I slipped it into my pocket. ‘Does Ver­ity know any­thing of this?’

  Chade con­sidered. ‘Ver­ity is as good as his name. He could not sit at table with a man he was pois­on­ing and con­ceal it. No, in this en­deav­our, stealth will serve us bet­ter than truth.’ He looked me dir­ectly in the eyes. ‘You will work alone, with no coun­sel other than your own.’

  ‘I see.’ I shif­ted on my tall wooden stool. ‘Chade?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Is this how it was for you? Your first time?’

  He looked down at his hands, and for a mo­ment he fingered the angry red scars that dot­ted the back of his left hand. The si­lence grew long, but I waited.

  ‘I was a year older than you are,’ he said at last. ‘And it was simply the do­ing of it, not the de­cid­ing if it should be done. Is that enough for you?’

  I was sud­denly em­bar­rassed without know­ing why. ‘I sup­pose,’ I mumbled.

  ‘Good. I know you meant no harm by it, boy. But men don’t talk about times spent among the pil­lows with a lady. And as­sas­sins don’t talk about … our busi­ness.’

  ‘Not even teacher to pu­pil?’

  Chade looked away from me, to a dark corner of the ceil­ing. ‘No.’ After a mo­ment more he ad­ded, ‘Two weeks from now, you’ll per­haps un­der­stand why.’

  And that was all we ever said about it.

  By my count, I was thir­teen years old.

  EIGHT

  Lady Thyme

  A his­tory of the duch­ies is a study of their geo­graphy. The Court Scribe of King Shrewd, one Fed­wren, was very fond of this say­ing. I can­not say I have ever found it wrong. Per­haps all his­tor­ies are re­count­ings of nat­ural bound­ar­ies. The seas and ice that stood between us and the Outis­landers made us sep­ar­ate peoples and the rich grass­lands and fer­tile mead­ows of the duch­ies cre­ated the riches that made us en­emies; per­haps that would be the first of a his­tory of the duch­ies. The Bear and the Vin rivers are what cre­ated the rich vine­yards and orch­ards of Tilth, as surely as the Painted Edges Moun­tains rising above Sandsedge both sheltered and isol­ated the folk there and left them vul­ner­able to our or­gan­ized armies.

  I jerked awake be­fore the moon had sur­rendered her reign over the sky, amazed that I had slept at all. Burrich had su­per­vised my travel pre­par­a­tions so thor­oughly the night be­fore that, had it been left to me, I would have de­par­ted a minute after I had swal­lowed my morn­ing por­ridge.

  But such is not the way when a group of folk set out to­gether to do any­thing. The sun was well over the ho­ri­zon be­fore we were all as­sembled and ready. ‘Roy­alty,’ Chade had warned me, ‘never travels light. Ver­ity goes on this jour­ney with the weight of the King’s sword be­hind him. All folk who see him pass know that without be­ing told. The news must run ahead to Kelvar, and to Shem­shy. The im­per­ial hand is about to re­con­cile their dif­fer­ences. They must both be left wish­ing they had never had any dif­fer­ences at all. That is the trick of good gov­ern­ment. To make folk de­sire to live in such a way that there is no need for its in­ter­ven­tion.’

  So Ver­ity trav­elled with a pomp that clearly ir­rit­ated the sol­dier in him. His picked troop of men wore his col­ours as well as the Farseer buck badges, and rode ahead of the reg­u­lar troops. To my young eyes, that was im­press­ive enough. But to keep the im­pact from be­ing too mar­tial, Ver­ity brought with him noble com­pan­ions to provide con­ver­sa­tion and di­ver­sion at the end of the day. Hawks and hounds with their hand­lers, mu­si­cians and bards, one pup­pet­eer, those who fetched and car­ried for the lords and ladies, those who saw to their gar­ments and hair and the cook­ing of fa­vour­ite dishes; bag­gage beasts; all trailed be­hind the well-moun­ted nobles, and made the tail of our pro­ces­sion.

  My place was about mid­way in the pro­ces­sion. I sat a rest­ive Sooty be­side an or­nate lit­ter borne between two sed­ate grey geld­ings. Hands, one of the brighter stable-boys, had been as­signed a pony and given charge of the horses bear­ing the lit­ter. I would man­age our bag­gage mule, and see to the lit­ter’s oc­cu­pant. This was the very eld­erly Lady Thyme whom I had never met be­fore. When she at last ap­peared to mount her lit­ter, she was so swathed in cloaks, veils and scarves that I re­ceived only the im­pres­sion that she was eld­erly in a gaunt rather than plump way, and that her per­fume caused Sooty to sneeze. She settled her­self in the lit­ter amidst a nest of cush­ions, blankets, furs and wraps, then im­me­di­ately ordered that the cur­tains be drawn and fastened des­pite the fine­ness of the morn­ing. The two little maids who had at­ten­ded her dar­ted hap­pily away, and I was left, her sole ser­vant. My heart sank. I had ex­pec­ted at least one of them to travel within the lit­ter with her. Who was go­ing to see to her per­sonal needs when her pa­vil­ion was set up? I had no no­tion as to wait­ing on a wo­man, let alone a very eld­erly one. I re­solved to fol­low Burrich’s ad­vice for a young man deal­ing with eld­erly wo­men: be at­tent­ive and po­lite, cheer­ful and pleas­ant of mien. Old wo­men were eas­ily won over by a per­son­able young man. Burrich said so. I ap­proached the lit­ter.

