Fool’s Errand (Tawny Man Trilogy Book One) by Robin Hobb (26)

They moved in, drifting like silt, until Laudwine’s folk stood dark between the light and me. I gazed round at the staring circle of my enemies. The daylight behind them made it hard to distinguish their features in the dim cave, but as my eyes adjusted, I studied each face. They were mostly young men, and among them four young women. None looked older than Laudwine. No Old Blood elders here; the Piebalds were a young man’s cause. Four of the men had the same large, square teeth: brothers or at least cousins. Some seemed almost neutral, but none looked friendly. The only smiles I saw were gloatingly hostile. I loosened my collar again. If Jinna’s charm made any difference, I did not perceive it. I wondered if any were related to the man I had killed at the trailhead. There were animals with them, though not so many as I would have expected. Two hounds and a cat were there, and one man had a raven on his shoulder.

I kept my silence, waiting, with no idea as to what would happen next. The Prince’s cat had never moved from where she crouched on the floor before us. Several times I had seen her glance aside, but each time her eyes had eventually returned to the lad, burning with a peculiar fixation that made them seem human. Laudwine had gone to the mouth of the cave to make his false farewell to Lord Golden. Now he smiled confidently as he came back to confront us.

‘I think we can dispense with your knife,’ Laudwine observed evenly. ‘I’ve kept my part of the bargain.’

‘It might not be wise,’ I cautioned him. Then I lied. ‘The boy tried to get away just a minute ago. The only thing that kept him still was the knife. Best I keep it on him until she’s …’ I sought for words. ‘All the way in,’ I finished lamely. I saw one or two faces twitch with uneasiness. Deliberately, I added, ‘Until Peladine takes his body as her own completely.’ I saw one woman swallow.

Laudwine seemed unaware that this troubled some of his followers. His affable manner never wavered. ‘I think not. It pains me to see you menace a throat that will soon belong to my kin. Your knife, sir. You are among your own kind here, you know. You have nothing to fear.’ He extended a hand for it.

Experience had taught me that those most like me presented the greatest threat to me. But I let a slow smile spread over my face and took my knife from the Prince’s throat. I did not give it to Laudwine, but sheathed it at my belt. I kept one hand always on Dutiful’s shoulder, holding him at my side. Here, where the cave narrowed, I could thrust him behind me if need be. I doubted that need would arise. I intended to kill him myself. Twenty years ago, Chade had drilled me repeatedly in all the ways there were to kill a man with my hands. I had learned silent ways, and swift ways, and ways that were slow. I hoped I would be as quick and accurate as I had once been. The most satisfying tactic would be to wait until the woman took the boy’s body, and then kill Dutiful so quickly that the woman would die with him, unable to flee back into her little cat’s body. Would I still have time to kill myself before they pulled me down? I doubted it. Best not to dwell on such thoughts.

Suddenly, the Prince spoke up for himself. ‘I won’t struggle.’ He shrugged clear of my hand on his shoulder and stood as straight as the low ceiling would allow. ‘I’ve been a fool. Perhaps I deserve this for my foolishness. But I thought …’ His gaze had been travelling the faces that surrounded us. His eyes seemed to know where to linger, and in the wake of his glance, I saw uncertainty kindle on a few faces. ‘I thought you genuinely believed me one of your own. Your welcome and aid seemed so real. My bond with the cat – I had never felt anything like that. And when the woman came into my mind and said that she, that she loved me –’ His voice hesitated over those words, but he forced it on. ‘I thought I had found something real, something worth more than my crown or my family or even my own duty to my people. I was a fool. So. Her name was Peladine, was it? She never told me her name, and of course I never saw her face. Well.’ He folded his knees and sat cross-legged. He opened his arms to the staring cat. ‘Come, cat. You, at least, loved me for myself. I know you like this no better than I do. Let us both be done with this.’

He glanced up at me, a swift glance fraught with a meaning I could not discern. It chilled me. ‘Don’t despise me as a complete fool. The cat loves me, and I love the cat. That much, at least, was always true.’ I knew that when the creature climbed into his lap, the contact would strengthen their bond. The woman would cross into him easily. His dark eyes were steady on mine. I saw Kettricken suddenly in his features, in his calm acceptance of what would be. His words were for me. ‘If by doing this I would be freeing the cat of her, I would rejoice. Instead, I go to share her entrapment. We shall be two that she bonded to, simply for the use of our bodies. She never had any need for our hearts, save to use them against us.’

