Fool’s Assassin

“I’ll find him,” my father promised. She smiled faintly, her teeth showing pink. “I’ll send for a healer now,” my father said, but she moved her head in a feeble shake.

“No. There’s more. Water, please.”

He held the cup to her mouth. She didn’t drink, but sloshed the water in her mouth and let it run out over her chin. He wiped her face again.

“Hunters will come. Acting friendly, maybe. Or in disguise. Making you believe they are friends.” She spoke in short bursts, breathing in between. “Trust the unexpected son to no one. Even if they say they have come for him, to take him where he belongs. Wait for the one who sent me. He will come for him, if he can. So he said, when he sent me. So long ago … why did he not get here before me? I fear … no. I must believe that he’s still journeying. He escaped but they will hunt him. When he is able to, he will come. But slowly. He has to evade them. It will take him time. But he will get here. Until then, you must find him and keep him safe.” I was not certain she believed her own words.

“Where should I look?” my father asked her urgently.

She shook her head slightly. “I don’t know. If he knew, he gave me no hints. So if they captured me and tortured me, I could not betray him.” She moved her head on the pillow, her blind eyes seeking for him. “Will you find him?”

He took her hand and held it carefully. “I’ll find his son and keep him safe until he gets here.” I wondered if he lied to make her feel better.

Her eyes closed until only a pale-gray moon showed under the lids. “Yes. So valuable. They will want him badly. Enough to kill. If they take him …” Her brow wrinkled. “Like I was treated. A tool. No choices.” Her eyelids fluttered open and her queer, colorless stare seemed to meet his gaze. “I’ve borne three children. Never seen or held any. They take them. As they took me.”

“I don’t understand,” my father said, but at her desperate look, he amended it to, “I understand enough. I will find him and I will keep him safe. I promise. Now we will make you comfortable and you will rest.”

“Burn my body,” she said insistently.

“If it comes to that, I will. But for now …”

“It will come to that. My companion searched the wounds. I told you. What went in won’t come out.”

“A poison?”

She shook her head. “Eggs. They’ve hatched now. They’re eating me.” She winced and coughed again. “Sorry. Burn bedding. With me.” Her eyes opened and her blank gaze wandered over the room. “You should put me outside. They bite and burrow. And lay eggs.” She coughed pink. “Punishment for traitor.” She blinked, and drops of red oozed from the corners of her eyes. “Treason is unforgivable. So punished with unstoppable death. Slow. It takes weeks. “She shuddered and then squirmed. She looked up at my father. “The pain is building. Again. I can’t see. They’re eating my eyes. Are they bloody?”

I heard the sound of my father swallowing. He sank down beside the bed until his face was on a level with the girl’s. A stillness had taken his face; I could not tell if he felt anything. He asked quietly, “Are you finished, then? That was the whole message?”

She nodded. She rolled her head to meet my father’s gaze but I knew she could not see him. Blood in ruby drops clung to her eyelashes. “I’m finished. Yes.”

My father lurched to his feet. He turned as if he would run from the room. Instead he snatched up the empty ewer. He spoke sternly. “Bee. I need cool fresh water. And bring some vinegar in a cup. And …” He paused to think. “Go to Patience’s garden room. Bring me two double handfuls of the mint that grows closest to the statue of the girl with the sword. Go.”

I took the ewer and a candle in a holder and went. The darkness made the corridors longer. The kitchen was a place of lurking shadows. The vinegar was in a large crock, and the containers to carry it all up out of my reach. I had to push benches and climb. I left the heavy ewer of water and the vinegar and threaded my way through the sleeping house to Patience’s garden room. I found the mint and tore at the plants recklessly, filling a fold of my nightshirt with the aromatic leaves. Then I trotted back to the kitchen, candle in one hand and the other holding my hiked-up nightshirt with the mint. In the kitchen I tied up the mint in a clean cloth and gripped the knot in my teeth. I abandoned my candle to clutch the heavy ewer in one arm and the vinegar in my other hand. I hurried as fast as I could, trying not to think of maggots eating me from the inside. By the time I reached the door of my room and set everything down to open the door, I was out of breath. I felt as if I had been running for the whole night.