  ‘Lady Thyme? Are you com­fort­able?’ I in­quired. A long in­ter­val passed with no re­sponse. Per­haps she was slightly deaf. ‘Are you com­fort­able?’ I asked more loudly.

  ‘Stop both­er­ing me, young man!’ was the sur­pris­ingly vehe­ment re­sponse. ‘If I want you, I’ll tell you.’

  ‘I beg par­don,’ I quickly apo­lo­gized.

  ‘Stop both­er­ing me, I said!’ she rasped in­dig­nantly. And ad­ded in an un­der­tone, ‘Stu­pid churl.’

  At this, I had the sense to be quiet, though my dis­may in­creased ten­fold. So much for a merry and com­pan­ion­able ride. Even­tu­ally I heard the horns cry out and saw Ver­ity’s pen­nant lif­ted far ahead of us. Dust drift­ing back told me that our fore­guard had be­gun the jour­ney. Long minutes passed be­fore the horses in front of us moved. Hands star­ted the lit­ter horses and I chir­ruped to Sooty. She stepped out eagerly and the mule fol­lowed resign­edly.

  I well re­call that day. I re­mem­ber the dust hanging thick in the air from all those who pre­ceded us, and how Hands and I con­versed in lowered voices, for the first time we laughed aloud, Lady Thyme scol­ded, ‘Stop that noise!’ I also re­mem­ber bright blue skies arch­ing from hill to hill as we fol­lowed the gentle un­du­la­tions of the coast road. There were breath­tak­ing views of the sea from the hill­tops, and flower-scen­ted air thick and drowsy in the vales. There were also the shep­herd­esses, all in a row on top of a stone wall to giggle and point and blush at us while we passed. Their fleecy charges dot­ted the hill­side be­hind them, and Hands and I ex­claimed softly at the way they had bundled their bright skirts to one side and knot­ted them up, leav­ing their knees and legs bare to the sun and wind. Sooty was rest­ive and bored with our slow pace, while poor Hands was con­stantly nudging his old pony in the ribs to make it keep up.

  We stopped twice dur­ing the day, to al­low riders to dis­mount and stretch, and to let the horses wa­ter. Lady Thyme did not emerge from her lit­ter, but one time tartly re­minded me that I should have brought her wa­ter by now. I bit my tongue and fetched her a drink. It was as close as we came to con­ver­sa­tion.

  We hal­ted when the sun was still above the ho­ri­zon. Hands and I erec­ted Lady Thyme’s small pa­vil­ion while she dined within her lit­ter from a wicker bas­ket of cold meat, cheese and wine that she had thought­fully provided for her­self. Hands and I fared more poorly, on sol­dier’s ra­tions of hard bread and harder cheese and dried meat. In the midst of my meal, Lady Thyme de­man­ded that I es­cort her from the lit­ter to her pa­vil­ion. She emerged draped and veiled as if for a bliz­zard. Her finery was of vary­ing col­ours and de­grees of age, but all had been both ex­pens­ive and well cut at one time. Now, as she leaned heav­ily on me and tottered along, I smelled a re­puls­ive ca­co­phony of dust and mil­dew and per­fume, with an un­der­ly­ing scent of ur­ine. She tartly dis­missed me at the door, and warned me that she had a knife and would use it if I at­temp­ted to enter and bother her in any way. ‘And well do I know how to use it, young man!’ she threatened me.

  Our sleep­ing ac­com­mod­a­tions were also the same as the sol­diers’: the ground and our cloaks. But the night was fine and we made a small fire. Hands teased and giggled about my sup­posed lust for Lady Thyme and the knife that awaited me if I should at­tempt to sat­isfy it. That led to a wrest­ling match between us, un­til Lady Thyme shrilled threats at us for keep­ing her awake. Then we spoke softly as Hands told me that no one had en­vied my as­sign­ment to her; that any­one who had ever jour­neyed with her avoided her ever after. He warned me also that my worst task was yet to come, but adam­antly re­fused, though his eyes brimmed with tears of laughter, to let me know what it was. I fell asleep eas­ily, for boy-like, I had put my true mis­sion out of my head un­til I should have to face it.