Dutiful Farseer turned away from me, closing his eyes. He bowed his head to the advancing animal. There was not a sound, not even an indrawn breath, in the cave. All watched, all waited. Several faces were white and taut. One young man turned aside, shuddering, as the cat stalked up to him. She pressed her striped brow to the Prince’s, marking him as cats do. As she swiped her face against his, her green gaze brushed mine.

Kill me now.

The sharp mind to mind contact was so unexpected, I could not react to it.

What had Jinna’s cat told me? That all cats can speak, but that they choose when and to whom. The mind that touched mine was a cat’s mind, not a woman’s. I stared at the little hunting cat, unmoving. She opened her jaws wide but soundlessly, as if a twinge of pain too great to express had passed through her. Then she gave her head a shake.

Stupid brother-to-a-dog! You waste our chance. Kill me now!

These words struck my mind with the impact of a blow. ‘No!’ cried Dutiful and belatedly I realized he had not been privy to her first words to me. He clutched at the mistcat but she launched, from the floor to Dutiful’s shoulder and at me, heedless of how her claws scored him in that spring. She flew at me, claws raw and mouth wide. What is so white as a cat’s teeth against her red mouth? I tried to reach my knife, but she was too fast. She landed on my chest, the curved claws of her front paws hooking securely into my flesh as her hind legs ripped at my belly. She turned her face sideways, and all I saw were teeth descending on my face as I fell backwards into the corner of the cave.

Other voices shouted. ‘Peladine!’ Laudwine roared, and I heard the Prince’s agonized cry of ‘No, no!’ but I was occupied with saving my eyes. I pushed at the cat with one hand as I dragged at my sheathed knife with the other, but her claws were well set in my flesh. I could not budge her. I twisted my face aside as we went down, inadvertently baring my throat to her fangs. She seized that opportunity quite literally, and as I felt her teeth enter my flesh, thwarted only by the beads of Jinna’s charm, I managed to pull my knife free. I did not know if I fought the woman or the cat, only that the creature intended to kill me. It mattered, but not in a way that would stay my hand. It was awkward to stab her as she clung to my chest, for her spine and ribs turned my blade twice. On the third time, I finally managed to sink the metal into her. She let go of my throat to sound her death yowl, but her claws remained firmly fixed in my chest. Her hind legs had shredded my shirt. My belly was striped with fire. I pulled her body off mine, cursing, but when I would have flung it aside, Dutiful snatched it from me.

‘Cat, oh, cat!’ he cried, and clutched the lifeless body to his as if it were his child. ‘You killed her!’ he cried accusingly.

‘Peladine?’ Laudwine asked wildly. ‘Peladine!’

Perhaps if his bond-animal had not just been slain, Dutiful would have had the presence of mind to pretend his body held the woman’s mind. But he did not, and before I could regain my feet, I saw Laudwine’s boot flying towards my head. I flung myself aside into a roll and sprang to my feet in a performance worthy of the Fool’s younger self. My knife was still in the cat’s body, but my sword still hung at my belt. I dragged it free and charged at Laudwine.

‘Run!’ I bellowed at the Prince. ‘Get away. She bought your freedom with her life. Don’t waste that!’

Laudwine was a bigger man than I, and the sword he was drawing would give him a sizeable advantage in reach. I gripped my hilt two-handed and took off his forearm before his weapon cleared his sheath. He went down with a shriek, clutching at the spurting stump as if it were a cup held aloft in a toast. Shock held the mob back for an instant, barely time for me to take two steps and crowd Dutiful into the alcove behind me. He had not fled and now it was too late. Perhaps it had always been too late. He went to his knees, the cat in his arms. I swung my blade in a mad man’s wild arc, forcing the mob back. ‘Get up!’ I roared at him. ‘Use that knife!’

I was peripherally aware of him coming to his feet behind me. I had no idea if he had the knife from the cat’s body. Fleetingly, I wondered if he would put it in my back. Then the wave of men surged forwards, some in the front propelled only by the push of men behind them. Two grabbed Laudwine and dragged his curled body out of my reach. Someone jumped past them to confront me. The quarters were too close for anything except butchery. My first wide cut laid open his belly and slashed the face of another man as it finished. That slowed their rush, but then they bunched towards me. The men attacking us were hampered by their own numbers. When I was forced back, I felt the Prince step aside, and suddenly both our backs were to the wall of the cave. He darted past me to stab a man who had just managed to slip inside my guard, and then spun to his right to defend himself. He screamed like a wildcat as he struck out at his man, and the man answered with a shriek of pain.

