Fool's Quest (32 page)

He looked down suddenly.

I hazarded a guess. “A man behind you attacked you? He knocked you unconscious?”

“No. No one touched me. I dropped my sword to the ground. And the two men I'd been fighting just stood and laughed at me. One gave me a hard push as I walked by him, and I didn't care. And I walked outside and stood in the snow in front of the manor. And I still don't know why.”

Skill-suggestion?
Chade's thought brushed lightly against mine.

I nodded, unwilling to make the effort to do more. To Skill to him, I'd have to drop my walls and let in that fog of
forget, forget, forget.
I would not forget. “Don't worry about what you don't know,” I suggested gently. “It's obvious magic was at work. You had no way to resist it. Just tell us what you do know.”

“Yes,” he said unwillingly. But he was shaking his head no.

“Do you want more of the elfbark?” Chade asked.

“No. I remember what happened that day, and on the days since. I don't understand it, but I recall it. I'm just ashamed to speak it aloud.”

“Lant, Fitz and I have both known our share of defeats. We've been burned, poisoned, beaten. And yes, we've been buffeted by Skill, made fools of, and done things we're ashamed to admit. No matter what you did or didn't do, we won't think less of you. Your hands were bound, even if there was no rope you could see. If we are to rescue your sister and little Bee, you have to set your pride aside and just tell us what you know.”

Chade's voice was comforting. A father's voice. Something cynical inside me wondered if he would have been that forgiving of me, but I quenched it.

It took Lant a little time. He rocked in his chair once or twice, cleared his throat, and then said nothing. When he spoke again, his voice was higher and tighter. “I stood with the others out in the snow. People walked out of the manor and came and stood near me. There were a few men on horseback but I didn't feel that they were keeping me there. I was afraid of them but mostly I was afraid to do anything except stay there with the others. No. Not afraid, not even reluctant. It just seemed that what I was doing was the only possible thing I could do. Everyone was there, milling about. Lots of people were weeping and agitated, but no one was talking to anyone else. No one resisted. Even the injured just stood and bled.” He paused again, his mind going back.

Bulen tapped on the door. “Sir? I am so sorry to disappoint you. I have been down to the cottages where the stableworkers live. No one there has any recollection of a lad named Perseverance or admits to being his family.”

I felt like a ninny. I looked at the boy. His eyes were dark with sorrow. He spoke softly. “It's the third cottage. There is a hedge-witch charm over the door for good luck. And my grandfather made a doorknocker out of a cart horse's shoe. My mother's name is Diligent.”

Bulen was nodding. I amended his orders. “Do not make mention of her son at all. Tell her we wish to speak to her to see if she will take on some extra tasks in the kitchen.”

“Oh, she'd like that,” Perseverance said quietly. “She's always after Da to build her an oven behind the cottage so she could bake whenever she wanted.”

“Very well, sir. And Steward Dixon sends to tell you that the guardsmen are eating everything within sight. As our larders were not well stocked this fall …”

Our larders had been overflowing before the raid. “Tell him to send a man and wagon to Withy and stock whatever he thinks we need for now. Next market day, he can make a trip to Oaksbywater. I will settle with the merchants later. They know we are good for it.”

“Very good, sir.” Bulen cast a worried look at FitzVigilant. He had only served him for a short time, but there was already a bond between the young men. “Is there anything I can bring for Scribe Lant?”

Lant did not even shift his eyes toward Bulen. Chade shook his head silently and the man withdrew. “Lant?” he said softly.

FitzVigilant drew a deep breath and took up his tale as if it were a heavy burden. “We were all there. And they brought out Shun and her maid. I remember I noticed that Shun was fighting them, because no one else was. She was kicking and screaming at the man who dragged her. Then from somewhere, she had a knife and she stabbed his hand. She almost broke free. He grabbed her by the shoulder and slapped her so hard that she fell. He still had to throttle the knife out of her hand. He pushed her toward us and walked away. Then she looked all around and when she saw me, she came running to me. She was screaming, ‘Do something! Why isn't anyone doing anything?' She threw her arms around me, but I just stood there. Then she asked me, ‘What's wrong with you?' And I couldn't think of anything wrong at all. I said we should just stand with the others. It was what I wanted to do. And she asked, ‘If it's what they want to do, why are they moaning?' ” He stopped and swallowed. “I listened, then. And they were. Moaning and weeping but in a disconnected way. And I realized I'd been doing it, too.”

