Assassin’s Apprentice. Робин Хобб

gone. But you don’t have to answer me now. Think about it. Discuss it with Burrich, perhaps.’

      And he handed me my pith-paper and sent me back to my place. I thought about his words, but it was not Burrich I took them to. In the feeble hours of a new day, Chade and I were crouched, head to head, I picking up the red shards of a broken crock that Slink had overset while Chade salvaged the fine black seeds that had scattered in all directions. Slink clung to the top of a sagging tapestry and chirred apologetically, but I sensed his amusement.

      ‘Come all the way from Kalibar, these seeds, you skinny little pelt!’ Chade scolded him.

      ‘Kalibar,’ I said, and dredged out, ‘A day’s travel past our border with Sandsedge.’

      ‘That’s right, my boy,’ Chade muttered approvingly.

      ‘Have you ever been there?’

      ‘Me? Oh, no. I meant that they came from that far. I had to send to Fircrest for them. They’ve a large market there, one that draws trade from all six duchies and many of our neighbours as well.’

      ‘Oh. Fircrest. Have you ever been there?’

      Chade considered. ‘A time or two, when I was a younger man. I remember the noise, mostly, and the heat. Inland places are like that: too dry, too hot. I was glad to return to Buckkeep.’

      ‘Was there any other place you ever went that you liked better than Buckkeep?’

      Chade straightened slowly, his pale hand cupped full of fine black seed. ‘Why don’t you just ask me your question instead of beating around the bush?’

      So I told him of Fedwren’s offer, and also of my sudden realization that maps were more than lines and colours. They were places and possibilities, and I could leave here and be someone else, be a scribe, or …

      ‘No.’ Chade spoke softly but abruptly. ‘No matter where you went, you would still be Chivalry’s bastard. Fedwren is more perspicacious than I believed him to be, but he still doesn’t understand. Not the whole picture. He sees that here at court you must always be a bastard, must always be something of a pariah. What he doesn’t realize is that here, partaking of King Shrewd’s bounty, learning your lessons, under his eye, you are not a threat to him. Certainly, you are under Chivalry’s shadow here. Certainly it does protect you. But were you away from here, far from being unneedful of such protection, you would become a danger to King Shrewd, and a greater danger to his heirs after him. You would have no simple life of freedom as a wandering scribe. Rather you would be found in your inn bed with your throat cut some morning, or with an arrow through you on the high road.’

      A coldness shivered through me. ‘But why?’ I asked softly.

      Chade sighed. He dumped the seeds into a dish, dusted his hands lightly to shake loose those that clung to his fingers. ‘Because you’re a royal bastard, and hostage to your own blood-lines. For now, as I say, you’re no threat to Shrewd. You’re too young, and besides, he has you right where he can watch you. But he’s looking down the road. And you should be, too. These are restless times. The Outislanders are getting braver about their raids. The coast folk are beginning to grumble, saying we need more patrol ships, and some say warships of our own, to raid as we are raided. But the Inland Duchies want no part of paying for ships of any kind, especially not warships that might precipitate us into a full-scale war. They complain the coast is all the king thinks of, with no care for their farming. And the mountain folk are becoming more chary about the use of their passes. The trade fees grow steeper every month. So the merchants mumble and complain to each other. To the south, in Sandsedge and beyond, there is drought, and times are hard. Everyone there curses, as if the King and Verity were to blame for that as well. Verity is a fine fellow to have a mug with, but he is neither the soldier nor the diplomat that Chivalry was. He would rather hunt winter buck, or listen to a minstrel by the fireside than travel winter roads in raw weather, just to stay in touch with the other duchies. Sooner or later, if things do not improve, people will look about and say, “Well, a bastard’s not so large a thing to make a fuss over. Chivalry should have come to power; he’d soon put a stop to all this. He might have been a bit stiff about protocol, but at least he got things done, and didn’t let foreigners trample all over us”.’

      ‘So Chivalry might yet become King?’ The question sent a queer thrill through me. Instantly I was imagining his triumphant return to Buckkeep, our eventual meeting, and … What then?

      Chade seemed to be reading my face. ‘No, boy. Not likely at all. Even if the folk all wanted him to, I doubt that he’d go against what he set upon himself, or against the King’s wishes. But it would cause mumblings and grumblings, and those could lead to riots and skirmishes, oh, and a generally bad climate for a bastard to be running around free in. You’d have to be settled one way or another. Either as a corpse, or as the King’s tool.’

      ‘The King’s tool. I see.’ An oppression settled over me. My brief glimpse of blue skies arching over yellow roads and me travelling down them astride Sooty suddenly vanished. I thought of the hounds in their kennels instead, or of the hawk, hooded and strapped, that rode on the King’s wrist and was loosed only to do the King’s will.

      ‘It doesn’t have to be that bad,’ Chade said quietly. ‘Most prisons are of our own making. A man makes his own freedom, too.’

      ‘I’m never going to get to go anywhere, am I?’ Despite the newness of the idea, travelling suddenly seemed immensely important to me.

      ‘I wouldn’t say that.’ Chade was rummaging about for something to use as a stopper on the dish full of seeds. He finally contented himself with putting a saucer on top of it. ‘You’ll go to many places. Quietly, and when the family interests require you to go there. But that’s not all that different for any prince of the blood. Do you think Chivalry got to choose where he would go to work his diplomacy? Do you think Verity likes being sent off to view towns raided by Outislanders, to hear the complaints of folks who insist that if only they’d been better fortified or better manned, none of this would have happened? A true prince has very little freedom when it comes to where he will go or how he will spend his time. Chivalry has probably more of both now than he ever had before.’

      ‘Except that he can’t come back to Buckkeep?’ The flash of insight made me freeze, my hands full of shards.

      ‘Except he can’t come back to Buckkeep. It doesn’t do to stir folks up with visits from a former King-in-Waiting. Better he faded quietly away.’

      I tossed the shards into the hearth. ‘At least he gets to go somewhere,’ I muttered. ‘I can’t even go to town …’

      ‘And it’s that important to you? To go down to a grubby, greasy little port like Buckkeep Town?’

      ‘There are other people there …’ I hesitated. Not even Chade knew of my town friends. I plunged ahead. ‘They call me Newboy. And they don’t think “the bastard” every time they look at me.’ I had never put it into words before, but suddenly the attraction of town was quite clear to me.

      ‘Ah,’ said Chade, and his shoulders moved as if he sighed, but he was silent. And a moment later he was telling me how one could sicken a man just by feeding him rhubarb and spinach at the same sitting, sicken him even to death if the portions were sufficient, and never set a bit of poison on the table at all. I asked him how to keep others at the same table from also being sickened, and our discussion wandered from there. Only later did it seem to me that his words regarding Chivalry had been almost prophetic.

      Two days later I was surprised to be told that Fedwren had requested my services for a day or so. I was surprised even more when he gave me a list of supplies he required from town, and enough silver to buy them, with two extra coppers for myself. I held my breath, expecting that Burrich or one of my other masters would forbid it, but instead I was told to hurry on my way. I went out of the gates with a basket on my arm and my brain giddy with sudden freedom. I counted up the months since I had last been able to slip away from Buckkeep, and was shocked to find it had been a year or better. Immediately I planned to renew my old familiarity with the town. No one had told