Fool's Quest - Страница 138

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The cantering soon gave way to an easy trot that would eat up the miles. We would overnight at an inn, and press on the next day. I hoped that the following evening would find me at the Skill-stone where Shine had seen my daughter vanish. There I would bid my companions farewell and journey on alone. I would go first to the ancient market-circle where once I had dreamed the Fool transformed.

It was a peculiarly routine journey. The inn had received word to expect us, and received us well. I actually slept that night, and in the morning enjoyed a solid breakfast with Riddle and Lant and Foxglove. We spoke of very ordinary things: that the breakfast bread was fresh and good, and that we hoped the weather would hold fair. Riddle predicted an early spring, and Foxglove said she thought the snow was already softening.

I donned my fine Buck-blue cloak and again we rode forth, with me at the head of a troop of guards. The innkeeper and his family saw us off with cheers, and sweet cakes of oats and dried fruit for our day’s journey. We pushed our horses, for I thought to be kind to my guard. If we reached the Skill-stone by afternoon, there was a possibility they could return to an inn for the night instead of having to sleep out in the open. I had no such prospect before me. I knew that once I had passed through that stone I would encounter winter in the Mountains. I only hoped I would not step out into a blasting storm.

My plan from there was clear. Camp for three nights in the ridiculously bulky tent I’d been gifted with. I’d subsist on marching rations for that necessary interval between uses of a Skill-pillar. From there, Chade’s chart showed me it was but a Skill-step through the pillar to Kelsingra. In that city, I would seek passage down the Rain Wild River and on to Bingtown and then Jamaillia. In Jamaillia, I was sure to find a ship bound for the Spice Isles. Once there, I’d trust to my luck and Kettricken’s map to find my way to Clerres. And blood.

I almost rode past the turn. Riddle was the one who pointed it out. The tracks we had made in the snowy field were smoothed to dimples and pocks in the snow. It seemed years since I had last ridden this way. Years since Bee had passed beyond my reach forever. Years, and a moment ago. The closer we drew to the stone, the more impatient I was to be gone. We entered the forest and followed the fading tracks. When we came to the place where Dwalia and her luriks had camped, Foxglove halted our troops and gave the order for them to set up a camp.

“No need.” I spoke quietly to her. “I’m not going to make this a dramatic moment, Foxglove. I’m going to walk to that rock, touch it, and be gone. And you will turn our guards around and head back toward an inn. I hope that tonight you will sleep in warmth and comfort, and perhaps hoist a tankard to wish me good luck.” I cleared my throat and added quietly, “Inside my chamber, there is a parcel addressed to you. Within it, there are messages for folk that are dear to me. If a year passes with no word from me, then you will know it is time to deliver them.”

She stared at me, then gave a stiff nod.

I dismounted, and she shouted to our guards to hold off on that order. She dismounted, handed her horse to her granddaughter, and followed me. Riddle came after us, and Lant. I glanced back, thinking I would see Perseverance shadowing us, but the boy had vanished. From somewhere, the crow squawked. They’d be together. Just as well.

In the gloom under the leaning evergreens, the winter afternoon already seemed like evening. The shadowed snow and dark trunks were shaded from black to palest gray. In that dimness, it took me a moment to pick out the Skill-stone gripped in the roots and leaning trunk of an evergreen. I approached it without reluctance. Nettle’s Skill-users had traveled to the Mountains via this stone and returned days later without incident. It was as safe to use as any Skill-portal, I told myself. I pushed from my memory what had happened the last time I had traveled by stone. I sealed from my heart that this was the very stone that had devoured Bee and those who had taken her.

Only a light snow had fallen since last I had been here, and little of it had penetrated the interweaving needled branches overhead. With a gloved hand, I brushed snow and fallen needles from the face of the stone. I had my sword at my side, a pack on my back, and a large carry-bag on my shoulder. Everything I thought I needed was in the pack and everything the others had insisted I take was in the carry-bag. I had privately resolved I would not carry it for long.

“So,” I said to Riddle. He pulled off his glove as I did mine, and we clasped wrists. Our eyes met briefly and then we both looked aside.

