I looked into the fire at the leap­ing flames. ‘My friend was liv­ing in Silt­bay. I need to find out …’

  ‘Oh, Fitz.’ There was more sym­pathy in Ver­ity’s voice than I could stand.

  A sud­den wave of wear­i­ness washed over me. I was glad to sit again. My hands began to tremble. I put them be­low the table and clasped them to still them. I still felt the tremors, but at least no one could see my weak­ness now.

  He cleared his throat. ‘Go to your room and rest,’ he said kindly. ‘Do you want a man to ride with you to Silt­bay to­mor­row?’

  I shook my head dumbly, sud­denly and miser­ably cer­tain of what I would dis­cover. The thought made me sick. An­other shud­der went through me. I tried to breathe slowly, to calm my­self and edge back from the fit that threatened. I could not abide the thought of sham­ing my­self that way be­fore Ver­ity.

  ‘Shame to me, not you, to have ig­nored how ill you have been.’ He had risen si­lently. He set his glass of wine be­fore me. ‘The dam­age you took was taken for me. I am ap­palled by what I al­lowed to be­fall you.’

  I forced my­self to meet Ver­ity’s eyes. He knew all that I tried to con­ceal. Knew it, and was miser­able with guilt.

  ‘It is not of­ten this bad,’ I offered.

  He smiled at me, but his eyes did not change. ‘You are an ex­cel­lent liar, Fitz. Do not think your train­ing has gone awry. But you can­not lie to a man who has been with you as much as I have, not just these last few days, but of­ten dur­ing your ill­ness. If any other man says to you, “I know just how you feel,” you may re­gard it as a po­lite­ness. But from me ac­cept it as truth. And I know that with you it is as it is with Burrich. I shall not of­fer you the pick of the colts a few months hence. I do of­fer you my arm, if you wish it, to get back to your room.’

  ‘I can man­age,’ I said stiffly. I was aware of how he hon­oured me, but also of how plainly he saw my weak­ness. I wanted to be alone, to hide my­self.

  He nod­ded, un­der­stand­ing. ‘Would that you had mastered the Skill. I could of­fer you strength, just as I have too of­ten taken it from you.’

  ‘I could not,’ I muttered, un­able to mask how dis­taste­ful I would find the draw­ing off of an­other man’s strength to re­place my own. I in­stantly re­gret­ted the mo­ment of shame I saw in my prince’s eyes.

  ‘I, too, could once speak with such pride,’ he said quietly. ‘Go get some rest, boy.’ He turned slowly aside from me. He busied him­self set­ting out his inks and his vel­lum once more. I left quietly.

  We had been closeted for the whole day. Out­side, it was full dark. The castle had the settled air of a winter’s even­ing. The tables cleared, the folk would be gathered about the hearths in the Great Hall. Min­strels might be singing, or a pup­pet­eer mov­ing his gangly charges through a story. Some folk would watch while fletch­ing ar­rows, some would be ply­ing needles, chil­dren would be spin­ning tops or match­ing mark­ers or drows­ing against their par­ents’ knees or shoulders. All was se­cure. Bey­ond the walls the winter storms blew and kept us safe.

  I walked with a drunk­ard’s cau­tion, avoid­ing the com­mon areas where folk had gathered for the even­ing. I fol­ded my arms and hunched my shoulders as if chilled, and so stilled the trem­bling in my arms. I climbed the first flight of stairs slowly, as if lost in thought. On the land­ing I per­mit­ted my­self to pause for a count of ten, then forced my­self to be­gin the next flight.

  But as I set my foot to the first step, Lacey came bound­ing down. A plump wo­man more than a score of years older than my­self, she still moved down the steps with a child’s skip­ping gait. As she reached the bot­tom, she seized me with a cry of ‘There you are!’ as if I were a pair of shears she’d mis­placed from her sew­ing bas­ket. She clutched my arm firmly and turned me to­ward the hall. ‘I’ve been up and down those stairs a dozen times today if I’ve been once. My, you’ve got taller. Lady Pa­tience has not been at all her­self and it’s your fault. At first she ex­pec­ted you to tap on the door any mo­ment. She was so pleased you were fi­nally home.’ She paused to look up at me with her bright bird eyes. ‘That was this morn­ing,’ she con­fided. Then, ‘You have been ill! Such circles un­der your eyes.’

  Without giv­ing me a chance to reply, she went on, ‘By early af­ter­noon, when you hadn’t ar­rived, she began to be in­sul­ted and a bit cross. By din­ner she was in such a tem­per over your rude­ness she could scarcely eat. Since then, she’s de­cided to be­lieve the ru­mours about how sick you’ve been. She’s sure that you’ve either col­lapsed some­where, or that Burrich has kept you down in the stables clean­ing up after horses and dogs des­pite your health. Now here we are, in you go. I have him, my lady.’ And she whisked me into Pa­tience’s cham­bers.

