Royal Assassin (UK)

by Robin Hobb

  A creep­ing cer­tainty shivered up my spine. ‘And if they act again?’

  He gave a life­less laugh. ‘There is no point to my wor­ry­ing about it, for I can­not pre­vent it. That is not to say I look for­ward to it. This,’ he said, with a half-ges­ture to­ward his face. ‘This will heal. What they did to my room will not. I shall be weeks pick­ing up that mess.’

  The words trivi­al­ized it. A ter­rible hol­low feel­ing welled up in me. I had been in the Fool’s tower cham­ber once. It had been a long climb up a dis­used stair­case, past the dust and lit­ter of years, to a cham­ber that looked out over the para­pets and con­tained a garden of won­der. I thought of the bright fish swim­ming in the fat pots, the moss gar­dens in their con­tain­ers, the tiny ceramic child, so me­tic­u­lously cared for, in its cradle. I closed my eyes as he ad­ded to the flames, ‘They were most thor­ough. Silly me. To think there was such a thing as a safe place in the world.’

  I could not look at him. Save for his tongue, he was a de­fence­less per­son whose only drive was to serve his king. And save the world. Yet someone had smashed his world. Worse, I sus­pec­ted the beat­ing he had taken was in re­venge for some­thing I had done.

  ‘I could help you set it to rights,’ I offered quietly.

  He shook his head tightly, quickly, twice. ‘I think not,’ he said. Then he ad­ded in a more nor­mal voice, ‘No of­fence in­ten­ded.’

  ‘None taken.’

  I bundled the cleans­ing herbs with the pot of salve and the leftover rags from my shirt. He hopped off my clothes chest. When I offered them to him, he took them gravely. He walked to the door, stiffly des­pite his claims that they had only dam­aged his face. At the door he turned, ‘When you know for cer­tain, you will tell me?’ He paused sig­ni­fic­antly. His voice dropped. ‘After all, if this is what they do to a king’s Fool, what might they do to a wo­man car­ry­ing a King-in-Wait­ing’s heir?’

  ‘They wouldn’t dare,’ I said fiercely.

  He snorted dis­dain. ‘Wouldn’t they? I no longer know what they would or would not dare, FitzChiv­alry. Neither do you. I’d find a sounder way to latch my door, if I were you. Un­less you wish to find your head in a bag as well.’ He gave a smile that wasn’t even a shadow of his usual mock­ing grin, and slipped out again. I walked to the door after he had left it, and dropped the bar into place. I leaned my back against it and sighed.

  ‘It’s all very well for the rest of them, Ver­ity,’ I said aloud to the si­lent room. ‘But for my­self, I think you should turn your­self about right now and ride home. There’s more afoot than Red Ships, and some­how I mis­doubt that Eld­er­lings would be much help against the other threats we face.’

  I waited, hop­ing to feel some sort of ac­know­ledge­ment or agree­ment from him. There was noth­ing. My frus­tra­tions whirled in me. I was sel­dom cer­tain of when Ver­ity was aware with me, and never sure if he sensed the thoughts I wished to send him. I wondered again at why he did not dir­ect Se­rene as to the ac­tions he wished taken. He had Skilled to her all sum­mer about Red Ships; why was he so si­lent now? Had he Skilled to her already, and she con­cealed it? Or re­vealed it, per­haps, to Regal only. I con­sidered it. Per­haps the bruises on the Fool’s face re­flec­ted Regal’s frus­tra­tion at find­ing Ver­ity aware of what was go­ing on in his ab­sence. Why he had chosen the Fool as the cul­prit was any­one’s guess. Per­haps he had simply chosen him as a vent for his rage. The Fool had never avoided of­fend­ing Regal. Or any­one else.

  Later that night, I went to Molly. It was a dan­ger­ous time to go, for the keep was abuzz with ex­tra folk and ex­tra ser­vants tak­ing care of them. But my sus­pi­cions would not let me stay away. When I tapped on the door that night, Molly asked through the wood, ‘Who is it?’

  ‘It’s me,’ I replied in­cred­u­lously. She had never asked be­fore.

  ‘Oh,’ she replied, and opened the door. I slipped in­side and bolted it be­hind me as she crossed to the hearth. She knelt be­fore it, adding wood it didn’t need and not look­ing at me. She was dressed in her blue ser­vant’s dress, and her hair was still bundled up. Every line of her body warned me. I was in trouble again.

  ‘I’m sorry I haven’t been here much lately.’

  ‘So am I,’ Molly said shortly.

  She wasn’t leav­ing me much in the way of open­ings. ‘A lot has been go­ing on, and they’ve been keep­ing me pretty busy.’

  ‘With what?’

  I sighed. I already knew where this con­ver­sa­tion was go­ing. ‘With things I can’t talk to you about.’