“Travel well,” he said to me, and “I shall try,” I replied. His grip tightened on my wrist and I returned that pressure. Nettle, you’ve chosen well, I Skilled to her. Through my eyes, I showed her the man she had chosen. Care for his heart. It’s a true one. And then I swiftly set my walls to hold in all my fears and worries.

I bade farewell likewise to Foxglove and to Lant. The old captain met my gaze with her steely one and bade me “Uphold the honor of the Farseers.” Lant’s hand was sweaty as he gripped my wrist, and he seemed to tremble.

“You’ll do fine,” I told him quietly. “Take care of that old man for me. Blame it on me that I would not let you come.”

He hesitated. “I’ll do my best to live up to his expectations,” he replied.

I returned him a rueful grin for that. “Best of luck with that!” I wished him, and he managed a shaky laugh.

They were watching me. I held up a hand. I closed my eyes, though I did not need to. Through the stone, I said to Nettle and Dutiful. I could feel Thick watching us drowsily. I’ll be sending Riddle right back to you. He should be home by tomorrow evening.

And you will Skill to us as soon as you emerge from the stone?

I already promised I would. I will not leave you worrying. I expect to be told as soon as the child is born.

And I already promised that to you. Go carefully, Da.

I love you all. And then, because those words sounded too much like a final farewell I added, Tell the Fool not to be too angry with me. Take care of him until I return.

I turned back to those waiting around me. “Nettle expects you home by tomorrow,” I warned Riddle.

“I’ll be there,” he promised me, and I knew that he did not mean just for the next evening.

Foxglove looked weary and Lant looked as if he felt sick. I shared some of his nervousness. The world seemed to waver a bit around me as I stepped toward the stone. As I set my bare hand to the cold stone and pressed firmly against the rune, Lant leapt forward suddenly. He clasped my wrist and exclaimed, “I go with you!”

Someone also clasped me suddenly around the waist. I thought perhaps Riddle would pull me back, but I felt the stone give way and draw me in. Lant came with me, with a drawn-out shout that cut off as the darkness snapped shut around us.

Traveling through a pillar had always felt disorienting. This time instead of twinkling darkness it was as if someone had snapped a hood over my head and then let a horse kick me. I had no sense of traveling a great distance; it was more like a sudden push off a ladder. I fell hard on snowy ground. Lant landed on top of me, and I was crumpled facedown across the lumpy carry-sack and something else. There was snow in my eyes, and the cold that engulfed me was far sharper than that of Buck. The wind had been knocked out of my lungs. I wheezed in snow, coughed it out, and then fought to breathe as I struggled to sit up.

Lant abruptly heaved himself away from me. He sat facing away from me in the snow. His shoulders shook but he made not a sound.

“Let me up!”

I pushed myself up off the noisy sack and wiped my sleeve across my eyes. I heaved myself into a sitting position. The struggling lump in the snow beneath me was wrapped in a butterfly’s wing. Perseverance abruptly pushed one corner of the Elderling cloak aside and stared up at me. “What happened? Where am I?” An instant later there was an explosion of black feathers slapping me, and an indignant Motley fled skyward.

“Stupidity happened!” I shouted. Except that I had no breath to shout, so it came out as a gasp. I floundered to my feet and looked around me. Yes. I was where I had expected to be. Loose, fresh snow had smoothed the rumpled tracks Nettle’s coterie had left. Around me was the open circle of what had once been a market pavilion, and we had tumbled from one face of the lone standing pillar that centered it. Dark mountain forest glowered at us from all directions. Beneath me, I felt the distant humming of what I thought of as the Skill-road. Constructed long ago by Elderlings, it thrummed with the memories of those who had trodden it. Moss and grass always seemed reluctant to invade its surfaces. The forest leaned in over the decorative stonework that edged the plaza. I set my walls against the muttering of stone-memories.

I glanced at the sky. Night would soon be falling, it was very cold, and I was unexpectedly saddled with two idiots. I felt vaguely ill in a way I could not define. Not dizzy or feverish. I felt as if I had just arisen from my bed after a long illness. Well, I had, without preparation, towed two unSkilled ones through a pillar, and the simmering memories of the Skill-road besieged my walls. I decided I was lucky that I felt only weak. And they were fortunate to be sane and alive. If they were.

“Lant? How do you feel?”

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