Fool's Errand (74 page)

“Do you think that’s wise?” she asked, but she smiled as she said it.

“No.” I shook my head slowly. “I think it’s foolish and wonderful.”

“Ah. Well. Will you stay and have another cup of tea, then? Or must you hurry back to the keep and your own duties?”

“I have no duties tonight. I won’t be missed.”

“Well, then.” She poured another cup of tea for me with an alacrity that was flattering. “You’ll stay a while here. Where you have been missed.” She sipped from her cup, smiling at me over the rim of it.

Fennel drew breath and began a deep, rumbling purr.

EPILOGUE

There was a time when I thought that my life’s significant work would be to write a history of the Six Duchies. I made a start on it any number of times, but always seemed to slide sideways from that grand tale into a recounting of the days and details of my own small life. The more I studied the accounts of others, both written and told, the more it seemed to me that we attempt such histories not to preserve knowledge, but to fix the past in a settled way. Like a flower pressed flat and dried, we try to hold it still and say, this is exactly how it was the day I first saw it. But like the flower, the past cannot be trapped that way. It loses its fragrance and its vitality, its fragility becomes brittleness and its colors fade. And when next you look on the flower, you know that it is not at all what you sought to capture, that that moment has fled forever.

I wrote my histories and observations. I captured my thoughts and ideas and memories in words on vellum and paper. So much I stored, and thought it was mine. I believed that by fixing it down in words, I could force sense from all that had happened, that effect would follow cause, and the reason for each event come clear to me. Perhaps I sought to justify myself, not just all I had done, but who I had become. For years, I wrote faithfully nearly every evening, carefully explaining my world and my life to myself. I put my scrolls on a shelf, trusting that I had captured the meaning of my days.

But then I returned one day, to find all my careful scribing gone to fragments of vellum lying in a trampled yard with wet snow blowing over them. I sat my horse, looking down on them, and knew that, as it always would, the past had broken free of my effort to define and understand it. History is no more fixed and dead than the future. The past is no further away than the last breath you took.

Praise for Robin Hobb’s
Liveship Traders Trilogy

Ship of Magic

Mad Ship

Ship of Destiny

“In today’s crowded fantasy market, Robin Hobb’s books are diamonds in a sea of zircons.” 
—George R. R. Martin

“A truly extraordinary saga . . . the characterizations are consistently superb, and [Hobb] animates everything with the love for and knowledge of the sea. If Patrick O’Brian were to turn to writing high fantasy, he might produce something like this. Kudos to the author, and encore!” —
Booklist

“Hobb gives us her usual marvelously coherent setting and intriguing, multidimensional characters who refuse to be pigeonholed. . . . A new series sure to please fantasy fans.” —
Publishers Weekly

“Rich, complex . . . [Hobb’s] plotting is complex but tightly controlled, and her descriptive powers match her excellent visual imagination. But her chief virtue is that she delineates character extremely well.” —
Interzone

And Praise for Robin Hobb’s
The Farseer Trilogy

Assassin’s Apprentice

“A gleaming debut in the crowded field of epic fantasies and Arthurian romances.” —
Publishers Weekly

“An intriguing, controlled, and remarkably assured debut, at once satisfyingly self-contained yet leaving plenty of scope for future extensions and embellishments.” —
Kirkus Reviews

Royal Assassin

“
Royal Assassin
offers great rewards. Hobb continues to revitalize a genre that often seems all too generic, making it new in ways that range from the subtle to the shocking. And beneath all, that wise, deeply
involved
humanity.” —
Locus

Assassin’s Quest

“An enthralling conclusion to this superb trilogy, displaying an exceptional combination of originality, magic, adventure, character, and drama.” 
—
Kirkus Reviews
(starred review)

Be sure not to miss
the next exciting
installment of

THE TAWNY MAN

Golden Fool

COMING IN JANUARY 2003

The watch had changed. The town watchman’s bell and cry came thin through the storm, but I heard it. Night had officially ended and we were venturing toward morning. The worst of the rain had fallen, the storm decayed to swirling gusts that seemed to lurk in wait at the street corners. It had made merry with the festival trim of the town. The blustering gusts sent fallen garlands snaking down the street, and whipped banners to tatters. Usually the taverns had torches set in sconces to guide customers to their doors, but at this hour they were either burned out or taken down. Most of the taverns and inns had closed their door for the night. All the decent folk were long abed, and most of the indecent ones, too. I hurried through the cold dark streets, guided more by my sense of direction than my eyes. It would be even darker once I left the cliff-side town behind and began the winding climb through the forest toward Buckkeep Castle, but that was a road I had known since my childhood. My feet would lead me home.

