‘Why are you telling me this?’

  ‘Be­cause I do not be­lieve Ver­ity is dead. King Shrewd used to be strong in the Skill, I am told. That is no longer the case. His ill­ness has stolen it away, as it has stolen so many other things. But, if we can per­suade him to try, if we can rouse him to the ef­fort, I can of­fer him my strength to sus­tain him. He may be able to reach Ver­ity.’

  ‘It will kill him.’ The Fool spoke his chal­lenge flatly. ‘I have heard of what the Skill takes out of a man. My king has not that left to give.’

  ‘I don’t think it will. If we reach Ver­ity, Ver­ity will break it off be­fore it hurts his father. More than once, he has drawn back from drain­ing my strength, to be sure of not in­jur­ing me.’

  ‘Even a Fool can see the fail­ure of your lo­gic.’ The Fool tugged at the cuffs of his fine new shirt. ‘If you reach Ver­ity, how will we know it is true, and not a show?’

  I opened my mouth in an angry protest, but the Fool held up a for­bid­ding hand. ‘Of course, my dear, dear Fitz, we should all be­lieve you, as you are our friend, who has only our very best in­terests at heart. But there may be a few oth­ers prone to doubt your word, or re­gard you as so self­less.’ His sar­casm bit at me like acid, but I man­aged to stand si­lent. ‘And if you don’t reach Ver­ity, what do we have? An ex­hausted and drained king to be fur­ther flaunted about as in­cap­able. A griev­ing queen, who must won­der, in ad­di­tion to all her other pains, if per­haps she grieves for a man who is not dead yet. That is the worst type of griev­ing there is. No. We gain noth­ing, even if you suc­ceed, for our be­lief in you would not be enough to stop the wheels that are already turn­ing. And we have much to lose if you fail. Too much.’

  Their eyes were on me. There was ques­tion even in Burrich’s dark eyes, as if he de­bated the wis­dom of what he had urged me to do. Kettricken stood very still, try­ing not to pounce on the bare bone of hope that I had thrown at her feet. I wished that I had waited, to talk first with Chade. I sus­pec­ted I would never have an­other chance after this night, to have these people in this room, Wal­lace out of the way and Regal busy be­low. It had to be now or it would not be.

  I looked at the only one who was not watch­ing me. King Shrewd idly watched the leap and play of the flames in his hearth. ‘He is still the King,’ I said quietly. ‘Let us ask him, and let him de­cide.’

  ‘Not fair! He is not him­self!’ The Fool flung him­self between us. He stood high on his feet to try to look me in the eye. ‘On the herbs fed him, he is as tract­able as a plough horse. Ask him to cut his own throat, and he’ll wait for you to hand him the knife.’

  ‘No.’ The voice quavered. It had lost its timbre and res­on­ance. ‘No, my Fool, I am not so far gone as that.’

  We waited, breath­less, but King Shrewd spoke no more. At last I slowly crossed the room. I crouched down be­side him, tried to make his eyes meet mine. ‘King Shrewd?’ I begged.

  His eyes came to mine, dar­ted away, came back un­will­ingly. At last he looked at me.

  ‘Have you heard all we have said? My king, do you be­lieve Ver­ity is dead?’

  He par­ted his lips. His tongue was grey­ish be­hind them. He took a long breath. ‘Regal told me Ver­ity is dead. He had word …’

  ‘From where?’ I asked gently.

  He shook his head slowly. ‘A mes­sen­ger … I think.’

  I turned to the oth­ers. ‘It would have to have come by mes­sen­ger. From the moun­tains, for Ver­ity must be there by now. He was nearly in the moun­tains when Burrich was sent back. I do not be­lieve a mes­sen­ger would come all the way from the moun­tains, and not stay to con­vey such news to Kettricken her­self.’

  ‘It might have come by re­lay,’ Burrich said un­will­ingly. ‘For one man and one horse, it is too ex­haust­ing a trip. A rider would have to ex­change horses. Or pass on the word to an­other rider, who would go on, on a swift horse. The last is most likely.’

  ‘Per­haps. But how long would such word take, to come to us all the way from the moun­tains? I know Ver­ity was alive on the day Bearns de­par­ted here. Be­cause that was when King Shrewd used me to speak to him. That night when I all but fain­ted on this hearth. That was what had happened, Fool.’ I paused. ‘I be­lieve I felt him with me dur­ing the battle at Neat Bay.’

  I saw Burrich count back the days in his mind. He shrugged un­will­ingly. ‘It is still pos­sible. If Ver­ity were killed that day, and word were sent out im­me­di­ately, and the riders and horses were both good … it could be so. Barely.’

