Royal Assassin

by Robin Hobb

O Bastard Princeling, gentle Fitz,

  Will you delay until chopped to bits?’”

  A passing servant girl paused to stand bemused and listen. A page came to the door of one chamber and peeped out at us, grinning widely. A slow flush began to heat my cheeks, for the Fool’s expression was both tender and ardent as he looked up at me. I tried to walk casually away from him, but he followed me on his knees, clutching at my sleeve. I was forced to stand, or engage in a ridiculous struggle to free myself. I stood, feeling foolish. He simpered a smile up at me. The page giggled, and down the hall I heard two voices conferring in amusement. I refused to lift my eyes to see who was so enjoying my discomfort. The Fool mouthed a kiss up at me. He let his voice sink to a confidential whisper as he sang on:

  “‘Will fate seduce you to her will?

  Not if you struggle with all your Skill.

  Summon your allies, locate the trained,

  Consummate all from which you’ve refrained.

  There’s a future not yet fashioned,

  Founded by your fiery passions.

  If you use your Wits to win,

  You’ll save the Duchies for your kin.

  Thus begs a Fool, on bended knee,

  Let not a darkness come to be.

  Let not our peoples go to dust

  When Life in you has placed this trust. ’”

  He paused, then sang loudly and jovially:

  “‘And if you choose to let this pass

  Like so much farting from your ass,

  Behold my reverence for thee,

  Feast eyes on what men seldom see!’”

  He suddenly released my cuff, to tumble away from me in a somersault that somehow reached a finish with his presentation of his bare buttocks to me. They were shockingly pale, and I could conceal neither my amazement nor affront. The Fool vaulted to his feet, suitably clothed again, and Ratsy on his scepter bowed most humbly to all who had paused to watch my humiliation. There was general laughter and a scattering of applause. His performance had left me speechless. I looked aside and tried to walk past him, but with a bound the Fool blocked my passage once again. The Fool abruptly assumed a stern stance and addressed all who still grinned.

  “Fie and shame upon you all, to be so merry! To giggle and point at a boy’s broken heart! Do not you know the Fitz has lost one most dear to him? Ah, he hides his grief beneath his blushes, but she has gone to her grave and left his passion unslaked. That most stubbornly chaste and virulently flatulent of maidens, dear Lady Thyme, has perished. Of her own stench, I doubt it not, though some say it came of eating spoiled meat. But spoiled meat, you say, has a most foul odor, to warn off any from consuming it. Such we can say of Lady Thyme also, and so perhaps she smelled it not, or deemed it but the perfume of her fingers. Mourn not, poor Fitz, another shall be found for you. To this I shall devote myself, this very day! I swear it, by Sir Ratsy’s skull. And now I bid you hasten on your tasks, for in truth I have delayed mine much too long. Farewell, poor Fitz. Brave, sad heart! To put so bold a face on your desolation! Poor disconsolate youth! Ah, Fitz, poor poor Fitz …”

  And he wandered off down the hall from me, shaking his head woefully, and conferring with Ratsy as to which elderly dowager he should court on my behalf. I stared in disbelief after him. I felt betrayed, that he could make so public a spectacle of me. Sharp-tongued and flighty as the Fool could be, I had never expected to be the public butt of one of his jokes. I kept waiting for him to turn around and say some last thing that would make me understand what had just happened. He did not. When he turned a corner, I perceived that my ordeal was finally at an end. I proceeded down the hallway, fuming with embarrassment and dazed with puzzlement at the same time. The doggerel of his rhymes had stored his words in my head, and I knew that I would ponder his love song much in days to come, to try to worry out the meanings hidden there. But Lady Thyme? Surely he would not say such a thing, were it not “true. ” But why would Chade allow his public persona to die in such a way? What poor woman’s body would be carried out as Lady Thyme, no doubt to be carted off to distant relatives for burial? Was this his method of beginning his journey, a way to leave the Keep unseen? But again, why let her be dead? So that Regal might believe he had succeeded in his poisoning? To what end?

