Fool’s Quest

I was surprised when he reached across and put his hand on my forearm. “Fitz. It was an intersection of fates and futures, a very powerful one. If they could discover how much they have injured both of us, they would rejoice. They have struck us down, haven’t they? Dwalia came looking for the Unexpected Son. She was so certain I knew where he could be found. I didn’t, but she was willing to destroy me to find out what I did not know. And she has destroyed both of us, by taking and then losing our child. They have destroyed the hope of this world, the one that could guide us on a better course. We cannot restore that. But if we cannot give the world hope, we can remove some of its despair by killing those who serve only their own greed.”

“Tell me more about them.”

“They are tremendously wealthy. They have been corrupt for generations, and they use the prophecies to make themselves ever wealthier. They know what to buy to sell later at a much higher price. They manipulate the future, not to make the world a better place but only to add to their wealth. The White Island is their castle, their palace, and their citadel. At low tide, there is a causeway. When the tide comes in, it becomes a sea-swamp. It is called the White Island not for the White Prophets who once were sheltered and taught there, but for the fortified city, all made of bones.”

“Bones?” I exclaimed.

“Ancient bones of immense sea creatures. The island itself, some say, is a heap of bones. When they existed, they came to that area to breed and to die. The bones, Fitz . . . ah. I have never been able to imagine a creature so large as to have such bones. But the palisade that surrounds the city is made of thighbones, as tall and stout and hard as stone. Some say they are bones that turned to stone but kept their shape. And that the palisade and some of the structures are older even than the Servants and the legend of the Whites they once served.

“But if ever the Servants truly served, they have long ago forgotten that duty. There are ranks of Servants. The bottom level consists of the Servitors. We need not be overly concerned with most of them. They come hoping to rise in the ranks of Servants, but most remain humble servingfolk all their lives. When we destroy those who rule them, they will disperse.

“Some few are the children born to the Servants, the second and third offspring with ambitions. Those may present problems for us. Next come the Collators who read the dreams and sort them and make copies and keep indexes. The Collators are mostly harmless. The clever ones are used as fortune-tellers by the Servants, to fleece folk of their coins by bending prophecies to suit their wishes. Again, they would be little threat if the upper hierarchy were gone. Like ticks on a dog. If the dog is dead, the ticks starve.

“Then there are the Lingstras, like Dwalia. The Lingstras mostly do as they are told by the Manipulors. And no wickedness is beyond the Lingstras once their masters give their orders. The Manipulors are the ones who take counsel over the massed dreams of hundreds of years, to study them and to discover how best to build the wealth of the Servants. And above the Manipulors is the Council of Four. They are the root of the evil that the Servants have become. All descended from Servants, they have known no other life than wealth and privilege built on the stolen prophecies that should be employed to better the world. They would be the ones who would have decided that they must possess the Unexpected Son, at any cost.”

And I knew in that moment that they were the four I would kill. I pushed on with my questions. “There were others. Shine said Dwalia called them her luriks.”

He pinched his lips tightly together. “They can be seen as benighted children who believe too firmly in all they are told.” The set of his mouth told me he did not agree with that assessment. In a deadlier voice he added, “Or you can see them as traitors to their own kind. They are the children of the Whites who did not breed true, or showed their talent for precognition in strange ways. Vindeliar is an example of that. Some see nothing of the future but are adept at remembering every dream they have ever read. They are like walking libraries of the dream-scrolls, able to cite what they read and tell who dreamed it and when. Others are adept at interpreting an event and listing the dreams that foretold it in various forms. The ones who followed Dwalia and died deserved to die. On that, you can absolutely believe me.”

“So you have said. Do you remain certain of that?”

“I speak of the ones who held and passed the tools of my misery. The ones who pushed the needles into my back to shoot the burning colors under my skin. The ones who so meticulously incised the slices in my face. The ones who cut the Skill from my fingertips.” He took a shuddering breath. “Ones who chose to live free of inconvenience by tolerating the agony and degradation of others.”