Royal Assassin by Robin Hobb
I heard a light step coming down the stairs toward me. It paused two steps above me. “Are you all right, sir?” someone asked uncertainly.
“A bit too much to drink,” I lied. Certainly the wine I had dumped over myself made me smell like a drunk. “I’ll be fine in a moment. ”
“Let me help you up the stairs. A stumble here might be dangerous. ” There was starched disapproval in the voice now. I opened my eyes and peered through my fingers. Blue skirts. Of the sensible fabric that all the servants wore. No doubt she’d had to deal with drunks before.
I shook my head, but she ignored that, just as I would have in her position. I felt a strong hand grip my upper arm firmly, while her other arm encircled my waist. “Let’s just get you up the stairs,” she encouraged me. I leaned on her, not wanting to, and stumbled up to the next landing.
“Thank you,” I muttered, thinking she would leave me now, but she kept her grip.
“Are you sure you belong on this level? The servants’ quarters are the next flight up, you know. ”
I managed a nod. “Third door. If you don’t mind. ”
She was silent for longer than a moment. “That’s the Bastard’s room. ” The words were flung like a cold challenge.
I did not flinch to the words as I would have once. I did not even lift my head. “Yes. You may go now. ” I dismissed her as coldly.
Instead she stepped closer. She seized my hair, jerked my head up to face her. “Newboy!” she hissed in fury. “I should drop you right here. ”
I jerked my head up. I could not make my eyes focus on her eyes, but all the same, I knew her, knew the shape of her face and how her hair fell forward on her shoulders, and her scent, like a summer afternoon. Relief crashed over me like a wave. It was Molly, my Molly the candlemaker. “You’re alive!” I cried out. My heart leaped in me like a hooked fish. I took her in my arms and kissed her.
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At least, I attempted to. She stiff-armed me away, saying gruffly, “I shall never kiss a drunk. That’s one promise I’ve made to myself and shall always keep. Nor be kissed by one. ” Her voice was tight.
“I’m not drunk, I’m … sick,” I protested. The surge of excitement had made my head spin more than ever. I swayed on my feet. “It doesn’t matter anyway. You’re here and safe. ”
She steadied me. A reflex she had learned taking care of her father. “Oh. I see. You’re not drunk. ” Disgust and disbelief mingled in her voice. “You’re not the scriber’s boy, either. Nor a stable hand. Is lying how you always begin with people? It seems to be how you always end. ”
“I didn’t lie,” I said querulously, confused by the anger in her voice. I wished I could make my eyes meet hers. “I just didn’t tell you quite … it’s too complicated. Molly, I’m just so glad you’re all right. And here in Buckkeep! I thought I was going to have to search …” She still gripped me, holding me on my feet. “I’m not drunk. Really. I did lie just now, because it was embarrassing to admit how weak I am. ”
“And so you lie. ” Her voice cut like a whip. “You should be more embarrassed to lie, Newboy. Or is lying permitted to a Prince’s son?”
She let go of me and I sagged against a wall. I tried to get a grip on my whirling thoughts while keeping my body vertical. “I’m not a Prince’s son,” I said at last. “I’m a bastard. That’s different. And yes, that was too embarrassing to admit, too. But I never told you I wasn’t the Bastard. I just always felt, when I was with you, I was Newboy. It was nice, having a few friends who looked at me and thought, ‘Newboy’ instead of ‘the Bastard. ’”
Molly didn’t reply. Instead she grabbed me, much more roughly than before, by my shirtfront, and hauled me down the hall to my room. I was amazed at how strong women were when they were angry. She shouldered the door open as if it were a personal enemy and propelled me toward my bed. As soon as I was close, she let go and I fell against it. I righted myself and managed to sit down. By clutching my hands tightly together and gripping them between my knees, I could control my trembling. Molly stood glaring at me. I couldn’t precisely see her. Her outline was blurred, her features a smear, but I could tell by the way she stood that she was furious.
After a moment I ventured, “I dreamed of you. While I was gone. ”
She still didn’t speak. I felt a bit braver. “I dreamed you were at Siltbay. When it was raided. ” My words came out tight with my effort to keep my voice from shaking. “I dreamed of fires, and Raiders attacking. In my dream, there were two children you had to protect. It seemed like they were yours. ” Her silence held like a wall against my words. She probably thought I was ten kinds of an idiot, babbling about dreams. And why, oh why, of all the people in the world who could have seen me so unmanned, why did it have to be Molly? The silence had grown long. “But you were here, at Buckkeep and safe. ” I tried to steady my quavering voice. “I’m glad you’re safe. But what are you doing at Buckkeep?”
“What am I doing here?” Her voice was as tight as mine. Anger made it cold, but I thought it was hedged with fear, too. “I came looking for a friend. ” She paused and seemed to strangle for a bit. When she spoke again, her voice was artificially calm, almost kind. “You see, my father died and left me a debtor. So my creditors took my shop from me. I went to stay with relatives, to help with the harvest, to earn money to start again. In Siltbay. Though how you came to know of it, I cannot even guess. I earned a bit and my cousin was willing to loan me the rest. The harvest had been good. I was to come back to Buckkeep the next day. But Siltbay was raided. I was there, with my nieces…. ” Briefly, her voice trailed away. I remembered with her. The ships, the fire, the laughing woman with the sword. I looked up at her and could almost focus on her. I could not speak. But she was looking off, over my head. She spoke on calmly.
