The Complete Tawny Man Trilogy Omnibus (247 page)

Chade and Dutiful must have known through Thick that I had returned, for I felt then such a battering against my Skill-walls as might have been a siege. I decided reluctantly that it was time to let them in. I took the cup of tea the Black Man had just poured for me and sat down by his fire and then, seeing the Fool well occupied with our host, I surrendered and lowered my Skill-walls.

Chade’s blast of fury, fear and frustration preceded all thought, shaking and cuffing me as if I were an errant serving-boy. When he was finished, I think it annoyed him even more that I laughed at his onslaught, even as my reaction cheered Dutiful.

Not much can be wrong with you if you can laugh like that! I’ve never felt such a carelessness of spirit from you.
I caught the boy’s sense of amazement and wonder.

An instant later, Chade echoed it.
What has come over you? Are you drunk?

No. I am whole and well healed. And so is the Fool. But my tale will keep. Does all go well with you? Has our prince well and truly won his bride? Thick has told me a wild bit of tale about a dragon’s head on the mothershouse hearth. Is it true? Who killed Icefyre?

No one killed the dragon. It was just his head he placed there. But, yes, it seems to be done and settled.
Chade replied with grim satisfaction.
Now that we know you are safe, we can sail tomorrow. That is, if Dutiful can find the courage to tell his bride she must come home with him.

I but allow her time to be sure it is her will that she follows in this
, Dutiful replied sternly.

I do not understand. Would someone start at the beginning and tell the tale?

And then it was that I heard in full, from both Chade and Dutiful, with excited asides from Thick, of how Nettle had bedevilled and nagged Tintaglia, troubling her dreams and her waking hours, importuning her to pay back the puny humans who had suffered so much so that Icefyre could fly free. Tintaglia in her turn had driven Icefyre much as a pigeon drives his mate to the nest, back to Zylig, where the dragons presented themselves to the Hetgurd still convened there, and then on to Mayle Island and Wuislington.

There the dragons had landed before Elliania’s mothershouse. I gathered that there had been some structural damage in the process,
but nonetheless the immense Icefyre had forced his way into the mothershouse, where he ungraciously placed his head, very briefly, upon the hearthstones, so that Dutiful’s promise to Elliania might be completely carried out.

I thought that Elliania had professed herself satisfied that Dutiful had fulfilled his promise and proven himself worthy of her when he aided in the rescue of her mother and sister.
I was a bit confused as to why all this had been necessary.

Oh
, she
has shown herself well
satisfied
, for some days now
, Chade replied acidly, and I suspected that perhaps Dutiful’s virtue had not been proof against the girl’s importuning.
It is her mother who has proven difficult, much to Peottre’s woe. Oerttre told us, before we were even docked in Zylig, that she did not regard any agreement that men had brokered concerning her daughter as binding. She finds it unthinkable that Elliania would leave her home, even to be Queen of all the Six Duchies. She has raised a thousand faults with the arrangement, saying that as she herself was still alive and therefore the true Narcheska, all of this was agreed to without the proper consent. She objects to the idea of Lestra inheriting the title of Narcheska; she finds the girl unfit to rule after her. And she is horrified at the thought that Elliania’s and Dutiful’s children would remain in the Six Duchies.

Except for our sons
, Dutiful interjected.

True
, Chade conceded.
She had been more than willing to allow Dutiful and Elliania to, that is, to become, to have
– He could not find a delicate way to verbalize the thought.

Dutiful was more prosaic.
Her mother was willing to allow me to share Elliania’s bed. She seemed affronted that anyone might think to thwart her daughter in who she wishes to bed. And the Narcheska Oerttre had offered that any male children so conceived would be given to the Six Duchies. At the age of seven.

There was a mutual silence as they allowed me to digest that idea. It was untenable. None of his dukes would accept an heir thus created.

And now? Now that Icefyre has fulfilled completely Elliania’s challenge to Dutiful?