I became aware of the men following me as I left the last scattered houses of Buckkeep Town behind. I knew that they were stalking me, not merely men on the same path as myself, for when I slowed my steps, they slowed theirs. Obviously they had no wish to catch up with me until I had left the houses of town behind me. That did not bode well for their intentions. I had left the keep unarmed, my country habits telling against me. I had the belt knife that any man carries for the small tasks of the day, but nothing larger. My ugly, workaday sword in its battered sheath was hanging on the wall in my little chamber. I told myself it was likely that they were no more than common footpads, looking for easy prey. Doubtless they believed me drunk and unaware of them, and as soon as I fought back, they would flee.

It was thin solace. I had no wish to fight at all. I was sick of strife, and weary of being wary. I doubted they would care. So I halted where I was and turned in the dark road to face those who came after me. I drew my belt knife and balanced my weight and waited for them.

Behind me, all was silence save for the wind soughing through the whispering trees that arched the road. Presently, I became aware of the waves crashing against the cliffs in the distance. I listened for the sounds of men moving through the brush, or the scuff of footsteps on the road, but heard nothing. I grew impatient. “Come on, then!” I roared to the night. “I’ve little enough for you to take, save my knife, and you won’t get that hilt first. Let’s get this done with!”

Silence flowed in after my words, and my shouting to the night suddenly seemed foolish. Just as I almost decided that I had imagined my pursuers, something ran across my foot. It was a small animal, lithe and swift, a rat or a weasel or perhaps even a squirrel. But it was no wild creature, for it snapped a bite at my leg as it passed. It unnerved me and I jumped back from it. Off to my right, I heard a smothered laugh. Even as I turned toward it, trying to peer through the gloom of the forest, a voice spoke from my left, closer than the laugh had been.

“Where’s your wolf, Tom Badgerlock?”

Both mockery and challenge were in the words. Behind me, I heard claws on gravel, a larger animal, a dog perhaps, but when I spun about, the creature had melted back into the darkness. I turned again to the sound of muffled laughter. At least three men, I told myself, and two Wit beasts. I tried to think only of the logistics of this immediate fight, and nothing beyond it. I would consider the full implications of this encounter later. I drew deep slow breaths, waiting for them. I opened my senses fully to the night, pushing away a sudden longing not just for Nighteyes’ keener perception but also for the comforting sensation of my wolf watching my back. This time I heard the scuttle as the smaller beast approached. I kicked at it, more wildly than I had intended, but caught it only a glancing blow. It was gone again.

“I’ll kill it!” I warned the crouching night, but only mocking laughter met my threat. Then, I shamed myself, shouting furiously, “What do you want of me? Leave me alone!”

They let the echoes of that childish question and plea be carried off by the wind. The terrible silence that followed was the shadow of my aloneness.

“Where is your wolf, Tom Badgerlock?” a voice called, and this time it was a woman’s, melodic with suppressed laughter. “Do you miss him, renegade?”

The fear that had been flowing with my blood suddenly turned to the ice of fury. I would stand here and I would kill them all and leave their entrails smoking on the road. My fist that had been clenched on my knife haft suddenly loosened, and a relaxed readiness spread through me. Poised, I waited for them. It would come as a sudden rush from all directions, the animals coming in low, and the people attacking high, with weapons. I had only the knife. I’d have to wait until they were close. If I ran, I knew they’d take me from behind. Better to wait and force them to come to me. Then I would kill them, kill them all.

