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“What thing?” I asked.

“He said, the Fool I mean, he said, ‘Don’t let Fitz follow us. Tell him to stay here and wait. We’ll be back.’ ”

“He did say that,” Lant admitted.

“Anything else? Anything at all?”

They exchanged looks. “Well, it wasn’t a thing he said, but something they did,” Per said. “Ash left the big pack and most of their supplies here. When they went back into the pillar, they took only a small part of what they’d brought.” He looked uncomfortable for a moment. “Sir, why would Ash and Gray both dress as women?”

“Probably the only warm garments they could steal easily,” I said to him. “Taken from a forgotten wardrobe that once belonged to an old woman named Lady Thyme.” Lant twitched at the name, and I wondered how much he knew of his father’s old disguise.

Per shook his head. “Well, maybe. But their faces … Ash had red lips. Like a girl. So did your friend. So it looked like they did it on purpose.”

Chapter Thirty-Four
Dragons

...

From Queen Malta and King Reyn of the Dragon Traders, greetings to King Dutiful and Queen Elliania of the Six Duchies!

We wish to express our great satisfaction with our recent trade negotiations. Our delegations have praised your hospitality, your courtesy, and your willingness to negotiate. The samples of trade-goods we have received are definitely to our satisfaction, particularly the grain, brandy, and leather.

Our long-standing agreements with our fellow Traders must prevail, however. Elderling-made goods will be released only through our contacts in Bingtown. We are sure you must be aware of our traditional and familial connections there. We are confident that you will understand our reluctance to abandon those generational alliances.

While we will not be trading Elderling goods for Six Duchies goods, we promise that our coinage is uniform and unadulterated. As it is a relatively new currency, we understand your reluctance to accept it but if you continue to refuse, we can only turn elsewhere to form our trade alliances, as we are certain you clearly understand.

As regards the dragons, we appreciate all your concerns. But we hold no authority over the dragons, nor do they owe us any obedience. While we enjoy a deep friendship with the dragons and savor their companionship, we cannot pretend to make any agreements on their behalf, nor do we claim any influence over them to moderate their behavior when in your territory.

Some individual dragons are amenable to forming agreements about where they hunt or accepting designated largesse when they are visiting foreign countries. The best time to negotiate with dragons is when they wake after they have eaten and slept. Attempting to greet or negotiate with an unfed dragon is not advisable. If you wish, we would be happy to share more of our knowledge of dragons with you, but claim no expertise that will bind them to any agreements.

Again we thank you for your gracious reception of our trade delegation. We look forward to a long and prosperous commerce between our domains.

“Did they say nothing of why they were going to Kelsingra? Did they tell you when they might return? Why did they think they had to move on immediately? Why did the Fool not wait for me?”

Neither Lant nor Per had answers to those questions or any of the others that I asked. I paced like a caged wolf, going from the fire to the stone pillar and back again. I dared myself to follow them, but knew I’d be abandoning Lant and Perseverance to their deaths if I did not return. Then I asked myself if that duty was not just a cover for my own cowardice. A question to which I had no answer.

We ate the hare, drank the broth, and made a fruity tea from the berries I’d found. While I’d been away, Lant and Per had made improvements to our camp. They’d dragged a longer piece of log to the fireside for us to sit on and had arranged our supplies more efficiently. I looked at the large pack that the Fool and Spark had left. Plainly they had packed for a substantial journey. But if these supplies were for Kelsingra, why had they left them here? And if the Fool had wished to journey with me, why had he and Spark gone on without me? I sat and stared at the fire and waited.

“Should I take the first watch?” Per asked me.

His voice startled me. I turned to look at his worried face. “No, Per. I’m not tired yet. You get some sleep. I’ll wake you when it’s your watch.”

He sat down beside me. “I slept while you were gone. There was little else to do. So I’m not tired, either.”

I didn’t argue with him. Later, when it was his turn to keep watch, he’d learn that he’d made a poor choice. Lant had already gone to bed. For a time, we stared at the fire in silence.

“Why were they dressed like girls?”

Secrets, secrets, secrets. Who owned the secrets? “You’d need to ask them about that.”

He was quiet for a while. Then he asked, “Is Ash a girl?”

