Royal Assassin (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  ‘Ill cared for? What ex­actly are you say­ing?’ he ac­cused me.

  I took a breath for cour­age. Truth. ‘I found his cham­ber un­tidy and musty. Dirty plates left about. The lin­ens of his bed un­changed …’

  ‘Dare you say such things?’ Regal hissed.

  ‘I do. I speak the truth to my king, as I ever have. Let him look about with his own eyes and see if it is not so.’

  Some­thing in the con­front­a­tion had stirred Shrewd to a shadow of his old self. He pushed him­self up in bed and looked about him­self. ‘The Fool has like­wise made these com­plaints, in his own acid way …’ he began.

  Wal­lace dared to in­ter­rupt him. ‘My lord, the state of your health has been tender. Some­times un­in­ter­rup­ted rest is more im­port­ant than rolling you out of your bed to fuss with a change of blankets or linen. And a dish or two stacked about is less an­noy­ance than the rattle and prattle of a page come in to tidy.’

  King Shrewd looked sud­denly un­cer­tain. My heart smote me. This was what the Fool had wished me to see, why he had so of­ten urged me to visit the King. Why had not he spoken more plainly? But then, when did the Fool ever speak plainly? Shame rose in me. This was my king, the king I had sworn to. I loved Ver­ity, and my loy­alty to him was un­ques­tion­ing. But I had aban­doned my king at the very mo­ment when he needed me most. Chade was gone, for how long I did not know. I had left King Shrewd with no more than the Fool to pro­tect him. And yet when had King Shrewd ever needed any­one to shel­ter him be­fore? Al­ways that old man had been more than cap­able of guard­ing him­self. I chided my­self that I should have been more em­phatic with Chade about the changes I noted when I first re­turned home. I should have been more watch­ful of my sov­er­eign.

  ‘How did he get in here?’ Regal sud­denly de­man­ded with a sav­age glare at me.

  ‘My prince, he had a token from the King him­self, he claimed. He said the King had prom­ised al­ways to see him if he but showed that pin …’

  ‘What rot! You be­lieved such non­sense …’

  ‘Prince Regal, you know it is true. You were wit­ness when King Shrewd first gave it to me.’ I spoke quietly but clearly. Within me, Ver­ity was si­lent, wait­ing and watch­ing, and learn­ing much. At my ex­pense, I thought bit­terly, and then strove to call back the thought.

  Mov­ing calmly and un­threat­en­ingly, I pulled one wrist free of a bull­dog’s grip. I turned back the col­lar of my jer­kin and drew the pin out. I held it up for all to see.

  ‘I re­call no such thing,’ Regal snapped, but Shrewd sat up.

  ‘Come closer, boy,’ he in­struc­ted me. Now I shrugged clear of my guards and tugged my cloth­ing straight. Then I bore the pin up to the King’s bed­side. De­lib­er­ately, King Shrewd reached out. He took the pin away from me. My heart sank in­side me.

  ‘Father, this is …’ Regal began an­noyedly, but Shrewd in­ter­rup­ted him.

  ‘Regal. You were there. You do re­call it, or you should.’ The King’s dark eyes were as bright and alert as I re­membered them, but also plain were the lines of pain about those eyes and the corner of his mouth. King Shrewd fought for this lu­cid­ity. He held the pin up and looked at Regal with a shadow of his old cal­cu­lat­ing glance. ‘I gave the boy this pin. And my word, in ex­change for his.’

  ‘Then I sug­gest you take them both back again, pin and word. You will never get well with this type of dis­rup­tion go­ing on in your rooms.’ Again, that edge of com­mand in Regal’s voice. I waited, si­lent.

  The King lif­ted a shaky hand to rub his face and eyes, ‘I gave those things,’ he said, and the words were firm, but the strength was fad­ing from his voice. ‘Once given, a man’s word is no longer his to call back. Am I right about this, FitzChiv­alry? Do you agree that once a man has given his word, he may not take it back?’ The old test was in that ques­tion.

  ‘As ever I have, my king, I agree with you. Once a man has given his word, he may not call it back. He must abide by what he has prom­ised.’

  ‘Good, then. That’s settled. It’s all settled.’ He proffered the pin to me. I took it from him, re­lief so im­mense it was like ver­tigo. He leaned back into his pil­lows. I had an­other dizzy­ing mo­ment. I knew those pil­lows, this bed. I had lain there, and looked with the Fool down on the sack of Silt­bay. I had burned my fin­gers in that fire­place …

  The King heaved a heavy sigh. There was ex­haus­tion in it. In an­other mo­ment, he would be asleep.

  ‘For­bid him to come and dis­turb you again, un­less you sum­mon him,’ Regal com­manded.

  King Shrewd pried his eyes open one more time. ‘Fitz. Come here, boy.’

