The Wise Man's Fear (126 page)

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Authors: Patrick Rothfuss

Tags: #Mercenary troops, #Magicians, #Magic, #Attempted assassination, #Fairies, #Fiction, #Fantasy, #General, #Heroes, #Epic

BOOK: The Wise Man's Fear
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Felurian said nothing. She held it tightly between her thumb and two forefingers, as if it were a snake struggling to twist around and bite her. Her mouth made a thin line, and her eyes began to brighten from their customary twilight purple to a deep-water blue.
“Can I help?” I asked.
She laughed. Not the light, chiming laugh I had heard so often, but a wild, fierce laugh. “do you want to help truly?” she asked. The hand holding the shard of iron trembled slightly.
I nodded, a little frightened.
“then go.” Her eyes were still changing, brightening to a bluish-white. “I do not need flame now, or songs, or questions.” When I didn’t move she made a shooing motion. “go to the forest. do not wander far, but do not trouble me for the time it takes to love four times.” Her voice had changed slightly too. Though still soft, it had taken on a brittle edge that alarmed me.
I was about to protest when she gave me a terrible look that sent me scampering mindlessly for the trees.
I wandered aimlessly for a while, trying to regain my composure. This was difficult, as I was baby-naked and had been shooed away from the presence of serious magic the way a mother sends a bothersome child away from the cookfire.
Still, I knew I wouldn’t be welcome back in the clearing for some time. So I pointed my face Dayward and set off to explore.
I can’t say why I wandered so far afield that day. Felurian had warned me to stay close, and I knew it to be good advice. Any of a hundred stories from my childhood told me the danger of wandering in the Fae. Even discounting them, the stories Felurian herself had told should have been enough to keep me close to the safety of her twilight grove.
My natural curiosity must take some of the blame, I suppose. But most of it belongs to my bruised pride. Pride and folly, they go together like two tightly grasping hands.
I walked for the better part of an hour as the sky above me slowly brightened into full daylight. I found a path of sorts, but saw nothing living aside from the occasional butterfly or leaping squirrel.
With every step I took, my mood teetered between boredom and anxiety. I was in the Fae, after all. I should be seeing marvelous things. Castles of glass. Burning fountains. Bloodthirsty trow. Barefoot old men, eager to give me advice ...
The trees gave way to a great grassy plain. All the parts of the Fae Felurian had shown me had been forested. So this seemed a clear sign I was well outside the bounds of where I ought to be.
Still I continued, enjoying the feel of sunlight on my skin after so long in the dim twilight of Felurian’s glade. The trail I followed seemed to be leading to a lone tree standing in the grassy field. I decided I would go as far as that tree, then head back.
However, after walking for a long while I didn’t seem to be coming much closer to the tree. At first I thought this was another oddity of the Fae, but as I continued to make my stubborn way along the path, the truth became clear. The tree was simply larger than I had thought. Much larger and much farther away.
The path did not ultimately lead to the tree. In fact, it curved away from it, avoiding it by more than half a mile. I was considering turning back when a bright flutter of color under the tree’s canopy caught my eye. After a brief struggle, my curiosity won out and I stepped off the path into the long grass.
It was no type of tree I had ever seen before, and I approached it slowly. It resembled a vast spreading willow, with broader leaves of a darker green. The tree had deep, hanging foliage scattered with pale, powder-blue blossoms.
The wind shifted, and as the leaves stirred I smelled a strange, sweet smell. It was like smoke and spice and leather and lemon. It was a compelling smell. Not in the same way that food smells appealing. It didn’t make my mouth water or my stomach growl. Despite this, if I’d seen something sitting on a table that smelled this way, even if it were a lump of stone or a piece of wood, I would have felt compelled to put it in my mouth. Not out of hunger, but from sheer curiosity, much like a child might.