I knew we had no chance, so when the arrow flew past my ear to shatter on the wall behind me, I was not too alarmed. Some fool wasted breath sounding a horn. I ignored it, as I ignored the cries of the men falling in front of me. One was dying and I finished another on the backstroke. I swung my blade wide, and unbelievably, they gave ground before me. I roared my triumph and stepped forwards into the gap. My body shielded Dutiful’s now. ‘Come and die!’ I snarled at them all. My free hand beckoned them in.

‘Blades down!’ someone shouted.

I swung my sword again, but those confronting me gave ground, tossing their swords to the earth. They cleared the way for an archer to advance on me. Other bowmen backed him, but his nocked arrow pointed straight at my chest. ‘Put it down!’ he shouted again. It was the boy who had ambushed us, the one who had shot Laurel, and then fled with her. As I stood panting, wondering if I should force him to kill me, Laurel spoke behind him. She tried to speak calmingly, but her voice shook.

‘Blade down, Tom Badgerlock. You’re among friends.’

Battle makes the world a small place, makes all life no bigger than the sweep of your sword’s length. It took me a time to come back to myself, and I was fortunate that they allotted me that time. I stared about, trying to make sense of what I saw, the archer and Laurel, and the folk who stood behind her, bows drawn. These were strangers, older folk than Laudwine’s band. Six men, two women. Most carried bows but a few had only staffs. Some of the arrows were pointed at Laudwine’s folk. They had dropped their swords and stood as much at bay as I was. Laudwine was on the floor, rolling in their midst, still clutching at his stump. Two steps and I could finish him at least. I drew a breath. Then I felt Dutiful’s hand on my upper arm. He pushed down firmly. ‘Blade down, Tom,’ he said evenly, and for a moment it was Verity’s calming voice in my ear. The strength went out of my arm and I let the tip of my weapon drop to the floor. Each panting breath I took was a flow of torment down my parched throat.

‘Drop it!’ the archer repeated. He stepped closer, and I heard the small sounds of a bow drawn tauter. I felt my heart begin to race again. I calculated the distance I’d have to cover.

‘Hold!’ Lord Golden interceded suddenly. ‘Give him a moment to come to himself. Battle-fury takes him and his mind is not his own.’ He came, pushing his way to the front of the massed archers and then stepped out between them and me with a fine disregard for the arrows that now pointed at his back. He did not even glance at the Piebalds who grudgingly parted to let him through. ‘Easy, Tom.’ He addressed me as if calming a horse. ‘It’s done now. It’s all done.’

He stepped forwards and set his hand on my arm, and I heard a murmur run through the crowd as if he had done something amazingly brave. At his touch, the sword fell from my grasp. Beside me, Dutiful dropped suddenly to his knees. I looked down at him. There was blood on his hand and shirtfront, but it did not seem to be his. He dropped my knife now and gathered the limp cat from the floor into his arms. He held it to his breast as if it were a child and rocked back and forth, keening. ‘My cat, my friend.’

A look of terrible concern washed over Lord Golden’s face. ‘My prince,’ he began worriedly. He stooped to touch the lad, but I caught him and turned him aside.

‘Leave him alone,’ I suggested quietly. ‘Give him his time to mourn.’

Then, tottering stiffly through the crowd came my wolf. When he reached my side, it was my turn to sink down beside him.

After that, little enough attention was paid to Tom Badgerlock and his wolf. They left us where we huddled as they moved Laudwine’s followers away from the Prince. That suited us both, for it gave us time to be together, and freed me to observe all around us. What we mostly watched was the Prince. The archer, one Deerkin by name, had brought an old healer with him. She set aside the bow she had carried and came to the Prince’s side. She made no effort to touch him, but only sat beside him and watched him as he mourned. Nighteyes and I kept vigil on the other side of him. She looked at me once. When our eyes met, her gaze was old and tired and sick with sadness. I fear mine was the same.

The bodies of the Piebalds I had killed were dragged outside, and slung over their horses. Too late I heard the clatter of departing hooves and realized that the Piebalds had been allowed to flee. I set my teeth. I could not have stopped it from happening. Laudwine had gone last, no longer their leader, swaying in the saddle atop his frothing warhorse and steadied by a young rider behind him. That had disturbed me most of all. Not only had I snatched the Prince from him, but I had slain the animal that held his sister’s soul, and maimed him as well. I needed no more enemies than I already had, but it had been beyond my control. He had gone free, and I hoped I would not live to regret that.

