Robin Hobb - Fool's Fate

I surveyed the faces around me. Dutiful was looking at me alertly. Thick was pursuing something inside his left nostril. Chade was sitting bolt upright, fairly shivering with energy. Whatever he had taken to bring him back to alertness had done nothing for the threads of blood in his eyes. The contrast with his green gaze was unsettling. "What I'd like to do today… Thick. Please stop that."

He looked at me blankly, his finger still wedged in his nose. "Can't. It's poking me in there." Chade rubbed his brow, looking aside. "Give him a handkerchief," he suggested to no one in particular. Prince Dutiful was closest. "Here, blow your nose. Maybe it will come out."

He handed Thick a square of embroidered linen. Thick regarded it doubtfully for several seconds, and then took it. Over the deafening sounds of his attempts to clear his nose, I asked, "Last night, each of us was to try Skill- walking in our dreams." I had been nervous about suggesting this, but I had felt both Dutiful and Chade were ready to attempt it. Thick routinely forgot what he was to do in the evenings, so I'd had small concern for him. When one Skill-walked, one could leave one's own body and for a short time experience life through someone else. I had managed it several times, most often by accident. The Skill scrolls had suggested that it was not only a good way to gather information but also to locate those who were open enough to be used as King's Men, sources of strength to a Skill-user. Those sufficiently open sometimes proved to possess the Skill themselves. Chade had been enthused yesterday, but a glance at him today showed none of the triumph he would have displayed if he had managed the feat. Dutiful likewise looked gloomy. "So. No success?"

"I did it!" Thick exulted.

"You Skill-walked?" I was astounded.

"No-o-o. I got it out. See?" He displayed his greenish trophy trapped in the middle of the Prince's handkerchief. Chade turned aside with an exclamation of disgust.

Dutiful, being fifteen, laughed aloud. "Impressive, Thick. That's a big one. Looks like an old green salamander."

"Yah," Thick agreed with satisfaction. His mouth sagged wide with pleasure. "I dreamed a big blue lizard last night. Bigger than this!" His laughter, like a dog's huffy panting, joined the Prince's.

"My prince and future monarch," I reminded Dutiful sternly, "we have work to do." In reality, I was struggling to keep a straight face. It was good to see Dutiful laugh freely, even over something puerile. Since I had first met the boy, he had always seemed weighted by his station and his perpetual duties. This was the first time I had seen him acting like a youngster in springtime; I regretted my rebuke when the smile faded so abruptly from his face. With a gravity that far exceeded my own, he turned to Thick, seized the handkerchief and balled it up.

"No, Thick. Stop. Listen to me. You dreamed a big blue lizard? How big?"

The intensity of the Prince's question drew Chade's glance. But Thick was confused and offended by how quickly Dutiful's tone and attitude toward him had changed. His brow furrowed and both bottom lip and tongue jutted as a sulk settled onto his face. "That wasn't nice."

I recognized the phrase. We'd been working on Thick's table manners. If he was to accompany us on the trip to Aslevjal, he had to learn at least a modicum of courtesy. Unfortunately, he seemed to recall the rules only when he could rebuke someone else with them.

"I'm sorry, Thick. You're right. Grabbing isn't nice. Now tell me about the big lizard you dreamed." The Prince was smiling earnestly at Thick, but the change of topic was too fast for the little man. Thick shook his heavy head and turned away. He folded his stubby arms on his chest. "Na," he declined gruffly. "Please, Thick," Dutiful began, but Chade interrupted. "Can't this wait, Dutiful? We've not that many days before we sail, and we still have so much ground to cover if we are to function as a Skill coterie." I knew the old man's anxiety. I shared it. The Skill might be essential to the Prince's success. Neither of us put much weight on his truly slaying some buried ice dragon. The true value of the Skill would be that Chade and I could gather information and convey it to Dutiful to smooth the path for his wedding negotiations. "No. This is important, Chade. I think. Well, it might be. Because I dreamed a big blue lizard last night, too. Actually, the creature I dreamed was a dragon."

A moment of silence held as we considered this. Then Chade hesitantly attempted, "Well, it should not surprise us if you and Thick share the same dream. You are so often Skill-linked throughout the day, why shouldn't it bleed over into the night?"

"Because I don't think I was asleep when it happened. I was trying to do the Skill-walking. Fi— Tom says it was easiest for him to bridge over to it from a light sleep. So I was in my bed, trying to be asleep but not too asleep, while reaching out with the Skill. And then I felt it."

"What?" Chade asked.

"I felt it looking for me. With its great big whirly silver eyes." Thick was the one who answered. "Yes," the Prince confirmed slowly. My heart sank.

"I don't understand," Chade said irritably. "Start at the beginning and report it properly." This was addressed to Dutiful. I understood the double prong of Chade's anger. Once again, the three of them had attempted an exercise, and both Thick and Dutiful had experienced some success while Chade had failed. Underscoring that was the mention of a dragon. There had been too many mentions of dragons lately: a frozen dragon for Dutiful to unearth and behead, the dragons the Bingtown contingent had bragged about (supposedly at the beck and call of the Bingtown Traders), and now a dragon intruding into our Skill-exercise. We knew far too little about any of them. We dared not dismiss them as legends and lies; too well we recalled the stone dragons that had rallied to the Six Duchies' defense sixteen years ago, yet we knew little about any of them.

"There's scarcely enough to report it," Dutiful replied. He took a breath, and despite his own words, began in the orderly way in which Chade had schooled both of us. "I had retired to my chambers, exactly as if I were going to sleep for the night. I was in my bed. There was a low fire in the hearth, and I was watching it, unfocusing my mind in a way that I hoped would invite sleep and yet leave me aware enough to reach out with the Skill. Twice I dozed off. Each time, I roused myself and tried to approach the exercise again. The third time, I tried reversing the process. I reached out with the Skill, held myself in readiness, and then tried to sink down into sleep." He cleared his throat and looked around at us. "Then I felt something big. Really big." He looked at me. "Like that time on the beach."

Thick was following the tale with his jaw ajar and his small round eyes bunched with thought. "A big fat blue lizard," he hazarded.

"No, Thick." Dutiful patiently kept his voice soft. "Not at first. At first, there was just this immense… presence. And I longed to go toward it, and yet I feared to go toward it. Not because of any deliberate threat from it. On the contrary, it seemed… infinitely benign. Restful and safe. I was afraid to touch it for fear that … I'd lose any desire to come back. It seemed like the end of something. An edge, or a place where something different begins. No. Like something that lives in a place where something different begins." The Prince's voice trickled away.

"I don't understand. Talk sense," Chade demanded.

"It's as much sense as you can apply to it," I interceded quietly. "I know the sort of being, or feeling, or place, that the Prince is speaking about. I've encountered such, a time or two. Once, one helped us. But I had the feeling that one was an exception. Perhaps another one of them might have absorbed us and not even noticed.