by Robin Hobb
I dozed. I awakened to a draught on my shoulder. The secret door beside the hearth that led up to Chade’s domain was wide open and beckoning. I arose stiffly, stretched, and went up the stone stairs. Thus had I first gone, so long ago, clad then as I was now in just my nightshirt. I had followed a frightening old man with a pocked visage and eyes sharp and bright as a raven’s. He had offered to teach me to kill people. He had also offered, wordlessly, to be my friend. I had accepted both offers.
The stone steps were cold. Here there were still cobwebs and dust and soot above the sconces on the walls. So the housekeeping hadn’t extended to this staircase. Nor to Chade’s quarters. They were as chaotic, disreputable and comfortable as ever. At one end of his chamber was his working hearth, bare stone floors and an immense table. The usual clutter overflowed it: mortars and pestles, sticky dishes of meat scraps for Slink the weasel, pots of dried herbs, tablets and scrolls, spoons and tongs, and a blackened kettle, still sending a reeking smoke curling into the chamber.
But Chade was not there. No, he was at the other end of the chamber, where a fatly cushioned chair faced a hearth with a dancing fire. Carpets overlay one another over the floor there, and an elegantly carved table held a glass bowl of autumn apples and a decanter of summer wine. Chade was ensconced in the chair, a partially unrolled scroll held to the light as he read it. Did he hold it farther from his nose than once he had, and were his spare arms more desiccated? I wondered if he had aged in the months I had been away, or if I had simply not noticed before. His grey woollen robe looked as well worn as ever, and his long grey hair overlay its shoulders and seemed the same colour. As always, I stood silent until he deigned to look up and recognize my presence. Some things changed, but some things did not.
He finally lowered the scroll and looked my way. He had green eyes, and their lightness was always surprising in his Farseer face. Despite the pox-like scars that stippled his face and arms, his bastard bloodlines were almost as plain marked as mine. I suppose I could have claimed him as a great-uncle, but our apprentice to master relationship was closer than a blood-tie. He looked me over and I self-consciously stood straighter under his scrutiny. His voice was grave as he commanded, ‘Boy, come into the light.’
I advanced a dozen steps and stood apprehensively. He studied me as intently as he had studied the scroll. ‘Were we ambitious traitors, you and I, we would make sure folk marked your resemblance to Chivalry. I could teach you to stand as he stood; you already walk as he did. I could show you how to add lines to your face to make you appear older. You have most of his height. You could learn his catch phrases, and the way he laughed. Slowly, we could gather power, in quiet ways, with none even recognizing what they were conceding. And one day, we could step up and take power.’
He paused.
Slowly I shook my head. Then we both smiled, and I came to sit on the hearth stones by his feet. The warmth of the fire on my back felt good.
‘It’s my trade, I suppose.’ He sighed and took a sip of his wine. ‘I have to think of these things, for I know that others will. One day, sooner or later, some petty noble will believe it an original idea and approach you with it. Wait and see if I am not right.’
‘I pray you are wrong. I have had enough of intrigues, Chade, and not fared as well at that game as I had expected to.’
‘You did not do badly, with the hand you were dealt. You survived.’ He looked past me into the fire. A question hung between us, almost palpably. Why had King Shrewd revealed to Prince Regal that I was his trained assassin? Why had he put me in the position of reporting to and taking orders from a man who wished me dead? Had he traded me away to Regal, to distract him from his other discontents? And if I had been a sacrificial pawn, was I still being dangled as bait and a distraction to the younger prince? I think not even Chade could have answered all my questions, and to ask any of them would have been blackest betrayal of what we were both sworn to be: King’s Men. Both of us long ago had given our lives into Shrewd’s keeping, for the protection of the royal family. It was not for us to question how he chose to spend us. That way lay treason.
So Chade lifted the summer wine and filled a waiting glass for me. For a brief time we conversed of things that were of no import to any save us, and all the more precious for that. I asked after Slink the weasel, and he haltingly offered sympathy over Nosy’s death. He asked a question or two that let me know he was privy to everything I had reported to Verity, and a lot of stable gossip as well. I was filled in on the minor gossip of the keep, and all the doings I had missed among the lesser folk while I was gone. But when I asked him what he thought of Kettricken our Queen-in-Waiting, his face grew grave.