The healer let the Prince hold and mourn the cat until the sun touched the horizon. Then she looked past him to me. ‘Take the cat’s body from him,’ she said quietly.

It was not a task I wanted, but I did it.

It was hard to coax him to give up the cat’s cooling body. I chose my words with great care. This was not a time to let the Skill-command force him to do what he was not ready to do on his own. When finally he allowed me to lift the mistcat from his lap, I was astonished at how light the creature seemed. Usually, a dead animal, lax and lolling, seems to weigh more than a live one, but with the loss of its life, the pathetic condition of the little cat was revealed. ‘As if she were eaten through with worms,’ Nighteyes had said, and he was not far off the mark. The cat was a wasted little creature, her once-sleek fur gone dry and brittle, and bumps of bone defining her spine. At her death, her fleas were leaving her, far too many for a healthy animal. As the healer took the cat from me, I saw anger flicker over her face. She spoke softly. I do not know if Dutiful heard her words, but I did. ‘She did not even let it keep itself as a cat would. She possessed it too completely, and tried to be a woman in a cat’s fur.’

Peladine had imposed a human’s ways on the mistcat. She had denied her the long sleeps, the gorging to satiation, and the grooming sessions that were the natural right of a lithe little cat. Play and hunting had been denied her. It was the way of the Piebalds to use the Wit only for their own human ends. It sickened me.

The healer carried the cat’s body outside and the Prince and I followed with Nighteyes walking between us. A half-built cairn awaited the little corpse. All Deerkin’s people came outside to witness the interment. Their eyes were saddened, but they brimmed with respect.

Their healer spoke words, for Dutiful was too numbed with grief. ‘She goes on without you. She died for you, to free you both. Keep within you the cat-tracks she left on your soul. Let go with her the humanness that you shared with her. You are parted now.’

The Prince had swayed as they put the last stones on the cat, covering her death snarl. I set a hand to his shoulder to steady him, but he shrugged away my touch as if I were tainted. I did not blame him. She had commanded me to kill her, had done all she could to force me to the act, and yet I did not expect him to forgive me for having obeyed her. As soon as the cat was interred, the Old Blood healer had brought the Prince a draught. ‘Your share of her death,’ she said as she offered it to him, and he had quaffed it down before either Lord Golden or I could interfere. Then the healer gestured to me that I should take him back into the cave. There, he lay down where his cat had died, and his mourning broke loose anew.

I don’t know what she gave him in that drink, but the boy’s heartbroken sobs wound slowly down into the hoarse breathing of sodden sleep. There was nothing of rest in the limp way he sprawled beside me. ‘A little death,’ she had confided to me, thoroughly frightening me. ‘I give him a little death of his own, a time of emptiness. He died, you know, when the cat was killed. He needs this empty time to be dead. Do not try to cheat him of it.’

Indeed, it plunged him into a sleep but one step shy of death. She settled him on a pallet, arranging his body as if it were a corpse. As she did so, she muttered scathingly, ‘Such bruises on his neck and back. How could they beat a mere boy like that?’

I was too shamed to admit I had given him those marks. I held my silence and she covered him well, shaking her head over him. Then she turned and brusquely motioned me to her side for her services. ‘The wolf, too. I’ve time for you, now that the boy’s hurts are tended. His hurt was far more grievous than anything that bleeds.’

With warm water she washed our wounds and salved them with a greasy unguent. Nighteyes was passive to her touch. He held himself so tightly against the pain I could scarcely feel him there. As she worked on the scratches on my chest and belly, she muttered sternly to me. I gave Jinna’s charm the credit that she deigned to speak to a renegade like me at all.

But the healer’s only comment on it was that my necklace had probably saved my life. ‘The cat meant to kill you, and no mistake about that,’ she observed. ‘But it was no will nor fault of her own, I’m sure. And not the boy’s fault either. Look at him. He is a child still, far too young to bond,’ she lectured me severely, as if it were my fault. ‘He is unschooled in our ways, and look how it has hurt him. I will not tell you lies. He is like to die of this, or take a melancholy madness that will plague him to the end of his days.’ She tightened the bandage around my belly with a tug. ‘Someone should teach him Old Blood ways. Proper ways of dealing with his magic.’ She glared at me, but I did not reply. I only pulled what was left of my shirt back over my head. As she turned away from me, I heard her snort of contempt.

Nighteyes wearily lifted his head and set it on my knee. Salve and clotted blood smeared me. He looked at the sleeping boy. Are you going to teach him?