  Like a dog, I came closer to him. I knelt by his bed. He lif­ted a thinned hand, pat­ted me awk­wardly. ‘You and I, boy. We have an un­der­stand­ing, don’t we?’ A genu­ine ques­tion. I nod­ded. ‘Good lad. Good. I’ve kept my word. You see that you keep yours, now. But,’ he glanced at Regal, and that pained me, ‘it were bet­ter if you came to see me in the af­ter­noons. I am stronger in the af­ter­noons.’ He was slip­ping away again.

  ‘Shall I come back this af­ter­noon, sire?’ I asked quickly.

  He lif­ted a hand and waved it in a vaguely deny­ing ges­ture. ‘To­mor­row. Or the next day.’ His eyes closed and he sighed out as heav­ily as if he would never breathe in again.

  ‘As you wish, my lord,’ I con­curred. I bowed deeply, form­ally. As I straightened, I care­fully re­turned the pin to my jer­kin lapel. I let them all spend a mo­ment or two watch­ing me do that. Then, ‘If you will ex­cuse me, my prince?’ I re­ques­ted form­ally.

  ‘Get out of here,’ Regal growled.

  I bowed less form­ally to him, turned care­fully and left. His guards’ eyes watched me go. I was out­side the room be­fore I re­called that I had never brought up the sub­ject of me mar­ry­ing Molly. Now it seemed un­likely I would have an op­por­tun­ity to for some time. I knew that af­ter­noons would now find Regal or Wal­lace or some spy of theirs al­ways at King Shrewd’s side. I had no wish to broach that topic be­fore any­one save my king.

  Fitz?

  I’d like to be alone for a while just now, my prince. If you do not mind?

  He van­ished from my mind like a burst­ing soap bubble. Slowly I made my way down the stairs.

  FIF­TEEN

  Secrets

  Prince Ver­ity chose to un­veil his fleet of war­ships on the mid-day of Win­ter­fest that de­cis­ive year. Tra­di­tion would have had him wait un­til the com­ing of bet­ter weather, to launch them on the first day of Spring­fest. That is con­sidered a more aus­pi­cious time to launch a new ship. But Ver­ity had pushed his ship­wrights and their crews hard to have all four ves­sels ready for a mid-winter launch. By choos­ing the mid-day of Win­ter­fest, he en­sured him­self a large audi­ence, both for the launch and for his words. Tra­di­tion­ally, a hunt is held that day, with the meat brought in seen as a har­binger of days to come. When he had the ships pushed out of the sheds on their rollers, he an­nounced to the gathered folk that these were his hunters, and that the only prey that would slake them would be Red Ships. The re­ac­tion to his an­nounce­ment was muted, and clearly not what he had hoped for. It is my be­lief that the people wanted to put all thoughts of the Red Ships from their minds, to hide them­selves in winter and pre­tend that the spring would never come. But Ver­ity re­fused to let them. The ships were launched that day, and the train­ing of the crews be­gun.

  Nighteyes and I spent the early af­ter­noon hunt­ing. He grumbled about it, say­ing it was a ri­dicu­lous time of day to hunt, and why had I wasted the early dawn hours tuss­ling with my lit­ter­mate? I told him that that was simply a thing that had to be, and would con­tinue to be for sev­eral days, and pos­sibly longer. He was not pleased. But neither was I. It rattled me not a little that he could be so clearly aware of how I spent my hours even if I had no con­scious sense of be
­ing in touch with him. Had Ver­ity been able to sense him?

  He laughed at me. Hard enough to make you hear me some­times. Should I bat­ter through to you and then shout for him as well?

  Our hunt­ing suc­cess was small. Two rab­bits, neither with much fat. I prom­ised to bring him kit­chen scraps on the mor­row. I had even less suc­cess at con­vey­ing to him my de­mand for pri­vacy at cer­tain times. He could not grasp why I set mat­ing apart from other pack activ­it­ies such as hunt­ing or howl­ing. Mat­ing sug­ges­ted off­spring in the near fu­ture, and off­spring were the care of the pack. Words can­not con­vey the dif­fi­culties of that dis­cus­sion. We con­versed in im­ages, in shared thoughts, and such do not al­low for much dis­cre­tion. His cand­our hor­ri­fied me. He as­sured me he shared my de­light in my mate and my mat­ing. I begged him not to. Con­fu­sion. I fi­nally left him eat­ing his rab­bits. He seemed piqued that I would not ac­cept a share of the meat. The best I had been able to get from him was his un­der­stand­ing that I did not want to be aware of him shar­ing my aware­ness of Molly. That was scarcely what I wanted but it was the best way I could con­vey it to him. The idea that at times I would want to sever my bond to him com­pletely was not a thought he could com­pre­hend. It made no sense, he ar­gued. It was not pack. I left him won­der­ing if I would ever again really and truly have a mo­ment to my­self.

