by Robin Hobb
His eyes were wide and dark, staring up at me. He looked slightly aside from me, and I felt the Wit working between them.
"I don't believe you. She says she can explain it all, that you're trying to confuse me." The words spilled out of him hastily, as if he tried to hide behind them.
I glanced over at the boy. Skepticism and confusion had closed his face.
I took a breath and kept my temper. "Look, lad. I don't know all the details. But I can speculate. Perhaps she knew she was dying; maybe that's why she chose such a helpless creature and forced the bond. When a bond is uneven, as that one would have been, the stronger partner can control the weaker one. She could dominate the kit, and move in and out, sharing the cat's body as she pleased. And when she died, instead of dying with her own body, she stepped over to the cat's."
I stopped walking. I waited until Dutiful met my eyes. "You're next," I said quietly.
"You're mad! She loves me!"
I shook my head. "I sense great ambition in her. She'll want a human body of her own again, not to be a cat, not to die when the cat's days are done. She'd have to find someone. It would have to be someone who was both Witted, and ignorant of the Wit. Why not someone well placed? Why not a prince?"
Conflicting expressions flickered over his face. Some part of him knew I spoke truth, and it shamed him that he had been so deceived. He struggled to disbelieve me. I tried to temper my words, so that he did not feel so foolish.
"I think she selected you. You never had any choice at all, any more than the cat did. The woman-cat is what you're bonded to, not the cat itself. And it wasn't done for love of you, any more than she loved the cat. No. Somewhere, someone has a very careful plan, and you're just a tool for it. A tool for the Piebalds."
"I don't believe you!" His voice rose on the words. "You're a liar!" On those words, his voice cracked.
I saw his shoulders heave with the breath he took. I almost felt my Skill-command hold him back from attacking me. For a time I was carefully quiet. When I judged he had mastered himself, I spoke very quietly. "You've called me a bastard, a thief, and now a liar. A prince should be more mindful of what insults he flings, unless he thinks that his title alone will protect him. So here's an insult for you, and a warning. Hide behind being a prince while calling me nasty names, and I'll call you a coward. The next time you insult me, your bloodlines won't stop my fist."
I held his gaze until he looked aside from me, a cub cowed by a wolf. I lowered my voice, forcing him to listen carefully to catch my words. "You're not stupid, Dutiful. You know I'm not a liar. She's dead, and you are being used. You don't want it to be true, but that's not the same as disbelieving me. You'll probably keep hoping and praying that something will happen to prove I'm wrong. It won't." I took a deep breath. "About the only thing I can offer you right now is that none of this is really your fault. Someone should have protected you from this. Someone should have taught you about Old Blood from the time you were small."
There was no way to admit to either of us that that someone was me. The same person who had introduced him to the Wit and all it could be, through Skill-dreams when he was four.
We walked for a long time without speaking. I kept my eyes on my seaweed-festooned snag. Once I'd left the Prince here, I could not predict how long I'd be gone. Could he care for himself? The treasures in the alcove made me uneasy. Such wealth belonged to someone, and that person might resent an intruder on his beach. Yet I could not take him back with me. He'd be a hindrance. A time alone, taking care of himself, might do him good, I decided. And if I died trying to save the Fool and Nighteyes? Well, at least the Piebalds would not have the Prince.
I set my teeth, trudged through the sand, and kept my grim thoughts to myself. We had nearly reached my snag when Dutiful spoke. His voice was very low. "You said my father taught you to Skill. Did he teach you to—"
Then he tripped on something. As he fell, the toe of his boot jerked a gold chain free of the sand that had covered it. He sat up, cursing, and then reached down to free his boot. As he dragged the looped chain clear of the sand, I gaped at it. It was an intricately woven thing, each thread of metal the thickness of a horsehair. He coiled it into his hand, a necklace-length of chain that filled his palm. He gave a final tug to free the last loop, and a figurine popped from the sand. It was fastened to the chain as a dangling charm. It was the length of Dutiful's little finger. Bright colors had been enameled onto the metal.
