Fool’s Fate. Робин Хобб

soon will. When Lord Golden pays me what he owes me from his gaming yesterday, I’ll get your coin to you. Had I known you were going to be so usurious about it, I never would have borrowed it from you.’

      The young man gave a low cry between dismay and outrage. ‘When Lord Golden pays you his wager? That’s as well as to say, “never”. All know he’s fallen behind in his debts. Had I known you were borrowing from me to wager against him, I’d never have loaned it.’

      ‘You flaunt your ignorance,’ she rebuked him after a moment of shocked silence. ‘All know his wealth is bottomless. When the next ship comes in from Jamaillia, he will have coin enough to pay us all.’

      From the shadows at the corner of the inn, I watched and listened intently.

      ‘If the next ship comes in from Jamaillia … which I doubt, from the way the war is going for them … it would have to be the size of a mountain to bring enough coin to pay all he owes now! Haven’t you heard that he is even behind on his rent, and that the landlord only lets him stay on because of the other business he brings here?’

      At his words, the woman turned from him angrily, but he reached out to seize her wrist. ‘Listen, you stupid wench! I warn you, I won’t wait long for what is owed me. You’d best find a way to pay me, and tonight.’ He looked her up and down and added huskily, ‘Not all of it need be in coin.’

      ‘Ah, Lady Heliotrope. There you are. I’ve been looking for you, you little minx! Have you been avoiding me?’

      The leisurely tones of Lord Golden wafted down to me as he emerged onto the balcony. The light from behind him glanced off his gleaming hair and limned his slender form. He stepped to the edge of the balcony. Leaning lightly on the rail, he gazed out over the town below him. The man immediately released the woman’s wrist and she stepped back from him with a toss of her head and went to join Lord Golden at his vantage point. She cocked her head at him and sounded like a tattling child as she complained, ‘Dear Lord Golden, Lord Capable has just told me that there is little chance you will pay me our wager. Do tell him how wrong he is!’

      Lord Golden lifted one elegant shoulder. ‘How rumours do fly, if one is but a day or so late in honouring a friendly wager. Surely one should never bet more than one can afford to lose … or afford to do without until paid. Don’t you agree, Lord Capable?’

      ‘Or, perhaps, that one should not wager more than one can immediately afford to pay,’ Lord Capable suggested snidely.

      ‘Dear, dear. Would not that limit our gaming to whatever a man could carry in his pockets? Small stakes, those. In any case, sweet lady, why do you think I was seeking you, if not to make good our bet? Here, I think, you will find a good part of what I owe you. I do hope you won’t mind if it is in pearls rather than coin.’

      She tossed her head, dismissing the surly Lord Capable. ‘I don’t mind at all. And if there are those that do, well, then they should simply be content to wait for crass coin. Gaming should not be about money, dear Lord Golden.’

      ‘Of course not. The risk is the relish, as I say, and the winning is the pleasure. Don’t you agree, Capable?’

      ‘And if I did not, would it do me any good?’ Capable asked sourly. He and I had both noticed that the woman made no immediate effort to pay him his due.

      Lord Golden laughed aloud, the melodic sound cutting the cool air of the spring night. ‘Of course not, dear fellow. Of course not! Now, I hope both of you will step within and sample a new wine with me. Standing out here in this chill wind, a man could catch his death of cold. Surely friends can find a warmer place to speak privately?’

      The others had already turned to re-enter the well-lit chamber. Yet Lord Golden paused a moment longer and gazed pensively at the spot where I had thought myself so well concealed. Then he inclined his head slightly to me before he turned and departed.

      I waited a few moments longer, then stepped from the shadows. I felt annoyed with him because he had noticed me so effortlessly and because his offer to meet me somewhere else had been too vague for me to comprehend. Yet as much as I longed to sit down and talk with him, greater was my dread that he would uncover my treachery. Better, I decided, to avoid my friend than have to confront that in his eyes. I strode sullenly through the dark streets, alone. The night wind on the back of my neck chilled me as it pushed me back toward Buckkeep Castle.

       THREE

       Trepidation

       Then Hoquin was enraged with those who questioned his treatment of his catalyst, and he resolved to make a show of his authority over her. ‘Child she may be,’ he declared. ‘And yet the burden is hers and it must be borne. And nothing must make her question her role, or sway her to save herself at the expense of condemning the world.’

       And then he required of her that she go to her parents, and deny them both, saying, ‘I have no mother, I have no father. I am only the Catalyst of the White Prophet Hoquin.’ And further she must say, ‘I give you back the name you gave me. I am Redda no longer, but Wild-eye, as Hoquin has made me.’ For he had named her thus for her one eye that always peered to one side.

       This she did not wish to do. She wept as she went, she wept as she spoke the words and she wept as she returned. For two days and two nights, the tears did not cease to flow from her eyes, and he allowed her this mourning. Then Hoquin said to her, ‘Wild-eye, cease your tears.’

       And she did. Because she must.

      Scribe Cateren, of the White Prophet Hoquin

      When a journey is twelve days away, that can seem plenty of time to put all in readiness. Even at seven days away, it seems possible that all preparations will be completed on time. But as the days dwindle to five and four and then three, the passing hours burst like bubbles, and tasks that seemed simple suddenly become complex. I needed to pack all I would require to be assassin, spy and Skillmaster, while appearing to carry only the ordinary gear of a guardsman. I had farewells to make, some simple and some difficult.

      The only part of the trip that I could look forward to with pleasure was our eventual return to Buckkeep. Dread can weary a man more than honest labour, and mine built with each passing day. Three nights before we were to sail, I felt exhausted and half-sick with it. That tension woke me long before dawn and denied me any more sleep. I sat up. The embers in the tower room’s fireplace illuminated little more than the shovel and poker leaning to one side of the hearth’s mouth. Then my eyes slowly adjusted to the gloom of the windowless chamber. It was a place familiar to me from my days as the assassin’s apprentice. Little had I thought that I would ever make it my own. I rose from Chade’s old bed, leaving behind the nightmare-rucked blankets and the warmth of sleep.

      I padded over to the fireplace and added a small log. I hung a pot of water from the hook and swung it over the low flames. I thought of putting on a kettle for tea but felt too weary still. I was too worried to sleep and too tired to admit that I was now awake for the day. It was a miserable place, one that had become achingly familiar as our departure date grew closer. I kindled a taper from the fire’s dancing flames. I lit the waiting candles in the branched candelabrum on the scarred old worktable. The chair was cold beneath me as I sat down with a groan.

      I sat at the worktable in my nightshirt and stared at the various charts I had assembled last night. They were all of Outislander origin, but so varied in size and composition that it was difficult to see their relationship to one another. It is their peculiar custom that charts of the sea can only be made on sea-mammal or fish skin. I suspected these charts had been cured in urine, for they had a peculiar and clinging odour. Out Island custom also decrees that each island must be presented as one of their gods’ runes, on its own chart. This means that there were curious flourishes and fillips on the representations that had nothing to do with the island’s physical characteristics.