As I stepped closer I was struck with the beauty of the scene: the deep green of the leaves contrasted with the butterflies flitting from branch to branch, sipping from the pale blossoms of the tree. What I had taken at first to be a bed of flowers beneath the tree turned out to be a carpet of butterflies almost completely covering the ground. The scene was so breathtaking I stopped several dozen feet away from the tree’s canopy, not wanting to startle them into flight.
Many of the butterflies flitting among the flowers were purple and black, or blue and black, like those in Felurian’s clearing. Others were a solid, vibrant green, or grey and yellow, or silver and blue. But my eye was caught by a single large red one, crimson shot through with a faint tracery of metallic gold. Its wings were bigger than my spread hand, and as I watched it fluttered deeper into the foliage in search of a fresh flower to light upon.
Suddenly, its wings were no longer moving in concert. They tumbled apart and fluttered separately to the ground like falling autumn leaves.
It was only after my eyes followed them to the base of the tree that I saw the truth. The ground below was not a resting place for butterflies . . . it was strewn with lifeless wings. Thousands of them littered the grass beneath the tree’s canopy, like a blanket of gemstones.
“The red ones offend my aesthetic,” claimed a cool, dry voice from the tree.
I took a step back, trying to peer through the thick canopy of hanging leaves.
“What manners,” chided the dry voice. “No introduction? Staring?”
“My apologies, sir,” I said earnestly. Then, remembering the tree’s flowers, I amended, “Ma’am. But I have never spoken with a tree before and find myself at something of a loss.”
“I daresay you are. I am no tree. No more than is a man a chair. I am the Cthaeh. You are fortunate to find me. Many would envy you your chance.”
“Chance?” I echoed, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever was speaking to me from among the branches of the tree. A piece of an old story tickled my memory, some scrap of folklore I’d read while searching for the Chandrian. “You’re an oracle,” I said.
“Oracle. How quaint. Do not try to pin me with small names. I am Cthaeh. I am. I see. I know.” Two iridescent blue-black wings fluttered separately where there had been a butterfly before. “At times I speak.”
“I thought the red ones offended you?”
“There are no red ones left.” The voice was nonchalant. “And the blue ones are ever so slightly sweet.” I saw a flicker of movement, and another pair of sapphire wings began spinning slowly to the ground. “You’re Felurian’s new manling, aren’t you?” I hesitated, but the dry voice continued as if I’d answered. “I thought as much. I can smell the iron on you. Just a hint. Still, one has to wonder how she stands it.”
A pause. A blur. A slight disturbance of a dozen leaves. Two more wings twitched, then fluttered downward. “Come now,” the voice continued, now coming from a different part of the tree, though still hidden by the hanging leaves. “Surely a curious boy is bound to have a question or two. Come. Ask. Your silence much offends me.”
I hesitated, then said, “I suppose I might have a question or two.”
“
Ahhhh
,” the sound was slow and satisfied. “I thought you might.”
“What can you tell me of the Amyr?”
“
Kyxxs
,” the Cthaeh spat an irritated noise. “What is this? Why so guarded? Why the games? Ask me of the Chandrian and have done.”
I stood, stunned and silent.
“Surprised? Why should you be? Goodness boy, you’re like a clear pool. I can see ten feet through you, and you’re barely three feet deep.” There was another blur of motion and two pairs of wings went spinning to the ground, one blue, one purple.
I thought I saw a sinuous motion among the branches, but it was hidden by the endless, wind-brushed swaying of the tree. “Why the purple one?” I asked, simply to have something to say.
“Pure spite,” the Cthaeh said. “I envied its innocence, its lack of care. Besides, too much sweetness cloys me. As does willful ignorance.” A pause. “You wish to ask me of the Chandrian, do you not?”
I could do nothing but nod.
“Not much to say really,” the Cthaeh remarked flippantly. “You would do better to call them the Seven though. ‘Chandrian’ has so much folklore hanging off it after all these years. The names used to be interchangeable, but nowadays if you say Chandrian people think of ogres and rendlings and scaven. Such silliness.”
There was a long pause. I stood motionless until I realized the creature was waiting for a response. “Tell me more,” I said. My voice sounded terribly thin to my own ears.
