for months. I managed a mouthful of the tea and felt the elfbark sting my mouth and throat. My shivering eased. Verity took a casual gulp from the mug.
"In the old days," he said conversationally, "a king would draw on his coterie. Half a dozen men or more, and all in tune with one another, able to pool strength and offer it as needed. That was their true purpose. To provide strength to their king, or to their own key man. I don't think Galen quite grasps that. His coterie is a thing he has fashioned. They are like horses and bullocks and donkeys, all harnessed together. Not a true coterie at all. They lack the singleness of mind."
"You drew strength from me?"
"Yes. Believe me, boy, I would not have, except that I had a sudden need, and I thought you knew what you offered. You yourself named yourself as a king's man, the old term. And as close as we are in blood, I knew I could tap you." He set the mug down on the tray with a thump. Disgust deepened his voice. "Shrewd. He sets things in motion, wheels turning, pendulums swaying. It is no accident you are the one to bring me my meals, boy. He was making you available to me." He took a swift turn about the room, then stopped, standing over me. "It will not happen again."
"It was not so bad," I said faintly.
"No? Why don't you try to stand, then? Or even sit up? You're just one boy, alone, not a coterie. Had I not realized your ignorance and drawn back, I could have killed you. Your heart and breath would just have stopped. I'll not drain you like this, not for anyone. Here." He stooped, and without effort, lifted me and placed me in his chair. "Sit here a bit. And eat. I don't need it now. And when you are better, go to Shrewd for me. Say that I say you are a distraction. I wish a kitchen boy to bring my meals, from now on.
"Verity," I began.
"No," he corrected me. "Say `my prince.' For in this, I am your prince, and I will not be questioned on it. Now eat."
I bowed my head, miserable, but I did eat, and the elfbark in the tea worked to revive me faster than I had expected. Soon I could stand, to stack the dishes on the tray and then to carry them to the door. I felt defeated. I lifted the latch.
"FitzChivalry Farseer."
I halted, frozen by the words. I turned slowly.
"It's your name, boy. I wrote it myself, in the military log, on the day you were brought to me. Another thing I had thought you knew. Stop thinking of yourself as the bastard, FitzChiva
lry Farseer. And be sure that you see Shrewd today."
"Good-bye," I said quietly, but he was already staring out the window again.
And so high summer found us all. Chade at his tablets, Verity at his window, Regal courting a princess for his brother, and I, quietly killing for my king. The Inland and Coastal Dukes took sides at the council tables, hissing and spitting at one another like cats over fish. And atop it all was Shrewd, keeping each piece of web as taut as any spider, and alert to the least thrumming of a line. The Red-Ships struck at us, like ratfish on beef bait, tearing away bits of our folk and Forging them. And the Forged folk became a torment to the land, beggars or predators or burden to their families. Folk feared to fish, to trade, or to farm the river-mouth plains by the sea. And yet the taxes must be raised, to feed the soldiers and the watchers who seemed unable to defend the land despite their growing numbers. Shrewd had grudgingly released me from my service to Verity. My king had not called for me in over a month when one morning I was abruptly summoned to breakfast.
"It's a poor time to wed," Verity objected. I looked at the sallow, fleshless man who shared the King's breakfast table and wondered if this was the bluff, hearty prince from my childhood. He had worsened so much in just a month. He toyed with a bit of bread, set it down again. The outdoors had gone from his cheeks and eyes; his hair was dull, his musculature slack. The whites of his eyes were yellowed. Burrich would have wormed him if he'd been a hound.
Unasked, I said, "I hunted with Leon two days ago. He took a rabbit for me."
Verity turned to me, a ghost of his old smile playing on his face. "You took my wolfhound for rabbits?"
"He enjoyed it. He misses you, though. He brought me the rabbit, and I praised him, but it didn't seem to satisfy him." I couldn't tell him how the hound had looked at me, not for you as plain in his eyes as in his bearing.
Verity picked up his glass. His hand quivered ever so slightly. "I am glad he gets out with you, boy. It's better than-"
"The wedding," Shrewd cut in, "will hearten the people. I am getting old, Verity, and the times are troubled. The people see no end to their troubles, and I do not dare promise them solutions we do not have. The Outislanders are right, Verity. We are not the warriors who once settled here. We have become a settled people. And a settled people can be threatened in ways that nomads and rovers have no care for. And we can be destroyed in those same ways. When settled people look for security, they look for continuity."
Here I looked up sharply. Those were Chade's words, I'd bet my blood on it. Did that mean that this wedding was something Chade was helping to engineer? My interest became keener, and I wondered again why I had been summoned to this breakfast.
"It's a matter of reassuring our folk, Verity. You have not Regal's charm, nor the bearing that let Chivalry convince anyone that he could take care of any matter. This is not to slight you; you have as much talent for the Skill as I have ever seen in our line, and in many eras your soldierly skills in tactics would have been more important than Chivalry's diplomacy."
