Fool’s Quest

I did not expect what he next said. A tremulous smile broke on his tearstained face. “He was right. He did know. My grandfather said as much, for he knew your father and said no one could be mistaken who had seen him. My father used to agree with him, but I think it was only so he would stop insisting on it. Sir, I am proud to serve you, as my family has served your family for generations. And here and now, I vow my loyalty to you. And to your daughter, Princess Bee. Forever and ever.”

“Thank you.” What else does one say when a boy promises his life and loyalty? I closed my heart to the storm of emotions his words woke in me and spoke soothingly. “Continue telling me what happened, Perseverance.”

“I mean it, sir.” A boy’s tender feelings that such an offer might be disdained as childishness rode in his words.

“I know you do.” I spoke severely. “And right now, I am holding you to it. I need what you are doing now. I need to know every bit of what you know. Keep talking.”

And so I heard of how he had gone to his lessons the next day, and my daughter had been there. He spoke of his conversation with Bee and how she had told him what I’d done. She’d been proud of me. Proud. I glanced at Lant as the lad spoke. His face was a mixture of emotions. Did he remember snatches of that day, scrubbed clean of Shun’s presence? But as Perseverance began to tell of the sounds they had heard and how Lant had gone to see what they were, the scribe began shaking his head again. I gave him a look and he stopped.

So I learned that Revel had spent the last moments of his life trying to save the Withywoods children. Truly, I’d never given the man the credit he deserved. And as the tale wound on, I heard of my Bee hiding the children where she had believed they would be safe, only to be deprived of that safety herself. Perseverance told me of the slaughter he’d seen in the stables, slain men sprawled with their throats cut as they did their daily chores, his own father and grandfather among them, and of stepping over bodies to saddle Priss, and the wild ride he and Bee had made in the hope of getting help.

His detailed account of the attack ended with the arrow. He had come to consciousness only in time to see them leaving with Bee. He had returned to the manor, to the stables still on fire and the folk he had known all his life denying that he had ever existed. I stopped him there. He had begun to shake as he spoke of it. “That’s enough. Let it go for now, Perseverance. I know the truth of your words. Now, I want you to think, but not speak, of the people you saw. Think about each one of them, and when you are ready tell me about them, one at a time.” This, I had been taught by Chade, was the best way to gain information from one who had not been trained to report as I had. A question such as Was he tall? or Was he bearded? could carry the untrained mind to imagining something that had not been there.

He was silent as I bandaged his shoulder. It was infected, but no worse than such wounds always were. When I had finished, I helped him with his shirt and then brought him food and another jot of brandy. “Drink that first. Down in a gulp. Then you can eat while you talk to me.”

He took the brandy down, gasped and choked even more than he had on the first two, and quickly took a piece of bread to clear the taste from his mouth. I waited. He was as close to drunk as I wanted him, his thoughts wide and unguarded. And he told me what I would expect a stable boy to notice. White horses, with peculiar flat saddles, and big horses suited for men who might wear chain mail. Saddles on the big horses that sounded almost Chalcedean in design.

They spoke a foreign tongue. I asked no question, but he told me of a man on a horse who shouted, “Krintzen, krintzen!” over and over.

Kar inte jhen. Chalcedean for “sit down.”

Chalcedeans in Buck. A raiding force? One that had crossed Shoaks Duchy and Farrow to raid an isolated manor in Buck? Why? To steal my daughter? It made no sense. Not until he told me that a pleasant-faced woman was with them, seeking a pale boy or young man. Then I knew what they had come seeking. The Unexpected Son, the child whom the Fool’s messenger had urged me to find and protect. I still had no idea who or where that lad might be, but the puzzle began to make sense. Hostages to exchange. Who better to take than the daughter of the house and a noble lady?