“My cousins lost everything they owned. They counted themselves lucky, for their children survived. I couldn’t ask them to loan me money still. Truth was, they couldn’t even have paid me for the work I had done, if I had thought to ask. So I came back to Buckkeep, with winter closing in, and no place to stay. And I thought, I’ve always been friends with Newboy. If there’s anyone I could ask to loan me money to tide me over, it would be him. So I came up to the Keep, and asked for the scriber’s boy. But everyone shrugged and sent me to Fedwren. And Fedwren listened as I described you, and frowned, and sent me to Patience. ” Molly paused significantly. I tried to imagine that meeting, but shuddered away from it. “She took me on as a lady’s maid,” Molly said softly. “She said it was the least she could do, after you had shamed me. ”
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“Shamed you?” I jerked upright. The world rocked around me and my blurry vision dissolved into sparks. “How? How shamed you?”
Molly’s voice was quiet. “She said you had obviously won my affections, and then left me. Under my false assumption that you would someday be able to marry me, I’d let you court me. ”
“I didn’t …” I faltered, and then: “We were friends. I didn’t know you felt any more than that…. ”
“You didn’t?” She lifted her chin; I knew that gesture. Six years ago she would have followed it with a punch to my stomach. I still flinched. But she just spoke more quietly when she said, “I suppose I should have expected you to say that. It’s an easy thing to say. ”
It was my turn to be nettled. “You’re the one who left me, with not even a word of farewell. And with that sailor, Jade. Do you think I don’t know about him? I was there, Molly. I saw you take his arm and walk away with him. Why didn’t you come to me, then, before leaving with him?”
She drew herself up. “I had been a woman with prospects. Then I became, all unwittingly, a debtor. Do you imagine that I knew of the debts my father had incurred, and then ignored? Not till after he was buried did the creditors come knocking. I lost everything. Should I have come to you as a beggar, hoping you’d take me in? I’d thought tha
For a moment I listened to an odd sound, trying to comprehend what it was. Then I knew. She was crying, in little catches of her breath. I knew if I tried to stand and go to her, I’d fall on my face. Or I’d reach her, and she’d knock me flat. So stupidly as any drunk, I repeated, “Well, what about Jade, then? Why did you find it so easy to go to him? Why didn’t you come to me first?”
“I told you! He’s my cousin, you moron!” Her anger flared past her tears. “When you’re in trouble, you turn to your family. I asked him for help, and he took me to his family’s farm, to help out with the harvest. ” A moment of silence. Then, incredulously: “What did you think? That I was the type of woman who could have another man on the side?” Icily. “That I would let you court me, and be seeing someone else?”
“No. I didn’t say that. ”
“Of course you would. ” She said it as if it suddenly all made sense. “You’re like my father. He always believed I lied, because he told so many lies himself. Just like you. ‘Oh, I’m not drunk,’ when you stink of it and you can barely stand. And your stupid story: ‘I dreamed of you at Siltbay. ’ Everyone in town knew I went to Siltbay. You probably heard the whole story tonight, while you were sitting in some tavern. ”
“No, I didn’t, Molly. You have to believe me. ” I clutched at the blankets on the bed to keep myself upright. She had turned her back on me.
“No. I don’t! I don’t have to believe anyone anymore. ” She paused, as if considering something. “You know, once, a long time ago, when I was a little, little girl. Before I even met you. ” Her voice was getting oddly calmer. Emptier, but calmer. “It was at Springfest. I remember when I asked my daddy for some pennies for the fair booths, he slapped me and said he wouldn’t waste money on foolish things like that. And then he locked me in the shop and went drinking. But even then I knew how to get out of the shop. I went to the fair booths anyway, just to see them. One was an old man telling fortunes with crystals. You know how they do. They hold the crystal to a candle’s light, and tell your future by how the colors fall across your face. ” She paused.
“I know,” I admitted to her silence. I knew the type of Hedge wizard she meant. I’d seen the dance of colored lights across a woman’s close-eyed face. Right now I only wished I could see Molly clearly. I thought if I could meet her eyes, I could make her see the truth inside me. I wished I dared stand, to go to her and try to hold her again. But she thought me drunk, and I knew I’d fall. I would not shame myself in front of her again.
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“A lot of the other girls and women were getting their fortunes told. But I didn’t have a penny, so I could only watch. But after a bit the old man noticed me. I guess he thought I was shy. He asked me if I didn’t want to know my fortune. And I started crying, because I did, but I didn’t have a penny. Then Brinna the fishwife laughed, and said there was no need for me to pay to know it. Everyone knew my future already. I was the daughter of a drunk, I’d be the wife of a drunk, and the mother of drunks. ” She whispered, “Everyone started laughing. Even the old man. ”
“Molly,” I said. I don’t think she even heard me.