This sounded suspiciously like a rehearsed speech to me. I watched Shrewd pause. He put cheese and preserves on some bread and bit into it thoughtfully. Verity sat silent, watching his father. He seemed both attentive and bemused. Like a man trying desperately to stay awake and be alert when all he can think of is putting his head down and closing his eyes; well, Verity certainly looked at least that tired. My brief experiences of the Skill and the split concentration it demanded to resist its enticements, while bending it to one's will, made me marvel at Verity's ability to wield it every day.
Shrewd glanced from Verity to me and back to his son's face. "Putting it simply, you need to marry. More, you need to beget a child. It would put heart into the people. They would say, `Well, it cannot be as bad as all that, if our prince does not fear to marry and have a child. Surely he would not be doing that if the whole kingdom were on the verge of crumbling.'"
"But you and I would still know better, wouldn't we, Father?" There was a hint of rust in Verity's voice, and a bitterness I had never heard there before.
"Verity-" Shrewd began, but his son cut in.
"My king," he said formally. "You and I do know that we are on the brink of disaster. And now, right now, there can be no slackening of our vigilance. I have no time for courting and wooing, and even less time for the more subtle negotiations of finding a royal bride. While the weather is fine, the Red-Ships will raid. And when it turns poor, and the tempests blow their ships back to their own ports, then we must turn our minds and our energies to fortifying our coastlines and training crews to manage raiding ships of our own. That is what I want to discuss with you. Let us build our own fleet, not fat merchant ships to waddle about tempting raiders, but sleek warships, such as we once had and our oldest shipwrights still know how to make. And let us take this battle to the Outislanders-yes, even through the storms of winter. We used to have such sailors and warriors among us. If we begin to build and train now, by next spring we could at least hold them away from our coast, and possibly by winter we could-"
"It will take money. And money does not flow fastest from terrified men. To raise the funds we need, we need to have our merchants confident enough to continue trading, we have to have farmers unafraid to pasture their flocks on the coast meadows and hills. It all comes back, Verity, to your taking a wife."
Verity, so animated when speaking of warships, leaned back in his chair. He seemed to sag in on himself, as if some piece of structure inside him had given way. I almost expected to see him collapse. "As you will, my king," he said, but as he spoke he shook his head, denying the affirmation of his own words. "I will do as you see wise. Such is the duty of a prince to his king and to his kingdom. But as a man, Father, it is a bitter and empty thing, this taking of a woman selected by my younger brother. I will wager that having looked on Regal first, when she stands beside me, she will not see me as any great prize." Verity looked down at his hands, at the battle and work scars that now showed plainly against their paleness. I heard his name in his words when he said softly, "Always I have been your second son. Behind Chivalry, with his beauty, strength, and wisdom.
And now behind Regal, with his cleverness and charm and airs. I know you think he would be a better King to follow after you than I. I do not always disagree with you. I was born second, and raised to be second. I had always believed my place would be behind the throne, not upon it. And when I thought that Chivalry would follow you to that high seat, I did not mind it. He gave me great worth, my brother did. His confidence in me was like an honor; it made me a part of all he accomplished. To be the right hand of such a king were better than to be King of many a lesser land. I believed in him as he believed in me. But he is gone. And I tell you nothing surprising when I say to you that there is no such bond between Regal and me. Perhaps there are too many years; perhaps Chivalry and I were so close we left no room for a third. But I do not think he sought for a woman that can love me. Or one that-"
"He chose you a queen!" Shrewd interrupted harshly. I knew then that this was not the first time this had been argued and sensed that Shrewd was most annoyed that I had been privy to these words. "Regal chose a woman, not for you, or himself, or any such silliness. He chose a woman to be Queen of this country, of these Six Duchies. A woman who can bring to us the wealth and the men and the trade agreements that we need now, if we are to survive these Red-Ships. Soft hands and a sweet scent will not build your warships, Verity. You must set aside this jealousy of your brother; you cannot fend off the enemy if you do not have confidence in those who stand behind you."
"Exactly," Verity said quietly. He pushed his chair back.
"Where do you go?" Shrewd demanded irritably.
"To my duties," Verity said shortly. "Where else have I to go?"
For a moment even Shrewd looked taken aback. "But you've scarcely eaten ...." He faltered.
"The Skill kills all other appetites. You know that."
"Yes." Shrewd
paused. "And I know, too, as you do, that when this happens, a man is close to the edge. The appetite for the Skill is one that devours a man, not one that nourishes him."
They both seemed to have forgotten entirely about me. I made myself small and unobtrusive, nibbling on my biscuit as if I were a mouse in a corner.
"But what does the devouring of one man matter, if it saves a kingdom." Verity did not bother to disguise the bitterness in his voice, and to me it was plain that it was not the Skill alone that he spoke of. He pushed his plate away. "After all," he added with ponderous sarcasm, "it is not as if you do not have yet another son to step in and wear your crown. One unscarred by what the Skill does to men. One free to wed where he will, or will not."
"It is not Regal's fault that he is unSkilled. He was a sickly child, too sickly for Galen to train. And who could have foreseen that two Skilled Princes would not be enough," Shrewd protested. He rose abruptly and paced the length of the chamber. He stood, leaning on the windowsill and peering out over the sea below. "I do what I can, son," he added in a lower voice. "Do you think I do not care, that I do not see how you are being consumed?"