“You’d need to ask Ash about that.”

“I did. And he asked me why I was dressed as a boy.”

“And what did you answer to that?” I prodded him.

He was quiet again and then said, “That means he’s a girl.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.” He hunched tighter toward the fire. “Why would Ash pretend to be a boy?”

“You’d need to ask Spark about that.”

“Spark.” The name annoyed him. He scowled and wrapped his arms around himself. “I’m not going to bother. I don’t trust him any longer.” His face set into hardness. “I don’t need a friend who deceives me.”

I took a deep breath and then sighed it out. There were a hundred things I could say to him. A hundred questions I could ask that might make him see things differently. But being told something is not the same as learning it. I thought of all the things Verity had told me. Burrich’s stern advice. Patience’s counsel. But when had I learned?

“Talk to Spark,” I said.

His silence was long. “Maybe,” he said at last.

Since, as he said, he seemed wide awake, I left him sitting there, shoved Lant over to make room, and crawled under the blankets. I gnawed on my questions. I must have slept, because I woke when Lant traded places with Per. The boy pushed his back up against mine, sighed heavily, and soon began to snore. I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep. After a time, I got up and went to join Lant by the fire. He was heating snow-water in a pot for tea. I sat down beside him and stared into the flames.

“Why do you dislike me so much?”

I didn’t need to think about it. “You made my daughter unhappy. And when I had to entrust her to you, you didn’t care for her or comfort her. Revel was the one to come and take her in from the snowy wagon.”

He was silent. “We were confused, Shine and I. We could make no sense of what you and Riddle were doing. You told us next to nothing. I tried to take Bee out of the wagon and she acted like … like a sulky child. I was tired, and cold, and angry with you. So I left her to find her own way in. If none of this had happened, would it have been so important? Fitz, I did not want to be a scribe, let alone a tutor to children. I wanted to be at Buckkeep Castle, with my friends, following my own life. I’ve never had the care of children, and even you must admit that Bee was no ordinary child.”

“That’s enough,” I suggested pleasantly. He had stirred guilt in me, until his last words.

“I’m not like you!” he burst out. “I’m not like my father. I tried to be, to please him. But I’m not! And I don’t want to be. I’m here, I’m going with you, because, yes, I failed your daughter. Just as much as I failed my sister. My sister. Do you know how it twists inside me to name her that? What they did to Shine, to my sister—it makes me ill to think of her hurt that way. I want to avenge her, I want to avenge Bee. I know I can’t undo what happened. I can’t change what I did, only what I will do. And I’m not doing this for you, or even for my father. I’m doing it for me. To give myself whatever peace I can find over what happened.

“I don’t know how I’ll help you or what you’ll ask me to do or if I can do it. But I’m here. I intend to try. And I can’t go home until this is done. But I do want to go home, after all this is over, and I want to go home alive. So you’d better start talking to me and telling me what is going on, or teaching me what I have to do. Or something. Because I’m with you now until you go home. Or I’m dead. And I think that boy is, too.”

“I don’t want you here. I didn’t want you to come.”

“Yet here we are. And I don’t think even you are spiteful enough to let me die of ignorance.”

That was true. I had almost thought of a response when I heard a muffled shriek. It burst suddenly louder and was followed by the sound of a wild struggle over by the Skill-pillar. Lant had the presence of mind to seize a flaming stick from the fire. I reached the pillar first but when Lant lifted the brand I shouted, “Get back! Don’t touch the Fool and don’t let him touch you!” And in the next breath, I told him, “Drag Spark over by the fire. Wake Per. Get water heating.”

Spark was twitching and yelping like a dog having a bad dream, but her eyes were open. I feared for her. Many years ago, I’d seen what a trip through a Skill-portal could do to unprepared minds. Regal had driven many of his young Skill-apprentices mad when he had attempted to send a small army through a pillar. Spark was unSkilled and had just experienced her third trip through a Skill-portal in less than a day. I was angry at the Fool for risking the youngster, and heartsick that I would be helpless to aid her. I feared even more for the Fool. I prayed that the uneven light of the burning branch tricked my eyes, for it looked to me as if his left hand was unevenly silvered with Skill.

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