The Complete Tawny Man Trilogy Omnibus (25 page)

Instantly he looked crestfallen, but to his credit he took a breath, squared his shoulders and nodded.

Beside the table, Nighteyes rolled to his side, and then onto his back.
Here’s the dead wolf. Might as well bury him, all he’s fit for is to lie about in a dusty yard and watch chickens he’s not permitted to kill
. He paddled his paws vaguely at the air.

Idiot. The chickens are why I’m asking the boy to stay, not you.

Oh? So, if you woke up tomorrow and they were all dead, there would be no reason we could not set out together?

You had better not
, I warned him.

He opened his mouth and let his tongue hang to one side. The boy smiled down at him fondly. ‘I always think he looks as if he’s laughing when he does that.’

I didn’t leave the next morning. I was up long before the boy was. I pulled out my good clothes, musty from disuse, and hung them out to air. The linen of the shirt had yellowed with age. It had been a gift from Starling, long ago. I think I had worn it once on the day she gave it to me. I looked at it ruefully, thinking that it would appal Chade and amuse the Fool. Well, like so many other things, it could not be helped.

There was also a box, built years ago and stored up in the rafters of my workshop. I wrestled it down, and opened it. Despite the oily rags that had wrapped it, Verity’s sword was tarnished with disuse. I put on the belt and scabbard, noting that I’d have to punch a new notch in the belt for it to hang comfortably. I sucked in a breath and buckled it as it was.
I wiped an oily rag down the blade, and then sheathed the sword at my hip. When I drew it, it weighed heavy in my hand, yet balanced as beautifully as ever. I debated the wisdom of wearing it. I’d feel a fool if someone recognized it and asked difficult questions. I would feel even stupider, however, if my throat were cut for lack of a weapon at my side.

I compromised by wrapping the jewelled grip with leather strips. The sheath itself was battered but serviceable. It looked appropriate to my station. I drew it again, and made a lunge, stretching muscles no longer accustomed to that reach. I resumed my stance and made a few cuts at the air.

Amusement.
Better take an axe
.

I don’t have one any more
. Verity himself had given me this sword. But both he and Burrich had advised me that my style of fighting was more suited to the crudity of an axe than this graceful and elegant weapon. I tried another cut at the air. My mind remembered all Hod had taught me, but my body was having difficulty performing the moves.

You chop wood with one.

That’s not a battleaxe. I’d look a fool carrying that about with me
. I sheathed the sword and turned to look at him.

Nighteyes sat in the doorway of the workshop, his tail neatly curled about his feet. Amusement glinted in his dark eyes. He turned his head to stare innocently into the distance.
I think one of the chickens died in the night. Sad. Poor old thing. Death comes for all of us eventually
.

He was lying, but he had the satisfaction of seeing me sheath the sword and hurry to see if it were so. All six of my biddies clucked and dusted themselves in the sun. The rooster, perched on a fence post, kept a watchful eye on his wives.

How odd. I would have sworn that fat white hen looked poorly yesterday. I’ll just lie out here in the shade and keep an eye on her
. He suited his actions to his thought, sprawling in the dappling shade of the birches while staring at the chickens intently. I ignored him and went back into the cabin.

I was boring a new hole in the swordbelt when Hap woke up. He came sleepily to the table to watch me. He came awake when his eyes fell on the sword waiting in its sheath. ‘I’ve never seen that before.’

‘I’ve had it for a long time.’

‘I’ve never seen you wear it when we went to market. All you ever carried before was your sheath-knife.’

‘A trip to Buckkeep is a bit different from a trip to market.’ His question made me look at my own motives for taking the blade. When last I had seen Buckkeep, a number of people there wished me dead. If I encountered any of them and they recognized me, I wanted to be ready. ‘A city like that has a lot more rogues and scoundrels than a simple country market.’

I finished boring the new belt notch and tried it on again. Better. I drew the sword and heard Hap’s indrawn breath. Even with the handle wrapped in plain leather, there was no mistaking it for a cheap blade. This was a weapon created by a master.

