Fool's Assassin - Страница 54

“They’ll be cruel to her there.” The words bled slowly from me.

“I would not hire a woman who would be cruel! Do you think so little of my judgment?” Nettle was outraged.

“Not her nurse. The children of the keep. When she goes for her lessons, they will peck her for being small and pale. Pinch her at meals. Take her sweets away, chase her down the corridors. Mock her. For being different.”

“The other children? Her lessons?” Nettle was incredulous. “Open your eyes, Fitz. Lessons in what? I love her as dearly as anyone can, but a comfortable and safe life is the best we can do for her. I would not send her to lessons, nor put her at a table where she might be mocked or pinched. I’ll keep her safe in her own chamber, near my own. Fed, dressed, and clean, with her simple little toys. It is the best we can offer her and all she knows to want from life.”

I stared at her, baffled by her words. How could she see Bee that way? “You think her a simpleton?”

She looked jolted that I would deny it. Then she reached into herself and found steel. “It happens. It’s not her fault. It’s not your fault. It’s something we cannot hide from. She was born to my mother late in her life, and she was born tiny. Such children seldom have a … a growing mind. They stay children. And for the rest of her life, be it short or long, someone must look after her. So it would be best if—”

“No. She’ll stay here.” I was adamant, shocked that Nettle could suggest otherwise. “Regardless of what you may think, despite her strange ways, she has a bright little mind. And even if she were simple, my answer would be the same. Withywoods is all she has ever known. She knows her way about the house and grounds, and the servants accept her. She isn’t stupid, Nettle, nor slow. She’s small, and yes, she’s different. She may not speak often, but she does talk. And she does things. Sewing, tending the hives, weeding the gardens, writing in her little book. She loves to be outdoors. She loves being free to do as she will. She followed Molly everywhere.”

My elder daughter just stared at me. She tipped her head toward Bee and asked skeptically, “This tiny child sews? And can tend a hive?”

“Surely your mother wrote to you …” My words dwindled away. Writing was a task for Molly. And it was only in the last year that I myself had seen the bright spark of intellect in my child. Why should I think Nettle had known of it? I had not shared the knowledge of it with her, or Chade or anyone at Buckkeep. At first I had feared to rejoice too soon. And after our remembering game, I had been wary of sharing knowledge of the child’s talents with Chade. I was still certain he would quickly find ways to exploit her.

Nettle was shaking her head. “My mother was overly fond of her youngest. She bragged to me of things that seemed … well. It was plain that she longed desperately for Bee to be …” Her voice sank as she could not bring herself to say the words.

“She’s a capable little girl. Ask the servants,” I advised her, and then wondered how much of Bee’s abilities they had seen. I walked back to my desk and dropped into my chair. None of it mattered. “In any case, she’s not going with you, Nettle. She’s my daughter. It’s only right that she stay with me.”

Such words for me to say to her. She stared at me, her mouth slowly flattening. She could have said something cruel then. I saw her choose not to do so. I would have called my words back if I could, would have found another way to state that thought. Instead I added frankly, “I failed at that duty once, with you. This will be my last chance to do it right. She stays.”

Nettle was silent for a short time and then said gently, “I know you mean well. You intend to do right by her. But Fitz, I just doubt that you can. It’s as you say; you’ve never had the care of such a small child as she is—”

“Hap was younger than she when I took him in!”

“Hap was normal.” I do not think she meant for the word to come out so harshly.

I stood. I spoke firmly to my elder daughter. “Bee is normal, too. Normal for who and what she is. She’s going to stay here, Nettle, and keep her little life as it is. Here, where her memories of her mother are.”

Nettle had begun to weep. Not for sorrow but because she was so weary and still knew she was going to defy me and that it would hurt me. Tears slid down her face. She did not sob. I saw her set jaw and knew she would not back down from her decision. Just as I knew I would not allow her to take Bee from me. Someone was going to break; we could not both win this.

“I have to do right by my baby sister. My mother would expect that of me. And I can’t allow her to stay here,” she said. She looked at me, and in her eyes I read a hard sympathy for what she knew I was feeling. Sympathy but no mercy. “Perhaps if I find a good nurse for her at Buckkeep, she could sometimes accompany Bee to come back here and visit,” she offered doubtfully.