I truly don’t know how long I stood there. That sort of readiness can make time stand still or run swift as wind. I heard a dawn bird call, and then another answered it, and still I waited. When light began to stain the night sky, I drew a deeper breath. I took a long look around myself, peering into the trees, but saw nothing. The only movement was the high flight of small birds as they flitted through the branches and the silver fall of the raindrops they shook loose. My stalkers were gone. The little creature that had snapped at me had left no traces of his passage on the wet stone of the road. The larger animal that had crossed behind me had left a single print in the mud at the road’s edge. A small dog. And that was all.

I turned and resumed my walk up to Buckkeep Castle. As I strode along, I began to tremble, not with fear, but with the tension that was now leaving me, and the fury that replaced it.

What had they wanted? To scare me. To make me aware of them, to let me know that they knew what I was and where I denned. Well, they had done that, and more. I forced my thoughts into order and tried to coldly assess the full threat they presented. I extended it beyond myself. Did they know about Jinna? Had they followed me from her door, and if so, did they know about my boy as well?

I cursed my own stupidity and carelessness. How could I have ever imagined the Piebalds would leave me alone? The Piebalds knew that Lord Golden came from Buckkeep, and that his servant Tom Badgerlock was Witted. They knew Tom Badgerlock had lopped off Laudwine’s arm and stolen their prince-hostage from them. The Piebalds would want revenge. They could have it as easily as posting one of their cowardly scrolls, denouncing me as practicing the Wit, the despised Beast Magic. I would be hung, quartered, and burned for it. Had I supposed that Buckkeep Town or Castle would keep me safe from them?

I should have known that this would happen. Once I plunged back into Buckkeep’s court and politics and intrigue, I had become vulnerable to all the plotting and schemes that power attracted. I
had
known this would happen, I admitted bitterly. And for some fifteen years, that knowledge had kept me away from Buckkeep. Only Chade and his plea for help in recovering Prince Dutiful had lured me back. Cold reality seeped through me now. There were only two courses open to me. I either had to sever all ties and flee, as I had once before, or I had to plunge fully into the swirling intrigue that had always been the Farseer court at Buckkeep. If I stayed, I would have to start thinking like an assassin again, always aware of the risks and threats to myself, and how they affected those around me.

Then I wrenched my thoughts into a more truthful path. I’d have to be an assassin again, not just think like one. I’d have to be ready to kill when I encountered people that threatened my prince or me. For there was no avoiding the connection: those who came to taunt Tom Badgerlock about his Wit and the death of his wolf were folk who also knew that Prince Dutiful shared their despised Beast Magic. It was their handle on the Prince, the lever they would use not just to end the persecution of those with the Wit, but also to gain power for themselves. It was no help to me that my sympathies in part were with them. In my own life, I had suffered from the taint of being Witted. I had no desire to see anyone else labor under that burden. If they had not presented such a threat to my prince, I might have sided with them.

My furious striding carried me up to the sentries at the gate to Buckkeep. There was a guardhouse there, and from within came the sound of men’s voices and the clatter of soldiers at food. One, a lad of about twenty, lounged by the door, bread and cheese in one hand and a mug of morning beer in the other. He glanced up at me, and then, mouth full, nodded me through the gates. I halted, anger coursing through me like a poison.

“Do you know who I am?” I demanded of him.

He started, then peered at me more closely. Obviously he was afraid he had offended some minor noble, but a glance at my clothing reassured him.

“You’re a servant in the keep. Aren’t you?”

“Whose servant?” I demanded. Foolishness, to call attention to myself this way, and yet just now I could not stop the words. Had others come this way before me last night, were they inside the keep even now? Had a careless sentry admitted folk bent on killing the Prince? It all seemed too possible.

“Well . . . I don’t know!” the boy sputtered. He drew himself up straight, but still had to look up to glare at me. “How am I supposed to know that? Why should I care?”

“Because, you damned fool, you are guarding the main entrance to Buckkeep Castle. Your queen and your prince depend on you to be alert, and to keep their enemies from walking in. That is why you are here. Isn’t it?”