  ‘Of course.’ For all the calmness and cool­ness in her voice, I knew her fury was ra­ging just be­neath the sur­face. The slight­est wrong word would set it off. So would not say­ing any­thing. So my ques­tion might as well be tackled head-on.

  ‘Molly, the reason I came to­night –’

  ‘Oh, I knew there had to be some spe­cial reason for you fi­nally to drop in. The only thing that really sur­prises me is my­self. Why am I here? Why do I come straight to my room after my du­ties each day and wait, on the off-chance that you might ap­pear? There are other things I could be do­ing. There are min­strels and pup­pet shows aplenty lately. Prince Regal sees to that. I could be at one of the lesser hearths with the other ser­vants, en­joy­ing their com­pany. In­stead of up here alone. Or I could be get­ting some work done. Cook lets me use the kit­chen when it’s not a busy time. I have wick­ing and herbs and tal­low; I should be us­ing them while the herbs still have their full po­tency. But no, I am up here, in the hope that you’ll re­mem­ber me and want to spend a few mo­ments with me.’

  I stood like a rock in the bat­ter­ing waves of her words. There was noth­ing else I could do. Everything she said was true. I looked at my feet while she caught her breath. When she spoke again, the an­ger had faded from her voice, to be re­placed with some­thing worse. Misery and dis­cour­age­ment.

  ‘Fitz, it’s just so hard. Every time I think I have ac­cep­ted it, I turn a corner and catch my­self hop­ing again. But there’s never go­ing to be any­thing for us, is there? Never go­ing to be a time that be­longs just to us, never go­ing to be a place that is just ours.’ She paused. She looked down, bit­ing on her lower lip. When she spoke, her voice trembled. ‘I’ve seen Celer­ity. She’s beau­ti­ful. I even made an ex­cuse to speak to her … I asked if they needed more candles for their rooms … She spoke back, shyly, but cour­teously. She even thanked me for be­ing con­cerned, as few here thank ser­vants. She’s … she’s nice. A lady. Oh, they’ll never give you per­mis­sion to marry me. Why would you want to marry a ser­vant?’

  ‘You are not a ser­vant to me,’ I said quietly. ‘I never think of you that way.’

  ‘Then what am I? I am not a wife,’ she poin­ted out quietly.

  ‘In my heart, you are,’ I said miser­ably. It was a pi­ti­ful com­fort to of­fer her. It shamed me that she ac­cep­ted it, and came to rest her fore­head on my shoulder. I held her gently for a few mo­ments, then pulled her into a warmer em­brace. As she nestled against me, I said softly into her hair, ‘There’s some­thing I have to ask you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Are you … with child?’

  ‘What?’ She pulled back from me, to look up into my face.

  ‘Are you car­ry­ing my child?’

  ‘I … no. No, I’m not.’ A pause. ‘What makes you ask such a thing all of a sud­den?’

  ‘It just oc­curred to me to won­der. That’s all. I mean …’

  ‘I know what you mean. If we were mar­ried, and I weren’t preg­nant by now, the neigh­bours would be shak­ing their heads over us.’

  ‘Really?’ Such a thing had never really oc­curred to me be­fore. I knew that some folk wondered if Kettricken were bar­ren as she had not con­ceived in over a year of mar­riage, but a con­cern over her child­less­ness was a pub­lic is­sue. I had never thought of neigh­bours
watch­ing new­ly­weds ex­pect­antly.

  ‘Of course. By now, someone would have offered me a tea re­cipe from their mother’s telling. Or powdered boar’s tusk to slip into your ale at night.’

  ‘Oh really?’ I gathered her closer to me, grin­ning fool­ishly.

  ‘Um.’ She smiled back up at me. The smile faded slowly. ‘As it is,’ she said quietly. ‘There are other herbs I take. To be sure that I do not con­ceive.’

  I had all but for­got­ten Pa­tience scold­ing me that day. ‘Some herbs like that, I’ve heard, can make a wo­man ill, if she takes them for long.’

  ‘I know what I’m do­ing,’ she said flatly. ‘Be­sides, what is the al­tern­at­ive?’ she ad­ded with less heart.

  ‘Dis­aster,’ I con­ceded.

  She nod­ded her head against me. ‘Fitz. If I had said yes to­night. If I were preg­nant … what would you have done?’

  ‘I don’t know. I haven’t thought about it.’

  ‘Think about it now,’ she begged me.

  I spoke slowly. ‘I sup­pose I’d … get a place for you, some­how, some­where.’ (I’d go to Chade, I’d go to Burrich, and I’d beg for help. In­wardly I blanched to think of it.) ‘A safe place. Away from Buck­keep. Up­river, maybe. I’d come to see you when I could. Some­how, I’d take care of you.’

