Fool’s Quest

The next few days passed in a whirl. Two seamstresses came to my room early the next morning and measured me thoroughly for “traveling clothes.” I told them to leave off any decorative buttons. A day later they delivered to my room sturdy shirts and trousers in subtle browns and a tightly woven cloak lined with fur. The lightweight leather armor came separately and was of a quality I had never experienced. The high-collared vest would protect my chest, belly, and throat. There were greaves and vambraces, also brown and unmarked by any insignia. I was pleased that Dutiful had known I would need to travel quietly and unremarked. But then came another delivery, of a lovely Buck-blue cloak and blue-dyed leather gloves lined with lamb’s wool, and a doublet embroidered all over with bucks and narwhals. I began to guess that there was more than one kind heart supplying me for my journey.

My worn pack was replaced by one of weatherproofed canvas with sturdy straps. The first things I put into it were Bee’s books and Molly’s candles. Those would go with me to the ends of the earth.

The word had gone out that I would be leaving, and the farewell notes, invitations, and gifts were overwhelming. And yet all must be acknowledged and politely refused. Every loose thread snipped or tied. Ash came to my room, grim-faced and silent, and every day presented me with all these missives sorted into tidy piles.

And I returned to the Fool’s room and failed at reasoning with him. I endured the Fool’s constant imprecations and pleas that I reconsider. I continued to see him and he continued to batter me with anger, sorrow, sarcasm, and silence. I held firm. “You will never penetrate those walls without me. I am your only hope of gaining entry,” he told me more than once. The more I refused to discuss it, the more he talked only about it. It did not stop my daily visits but I counted down to the last one.

Two days before my departure, Kettricken summoned me to her audience chamber. That day no one else was waiting, having been warned she was busy for the whole day. I was admitted immediately and found her busy with pen and paper. A scroll rack had been brought in, and it held perhaps a score of scrolls. She was kneeling on a cushion, pen in hand, head bent over a vellum.

“Just in time,” she said as I entered. “I’m finished.” She lifted a container and sanded her wet ink.

I opened my mouth to speak and she held up a hand. “Many years ago, I suffered as I have watched you suffer. I waited in idleness, knowing nothing of the fate of my husband. Of my love.” Her voice broke slightly on the word. “When I set out at last, I had nothing to guide me except hope and a map.” She tapped the sand from the vellum and offered it to me. “A map. With Clerres on it. And Fishbones and Wortletree and all the other places you’ve been seeking. A map based on old drawings and hearsay and tales from that old sailor.”

I stared at her incredulously. “The one from the tavern? He had little enough to tell me.”

She smiled. “Him, and a few others. More than a little I have learned from our good Chade through the years. And informants love to be paid. A few were clever enough to move up the chain and come to me with empty palms waiting. A few coins and they are mine now, Fitz, and with them all they know.” A steaming pot and two cups had been waiting on the table. She wore a little cat-smile as she poured a bit, considered the color, and then filled our cups. As she set one before me, she blushed and said, “Tell me you are proud of me.”

“Always. And astounded!”

Her hand was more delicate than Verity’s but her work as precise. She had noted that sailing into Wortletree at low tide was inadvisable, and a few other snippets of information.

We had finished our tea when she asked suddenly, “You don’t expect to come back, do you?”

I gaped at her. Then I demanded, “How did you know?”

“You’ve the look that Verity had when he was carving his dragon. He knew he’d begun something that he would not return from.”

We both fell silent for a time. Then she spoke in a husky whisper. “Thank you for my son.”

I lifted my eyes from the map. I just looked at her.

“I’ve known for years. How it was done.”

I didn’t ask how she knew. Starling had possibly told her. Perhaps Verity himself.

“Your body. Verity’s will.”

“I wasn’t there, Kettricken. I spent that night inhabiting Verity’s body.”

“He’s Verity’s son. I know.”

And we left it there, and I was not certain if I felt better for her knowing and letting me know she knew or if I felt even odder about it. I only asked her, “Are you telling me this because you don’t think I’ll come back?”

She met my gaze. “I think you left when you lost Bee, and you haven’t truly been here since. Go find out, Fitz. Come back to us if you can. But go do what you must.”