  Lacey’s chat­ter had an odd un­der­tone to it, as if she avoided some­thing. I entered hes­it­antly, won­der­ing if Pa­tience her­self had been ill or if some mis­for­tune had be­fallen her. If either were so, then it hadn’t af­fected her liv­ing habits at all. Her cham­bers were much as they al­ways were. All her green­ery had grown and twined and dropped leaves. A new layer of sud­den in­terests over­lay all the dis­carded ones in the room. Two doves had been ad­ded to her me­na­gerie. A dozen or so horse­shoes were scattered about the room. A fat bay­berry candle burned on the table, giv­ing off a pleas­ant scent, but drip­ping wax onto some dried flowers and herbs on a tray be­side it. Some oddly carved little sticks in a bundle were also threatened. They ap­peared to be for­tune telling sticks such as the Chy­urda used. As I entered, her tough little ter­rier bitch came up to greet me. I stooped to pat her, then wondered if I could stand again. To cover my delay, I care­fully picked up a tab­let from the floor. It was a rather old one, and prob­ably rare, on the use of the for­tune telling sticks. Pa­tience turned away from her loom to greet me.

  ‘Oh, get up and stop be­ing ri­dicu­lous,’ she ex­claimed at see­ing me crouch. ‘Go­ing down on one knee is idiocy. Or did you think it would make me for­get how rude you’ve been in not com­ing to see me right away. What’s that you’ve brought me? Oh, how thought­ful! How did you know I’d been study­ing them? You know, I’ve searched all the castle’s lib­rar­ies and not found much on the pre­dict­ing sticks at all!’

  She took the tab­let from my hand and smiled up at me at the sup­posed gift. Over her shoulder, Lacey winked at me. I gave a minus­cule shrug in re­turn. I glanced back at Lady Pa­tience, who set the tab­let upon a tee­ter­ing stack of tab­lets. She turned back to me. For a mo­ment she re­garded me warmly, then she called up a frown to her face. Her brows gathered over her hazel eyes, while her small straight mouth held a firm line. The ef­fect of her re­prov­ing look was rather spoiled by the fact that she came just to my shoulder now, and that she had two ivy leaves stuck in her hair. ‘Ex­cuse me,’ I said, and boldly plucked them from the un­ruly dark curls. She took them from my hand ser­i­ously, as if they were im­port­ant and set them on top of the tab­let.

  ‘Where have you been, all these months, when you were needed here?’ she de­man­ded. ‘Your uncle’s bride ar­rived months ago. You’ve missed the formal wed­ding, you’ve missed the feast­ing and the dan­cing and the gath­er­ing of the nobles. Here I am, ex­pend­ing all my en­er­gies to see that you are treated as the son of a prince, and there you are, avoid­ing all your so­cial ob­lig­a­tions. And when you do get home, you don’t come to see me, but go all about the keep where any­one else might talk to you, dressed like a ragged tinker. Whatever pos­sessed you to cut your hair like that?’ My father’s wife, once hor­ri­fied to dis­cover that he had sired a bas­tard be­fore they were wed, had gone from ab­hor­ring me to ag­gress­ively bet­ter­ing me. Some­times that was more dif­fi­cult to deal with than if she had os­tra­cized me. Now she de­man­ded, ‘Had you no thought that you might have so­cial du­ties here that were more im­port­ant than gal­li­vant­ing about with Burrich look­ing at horses?’

  ‘I am sorry, my lady.’ Ex­per­i­ence had taught me never to ar­gue with Pa­tience. Her ec­cent­ri­city had de­lighted Prince Chiv­alry. It drove me to dis­trac­tion on a good day. To­night I felt over­whelmed by it. ‘For a time, I was ill. I did not feel well enough to travel. By the time I re­covered, the weather delayed us. I am sorry to have missed the wed­ding.’

  ‘And that was all? That was the sole reason for your delay?’ She spoke sharply, as if sus­pect­ing some hein­ous de­cep­tion.

  ‘It was.’ I answered gravely. ‘But I did think of you. I have some­thing for you, out in my packs. I haven’t brought them up from the stable yet, but I will to­mor­row.’

  ‘What is it?’ she de­man­ded, curi­ous as a child.

  I took a deep breath. I des­per­ately wished for my bed. ‘It’s a sort of a herbal. A simple one, for they are del­ic­ate, and the more or­nate ones would not have stood up to the trip. The Chy­urda don’t use tab­lets or scrolls for teach­ing herbs as we do. In­stead, this is a wooden case. When you open it, you will dis­cover tiny wax mod­els of the herbs, tin­ted to the cor­rect col­ours and scen­ted with each herb to make it easier to learn them. The let­ter­ing is in Chy­urda, of course, but I still thought you would en­joy it.’