  ‘I don’t be­lieve it.’ I turned to the rest of them, tried to force my hope into them. ‘I don’t be­lieve Ver­ity is dead.’ I turned my eyes up to King Shrewd once more. ‘Do you? Do you be­lieve your son could have died, and you not feel any­thing?’

  ‘Chiv­alry … went like that. Like a fad­ing whis­per. “Father”, he said, I think. Father.’

  A si­lence seeped into the room. I waited, crouched on my heels, for my king’s de­cision. Slowly his hand lif­ted, as if it had a life of its own. It crossed the small space to me, res­ted on my shoulder. For a mo­ment that was all. Just the weight of my king’s hand on my shoulder. King Shrewd shif­ted slightly in his chair. He took a breath through his nos­trils.

  I closed my eyes and we plunged into the black river again. Once more I faced the des­per­ate young man trapped in King Shrewd’s dy­ing body. We tumbled to­gether in the sweep­ing cur­rent of the world. ‘There’s no one here. No one here but us any more.’ Shrewd soun­ded lonely.

  I couldn’t find my­self. I had no body, no tongue here. He held me un­der with him in the rush and the roar. I could hardly think at all, let alone re­mem­ber what little of the Skill les­sons I had re­tained from Ga­len’s harsh in­struc­tion. It was like try­ing to re­cite a mem­or­ized speech while be­ing throttled. I gave up. I gave it all up. Then from some­where, like a feather float­ing in a breeze, or a mote dan­cing in a sun­beam, came Ver­ity’s voice telling me, ‘Be­ing open is simply not be­ing closed.’

  The whole world was a space­less place, all things in­side of all other things. I did not say his name aloud or think of his face. Ver­ity was there, had al­ways been right there and join­ing him was ef­fort­less. You live!

  Of course. But you won’t, spill­ing all over like this. You’re pour­ing out everything you have in one gush. Reg­u­late your strength. Be pre­cise. He stead­ied me, shaped me back into my­self, then gasped in re­cog­ni­tion.

  Father!

  Ver­ity pushed at me roughly. Get back! Let go of him, he hasn’t the strength for this. You’re drain­ing him, you idiot! Let go!

  It was like be­ing re­pelled but rougher. When I found my­self and opened my eyes, I was sprawled on my side be­fore the fire­place. My face was un­com­fort­ably close to it. I rolled over, groan­ing, and saw the King. His lips were puff­ing in and out with each breath, and there was a blu­ish cast to his skin. Burrich and Kettricken and the Fool were a help­less circle stand­ing about him. ‘Do … some­thing!’ I gasped up at them.

  ‘What?’ de­man­ded the Fool, be­liev­ing I knew.

  I floundered about in my mind, came up with the only rem­edy I could re­call. ‘Elf­bark,’ I croaked. The edges of the room kept turn­ing black. I shut my eyes and listened to them pan­ick­ing about. Slowly I un­der­stood what I had done. I had Skilled.

  I had tapped my king’s strength to do it.

  You will be the death of kings, the Fool had told me. A proph­ecy or a shrewd guess? A Shrewd guess. Tears came to my eyes.

  I smelled elf­bark tea. Plain strong elf­bark, no ginger or mint to dis­guise it. I prised my eyes open a crack.

  ‘It’s too hot!’ hissed the Fool.

  ‘It cools quickly in the spoon,’ Burrich in­sisted, and ladled some into the King’s mouth. He took it in, but I did not see him swal­low. With the cas­ual ex­pert­ise of years in the stables, Burrich tugged gently at the King’s lower jaw, and then stroked his throat. He ladled an­other spoon­ful into his slack mouth. Not much was hap­pen­ing.

  Kettricken came to crouch by me. She lif­ted my head to her knee, put a hot cup to my mouth. I sucked at it, too hot, I didn’t care, I sucked in air with it, nois­ily. I swal­lowed it, fought chok­ing against its bit­ter­ness. The dark­ness re­ceded. The cup came back, I sipped again. It was strong enough to nearly numb my tongue. I looked up at Kettricken, found her eyes. I man­aged a tiny nod.

  ‘He lives?’ she asked softly.

  ‘Yes.’ It was all I could man­age.

  ‘He lives!’ She cried it out aloud to the oth­ers, joy in her voice.

  ‘My father!’ Regal shouted the words. He stood sway­ing in the door, face red with drink and an­ger. Be­hind him I glimpsed his guard, and little Rose­mary peep­ing around the corner, wide-eyed. Some­how she man­aged to slip past the men, to race to Kettricken and clutch at her skirts. For an in­stant, our tableau held.