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  Thus bemused, I finally came to the doors of Kettricken’s chamber. I stood in the hall a moment, to recover my aplomb and compose my face. Suddenly the door across the hall flung open and Regal strode into me. His momentum jostled me aside, and before I could recover myself, he grandly offered, “It’s all right, Fitz. I scarcely expect an apology from one so bereaved as yourself. ” He stood in the hallway, straightening his jerkin as the young men following him emerged from his chamber, tittering in amusement. He smiled ’round at them, and then leaned close to me to ask, in a quietly venomous voice, “Where will you suckle up now that the old whore Thyme is dead? Ah, well. I am sure you will find some other old woman to coddle you. Or are you come to wheedle up to a younger one now?” He dared to smile at me, before he wheeled on his heel and strode off in a fine flutter of sleeves, trailed by his three sycophants.

  The insult to the Queen poisoned me into rage. It came with a suddenness such as I had never experienced. I felt my chest and throat swell with it. A terrible strength rushed through me; I know my upper lip lifted in a snarl. From afar I sensed, What? What is it? Kill it! Kill it! Kill it! I took a step, the next would have been a spring, and I know my teeth would have sunk into the place where throat meets shoulder.

  But: “FitzChivalry,” said a voice, full of surprise.

  Molly’s voice! I turned to her, my emotions wrenching from rage to delight at seeing her. But as swiftly she was turning aside, saying, “Beg pardon, my lord,” and brushing past me. Her eyes were down, her manner that of a servant.

  “Molly?” I called, stepping after her. She paused. When she looked back at me, her face was empty of emotion, her voice neutral.

  “Sir? Had you an errand for me?”

  “An errand?” Of course. I glanced about us, but the corridor was empty. I took a step toward her, pitched my voice low for her ears only. “No. I’ve just missed you so. Molly, I—”

  “This is not seemly, sir. I beg you to excuse me. ” She turned, proudly, calmly, and walked away from me.

  “What did I do?” I demanded, in angry consternation. I did not really expect an answer. But she paused. Her blue-clothed back was straight, her head erect under her tatted haircloth. She did not turn back to me, but said quietly, to the corridor, “Nothing. You did nothing at all, my lord. Absolutely nothing. ”

  “Molly!” I protested, but she turned the corner and was gone. I stood staring after her. After a moment I realized I was making a sound somewhere between a whine and a growl.

  Let us go hunting instead.

  Perhaps, I found myself agreeing, that would be the best thing. To go hunting, to kill, to eat, to sleep. And to do no more than that.

  Why not now?

  I don’t really know.

  I composed myself and knocked at Kettricken’s door. It was opened by little Rosemary, who dimpled a smile at me as she invited me in. Once within, Molly’s errand here was evident. Kettricken was holding a fat green candle under her nose. On the table were several others. “Bayberry,” I observed.

  Kettricken looked up with a smile. “FitzChivalry. Welcome. Come in and be seated. May I offer you food? Wine?”

  I stood looking at her. A sea change. I felt her strength, knew she stood in the center of herself. She was dressed in a soft gray tunic and leggings. Her hair was dressed in her customary way. Her jewelry was simple, a single necklace of green and blue stone beads. But this was not the woman I had brought back to the Keep a few days ago. That woman had been distressed, angry, hurt, and confused. This Kettricken welled serenity.

  “My queen,” I began hesitantly.

  “Kettricken,”
she corrected me calmly. She moved about the room, setting some of the candles on shelves. It was almost a challenge in that she did not say more.

  I came farther into her sitting room. She and Rosemary were the only occupants. Verity had once complained to me that her chambers had the precision of a military encampment. It had not been an exaggeration. The simple furnishings were spotlessly clean. The heavy tapestries and rugs that furnished most of Buckkeep were missing here. Simple mats of straw were on the floor, and frames supported parchment screens painted with delicate sprays of flowers and trees. There was no clutter at all. In this room, all was finished and put away, or not yet begun. That is the only way I can describe the stillness I felt there.

  I had come in a roil of conflicting emotions. Now I stood still and silent, my breathing steadying and my heart calming. One corner of the chamber had been turned into an alcove walled with the parchment screens. Here there was a rug of green wool on the floor, and low padded benches such as I had seen in the mountains. Kettricken placed the green bayberry candle behind one of the screens. She kindled it with a flame from the hearth. The dancing candlelight behind the screen gave the life and warmth of a sunrise to the painted scene. Kettricken walked around to sit on one of the low benches within the alcove. She indicated the bench opposite hers. “Will you join me?”

