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When we entered the dining hall, I found not only Spurman but also a handful of his officers, Foxglove, Lant, and several others convened. I had expected a small and simple meal, but Spurman had ordered up the best his keep could offer. For a moment, I was baffled. Then I recalled that I was a prince. Carris seed. My head felt full of wool. Time to tighten my thoughts and be very careful.

I do not know how I survived that meal. I decided it was better to be seen as taciturn than as a man who made unrelated comments. When the meal was over, I hoped to retreat to my bed, but killing Chalcedeans within Buck was an activity that seemed to require a thorough discussion. Over and over Spurman and his officers marveled at the Chalcedeans’ audacity and wondered who their peculiar allies had been and what they had hoped to achieve. Riddle, Lant, and Foxglove all expressed puzzlement, and I maintained my noble silence. When the talk ran down, the keep’s Skill-user found a moment to draw Riddle and me aside. “A private word before you retire, gentlemen, if you are not too weary?”Advertisement

I was so tired my ears were humming, but as we bade everyone good night and left the gathering, she managed to catch up with us. Out of earshot of the others, she still looked embarrassed as she told us, “I am to inform you, in the strongest possible terms, that you are to return to Buckkeep Castle as soon as you are able.”

Riddle and I exchanged a glance. “Was the message from Skillmistress Nettle or King Dutiful?”

“Yes. She relayed the king’s will in this.”

I thanked the Skill-user, and both Riddle and I moved slowly toward our rooms. At a bend in the corridor, I asked him, “How angry is Nettle, do you think?”

“Very,” he said shortly. And in that terse response, I sensed that he wished to keep that aspect of our fiasco private. For a time I was silent. Nettle was pregnant and should have had a time of peace and happiness as she waited for her child. I had driven a wedge between her and Riddle. I tried to tell myself that it was outside my control, that her sister being stolen had destroyed peace and happiness for all of us. Yet I could not quite convince myself.

I walked more slowly. “Before we go back to Buck, I want to see the ship they came on.”

He shook his head. “It’s not tied up in Salter’s Deep anymore. It was confiscated days ago. Spurman told me that they removed the ship as part of the ambush. The crew claimed to know nothing except that they’d been hired and paid very well to simply stay aboard and wait for their passengers to come back. They came out of the Pirate Isles, and were hired new to the ship and one another. Most of them seemed glad to walk away from it.”

“No chart on board with Clerres marked on it?” I was half-jesting, but Riddle took me seriously.

“Nothing. Literally nothing. No extra clothing left aboard, not a trinket or a shoestring. Only the crew and their bits of possessions. Nothing to indicate there had even been passengers.”

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Despair gaped like a dry well in front of me. I could not indulge in that. I could not curse nor weep. Such things prevent a man from thinking, and I needed to think clearly. I reached the door of my room and opened it. Riddle followed me in.

“So. We return to Buckkeep Castle tomorrow,” he told me.

“So I planned.”

“We are ordered back, Fitz. That’s a bit different.”

“Oh.” It took a moment for me to consider all the ramifications of that. Prince FitzChivalry, so recently acknowledged and lauded, was being summoned back to Buckkeep like a recalcitrant page. This was not going to be pleasant for anyone. I grasped abruptly how much of my personal freedom had vanished when Chade had taken my arm and presented me to the court. What had seemed a family matter, my sidestepping my cousin’s request that I not go off on my own, now loomed as a prince directly disobeying his king’s directive. Dutiful had reminded me he was my king, and I’d admitted that to him. And then done as I thought best, as if I were merely Tom Badgerlock. No. Not even Tom Badgerlock should have defied his king that way. I chewed my lower lip.

Riddle sank down to sit on the edge of my bed. “I see that you understand.”

I walked to the window and stared out at the lights of Salter’s Deep. “I wish you hadn’t been dragged into it.”

“Oh, Fitz, I dragged myself into it. I could have just reported that I suspected you were going alone, and the Buckkeep Guard would have brought you back.”

I turned to stare at him. “Truly?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. They might have just told me to drag you back quietly. A task that neither of us would have relished.” He gave a small sigh. “No, I got myself into this.” pqdm.com