‘Can I try it?’

I nodded permission and he picked it up gingerly. He adjusted his grip for the heft of it, and then fell into an awkward imitation of a swordsman’s stance. I had never taught Hap to fight. I wondered for an instant if that omission had been a bad decision. I had hoped he would never need the skills of a fighter. But not teaching them to him was no protection against someone challenging him.

Rather like refusing to teach Dutiful about the Skill.

I pushed that thought aside and said nothing as Hap swung the blade at the air. In a few moments he had tired himself. The hard muscles of a farming hand were not what a man used to swing a blade. The endurance to wield such a weapon demanded both training and constant practice. He set it down and looked at me without speaking.

‘I’ll be leaving for Buckkeep tomorrow morning at dawn.
I still need to clean this blade, grease my boots, pack some clothing and food –’

‘And cut your hair,’ Hap interjected quietly.

‘Hm.’ I crossed the room and took out our small looking-glass. Usually, when Starling came to visit me, she cut my hair for me. For a moment I stared at how long it had grown. Then, as I had not in years, I pulled it to the back of my head and fastened it into a warrior’s tail. Hap looked at me with his brows raised, but said nothing about my martial aspect.

Long before dusk, I was ready to travel. I turned my attention to my smallholding. I busied myself and the boy with making sure all would go well for him while I was gone. By the time we sat down to our evening meal, we were ahead on every chore I could think of. He promised he would keep the garden watered and harvest the rest of the peas. He would split the last of the firewood and stack it. I caught myself telling him things he knew, things he had known for years, and finally stopped my tongue. He smiled at my concerns.

‘I survived on my own out on the roads, Tom. I’ll be fine here at home. I only wish I were going with you.’

‘If all works out, when I return, we will make a trip to Buckkeep together.’

Nighteyes sat up abruptly, pricking his ears.
Horses
.

I went to the door with the wolf at my side. A few moments later, the hoofbeats reached my ears. The animals were coming at a steady trot. I stepped to where I could see around the bend in our narrow lane, and glimpsed the horseman. It was not, as I had hoped, the Fool. This was a stranger. He rode a rangy roan horse and led another. Dust mottled the sweat streaks on his horse’s withers. As I watched them come, a sense of foreboding rose in me. The wolf shared my trepidation. His hackles bristled down his spine and the deep growl that rose from him brought Hap to the door as well. ‘What is it?’

‘I’m not sure. But it’s no random wanderer or peddler.’

At the sight of me, the stranger reined in his horse. He
lifted a hand in greeting, then came forwards more slowly. I saw both horses prick their ears at the scent of the wolf, and felt their anxiety as well as their eagerness for the water they could also smell.

‘Are you lost, stranger?’ I greeted the man from a safe distance.

He made no reply but rode closer to us. The wolf’s growl reached a crescendo. The rider seemed unaware of the rising warning.

Wait
, I bade him.

We stood our ground as the man rode closer. The horse he led was saddled and bridled. I wondered if he had lost a companion, or stolen it from someone.

‘That’s close enough,’ I warned him suddenly. ‘What do you seek here?’

He had been watching me intently. He did not pause at my words, but made a gesture at first his ears, and then his mouth as he rode closer. I held out a hand. ‘Stop there,’ I warned him, and he understood my motion and obeyed it. Without dismounting, he reached into a messenger’s pouch that was slung across his chest. He drew out a scroll and proffered it to me.

Stay ready
, I warned Nighteyes as I stepped forwards to take it. Then I recognized the seal on it. In thick red wax, my own charging buck was imprinted. A different sort of trepidation swept through me. I stared at the missive in my hand, then with a gesture gave the deaf-mute permission to dismount. I took a breath and spoke to Hap with a steady voice. ‘Take him inside and provide him food and drink. The same for his horses. Please.’

And to Nighteyes,
Keep an eye on him, my brother, while I see what this scroll says
.