  I re­turned to the keep and sought the solitude of my own room. If only for a mo­ment, I had to be where I could close the door be­hind me and be alone. Phys­ic­ally, any­way. As if to fuel my quest for quiet, the halls and stair­ways were full of hur­ry­ing folk. Ser­vants were clean­ing away old rushes and spread­ing new ones, fresh candles were be­ing placed in hold­ers, and boughs of ever­green were hung in fes­toons and swags every­where. Win­ter­fest. I didn’t much feel like it.

  I fi­nally reached my own door and slipped in­side. I shut it firmly be­hind me.

  ‘Back so soon?’ The Fool looked up from the hearth where he crouched in a semi-circle of scrolls. He seemed to be sort­ing them into groups.

  I stared at him with un­con­cealed dis­may. In an in­stant, it flashed into an­ger. ‘Why didn’t you tell me of the King’s con­di­tion?’

  He con­sidered an­other scroll and, after a mo­ment, set it in the pile to his right. ‘But I did. A ques­tion in ex­change for yours: Why didn’t you already know of it?’

  That set me back. ‘I ad­mit I’ve been lax in call­ing upon him. But …’

  ‘None of my words could have had the im­pact of see­ing for your­self. Nor do you pause to think what it would have been like, had I not been there every single day, empty­ing cham­ber­pots, sweep­ing, dust­ing, car­ry­ing out dishes, comb­ing his hair and his beard …’

  Again he had shocked me into si­lence. I crossed the room, sat down heav­ily upon my cloth­ing chest. ‘He’s not the king I re­mem­ber,’ I said bluntly. ‘It fright­ens me that he could sink so far, so fast.’

  ‘Fright­ens you? Ap­pals me. At least you’ve an­other king when this one’s been played.’ The Fool flipped an­other scroll onto the pile.

  ‘We all do,’ I poin­ted out care­fully.

  ‘Some more than oth­ers,’ the Fool said shortly.

  Without think­ing, my hand rose to tuck the pin tighter in my jer­kin. I’d al­most lost it today. It had made me think of all it had sym­bol­ized all these years. The King’s pro­tec­tion, for a bas­tard grand­son that a more ruth­less man would have done away with quietly. And now that he needed pro­tec­tion? What did it sym­bol­ize to me now?

  ‘So. What do we do?’

  ‘You and I? Pre­cious little. I’m but a Fool, and you are a Bas­tard.’

  I nod­ded grudgingly. ‘I wish Chade were here. I wish I knew when he was com­ing back.’ I looked to the Fool, won­der­ing how much he knew.

  ‘Shade? Shade re­turns when the sun does, I’ve heard.’ Evas­ive as al­ways. ‘Too late for the King, I ima­gine,’ he ad­ded more quietly.

  ‘So we are power­less?’

  ‘You and I? Never. We’ve too much power to act here; that is all. In this area, the power­less ones are al­ways the most power­ful. Per­haps you are right; they are who we should con­sult in this. And now,’ here he rose and made a show of shak­ing all his joints loose as if he were a ma­ri­on­ette with tangled strings. He set every bell he had to jingling. I could not help but smile. ‘My king will be com­ing into his best time of day. And I will be there, to do what little I can for him.’

  He stepped care­fully out of his ring of sor­ted scrolls and tab­lets. He yawned. ‘Farewell, Fitz.’

  ‘Farewell.’

  He hal­ted, puzzled, by the door. ‘You have no ob­jec­tions to my go­ing?’

  ‘I be­lieve I ob­jec­ted first to your stay­ing.’

  ‘Never bandy words with a Fool. But do you for­get? I offered you a bar­gain. A secret for a secret.’

  I had not for­got­ten. But I was not sure, sud­denly, that I wanted to know. ‘Whence comes the Fool, and why?’ I asked softly.

  ‘Ah.’ He stood a mo­ment, then asked gravely, ‘You are cer­tain you wish the an­swers to these ques­tions?’

  ‘Whence comes the Fool, and why?’ I re­peated slowly.

  For an in­stant he was dumb. I saw him then. Saw him as I had not in years, not as the Fool, glib-tongued and wits as cut­ting as any barnacle, but as a small and slender per­son, all so fra­gile, pale flesh, bird-boned, even his hair seemed less sub­stan­tial than that of other mor­tals. His mot­ley of black and white trimmed with sil­ver bells, his ri­dicu­lous rat sceptre were all the ar­mour and sword he had in this court of in­trigues and treach­ery. And his mys­tery. The in­vis­ible cloak of his mys­tery. I wished for an in­stant he had not offered the bar­gain, and that my curi­os­ity had been less con­sum­ing.

  He sighed. He glanced about my room, then walked over to stand be­fore the tapestry of King Wis­dom greet­ing the Eld­er­ling. He glanced up at it, then smiled sourly, find­ing some hu­mour there I had never seen. He as­sumed the stance of a poet about to re­cite. Then he hal­ted, looked at me squarely once more. ‘You are cer­tain you wish to know, Fitzy-Fitz?’

