There are always those dark thoughts, I must believe, when a deep friendship ends so abruptly. But every wound becomes a scar, eventually. That one never entirely ceased being tender, but I had learned to live with it. It did not intrude on me every moment. I had a home, a family, a loving wife, and then a child to raise with her. And though Molly’s death had reawakened those echoes of loss and abandonment, I did not think I had been dwelling on it.
Then the messenger arrived. And a message so poorly conveyed or badly constructed that it made little sense. She had hinted that there had been other messengers who had not reached me. A memory stirred. All those years ago. A girl messenger, and three strangers. Blood on the floor, and bloody fingerprints on the Fool’s face. That scream …
I felt dizzied and sick. My heart hurt as if someone had squeezed it. What message had I missed, all those years ago? What death had that messenger endured that night?
The Fool had not forsaken or ignored me. Years ago, he had reached out for me. To warn me, or to beg for help? I’d missed his message, and let it go unanswered. Suddenly that hurt me more than all the years of thinking he had abandoned our friendship. The thought that he had vainly waited for years for some sort of response from me was a razor-edged pain.
But I did not know how to reach him now, or how to begin on this quest he had set for me. And I had no idea where to search for his son, or what sort of a person I would be seeking.
I pushed the thought from my mind. I needed sleep, at least a little sleep, before the dawn came.
But there was the killing. Ironic, that the one person who had understood how little I wanted to continue as an assassin had been involved in forcing my return to that profession. I did not regret my decision; I remained absolutely certain it had been the correct one. But I resented that I’d had to make such a decision, and was deeply agitated that my child had been forced to witness me disposing of a body, and to bear the burden of keeping that secret.
When Shun’s ghost hysteria was settled and after I had moved my sleeping child from Molly’s chair to a couch, I had fetched a blanket from my bed and the bit of writing, thinking to study it one more time. But it was worse than useless. I concealed it beneath some forgotten mending in Molly’s sewing basket and looked around her placid room. The fire was down to coals; I fed it. I took a pillow from her chair, and felt guilty about putting the pretty thing on the floor. I lay down in front of the fire and flipped and kicked at the blanket until it somewhat covered me. The stitches of Molly’s embroidery on the cushion pressed into my cheek. I resolved to put all questions and fears out of my head and just sleep. For now there was no immediate threat to me and mine, I had no idea what to do about the peculiar message, and there was nothing I could do about Shun’s dramatics. I closed my eyes and emptied my mind. Clean snow falling on a wooded hillside. I took a deep, steadying breath and told myself there was a hint of deer scent in the crisp wind. I smiled. Do not agonize about yesterday. Do not borrow tomorrow’s trouble. Let your heart hunt. Rest in the now. I filled my lungs slowly and as slowly let the air out. I drifted to a place, not sleeping, not waking. I was a wolf on a snowy hillside, taking in deer scent, and living only in the now.
Fitz?
No.
Fitz? I know you’re awake.
I’m not, really. My mind drifted against Chade’s, a boat tethered to a dock. I more than wanted to be asleep. I needed to be asleep, to float freely away on that current.
I felt him sigh in annoyance. Very well. But tomorrow, remember this as more than a dream. I’m sending the lad to you. They beat him badly, and if the city guard hadn’t chanced upon the scene and chased them off, it’s likely they would have killed him. But he’s well enough to ride, or will be in a few more days, and I think my best course is to send him away from Buckkeep as soon as possible.
The windswept winter forest had vanished. I opened my eyes. There was the smell of smoke and burning flesh on my hands and shirt. I should have washed. And found a nightshirt instead of sleeping in my clothes. I was too tired, too tired of all of it to do any of it right. If I’d reported to you like that when I was twelve, you’d have called me an idiot and hit me with something.
That’s probably true. But I’ve been trying to reach you for hours. What made you put up your walls so stoutly? I began to think you’d taken my advice and sealed yourself against the Skill whenever you were sleeping.
Probably something I should do. I hadn’t even been aware I’d put my walls up, but suddenly knew when I’d done it. Keeping my walls up around Bee was a habit, but I’d always left a chink for deliberate Skilling. I suppose it had been old instinct to raise them to full resistance during the kill. I’d wanted no chance witnesses to that. Easing into sleep must have lowered them. I told him half a truth. I was preoccupied with Shun. She believes in ghosts and thought her room was haunted by some unfortunate child from her past. Evidently he got the poison that had been meant for her. Not her fault, but when she hears a strange noise at night, it’s hard to convince her of that.
Is she all right? Anxiety thrummed in his Skilling.