Nighteyes ceased his rumbling growl at my thought, but followed the messenger very closely as a puzzled Hap gestured him towards our cabin. The weary horses stood where he had left them. A few moments later, Hap emerged to lead them
off to water. Alone I stood in the dooryard and stared at the coiled scroll in my hand. I broke the seal at last and studied Chade’s slanting letters in the fading daylight.

Dear Cousin,

Family matters at home require your attention. Do not delay your return. You know I would not summon you thus unless the need was urgent.

The signature that followed this brief missive was indecipherable. It was not Chade’s name. The real message had been in the seal itself. He never would have used it unless the need was urgent. I re-rolled the scroll and looked up towards the sinking sun.

When I entered the house, the messenger stood up immediately. Still chewing, he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, and indicated he was ready to leave at once. I suspected his orders from Chade had been very specific. There was no time to lose in sleep or rest for man or beast. I gestured him back to his food. I was glad my rucksack was already packed.

‘I unsaddled the horses and wiped them down a bit,’ Hap told me as he came in the door. ‘They look as if they’ve come a long way today.’

I took a breath. ‘Put their saddles back on. As soon as our friend has eaten, we’ll be leaving.’

For a moment, the boy was thunderstruck. Then he asked in a small voice, ‘Where are you going?’

I tried to make my smile convincing. ‘Buckkeep, lad. And faster than I expected.’ I considered the matter. There was no way to estimate when I might be back. Or even if I would come back. A missive like this from Chade would definitely mean danger of some kind. I was amazed at how easily I decided. ‘I want you and the wolf to follow at first light. Use the pony and cart, so if he gets weary, he can ride.’

Hap stared at me as if I had gone mad. ‘What about the chickens? And the chores I was to do while you were gone?’

‘The chickens will have to fend for themselves. No. They
wouldn’t last a week before a weasel had them. Take them to Baylor. He’ll feed and watch them for the sake of their eggs. Take a day or so, and close the house up tight. We may both be gone awhile.’ I turned away from the incomprehension on Hap’s face.

‘But …’ The fear in his voice made me turn back to him. He stared at me as if I were suddenly a stranger. ‘Where should I go when I get to Buckkeep Town? Will you meet me there?’ I heard an echo of the abandoned boy in his voice.

I reached back in my memory fifteen years and tried to summon up the name of a decent inn. Before I could dredge one out, he hopefully put in, ‘I know where Jinna’s niece lives. Jinna said I could find her there, when next I came to Buckkeep. Her house has a hedge-witch sign on it, a hand with lines on the palm. I could meet you there.’

‘That will be it then.’

Relief showed on his face. He knew where he was going. I was glad he had that security. I myself did not. But despite all my uneasiness, a strange elation filled me. Chade’s old spell fell over me again. Secrets and adventures. I felt the wolf nudge against me.

A time of change
. Then, gruffly:
I could try to keep pace with the horses. Buckkeep is not so far
.

I do not know what this means, my brother. And until I do, I would just as soon that you stayed by Hap’s side.

Is that supposed to salve my pride?

No. It’s supposed to ease my fears.

I will bring him safely to Buckkeep Town, then. But after that, I am at your side.

Of course. Always.

Before the sun kissed the horizon good-night, I was mounted on the nondescript grey horse. Verity’s disguised sword hung at my hip, and my pack was fastened tightly to the back of my saddle. I followed my silent companion as he hastened us down the road to Buckkeep.

Between the Six Duchies and the Out Islands as much blood has been shared as has been shed. Despite the enmity of the Red Ship War, and the years of sporadic raiding that preceded it, almost every family in the Coastal Duchies will acknowledge having ‘a cousin in the Out Islands’. All acknowledge that the folk of the Coastal Duchies are of those mingled bloodlines. It is well documented that the first rulers of the Farseer line were likely raiders from the Out Islands who came to raid and settled instead.

