The city itself had more buildings and larger ones than ever I had seen, even larger than Sewelsby. ‘That’s because the city was built for the dragons as much as for the Elderlings,’ Per told me. ‘Look at the steps, how wide they are, and the height of the doors on that building!’ He had already recounted so many wonders that I would soon see that I could hardly bear to wait for the time it took to secure Tarman to the dock.
I jumped when Lant suddenly shouted right beside me, ‘Hoy, Clansie! By Eda and El! Marden! Nick! Look at them! They’re here! They’re here, in Kelsingra!’ He was literally hopping up and down with excitement, and it was a few moments before I could wring from him that the folk on the dock were from Buckkeep Castle, the Queen’s Own Coterie, my sister Nettle’s special Skill-users. Spark had never met them, while Per was as ignorant as I was. There were three of the Buck folk and they looked almost like a different kind of human, with their short stature, dark skin and dark curling hair, beside the tall, slender Elderlings with skin and scales in every imaginable colour and pattern.
‘They’ve come to take us home,’ Amber said softly. She put an arm around me and a hand on my shoulder. I tolerated it. I thought of that word as the ropes were tied and a walkway put down for us. Home. It would not be home for me. But I was about to meet the people who served my sister Nettle, those she had chosen and trained. I straightened my shoulders and patted my hair flatter, but felt it pop up again. I did not need to brush my Elderling garb. It hung, sparkling and immaculate, on me. As we drew closer to the dock, I made myself smile. I lifted my hand and waved to them. Per took my other hand. ‘He would be proud of you,’ he whispered.
Kelsingra was as astonishing as Per said it would be, but it exhausted me. Everything was a whirl and a blur. Elderlings both real and shadowy were celebrating in the streets. We were welcomed as if we were royalty, and it was Per who reminded me that I was. The members of Nettle’s special Skill-coterie had their walls up so tight against the city that I could barely sense them. I tried to copy them, but perhaps some residue of serpent spit in my blood made me more vulnerable. All the beauties and wonders of Kelsingra could not charm me enough to make me remain in that cacophony of voices and whirling rainbow of colour and sights. Clansie, the woman who led the coterie, gave me a tea of mint and valerian with a dark, bitter aftertaste. As she had warned me it might, it deadened me to the voices.
But it also freed my sadness from where I had hidden it. Even during the dinners and entertainments, even when the two Paragon dragons demanded to see me, even as I gave my rehearsed speech thanking them for helping to free me, tears would roll. The dragons told me that my father would be remembered as a friend to dragons and a vengeance-taker. As long as dragons flew and serpents swam, he would be remembered. They regretted that they had not been able to eat his body and preserve all his memories. I laughed aloud at this in horror. Fortunately, they took that as my joy at their wish to have made my father their dinner.
Then that was over and I slept. But even sleep was not rest, for the distant voices tugged at me. Even when I rode in a tiny boat on a cable across the river to the Village I heard the voices and knew the story of the shattered bridge in the river below us.
There on the other side the rest of the coterie had been busy with Rain Wilders who were ‘Touched’. They had been there for two months, and had done, I was told, miracles for people. Four pregnancies were attributed to their putting their hands on women’s bellies and opening something for them. A young man who had been dying from his inability to breathe normally had been revived and healed and celebrated his son’s third birthday. All of these joyous things were attributed to my father’s wishes to bring them there.
But they could no longer stay, because I had come there. I was resting in a lovely chamber where fish swam in the walls and leapt over my head. They made me ill just watching them. King Reyn and Queen Malta had come to visit me on the day that Clansie told them we all had to leave. ‘Only the teas I am giving her are keeping her sane and preventing her from slipping away altogether. You would call it drowning in memories. If we keep her here longer, she will fall into unresponsiveness. We must take her home.’
‘Will you travel through the pillars as you did to come here?’ Queen Malta asked, and they nodded.
Beloved was still being Amber. She was sitting by my bedside in a chair. She held my hand in her gloved one. The tea and the sadness it gave me had renewed my dislike of her. I didn’t like the touch but she helped to anchor me. Per had been best at that. He was so immune to the magic that I could hide inside him. But when I had told Clansie that, she had frowned and said that what I was doing was drawing off his strength, and that doing so put him in danger. So Clansie had separated us.
‘It’s too dangerous for Bee to travel that way,’ Amber objected.
Clansie was very calm as she said, ‘The Skillmistress has decided that the whole coterie will travel with you, and take all of you back to Buckkeep at once.’
‘I don’t agree,’ Amber objected in Fool’s voice, and Clansie replied, ‘It is neither your decision nor mine. Tomorrow we depart.’
I drew a deep breath of relief and sank into sleep. I did not bother to listen to the rest of their long farewells to the king and queen of the Elderlings. I would see my sister soon. And Riddle.
FORTY-FIVE
* * *
A Princess of the Farseers
A grey man is singing in the wind. He is as grey as storm clouds, grey as rain on a windowpane. He is smiling as the wind blows past him. His hair and his cloak stream in the wind and tatter away. He tatters with them, until only his song is left.
I awakened from the dream smiling. It is a promise, and a good one. It will happen.
Bee Farseer’s dream journal
I was royal now. I did not much like it. I understood why my father had tried to spare me from it.
The journey through the Skill-pillar was uneventful. The horrid procession to it, and the endless farewells and the dragons trumpeting overhead that preceded it, were all extended agony. Oh, how stiffly I smiled, and curtsied and thanked everyone. I had begged for Per and they let me have him. I held tight to his hand on one side and to Clansie on the other, and through we went like a string of beads.
Only to discover that on the other side, there was a welcoming party gathered and there would be another procession, and a feast that night followed by music and dancing. I held tight to Per’s hand as they announced it. It was only when he said, ‘I feel dizzy,’ that I knew what I was doing. I let go of him then. Riddle had been standing beside me on the other side. He suddenly stepped between us and put one hand on my shoulder and one on Per’s. We both felt better for that touch.