‘She faces a difficult path. She comes to a queenless court, where she herself is and yet is not the Queen. She comes in a time of hardship, to a kingdom facing both Raiders and civil unrest. But most difficult for her is that she comes to a court that does not understand her concept of royalty. She had been besieged with feasts and gatherings in her honour. She is used to walking out among her own people, to tending her own gardens and looms and forge, to solving disputes and sacrificing herself to spare her people hardship. Here, she finds, her society is solely the nobility, the privileged, the wealthy. She does not understand the consumption of wine and exotic foods, the display of costly fabrics in dress, the flaunting of jewels that are the purpose of these gatherings. And so she does not “show well”. She is a handsome woman, in her way. But she is too big, too heartily muscled, too fair amongst the Buckkeep women. She is like a charger stabled among hunters. Her heart is good, but I do not know if she will be sufficient to the task, boy. In truth, I pity her. She came here alone, you know. Those few who accompanied her here have long since returned to the mountains. So she is very alone here, despite those who court her favour.’
‘And Verity,’ I asked, troubled. ‘He does nothing to allay that loneliness, nothing to teach her of our ways?’
‘Verity has little time for her,’ Chade said bluntly. ‘He tried to explain this to King Shrewd before the marriage was arranged, but we did not listen to him. King Shrewd and I were beguiled with the political advantages she offered. I forgot there would be a woman here, in this court, day after day. Verity has his hands full. Were they just a man and a woman, and given time, I think they could genuinely care for one another. But here and now, they must devote all their efforts to appearance. Soon an heir will be demanded. They have no time to get to know one another, let alone care for one another.’ He must have seen the pain in my face, for he added, ‘That’s how it has always been for royalty, boy. Chivalry and Patience were the exception. And they bought their happiness at the cost of political advantages. It was unheard of, for the King-in-Waiting to marry for love. I’m sure you’ve heard over and over how foolish a thing it was.’
‘And I’d always wondered if he’d cared.’
‘It cost him,’ Chade said quietly. ‘I don’t think he regretted his decision. But he was King-in-Waiting. You don’t have that latitude.’
Here it came. I’d suspected he’d know everything. And useless to hope he’d say nothing. I felt a slow flush steal up my face. ‘Molly.’
He nodded slowly. ‘It was one thing when it was down in town, and you were more or less a boy. That could be ignored. But now you’re being seen as a man. When she came here asking after you, it started tongues wagging and folk speculating. Patience was remarkably agile at hushing the rumours and taking charge of the situation. Not that I’d have kept the woman here, had it been left to me. But Patience handled it well enough.’
‘The woman …’ I repeated, stung. If he’d said ‘the whore’ I couldn’t have felt it more sharply. ‘Chade, you misjudge her. And me. It began as a friendship, a long time ago, and if anyone was at fault in … how things went, it was me, not Molly. I’d always thought that the friends I made in town, that the time I spent there as “Newboy” belonged to me.’ I faltered to a halt, hearing only the foolishness of my words.
&n
bsp; ‘Did you think you could lead two lives?’ Chade’s voice was soft but not gentle. ‘We belong to the King, boy. King’s Men. Our lives belong to him. Every moment, of every day, asleep or awake. You have no time for your own concerns. Only his.’
I shifted slightly, to look into the fire. I considered what I knew of Chade in that light. I met him here, by darkness, in these isolated chambers. I had never seen him out and about around Buckkeep. No one spoke his name to me. Occasionally, disguised as Lady Thyme, he ventured forth. Once we had ridden together through the night, to that first awful Forging at Forge. But even that had been at the King’s command. What did Chade have for a life? A chamber, good food and wine, and a weasel for a companion. He was Shrewd’s older brother. But for his bastardy, he would be upon the throne. Was his life a foreshadowing of what mine was to be?
‘No.’
