Fool's Assassin - Страница 37

Nettle gave a curt nod and left the room, already calling for Tavia to give her a hand to get some guest rooms into order for Lady Kettricken of the Mountains, who would be arriving perhaps before the day was out. Nettle set as little stock by formality with the servants as her mother did. She passed me in the hall and gave me a glance full of rebuke before shouting for Revel as well. I slipped past her and into the nursery. “She’ll be opening the windows and shaking out the comforters herself,” Molly said to me, and I knew she was proud of her pragmatic daughter.

“Sometimes she reminds me of Verity.” I smiled as I entered. “She doesn’t ask anyone to do anything that she’d hesitate to do herself. And if she thinks a task needs doing, she doesn’t wait.”

“You knew Kettricken was coming and you didn’t tell me,” Molly greeted me.

I had. I looked at her silently. I had told myself that not telling her something was different from lying to her. She didn’t agree. Her anger was frozen fire in her voice as she said quietly, “It doesn’t make it easier for me when I don’t have time to prepare.”

“I thought it through carefully. There is nothing we can do to prepare for this, except meet it head-on today. I saw no use in worrying you ahead of time. The servants are adept at quickly readying the rooms.”

Her voice was low. “I wasn’t speaking of readying the rooms. I was talking of preparing myself. My thoughts. My bearing.” She shook her head at me and then spoke more clearly. “Fitz, Fitz. All goes well between us, until your Farseer legacy intrudes. Then you return to the close-mouthed, deceitful ways that doomed us once before. Will you ever be free of that? Ever know a time when your first impulse is not to conceal what you know?”

Her words struck me like arrows, and I shuddered with their impact. “I’m sorry,” I said, and hated the words. Truly I regretted that I had hidden information from her and wondered, as she did, why I always fell prey to the drive to keep knowledge to myself. There echoed through me a warning I had received long ago, from Chade. The old man had cautioned me that I could wear out the words “I’m sorry,” could apologize so often that it meant nothing to anyone, not even myself. I wondered if I had reached that point with Molly. “Molly,” I began.

“Fitz,” she said firmly. “Just stop.”

I fell silent. She gathered our baby closer to her. “Listen to me. I share your worries. This is not a time for us to be at odds. Later, we will speak of it. After Kettricken has left. But not before then, and certainly not in front of Nettle. If the old queen comes to look at our child, then we must be ready to face that together. And insist to her that we will know what is best for Bee as she grows.”

I knew her anger was not vanquished but restrained. And I knew that I deserved it. “Thank you,” I said quietly, and that lit the sparks again in her eyes. Then, almost sadly, she shook her head and smiled at me. “They took that piece of you away from me, long before I even claimed you as my own. Not your fault, Fitz. Not your fault. Though sometimes I think that you could take it back, if you tried hard enough.” She settled our baby against her shoulder and then looked at me as if she had banished anger to the Out Islands.

The rest of that day, Nettle had the staff in an uproar. Only Revel seemed to delight in the challenge of entertaining royalty at a moment’s notice. No less than eight times he came to consult with me on menus and bedchambers. When he appeared at my door again, to ask if he might hire some musicians from Withy for evening entertainment, I heartlessly referred him to Nettle.

But the end result was that we had had one quiet evening as a family, a time for all three adults to share a meal and stay up late talking. Between Nettle and Revel, everything that could be arranged or planned had been done. When evening deepened, we gathered in the nursery and had our food brought to us there. We ate and talked, and ate and talked. Nettle held the baby and studied Bee’s face as she stared past her shoulder.

Nettle gave us news from Buckkeep, but Molly was most hungry to hear of her boys. Nettle gave us fresh news of her brothers. Steady had been not at Buckkeep but visiting Hearth. She had sent him word. Swift was traveling with Web; she’d sent a message but had no idea when it would find them. Chivalry was prospering. He’d built on the fine foundation of horseflesh that Burrich had left to him. Recently he had acquired the holding next to his, increasing his pasture and giving himself room to build a larger stable. And so on, naming each brother, all scattered across the Six Duchies now. Molly listened and rocked Bee as she held her close. I watched her and thought I guessed her heart: This was her last child, the one who would be at her side as she grew old. I watched Nettle’s gaze travel from me to her mother and then to Bee. Pity, I read in her face. Pity for all of us, for in her estimation, Bee would either die soon or live the life of a stunted thing, limited in both mind and body. She did not speak the thought aloud but Burrich had raised her well, to look at a young thing and judge its chances. Still, I thought to myself, I had the advantage of experience. Bee might well and truly be a runt but she had the spark to survive. She would live. What sort of a life, none could yet tell, but Bee would live.

