She sat up straight and spoke bitterly. “Fine. So you both agreed on that. Did either of you ever think to consult with me on it? Did either of you ever pause to consider that perhaps the decision belonged to me?”
And those words opened the door for me to go back down the years, and to tell her what I was doing, and where and how I had learned that she had given herself to Burrich. She looked away from me, chewing on her thumbnail, as I spoke. When my words lapsed to silence she said, “I thought you were dead. If I had known otherwise, if he had known otherwise...”
“I know. But there was no safe way to send word to you. And then, once you had...it was too late. If I had come back, it would have torn all of us apart.”
She leaned forward, her chin cupped in both her palms and her fingers over her mouth. Her eyes were closed, but tears welled from under her lashes. “What a mess you made of it. What a mare's nest we made of our lives.”
There were a hundred answers to that. I could have protested that I had not made the mess, that it had befallen all of us. Suddenly, it would have taken more strength than I had. I let it go. I let it all go. “And now it's too late for there ever to be anything for you and me.”
“Oh, Fitz.” And even in rebuke, for me to hear my name from her lips was a sort of sweetness. “For you, it has always been too late or too soon. Always someday. Always tomorrow, or after you do this one last duty for your king. A woman needs a chance for something to be now. I needed that. I'm sorry we had so little of it.”
A little time longer we sat there in our own sorry silence. Then she said quietly, “Chivalry will be bringing the little ones to me soon. I promised they could stay until the last puppet show. It would not do for them to find you here. They would not understand and I could not explain.”
And so I left her, bowing to her at her door. I had not touched so much as her hand. I felt worse than I had when I had been trying to knock. Then, there had been some shred of possibility. Now, I was left with the reality. Too late.
I descended the stairs, back into the crowds and the noise. Then the noise seemed suddenly louder, and people were talking excitedly, some asking questions, others repeating rumors. “A ship! From the Out Islands!”
“It's late to be docking!”
“A Narwhal banner?”
“The runner just went in! I saw his message baton.”
Then I was trapped in the herd of folk crowding back toward the Great Hall. I tried to fight my way to the edge of the corridor, but only succeeded in being elbowed in the ribs, cursed at, and having my feet trodden on. I gave up and let the surge of eager folk carry me into the Great Hall.
A runner had indeed just reached the Queen. It took some little time for awareness of this to settle on the room. The musicians for the dance fell silent first, and then the puppeteers ceased their play. Jugglers stilled their clubs. The crowd hummed like a hive in anticipation as more and yet more folk crowded into the room. The messenger stood before the Queen, panting still, his baton that signaled to all that he was a royal messenger and not to be delayed still clasped in his hand. In a moment, Chade was at Kettricken's side, and then the Prince was climbing the dais to stand beside her. She held out the open scroll so that they both might read it. Then, when she held it aloft, the murmurs and speculation died to near silence.
“Good tidings! A ship with the Narwhal emblem has docked in the harbor,” she announced. “It seems that perhaps Kaempra Peottre of the Narwhal Clan of the Out Islands will join us for our Harvest Fest tomorrow.”
It was wonderful news and Arkon Bloodblade's shout of enthusiasm was easily heard above the polite mutters of the dukes and duchesses. An Outislander slapped the Duke of Tilth on the back. The Prince nodded his pleasure to the entire assembly and then motioned to the musicians, who launched into a lively and celebratory tune. There was scarcely room to dance; yet folk seemed content to hop or sway in place to the merry tune. Then the crowding in the room eased a bit as some folk fled it for fresh air or space or a chance to spread the gossip further. The puppet show finished and I saw Chivalry and Nettle gather up their smaller siblings and herd them from the room. Other youngsters were being shooed along, as well. Just when I thought that the crowd had eased enough that I could gracefully leave without resorting to elbows to get through the door, a second wave of excited voices reached us from outside. Almost immediately, folk began to spill back into the room. I felt someone tug at my sleeve and turned to find Lacey standing there. “Come sit with us, lad. We'll hide you.”