“I still don’t have a penny,” she said slowly. “But at least I know I won’t be the wife of a drunk. I don’t think I even want to be friends with one. ”
“You have to listen to me. You’re not being fair!” My traitorous tongue slurred my words. “I—”
The door slammed.
“—didn’t know you liked me that way,” I said stupidly to the cold and empty room.
The shaking overtook me in earnest. But I wasn’t going to lose her that easily again. I rose and managed two strides before the floor rocked beneath me and I went to my knees. I remained there a bit, head hanging like a dog. I didn’t think she’d be impressed if I crawled after her. She’d probably kick me. If I could even find her. I crawled back to my bed instead, and clambered back onto it. I didn’t undress, but just dragged the edge of my blanket over me. My vision dimmed, closing in black from the edges, but I didn’t sleep right away. Instead, I lay there and thought what a stupid boy I had been last summer. I had courted a woman, thinking that I was walking out with a girl. Those three years’ difference in age had mattered so much to me, but in all the wrong ways. I had thought she had seen me as a boy, and despaired of winning her. So I had acted like a boy, instead of trying to make her see me as a man. And the boy had hurt her, and yes, deceived her, and in all likelihood, lost her forever. The dark closed down, blackness everywhere but for one whirling spark.
She had loved the boy, and foreseen a life together for us. I clung to the spark and sank into sleep.
4
Dilemmas
AS REGARDS THE Wit and the Skill, I suspect that every human has at least some capacity. I have seen women rise abruptly from their tasks to go into an adjacent room where an infant is just beginning to awake. Cannot this be some form of the Skill? Or witness the wordless cooperation that arises among a crew that has long tended the same vessel. They function, without spoken words, as closely as a coterie, so that the ship becomes almost a beast alive, and the crew her life force. Other folk sense an affinity for certain animals, and express it in a crest or in the names they bestow upon their children. The Wit opens one to that affinity. The Wit allows awareness of all animals, but folklore insists that most Wit users eventually develop a bond with one certain animal. Some tales recount that users of the Wit eventually took on the ways and finally the form of the beasts they bonded to. These tales, I believe, we can dismiss as scare tales to discourage children from Beast magic.
I awoke in the afternoon. My room was cold. No fire at all. My sweaty clothes clung to me. I staggered downstairs to the kitchen, ate something, went out to the bathhouse, began trembling, and went back up to my room. I got back into my bed, shaking with cold. Later someone came in and talked to me. I don’t remember what was said, but I do remember being shaken. It was unpleasant, but I could ignore it and did.
I awoke in early evening. There was a fire in my hearth, and a neat pile of firewood in the hod. A little table had been drawn up near my bed, and some bread and meat and cheese was set out on a platter atop an embroidered cloth with tatted edges. A fat pot with brewing herbs in the bottom was waiting for water from the very large kettle steaming over the fire. A washtub and soap were set out on the other side of the hearth. A clean nightshirt had been left across the foot of my bed; it wasn’t one of my old ones. It might actually fit me.
My gratitude outweighed my puzzlement. I managed to get out of bed and take advantage of everything. Afterward I felt much better. My dizziness was replaced by a feeling of unnatural lightness, but that quickly succumbed to the bread and cheese. The tea had a hint of elfbark in it; I instantly suspected Chade and wondered if he was the one who’d tried to wake me. But no, Chade only summoned me at night.
I was dragging the clean nightshirt over my head when the door opened quietly. The Fool came slipping into my room. He was in his winter motley of black and white, and his colorless skin seemed even paler because of it. His garments were
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“You,” I surmised, and gestured ’round. “Thank you. ”
“No,” he denied. His pale hair floated out from beneath his cap in a halo as he shook his head. “But I assisted. Thank you for bathing. It makes my task of checking on you less onerous. I’m glad you’re awake. You snore abominably. ”
I let his comment pass. “You’ve grown,” I observed.
“Yes. So have you. And you’ve been sick. And you slept quite a long time. And now you are awake and bathed and fed. You still look terrible. But you no longer smell. It’s late afternoon now. Are there any other obvious facts you’d like to review?”
“I dreamed about you. While I was gone. ”
He gave me a dubious look. “Did you? How touching. I can’t say I dreamed of you. ”
“I’ve missed you,” I said, and enjoyed the brief flash of surprise on the Fool’s face.
“How droll. Does that explain why you’ve been playing the fool yourself so much?”
“I suppose. Sit down. Tell me what’s been happening while I was gone. ”
“I can’t. King Shrewd is expecting me. Rather, he isn’t expecting me, and that is precisely why I must go to him now. When you feel better, you should go and see him. Especially if he isn’t expecting you. ” He turned abruptly to go. He whisked himself out the door, then leaned back in abruptly. He lifted the silver bells at the end of one ridiculously long sleeve and jingled them at me. “Farewell, Fitz. Do try to do a bit better at not letting people kill you. ” The door closed silently behind him.