I hadn’t spoken, but as I looked up into Chade’s face, he guessed my thoughts. ‘I chose this life, boy. After a mishandled potion exploded and scarred me. I was handsome, once. And vain. Almost as vain as Regal. When I ruined my face, I wished myself dead. For months, I did not stir out of my chambers. When I finally went forth, it was in disguises, not Lady Thyme, not then, no. But disguises that covered my face and my hands. I left Buckkeep. For a long time. And when I came back, that handsome young man I had been was dead. I found myself more useful to the family, now that I was dead. There is much more to that story, boy. But know that I chose the way I live. It was not something Shrewd forced me into. I did it myself. Your future may be different. But do not imagine it is yours to command.’
Curiosity prodded me. ‘Is that why Chivalry and Verity knew of you, but not Regal?’
Chade smiled in an odd way. ‘I was a sort of a kindly step-uncle to the two older boys, if you can believe it. I watched over them, in some ways. But once I was scarred, I kept myself even from them. Regal never knew me. His mother had a horror of the pox. I think she believed all the legends of the pocked-man, harbinger of disaster and misfortune. For that matter, she had an almost superstitious dread of anyone who was not whole. You see it in Regal’s reaction to the Fool. She would never keep a club-footed maid or even a serving-man with a missing finger or two. So. When I returned, I was never introduced to the lady, or the child she bore. When Chivalry became King-in-Waiting to Shrewd, I was one of the things revealed to him. I was shocked to find he recalled me, and had missed me. He brought Verity to see me that evening. I had to scold him over that. It was difficult to make them understand they could not come calling on me anytime they chose. Those boys.’ He shook his head and smiled at his memories. I can not explain the twinge of jealousy I felt. I called the conversation back to myself.
‘What do you think I should do?’
Chade pursed his lips, sipped his wine, and thought. ‘For now, Patience has given you good advice. Ignore or avoid Molly, but not obviously. Treat her as if she were a new scullery maid: courteously, if you encounter her, but not familiarly. Do not seek her out. Devote yourself to the Queen-in-Waiting. Verity will be glad of your distracting her. Kettricken will be glad of a friendly face. And if your intent is to win permission to marry Molly, the Queen-in-Waiting could be a powerful ally. As you divert Kettricken, watch over her as well. Bear in mind there are those whose interests do not support Verity having an heir. Those same ones who would not be enthused about your having children. So be wary and alert. Keep your guard up.’
‘Is that all?’ I asked, daunted.
‘No. Get some rest. Deadroot was what was used on you, by Regal?’ I nodded and he shook his head, narrowing his eyes. Then he looked me squarely in the face. ‘You are young. You may be able to recover, mostly. I’ve seen one other man survive it. But he trembled the rest of his life. I see the small signs of it on you yet. It will not show much, except to those who know you well. But do not overtire yourself. Weariness will bring on tremblings and blurred vision. Push yourself, and you will have fits. You do not want anyone to know you have a weakness. The best course is to conduct your life in such a way the weakness never shows.’
‘Was that why there was elfbark in the tea?’ I asked needlessly.
He raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Tea?’
‘Perhaps it was the Fool’s doing. I awoke to food and tea in my room …’
‘And if it had been Regal’s doing?’
It took a moment for the realization to dawn. ‘I could have been poisoned.’
‘But you weren’t. Not this time. No, it was neither I nor the Fool. It was Lacey. There is someone deeper than you credit. The Fool discovered you, and something possessed him to tell Patience. While she was flustering, Lacey quietly ordered it all done. I think that privately she considers you as scatter-brained as her mistress. Give her the slightest opening, and she will move in and organize your life. Good as her intentions are, you cannot allow that, Fitz. An assassin needs privacy. Get a latch for your door.’
‘Fitz?’ I wondered aloud.
‘It is your name. FitzChivalry. As it seems to have lost its sting with you, I will use it now. I was beginning to weary of “boy”.’
I bowed my head. We went on to talk of other things. It was an hour or so until morning when I left his windowless chambers and returned to my own. I went back to bed, but sleep eluded me. I had always stifled the hidden anger I felt at my position at court. Now it smouldered within me so that I could not rest. I threw off my blankets and dressed in my outgrown clothes, left the keep, and walked down into Buckkeep Town.
