So this caller was probably a lost traveler, or a roadweary trader. I told myself a guest might be a pleasant distraction, but the thought was less than convincing.
I heard the horse halt outside and the small sounds of a man dismounting.
The Gray One, the wolf growled low.
My heart near stopped in my chest. I opened the door slowly as the old man was reaching to knock at it. He peered at me, and then his smile broke forth. “Fitz, my boy. Ah, Fitz!”
He reached to embrace me. For an instant, I stood frozen, unable to move. I did not know what I felt. That my old mentor had tracked me down after all these years was frightening. There would be a reason, something more than simply seeing me again. But I also felt that leap of kinship, that sudden stirring of interest that Chade had always roused in me. When I had been a boy at Buckkeep, his secret summons would come at night, bidding me climb the concealed stair to his lair in the tower above my room. There he mixed his poisons and taught me the assassin's trade and made me irrevocably his. Always my heart had beaten faster at the opening of that secret door. Despite all the years and the pain, he still affected me that way. Secrets and the promise of adventure clung to him.
So I found myself reaching out to grasp his stooping shoulders and pull him to me in a hug. Skinny, the old man was getting skinny again, as bony as he had been when I first met him. But now I was the recluse in the worn robe of gray wool. He was dressed in royal blue leggings and a doublet of the same with slashed insets of green that sparked off his eyes. His riding boots were black leather, as were the soft gloves he wore. His cloak of green matched the insets in his doublet and was lined with fur. White lace spilled from his collar and sleeves. The scattered scars that had once shamed him into hiding had faded to a pale speckling on his weathered face. His white hair hung loose to his shoulders and was curled above his brow. There were emeralds in his earrings, and another one set squarely in the center of the gold band at his throat.
The old assassin smiled mockingly as he saw me take in his splendor. “Ah, but a queen's councillor must look the part, if he is to get the respect both he and she deserve in his dealings.”
“I see,” I said faintly, and then, finding my tongue, “Come in, do come in. I fear you will find my home a bit ruder than what you have obviously become accustomed to, but you are welcome all the same.”
“I did not come to quibble about your house, boy. I came to see you.”
“Boy?” I asked him quietly as I smiled and showed him in.
“Ah, well. To me, always, perhaps. It is one of the advantages of age, I can call anyone almost anything I please, and no one dares challenge me. Ah, you have the wolf still, I see. Nighteyes, was it? Up in years a bit now; I don't recall that white on your muzzle. Come here now, there's a good fellow. Fitz, would you mind seeing to my horse? I've been all morning in the saddle, and spent last night at a perfectly wretched inn. I'm a bit stiff, you know. And just bring in my saddlebags, would you? There's a good lad.”
He stooped to scratch the wolf's ears, his back to me, confident I would obey him. And I grinned and did. The black mare he'd ridden was a fine animal, amiable and willing. There is always a pleasure to caring for a creature of that quality. I watered her well, gave her some of the chickens' grain, and turned her into the pony's empty paddock. The saddlebags that I carried back to the house were heavy and one sloshed promisingly.
I entered to find Chade in my study, sitting at my writing desk, poring over my papers as if they were his own. “Ah, there you are. Thank you, Fitz. This, now, this is the stone game, isn't it? The one Kettle taught you, to help you focus your mind away from the Skillroad? Fascinating. I'd like to have this one when you are finished with it.”
“If you wish,” I said quietly. I knew a moment's unease. He tossed out words and names I had buried and left undisturbed. Kettle. The Skillroad. I pushed them back into the past. “It's not Fitz anymore,” I said pleasantly. “It's Tom Badgerlock.”
“Oh?”
I touched the streak of white in my hair from my scar. “For this. People remember the name. I tell them I was born with the white streak, and so my parents named me.”
“I see,” he said noncommittally. “Well, it makes sense, and it's sensible.” He leaned back in my wooden chair. It creaked. “There's brandy in those bags, if you've cups for us. And some of old Sara's ginger cakes... I doubt you'd expect me to remember how fond you were of those. Probably a bit squashed, but it's the taste that matters with those.” The wolf had already sat up. He came to place his nose on the edge of the table. It pointed directly at the bags.