Only Shun had fought back. Why? Had the training Chade had provided for her made her bolder than the others? I'd hired no servants for their skill with arms, but I was sure my stablefolk had seen a brawl or three. Yet no one had fought back. Except Shun. I looked at Chade. He didn't meet my eyes, and I was forced to set the question aside for later.

“The guards on horseback started shouting at us to ‘sit down, sit down.' Some yelled in Chalcedean, some in our tongue. I didn't sit, because I was already too cold and there was snow on the ground. And I felt that as long as I stayed with the others in the carriage turnaround, I was doing what I should be doing. One of the men started making threats. He was looking for someone, a pale boy, and said he would kill us all if we did not turn him over to them. I knew of no such lad, and apparently no one else did. There was Oak, who you had hired as a serving man. He was blond, but scarcely a boy. But someone said to one of the men that he was the only towhead working at Withywoods. He was standing not far from me. And the man who was asking rode his horse over to Oak, looked down on him, and then pointed. ‘Him?' he shouted at this other man. He was dressed all in white, and though he looked like a prosperous merchant, his face was a boy's. He shook his head and the man on the horse was suddenly very angry. ‘Not him!' he shouted and then he leaned down and slashed Oak's throat with his sword. And he fell into the snow, with the blood leaping from the wound. He lifted his hand to his throat, as if he could hold it back. But he couldn't. He looked right at me until he died. Blood steams when the day is that cold. I never knew that. And I just watched.

“But Shun didn't. She screamed, and cursed the man on the horse, saying she would kill him. She started to run at him. And I didn't know why, but I caught hold of her arm and tried to hold her back. I struggled with her. And a man on a horse rode over and kicked me hard in the head, so I let go of her. Then he leaned down and thrust his sword through me. And he laughed as I fell right onto Oak's body. His blood was still warm. I remember that.”

Oak. A young man hired to help serve the dinners. A smiling young man, unlearned at serving in a house, but always smiling, and so proud of his new livery. Oak, a lifeless body, seeping red into white snow. He had come to us from Withy. Did his parents wonder yet why he had not come home to visit?

There was a noise at the door. It was Thick, coming back with a platter of little raisin cakes. He was smiling as he offered them to us. He looked puzzled when Chade and Lant and I shook our heads. Perseverance took one, but held it in his hand. Thick smiled and sat down on the hearth with the plate on his lap. He made a great show of choosing one. His simple enjoyment of a little cake rang sharply against my heart. Why could not it be my little girl, my Bee, sitting there with a whole plate of cakes to herself and no worries?

Lant had paused, his brow furrowed. He looked up at Chade, as if to find what the old man thought of his words. Chade's face was expressionless. “Go on,” he said in a voice both quiet and wooden.

“I don't remember anything after that. Not until I woke very late at night. I was alone in the carriageway. Oak's body was gone, and it was fully dark, except for the light from the stables. They were burning. But no one was paying any attention to the fire. I didn't think about any of that, then. I didn't notice Oak's body was gone or that the stables were burning. I got up. I felt very dizzy and the pain in my arm and shoulder was terrible, and I was so cold I was shaking all over. I staggered inside and went to my room. Bulen was there, and he said he was glad to see me. And I told him I'd been hurt. And he bandaged me and helped me to bed, and said Old Rosie the shepherd's granny was in the manor doing some healing. And she came and saw to my shoulder.”

“Bulen didn't ride to Withy to get a real healer? Or to Oaksbywater?” Chade was obviously appalled that someone's granny had tended to his son's sword wound.

Lant knit his brows. “No one wanted to leave the house and grounds. And no one wanted any strangers to come in. We all agreed on that. Just as we agreed that someone must have been drunk and careless to burn the stables. But none of us really cared. I could not recall how I had been injured. Some said there had been a drunken brawl, others that there were injuries from the stable fire. But no one was clear about what had happened. And we didn't care, really. It wasn't something to dwell on.” He looked up at Chade suddenly, a piercing, pleading look. “What did they do to me? How did they do that?”