  ‘You’d set me aside is what you’re say­ing. Me, and our … my child.’

  ‘No! I’d keep you safe, put you where no one would point shame at you or mock you for hav­ing a child alone. And when I could, I’d come to you and our child.’

  ‘Have you ever con­sidered that you could come with us? That we could leave Buck­keep, you and I, and go up­river now?’

  ‘I can’t leave Buck­keep. I’ve ex­plained that to you every way I know how.’

  ‘I know you have. I’ve tried to un­der­stand it. But I don’t see why.’

  ‘The work I do for the King is such that …’

  ‘Stop do­ing it. Let someone else do it. Go away with me, to a life of our own.’

  ‘I can’t. It’s not that simple. I wouldn’t be al­lowed to leave just like that.’ Some­how, we had come un­coupled. Now she fol­ded her arms across her chest.

  ‘Ver­ity’s gone. Al­most no one be­lieves he’s com­ing back. King Shrewd grows more feeble each day, and Regal pre­pares him­self to in­herit. If half of Regal’s feel­ings for you are what you say they are, why on earth would you wish to stay here with him as king? Why would he want to keep you here? Fitz, can’t you see that it’s all tum­bling apart? The Near Is­lands and Ferry are just the be­gin­ning. The Raid­ers won’t stop there.’

  ‘All the more reason for me to stay here. To work and, if need be, fight for our people.’

  ‘One man can’t stop them,’ Molly poin­ted out. ‘Not even a man as stub­born as you. Why not take all that stub­born­ness and fight for us in­stead? Why don’t we run away, up the river and in­land, away from the Raid­ers, to a life of our own? Why should we have to give up everything for a hope­less cause?’

  I couldn’t be­lieve what I was hear­ing from her. If I had said it, it would have been treason. But she said it as if it were the com­mon­est sense. As if she and I and a child that didn’t ex­ist yet were more im­port­ant than the King and the Six Duch­ies com­bined. I said as much.

  ‘Well,’ she asked me, look­ing at me lev­elly. ‘It’s true. To me. If you were my hus­band and I had our child, that’s how im­port­ant it would be to me. More im­port­ant than the whole rest of the world.’

  And what was I to say to that? I reached for the truth, know­ing it wouldn’t sat­isfy her. ‘You would be that im­port­ant to me. You are that im­port­ant to me. But it’s also why I have to stay here. Be­cause some­thing that im­port­ant isn’t some­thing you run away and hide with. It’s some­thing that you stand and de­fend.’

  ‘De­fend?’ Her voice went up a notch. ‘When will you learn we aren’t strong enough to de­fend ourselves? I know. I’ve stood between Raid­ers and chil­dren of my own blood, and just barely sur­vived. When you’ve done that, talk to me about de­fend­ing!’

  I was si­lent. Not just that her words cut me. They did, and deeply. But she brought back to me a memory of hold­ing a child, study­ing the blood that had trickled down her cool­ing arm. I couldn’t abide the thought of ever do­ing it again. But it could not be fled. ‘There is no run­ning away, Molly. We either stand and fight here, or are slaughtered when the fight­ing over­takes us.’

  ‘Really?’ She asked me coldly. ‘It isn’t just your put­ting your loy­alty to a king ahead of what we have?’ I could not meet her eyes. She snorted. ‘You’re just like Burrich. You don’t even know how much you’re like him!’

  ‘Like Burrich?’ I was left flounder­ing. I was startled that she said it at all, let alone that she said it as if it were a fault.

  ‘Yes.’ She was de­cis­ive.

  ‘Be­cause I am true to my king?’ I was still grasp­ing at straws.

  ‘No! Be­cause you put your king be­fore your wo­man … or your love, or your own life.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talk­ing about!’

  ‘There! You see! You really don’t. And you go about, act­ing like you know all these great things and secrets and every im­port­ant thing that ever happened. So an­swer me this. Why does Pa­tience hate Burrich?’

  I was com­pletely at a loss now. I had no idea how this figured into what was wrong with me. But I knew some­how Molly would make a con­nec­tion. Gingerly I tried, ‘She blames him for me. She thinks Burrich led Chiv­alry into bad ways … and hence into con­ceiv­ing me.’

  ‘There. You see. That’s how stu­pid you are. It’s noth­ing of the kind. Lacey told me one night. A bit too much eld­er­berry wine, and I was talk­ing of you and she of Burrich and Pa­tience. Pa­tience loved Burrich first, you idiot. But he wouldn’t have her. He said he loved her, but he couldn’t marry her, even if her father would give con­sent for her to wed be­neath her sta­tion. Be­cause he was already sworn, life and sword, to a lord of his own. And he didn’t think he could do justice to both of them. Oh, he said he wished he were free to marry her, and that he wished he hadn’t sworn be­fore he’d met her. But all the same, he said he wasn’t free to marry her just then. He said some­thing stu­pid to her, about no mat­ter how will­ing the horse, it can only wear one saddle. So she told him, well, go off then, go fol­low this lord who’s more im­port­ant to you than I am. And he did. Just as you would, if I told you that you had to choose.’ There were two spots of high col­our on her cheeks. She tossed her head as she turned her back on me.