And so I soon found myself on a bench between Patience and Lacey, looking as unostentatious as a fox in the henhouse. I slumped my shoulders and hid my face behind a mug of fresh cider and waited to see what the fresh hubbub was about.
It was Peottre arriving, I thought when I saw him standing still in the door. And yet the noise outside seemed greater than that would occasion and Peottre himself had a determined look on his face that bespoke something momentous. He lifted both arms over his head and cried out loudly, “Clear a way, if you will! Clear a path.”
It was easier said than done in the crowded space, and yet folk tried to give way. He walked in first, setting a measured tread, and then behind him came a vision such as few have ever seen. Elliania wore a hooded blue cloak. The hood was lined with white fur that set off her shining black eyes and hair. The cloak itself was floor length and trailed some little distance in a train. It was Buck blue, and worked all over with bucks and narwhals leaping side by side. Tiny glittering white gems made up their eyes, so that it seemed she wore a summer evening sky as she advanced into the room.
Prince Dutiful had remained upon the dais with his mother. Now he looked down on her and no one in the room could doubt that he beheld her with delight. He did not say a word to either Chade or the Queen. Nor did he bother with the two steps, but leaped straight to the floor. At sight of him, Elliania threw back her hood, and then ran to meet him. They met in the center of the Great Hall. As they clasped hands, her clear and joyous voice carried. “I could not wait. I could not wait for winter and I could not wait for spring. I am here to marry you and I will do my best to live according to your ways, strange though they are.”
The Prince looked down at her. I saw his face light with joy, and then I saw his hesitation. I saw him groping for what he must say, for what was correct for him to say before all his gathered people. Elliania looked up at him, and the light in her face began to dim as Dutiful attempted to compose a careful reply.
I Skilled fiercely. Tell her you cannot wait, either. Tell her you love her and that you will wed her right away. Love that comes so far and at such a price should not be put off! A woman needs to be loved now.
Chade's face froze in a smile of horror. The Queen stood, and I knew she held her breath. Peottre stood motionless, and his face was very still. I knew he prayed the Prince would not hurt or humiliate the girl.
Dutiful spoke loud and clear. “Then we shall wed, within the week. Not just before my dukes, but before all gathered here. We shall wed, and we shall bring in the harvest as man and wife. Would that please you?”
“El and Eda, the Sea and the Land!” Bloodblade shouted. “The Buck and the Narwhal! At the turning of the year. Good fortune to us all!”
“So it would be!” Peottre cried out and a sort of wonder came into his face.
“That would please me.” I saw the words formed by her lips, but did not hear them. Noise had erupted all about me as hundreds of tongues clattered at once. Chade closed his eyes for a moment, then put on a smile and looked with apparent fondness at his impulsive, impetuous prince. Yet the secret sourness of his gaze was defeated and nullified by what shone in Elliania's eyes. If she had ever needed confirmation of her decision, Dutiful had given it. I wondered at what cost to herself and to her clan she had come here. The garment she wore bore both narwhals and bucks, and I doubted she had made it entirely herself. So I deduced some maternal support of her decision.
“They're getting married this week?” Patience asked me, and I nodded in response.
“This will be a Harvest Fest to remember,” she observed. “Best send runners out about the countryside. No one will want to miss this. We haven't had a proper wedding in Buckkeep since Chivalry and I married here.”
“I don't think this will be one now. They've prepared for Harvest Fest, not a wedding. Cook's going to be very upset!” Lacey warned us.
She was right, of course. I was able to retreat from the chaos I'd created, and actually found a few hours of sleep that night holed up in the workroom. I fear few others did. The servants worked through the night. It was fortunate they had the feast for the harvest well begun and the castle already decked with autumn garlands. Fortunate too that the Prince's dukes and duchesses had already convened for Harvest Fest, for it would have caused a greater furor if the Prince's haste to wed had caused one of his high nobles to miss the ceremony.
I almost missed my peephole the next day. I stood through the lengthy harvest ceremony in the back row of the Prince's Guard. Longwick had replenished our depleted ranks, yet even so I was painfully aware of the absence of those who had gone to find the dragon with us. Riddle stood beside me, and I think he felt it as keenly as I did. Yet for all that, there was satisfaction in watching our prince and his bride.