Just as the history of the Six Duchies has been shaped by geography, so too has the chronicle of the Out Islands. Theirs is a harsher land than ours. Ice rules their mountainous islands year round. Deep fjords slash their islands and rough water divides them. We consider their islands immense, yet the domination of glacier grants men only the edges of those islands as dwelling places. What arable land they have along the coasts of their islands is stingy and thin in its yield. Thus no large cities can be supported there, and few towns. Barriers and isolation are the hallmark of that land, and so the folk dwell in fiercely independent villages and town-states. In times past, they were raiders by necessity as well as by inclination, and robbed one another as often as they ventured across the seas to harry the Six Duchies coastline. It is true that during the Red Ship War, Kebal Rawbread was able to force a brief alliance among the island folk, and from that alliance, he hammered together a powerful raiding fleet. Only the devastation of the Six Duchies dragons was sufficient to shatter his merciless hold over his own people.

Having once seen the strength of such an alliance, the individual headmen of the Out Island villages realized that such power could be used for more than War. In the years of recovery that followed the end of the Red Ship War, the Hetgurd was formed. This alliance of Out Island headmen was an uneasy one. At first, they sought only to replace inter-island raiding with trading treaties between individual headmen. Arkon Bloodblade was the first headman to point out to the others that the Hetgurd could use its unified strength to normalize trade relations with the Six Duchies
.

Brawnkenner’s
The Out Island Chronicles

As always, Chade had planned well. His silent messenger seemed very familiar with his ways. Before noon the next day, we had changed our exhausted horses for two others at a decrepit farmhouse. We travelled across brown hillsides seared by summer, and left those two horses at a fisherman’s hut. A small boat was waiting and the surly crew took us swiftly up the coast. We put in at a landing at a tiny trading port, where two more horses awaited us at a run-down inn. I stayed as silent as my guide, and no one questioned me about anything. If coin was exchanged, I never saw it. It is always best not to see what is meant to be concealed. The horses carried us to yet another waiting boat, this one with a scaly deck that smelled much of fish. It struck me that we were approaching Buckkeep not by the swiftest possible path, but by the least likely one. If anyone watched the roads into Buckkeep for us, they were doomed to disappointment.

Buckkeep Castle is built on an inhospitable strip of coast. It stands, tall and black, on top of the cliffs, but it commands a fine view of the Buck River mouth. Whoever controls that castle controls trade on the Buck River. For that reason was it built there. The vagaries of history have made it the ruling seat of the Farseer family. Buckkeep Town clings to the cliffs below the castle like lichens to rock. Half of it is built out on
docks and piers. As a boy, I had thought the town had grown as large as it could, given its geography, but on the afternoon that we sailed into it, I saw that I had been wrong. Human ingenuity had prevailed over nature’s harshness. Suspended pathways now vined across the face of the cliffs, and tiny houses and shops found purchase to cling there. The houses reminded me of mud-swallows’ nests, and I wondered what pounding they took during the winter storms. Pilings had been driven into the black sand and rock of the beaches where I had once run and played with Molly and the other children. Warehouses and inns squatted on these perches, and at high tide, one could tie up right at their doorsteps. This our fishing boat did, and I followed my mute guide ‘ashore’ onto a wooden walkway.

As the small boat cast off and left us there, I gawked about us, a country farmer come to town. The increase in structures and the lively boat commerce indicated that Buckkeep prospered, yet I could take no joy in it. Here was the final evidence of my childhood erased. The place I had both dreaded and longed to return to was gone, swallowed by this thriving port. When I glanced about for my mute guide, he had vanished. I loitered where he had left me a bit longer, already suspecting he would not return. He had brought me back to Buckkeep Town. From here, I needed no guide. Chade never liked any of his contacts to know every link of the convoluted paths that led to him. I shouldered my small rucksack and headed towards home.

Perhaps, I thought as I wended my way through Buckkeep’s steep and narrow streets, Chade had even known that I would prefer to make this part of my journey alone. I did not hurry. I knew I could not contact Chade until after nightfall. As I explored the once-familiar streets and byways, I found nothing that was completely familiar. It seemed that every structure that could sprout a second storey had, and on some of the narrower streets the balconies almost met overhead, so that one walked in a perpetual twilight. I found inns I had frequented and stores where I had traded, and even glimpsed the faces of
old acquaintances overlaid with fifteen years of experience. Yet no one exclaimed with surprise or delight to see me; as a stranger I was visible only to the boys hawking hot pies in the street. I bought one for a copper and ate it as I walked. The taste of the peppery gravy and the chunks of river fish in it were the taste of Buckkeep Town itself.