Narcheska Oerttre was impressed. It is hard not to be impressed when a creature of that size lumbers through your home and places his head
on your hearthstones. Especially when some of the framework of your door is still around his neck.
I could easily excuse Dutiful’s youthful satisfaction at this vindication.
I think her objections are at an end. And even if she still has reservations, there were enough members of the Hetgurd here to witness it that they will not stand. They now see it as honour that Elliania will come to my hearth. To ‘found a new mothershouse’ is how they phrase it.

As if she were conquering all the Six Duchies by becoming Dutiful’s Queen
, Chade complained. Yet I could hear the relief in his voice. I foresaw there would be difficulties in future days, as the customs of her land clashed with ours. If she bore a son first, would her relatives be scandalized to see him inherit before her daughters? I set the thought from my mind. There would be enough time to worry about that when it happened.

And how was that brought about?

Ask Thick. He and Nettle seem to have concocted that.

The smile faded from my face. I had to know.
Does Nettle know about Burrich’s death?

Yes.
Chade’s reply was short and grim.

I would not wish such news to be withheld from me
, Dutiful pointed out severely. I knew he was justifying his action to Chade as much as to me.
And so I did as I thought best. Besides, my mother deserved that news as well, that she can see to the needs of the family of the man who served us so well and so long. Besides. When I stand before my cousin in the flesh, I do not wish to do so with a bag of dirty secrets behind my back.

That seemed harsh and I sensed that I trod on the edges of a quarrel between Dutiful and Chade. It did not seem a good time to advance my own opinion. Moreover, it was too late to change what had been done. So I tried to change the subject instead.
So. The wedding will now proceed with no further objections.

Now it can. Dutiful had insisted we remain here until we heard from you. Or until we decided you were dead, and sent a rescue party back for Thick. Not that he was fond of the idea of being rescued and brought home. But now that you are there, we shall send a boat for both of you immediately. As soon as you arrive here, we can proceed home.

No boats!
Thick insisted.

The Prince ignored him.
Our wait for Fitz has not been wasted time
, Dutiful contradicted Chade.
It would not have been appropriate to immediately snatch the Narcheska from her family. Elliania has been too long separated from her mother and sister. I have enjoyed seeing them together. And when she looks from her sister to me … Fitz, she thinks I am a hero. The Outislander bards are making songs of this.

Very long songs
, Chade added.
We’ve had to listen to them, smiling, nearly every night.

We simmered into satisfied silence. My prince had won his bride. There would be peace between the Six Duchies and the Out Islands. Then Dutiful added solemnly,
And I was glad that you were allowed some time to deal with your loss. I am sorry, Fitz.

Chade asked quietly,
You were able to recover the Fool’s body?

It was my moment for triumph.
I recovered the Fool.

I thought he was dead!
Dutiful’s gravity dissolved in amazement.

So did I, I replied, and abruptly decided to leave that as my full explanation. It was easy enough to divert them from any more questions regarding the Fool. I simply added,
I am sorry to have missed the ship you sent for us. But you need not bother with another. Thick and I have an easier way back to Buckkeep. One that does not require him to set foot on a deck again.

Their astonishment at my revelation of the working Skill-pillar could not match Thick’s delight at the news he could go home without sailing. He suddenly clutched me about the middle, tugged me to my feet and capered so wildly about me that I could not hold the focus necessary to Skill. I seized him by his shoulders and braced my feet to stop our dance, and then looked up to find the Black Man regarding us with alarmed amusement. The Fool looked too tired to show any surprise.

‘He just realized that we could go home through the Skill-pillars,’ I explained to them. ‘Thick hates boats. And he is delighted to know that our journey may be a matter of moments instead of days.’

The Black Man looked at me without comprehension. Then the Fool said something to him in his own tongue, and the man made a long ‘aaaah’ of understanding and nodded sagely. The Fool’s explanation seemed to bring to his mind some other incident, for the Black Man launched into a long monologue intended for the Fool.

Thick skidded to a sudden halt and cocked his head as if listening. ‘Skill-scrolls, Chade says, bring the Skill-scrolls.’ He paused, frowning as he paid attention to Chade’s Skilling. ‘But not yet! Don’t go home yet, not until he has a good way to explain it. But soon. Nettle is getting tired of all the messages. You could do it better.’