  Like a liturgy, I re­peated the ques­tion. ‘Whence comes the Fool and why?’

  ‘Whence? Ah, whence?’ He went nose to nose with Ratsy for a mo­ment, for­mu­lat­ing a reply to his own ques­tion. Then he met my eyes. ‘Go south, Fitz. To lands past the edges of every map that Ver­ity has ever seen. And past the edges of the maps made in those coun­tries as well. Go south, and then east across a sea you have no name for. Even­tu­ally, you would come to a long pen­in­sula, and on its snak­ing tip you would find the vil­lage where a Fool was born. You might even find, still, a mother who re­called her wormy-white babe, and how she cradled me against her warm breast and sang.’ He glanced up at my in­cred­u­lous, en­rap­tured face and gave a short laugh. ‘You can­not even pic­ture it, can you? Let me make it harder for you. Her hair was long and dark and curl­ing, and her eyes were green. Fancy that! Of such rich col­ours was this trans­par­ency made. And the fath­ers of the col­our­less child? Two cous­ins, for that was the cus­tom of that land. One broad and swarthy and full of laughter, ruddy-lipped and brown-eyed, a farmer smelling of rich earth and open air. The other as nar­row as the one was wide, and gold to his bronze, a poet and song­ster, blue-eyed. And, oh, how they loved me and re­joiced in me! All the three of them, and the vil­lage as well. I was so loved.’ His voice grew soft, and for a mo­ment he fell si­lent. I knew with great cer­tainty that I was hear­ing what no other had ever heard from him. I re­membered the time I had ven­tured into his room, and the ex­quis­ite little doll in its cradle that I had found there. Cher­ished as the Fool had once been cher­ished. I waited.

  ‘When I was … old enough, I bade them all farewell. I set off to find my place in his­tory, and choose where I would thwart it. This was t
he place I se­lec­ted; the time had been destined by the hour of my birth. I came here, and be­came Shrewd’s. I gathered up whatever threads the fates put into my hands, and I began to twist them and col­our them as I could, in the hopes of af­fect­ing what was woven after me.’

  I shook my head. ‘I don’t un­der­stand a thing you just said.’

  ‘Ah.’ He shook his head, set­ting his bells to jingling. ‘I offered to tell you my secret. I didn’t prom­ise to make you un­der­stand it.’

  ‘A mes­sage is not de­livered un­til it is un­der­stood,’ I countered. This was a dir­ect quote from Chade.

  The Fool teetered on ac­cept­ing it. ‘You do un­der­stand what I said,’ he com­prom­ised. ‘You simply do not ac­cept it. Never be­fore have I spoken so plainly to you. Per­haps that is what con­fuses you.’

  He was ser­i­ous. I shook my head again. ‘You make no sense! You went some­where to dis­cover your place in his­tory? How can that be? His­tory is what is done and be­hind us.’

  He shook his head, slowly this time. ‘His­tory is what we do in our lives. We cre­ate it as we go along.’ He smiled en­ig­mat­ic­ally. ‘The fu­ture is an­other kind of his­tory.’

  ‘No man can know the fu­ture,’ I agreed.

  His smile widened. ‘Can­not they?’ he asked in a whis­per. ‘Per­haps, Fitz, some­where, there is writ­ten down all that is the fu­ture. Not writ­ten down by one per­son, know, but if the hints and vis­ions and pre­mon­i­tions and fore­see­ings of an en­tire race were writ­ten down, and cross-ref­er­enced and re­lated to one an­other, might not such a people cre­ate a loom to hold the weav­ing of the fu­ture?’

  ‘Pre­pos­ter­ous,’ I ob­jec­ted. ‘How would any­one know if any of it were true?’

  ‘If such a loom were made, and such a tapestry of pre­dic­tions woven, not for a few years, but for tens of hun­dreds of years, after a time, it could be shown that it presen­ted a sur­pris­ingly ac­cur­ate fore­tell­ing. Bear in mind that those who keep these re­cords are an­other race, an ex­ceed­ingly long-lived one. A pale, lovely race, that oc­ca­sion­ally mingled its blood-lines with that of men. And then!’ He spun in a circle, sud­denly fey, pleased in­suf­fer­ably with him­self, ‘And then, when cer­tain ones were born, ones marked so clearly that his­tory must re­call them, they are called to step for­ward, to find their places in that fu­ture his­tory. And they might fur­ther be ex­hor­ted to ex­am­ine that place, that junc­ture of a hun­dred threads, and say, these threads, here, these are the ones I shall tweak, and in the tweak­ing, I shall change the tapestry, I shall warp the weft, al­ter the col­our of what is to come. I shall change the des­tiny of the world.’