Assassin's Quest

The Fool seemed somewhat better. His body was no longer feverish, but he seemed unable to stomach food or even tea. Kettle forced water on him until he simply sat and refused it, shaking his head wordlessly. He seemed as indisposed to talk as I was. Starling and Kettle with her staff led our weary little procession. The Fool and I followed the jeppas, while Kettricken with her bow strung kept our rear guarded. The wolf prowled restlessly up and down the line, now ranging ahead, now loping up our back trail.

Nighteyes and I had gone back to a sort of wordless bond. He understood that I did not wish to think at all, and did his best not to distract me. It was still unnerving to sense him trying to use the Wit to communicate with Kettricken. No sign of anyone behind us, he would tell her as he trotted past on one of his endless trips. Then he would go ranging far ahead of the jeppas and Starling, only to come back to Kettricken and assure her in passing that all was clear ahead of us. I tried to tell myself that she merely had faith that Nighteyes would let me know if he found anything amiss on his scouting trips. But I suspected she was becoming more and more attuned to him.

The road led us very swiftly downward. As we descended the land changed. By late afternoon, the slope above the road was gentling and we began to pass twisted trees and mossy boulders. Snow faded and became patchy on the hillside while the road was dry and black. Dry tufts of grass showed green at their bases just off the shoulder of the road. It was hard to make the hungry jeppas keep moving. I made a vague Wit-effort to let them know that there would be better browsing ahead, but I doubt that I had enough familiarity with them to make any lasting impression on them. I tried to limit my thoughts to the fact that firewood would be more plentiful tonight, and to gratitude that the lower the road carried us the warmer grew the day.

At one time, the Fool made a gesture to a low growing plant that had tiny white buds on it. "It would be spring in Buckkeep by now," he said in a low voice, and then added quickly, "I'm sorry. Pay no attention to me, I'm sorry."

"Are you feeling any better?" I asked him, resolutely thrusting spring flowers and bees and Molly's candles out of my mind.

"A little." His voice shook and he took a quick breath. "I wish we could walk more slowly."

"We'll camp soon," I told him, knowing that we could not slow our pace now. I felt a growing urgency and had developed the notion it came from Verity. I pushed that name, too, from my mind. Even walking down the wide road in daylight, I feared that Regal's eye was only a blink away and that if I glimpsed it they would once more hold me under their power. For an instant I hoped Carrod and Will and Burl were cold and hungry, but then realized I could not safely think of them, either.

"You were sick like this before," I observed to the Fool, mostly to think of something else.

"Yes. In Blue Lake. My lady queen spent the food money on a room that I might be in out of the rain." He turned his head to stare at me. "Do you think that might have caused it?"

"Caused what?"

"Her child to be stillborn …"

His voice dwindled off. I tried to think of words. "I don't think it was any one thing, Fool. She simply suffered too many misfortunes while she was carrying the babe."

"Burrich should have gone with her and left me. He would have taken better care of her. I wasn't thinking clearly at the time …."

"Then I'd be dead," I pointed out. "Among other things. Fool, there is no sense in trying to play that game with the past. Here is where we are today, and we can only make our moves from here."

And in that instant, I suddenly perceived the solution to Kettle's game problem. It was so instantly clear that I wondered how I could not have seen it. Then I knew. Each time I had studied the board, I wondered how it could have got into such a sorry condition. All I had seen were the senseless moves that had preceded mine. But those moves had no longer mattered, once I held the black stone in my hand. A half-smile crooked my lips. My thumb rubbed the black stone.

"Where we are today," the Fool echoed, and I felt his mood shadow mine.

"Kettricken said that you might not truly be ill. That it might be … peculiar to your kind." I was uncomfortable coming even that close to a question regarding this.

"It could be. I suppose. Look." He drew off his mitten, then reached up, and dragged his nails down his cheek. Dry white trails followed them. He rubbed at it and the skin powdered away beneath his hands. On the back of his hand, the skin was peeling as if it had been blistered.

"It's like a sunburn peeling away. Do you think it's the weather you've been in?"

"That, too, is possible. Save that if it is like last time, I shall itch and peel over every bit of my body. And gain a bit more color in the process. Are my eyes changing?"