The brisk wind off the water blew damp cold like a wet slap in the face. I pulled my cloak more tightly around myself and tugged up my hood. I walked briskly, avoiding icy spots on the steep roadway down to town. I tried not to think, but I found that the brisk pumping of my blood was warming my anger more than my flesh. My thoughts danced like a reined-in horse.
When I had first come to Buckkeep Town, it had been a busy, grubby little place. In the last decade it had grown and adopted a veneer of sophistication, but its roots were only too plain. The town clung to the cliffs below Buckkeep Castle, and when those cliffs gave way to the rocky beaches, the warehouses and sheds were built out on docks and pilings. The good deep anchorage that sheltered below Buckkeep attracted merchant vessels and traders. Further to the north, where the Buck River met the sea, there were gentler beaches and the wide river to carry trading barges far inland to the Inland Duchies. The land closest to the river mouth was susceptible to flooding, and the anchorage unpredictable as the river shifted in its course. So the folk of Buckkeep Town lived crowded together on the steep cliffs above the harbour like the birds on Egg Bluffs. It made for narrow, badly cobbled streets that wound back and forth across the steepness as they made their way down to the water. The houses, shops and inns clung humbly to the cliff face, endeavouring to offer no resistance to the winds that were almost constant there. Higher up the cliff, the more ambitious homes and businesses were of timber, with their foundations cut into the stone itself. But I knew little of that stratum. I had run and played as a child among the humbler shops and sailors’ inns that fronted almost on the water itself.
By the time I reached this area of Buckkeep Town, I was reflecting ironically that both Molly and I would have been better off had we never become friends. I had compromised her reputation, and if I continued my attentions, she would most likely become a target for Regal’s malice. As for myself, the anguish I had felt at believing she had blithely left me for another was but a scratch compared to the bleeding now at knowing she thought I had deceived her.
I came out of my bleak thoughts to realize that my traitorous feet had carried me to the very door of her chandlery. Now it was a tea and herb shop. Just what Buckkeep Town needed, another tea and herb shop. I wondered what had become of Molly’s bee hives. It gave me a pang to realize that for Molly the sense of dislocation must be ten times, no, a hundred times worse. I had so easily accepted that Molly had lost her father, and with him her livelihood and her prospects. So easily accepted
the change that made her a servant in the keep. A servant. I clenched my teeth and kept walking.
I wandered the town aimlessly. Even in my bleak mood, I noticed how much it had changed in the last six months. Even on this cold winter day, it bustled. The construction of the ships had brought more folk, and more folk meant more trade. I stopped in a tavern where Molly, Dirk, Kerry and I had used to share a bit of brandy now and then. The cheapest blackberry brandy was usually what we got. I sat by myself and drank my short beer in silence, but around me tongues wagged and I learned much. It was not just the ship construction which had bolstered Buckkeep Town’s prosperity; Verity had put out a call for sailors to man his warships. The call had been amply answered, by men and women from all of the Coastal Duchies. Some came with a grudge to settle, to avenge those killed or Forged by the Raiders. Others came for the adventure, and the hope of booty, or simply because, in the ravaged villages, they had no other prospects. Some were from fisher or merchant families, with sea time and water skills. Other were the former shepherds and farmers of ravaged villages. It mattered little. All had come to Buckkeep Town, eager to shed Red Ship blood.
For now, many were housed in what had once been warehouses. Hod, the Buckkeep Weapons-master, was giving them weapons training, winnowing out those she thought might be suitable for Verity’s ships. The others would be offered hire as soldiers. These were the extra fold that swelled the town and crowded the inns and taverns and eating places. I heard complaints, too, that some of those who came to man the warships were immigrant Outislanders, displaced from their own land by the very Red Ships that now menaced our coasts. They, too, claimed to be eager for revenge, but few Six Duchies folk trusted them, and some businesses in town would not sell to them. It gave an ugly charged undercurrent to the busy tavern. There was a snickering discussion of an Outislander who had been beaten on the docks the day before. No one had called the town patrol. When the speculation became even uglier, that these Outislanders were all spies and that burning them out would be a wise and sensible precaution, I could no longer stomach it, and left the tavern. Was there nowhere I could go to be free of suspicions and intrigues, if only for an hour?