  I awoke at dawn to the twit­ter­ing of birds and the over-whelm­ing stench of a brim­ming cham­ber­pot out­side Lady Thyme’s pa­vil­ion. Though my stom­ach had been hardened by clean­ing stables and ken­nels, it was all I could force my­self to do to dump it and cleanse it be­fore re­turn­ing it to her. By then she was harpy­ing at me through the tent door that I had not yet brought her wa­ter, hot or cold, nor cooked her por­ridge whose in­gredi­ents she had set out. Hands had dis­ap­peared, to share the troop’s fire and ra­tions, leav­ing me to deal with my tyr­ant. By the time I had served her on a tray that she as­sured me was slov­enly ar­ranged, and cleaned the dishes and pot and re­turned all to her, the rest of the pro­ces­sion was al­most ready to leave. But she would not al­low her pa­vil­ion to be struck un­til she was safely within her lit­ter. We ac­com­plished that pack­ing in a frantic haste and I found my­self fi­nally on my horse without a crumb of break­fast in­side me.

  I was raven­ous after my morn­ing’s work. Hands re­garded my glum face with some sym­pathy and mo­tioned me to ride closer to him. He leaned over to speak to me.

  ‘Every­one but us had heard of her be­fore.’ This with a furt­ive nod to­ward Lady Thyme’s lit­ter. ‘The stench she makes every morn­ing is a le­gend. White­lock says she used to go along on a lot of Chiv­alry’s trips … She has re­l­at­ives all over the Six Duch­ies, and not much to do ex­cept visit them. All the men in the troop say they learned a long time ago to stay out of her range or she puts them to a bunch of use­less er­rands. Oh, and White­lock sent you this. He says not to ex­pect to sit down and eat as long as you’re tend­ing her. But he’ll try to set aside a bit for you each morn­ing.’

  Hands passed me a wad of camp-bread with three rash­ers of ba­con greas­ily cold in­side it. It tasted won­der­ful. I wolfed down the first few bites greed­ily.

  ‘Churl!’ shrilled Lady Thyme from in­side her lit­ter. ‘What are you do­ing up there? Dis­cuss­ing your bet­ters, I’ve no doubt. Get back to your po­s­i­tion! How are you to see to my needs if you’re gal­li­vant­ing ahead like that?’

  I quickly reined Sooty in and dropped back to a po­s­i­tion along­side the lit­ter. I swal­lowed a great lump of bread and ba­con and man­aged to ask, ‘Is there any­thing your lady­ship re­quires?’

  ‘Don’t talk with your mouth full,’ she snapped. ‘And stop both­er­ing me. Stu­pid clod.’

  And so it went. The road fol­lowed the coast­line, and at our laden pace it took us a full five days to reach Neat­bay. Other than two small vil­lages, our scenery con­sisted of windswept cliffs, gulls, mead­ows and oc­ca­sional stands of twis­ted and stun­ted trees. Yet to me it seemed full of beau­ties and won­ders, for every bend in the road brought me to a place I had never seen be­fore.

  As our jour­ney wore on, Lady Thyme be­came more tyr­an­nical. By the fourth day she had a con­stant stream of com­plaints, few of which I could do any­thing about. Her lit­ter swayed too much; it was mak­ing her ill. The wa­ter I brought from a stream was too cold, that from my own wa­ter bags too warm. The men and horses ahead of us were rais­ing too much dust; they were do­ing it on pur­pose, she was sure. And tell them to stop singing those rude songs. With her to deal with I had no time to think about killing or not killing Lord Kelvar, even if I had wanted to.

  Early on the fifth day we saw the rising smoke of Neat­bay. By noon we could pick out the lar­ger build­ings and the Neat­bay watchtower on the cliffs above the town. Neat­bay was a much gentler piece of land than Buck­keep. Our road wound down through a wide val­ley. The blue wa­ters of Neat­bay it­self opened wide be­fore us. The beaches were sandy, and their fish­ing fleet was all shal­low draught ves­sels with flat bot­toms, or spunky little dor­ies that rode the waves like gulls. Neat­bay didn’t have the deep an­chor­age that Buck­keep did, so it was not the ship­ping and trad­ing port that we were, but all the same it seemed to me it would have been a fine place to live.

  Kelvar sent an hon­our guard to meet us, so there was a delay as they ex­changed form­al­it­ies with Ver­ity’s troops. ‘Like two dogs sniff­ing each other’s bung-holes,’ Hands ob­served sourly. By stand­ing in my stir­rups, I was able to see far enough down the line to ob­serve the of­fi­cial pos­tur­ings, and grudgingly nod­ded my agree­ment. Even­tu­ally we got un­der way again, and were soon rid­ing through the streets of Neat­bay town it­self.

