Assassin 3 - Royal Assassin (3 page)

To be King-in- Waiting, or the Queen-in-
Waiting, is to firmly straddle the fence between responsibility and
authority. It is said the position was created to satisfy the
ambitions of an heir for power, while schooling him in the
exercising of it. The eldest child in the royal family assumes this
position upon the sixteenth birthday. From that day on, the King-
or Queen-in-Waiting assumes a full share of responsibility for the
running of the Six Duchies. Generally, he immediately assumes such
duties as the ruling monarch cares least for, and these have varied
greatly from reign to reign.

Under King Shrewd, Prince Chivalry first became
king-in-waiting. To him, King Shrewd ceded over all that had to do
with the borders and frontiers: warfare, negotiations and
diplomacy, the discomforts of extended travel and the miserable
conditions often encountered on the campaigns. When Chivalry
abdicated and Prince Verity became king-in-waiting, he inherited
all the uncertainties of the war with the Outislanders, and the
civil unrest this situation created between the Inland and Coastal
Duchies. All of these tasks were rendered more difficult in that,
at any time, his decisions could be overridden by the King. Often
he was left to cope with a situation not of his creating, armed
only with options not of his choosing.

Even less tenable, perhaps, was the position of
Queen-in-Waiting Kettricken. Her Mountain ways marked her as a
foreigner in the Six Duchies court. In peaceful times, perhaps she
would have been received with more tolerance. But the court at
Buckkeep seethed with the general unrest of the Six Duchies. The
Red-Ships from the Outislands harried our shoreline as they had not
for generations, destroying far more than they stole. The first
winter of Kettricken 's reign as queen-in-waiting saw also the
first winter raiding we had ever experienced. The constant threat
of raids, and the lingering torment of Forged ones in our midst
rocked the foundations of the Six Duchies. Confidence in the
monarchy was low, and Kettricken had the unenviable position of
being an unadmired king-in-waiting's outlandish queen.

Civil unrest divided the court as the Inland
Duchies voiced their resentment at taxes to protect a coastline
they did not share. The Coastal Duchies cried out for warships and
soldiers and an effective way to battle the Raiders that always
struck where we were least prepared. Inland-bred Prince Regal
sought to gather power to himself by courting the Inland Dukes with
gifts and social attentions. King-in-Waiting Verity, convinced that
his Skill was no longer sufficient to hold the Raiders at bay, put
his attentions to building warships to guard the Coastal Duchies,
with little time for his new queen. Over all, King Shrewd crouched
like a great spider, endeavoring to keep power spread among himself
and his sons, to keep all in balance and the Six Duchies
intact.

I awakened to someone touching my forehead. With
an annoyed grunt, I turned my head aside from the touch. My
blankets were weltered around me; I fought my way clear of their
restraint and then sat up to see who had dared disturb me. King
Shrewd's fool perched anxiously on a chair beside my bed. I stared
at him wildly, and he drew back from my look. Uneasiness assailed
me.

The Fool should have been back in Buckkeep, with
the King, many miles and days from here. I had never known him to
leave the King's side for more than a few hours or a night's rest.
That he was here boded no good. The Fool was my friend, as much as
his strangeness allowed him to be friends with anyone. But a visit
from him always had a purpose, and such purposes were seldom
trivial or pleasant. He looked as weary as I had ever seen him. He
wore an unfamiliar motley of greens and reds and carried a fool's
scepter with a rat's head on it. The gay garments contrasted too
strongly with his colorless skin. They made him a translucent
candle wreathed in holly. His clothing seemed more substantial than
he did. His fine pale hair floated from the confines of his cap
like a drowned man's hair in seawater, while the dancing flames of
the fireplace shone in his eyes. I rubbed my gritty eyes and pushed
some of the hair back from my face. My hair was damp; I'd been
sweating in my sleep.

Hello, I managed. I didn't expect to see you
here. My mouth felt dry, my tongue thick and sour. I'd been sick, I
recalled. The details seemed hazy.

