The Complete Tawny Man Trilogy Omnibus (255 page)

Finally, during a pause in a very convoluted argument in which Chade had been sorting dukes and Outislander kaempras into sets and predicting where each group would side, my weariness got the better of me.

‘Just tell him “no”,’ I suggested. ‘Tell him the Prince has given his word to his fiancée, and it will not be abrogated by you or by Chade. Tell him that if it is an error, it is the Prince’s error, and learning the consequences of errors is one of the best tutors that any young ruler can have.’

My throat was hoarse and my mouth dry with talking. My head seemed too big and heavy for my neck and my eyeballs to have been rolled in sand. I reached for the wine bottle to pour us each a little more, but as I extended my hand, Kettricken seized it in both of her own. I lifted my eyes to hers, startled. Her blue gaze burned as I had never seen it blaze before; it made her eyes seem dark and a little wild.

‘You tell him, Sacrifice. Do not say it comes from me. I wish you to tell him it is your decision. That as the rightful if uncrowned King, this is what you decree.’

I blinked and stared. ‘I … cannot.’

‘Why not?’

The answer did not make me feel brave. ‘If once I take that
stance, I cannot step aside from it. If once I declare myself so to Chade, then I must ever guard that right, the right of final say, from him.’

‘Until Dutiful puts on his full crown. Yes.’

‘My life would never be my own again.’

‘This is the life that has always waited for you. This is your life, your own life, which you have never taken up. Take it up now.’

‘Have you discussed this with Dutiful?’

‘He knows that I regard you as Sacrifice. When I told him that, he did not dispute it.’

‘My queen, I …’ I pressed the heels of my hands to my throbbing temples. I wanted to say I had never even considered such a role. But I had. I had come two breaths from it on the night King Shrewd died. I had been ready to step up and seize the power of the throne. Not for myself, but to guard it for the Queen until Verity returned. I teetered on accepting the shadow crown she offered. Was it truly hers to give?

Chade pushed into my thoughts.
It is late and I am an old man. Enough of this. Tell her –

No.
It was not hers to give. It was mine to take.
No, Chade. Our prince has given his word, and it will not be abrogated by any of us. If it is an error, it is the Prince’s error, and learning the consequences of errors is one of the best tutors that any young ruler can have.

Those are not the Queen’s words.

No. They are mine.

A long absence of thought followed my words. I could feel Chade there, I could almost sense his steady breathing as he stacked up my words and considered them from every angle. When next he touched minds with me, I could feel his smile, and strangely, the welling of his pride.
Well. After fifteen years, do we finally have a true Farseer on the throne again?

I held my stillness. Waiting. Waiting for mockery or challenge or defiance.

I shall tell the Prince that his decision has been confirmed. And extend our gracious invitation to all the Outislander kaempras. As you will, King Fitz.

Our loss is great, and all for the foolishness of a wager between novices no wiser than children. By order of Skillmaster Treeknee all markings will be removed from the Witness Stones. By order of Master Treeknee, it is forbidden for any Skill-candidates or novices to go to the Witness Stones unless the Skillmaster accompanies them. By order of Skillmaster Treeknee, all knowledge of the use of the Witness Stones is hereafter restricted to those who are candidates for Master status.

Recovered Skill-scroll

When I climbed the hidden stairs back up to Chade’s tower room that dawn, I was beyond weariness. I could not seem to find a coherent thought of my own. Chade and Prince Dutiful would be on their way home by this afternoon. The invitation to the Harvest Fest would have been passed to every kaempra of every clan. Kettricken would have to set in motion the preparations for the grandest celebration that had ever been held in Buckkeep Castle. The invitations to the dukes and their nobles, the food, the guest housing, the minstrels and jugglers and puppeteers to be hired: it made my head spin and I longed to lie down and sleep. Instead, once in my room, I added a few sticks of dry wood to the failing embers in the hearth. I filled a ewer with water from the barrel, and then poured it into the old washbasin and plunged my face into it. I came up, rubbed at my eyes until they felt less sandy and then wiped my face dry. I looked into the small glass Chade had always kept there and wondered who it was looking back at me.