I doubt he’d wish to learn anything from me. I killed his cat.

Who will, then?

I left that question hanging. I stretched out in the darkness beside the wolf. We lay between the Farseer heir and the outside world.

Not far from us, in the central part of the shelter, Deerkin sat in council with Lord Golden. Laurel sat between them. The healer had joined them, and there were two other elders present in the circle closest to the fire. I regarded them through my lashes. In the rest of the cave, the other Old Blood folk appeared casually engaged in the ordinary evening chores of a campsite. Several lounged on their blanket rolls behind Deerkin. They seemed content to let the young man speak for them, but I sensed that perhaps they were the true holders of power in the group. One was smoking a long-stemmed pipe. Another, a bearded fellow, was working a careful edge onto his sheath knife. The whetting of the blade was a monotonous undertone to the conversation. For all their casual postures, I sensed how keenly they listened to what went on. Deerkin might speak for them, but I sensed they would listen to be sure his words were what they wished said.

It was not to Tom Badgerlock that these Old Blood riders explained themselves, but to Lord Golden. What was Tom Badgerlock but a renegade to his kind, a lackey of the crown? He was worse by far than Laurel, for all knew that though she had been born to an Old Blood family, the talent was dead in her. It was expected of her that she must make her way in the world however she might, forever half-dead to all the life that blossomed and buzzed and burned about her. No shame to her that she was a huntswoman to the Queen. I even sensed an odd pride in the Old Bloods, that one so impaired had risen so far. I had chosen my treason, however, and all the Witted folk walked a wide swathe around me. One brought meat on spits and propped it over the fire. The smell was vaguely tantalizing.

Food? I asked Nighteyes.

Too tired to eat, he declined, and I agreed with him. But for me there was the added reluctance of asking food of folk who ostracized us. So we rested, ignored in the outer circle of darkness. I refused to feel hurt that the Fool had spoken so little to me. Lord Golden could not be concerned with a servant’s injuries, any more than Tom Badgerlock should fret about his master’s bruises. We had our roles to play still. So I feigned sleep, but from beneath lowered lashes I watched them, and listened to their talk.

The talk was general at first, and I gathered my facts in bits and by assumption. Deerkin was telling Laurel some news of an uncle they had in common. It was old news, of sons grown and wed. So. Estranged cousins, separated for years. It made sense. She had admitted she had family in this area, and as much as told me they were Witted. The rest came out in an explanation to Lord Golden. Deerkin and Arno had ridden with Laudwine’s Piebalds for only a summer. They had both been sickened and angry over how the Old Blood folk were treated. When Laudwine’s sister had died, he had devoted himself to his people’s cause and risen as a leader. He had nothing save himself to lose, and change, he had told them, demanded sacrifice. It was time the Old Blood took the peace that was rightfully theirs. He made them feel strong and daring, these Old Blood sons and daughters rising up boldly to take what their parents feared to reach for. They would change the world. Time once more to live as a united folk in Old Blood communities, time to let their children openly acknowledge their magic. Time for change. ‘He made it sound so logical. And so noble. Yes, we would have to take extreme measures, but the end we sought was no more than what we were rightfully entitled to. Simple peace and acceptance. That was all. Is that so much for any man to ask?’

‘It seems a righteous goal,’ Lord Golden murmured attentively. ‘Though his means to it seem …’ He left it dangling, for them to fill in. Disgusting. Cruel. Immoral. The very lack of a description let the full baseness of it be considered.

A short silence fell. ‘I didn’t know that Peladine was in the cat,’ Deerkin asserted defensively. A sceptical quiet followed his words. Deerkin looked around at the elders almost angrily. ‘I know you say I should have been able to sense her, but I did not. Perhaps I have not been taught as well as I should. Or perhaps she was more adept at hiding than you know. But I swear I did not know. Arno and I took the cat to the Bresingas. They knew it was an Old Blood gift, intended for Prince Dutiful, to sway him to our cause. But I swear by my Old Blood, that was all they knew. Or I. Otherwise, I would not have been a party to it.’

The old healer shook her head. ‘So many will say of an evil thing, after the fact,’ she charged him. ‘Only this puzzles me. You know a mistcat must be taken young, and that it hunts only for the one who takes it. Did not you wonder?’

