witnesses?'
'I am not so easy a target as that,' she defied me. 'It would take an excellent archer indeed to make an arrow fly true in these shifting winds. As for a knife, well, I've a knife, too. To strike me, one must come where I can strike back.' She turned and strode off again.
I followed relentlessly. 'And where would that lead? To your killing a man. And all the Keep in an uproar, and Verity chastising his guard, that you could be so endangered? And what if the killer were better with a knife than you? What consequence for the Six Duchies if I were now pulling your body out of a drift?' I swallowed and added, 'My queen.'
Her pace slowed, but her chin was still up as she asked softly, 'What consequence for me if I sit day after day in the Keep, growing soft and blind as a grub? FitzChivalry, I am not a game piece, to sit my space on the board until some player sets me in motion. I am… there's a wolf watching us!'
'Where?'
She pointed, but he had vanished like a swirl of snow, leaving only a ghostly laughter in my mind. A moment later a trick of the wind brought his scent to Sidestep. The mule snorted and tugged at his lead rope. 'I did not know we had wolves so near!' Kettricken marveled.
'Just a town dog, my lady. Probably some mangy, homeless beast out to sniff and paw through the village trash heap. He is nothing to fear.'
You think not? I'm hungry enough to eat that mule.
Go back and wait. I shall come soon.
The trash heap is nowhere near here. Besides, it's full of seagulls and stinks of their droppings. And other things. The mule would be fresh and sweet.
Go back, I tell you. I'll bring you meat later.
'FitzChivalry?' This from Kettricken, warily.
I snapped my eyes back to her face. 'I beg pardon, my lady. My mind wandered.'
'Then that anger in your face is not for me?'
'No. Another has… crossed my will this day. For you, I have concern, not anger. Will not you mount Sidekick and let me take you back to the Keep?'
'I wish to see Verity.'
'My queen, it will not please him, to see you come so.'
She sighed and grew a bit smaller inside her cloak. She looked aside from me as she asked more quietly, 'Have you never wished to pass your time in someone's presence, Fitz, whether they welcomed you or not? Cannot you understand my loneliness?..'
'I do.'
'To be his queen-in-waiting, to be sacrifice for Buckkeep, this I know I must do well. But there is another part of me… I am woman to his man and wife to his husbanding. To that I am sworn as well, and am more willing than dutiful to it. But he comes seldom to me, and when he does, he speaks little and leaves soon.' She turned back to me. Tears sparkled suddenly on her eyelashes. She dashed them away and a note of anger crept into her voice. 'You spoke once of my duty, of doing what only a Queen can do for Buckkeep. Well, I shall not get with child lying alone in my bed night after night!'
'My queen, my lady, please,' I begged her. Heat rose in my face.
She was merciless. 'Last night, I did not wait. I went to his door. But the guard claimed he was not there. That he had gone to his tower.' She looked aside from me. 'Even that work is preferable to how he must labor in my bed.' Not even that bitterness could cover the hurt under her words.
I reeled with the things I did not want to know. The cold of Kettricken alone in her bed. Verity, drawn to Skill at night. I did not know what was worse. My voice shook as I said, 'You must not tell me these things, my queen. To speak of this to me is not right—'
'Then let me go and speak to him. He is the one who needs to hear this, I know. And I am going to speak it! If he will not come to me for his heart's sake, then he must come for his duty.'
This makes sense. She is the one who must bear if the pack is to increase.
Stay out of this. Go home.
Home! A derisive bark of laughter in my mind. Home is a pack, not a cold empty place. Listen to the female. She speaks well. We should all go, to be with him who leads. You fear foolishly for this bitch. She hunts well, with a keen tooth, and her kills are clean. I watched her yesterday. She is worthy of he who leads.
We are not pack. Be silent.
I am.
At the corner of my eye, I caught a flash of movement. I turned quickly, but there was nothing there. I turned back to find Kettricken standing silent before me still. But I sensed the spark of anger that had spirited her was now damped in pain. It bled her resolve from her.
I spoke quietly through the wind. 'Please, lady, let me take you back to Buckkeep.'
She did not reply, but pulled her hood up around her face and tightened it to hide most of her face. Then she walked to the mule and mounted and suffered me to lead the beast back to Buckkeep. It seemed a longer, colder walk in her subdued silence. I was not proud of the change I had wrought in her. To take my mind from it, I quested out about me carefully. It did not take me long to find Cub. He stalked and shadowed us, drifting like smoke through the tree cover, using the windblown drifts and falling snow to hide himself. I could never once actually swear that I saw him. I caught motion from the corner of my eye, of a tiny bit of his scent on the wind. His instincts served him well.
Think you I am ready to hunt?
Not until you are ready to obey. I made my reply severe.
What then shall I do when I hunt alone, packless one? He was stung, and angry.
We were drawing near to the outer wall of Buckkeep. I wondered how he had gotten outside the Keep without passing through a gate.
Shall I show you? A peace offering.
Perhaps later. When I come with meat. I felt his assent. He was no longer pacing us, but had raced off ahead, and would be at the cottage when I got there. The guards at the gate abashedly challenged me. I identified myself formally, and the sergeant had the wit not to insist that I identify the lady with me. In the courtyard I halted Sidekick that she might dismount and offered her my hand. As she climbed down I all but felt eyes on me. I turned, and saw Molly. She carried two buckets of water fresh drawn from the well. She stood still, looking at me, poised like a deer before flight. Her eyes were deep, her face very still. When she turned aside, there was a stiffness to her carriage. She did not glance at us again as she crossed the courtyard and went toward the kitchen entrance. I felt a cold foreboding inside me. Then Kettricken let go of my hand and gathered her cloak more closely about herself. She did not look at me either, but only said softly, 'Thank you, FitzChivalry.' She walked slowly toward the door.
I returned Sidekick to the stable and saw to him. Hands came by and raised an eyebrow at me. I nodded, and he went on about his work. Sometimes, I think that was what I liked best about Hands, his ability to leave alone that which was not his concern.
I made bold my heart for that which I did next. I went out behind the exercise pens. There was a thin trail of smoke rising and a nasty scent of scorching meat and hair. I walked toward it. Burrich stood next to the fire, watching it burn. The wind and snow kept trying to put it out, but Burrich was determined it would burn well. He glanced at me as I came up but would not look at me or speak to me. His eyes were black hollows full of dumb pain. It would turn to anger if I dared speak to him. But I had not come for him. I took my knife from my belt and cut from my head a finger's-length lock of hair. I added it to the pyre, and watched as it burned. Vixen. A most excellent bitch. A memory came to me and I spoke it aloud. 'She was there the first time Regal ever looked at me. She lay beside me and snarled up at him.'
After a moment Burrich nodded to my words. He, too, had been there. I turned and slowly walked away.
My next stop was the kitchen, to filch a number of meaty bones left over from yesterday's wake. They were not fresh meat, but they'd have to do. Cub was right. He'd have to be put out on his own soon, to hunt for himself. Seeing Burrich's pain had renewed my resolve. Vixen had lived a long life, for a hound, but still too short for Burrich's heart. To bond to any animal was to promise oneself that future pain. My heart had been broken
