CHAPTER FIVE
Confrontations
What is the Wit? Some would say it is a perversion, a twisted indulgence of spirit by which men gain knowledge of the lives and tongues of the beasts, eventually to become little more than beasts themselves. My study of it and its practitioners has led me to a different conclusion, however. The Wit seems to be a form of mind linking, usually with a particular animal, which opens a way for the understanding of that animal's thoughts and feelings. It does not, as some have claimed, give men the tongues of the birds and beasts. A Witted one does have an awareness of life all across its wide spectrum, including humans and even some of the mightier and more ancient of trees. But a Witted one cannot randomly engage a chance animal in "conversation". He can sense an animal's nearby presence, and perhaps know if the animal is wary or hostile or curious. But it does not give one command over the beasts of the land and the birds of the sky as some fanciful tales would have us believe. What the Wit may be is a man's acceptance of the beast nature within himself, and hence an awareness of the element of humanity that every animal carries within it as well. The legendary loyalty that a bonded animal feels for his Witted one is not at all the same as what a loyal beast gives its master. Rather it is a reflection of the loyalty that the Witted one has pledged to his animal companion, like for like.
I did not sleep well, and it was not just that I was no longer accustomed to sleeping at night. What they had told me about Forged ones had put the wind up my back. The musicians all climbed up into the loft to sleep on the heaped straw there, but I found myself a corner where I could put my back to a wall and yet still have a clear view of the door. It felt strange to be inside a barn again at night. This was a good tight barn, built of river rock and mortar and timber. The inn kept a cow and a handful of chickens in addition to their hire-horses and the beasts of their guests. The homely sounds and smells of the hay and animals put me sharply in mind of Burrich's stables. I felt suddenly homesick for them as I never had for my own room up in the keep.
I wondered how Burrich was, and if he knew of Patience's sacrifices. I thought of the love that had once been between them, and how it had foundered on Burrich's sense of duty. Patience had gone on to marry my father, the very man to whom Burrich had pledged all that loyalty. Had he ever thought of going to her, attempting to reclaim her? No. I knew it instantly and without doubt. Chivalry's ghost would stand forever between them. And now mine as well.
It was not a far jump from pondering this to thinking of Molly. She had made the same decision for us that Burrich had made for Patience and himself. Molly had told me that my obsessive loyalty to my king meant we could never belong to one another. So she had found someone she could care about as much as I cared for Verity. I hated everything about her decision except that it had saved her life. She had left me. She had not been at Buckkeep to share my fall and my disgrace.
I reached vaguely toward her with the Skill, then abruptly rebuked myself. Did I really want to see her as she probably was this night, sleeping in another man's arms, his wife? I felt an almost physical pain in my chest at the thought. I did not have a right to spy on any happiness she had claimed for herself. Yet as I drowsed off, I thought of her, and longed hopelessly after what had been between us.
Some perverse fate brought me a dream of Burrich instead, a vivid dream that made no sense. I sat across from him. He was sitting at a table by a fire, mending harness as he often did of an evening. But a mug of tea had replaced his brandy cup, and the leather he worked at was a low soft shoe, much too small for him. He pushed the awl through the soft leather and it went through too easily, jabbing him in the hand. He swore at the blood, and then looked up abruptly, to awkwardly beg my pardon for using such language in my presence.
I woke up from the dream, disoriented and bemused. Burrich had often made shoes for me when I was small but I could not recall that he had ever apologized for swearing in my presence, though he had rapped me often enough when I was a boy if I had dared to use such language in his. Ridiculous. I pushed the dream aside, but sleep had fled with it.
Around me, when I quested out softly, were only the muzzy dreams of the sleeping animals. All were at peace save me. Thoughts of Chade came to niggle and worry at me. He was an old man in many ways. When King Shrewd had lived, he had seen to all Chade's needs, so that his assassin might live in security. Chade had seldom ventured forth from his concealed room, save to do his "quiet work." Now he was out on his own, doing El knew what, and with Regal's troops in pursuit of him. I rubbed vainly at my aching forehead. Worrying was useless, but I could not seem to stop.
I heard four light foot scuffs, followed by a thud, as someone climbed down from the loft and skipped the last step on the ladder. Probably one of the women headed for the backhouse. But a moment later I heard Honey's voice whisper, "Cob?"
"What is it?" I asked unwillingly.
She turned toward my voice, and I heard her approach in the darkness. My time with the wolf had sharpened my senses. Some little moonlight leaked in at a badly shuttered window. I picked out her shape in the darkness. "Over here," I told her when she hesitated, and saw her startle at how close my voice was. She groped her way to my corner, and then hesitantly sat down in the straw beside me.
"I daren't go back to sleep," she explained. "Nightmares."
"I know how that is," I told her, surprised at how much sympathy I felt. "When, if you close your eyes, you tumble right back into them."
"Exactly," she said, and fell silent, waiting.
But I had nothing more to say, and so sat silent in the darkness.
"What kind of nightmares do you have?" she asked me quietly.
"Bad ones," I said dryly. I had no wish to summon them by speaking of them.
"I dream Forged ones are chasing me, but my legs have turned to water and I cannot run. But I keep trying and trying as they come closer and closer."
"Uhm," I agreed. Better than dreaming of being beaten and beaten and beaten… I reined my mind away from that.
"It's a lonely thing, to wake up in the night and be afraid."
I think she wants to mate with you. Will they accept you into their pack so easily?.
"What?" I asked startled, but it was the girl who replied, not Nighteyes.
"I said, it's lonely to awake at night and be afraid. One longs for a way to feel safe. Protected."
"I know of nothing that can stand between a person and the dreams that come at night," I said stiffly. Abruptly I wanted her to go away.
"Sometimes a little gentleness can," she said softly. She reached over and patted my hand. Without intending to, I snatched it away.
"Are you shy, prentice-boy?" she asked coyly.
"I lost someone I cared for," I said bluntly. "I've no heart to put another in her place."
"I see." She rose abruptly, shaking straw from her skirts. "Well. I'm sorry to have disturbed you." She sounded insulted, not sorry.
She turned and groped her way back to the loft ladder. I knew I had offended her. I did not feel it was my fault. She went up the steps slowly, and I thought she expected me to call her back. I didn't. I wished I had not come to town.
That makes two of us. The hunting is poor, this close to all these men. Will you be much longer?
I fear I must travel with them, for a few days, at least as far as the next town.
You would not mate her, she is not pack. Why must you do these things?
I did not try to form it into words for him. All I could convey was a sense of duty, and he could not grasp how my loyalty to Verity bound me to help these travelers on the road. They were my people because they were my king's. Even I found the connection so tenuous as to be ridiculous, but there it was. I would see them safely to the next town.