“Why?” I thought I detected a playful note in the voice.
“Because I need to know,” I said, trying to force some strength back into my voice.
“Need?” Cthaeh asked skeptically. “Why this sudden need? The masters at the University might know the answers you’re looking for. But they wouldn’t tell you even if you did ask, which you won’t. You’re too proud for that. Too clever to ask for help. Too mindful of your reputation.”
I tried to speak, but my throat did nothing but make a dry clicking sound. I swallowed and tried again. “Please, I need to know. They killed my parents.”
“Are you going to try to kill the Chandrian?” The voice sounded fascinated, almost taken aback. “Track and kill them all yourself? My word, how will you manage it? Haliax has been alive five thousand years. Five thousand years and not one second’s sleep.
“Clever to go looking for the Amyr, I suppose. Even one proud as you can recognize the need for help. The Order might give it to you. Trouble is they’re as hard to find as the Seven themselves. Oh dear, oh dear. Whatever is a brave young boy to do?”
“Tell me!” I meant to shout it, but it came out pleading.
“It would be frustrating, I suppose,” the Cthaeh continued calmly. “The few people who believe in the Chandrian are too afraid to talk, and everyone else will just laugh at you for asking.” There was a dramatic sigh that seemed to come from several places in the foliage at once. “That’s the price you pay for civilization though.”
“What price?” I asked.
“Arrogance,” the Cthaeh said. “You assume you know everything. You laughed at faeries until you saw one. Small wonder all your civilized neighbors dismiss the Chandrian as well. You’d have to leave your precious corners far behind before you found someone who might take you seriously. You wouldn’t have a hope until you made it to the Stormwal.”
There was a pause, then another pair of purple wings went drifting to the ground. I swallowed against the dryness in my throat, trying to think of what question I could ask to get more information.
“Not many folk will take your search for the Amyr seriously, you realize,” the Cthaeh continued calmly. “The Maer, however, is quite the extraordinary man. He’s already come close to them, though he doesn’t realize it. Stick by the Maer and he will lead you to their door.”
The Cthaeh gave a thin, dry chuckle. “Blood, bracken, and bone, I wish you creatures had the wit to appreciate me. Whatever else you might forget, remember what I just said. Eventually you’ll get the joke. I guarantee. You’ll laugh when the time comes.”
“What can you tell me about the Chandrian?” I asked.
“Since you ask so sweetly, Cinder is the one you want. Remember him? White hair? Dark eyes? Did things to your mother, you know. Terrible. She held up well though. Laurian was always a trouper, if you’ll pardon the expression. Much better than your father, with all his begging and blubbering.”
My mind flashed pictures of things I had tried to forget for years. My mother, her hair wet with blood, her arms unnaturally twisted, broken at the wrist, the elbow. My father, his belly cut open, had left a trail of blood for twenty feet. He’d crawled to be closer to her. I tried to speak, but my mouth was dry. “Why?” I managed to croak.
“Why?” the Cthaeh echoed. “What a good question. I know so many whys. Why did they do such nasty things to your poor family? Why, because they wanted to, and because they could, and because they had a reason.
“Why did they leave you alive? Why, because they were sloppy, and because you were lucky, and because something scared them away.”
What scared them away?
I thought numbly. But it was all too much. The memories, the things the voice said. My mouth worked silently, questioning.
“What?” the Cthaeh asked. “Are you looking for a different why? Are you wondering why I tell you these things? What good comes of it? Maybe this Cinder did me a bad turn once. Maybe it amuses me to set a young pup like you snapping at his heels. Maybe the soft creaking of your tendons as you clench your fists is like a sweet symphony to me. Oh yes it is. And you can be sure.
“Why can’t you find this Cinder? Well, that’s an interesting why. You’d think a man with coal-black eyes would make an impression when he stops to buy a drink. How can it be that you haven’t managed to catch wind of him in all this time?”
I shook my head, trying to clear it of the smell of blood and burning hair.

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