Where else? He looked at me woefully. For every
hour you've slept, the less rested you seem. Lie back, my lord. Let
me make you comfortable. He plucked at my pillows fussily, but I
waved him away. Something was wrong here. Never had he spoken me so
fair. Friends we were, but the Fool's words to me were always as
pithy and sour as half-ripened fruit. If this sudden kindness was a
show of pity, I wanted none of it.

I glanced down at my embroidered nightshirt, at
the rich bedcovers. Something seemed odd about them. I was too
tired and weak to puzzle it out. What are you doing here? I asked
him.

He took a breath and sighed. I am tending you.
Watching over you while you sleep. I know you think it foolish, but
then, I am the Fool. You know then that I must be foolish. Yet you
ask me this same thing every time you awake. Let me then propose
something wiser. I beg you, my lord, let me send for another
healer.

I leaned back against my pillows. They were
sweat damp, and smelled sour to me. I knew I could ask the Fool to
change them and he would. But I would just sweat anew if he did. It
was useless. I clutched at my covers with gnarled fingers. I asked
him bluntly, Why have you come here?

He took my hand in his and patted it. My lord, I
mistrust this sudden weakness. You seem to take no good from this
healer's ministrations. I fear that his knowledge is much smaller
than his opinion of it.

Burrich? I asked incredulously.

Burrich? Would that he were here, my lord! He
may be the stablemaster, but for all that, I warrant he is more of
a healer than this Wallace who doses and sweats you.

Wallace? Burrich is not here?

The Fool's face grew graver. No, my king. He
remained in the Mountains, as well you know.

Your king, I said, and attempted to laugh. Such
mockery.

Never, my lord, he said gently.
Never.

His tenderness confused me. This was not the
Fool I knew, full of twisting words and riddles, of sly jabs and
puns and cunning insults. I felt suddenly stretched thin as old
rope, and as frayed. Still, I tried to piece things together. Then
I am in Buckkeep?

He nodded slowly. Of course you are. Worry
pinched his mouth.

I was silent, plumbing the full depth of my
betrayal. Somehow I had been returned to Buckkeep. Against my will.
Burrich had not even seen fit to accompany me.

Let me get you some food, the Fool begged me.
You always feel better after you have eaten. He rose. I brought it
up hours ago. I've kept it warm by the hearth.

My eyes followed him wearily. At the big hearth
he crouched, to coach a covered tureen away from the edge of the
fire. He lifted the lid and I smelled rich beef stew. He began to
ladle it into a bowl. It had been months since I'd had beef. In the
Mountains, it was all venison and mutton and goat's flesh. My eyes
wandered wearily about the room. The heavy tapestries, the massive
wooden chairs. The heavy stones of the fireplace, the richly worked
bed hangings. I knew this place. This was the King's bedchamber at
Buckkeep. Why was I here, in the King's own bed? I tried to ask the
Fool, but another spoke with my lips. I know too many things, Fool.
I can no longer stop myself from knowing them. Sometimes it is as
if another controlled my will, and pushed my mind where I would
rather it did not go. My walls are breached. It all pours in like a
tide. I drew a deep breath, 'but I could not stave it off. First a
chill tingling, then as if I were immersed in a swift flowing of
cold water. A rising tide, I gasped. Bearing ships. Red-keeled
ships ...

The Fool's eyes widened in alarm. In this
season, Your Majesty? Surely not! Not in winter!

My breath was pressed tight in my chest. I
struggled to speak. The winter has crept in too softly. She has
spared us both her storms and her protection. Look. Look out there,
across the water. See? They come. They come from the
fog.

I lifted my arm to point. The Fool came hastily,
to stand beside me. He crouched to peer where I pointed, but I knew
he could not see. Still, he loyally placed a hesitant hand on my
thin shoulder, and stared as if he could will away the walls and
the miles that stood between him and my vision. I longed to be as
blind as he. I clasped the long-fingered pale hand that rested on
my shoulder. For a moment I looked down at my withered hand, at the
royal signet ring that clung to a bony finger behind a swollen
knuckle. Then my reluctant gaze was drawn up and my vision taken
afar.

