LITMIR.BIZ

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I think she regrets much and is trying to make up for lost time, something that never works. You’ll have to cut back your weapons-training. And Burrich will have to find himself another stable-boy.’

      I didn’t give a peg about the weapons-training. As Chade had often pointed out to me, a really good assassin worked close and quietly. If I learned my trade well, I wouldn’t be swinging a long blade at anyone. But my time with Burrich – again I had the odd sensation of not knowing how I felt. I hated Burrich. Sometimes. He was overbearing, dictatorial and insensitive. He expected me to be perfect, yet bluntly told me that I would never be rewarded for it. But he was also open, and blunt, and believed I could achieve what he demanded …

      ‘You’re probably wondering what advantage she won us,’ Chade went on obliviously. I heard suppressed excitement in his voice. ‘It’s something I’ve tried for twice for you, and been twice refused. But Patience nattered at Shrewd until he surrendered. It’s the Skill, boy. You’re to be trained in the Skill.’

      ‘The Skill,’ I repeated, without sense of what I was saying. It was all going too fast for me.

      ‘Yes.’

      I scrabbled to find thoughts. ‘Burrich spoke of it to me, once. A long time ago.’ Abruptly I remembered the context of that conversation. After Nosy accidentally betrayed us. He had spoken of it as the opposite of whatever was the sense I shared with animals. The same sense had revealed to me the change in the folk of Forge. Would training in one free me of the other? Or would it be a deprivation? I thought of the sense that I had shared with horses and dogs when I knew Burrich was not around. I remembered Nosy, in a mingling of warmth and grief. I had never been so close, before or since, to another living creature. Would this new training in the Skill take that away from me?

      ‘What’s the matter, boy?’ Chade’s voice was kindly, but concerned.

      ‘I don’t know.’ I hesitated. But not even to Chade could I dare to reveal my fear. Or my taint. ‘Nothing, I suppose.’

      ‘You’ve been listening to old tales about the training,’ he guessed, totally incorrectly. ‘Listen, boy, it can’t be that bad. Chivalry went through it. So did Verity. And with the threat of the Red Ships, Shrewd has decided to go back to the old ways, and extend the training to other likely candidates. He wants a coterie, or even two, to supplement what he and Verity can do with the Skill. Galen is not enthused, but I suspect it’s a very good idea. Though, being a bastard myself, I was never allowed the training. So I’ve no real idea how the Skill might be employed to defend the land.’

      ‘You’re a bastard?’ The words burst out of me. All my tangled thoughts were suddenly sliced through by this revelation. Chade stared at me, as shocked at my words as I by his.

      ‘Of course. I thought you’d worked that out long ago. Boy, for someone as perceptive as you are, you’ve got some very odd blindspots.’

      I looked at Chade as if for the first time. His scars, perhaps, had hidden it from me. The resemblance was there. The brow, the way his ears were set, the line of his lower lip. ‘You’re Shrewd’s son,’ I guessed wildly, going only by his appearance. Even before he spoke, I realized how foolish my words were.

      ‘Son?’ Chade laughed grimly. ‘How he would scowl to hear you say that! But the truth makes him grimace even more. He is my younger half-brother, boy, though he was conceived in a wedded bed and I on a military campaign near Sandsedge.’ Softly he added, ‘My mother was a soldier when I was conceived. But she returned home to bear me, and later wedded a potter. When my mother died, her husband put me on a donkey, gave me a necklace she had worn, and told me to take it to the King at Buckkeep. I was ten. It was a long, hard road from Woolcot to Buckkeep, in those days.’

      I couldn’t think of anything to say.

      ‘Enough of this.’ Chade straightened himself up sternly. ‘Galen will be instructing you in the Skill. Shrewd browbeat him into it. He finally acceded, but with reservations. No one is to interfere with any of his students during the training. I wish it were otherwise, but there’s nothing I can do about it. You’ll just have to be careful. You know of Galen, don’t you?’

      ‘A little,’ I said. ‘Only what other people say about him.’

      ‘What do you know by yourself?’ Chade quizzed me.

      I took a breath and considered. ‘He eats alone. I’ve never seen him at table, either with the men-at-arms, or in the dining-hall. I’ve never seen him just standing about and talking, not in the exercise yard or the washing-court or in any of the gardens. He’s always going somewhere when I see him, and he’s always in a hurry. He’s bad with animals. The dogs don’t like him, and he overcontrols the horses so much that he ruins their mouths and their temperaments. I imagine he’s about Burrich’s age. He dresses well, is almost as fancy as Regal. I’ve heard him called a Queen’s man.’

      ‘Why?’ Chade asked quickly.

      ‘Um, it was a long time ago. Gage. He’s a man-at-arms. He came to Burrich one night, a bit drunk, a bit cut-up. He’d had a fight with Galen, and Galen had hit him in the face with a little whip or something. Gage asked Burrich to fix him up, because it was late, and he wasn’t supposed to have been drinking that night. His watch was coming up, or something. Gage told Burrich that he’d overheard Galen say that Regal was twice as royal as Chivalry or Verity, and it was a stupid custom that kept him from the throne. Galen had said that Regal’s mother was better-born than Shrewd’s first queen. Which everyone knows is true. But what angered Gage enough to start the fight was that Galen said Queen Desire was more royal than Shrewd himself, for she’d Farseer blood from both her parents, and Shrewd’s was just from his father. So Gage swung at him, but Galen sidestepped and struck him in the face with something.’

      I paused.

      ‘And?’ Chade encouraged me.

      ‘And so he favours Regal, over Verity or even the King. And Regal, well, accepts him. He’s friendlier with him than he usually is with servants or soldiers. He seems to take counsel from him, the few times I’ve seen them together. It’s almost funny to watch them together; you’d think Galen was aping Regal, from the way he dresses and walks as the prince does. Sometimes they almost look alike.’

      ‘They do?’ Chade leaned closer, waiting. ‘What else have you noticed?’

      I searched my memory for more first-hand knowledge of Galen. ‘That’s all, I think.’

      ‘Has he ever spoken to you?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘I see.’ Chade nodded as if to himself. ‘And what do you know of him by reputation? What do you suspect?’ He was trying to lead me to some conclusion, but I could not guess what.

      ‘He’s from Farrow. An Inlander. His family came to Buckkeep with King Shrewd’s second queen. I’ve heard it said that he’s afraid of the water, to sail or to swim. Burrich respects him, but doesn’t like him. He says he’s a man who knows his job and does it, but Burrich can’t get along with anyone who mistreats an animal, even if it’s out of ignorance. The kitchen folk don’t like him. He’s always making the younger ones cry. He accuses the girls of getting hair in his meals or having dirty hands, and he says the boys are too rowdy and don’t serve food correctly. So the cooks don’t like him either, because when the apprentices are upset they don’t do their work well.’ Chade was still looking at me expectantly, as if waiting for something very important. I racked my brains for other gossip.

      ‘He wears a chain with three gems set in it. Queen Desire gave it to him, for some special service he did. Um. The Fool hates him. He told me once that if no one else is around Galen calls him a freak and throws things at him.’

      Chade’s brows went up. ‘The Fool talks to you?’

      His tone was more than incredulous. He sat up in his chair so suddenly that his wine leaped out of his cup and splashed on his knee. He rubbed at it distractedly with his sleeve.

      ‘Sometimes,’ I admitted

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