In the morning a herald arrived to announce that Kettricken would soon be there. By the time the old Queen arrived that afternoon, the guest rooms were ready, a simple meal of good food was simmering and baking, and Bee was freshly attired in garments hastily taken in to fit her. Nettle came herself to tell Molly and me of the arrival of Kettricken and her guard. She found us in the nursery. Molly had dressed Bee twice, and changed her own garments three times. Each time, I had assured her that she looked lovely to me, but she had decided that the first dress was too youthful, and the second “made me look like a doddering granny.” The third try was something I had never seen her wear before. She wore long loose trousers, so full that they appeared at first to be a skirt. A garment like a knee-length vest was worn over a loose-sleeved white blouse; a wide belt sashed her waist. The vest, trousers, and sash were all in different shades of blue, and Molly netted her hair back into a sack made of blue ribbons. “How do I look?” she asked me when she returned to the nursery, and I was not sure what to reply.

“I like the slippers,” I said cautiously. They were red, with black bead embroidery and very pointed toes.

Molly laughed. “Nettle brought these clothes for me. It’s a Jamaillian style, now favored at Buckkeep.” She turned slowly, inviting me to admire the garments. “It’s very comfortable. Nettle begged me to wear it, so I would not look too provincial. And you know, Fitz, I think I shall.”

I myself wore a simple jerkin of brown over a shirt of Buckkeep blue, brown trousers, and black knee-boots. The fox pin that Kettricken had given me still sparkled at my collar. For a moment I wondered if I looked provincial, then decided I did not care.

Nettle came into the room, smiled, and lifted her brows at her mother, well pleased with her appearance. She was similarly garbed in rich browns and amber yellow. Then she glanced down into Bee’s cradle and visibly startled. Blunt as she ever was, she said, “Even though the other clothes were too big, they made her look larger. Mother, she is so tiny, she’s almost … grotesque.” Despite her words, she picked up her sister and held Bee in her arms, looking into her face. The baby gazed past her shoulder. Yet as Nettle studied her, Bee suddenly began to toss her little hands. Then her mouth opened wide, she drew a deep breath, and she began a shrill wail of protest.

At her first wail, Molly went to take her. “What’s wrong, my little Bee? What’s wrong?” The moment Molly took her from Nettle, the child went limp in her hands and her wailing became a snuffling sobbing. Molly held her and patted her and she quickly quieted. She looked at Nettle apologetically. “Don’t be hurt. She does the same thing to her father. I think she’s just old enough to realize I’m her mother and to think that I should always be holding her.”

I gave Nettle a small, rueful smile. “I’m almost relieved. I was beginning to think it was just me she disliked.”

Molly and Nettle shot me twin looks of outrage. “Bee does not dislike Nettle!” Molly insisted. “She just …” Her words dwindled away and her eyes widened slightly. Then, as direct as Nettle herself, she looked at her elder daughter and asked, “Did you do something to her? With your mind?”

“I … no! Well, not intentionally. Sometimes …” She let her words trail off. “It’s hard to explain to someone who doesn’t have it. I touch people when I’m close to them. Not always on purpose. It’s like …” She groped for a comparison. “Like smelling someone. Even if it might seem rude, I can’t really help it. I’ve become aware of people in that way.”

Molly weighed her words as she began the slow shifting of her weight from foot to foot that she always affected when she held the child. “Then your sister is Skilled? As you are?”

Nettle laughed and shook her head. “I couldn’t tell something like that just from holding her. Besides, she’s a baby.” Her words trailed off slightly as she reflected on her own talent for Skill and how early it had wakened in her. She glanced over at me, and I felt her send a seeking tendril of Skill toward the baby. I caught my breath. Should I stop her? I watched as Bee curled more tightly against her mother and buried her face in Molly’s neck. Did she sense her sister reaching for her? I watched Nettle’s face. Puzzlement and then resignation. She didn’t sense any Skill in the baby.