It was the image of a woman. We stared down at the proud face. The artist had given her black eyes and let the dark gold shine through for the tone of her skin. Her hair was painted black with a standing blue ornament crowning it. The draped garments bared one of her breasts. Bare feet of dark gold peeped from beneath the hem.
"She's beautiful," I said. He made no reply.
The Prince was engrossed by her. He turned the figurine over in his hand and traced the fall of hair down her back.
"I don't know what this is made from. It weighs scarcely anything."
We both lifted our heads at the same instant. Perhaps it was our Wit warning us of the presence of another living being, but I do not think so. I had caught the scent of something indescribably foul on the air. Yet even as I turned my head to seek the source of the stench, I almost became persuaded it was a sweet perfume. Almost.
Some things one never forgets. The insidious tendriling of mind touch is one of them. Terror spasmed through me and I slammed up the Skill-walls around my mind in a reflex I thought I had forgotten. My reward was that I perceived the full foulness of its stench as I turned to confront a nightmare creature.
It stood as tall as I did, but that was only the portion of its body that reared upright. I could not decide if it reminded me of a reptile or a sea mammal. The flat flounder eyes on the front of its face looked unnatural in their orientation. The brain bump of its skull seemed tumescently large. Its lower jaw dropped like a trapdoor as it stared at us. Its mouth could have engulfed a rabbit. A stiff, fishy tongue protruded from it briefly. As we stared, it jerked its tongue back in and closed its jaws with a snap.
To my horror, the transfixed Prince was smiling at the creature in an addled way. He swayed a step closer to it. I set my hand firmly to his shoulder and gripped hard. I set my thumb to his flesh and tried to invoke the earlier Skill-bond I had laid on him without breaching my own walls. "Come with me," I said quietly but firmly. I drew him back toward me, and if he did not actively obey at least he did not resist me.
The thing reared up even taller. Sacs at the sides of its throat puffed up as it lifted its flipperlike limbs. It suddenly spread finny hands that were large and wide. Claws like bullfish spines stood out from the ends of the digits. Then it spoke, wheezing and belching the syllables. The shock of its distorted words felt like pebbles pelting against me. "You did not come by the path. How came you?"
"We came by—"
"Silence!" I warned the Prince and gave him a rough shake. I was backing us away from the creature, but it hummocked its ungainly body over the sand toward us. Where had it come from? I glanced about wildly, fearing to see more of the creatures, but there was only the one. It made a sudden rush forward, interposing its huge body between the tableland and us. I responded by retreating toward the water. It was where I wished to go anyway, the only possible escape that I could imagine. I prayed the tide would bare the Skill-pillar.
"You must leave it!" the creature belched at us. "What the ocean washes up on the treasure beach must always remain here. Drop what you have found."
The Prince opened his hand. The figurine fell but the chain tangled on his lax fingers, to dangle from his handlike a puppet.
"Drop it!" the creature repeated more urgently.
I decided the time for subtlety was past. I drew my sword awkwardly with my left hand, for I feared to let go of the Prince. "Stay back," I warned. My feet were crunching over barnacles on the uneven rocks. I risked a glance behind me. I could see my squared-off black stones, but they b
arely stuck up above the water. The creature mistook my look.
"Your ship has left you here! There is nothing out there but ocean. Drop the treasure." There was a hissing quality to its speech, most unnerving. It had no more lips than a lizard, but the teeth that the opened mouth bared were multitudinous and sharp. "The treasures of this beach are not for humans! What the sea brings here is meant to be lost to humankind! You were not worthy of it."
Seaweed squelched underfoot. The Prince slipped and nearly went down. I kept my grip on his shoulder and dragged him back to his feet. Three more steps, and water lapped around my feet.
"You cannot swim far!" the creature warned us. "The beach will have your bones!"