  ‘It sounds quite in­ter­est­ing,’ she said, and her eyes shone. ‘I look for­ward to see­ing it.’

  ‘Shall I bring him a chair, my lady? He does look as if he has been ill,’ Lacey in­ter­jec­ted.

  ‘Oh, of course, Lacey. Sit down, boy. Tell me, what was your ill­ness?’

  ‘I ate some­thing, one of the for­eign herbs, and had a strong re­ac­tion to it.’ There. That was truth­ful. Lacey brought me a small stool and I sat grate­fully. A wave of wear­i­ness passed through me.

  ‘Oh. I see.’ She dis­missed my ill­ness. She took a breath, glanced about, then sud­denly de­man­ded, ‘Tell me. Have you ever con­sidered mar­riage?’

  The ab­rupt change in sub­ject was so like Pa­tience that I had to smile. I tried to put my mind to the ques­tion. For a mo­ment I saw Molly, her cheeks reddened with the wind that teased her dark hair loose. Molly. To­mor­row, I prom­ised my­self. Silt­bay.

  ‘Fitz! Stop that! I won’t have you star­ing through me as if I were not here. Do you hear me? Are you well?’

  With an ef­fort I called my­self back. ‘Not really,’ I answered hon­estly. ‘It’s been a tir­ing day for me …’

  ‘Lacey, fetch the boy a cup of eld­er­berry wine. He does look worn. Maybe this isn’t the best time for talk,’ Lady Pa­tience de­cided fal­ter­ingly. For the first time, she really looked at me. Genu­ine con­cern grew in her eyes. ‘Per­haps,’ she sug­ges­ted softly, after a mo­ment, ‘I do not know the full tale of your ad­ven­tures.’

  I looked down at my pad­ded moun­tain buskins. The truth hovered in­side me, then fell and was drowned in the danger of her know­ing all that truth. ‘A long jour­ney. Bad food. Dirty inns with sour beds and sticky tables. That sums it up. I don’t think you really want to hear all the de­tails.’

  An odd thing happened. Our eyes met, and I knew she saw my lie. She nod­ded slowly, ac­cept­ing the lie as ne­ces­sary, and looked aside. I wondered how many times my father had told her sim­ilar lies. What did it cost her to nod?

  Lacey put the cup of wine into my hand firmly. I lif­ted it, and the sweet sting of the first sip re­vived me. I held it in both hands and man­aged to smile at Pa­tience over it. ‘Tell me,’ I began, and des­pite my­self, my voice quavered like an old man’s. I cleared my throat to steady it. ‘How have you been? I ima­gine that hav­ing a queen here at Buck­keep has made your life much busier. Tell me of all I have missed.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, as if pricked with a pin. Now it was Pa­tience’s turn to look aside. ‘You know what a sol­it­ary creature I am. My health is not al­ways strong. To stay up late, dan­cing and talk­ing leaves me abed for two days af­ter­ward. No. I have presen­ted my­self to the Queen and sat at table with her a time or two. But she is young and busy and caught up in her new life. And I am old and odd, and my life is full of my own in­terests …’

  ‘Kettricken shares your love of grow­ing things,’ I ven­tured. ‘She would prob­ably be most in­ter­ested …’ A sud­den tremor rattled my bones and my teeth chattered to still­ness. ‘I am just … a bit cold,’ I ex­cused my­self and lif­ted my wine cup again. I took a gulp in­stead of a sip I had in­ten­ded. My hands shook and wine sloshed over my chin and down my shirt front. I jumped up in dis­may and my trait­or­ous hands let go the cup. It struck the car­pet and rolled away leav­ing a trail of dark wine like blood. I sat down again ab­ruptly and clasped my arms around my­self to try to still my shak­ing. ‘I am very tired,’ I at­temp­ted.

  Lacey came at me with a cloth and dabbed at me un­til I took it from her. I wiped my chin and blot­ted most of the wine from my shirt. But when I crouched down to mop up what had spilled, I al­most pitched for­ward onto my face.

  ‘No, Fitz, for­get the wine. We can tidy up. You are tired, and half sick. Just take your­self up to bed. Come and see me when you’ve res­ted. I’ve some­thing ser­i­ous to dis­cuss with you, but it will keep an­other night. Now off you go, boy. Off to bed.’

  I stood, grate­ful for the re­prieve, and made my cau­tious cour­tes­ies. Lacey saw me as far as the door, and then stood watch­ing after me anxiously as far as the land­ing. I tried to walk as if the walls and floors weren’t waver­ing. I paused at the stairs to give her a small wave, and then star­ted up them. Three steps up and out of her sight, I stopped to lean on the wall and catch my breath. I lif­ted my hands to shield my eyes from the bril­liant candle­light. Dizzi­ness was wash­ing over me in waves. When I opened my eyes, my vis­ion was wreathed in rain­bow fogs. I closed them tight and pressed my hands to them.