Deerkin reddened but, ‘I did not know Peladine was in the cat,’ he insisted. ‘Yes, I knew she had been bonded with the mistcat. But Peladine was dead. I thought the cat alone, and put her odd ways down to her mourning. What else could be done with the cat? She could not make her own way in the hills; she had never lived a wild life. And so I took her to the Bresingas, a gift fit for a prince. I thought it possible,’ and a hitch in his voice betrayed him, ‘that she might want to bond again. She had that right, if she so chose. But when the Prince came to us, I thought it was what Laudwine said it was. That he came of his own will, to learn our ways. Do you think I would have helped otherwise, do you think Arno would have sacrificed his life for such an end?’

Some, I think, must have doubted his story as much as I did. But it was not a time for such accusations. All let it pass and he continued his tale.

‘Arno and I rode with Laudwine and the Piebalds, as escort for the Prince. We intended to take him to Sefferswood, where he could live among the Piebalds and learn our ways. So Laudwine told us. When Arno was taken at Hallerby outside The Piebald Prince, we knew we had to ride for our lives. I hated to leave him, but it was what we had sworn as Piebalds: that each of us would sacrifice our life for the others as needed. My heart was full of fury when we first turned and set our ambush for the cowards that chased us. I do not regret a single one of those deaths. Arno was my brother! Then we rode on, and when next we came to a good place, Laudwine once more left me to guard the trail. “Stop them,” he told me. “If it takes your life to do it, so be it.” And I agreed with him.’

He paused in his narrative and his eyes sought Laurel. ‘I swear I did not recognize you, cousin. Not even when my arrow stood in you did I know you. All I could think was to kill all those who had helped to kill Arno. Not until Badgerlock dragged me from the tree and I looked up at you did I realize what I had done. Shed more of my own family’s blood.’ He swallowed and suddenly fell silent.

‘I forgive you.’ Laurel’s voice was soft but carrying. She looked at the gathered Old Bloods. ‘Let all here witness that. Deerkin hurt me unknowingly, and I forgive him. There is no debt of vengeance or reparation between us. At the time, I knew none of this. All I could think was that, because I lacked the magic you possessed, you had marked me as fit to kill.’ A laugh twisted from her throat. ‘It was only when Badgerlock was brutalizing you did I realize that … that it didn’t matter.’ She suddenly turned to look at him. Shamefaced, Deerkin still forced himself to meet her earnest gaze. ‘You are my cousin, and my blood,’ she asserted softly. ‘What we share far outweighs our differences. I feared he would kill you, trying to get you to speak. And I knew that, despite what you had done, even regardless of my loyalty to the Queen, I could not let that happen. So I rose in the night while Lord Golden and his man were sleeping, and spirited my cousin away.’ She transferred her gaze to Lord Golden. ‘Earlier, you had told me I must trust you when you excluded me from the confidences you shared with Badgerlock. I decided I had the right to demand the same from you. So I left you sleeping, and did what I thought best to save my prince.’

Lord Golden bowed his head for a moment, and then nodded to her gravely.

Deerkin rubbed a hand across his eyes. He spoke as if he had not even heard her words to Lord Golden. ‘You are wrong, Laurel. I owe you a debt, and I will never forget it. When we were children, we were never kind to you when you came to visit your mother’s kin. We always excluded you. Even your own brother called you the mole, blind and tunnelling where we ran free and wise. And I had shot you. I had no right to expect any help from you. But you came to me. You saved my life.’

Laurel’s voice was stiff. ‘Arno,’ she said. ‘I did it for Arno. He was as blind and deaf as I was to this “family” magic that excluded us. He alone was my playmate when I visited. But he loved you, always, and in the end he thought you worth his life.’ She shook her head. ‘I would not have let his death be for nothing.’

Together, they had crept away from the cave that night. She had convinced him that the taking of Prince Dutiful could only bring harsh persecution down on the Old Blood, and demanded that he find elders powerful enough to demand Laudwine surrender him. Queen Kettricken, she reminded him, had already spoken out against those who lynched the Witted. Would he turn that queen, the first who had taken their part in generations, against them? Laurel had convinced Deerkin that, as Piebalds had stolen the Prince, so the Old Blood must return him. It was the only reparation they could make.

She turned to Lord Golden. Her voice pleaded. ‘We returned with aid as swiftly as we could. It is not the fault of Old Blood that they must live scattered and silent. From farm to cottage we rode, gathering those of influence who were willing to speak sense to Laudwine. It was hard, for that is not the Old Blood way. Each man is supposed to rule himself, each household have its own integrity. Few wanted to stand over Laudwine and demand he do what was right.’ Her gaze left Lord Golden and travelled over the others gathered there. ‘To those of you who came, I give great thanks. And if you would let me, I would make your names known to the Queen, so she would know where her debt lies.’