“Well. I—” The boy shook his head in angry frustration, then turned suddenly to the door of the guardhouse. “Kespin! Can you come out here?”

Kespin was a taller man, and older. He moved like a swordsman, and his eyes were keen above his grizzled beard. They appraised me as a threat and dismissed me. “What’s the problem here?” he asked us both. His voice was not a warning, but an assurance that he could deal with either of us as we deserved.

The sentry waved his beer mug at me. “He’s angry because I don’t know whose servant he is.”

“What?”

“I’m Lord Golden’s servant,” I clarified. “And I’m concerned that the sentries on this gate seem to do no more than watch folk go in and out of the keep. I’ve been walking in and out of Buckkeep Castle for over a fortnight now, and I’ve never been challenged once. It doesn’t seem right to me. A score of years ago, when I visited here, the sentries on duty here took their task seriously. There was a time when—”

“There was a time when that was needed,” Kespin interrupted me. “During the Red Ship War. But we’re at peace, man. And the keep and the town are full of Outislander folk and nobility from the other duchies for the Prince’s betrothal. You can’t expect us to know them all.”

I swallowed, wishing I hadn’t started this, yet determined to follow it to the end. “It only takes one mistake for our prince’s life to be threatened.”

“Or one mistake to insult some Outislander noble. My orders come down from Queen Kettricken, and she said we were to be welcoming and hospitable. Not suspicious and nasty. Though I’d be willing to make an exception for you.” The grin he gave me somewhat modified his words, yet it was still clear he did not enjoy my questioning of his judgment.

I inclined my head to him. I was going about this all wrong. I should bother Chade about it, and see if he could not put the guards more on edge. “I see,” I said conciliatingly. “Well. I but wondered.”

“Well, next time you ride that tall black mare out of here, remember that a man doesn’t have to say much to know a lot. And as long as you’ve made me wonder, what is your name?”

“Tom Badgerlock. Servant to Lord Golden.”

“Ah. His servant.” He smiled knowingly. “And his bodyguard, right? Yea, I’d heard some tale of that. And that isn’t all that I heard about him. You’re not what I expected he’d choose to keep by him.” He gave me an odd look as if I should make some reply to that, but I held my tongue, not knowing what he was implying. After a moment, he shrugged. “Well. Trust some foreigner to think he needs his own guard even while he lives in Buckkeep Castle. Well, go on with you, Tom Badgerlock. We know you now, and I hope that helps you sleep better at night.”

So they passed me into Buckkeep Castle. I walked away from them, feeling both foolish and dissatisfied. I must speak with Kettricken, I decided, and convince her that the Piebalds were still a very real danger to Dutiful. Yet I doubted my queen would have even a moment to spare for me in the days to come. The betrothal ceremony was tonight. Her thoughts would be full of her Out Island negotiations.

The kitchens were well astir. Maids and pages were preparing ranks of teapots and rows of porridge tureens. The smells awoke my hunger. I paused to load a breakfast tray for Lord Golden. I stacked a platter with smoked ham and fresh morning rolls and a pot of butter and strawberry preserves. There was a basket of pears from the keep orchard, and I chose firm ones. As I left the kitchen, a garden maid with a tray of flowers on her arm greeted me. “You’re Lord Golden’s man?” she asked, and at my nod, she motioned me to a halt, so she could add a bouquet of fresh-cut flowers and a tiny nosegay of sweet white buds to the tray I carried. “For his lordship,” she told me needlessly, and then hastened on her way.

I climbed the stairs to Lord Golden’s chambers, knocked and then entered. The door to his bedchamber was closed, but before I had finished setting out his breakfast things, he emerged fully dressed. His gleaming hair had been smoothed back from his brow and was secured at the nape of his neck with a blue silk ribbon. A blue jacket was slung over his arm. He wore a shirt of white silk, the chest puffed with lace, and blue leggings a shade darker than the jacket. With the gold of his hair and his amber eyes, the effect was like a summer sky. He smiled warmly at me. “Good to see that you’ve realized your duties require you to arise early, Tom Badgerlock. Now if only your taste in clothing would likewise awaken.”