  I heard a light step com­ing down the stairs to­wards me. It paused two steps above me. ‘Are you all right, sir?’ someone asked un­cer­tainly.

  ‘A bit too much to drink,’ I lied. Cer­tainly the wine I had dumped over my­self made me smell like a drunk. ‘I’ll be fine in a mo­ment.’

  ‘Let me help you up the stairs. A stumble here might be dan­ger­ous.’ There was starched dis­ap­proval in the voice now. I opened my eyes and peered through my fin­gers. Blue skirts. Of the sens­ible fab­ric that all the ser­vants wore. No doubt she’d had to deal with drunks be­fore.

  I shook my head, but she ig­nored that, just as I would have in her po­s­i­tion. I felt a strong hand grip my up­per arm firmly, while her other arm en­circled my waist. ‘Let’s just get you up the stairs,’ she en­cour­aged me. I leaned on her, not want­ing to, and stumbled up to the next land­ing.

  ‘Thank you,’ I muttered, think­ing she would leave me now, but she kept her grip.

  ‘Are you sure you be­long on this level? The ser­vants’ quar­ters are the next flight up, you know.’

  I man­aged a nod. ‘Third door. If you don’t mind.’

  She was si­lent for longer than a mo­ment. ‘That’s the Bas­tard’s room.’ The words were flung like a cold chal­lenge.

  I did not flinch to the words as I would have once. I did not even lift my head. ‘Yes. You may go now.’ I dis­missed her as coldly.

  In­stead she stepped closer. She seized my hair, jerked my head up to face her. ‘New­boy!’ she hissed in fury. ‘I should drop you right here.’

  I jerked my head up. I could not make my eyes fo­cus on her eyes, but all the same, I knew her, knew the shape of her face and how her hair fell for­ward on her shoulders, and her scent, like a sum­mer af­ter­noon. Re­lief crashed over me like a wave. It was Molly, my Molly the candle-maker. ‘You’re alive!’ I cried out. My heart leaped in me like a hooked fish. I took her in my arms and kissed her.

  At least, I at­temp­ted to. She stiff-armed me away, say­ing gruffly, ‘I shall never kiss a drunk. That’s one prom­ise I’ve made to my­self and shall al­ways keep. Nor be kissed by one.’ Her voice was tight.

  ‘I’m not drunk, I’m … sick,’ I pro­tested. The surge of ex­cite­ment had made my head spin more than ever. I swayed on my feet. ‘It doesn’t mat­ter any­way. You’re here and safe.’

  She stead­ied me. A re­flex she had learned tak­ing care of her father. ‘Oh. I see. You’re not drunk.’ Dis­gust and dis­be­lief mingled in her voice. ‘You’re not the scriber’s boy, either. Nor a stable-hand. Is ly­ing how you al­ways be­gin with people? It seems to be how you al­ways end.’

  ‘I didn’t lie,’ I said quer­ulously, con­fused by the an­ger in her voice. I wished I could make my eyes meet hers. ‘I just didn’t tell you quite … it’s too com­plic­ated. Molly, I’m just so glad you’re all right. And here in Buck­keep! I thought I was go­ing to have to search …’ She still gripped me, hold­ing me on my feet. ‘I’m not drunk. Really. I did lie just now, be­cause it was em­bar­rass­ing to ad­mit how weak I am.’

  ‘And so you lie.’ Her voice cut like a whip. ‘You should be more em­bar­rassed to lie, New­boy. Or is ly­ing per­mit­ted to a prince’s son?’

  She let go of me and I sagged against a wall. I tried to get a grip on my whirl­ing thoughts while keep­ing my body ver­tical. ‘I’m not a prince’s son,’ I said at last. ‘I’m a bas­tard. That’s dif­fer­ent. And yes, that was too em­bar­rass­ing to ad­mit, too. But I never told you I wasn’t the Bas­tard. I just al­ways felt, when I was with you, I was New­boy. It was nice, hav­ing a few friends who looked at me and thought, “New­boy” in­stead of “the Bas­tard”.’

  Molly didn’t reply. In­stead she grabbed me, much more roughly than be­fore, by my shirt­front and hauled me down the hall to my room. I was amazed at how strong wo­men were when they were angry. She shouldered the door open as if it were a per­sonal en­emy and pro­pelled me to­ward my bed. As soon as I was close, she let go and I fell against it. I righted my­self and man­aged to sit down. By clutch­ing my hands tightly to­gether and grip­ping them between my knees, I could con­trol my trem­bling. Molly stood glar­ing at me. I couldn’t pre­cisely see her. Her out­line was blurred, her fea­tures a smear, but I could tell by the way she stood that she was furi­ous.