Assassin's Apprentice

ACCORDING TO ANCIENT CHRONICLES, Skill users were organized in coteries of six. These groups did not usually include any of exceptional royal blood, but were limited to cousins and nephews of the direct line of ascension, or those who showed an aptitude and were judged worthy. One of the most famous, Crossfire's Coterie, provides a splendid example of how they functioned. Dedicated to Queen Vision, Crossfire and the others of her coterie had been trained by a Skillmaster called Tactic. The partners in this coterie were mutually chosen by one another, and then received special training from Tactic to bind them into a close unit. Whether scattered across the Six Duchies to collect or disseminate information, or when massed as a group for the purpose of confounding and demoralizing the enemy, their deeds became legendary. Their final heroism, detailed in the ballad "Crossfire's Sacrifice," was the massing of their strength, which they channeled to Queen Vision during the battle of Besham. Unbeknownst to the exhausted Queen, they gave to her more than they could spare themselves, and in the midst of the victory celebration the coterie was discovered in their tower, drained and dying. Perhaps the people's love of Crossfire's Coterie stemmed in part from their all being cripples in one form or another: blind, lame, harelipped, or disfigured by fire were all of the six, yet in the Skill their strength was greater than that of the largest warship, and more important to the defense of the Queen.

During the peaceful years of King Bounty's reign, the instruction of the Skill for the creation of coteries was abandoned. Existing coteries disbanded due to aging, death, or simply a lack of purpose. Instruction in the Skill began to be limited to princes only, and for a time it was seen as a rather archaic art. By the time of the Red-Ship raids, only King Shrewd and his son Verity were active practitioners of the Skill. Shrewd made an effort to locate and recruit former practitioners, but most were aged, or no longer proficient.

Galen, then Skillmaster for Shrewd, was assigned the task of creating new coteries for the defense of the kingdom. Galen chose to set aside tradition. Coterie memberships were assigned rather than mutually chosen. Galen's methods of teaching were harsh, his training goal that each member would be an unquestioning part of a unit, a tool for the King to use as he needed. This particular aspect was designed solely by Galen, and the first Skill coterie he created, he presented to King Shrewd as if it were his gift to give. At least one member of the royal family expressed his abhorrence of the idea. But times were desperate, and King Shrewd could not resist wielding the weapon that had been given into his hand.

Such hate. Oh, how they hated me. As each student emerged from the stairwell onto the tower roof to find me there and waiting, each spurned me. I felt their disdain, as palpably as if each had dashed cold water against me. By the time the seventh and final student appeared, the cold of their hatred was like a wall around me. But I stood, silent and contained, in my accustomed place, and met every eye that was lifted to mine. That, I think, was why no one spoke a word to me. They were forced to take their places around me. They did not speak to each other, either.

And we waited.

The sun came up, and even cleared the wall around the tower, and still Galen had not come. But they kept their places and waited and so I did likewise.

Finally I heard his halting steps upon the stairs. When he emerged, he blinked in the sun's pale wash, glanced at me, and visibly started. I stood my ground. We looked at one another. He could see the burden of hatred that the others had imposed on me and it pleased him, as did the bandages I still wore on my temple. But I met his eyes and did not flinch. I dared not.

And I became aware of the dismay the others were feeling. No one could look at him and not see how badly he had been beaten. The Witness Stones had found him lacking, and all who saw him would know. His gaunt face was a landscape of purples and greens washed over with yellows. His lower lip was split in the middle and cut at the corner of his mouth. He wore a long-sleeved robe that covered his arms, but the flowing looseness of it contrasted so strongly with his usual tightly laced shirts and vests that it was like seeing the man in his nightshirt. His hands, too, were purple and knobby, but I could not recall that I had seen bruises on Burrich's body. I concluded that he had used them in a vain attempt to shield his face. He still carried his little whip with him, but I doubted he had the capability to swing it effectively.