I suddenly understood what the Fool had said to me earlier. I
had journeyed to a place and time I had never foreseen, one past my death. Futures I had never imagined loomed before me, and I had no idea which one I should aspire to. I had taken a step toward claiming a throne, in essence if not in view. I wondered if that meant that I had pushed any life with Molly out of the possible futures I might claim.

Chivalry’s sword rested where I had left it, above the hearth. I took it down. It fitted my hand as if made for it. I flourished it aloft, and then asked the empty chamber, ‘And what would you think of your bastard now, King Chivalry? But, I forget. You never wore the crown, either. No one ever called you King Chivalry.’ I lowered the point of the sword to the floor, conceding to fate. ‘Nor will anyone ever bow the knee to me. All the same, I think I will leave some sign of my passage.’

A strange trembling passed through me, leaving calm in its wake. Hastily, I restored the sword to its place and then wiped my sweaty palms down my shirtfront. A fine king, I thought, wiping sweat down his guard’s uniform. I needed some sleep, but not yet. King Fitz, the bastard monarch. I made a decision and refused to think any more on it. I added a bottle of good brandy to my basket, covered it with a napkin, took up a heavy cloak and fled.

I left the secret corridors behind me and departed by the guards’ entrance. I had to pass the kitchens and almost I stopped to eat. Instead, I helped myself to a little loaf of sweet morning bread from the guards’ mess and ate it as I walked. I passed out of the gate with no more than a sleepy nod from the lad on watch there. I thought how I might change that and then pushed the thought aside. I strode on. I diverted from the main road down to Buckkeep Town onto the trodden trail that went first through the woods and then across the gentle roll of a hill. In the early light of day, the Witness Stones stood stark against the blue sky, awaiting me. Sheep cropped the grass around them. As I approached, they regarded me with that lack of curiosity that is sometimes confused with stupidity. They moved away slowly.

I reached the Witness Stones and walked a slow circle around them. Four stones. Four sides to each stone. Sixteen possible destinations. How often had they been used over the years? I
stood on the hilltop and looked out around me. Grass and trees and there, if one looked for it, the indentation of an ancient road. If there had ever been the rubble of houses here, it had long ago been swallowed by the earth, or more likely carted off to rise again as a hut elsewhere.

Hands behind my back, I studied the stone faces. I decided the runes had been deliberately effaced, long ago. I wondered why and suspected I would never know. And that was almost a comfort.

The basket on my arm was growing heavy and the sun was warming me too well. I slung the heavy cloak around my shoulders. It would be cold where I was going. I stepped up to the face of the pillar I had emerged from on my last journey, set my hand to it, and passed through.

I stumbled a bit as I emerged into the pillar room. Then dizziness took me and I sat down flat on the dusty tiles until it passed. ‘Not enough sleep, and using the stones twice in too short a period of time. Not good,’ I told myself firmly. ‘Not wise.’ I tried to stand up, and then decided to sit down again until the tower stopped spinning. It took several moments of sitting there before I realized something obvious. The floor was no longer cold. I put both hands flat against it, as if to prove it to myself. It was not exactly warm; it was more neutral, neither warm nor cold. I stood, and noticed that the windows were losing their haze of thick frost. I thought I heard whispering behind me and turned quickly. No one was there. Perhaps it was an errant summer wind, a warm wind from the south sweeping the island. Very peculiar. I had no time to dwell on it.

I left the pillar room and basket on my arm, tried to hasten through the icy labyrinth. My head pounded. I had not imagined the change in temperature. In one corridor, water slipped over the stones of the floor in a shallow running flow. The gentle warming of the chambers and halls lessened and then ceased as I approached the juncture where stone walls met ice. Little black spots danced before my eyes. I stopped and leaned my brow against the icy wall and rested. The spots receded and slowly I felt more myself. The coolness seemed to help. By the time I emerged from the crack in the ice wall onto the narrow path down to the Black Man’s cavern, I had my cloak wrapped well about my basket and me.

I made my way down the steep path and knocked again at the Black Man’s door. No one answered. I knocked again, hesitated for a time and then tried the string latch. The door swung open and I entered.

