Fool’s Quest

I had begun to tremble but not as badly as he did. He shook. I went to him, drew him to his feet, and held him tightly, as much to still my own shaking as his. We had both known the torturer’s touch, and that creates a common ground that is hard for other to understand. “You killed them,” he reminded me. “The ones who tormented you in Regal’s dungeon. When you had the chance, you killed them.”

“I did.” My tongue stilled. I recalled a youngster, the last of his patrol, dying of poison. Did I regret him? Perhaps. But if I were in that situation again, I’d still do as I’d done. I squared my shoulders and renewed my promise. “And when I gain the chance, Fool, I will do the same to those who tormented you. And to those who gave you over to torture.”

“Dwalia,” he said and his voice went deep with hatred. “She was there. In the gallery, watching. Mimicking my screams.”

“Gallery?” I asked, confused.

He set his palms against my chest and pushed me suddenly away. I took no offense. I knew that sudden need not to be touched. When he spoke, his voice had gone high and he sounded as if he would laugh, but he did not. “Oh, yes, they have a gallery. It’s a much more sophisticated arena for torment than you Buckmen could ever imagine. There they might cut open the chest of a strapped-down child who shows no promise, to show the beating heart and swelling lungs to those who would later learn to be healers. Or torturers. Many come to witness torture, some to record every word that is spoken, and others to while away a tiresome afternoon. Fitz, when you can control the course of events, when you can precipitate a famine or bring wealth to a seaport and all who live near it, the suffering of one individual comes to mean less and less. We Whites are chattel to them, to be bred or slaughtered as they please. Yes, there is a gallery. And Dwalia looked down on me as I bled.”

“I wish I had been able to kill her for you, then, Fool. And for me as well.”

“So I wish also. But there are others. Those who raised and shaped her. Those who gave her power and permission.”

“Yes. So tell me of them.”

More the Fool told me that afternoon, and I listened well. The more he talked, the calmer he became. There were things he knew that might be useful. He knew of the deep spring that supplied the palace with water, and he knew of the four towers where the Council members slept. He knew of the horns that sounded when folk could cross the causeway and enter the fortified city that was the White Island, and of the bell that tolled to warn folk that they must leave or risk being caught by the rising tides. He knew of the walled garden and the great house where the Whites and part-Whites were housed, knowing no other world than that. “Raised like penned cattle thinking the pen is the world. When I first came to Clerres, the Servants kept me apart from their Whites, and I truly believed that I was the only White left in the world. The only White Prophet for this generation.” He sat silent, and then he sighed. “Then the Pale Woman, at that time little more than a girl, demanded to meet me. She hated me from the time she saw me, for I was so certain I was all she was not. She decreed that I must be tattooed as I was. And when they were done, they put me in with the others. Fitz, they hoped I would breed for them. But I was young, too young to be interested in such things, and the tales I told the others of my home and my family, of market days and cows to milk, and pressing grapes for wine . . . Oh. How they envied me those memories, and how they insisted they must only be tales. By day they mocked me and set me apart, but in the evenings they would gather round me and ask me questions and listen to my tales. They scoffed, even then, but I felt their hunger. At least for a time, I had had all that they had never known. The love of my parents. My sisters’ fond teasing. A little white cat that trotted at my heels. Ah, Fitz, I had been such a happy child.

“And telling them my tales sharpened my own hunger, until I had to take action. And so I escaped. And made my slow way to Buckkeep.” He shrugged his thin shoulders. “To wait to discover you. To begin our tasks.”

And so he spoke, and I was entranced, as he shared so much I had never known of him. I sat and I listened to him, afraid to break the spell of such honesty. When he ceased speaking, I realized the day was dimming to a close. There was still so much I needed to do.

I persuaded him then to let me ring for Ash and have food brought, and perhaps ask for a bath. For I guessed now that he had neither bathed nor changed his clothes since he had returned from his misadventure. When I rose to leave, he smiled at me.

“We’re going there. We’re going to stop them.” It sounded like a promise.

“I am but one man, Fool. Your quest demands an army.”

“Or the father of a stolen and murdered child.”