I had given Chade much to think about, and to my relief, he excused himself from our Skilling to do just that. Dutiful attempted to explain to me how Nettle had persuaded Icefyre to present his head to the Narcheska, but Thick was too excited to permit our conversation. And I sensed restlessness from the Prince that told me that he had better ways to pass his time than lingering with me. I sent him off with a stern warning to be circumspect, which I am sure he ignored.

I came back to full awareness to find the Fool nodding wearily to the Black Man’s long explanation of something. It was the most foreign babbling I had ever heard, with not a single word that I recognized. Thick insisted on reporting how he had spent his time with the Black Man, with many descriptions of food, of Chade being angry and upset, and of a wonderful sliding place he had discovered not far away. I looked at his round face, beaming with contentment. He was a wonderful man. He accepted, with equanimity, that I had returned, that the Fool was no longer dead, and that soon we would be back home without going on a boat. His joy at sliding on snow was equal to his joy at my return. I envied his easy acquiescence to change and the future.

As he prattled, I tried to decipher what the future held for me. We would go back to Buckkeep and I’d have the task of transporting the Skill-library there. Already I dreaded how many trips through the pillars that would entail. Yet that task became simple when I thought of what would follow. I had to introduce myself to Nettle. And reveal to Molly that I lived. Such a wave of longing swept through me at that thought that it near took my breath away. In restoring the full range of my memories of her, the Fool had swept my heart back in time to that moment when I first knew I had lost her. The anguish was as fresh, and my love for her as strong. I dreaded the thought of our first meeting, and all the explaining
I must do. I dreaded facing her grief for her husband, but I knew I must. Burrich had cared for my daughter when I had ‘died’. Could I do less for his little sons? And yet, it was not going to be easy. None of it was going to be easy. Yet, with an odd sideways tilt of my heart, I realized I was anticipating it, that I believed that beyond the sorrow we would share at Burrich’s death, there might eventually be something else. I felt shallow and greedy even as I thought of it, but nonetheless, it was there. It seemed years since I had looked ahead and seen opportunities and possibilities. I suddenly knew that I wanted change and life and the dangers of attempting to win Molly’s love again.

Thick shook me by the shoulder. ‘So?’ he asked me delightedly. ‘So, you want to go now?’

‘Yes,’ I found myself saying, and then discovered that I had been smiling and nodding so to his descriptions of sliding on the snow, I’d volunteered to go sliding with him. His delight was too great for me to crush it, and it suddenly came to me that I truly had nothing better to do at the moment. The Fool could do with rest and he seemed to be enjoying his talk with the Black Man. So we bundled up and went outside again. I had planned to slide with him once or twice, just enough to content him, but the slope he had found was as long and sweeping as an otter slide and just as inviting. Thick’s use of it over the last few days had polished it smooth. We slid on our bellies and then together, on top of my cloak, whooping like children, heedless of how wet and cold we got.

It was play, pure and simple. Play that I’d had no time for, that I had dismissed as unnecessary and an interruption to all the practical tasks of a well-ordered life. When had I lost sight of taking simple pleasure for the sake of pleasure? I forgot myself in it and came back to the world with a start when I heard my name being called. I had just come to the end of the slide and as I turned to the Fool’s voice, Thick crashed into me from behind. I went flying and landed, mostly unhurt, with Thick on top of me. We floundered to our feet to find the Fool watching us with amusement and fondness that was hard to look upon. Regret and wistfulness were there also. ‘You should try it,’ I told him, half-embarrassed to be caught cavorting like a boy in the first snow of the year. I
stood and helped Thick to his feet. He was grinning despite his tumble.

‘My back,’ the Fool said quietly, and I nodded, feeling suddenly subdued. I knew it was more than his newly-healed back, more than the stiffness of half-healed hurts. His experience had scarred and stiffened more than his body. I wondered how long it would be before his spirit regained its flexibility.