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  I did. The gently lit screen, the illusion of a small private room, and the sweet scent of bayberry surrounded me. The low bench was oddly comfortable. It took me a moment to recall the purpose of my visit. “My queen, I thought you might like to learn some of the games of chance we play at Buckkeep. So you could join in when the other folk are amusing themselves. ”

  “Perhaps another time,” she said kindly. “If you and I wish to amuse ourselves, and if it would please you to teach me the game. But for those reasons only. I have found the old adages to be true. One can only walk so far from one’s true self before the bond either snaps, or pulls one back. I am fortunate. I have been pulled back. I walk once more in trueness to myself, FitzChivalry. That is what you sense today. ”

  “I don’t understand. ”

  She smiled. “You don’t need to. ”

  She fell silent again. Little Rosemary had gone to sit by the hearth. She took up her slate and chalk as if to amuse herself. Even that child’s normal merriment seemed placid today. I turned back to Kettricken and waited. But she only sat looking at me, a bemused smile on her face.

  After a moment or two, I asked, “What are we doing?”

  “Nothing,” Kettricken said.

  I copied her silence. After a long time she observed, “Our own ambitions and tasks that we set for ourselves, the framework we attempt to impose upon the world, is no more than a shadow of a tree cast across the snow. It will change as the sun moves, be swallowed in the night, sway with the wind, and when the smooth snow vanishes, it will lie distorted upon the uneven earth. But the tree continues to be. Do you understand that?” She leaned forward slightly to look into my face. Her eyes were kind.

  “I think so,” I said uneasily.

  She gave me a look almost of pity. “You would if you stopped trying to understand it, if you gave up worrying about why this is important to me, and simply tried to see if it is an idea that has worth in your own life. But I do not bid you to do that. I bid no one do anything here. ”

  She sat back again, a gentle loosening that made her straight spine seem effortless and restful. Again she did nothing. She simply sat across from me and unfurled herself. I felt her life brush up against me and flow around me. It was but the faintest touching, and had I not experienced both the Skill and the Wit, I do not think I would have sensed it. Cautiously, as softly as if I assayed a bridge made of cobweb, I overlay my senses on hers.

  She quested. Not as I did, toward a specific beast, or to read what might be close by. I discarded the word I had always given to my sensing. Kettricken did not seek after anything with her Wit. It was as she said, simply a being, but it was being a part of the whole. She composed herself and considered all the ways the great web touched her, and was content. It was a delicate and tenuous thing and I marveled at it. For an instant I, too, relaxed. I breathed out. I opened myself, Wit wide to all. I discarded all caution, all worry that Burrich would sense me. I had never done anything to compare it with before. Kettricken’s reaching was as delicate as droplets of dew sliding down a strand of spiderweb. I was like a dammed flood, suddenly released, to rush out to fill old channels to overflowing and to send fingers of water investigating the lowlands.

  Let us hunt! The Wolf, joyfully.

  In the stables, Burrich straightened from cleaning a hoof, to frown at no one. Sooty stamped in her stall. Molly shrugged away and shook out her hair. Across from me, Kettricken started and looked at me as if I had spoken aloud. A moment more I was held, seized from a thousand sides, stretched and expanded, illuminated pitilessly. I felt it all, not just the human folk with their comings and goings, but every pigeon that fluttered in the eaves, every mouse that crept unnoticed behind the wine kegs, every speck of life, that was not and never had been a speck, but had always been a node on the web of life. Nothing alone, nothing forsaken, nothing without meaning, nothing of no significance, and nothing of importance. Somewhere, someone sang, and then fell silent. A chorus filled in after that solo, other voices, distant and dim, saying, What? Beg pardon? Did you call? Are you here? Do I dream? They plucked at me, as beggars pluck at strangers’ sleeves, and I suddenly felt that if I did not draw away, I could come unraveled like a piece of fabric. I blinked my eyes, sealing myself inside myself again. I breathed in.

  No time had passed. A single breath, a wink of an eye. Kettricken looked askance at me. I appeared not to notice. I reached up to scratch my nose. I shifted my weight.