The chandlery that had once belonged to Molly’s father was now a tailor’s shop. I did not go inside. I went instead to the tavern we had once frequented. It was as dark, as smoky, and as crowded as I recalled. The heavy table in the corner still bore the marks of Kerry’s idle whittling. The boy who brought my beer was too young ever to have known me, but I knew who had fathered him by the line of his brow and was glad the business had remained in the same family. One beer became two, and then three, and the fourth was gone before twilight began to creep through the streets of the town. No one had uttered a word to the dour-faced stranger drinking alone, but I listened all the same. But whatever desperate business had led Chade to call on me, it was not common knowledge. I heard only gossip of the Prince’s betrothal, complaints about Bingtown’s war with Chalced disrupting trade, and the local mutterings about the very strange weather. Out of a clear and peaceful night sky, lightning had struck an unused storage hut in the outer keep of the castle and blown the roof right off. I shook my head at that tale. I left an extra copper for the boy, and shouldered my pack once more.

The last time I had left Buckkeep it had been as a dead man in a coffin. I could scarcely re-enter the same way, and yet I feared to approach the main gate. Once I had been a familiar face in the guardroom. Changed I might be, but I would not take the chance of being recognized. Instead, I went to a place both Chade and I knew, a secret exit from the castle grounds that Nighteyes had discovered when he was just a cub. Through that small gap in Buckkeep’s defences, Queen Kettricken and
the Fool had once fled Prince Regal’s plot. Tonight, I would return by that route.

But when I got there, I found that the fault in the walls that guarded Buckkeep had been repaired a long time ago. A heavy growth of thistles cloaked where it had been. A short distance from the thistles, sitting cross-legged on a large embroidered cushion, a golden-haired youth of obvious nobility played a penny whistle with consummate skill. As I approached, he ended his tune with a final scattering of notes and set his instrument aside.

‘Fool,’ I greeted him fondly and with no great surprise.

He cocked his head and made a mouth at me. ‘Beloved,’ he drawled in response. Then he grinned, sprang to his feet, and slipped his whistle inside his ribboned shirt. He indicated his cushion. ‘I’m glad I brought that. I had a feeling you might linger a time in Buckkeep Town, but I didn’t expect to wait this long.’

‘It’s changed,’ I said lamely.

‘Haven’t we all?’ he replied, and for a moment there was an echo of pathos in his voice. But in an instant it was gone. He tidied his gleaming hair fussily and picked a leaf from his stocking. He pointed at his cushion again. ‘Pick that up and follow me. Hurry along. We are expected.’ His air of petulant command mimed perfectly that of a foppish dandy of the noble class. He plucked a handkerchief from his sleeve and patted at his upper lip, erasing imaginary perspiration.

I had to smile. He assumed the role so deftly and effortlessly. ‘How are we going in?’

‘By the front gate, of course. Have no fear. I’ve put word about that Lord Golden is very dissatisfied with the quality of servants he has found in Buckkeep Town. None have suited me, and so today I went to meet a ship bringing to me a fine fellow, if a bit rustic, recommended to me by my second cousin’s first valet. By name, one Tom Badgerlock.’

He proceeded ahead of me. I picked up his cushion and
followed. ‘So. I’m to be your servant?’ I asked in wry amusement.

‘Of course. It’s the perfect guise. You’ll be virtually invisible to all the nobility of Buckkeep. Only the other servants will speak to you, and as I intend that you will be a down-trodden, overworked, poorly-dressed lackey of a supercilious, overbearing and insufferable young lord, you will have little time to socialize at all.’ He halted suddenly and looked back. One slender, long-fingered hand clasped his chin as he looked down his nose at me. His fair brows knit and his amber eyes narrowed as he snapped, ‘And do not dare to meet my eyes, sirrah! I will tolerate no impertinence. Stand up straight, keep your place, and speak no word without my leave. Are you clear on these instructions?’