They were arrayed as the King and Queen of the Harvest. Long had it been since that old custom was observed, for long had it been since we had had a royal couple in residence. The seamstresses must have worked throughout the night. Elliania wore her cloak of narwhals and bucks, and somehow a doublet that matched it perfectly had been created for the Prince. Dutiful's simple coronet had been replaced with an ornate harvest crown, and in that I saw Chade's subtle hand, for he displayed the Prince as a crowned king before his dukes. Ceremonial it might be, yet it could not fail to leave an impression. Elliania was crowned, as well. Whereas the Prince wore a crown of gilded antlers, hers featured a single narwhal horn enameled in blue and trimmed in silver. When they danced together, alone in the center of the sanded floor, they looked like a couple from a legend sprung to life.
“Like Eda and El themselves,” Riddle observed, and I nodded to myself.
Nobility and commoners are alike swayed by pomp and pageantry. Over the next few days, the castle and the town swelled with folk as it had not in years. The ceremony to honor the Prince's Wit coterie was well attended, with far more folk than it would have ordinarily attracted. Cockle had the telling of the tale, and he acquitted himself well and with far more accuracy than I had come to expect of minstrels. Perhaps because he was Witted himself, he did not wish to be seen as embroidering the truth beyond what it would bear. So he told the tale with moving simplicity that made little of the type of magic Burrich and the coterie used and much that they had been willing to sacrifice all for their prince.
Cockle, Swift, Web, and Civil were formally recognized as the Prince's Wit coterie. There was some small grumbling at that, as older nobles recalled well that once the word had only been applied to the circle of Skilled ones who aided a king. Chade assured them that there would indeed eventually be a Skill coterie, as well, as soon as suitable candidates could be tested and selected.
The Queen conveyed Withywoods to Molly rather than Nettle, so that it might be seen as granted to Burrich's line in token of his service. Molly accepted it gravely and I knew that the monies from that estate would provide well for her and all her children. Lady Nettle was presented as the newest of the Queen's circle of ladies, and Swift officially apprenticed to the Witmaster Web. Web spoke briefly but strongly of the power of Burrich's magic, and bemoaned that the man had been forced to hide it rather than educate his son in it. He hoped there would never be such a waste of talent again. Then Web solved for me the riddle that he had given me when first we set out on the voyage. For he said that Burrich briefly rallied before he died, enough to bid his son farewell, and to die with the Warrior's Prayer on his lips. For, “Yes,” he had sighed on his dying breath, and all knew that was the ultimate prayer one could offer to life. Acceptance.
I pondered that during the evening when I sat in my workroom. My hands were slick with lamp oil. It had spread through the Skill scrolls, making many of the old letters fuzzy and swollen to my weary eyes. It was a discouraging, tiresome task. I pushed the scroll away from me, wiped my hands on a rag, and poured myself a little more brandy.
I was not certain I agreed with Web's thoughts, and yet it seemed to me that “yes” had been Burrich's word for life. Certainly, there seemed to be very little glory or satisfaction in saying “no” to it. I had said it often enough to have felt fully the truth of that.
I had sought in vain for another opportunity to speak to Molly alone. Always, she seemed surrounded by her children. Slowly it came to me, sitting there alone by my fire, that they were a part of her. Likely there would be very little chance of finding her alone and apart from them. The opportunity I had so long denied myself was here and now, but rapidly slipping away from me.
The next morning, on the eve of the wedding, I went to the steams early in the day. I washed myself and shaved more carefully than I had in years. Back in the tower room, I brushed my hair back into a warrior's tail, and then took out the selection of clothing that the Fool had inflicted on me. I dressed slowly in the blue doublet and the white shirt, finishing it with the Buck blue leggings. I was now definitely a Buckman, but no longer looked like servant or guardsman. I looked at myself in the mirror and smiled ruefully. Patience would approve. I looked dangerously like my father's son. I dared myself, and then moved the silver fox pin from the inside of my doublet to the outside. The little fox winked at me and I smiled back.