‘And where to bring the rope and the sword?’ the healer asked quietly. ‘Times are not yet kind enough for names to be given, Laurel. We have yours. If we need the Queen’s ear, we can seek her out through you.’

Those they had gathered were Old Blood folk, but they did not style themselves Piebalds, nor did they condone the latter’s ways. They clove to the old teachings, Deerkin told Lord Golden earnestly. It shamed him that for a time he had followed Laudwine. Anger had made him do it, he swore, not a desire to master animals and turn them to his own purposes as the Piebalds did. He had seen too many of his own folk hung and quartered these last two years. It was enough to turn any man’s reason, but he had seen the error of his ways, thank Eda. And thanks to Laurel, and he hoped his cousin would forgive him the cruelty of their childhood years.

The conversation lapped against me like the rhythmic washing of waves. I tried to stay awake and make sense of his words, but we were so weary, my wolf and I. Nighteyes lay beside me and I could not separate where his pain ended and mine began. I did not care. Even if pain had been all we could share any more, I would have taken it gladly. We still had one another.

The Prince was not so fortunate. I rolled my head to look at him, but he slept on, his breath sighing in and out as if even in his dreams, he grieved.

I felt myself wavering in and out of awareness. The wolf’s heavy sleep tugged at me, a pleasant lure. Sleep is the great healer, Burrich had always told me. I prayed he had been right. As if they were the notes of far-off music, I sensed Nighteyes’ dreams of hunting, but I could not yet give in to my longing to share them. The Fool might be confident of Laurel and Deerkin and their fellows, but I was not. I would keep watch, I promised myself. I would keep watch.

In my seeming sleep, I shifted to observe them. I idly marked that though Laurel sat between Lord Golden and Deerkin, she sat closer to the noble than she did to her own cousin. The talk had moved nearer to negotiation than explanation. I listened keenly to Lord Golden’s measured and reasonable words.

‘I fear you do not completely understand Queen Kettricken’s position. I cannot, of course, presume to speak for her. I am but a guest at the Farseer court, a newcomer and a foreigner at that. Yet perhaps these very limitations let me see more clearly what familiarity blinds you to. The crown and the Farseer name will not shield Prince Dutiful from persecution as a Witted one. Rather they will be as oil thrown on a fire; it will immolate him. You admit Queen Kettricken has done far more than any of her predecessors to outlaw persecution of your people. But if she reveals that her son is Witted, not only may both he and she be thrown down from power, but her very efforts to shelter your folk will be seen as a suspicious attempt to shield her own blood.’

‘Queen Kettricken has outlawed putting us to death simply for being “Witted”, that is true,’ Deerkin replied. ‘But it does not mean we have stopped dying. The reality is obvious. Those who seek to kill us all fabricate injuries and invent supposed wrongs we have done to them. One man lies, another swears to it, and an Old Blood father or sister is hanged and quartered and burnt. Perhaps if the Queen sees the same threat to her son that my father sees to his, she will take greater action on our behalf.’

Behind Deerkin, a man gave a slow nod.

Lord Golden spread his hands gracefully. ‘I will do what I can, I assure you. The Queen will hear a full accounting of all you did to save her son. Laurel, too, is more than a simple Huntswoman to Queen Kettricken. She is friend and confidante as well. She will tell the Queen all you did to recover her son. More, I cannot do. I cannot make promises for Queen Kettricken.’

The man who had nodded behind Deerkin leaned forwards. He touched him on the shoulder, a ‘go on’ nudge. Then he leaned back and waited. Deerkin looked uncomfortable for a moment. Then he cleared his voice and spoke. ‘We will be watching the Queen and listening for what she will say to her nobles. We know better than any the threat that Prince Dutiful would face, were it known that he has Old Blood in his veins. They are the dangers that our brothers and sisters face every day. We would that our own were not at jeopardy. If the Queen sees fit to stretch forth her hand and shield our folk from persecution, then Old Blood will shield her son’s secret. But if she ignores our situation, if a blind eye is turned to the bloodshed … well …’

‘I take your meaning,’ Lord Golden replied swiftly. His voice was cool but not harsh. He took a breath. ‘Under the circumstances, it is, perhaps, the most we could ask of you. You have already restored the Farseer heir to us. This will dispose the Queen kindly towards you.’

‘So we expect,’ Deerkin responded heavily, and the men behind him nodded gravely.