My pointing hand indicated the quiet harbor. I
struggled to sit up taller, to see more. The darkened town spread
out before me like a patchwork of houses and roads. Fog lay in
hollows and was thick upon the bay. Weather change coming, I
thought to myself. Something stirred in the air that chilled me,
cooling the old sweat on my skin so that I shivered. Despite the
blackness of the night and the fog, I had no difficulty in seeing
everything perfectly. Skill watching I told myself, and then
wondered. I could not Skill, not predictably, not
usefully.

But as I watched, two ships broke out of the
mists and emerged into the sleeping harbor. I forgot what I could
or could not do. They were sleek and trim, those ships, and though
they were black under the moonlight, I knew their keels were red.
Red-Ship Raiders from the Outislands. The ships moved like knives
through the wavelets, cutting their way clear of the fog, slicing
into the protected water of the harbor like a thin blade slicing
into a pig's belly. The oars moved silently, in perfect unison,
oarlocks muffled with rags. They came alongside the docks as boldly
as honest merchants come to trade. From the first boat, a sailor
leaped lightly, carrying a line to make fast to a piling. An
oarsman fended her off the dock until the aft line was thrown and
made fast as well. All so calmly, so blatantly. The second ship was
following their example. The dreaded Red-Ships had come into town,
bold as gulls, and tied up at their victims home dock.

No sentry cried out. No watchman blew a horn, or
threw a torch onto a waiting heap of pitchpine to kindle a signal
fire. I looked for them, and instantly found them. Heads on chests,
they were idling at their posts. Good woolen homespun had gone from
gray to red sopping up the blood of their slit throats. Their
killers had come quietly, overland, sure of each sentry post, to
silence every watcher. No one would warn the sleeping
town.

There had not been that many sentries. There was
not much to this little town, scarce enough to deserve a dot on the
map. The town had counted on the humbleness of its possessions to
shelter it from raids such as this. Good wool they grew there, and
they spun a fine yarn, it was true. They harvested and smoked the
salmon that came right up their river, and the apples here were
tiny but sweet, and they made a good wine. There was a fine clam
beach to the west of town. These were the riches of Siltbay, and if
they were not great, they were enough to make life treasured by
those who lived here. Surely, though, they were not worth coming
after with a torch and a blade. What sane man would think a keg of
apple wine or a rack of smoked salmon worth a raider's
time?

But these were Red-Ships, and they did not come
to raid for wealth or treasures. They were not after prize breeding
cattle or even women for wives or boys for galley slaves. The
wool-fat sheep would be mutilated and slaughtered, the smoked
salmon trampled underfoot, the warehouses of fleeces and wines
torched. They would take hostages, yes, but only to Forge them. The
Forge magic would leave them less than human, bereft of all
emotions and any but the most basic thoughts. The Raiders would not
keep these hostages, but would abandon them here, to work their
debilitating anguish upon those who had loved them and called them
kin. Stripped of every human sensitivity, Forged ones would scour
their homeland as pitilessly as wolverines. This setting of our own
kin to prey upon us as Forged ones was the Outislanders' cruelest
weapon. This I already knew as I watched. I had seen the aftermath
of other raids.

I watched the tide of death rise to inundate the
little town. The Outislander pirates leaped from the ship to the
docks and flowed up into the village. They trickled silently up the
streets in bands of twos and threes, as deadly as poison unfurling
in wine. Some few paused to search the other vessels tied to the
dock. Most of the boats were small open dories, but there were two
larger fishing vessels and one trader. Their crews met swift death.
Their frantic struggles were as pathetic as fowl flapping and
squawking when a weasel gets into the chicken house. They called
out to me with voices full of blood. The thick fog gulped their
cries greedily. It made the death of a sailor no more than the
keening of a seabird. Afterward, the boats were torched,
carelessly, with no thought to their value as spoils. These Raiders
took no real booty. Perhaps a handful of coins if easily found, or
a necklace from the body of one they had raped and killed, but
little more than that.