  Then Regal swept into the room, rant­ing, de­mand­ing, ques­tion­ing but giv­ing no one a chance to speak. Kettricken kept a pro­tect­ive crouch be­side me, or I swear Regal’s guards would have had me again. Above me, in his chair, the King had a bit of col­our again in his face. Burrich put an­other spoon­ful of tea to his lips, and I was re­lieved to see him sip at it.

  Regal was not. ‘What are you giv­ing him? Stop that! I won’t have my father poisoned by a stable-hand!’

  ‘The King had an­other at­tack, my prince,’ the Fool said sud­denly. His voice cut through the chaos in the room, made a hole that be­came a si­lence. ‘Elf­bark tea is a com­mon res­tor­at­ive. I am sure that even Wal­lace has heard of it.’

  The Prince was drunk. He was not sure if he was be­ing mocked or con­cili­ated. He glared at the Fool, who smiled be­nignly back.

  ‘Oh.’ He said it grudgingly, not really wish­ing to be mol­li­fied. ‘Well, what then of him?’ He ges­tured at me in an­ger.

  ‘Drunk.’ Kettricken stood up, let­ting my head drop to the floor with a con­vin­cing thump. Flashes of light marred my vis­ion. There was only dis­gust in her voice. ‘Sta­ble­mas­ter. Get him out of here. You should have stopped him be­fore he got this far. Next time, see that you use your judge­ment when he has none of his own.’

  ‘Our Sta­ble­mas­ter is well known for hav­ing his own taste for the cup, lady queen. I sus­pect they have been at it to­gether,’ Regal sneered.

  ‘The news of Ver­ity’s death hit him hard,’ Burrich said simply. He was true to him­self, of­fer­ing an ex­plan­a­tion, but no ex­cuse. He took hold of my shirt-front, jerked me from the floor. With no ef­fort at play-act­ing, I swayed on my feet un­til he gripped me more firmly. I caught a passing glimpse of the Fool hast­ily spoon­ing an­other dose of elf­bark into the King. I prayed no one would in­ter­rupt him. As Burrich ushered me roughly out of the room, I heard Queen Kettricken re­buk­ing Regal, say­ing he should be be­low with his guests, and prom­ising that she and the Fool could get the King to bed. As we were go­ing up the stairs, I heard Regal and his guard go­ing down. He was still mut­ter­ing and then rant­ing, com­plain­ing that he was not stu­pid, he could tell a plot when he saw one. It wor­ried me, but I was fairly cer­tain he had no real idea of what had been go­ing on.

  At my door, I was well enough to work my latches. Burrich fol­lowed me in. ‘If I had a dog that was sick as of­ten as you are, I’d put it down,’ he ob­served kindly. ‘Do you need more elf­bark?’

  ‘It wouldn’t hurt me. But in a gentler dose. Do you have any ginger or mint or rose­hips?’

  He gave me a look. I sat on my chair while he poked at the pathetic em­bers in my fire­place un­til he got them to glow. He built up a fire, put wa­ter in the kettle and set it to heat. He found a pot and put in the flaked elf­bark, then found a mug and wiped the dust out of it. He set the things out ready, then looked about him­self. Some­thing like dis­gust was on his face. ‘Why do you live like this?’ he de­man­ded.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘In so bare a room, with so little care for it? I’ve seen winter-quarter tents that were co­sier than this room. It’s as if you’ve never ex­pec­ted to stay here more than a night or two longer.’

  I shrugged. ‘I’ve never given it much thought.’

  There was a si­lence for a bit. ‘You should,’ he said un­will­ingly. ‘And you should think about how of­ten you’re hurt, or sick.’

  ‘This, what happened to­night, this couldn’t be helped.’

  ‘You knew what it would do to you, but you went ahead with it any­way,’ he poin­ted out.

  ‘I had to.’ I watched him pour steam­ing wa­ter over the elf­bark in the pot.

  ‘Did you? It seemed to me the Fool had a pretty con­vin­cing ar­gu­ment against it. Yet you went ahead. You and King Shrewd, both of you.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘I know a bit about the Skill,’ Burrich said quietly, ‘I was King’s Man to Chiv­alry. Not of­ten, and it did not leave me as bad as you are now, save for once or twice. But I’ve felt the ex­cite­ment of it, the –’ he groped for words, sighed. ‘The com­ple­tion of it. The one­ness with the world. Chiv­alry once spoke to me about it. A man can get ad­dicted, he said. So that he looks for ex­cuses to Skill, and then fi­nally he is ab­sorbed into it.’ He ad­ded after a mo­ment, ‘It is not un­like the rush of battle, in some ways. The sense of mov­ing un­hampered by time, of be­ing a force more power­ful than life it­self.’

