I stood, staggered sideways a few steps, and was glad to catch myself before Dutiful could seize my arm. When a man’s pride is all he has left, he holds it closely. I did not care that they watched as I went to the drapes and triggered the hidden door. I was sick of secrets. Let them all spill out into the daylight. But it wasn’t daylight now. It was night. Let the secrets spill into the night? I shook my head. I had been doing something. Going to the Fool. I clutched my thoughts tightly.
I ascended the stairs. I knew they followed. The room above was yellow with candlelight and hearth fire. I smelled the resinous fragrance of the Mountain forests and suspected that Kettricken burned incense from her home. It cleared my mind and as I entered the chamber, it struck me that I had never seen it so warm and welcoming. My eyes swept over the changes. The crow perched on one of the chairbacks, dozing in the warmth from the fire. “Fitz—Chivalry!” she greeted me. Ash sat on the floor by the hearth at Kettricken’s feet. He gave me a doleful look and then turned his gaze back to the fire. My former queen was ensconced in Chade’s old chair. She had draped a colorful Mountain coverlet over it. On the table beside her, a fat blue teapot painted with leaping hares steamed. Her braided hair was pinned high on her head, and the cuffs of her simple blue gown were folded back as if she were ready to do the day’s scrubbing. She turned to me, a mug of aromatic tea in her hands. Her eyes were concerned but her mouth smiled. “Fitz! I am so relieved you have returned to us, and so worried for little Bee! And for Chade’s daughter!”
I made no answer to her greeting. My gaze was snagged on the man who sat beside her. He was slender and upright, but his posture was still uncertain. An invalid still, he was robed in soft gray wool; a loose hood covered his head. I could not tell if he could see me or not. The eyes he turned on me were no longer clouded and gray; they gleamed a faint gold as if the firelight reflected in them. He extended a hand toward me. The knuckles were still swollen and his hands were bone-gaunt, but his fingers moved with a shadow of their old grace. He turned his hand palm up and reached toward me. “Fitz?” he asked, and I knew then he could not see me. Yet I had the uncanny feeling he could sense me.
I crossed the room and seized his hand in both of mine. It was slightly cool, as the Fool’s flesh had ever been. “You are better!” I exclaimed, full of relief at the sight of him upright and moving. I had expected to see him gray and failing in the bed. I turned his hand over in mine; the flesh of the back of it was strangely puckered. It reminded me of an unfledged squab.
“I am alive,” he rejoined. “And more vital. Better? I do not know. I feel so different that I cannot say if I am better or not.”