“We think they imposed a strong Skill-suggestion on you and the others. And then suggested that you keep reinforcing it with one another. You were all to refuse to remember, to not think about it, to be unwelcoming to outsiders, and to have no desire to leave the estate. It was the perfect way to cover up what had happened here.”

“Was it my fault? Was I weak, that they could do that to me?” There was agony in that question.

“No.” Chade was very certain. “It was not your fault. A person with great Skill-talent can impose his will on another and make him believe almost anything. It was one of King Verity's best weapons against the Red Ships during the war.” More softly he added, “I never thought to see it used like this, within Buck's boundaries. It took tremendous strength and Skill to do this. Who has that sort of knowledge of the magic? And that sort of talent for it?”

“I could do that,” Thick announced. “I know how to do it now. Make a music to forget, forget, and make them all sing the same song, over and over. Probably not hard. I just never thought of doing that before. I could do that if you want?”

I don't think I have ever heard more chilling words. Thick and I were friends now, but in the past, we had had our differences. For the most part, the simple man had a generous heart. But crossed, he had proved he was capable of making me so clumsy that I constantly barked my shins or bumped my head in doorways. His magical strength was far beyond my own. Should he ever decide that I should forget something, would I even know he had done it? I lifted my eyes and met Chade's gaze. I saw the same thought in his eyes.

“Didn't say I would do it,” Thick reminded us. “Just said I could do it.”

“I think taking someone's memories is wrong and bad,” I said. “Like taking someone's coins or their sweets.”

Thick's tongue had curled over his upper lip. It was his thinking expression. “Yah,” he replied gravely. “Probably bad.”

Chade had picked up my teapot and was weighing it thoughtfully in his hand. “Thick. Could you make a song that let people remember? Not one that forced people to remember, but one that told them they could remember if they wanted to.”

“Don't do it yet!” I intervened. “Think about it, and tell us if you think it can be done. But maybe we shouldn't do that, either.”

“Do you think we have enough elfbark to make tea for all of Withywoods? Even if a courier brings my supply also? Fitz, with every minute, every hour, Bee and Shun may be in greater danger. At the very least, they are moving away from us. At worst, well, I refuse to consider the worst. But we need to know what happened after Lant was knocked unconscious. We both know that their tracks are totally obscured by now, with all the snow and wind we've had. And if the raiders can make Withywoods folk forget what happened here, can they make folk forget they've seen them passing? As we've had no news of strangers in this part of Buck, I consider that likely. So our only hope is to find out who they were and what their plans were. They came a long way and apparently made very elaborate plans to get something. What?”

“Who,” Lant corrected him. “They wanted a pale boy.”

“The Unexpected Son,” I said quietly. “From the White Prophecies. Chade, the Fool told me that was why he was tortured. The Servants are looking for the next White Prophet, and they thought the Fool would know where to find him.”

A tap at the door turned my gaze that way. Bulen poked his head in. “Sir, I've brought her.”

“Please bring her in,” I invited him. As Bulen opened the door and the woman entered, Perseverance came to his feet. He stared at her with dog's eyes. I saw his lip quiver and then he clenched his jaws.

I had possibly met his mother when I first came to Withywoods, but I doubted our paths had crossed much since then. She was a typical Buck woman, with curly black hair bundled into a lace net at the back of her head and soft brown eyes. She was slender for a woman of her years, and her clothing was well cared for. She bobbed a curtsy to us and politely but eagerly asked about the position in the kitchen. I let Chade reply.

“This lad who has worked in the stables says you have a reputation as an excellent baker.”

Diligent turned a polite smile on Perseverance but showed no sign of recognition. Chade continued, “I understand that you live in the cottages used by the stable hands. We are looking into the stable fire that happened on Winterfest eve. Lives were lost in that fire, and we are trying to get an accurate accounting of how it may have started. Did you know any of the stable hands?”