Like a distant wind, I faintly felt the buffeting of fear that he directed at us. The Prince's mind was unshielded, and he gave a sudden cry of wild terror. "I don't want to drown!" he cried out. "Please, I don't want to drown!" When he turned to me, the whites showed all around the edges of his eyes. I did not think him a coward. I knew only too well what it was like to have another mind impose panic on my unguarded thoughts.
"Dutiful. You have to trust me. Trust me."
"I can't!" he bellowed, and I believed him. He was torn between us, my Skill-command for obedience warring with the insidious waves of fear the creature gushed at him. I tightened my grip and dragged him back with me as I retreated. The water was up to our knees. Every wave nudged against us in its passage. The wallowing creature did not hesitate to follow us. Doubtless it would be more at home in the sea. I risked another glance behind me. The Skill-pillar was close. I felt that vague confusion that the black memory stone always inflicted on me. It was strange, to push myself toward disorientation in the hopes of salvation.
"Give me the treasure!" the creature commanded, and virulent green droplets shimmered suddenly at the end of its claws. It lifted them menacingly.
In one motion, I sheathed my sword, threw my left arm around Dutiful, and flung us both backward into the water. As the creature dove toward us, I thought I saw a sudden flash of comprehension in those inhuman eyes, but it was too late. We fell full length into the cold saltwater, and my groping fingers sought and found the canted surface of the fallen pillar. I had no time to warn the Prince as it swallowed us.
We stumbled out into an almost-warm afternoon. The Prince dropped nervelessly from my grip to sprawl on a cobblestoned street in the gush of saltwater that had accompanied us. I drew a deep breath and looked around us. "Wrong face!" I had known this could happen but had been too intent on escaping the thing on the beach to consider it. Each face of a Skill-pillar was carved with a rune that told where that surface would transport you. It was a wonderful system, if one understood what the runes meant. With a jolt, I suddenly grasped how much I had just risked. What if this pillar had been buried under stone, or shattered to pieces? I dared not think what might have become of us. Shaking, I stared at the foreign landscape. We stood in the windswept ruins of an abandoned Elderling city. It looked vaguely familiar and I wondered if it was the same city that a similar pillar had once carried me to. But there was no time for exploration or speculation. All had gone wrong. My original plan had been to return alone through the pillar, to rush unhindered to the aid of my friends. But I could not leave Dutiful stunned and alone in this barren place any more than I could have left him on the hostile beach. I'd have to take him with me. "We have to go back," I told the Prince. "We have to get back to Buck exactly as we came."
"I didn't like that at all." His voice shook, and I knew instinctively that he was not speaking about the creature on the beach. Going through a pillar was a harrowing experience for an untrained mind. Regal had used the pillars recklessly in transporting his young Skill-users, little caring how many of them went mad from the process. I would not use my Prince so recklessly. Except that I had no other choice, and no time.
"I know," I said gently. "But we have to go now, before the tide comes in any deeper." He stared at me without comprehension. I weighed him keeping his sanity against what the woman might know through him. Then I threw that concern aside. He had to understand, at least a little, or I'd emerge from the pillar with a drooling idiot. "We have to go back to the pillar on the beach. We know it has a facet that will take us back to Buck. We'll have to discover which one."
The boy made a small retching sound. He hunkered down on the cobblestones, pressing the heels of his hands to his temples. "I don't think I can," he said faintly.
My heart smote me. "Waiting won't make it any better," I warned him. "I'll hold you together as best I can. But we have to go now, my Prince."
"That thing might be waiting for us!" he cried wildly, but I think he feared the passage more than any lurking creature.
I stooped and put my arms around him, and although he struggled wildly, I dragged him back into the pillar with me.
I had never used a pillar twice in such swift succession. I was unprepared for the sharp sensation of heat. As we emerged, I accidentally snuffed warm seawater up my nose. I stood up, holding Dutiful's head above water. The water around the pillar was seething with the heat from it. And the Prince had been right. As I held his lax body in my arms and shook water from my face, I heard startled grunts from the beach. Not one, but four of the ungainly creatures had congregated there. At the sight of us, they charged, hunching across the sand and into the waves. No time to think or look or choose. The Prince was limp and lolling. I clutched him to me, and risked dropping my Skill-walls to try to hold his mind intact. As an incoming wave drove me to my knees, I slapped a hand to the steaming surface of the Skill-pillar. It dragged me in.