  ‘As I can­not Skill alone, I dare say it is not a danger to me.’

  ‘You of­fer your­self very of­ten to those who can.’ Bluntly spoken. ‘As of­ten as you will­ingly plunge your­self into dan­ger­ous situ­ations that of­fer that same kind of ex­cite­ment. In a battle, you go into a frenzy. Is that what hap­pens to you when you Skill?’

  I had never con­sidered the two to­gether in such a light. Some­thing like fear nibbled at me. I pushed it aside.

  ‘To be a King’s Man is my duty. Be­sides, was not this even­ing your sug­ges­tion?’

  ‘It was. But I would have let the Fool’s words dis­suade us from it. You were de­term­ined. You put no value at all on what it would do to you. Per­haps you should have a care for your­self.’

  ‘I know what I’m do­ing.’ I spoke more sharply than I in­ten­ded, and Burrich did not reply. He poured the tea he had made, and handed it to me with a ‘see what I mean’ look on his face. I took the mug and stared into the fire. He sat down on my cloth­ing chest.

  ‘Ver­ity is alive,’ I said quietly.

  ‘So I heard the Queen say. I had never be­lieved he was dead.’ He ac­cep­ted it very calmly. As calmly as he ad­ded, ‘But we have no proof.’

  ‘Proof? I spoke to him. The King spoke to him. Isn’t that enough?’

  ‘For me, more than enough. For most other folks, well …’

  ‘When the King re­cov­ers, he will bear me out. Ver­ity lives.’

  ‘I doubt it will be enough to pre­vent Regal from pro­claim­ing him­self King-in-Wait­ing. The ce­re­mony is sched­uled for next week. I think he would have done it to­night, save that every duke must be present to wit­ness it.’

  Elf­bark bat­tling with ex­haus­tion, or simply the un­re­lent­ing march of events sud­denly made the room tilt around me. I felt I had thrown my­self in front of a wagon to stop it, and in­stead it had rolled over me. The Fool had been right. What I had done to­night coun­ted for little, save the peace of mind it brought Kettricken. A sud­den welling of des­pair filled me. I set down my empty cup. The Six Duch­ies king­dom was fall­ing apart. My King-in-Wait­ing Ver­ity would re­turn to a mock­ery of what he had left: a sundered coun­try, a rav­aged coast­line, a plundered and empty keep. Per­haps if I had be­lieved in Eld­er­lings, I could have found some way to be­lieve it would all come out right. All I could see now was my fail­ure.

  Burrich was look­ing at me oddly. ‘Go to bed,’ he sug­ges­ted. ‘A bleak spirit is some­times what fol­lows an over-in­dul­gence in elf­bark. Or so I have heard.’

  I nod­ded. To my­self, I wondered if that might ac­count for Ver­ity’s of­ten dour moods.

  ‘Get some real rest. In the morn­ing, things may look bet­ter.’ He gave a bark of laughter and smiled wolfishly. ‘Then again, they may not. But the rest will at least leave you bet­ter pre­pared to face them.’ He paused, sober­ing. ‘Molly came to my room, earlier.’

  ‘Is she all right?’ I de­man­ded to know.

  ‘Bring­ing candles she knew I did not need,’ Burrich went on as if I had not spoken. ‘Al­most as if she wanted an ex­cuse to speak to me …’

  ‘What did she say?’ I rose from my chair.

  ‘Not very much. She is al­ways very cor­rect with me. I am very dir­ect with her. I simply told her you missed her.’

  ‘And she said?’

  ‘Noth­ing.’ He grinned. ‘But she blushes very pret­tily.’ He sighed, sud­denly ser­i­ous. ‘And, as dir­ectly, I asked her if any­one had given her any fur­ther cause to fear. She squared her little shoulders and tucked in her chin as if I was try­ing to force a bit in her teeth. She said she thanked me kindly for my con­cern, as she had be­fore, but that she was cap­able of see­ing to her­self.’ In a quieter voice, he asked, ‘Will she ask for help if she needs it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I con­fessed. ‘She has her own store of cour­age. Her own way of fight­ing. She turns and con­fronts things. Me, I slink about and try to ham­string them when they aren’t look­ing. Some­times, she makes me feel a cow­ard.’

  Burrich stood up, stretch­ing so that his shoulders cracked. ‘You’re no cow­ard, Fitz. I’ll vouch for you there. Per­haps you just un­der­stand odds bet­ter than she does. I wish I could put your mind at rest about her. I can’t. I’ll watch over her as well as I can. As much as she’ll let me.’ He gave me a side­ways glance. ‘Hands asked me today who the pretty lady is who calls on me so of­ten.’