Assassin's Apprentice

We emerged from his kennels and out into the sun, where an older dog slept lazily on a pile of straw. "Sleep on, old man. You've fathered enough pups that you never need hunt again, except you love it so," Rurisk told him genially. At his master's voice, the old hound heaved himself to his feet and came to lean affectionately on Rurisk. He looked up at me, and it was Nosy.

I stared at him, and his copper-ore eyes returned the look. I quested softly toward him, and for a moment received only puzzlement. And then a flood of warmth, of affection shared and remembered. There was no doubt that he was Rurisk's hound now; the intensity of the bond that had been between us was gone. But he offered me back great fondness and warm memories of when we were puppies together. I went down on one knee, and stroked the red coat gone all bristly with the years, and looked into the eyes that were beginning to show the clouding of age. For an instant, with the physical touch, the bond was as it had been. I knew he was enjoying dozing in the sun, but could be persuaded to go hunt with very little trouble. Especially if Rurisk came along. I patted his back and drew away from him. I looked up to find Rurisk regarding me strangely. "I knew him when he was just a puppy," I told him.

"Burrich sent him to me, in care of a wandering scribe, these many years ago," Rurisk told me. "He has brought me great pleasure, in company and in hunting."

"You have done well by him," I said. We left and strolled back to the palace, but as soon as Rurisk left my side, I went straight to Burrich. As I came up he had just received permission to take the horses outside and into the open air, for even the calmest beast will grow restive in close quarters with many strangers. I could see his dilemma; while he was taking horses out he would be leaving the others untended. He looked up warily as I approached.

"With your leave, I will help you move them," I offered.

Burrich's face remained impassive and polite. But before he could open his mouth to speak, a voice behind me said, "I am here to do that, master. You might soil your sleeves, or overly weary yourself working with beasts." I turned slowly, baffled by the venom in Cob's voice. I glanced from him to Burrich, but Burrich did not speak: I looked squarely at Burrich.

"Then I will walk alongside you, if I may, for I have something important we must speak of." My words were deliberately formal. For a moment longer Burrich gazed at me. "Bring the Princess's mare," he said at last, "and that bay filly. I will take the grays. Cob, mind the rest for me. I shan't be long."

And so I took the mare's head and the filly's lead rope and followed Burrich as he edged the horses through the crowd and out of doors. "There is a paddock, this way," he said, and no more. We walked for a bit in silence. The crowd thinned rapidly once we were away from the palace. The horses' hooves thudded pleasantly against the earth. We came to the paddock, which fronted on a small barn with a tack room. For a moment or two it almost seemed normal to be working alongside Burrich again. I unsaddled the mare and wiped the nervous sweat from her while he shook out grain into a grain box for them. He came to stand beside me as I finished with the mare. "She's a beauty," I said admiringly. "From Lord Ranger's stock?"

"Yes." His word cut off the conversation. "You wished to speak to me."

I took a great breath, then said it simply. "I just saw Nosy. He's fine. Older now, but he's had a happy life. All these years, Burrich, I always believed you killed him that night. Dashed out his brains, cut his throat, strangled him-I imagined it a dozen different ways, a thousand times. All those years."

He looked at me incredulously. "You believed I would kill a dog for something you did?"

"I only knew he was gone. I could imagine nothing else. I thought it was my punishment."

For a long time he was still. When he looked back up at me, I could see his torment. "How you must have hated me.

"And feared you."

"All those years? And you never learned better of me, never thought to yourself, He would not do such a thing?"

I shook my head slowly.

"Oh, Fitz," he said sadly. One of the horses came to nudge at him, and he petted it absently. "I thought you were stubborn and sullen. You thought you had been grievously wronged. No wonder we have been so much at odds."

"It can be undone," I offered quietly. "I have missed you, you know. Missed you sorely, despite all our differences."

I watched him thinking, and for a moment or two I thought he would smile and clap me on the shoulder and tell me to go fetch the other horses. But his face grew still, and then stern. "But for all that, it did not stop you. You believed I had it in me to kill any animal you used the Wit on. But it did not stop you from doing it."

"I don't see it the way you do," I began, but he shook his head.