Fool’s Quest

I dismounted, and she shouted to our guards to hold off on that order. She dismounted, handed her horse to her granddaughter, and followed me. Riddle came after us, and Lant. I glanced back, thinking I would see Perseverance shadowing us, but the boy had vanished. From somewhere, the crow squawked. They’d be together. Just as well.

In the gloom under the leaning evergreens, the winter afternoon already seemed like evening. The shadowed snow and dark trunks were shaded from black to palest gray. In that dimness, it took me a moment to pick out the Skill-stone gripped in the roots and leaning trunk of an evergreen. I approached it without reluctance. Nettle’s Skill-users had traveled to the Mountains via this stone and returned days later without incident. It was as safe to use as any Skill-portal, I told myself. I pushed from my memory what had happened the last time I had traveled by stone. I sealed from my heart that this was the very stone that had devoured Bee and those who had taken her.

Only a light snow had fallen since last I had been here, and little of it had penetrated the interweaving needled branches overhead. With a gloved hand, I brushed snow and fallen needles from the face of the stone. I had my sword at my side, a pack on my back, and a large carry-bag on my shoulder. Everything I thought I needed was in the pack and everything the others had insisted I take was in the carry-bag. I had privately resolved I would not carry it for long.

“So,” I said to Riddle. He pulled off his glove as I did mine, and we clasped wrists. Our eyes met briefly and then we both looked aside.

“Travel well,” he said to me, and “I shall try,” I replied. His grip tightened on my wrist and I returned that pressure. Nettle, you’ve chosen well, I Skilled to her. Through my eyes, I showed her the man she had chosen. Care for his heart. It’s a true one. And then I swiftly set my walls to hold in all my fears and worries.

I bade farewell likewise to Foxglove and to Lant. The old captain met my gaze with her steely one and bade me “Uphold the honor of the Farseers.” Lant’s hand was sweaty as he gripped my wrist, and he seemed to tremble.

“You’ll do fine,” I told him quietly. “Take care of that old man for me. Blame it on me that I would not let you come.”

He hesitated. “I’ll do my best to live up to his expectations,” he replied.

I returned him a rueful grin for that. “Best of luck with that!” I wished him, and he managed a shaky laugh.

They were watching me. I held up a hand. I closed my eyes, though I did not need to. Through the stone, I said to Nettle and Dutiful. I could feel Thick watching us drowsily. I’ll be sending Riddle right back to you. He should be home by tomorrow evening.

And you will Skill to us as soon as you emerge from the stone?

I already promised I would. I will not leave you worrying. I expect to be told as soon as the child is born.

And I already promised that to you. Go carefully, Da.

I love you all. And then, because those words sounded too much like a final farewell I added, Tell the Fool not to be too angry with me. Take care of him until I return.

I turned back to those waiting around me. “Nettle expects you home by tomorrow,” I warned Riddle.

“I’ll be there,” he promised me, and I knew that he did not mean just for the next evening.

Foxglove looked weary and Lant looked as if he felt sick. I shared some of his nervousness. The world seemed to waver a bit around me as I stepped toward the stone. As I set my bare hand to the cold stone and pressed firmly against the rune, Lant leapt forward suddenly. He clasped my wrist and exclaimed, “I go with you!”

Someone also clasped me suddenly around the waist. I thought perhaps Riddle would pull me back, but I felt the stone give way and draw me in. Lant came with me, with a drawn-out shout that cut off as the darkness snapped shut around us.

Traveling through a pillar had always felt disorienting. This time instead of twinkling darkness it was as if someone had snapped a hood over my head and then let a horse kick me. I had no sense of traveling a great distance; it was more like a sudden push off a ladder. I fell hard on snowy ground. Lant landed on top of me, and I was crumpled facedown across the lumpy carry-sack and something else. There was snow in my eyes, and the cold that engulfed me was far sharper than that of Buck. The wind had been knocked out of my lungs. I wheezed in snow, coughed it out, and then fought to breathe as I struggled to sit up.