Sleep beckoned me. Nighteyes was already in a torpor. His coat was sticky with salve, as was my chest and belly. There was almost no place that we didn’t hurt, but I rested my brow against the back of his neck and draped a careful arm over him. His fur stuck to my skin. The words of the conference beside the fire faded and became insignificant as I opened myself to him. I sank my consciousness past the red pain that bounded him until I found the warmth and humour of his soul.

Cats. Worse than porcupines.

Much worse.

But the boy loved the cat.

The cat loved the boy. Poor boy.

Poor cat. The woman was selfish.

Past selfish. Evil. Her own life wasn’t enough for her.

That was a brave little cat. She held tight and took the woman with her.

Brave cat. A pause. Do you think it will ever come, that Witted folk can openly declare the magic?

I don’t know. It would be good. I suppose. Look how the secrecy and evil reputation of it has shaped our lives. But … but it has also been good as it has been. Ours. Yours and mine.

Yes. Rest now.

Rest.

I could not sort out which thoughts were mine and which the wolf’s. I didn’t need to. I sank into his dreams with him and we dreamed well together. Perhaps it was Dutiful’s loss that put us so much in mind of all we still possessed, and all we had had. We dreamed of a cub hunting mice beneath the rotting floor of an old outbuilding, and we dreamed of a man and a wolf pulling down a great boar between them. We dreamed of stalking one another in deep snow, tussling and yelping and shouting. Deer blood, hot in the mouth, and the rich soft liver to squabble over. And then we sank past those ancient memories into perfect rest and comfort. Healing begins in deep sleeps such as that.

He stirred first. I nearly woke as he rose, gingerly shook himself, and then stretched more bravely. His superior sense of smell told me that the edge of dawn was in the air. The weak sun had just begun to touch the dew-wet grasses, waking the smells of the earth. Game would be stirring. The hunting would be good.

I’m so tired, I complained. I can’t believe you’re getting up. Rest for a while longer. We’ll hunt later.

You’re tired? I’m so tired that rest won’t ease me. Only the hunt. I felt his wet nose poke my cheek. It was cold. Aren’t you coming? I was sure you’d want to come with me.

I do. I do. But not just yet. Give me just a bit longer.

Very well, little brother. Just a bit longer. Follow me when you will.

But my mind rode with his, as it had so many times. We left the cave, thick with man-stink, and walked past the cat’s new cairn. We smelled her death, and the musk of a fox who had come to the scent, but turned aside at the smell of the campfire’s smoke. Swiftly we left the camp behind. Nighteyes chose the open hillside instead of the wooded vale. The sky overhead was blue and deep, and the last star fading in the sky. The night had been colder than I had realized. Frost tipped some of the grasses still, but as the rising sun touched it, it smoked briefly and was gone. The crisp edge of the air remained, each scent as sharp as a clean knife-edge. With a wolf’s nose, I scented all and knew all. The world was ours. The turning time, I said to him.

Exactly. Time to change, Changer.

There were fat mice hastily harvesting seedheads in the tall grass, but we passed them by. At the top of the hill, we paused. We walked the spine of the hill, smelling the morning, tasting the lip of the day to come. There would be deer in the forested creek bottoms. They would be healthy and strong and fat, a challenge to any pack let alone a single wolf. He would need me at his side to hunt those. He would have to come back for them later. Nevertheless, he halted on top of the ridge. The morning wind riffled his fur and his ears were perked as he looked down to where we knew they must be.

Good hunting. I’m going now, my brother. He spoke with great determination.

Alone? You can’t bring a buck down alone! I sighed with resignation.

Wait, I’ll get up and come with you.

Wait for you? Not likely! I’ve always had to run ahead of you and show you the way.

Swift as thought, he slipped away from me, running down the hillside like a cloud’s shadow when the wind blows. My connection to him frayed away as he went, scattering and floating like dandelion fluff in the wind. Instead of small and secret, I felt our bond go wide and open, as if he had invited all the Witted creatures in the world in to share our joining. All the web of life on the whole hillside suddenly swelled within my heart, linked and meshed and woven through with one another. It was too glorious to contain. I had to go with him; a morning this wondrous must be shared.

‘Wait!’ I cried, and in shouting the word, I woke myself. Nearby, the Fool sat up, his hair tousled. I blinked. My mouth was full of salve and wolf-hair, my fingers buried deep in his coat. I clutched him to me, and my grip sighed his last stilled breath out of his lungs. But Nighteyes was gone. Cold rain was cascading down past the mouth of the cave.