‘Perfectly,’ I grinned at him.

He continued to glare at me. Then suddenly the glare was replaced by a look of exasperation. ‘FitzChivalry, the game is up if you cannot play this role and play it to the hilt. Not just when we stand in the Great Hall of Buckkeep, but every moment of every day when there is the remotest chance that we might be seen. I have been Lord Golden since I arrived, but I am still a newcomer to the Queen’s Court, and folk will stare. Chade and Queen Kettricken have done all they could to help me in this ruse, Chade because he perceived how useful I might be, and the Queen because she feels I truly deserve to be treated as a lord.’

‘And no one recognized you?’ I broke in incredulously.

He cocked his head. ‘What would they recognize, Fitz? My dead white skin and colourless eyes? My jester’s motley and painted face? My capers and cavorting and daring witticisms?’

‘I knew you the moment I saw you,’ I reminded him.

He smiled warmly. ‘Just as I knew you, and would know you when first I met you a dozen lives hence. But few others do. Chade with his assassin’s eyes picked me out, and arranged
a private audience at which I made myself known to the Queen. A few others have given me curious glances from time to time, but no one would dare to accost Lord Golden and ask him if fifteen years ago he had been King Shrewd’s jester at this self-same court. My age appears wrong to them, as does my colouring, as does my demeanour, as does my wealth.’

‘How can they be so blind?’

He shook his head and smiled at my ignorance. ‘Fitz, Fitz. They never even saw me in the first place. They saw only a jester and a freak. I deliberately took no name when first I arrived here. To most of the lords and ladies of Buckkeep, I was just the Fool. They heard my jokes and saw my capers, but they never really saw
me
.’ He gave a small sigh. Then he gave me a considering look. ‘You made it a name. The Fool. And you saw me. You met my eyes when others looked aside, disconcerted.’ I saw the tip of his tongue for a second. ‘Did you never guess how you frightened me? That all my ruses were useless against the eyes of a small boy?’

‘You were just a child yourself,’ I pointed out uneasily.

He hesitated. I noticed he did not agree or disagree with me when he went on. ‘Become my faithful servant, Fitz. Be Tom Badgerlock, every second of every day that you are at Buckkeep. It is the only way you can protect both of us. And the only guise in which you can aid Chade.’

‘What, exactly, does Chade need of me?’

‘That would be better heard from his lips than mine. Come. It grows dark. Buckkeep Town has grown and changed, as has Buckkeep itself. If we try to enter after dark, we may well be turned away.’

It had grown later as we talked and the long summer day was fading around us. He led and I followed as he took me round about to the steep road that led to Buckkeep Castle’s main gate. He lingered in the trees to let a wine merchant round a bend before we ourselves stepped out on the road. Then Lord
Golden led and his humble servant Tom Badgerlock trudged behind him, bearing his embroidered cushion.

At the gate he was admitted without question and I followed at his heels, unnoticed. The guard on the gate wore Buckkeep’s blue and their jerkins were embroidered with the Farseer leaping buck. Small things like that twisted my heart unexpectedly. I blinked and then coughed and rubbed my eyes. The Fool had the kindness not to look back at me.

Buckkeep had changed as much as the town that clung to the cliffs below it. Overall, the changes were ones I approved. We passed a new and larger stable. Paving stones had been laid where once muddy tracks had run. Although more folk thronged the castle than I recalled, it seemed cleaner and better maintained. I wondered if this was Kettricken’s Mountain discipline applied to the keep, or simply the result of peace in the land. All the years that I had lived in Buckkeep had been years of the Outislander raids and eventually outright war. Relative peace had brought a resumption of trade, and not just with the countries to the south of the Six Duchies. Our history of trading with the Out Islands was as long as our history of fighting with them. I had seen the Outislander ships, both oared and sailed, in Buckkeep’s harbour when I arrived.