  I resettled myself firmly. I let a few more minutes pass before I sighed and shrugged apologetically. “I do not understand the game, I am afraid,” I offered.

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  I had succeeded in annoying her. “It is not a game. You don’t have to understand it, or ‘do’ it. Simply stop all else, and be. ”

  I made a show of making another effort. I sat still for several moments, then fidgeted absently with my cuff until she looked at me doing it. Then I cast my eyes down as if ashamed. “The candle smells very sweet,” I complimented her.

  Kettricken sighed and gave up on me. “The girl who makes them has a very keen awareness of scents. Almost she can bring me my gardens and surround me with their fragrances. Regal brought me one of her honeysuckle tapers, and after that I sought out her wares myself. She is a serving girl here, and does not have the time or resources to make too many. So I count myself fortunate when she brings them to offer to me. ”

  “Regal,” I repeated. Regal speaking to Molly. Regal knowing her well enough to know of her candlemaking. Everything inside me clenched with foreboding. “My queen, I think I distract you from what you wish to be doing. That is not my desire. May I leave you now, to return again when you wish to have company?”

  “This exercise does not exclude company, FitzChivalry. ” She looked at me sadly. “Will not you try again to let go? For a moment I thought … No? Ah, then, I let you go. ” I heard regret and loneliness in her voice. Then she straightened herself. She took a breath, breathed it out slowly. I felt again her consciousness thrumming in the web. She has the Wit, I thought to myself. Not strong, but she has it.

  I left her room quietly. There was a tiny bit of amusement to wondering what Burrich would think if he knew. Much less amusing to recall how she had been alerted to me when I quested out with the Wit. I thought of my night hunts with the wolf. Would soon the Queen begin to complain of strange dreams?

  A cold certainty welled up in me. I would be discovered. I had been too careless, too long. I knew that Burrich could sense when I used the Wit. What if there were others? I could be accused of Beast magic. I found
my resolve and hardened myself to it. Tomorrow, I would act.

  11

  Lone Wolves

  THE FOOL WILL always remain one of Buckkeep’s great mysteries. It is almost possible to say that nothing is definitely known of him. His origin, age, sex, and race have all been the subject of conjecture. Most amazing is how such a public person maintained such an aura of privacy. The questions about the Fool will always outnumber the answers. Did he ever truly possess any mystical powers, any prescience, any magic at all, or was it merely that his quick wits and razor tongue made it seem as if he knew all before it came to pass? If he did not know the future, he appeared to, and by his calm assumption of foreknowledge, he swayed many of us to help him shape the future as he saw fit.

  White on white. An ear twitched, and that minute movement betrayed all.

  You see? I prompted him.

  I scent.

  I see. I flicked my eyes toward the prey. No more a movement than that. It was sufficient.

  I see! He leaped, the rabbit started, and Cub went floundering after it. The rabbit ran lightly over the unpacked snow, while Cub had to surge and bound and leap through it. The rabbit darted elusively, this way, that way, around the tree, around the clump of bushes, into the brambles. Had he stayed in there? Cub snuffed hopefully, but the density of the thorns turned his sensitive nose back.

  It’s gone, I told him.

  Are you sure? Why didn’t you help?

  I can’t run down game in loose snow. I must stalk and spring only when one spring is sufficient.

  Ah. Enlightenment. Consideration. There are two of us. We should hunt as a pair. I could start game and drive it toward you. You could be ready to leap out and snap its neck.

  I shook my head slowly. You must learn to hunt alone, Cub. I will not always be with you, in mind or in flesh.

  A wolf is not meant to hunt alone.

  Perhaps not. But many do. As you will. But I did not intend that you should start with rabbits. Come on.

  He fell in at my heels, content to let me lead. We had left the Keep before winter light had even grayed the skies. Now they were blue and open, clear and cold above us. The trail we were following was no more than a soft-shouldered groove in the deep snow. I sank calf-deep at every step. About us, the forest was a winter stillness, broken only by the occasional dart of a small bird, or the far-off cawing of a crow. It was open forest, mostly saplings with the occasional giant that had survived the fire that had cleared this hillside. It was good pasturage for goats in summer. Their sharp little hooves had cut the trail we were now following. It led to a simple stone hut and a tumbledown corral and shelter for the goats. It was only used in summer.