  Every­one else pro­ceeded straight up to Kelvar’s keep, but Hands and I were ob­liged to es­cort Lady Thyme’s lit­ter through sev­eral back­streets to reach the par­tic­u­lar inn that she in­sisted on us­ing. From the look on the cham­ber­maid’s face, she had gues­ted there be­fore. Hands took the lit­ter horses and lit­ter to the stables, but I had to en­dure her lean­ing heav­ily on my arm as I es­cor­ted her to her cham­ber. I wondered what she had eaten that had been so foully spiced as to make her every breath a trial to me. She dis­missed me at the door, warn­ing myriad pun­ish­ments if I didn’t re­turn promptly in seven days. As I left, I felt sym­pathy for the cham­ber­maid, for Lady Thyme’s voice was lif­ted in a loud tirade about thiev­ing maids she had en­countered in the past, and ex­actly how she wanted the bed lin­ens ar­ranged on the bed.

  With a light heart I moun­ted Sooty and called to Hands to make haste. We cantered through the streets of Neat­bay, and man­aged to re­join the tail of Ver­ity’s pro­ces­sion as they entered Kelvar’s keep. Bay­guard was built on flat land that offered little nat­ural de­fence, but was for­ti­fied by a series of walls and ditches that an en­emy would have had to sur­mount be­fore fa­cing the stout stone walls of the keep. Hands told me that raid­ers had never got past the second ditch and I be­lieved him. Work­men were do­ing main­ten­ance on the walls and ditches as we passed, but they hal­ted and watched in won­der as the King-in-Wait­ing came to Bay­guard.

  Once keep gates closed be­hind us, there was an­other in­ter­min­able wel­com­ing ce­re­mony. Men and horses and all, we were kept stand­ing in the mid­day sun while Kelvar and Bay­guard wel­comed Ver­ity. Horns soun­ded and then the mut­ter of of­fi­cial voicings muted by shift­ing horses and men. But at last it was over. This was sig­nalled by a sud­den gen­eral move­ment of men and beasts as the form­a­tions ahead of us broke up.

  Men dis­moun­ted and Kelvar’s stable-folk were sud­denly among us, dir­ect­ing us where to wa­ter our mounts, where we might rest for the night, and most im­port­ant to any sol­dier, where we might ourselves wash and eat. I fell in be­side Hands as we led Sooty and his pony to­ward the stables. I heard my name called and turned to see Sig from Buck­keep point­ing me out to someone in Kelvar’s col­ours.

  ‘There he be: that’s the fitz. Ho, Fitz! Sit­swell here says you’re summoned. Ver­ity wants you in his cham­ber; Leon’s sick. Hands, you take Sooty for the fitz.’

  I could al­most feel the food be­ing snatched from my jaws. But I took a breath and presen­ted a cheer­ful coun­ten­ance to Sit­swell, as Burrich had coun­selled me. I doubt that dour man even no­ticed. To him I was just one more boy un­der­foot on a hec­tic day. He took me to Ver­ity’s cham­ber and left me, ob­vi­ously re­lieved to re­turn to his stables. I tapped softly and Ver­ity’s man opened the door at once.

  ‘Ah! Thank Eda it’s you. Come in, then, for the beast won’t eat and Ver­ity’s sure it’s ser­i­ous. Hurry up, Fitz.’

  The man wore Ver­ity’s badge, but was no one I re­membered hav­ing met. Some­times it was dis­con­cert­ing how many folk knew who I was when I had no ink­ling who they were. In an ad­join­ing cham­ber Ver­ity was splash­ing and in­struct­ing someone loudly about what gar­ments he wished for the even­ing. But he was not my con­cern. Leon was.

  Leon was Ver­ity’s wolf­hound. I groped to­ward him, for I had no qualms about it when Burrich wasn’t about, Leon lif­ted his bony head and re­garded me with mar­tyred eyes. He was ly­ing on Ver­ity’s sweaty shirt in a corner by a cold hearth. He was too hot, he was bored, and if we weren’t go­ing to hunt any­thing he wanted to go home.

  I made a show of run­ning my hands over him and lift­ing his lips to ex­am­ine his gums and then press­ing my hand down firmly on his belly. I fin­ished all this by scratch­ing be­hind his ears and then told Ver­ity’s man, ‘There’s noth­ing wrong with him, he just isn’t hungry. Let’s give him a bowl of cold wa­ter and wait. When he wants to eat, he’ll let us know. And let’s take away all this, be­fore it spoils in this heat and he eats it any­way and be­comes really sick.’ I re­ferred to a dish already over­filled with scraps of pastries from a tray that had been set for Ver­ity. None of it was fit for the dog, but I was so hungry I wouldn’t have minded din­ing off the scraps my­self; in fact my stom­ach growled at the sight of it. ‘I won­der if I found the kit­chens, per­haps they would have a fresh, beef bone for him? Some­thing that’s more toy than food is what he would wel­come most now …’