  So there was the con­nec­tion to my fault. But my mind was reel­ing as bits and pieces of stor­ies and com­ments sud­denly fell into place. Burrich’s tale of first meet­ing Pa­tience. She’d been sit­ting in an apple tree, and she’d de­man­ded that he take a splinter out of her foot. Scarcely some­thing a wo­man would ask of her lord’s man. But some­thing a dir­ect young maid might ask of a young man who had caught her eye. And his re­ac­tion the night I had spoken to him about Molly and Pa­tience, and re­peated Pa­tience’s words about horses and saddles.

  ‘Did Chiv­alry know any­thing of all this?’ I asked.

  Molly spun about to con­sider me. It was ob­vi­ously not the ques­tion she had ex­pec­ted me to ask. But she couldn’t res­ist fin­ish­ing the story either. ‘No. Not at first. When Pa­tience first came to know him, she had no idea he was Burrich’s mas­ter. Burrich had never told her what lord he was sworn to. At first Pa­tience would have noth­ing to do with Chiv­alry. Burrich still held her heart, you see. But Chiv­alry was stub­born. From what Lacey says, he loved her to dis­trac­tion. He won her heart. It wasn’t un­til after she had said yes, she’d marry him, that she found out he was Burrich’s mas­ter. And only be­cause Chiv­alry sent Burrich to de­liver a spe­cial horse to her.’

  I sud­denly re­membered Burrich in the stable, look
­ing at Pa­tience’s mount and say­ing, ‘I trained that horse.’ I wondered if he’d trained Silk know­ing she was to go to a wo­man he’d loved, as a gift from the man she’d marry. I’d bet it was so. I had al­ways thought that Pa­tience’s dis­dain for Burrich was a sort of jeal­ousy that Chiv­alry could care so much for him. Now the tri­angle was an even stranger one. And in­fin­itely more pain­ful. I closed my eyes and shook my head at the un­fair­ness of the world. ‘Noth­ing is ever simple and good,’ I said to my­self. ‘There is al­ways a bit­ter peel, a sour pip some­where.’

  ‘Yes.’ Molly’s an­ger seemed sud­denly spent. She sat down on the bed­side, and when I went and sat be­side her, she didn’t push me away. I took her hand and held it. A thou­sand thoughts cluttered my mind. How Pa­tience hated Burrich’s drink­ing. How Burrich had re­called her lap-dog, and how she al­ways car­ried it about in a bas­ket. The care he al­ways took with his own ap­pear­ance and be­ha­viour. ‘Just be­cause you can­not see a wo­man does not mean she does not see you.’ Oh, Burrich. The ex­tra time he still took, groom­ing a horse that she sel­dom rode any more. At least Pa­tience had had a mar­riage to a man she loved, and some years of hap­pi­ness, com­plic­ated as they were by polit­ical in­trigues. But some years of hap­pi­ness, any­way. What would Molly and I ever have? Only what Burrich had now?

  She leaned against me and I held her for a long time. That was all. But some­how in that mel­an­choly hold­ing that night, we were closer than we had been for a very long time.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Dark Days

  King Eyod of the Moun­tains held the Moun­tain throne dur­ing the years of the Red Ships. The death of his elder son, Rurisk, had left his daugh­ter Kettricken sole heir to that throne. By their cus­toms, she would be­come Queen of the Moun­tains, or ‘Sac­ri­fice’ as that people call it, upon the de­mise of her father. Thus her mar­riage to Ver­ity en­sured not only that we had an ally at our back dur­ing those un­stable years, but also prom­ised the even­tual join­ing of a ‘sev­enth duchy’ to the King­dom of the Six Duch­ies. That the Moun­tain King­dom bordered only on the two in­land duch­ies of Tilth and Far­row made the pro­spect of any civil sun­der­ing of the Six Duch­ies of es­pe­cial con­cern to Kettricken. She had been raised to be ‘Sac­ri­fice’. Her duty to her folk was of su­preme im­port­ance in her life. When she be­came Ver­ity’s Queen-in-Wait­ing, the Six Duch­ies folk be­came her own. But it could never have been far from her heart that on her father’s death, her Moun­tain folk would once more claim her as ‘Sac­ri­fice’ as well. How could she ful­fil that ob­lig­a­tion if Far­row and Tilth stood between her and her folk, not as part of the Six Duch­ies, but as a hos­tile na­tion?