The transit this time seemed unbearable. I swear I smelled a strange odor, oddly familiar and yet repulsive. Dutiful. Dutiful, prince. Heir to the Far seer throne. Son of Kettricken. I wrapped his tattering thoughts in my own and named him by every name I could think of.
Then came a moment he reached back to me. That was all I sensed from him, but after that he held to himself and to me. There was a queer passivity to our bond and when at length we shed out onto green grass under a lowering sky, I wondered if the Prince had survived our escape from the treasure beach.
Chapter XXV
Ransom
By these signs may you know one who has the potential for the Skill:
A child who comes of Skilled parents.
A child who wins often at games of physical skill, and his opponents stumble, lose heart, or play poorly against him.
A child who possesses memories not rightfully his.
A child who dreams, and his dreams are detailed and contain knowledge beyond the child's own experience.
Dun Needleson, Skillmaster to King Wielder
The barrow crouched on the hillside above us. It was raining, a misty but determined fall of water. The grass was deep and wet. I suddenly didn't have the strength to stand by myself, let alone support the Prince. As one, we sank down until I knelt on the wet earth. I lowered his body to the sward. His eyes were open but they stared blindly. Only the rasping of his breath showed me he was alive. We were back in Buck, but our situation was only marginally better than when we had last left here.
We were both soaking wet. After a moment, I became aware of an odd smell and realized that the pillar behind us was radiating warmth. The smell was the dampness forced out of the stone. I decided I would rather be cold than get too close to it. The figurine still dangled from the chain tangled in the Prince's fingers. I plucked it free, gathered up the chain, and put it inside my pouch. The Prince made no response to any of this. "Dutiful?" I leaned closer and looked directly into his eyes. They didn't focus on me. The rain was falling on his face and his open eyes. I tapped him lightly on the cheek. "Prince Dutiful? Do you hear me?"
He blinked slowly. It was not much of a response, but it was better than nothing.
"You'll feel better in a little while. Just rest here for a time." I wasn't sure that was true, but I left him on the wet grass and climbed up on top of the barrow. I surveyed the
surrounding lands, but saw no other humans. There wasn't much of anything to see, just rolling countryside and a few copses of trees. A flock of starlings wheeled in unison, and settled again, squabbling over feed. Beyond the wild meadow, there was forest. There was nothing that looked like an immediate threat, but nothing that looked like food, drink, and shelter, either. I was fairly certain that Dutiful would benefit from all three, and feared that without them he would sink further into unresponsiveness, but what I needed was even more basic. I wanted to know if my friends lived. I wanted beyond all rationality to reach out for my wolf. I longed to howl for him, to put my whole heart into that questing. I also knew it was the most foolish and reckless thing I could do. It would not only alert any Witted ones nearby that I was here, it would also warn them that I was coming.
I forced order onto my thoughts. I needed a refuge, and quickly. It seemed likely to me that the woman and the cat would be constantly questing for the Prince. Even now, they might be coming for him. The afternoon was already venturing toward evening. Dutiful had told me the Piebalds would kill Nighteyes and the Fool at sunset if I had not returned him. Somehow, I must get the Prince to a safe place before the woman could find us, then slip off on my own to discover where the Piebalds held my friends and then free them. Before sunset. I racked my brain. The closest inn I knew of was the Piebald Prince. I doubted that Dutiful would get a fond welcome there. Yet Buckkeep was a long walk and a river-fording away. I pondered but could think of no other refuge for him. In his present condition, I could scarcely leave him here alone, and another trip through a pillar would be the end of Dutiful's mind, even if we emerged physically unscathed. I once more scanned the empty landscape. I reluctantly admitted that though I had choices, none of them were good. I abruptly decided that I would get us moving, and try to think of something better along the way.
