The Complete Farseer Trilogy: Assassin’s Apprentice, Royal Assassin, Assassin’s Quest. Robin Hobb

my mind back over the last few weeks, tried to find a way to explain. Events danced in my mind, slipped away from me. I remembered only defeat. ‘Galen tested me,’ I said slowly. ‘I failed. And he punished me for it.’ And with my words, a wave of dejection, shame and guilt swept over me, washing away the brief comfort I had taken in the familiar surroundings. On the hearth, a sleeping Smithy abruptly waked and sat up. Reflexively, I quieted him before he could whine. Lie down. Rest. It’s all right. To my relief, he did so. And to my greater relief, Burrich seemed unaware of what had passed between us. He offered me the cup.

      ‘Drink this. You need water in you, and the herbs will deaden the pain and let you sleep. Drink it all, now.’

      ‘It stinks,’ I told him, and he nodded, and held the cup my hands were too bruised to curl around. I drank it all and then lay back.

      ‘That was all?’ he asked carefully, and I knew what he referred to. ‘He tested you on a thing he had taught you, and you did not know it. So he did this to you?’

      ‘I could not do it. I didn’t have the … self-discipline. So he punished me.’ Details eluded me. Shame washed over me, drowning me in misery.

      ‘No one is taught self-discipline by beating him half to death.’ Burrich spoke carefully, stating the truth for an idiot. His movements were very precise as he set the cup back on the table.

      ‘It was not to teach me … I don’t think he believes I can be taught. It was to show the others what would happen if they failed.’

      ‘Very little worth knowing is taught by fear,’ Burrich said stubbornly. And, more warmly, ‘It’s a poor teacher who tries to instruct by blows and threats. Imagine taming a horse that way. Or a dog. Even the most knot-headed dog learns better from an open hand than a stick.’

      ‘You’ve struck me before, when trying to teach me something.’

      ‘Yes. Yes, I have. But to jolt, or warn, or awaken. Not to damage. Never to break a bone or blind an eye or cripple a hand. Never. Never say to anyone that I’ve struck you, or any creature in my care that way, for it’s not true.’ He was indignant that I could even have suggested it.

      ‘No. You’re right about that.’ I tried to think how I could make Burrich understand why I had been punished. ‘But this was different, Burrich. A different kind of learning, a different kind of teaching.’ I felt compelled to defend Galen’s justice. I tried to explain. ‘I deserved this, Burrich. The fault was not with his teaching. I failed to learn. I tried. I did try. But like Galen, I believe there is a reason the Skill is not taught to bastards. There is a taint in me, a fatal weakness.’

      ‘Horseshit.’

      ‘No. Think on it, Burrich. If you breed a scrub-mare to a fine stud, the colt you get is as likely to get the weakness of the mother as the fineness of the father.’

      The silence was long. Then, ‘I doubt much that your father would have lain down beside a woman that was a “scrub”. Without some fineness, some sign of spirit or intelligence, he would not. He could not.’

      ‘I’ve heard it said he was tranced by a mountain witch-woman.’ For the first time I repeated a tale I’d heard whispered often.

      ‘Chivalry was not a man to fall for such magickry. And his son is not some snivelling, weak-spirited fool that lies about and whines that he deserved a beating.’ He leaned closer, gently prodded just below my temple. A blast of pain rocked my consciousness. ‘That’s how near you were to losing an eye to this “teaching”.’ His temper was rising, and I kept my mouth closed. He took a quick turn around the room, then spun to face me.

      ‘That puppy. He’s from Patience’s bitch, isn’t he?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘But you haven’t … oh, Fitz, please tell me that it wasn’t your using the Wit that brought this on you. If he did this to you for that, there’s not a word I can say to anyone, or an eye I can meet anywhere in the keep or the whole kingdom.’

      ‘No, Burrich. I promise you, this had nothing to do with the pup. It was my failure to learn what I had been taught. My weakness.’

      ‘Quiet,’ he ordered me impatiently. ‘Your word is enough. I know you well enough to know your promise will always be true. But for the rest, you’re making no sense at all. Go back to sleep. I’m going out, but I’ll be back soon enough. Get some rest. It’s the real healer.’

      A purpose had settled on Burrich. My words seemed to have satisfied him finally, settled something for him. He dressed quickly, pulling on boots, changing his shirt for a loose one, and putting only a leather jerkin over it. Smithy stood and whined anxiously as Burrich went out, but could not convey his worry to me. Instead, he came to the bedside and scrabbled up, to burrow into the covers beside me and comfort me with his trust. In the bleak despair that settled over me, he was my only light. I closed my eyes and Burrich’s herbs sank me into a dreamless sleep.

      I awoke later that afternoon. A gust of cold air preceded Burrich’s entry into the room. He checked me over, casually prising open my eyes and then running competent hands down my ribs and over my other bruises. He grunted his satisfaction, then changed his torn and muddied shirt for a fresh one. He hummed as he did so, seeming in a fine mood much at odds with my bruises and depression. It was almost a relief when he left again. Below, I heard him whistling and calling orders to the stable-boys. It all sounded so normal and workaday and I longed for it with an intensity that surprised me. I wanted that back, the warm smell of the horses and dogs and straw, the simple tasks, done well and completely, and the good sleep of exhaustion at the end of a day. I longed for it, but the worthlessness that filled me now predicted that, even at that, I would fail. Galen had often sneered at those who worked such simple jobs about the keep. He had only contempt for the kitchen-maids and cooks, derision for the stable-boys, and the men-at-arms who guarded us with sword and bow, were, in his words, ‘ruffians and dolts, doomed to flail away at the world, and control with a sword what they can’t master with their minds’. So now I was strangely torn. I longed to return to being what Galen had convinced me was contemptible, yet doubt and despair filled me that I could even do so much as that.

      I was abed for two days. A jovial Burrich tended me with banter and good nature that I could not fathom. There was a briskness to his step and a sureness to him that made him seem a much younger man. It added to my dispiritedness that my injuries put him in such fine fettle. But after two days of bed rest, Burrich informed me that only so much stillness was good for a man, and it was time I was up and moving if I wished to heal well. He proceeded to find me many minor chores to perform, none heavy enough to tax my strength, but more than enough to keep me busy, for I had to rest often. I believe that the busyness was what he was after rather than any exercise for me, for all I had done was to lie in bed and look at the wall and despise myself. Faced with my unrelenting depression, even Smithy had begun to turn aside from his food. Despite this, he remained my only real source of comfort. Following me about the stable was the purest enjoyment he’d ever had. Every scent and sight he relayed to me with an intensity that, despite my bleakness, renewed in me the wonder I had first felt when I’d plunged into Burrich’s world. Smithy was savagely possessive of me as well, challenging even Sooty’s right to sniff me, and earning himself a snap from Vixen that sent him yipping and cowering to my heels.

      I begged the next day free for myself, and went into Buckkeep Town. The walk took me longer than it had ever taken me before, but Smithy rejoiced in my slow pace, for it gave him time to snuff his way around every clump of grass and tree on the way. I had thought that seeing Molly would lift my spirits, and give me some sense of my own life again. But when I got to the chandlery she was busy, filling three large orders for outbound ships. I sat by the hearth in the shop. Her father sat opposite me, drinking and glaring at me. Although his illness had weakened him, it had not changed his temperament, and on days when he was well enough to sit up, he was well enough to drink. After a while, I gave up all pretence at conversation, and simply watched him drink and disparage his daughter as Molly bustled frantically about, trying to be both efficient and hospitable to her customers. The dreary pettiness of it all depressed me.