It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the dim room. The fire had burned low. The Fool was sleeping heavily on a pallet made up near the hearth. There was no sign of Prilkop. I shut the door quietly, put my basket on Prilkop’s low table and took off my cloak. Silently I moved to the Fool’s side and crouching down, peered into his sleeping face. The darkening of his skin was already apparent. I wanted to wake him and ask him how he was. Sternly I resisted that impulse. Instead, I unloaded the basket, finding a wooden platter for the bread and cheese and a basket for the fruit. Prilkop’s water barrel was nearly empty. I put water on to heat for tea, and then took his buckets out and down to the place where the trickle down the rockface came to a slight overhang and fell free. I waited while they filled, and then hauled them up again. By that time, the water was hot, and I made fragrant spice tea.

I think the aroma of the tea was what woke the Fool. He opened his eyes and lay still, staring at the awakened fire for a time. He did not move until I said, ‘Fool? Are you any better?’

Then he gave a small start and turned his head sharply toward me as he jerked his body into a protective ball. I was sorry to have frightened him, and well understood that reflex.

I made no comment on it, saying only, ‘I’ve come back, and brought food with me. Are you hungry?’

He pushed his blankets back a little and half sat up, and then sagged back down into his bedding. ‘I’m getting better. The tea smells good.’

‘No apricots, but I brought you plums.’

‘Apricots?’

‘I thought your mind was wandering a bit when you asked me to fetch you apricots. The fever, you know. Still, if there had been any to hand, I’d have filched some for you.’

‘Thank you,’ he said. Then, staring at me, ‘You look different. More than just being clean.’

‘I feel different. But the clean helps, too. I wish I could have brought the Buckkeep steams with me for you. I think they’d do
you good. But as soon as you can walk at all, I’ll get you home. I’ve told Kettricken that we’ll be putting you up in Chade’s old tower room for a time, until you’ve completely recovered and decided who you’d like to become next.’

‘Who I’d like to become …’ He made a small sound of amusement. I could not find the right sort of knife for cutting the bread, so contented myself with tearing off the end of the loaf for him. I took him bread and cheese and a plum, and when the tea had finished steeping, poured him a cup. ‘Where’s Prilkop?’ I asked as he sipped at his tea. I was a bit annoyed that he had left the Fool here alone.

‘Oh, out and about. He has been investigating the Elderling stronghold, to see what damage has been done to it. We’ve had more time for talk while you were gone, in the moments when I was awake. There were not many, I think. He told me tales of the old city; they seem interwoven with my dreams. I suspect that is where he is now. He spoke of seeing what damage she had done, and what he could put right. I suspect he did things to make the city less hospitable, in hopes of driving her out. Now he plans to undo them. I asked him, “For whom?” and he said, “Perhaps just for the sake of putting it right.” He lived there alone for many years after all the others died. For generations, perhaps. He did not tally the passing years, but I am convinced he has been here a very long time. He welcomed the Pale Woman when she first arrived for he thought she had come with her Catalyst to fulfil Prilkop’s goals.’

He drew breath and sipped at the tea. ‘Eat first and then tell stories,’ I suggested to him.

‘Tell me yours while I eat. Something momentous has happened to you. It’s in your bearing and eyes.’

And so I spoke to him, as I could have to no other, divulging all that had befallen me. He smiled but it seemed weighted with sadness, and nodded to himself as if I were but confirming things that he already knew. When I had finished, he tossed his plum pit into the fire and said quietly, ‘Well. It is nice to know that my last vision and prophecy was a true one.’

‘So. I’ll live happily ever after, as the minstrels sing?’

He twisted his mouth at me and shook his head. ‘You’ll live
among people who love you and have expectations of you. That will make your life horribly complicated and they will worry you sick half the time. And the other half, annoy you. And delight you.’ He turned away from me and took up his cup and looked into it, like a hedge-witch reading tea leaves. ‘Fate has given up on you, FitzChivalry Farseer. You’ve won. In the future that you now have found, it’s almost likely that you’ll live to a ripe old age, rather than that fate will try to sweep you from the playing board at every opportunity.’

I tried to lighten his words. ‘I was getting a bit tired of being hauled back from death’s door and beyond every time I turned around.’