I could feel my anger start to build. Who was she to question my competence in this? The answer that came to me was a dash of cold water in my face. She was the daughter I had abandoned so that I might serve my king. The daughter raised by another man. More than anyone else in the world, she had the right to believe me an incompetent parent. I looked away from both my daughters.

“If you take her, I’ll be alone here.” The words sounded so self-pitying that I instantly regretted them.

Nettle spoke softly and more gently than such a selfish statement deserved. “Then the answer is clear. Close up Withywoods. Leave the staff to run it. Pack up your things. Come back with me to Buckkeep Castle.”

I opened my mouth to speak and could think of nothing to say. I’d never even considered the idea that I might return to Buckkeep Castle one day. Part of my heart leapt up at the thought. No need to face this gulf of loneliness. I could run from it. At Buckkeep, I’d see old friends again, the halls of the keep, the kitchens, the steams, the stables, the steep streets of Buckkeep Town …

As abruptly, my enthusiasm died. Empty. No Molly, no Burrich, no Verity, no Shrewd. No Nighteyes. The yawning cavern of emptiness gaped wider as each remembered death slashed at me.

No Fool.

“No,” I said. “I can’t. There’s nothing for me there. Only politics and intrigue.”

The sympathy I had seen in her face faded. “Nothing.” She said the word stiffly. “Only me.” She cleared her throat. “And Chade and Dutiful and Kettricken and Thick.”

“That’s not what I meant.” Suddenly I was too tired to explain. I tried anyway. “The Buckkeep Castle I knew is long gone. And life there has gone on without me for too long. I don’t know how I’d fit in there now. Not as FitzChivalry Farseer, certainly. Not as the assassin and spy for the royal family. Nor as Tom Badgerlock, the serving man. One day I’ll come to visit for a week or even a month, and see everyone then. But not to stay, my dear. Never again to stay there. And not now. The thought of going somewhere now, of meeting old friends, eating and drinking, laughing and talking … no. I have no heart for it.”

She rose and came to me. She stood behind my chair and set her hands to my shoulders. “I understand,” she said. There was forgiveness in her voice for my thoughtless remark. She had that in her, that ability to forgive easily. I had no idea where she had learned it. It humbled me: I knew I didn’t deserve it. She spoke on. “I had hoped it might be otherwise, but I understand. And maybe in the spring you will feel differently. Maybe by then you’ll be ready to come and spend some time with us.”

She sighed, squeezed my shoulders a final time, and then yawned like a cat. “Oh. It’s gotten late somehow. I should have put Bee to bed hours ago. We’ve an early start to make, and I still need to find a way to make her comfortable in a pannier. I should go to bed now.”

I made no reply. Let her go to bed and get some sleep. In the morning, when she tried to take Bee, I’d simply say no. But for tonight, I could let it go. A coward’s way out.

Bee was still sitting cross-legged, still staring into the flames. “Come, Bee, bedtime,” Nettle said, and stooped to pick up her sister. Bee rolled her little shoulders in a way I knew well, moving herself just outside Nettle’s grip. Nettle tried again, and again the child shrugged her away. “Bee!” Nettle objected.

Bee turned her face up and looked somewhere between Nettle and me. “No. I’m staying with Papa.”

Never had I heard her speak so clearly. It shocked me, and I fought to keep that from my face and from my Skill.

Nettle froze. Then slowly she crouched down next to her sister to peer into her face. “Staying with Papa?” She spoke each word slowly and carefully.

Bee turned her head sharply aside and said nothing. She looked away from both of us, into the shadowy corners of the room. Nettle shot me an incredulous look. I realized that it might be the first time she had ever heard her sister speak a full sentence. Nettle put her attention back on the child.

“Bee, it’s time to go to bed. In the morning we must get up very early. You’re going for a ride with me, a long ride to a place called Buckkeep Castle. It will be so much fun to see a new place! So come to me so I can take you to your bed and tuck you in.”

I saw Bee’s shoulders tighten. She bent her head down, tucking her chin to her chest.

“Bee,” Nettle warned her and then tried again to pick her up. Again Bee squirmed out of her grip.