"She will," he promised me gravely. "She will."

The slow days passed. My hands began to look normal again and even to have some callus on them again. The healer said I might go with no bandaging on my back. I began to feel restless but knew I did not yet have the strength to leave. My disquiet in turn agitated the Fool. I did not realize how much I paced until the evening he rose from his chair and shoved his table over into my path to divert me from my course. We both laughed, but it did not dispel the underlying tension. I began to believe I destroyed peace wherever I went.

Kettle visited often and drove me to distraction with her knowledge of the scrolls concerning the White Prophet. Too often they mentioned a Catalyst. Sometimes the Fool was drawn into her discussions. More often he simply made noncommittal noises as she tried to explain it all to me. I almost missed her dour taciturnity. I confess, too, that the more she talked, the more I wondered how a woman of Buck had ever chanced to wander so far from her homeland, to become a devotee of a distant teaching that would someday lead her back to her homeland. But the old Kettle showed through when she deflected my slyly posed questions.

Starling came, though not as often as Kettle, and usually when the Fool was out and about on errands. It seemed that they could not be in the same room without striking sparks from one another. As soon as I was able to move about at all, she began to persuade me to take outside walks with her, probably to avoid the Fool. I suppose they did me good, but I took no enjoyment in them. I had had my fill of winter cold and usually her conversation made me feel both restless and spurred. Her talk was often of the war back in Buck, snippets of news overheard from Chade and Kettricken, for she was often with them. She played for them in the evenings, as best she could with her damaged hand and a borrowed harp. She lived in the main hall of the royal residence. This taste of a court life seemed to agree with her. She was frequently enthused and animated. The bright clothes of the Mountain folk set off her dark hair and eyes, while the cold brought color to her face. She seemed to have recovered from all misfortune, to be once more filled with life. Even her hand was healing well, and Chade had helped her barter for wood to make a new harp. It shamed me that her optimism only made me feel older and weaker and more wearied. An hour or two with her wore me out as if I had been exercising a headstrong filly. I felt a constant pressure from her to agree with her. Often I could not.

"He makes me nervous," she told me once, in one of her frequent diatribes against the Fool. "It's not his color; it's his manner. He never says a kind or simple word to anyone, not even to the children who come to trade for his toys. Have you marked how he teases and mocks them?"

"He likes them, and they like him," I said wearily. "He does not tease them to be cruel. He teases them as he teases everyone. The children enjoy it. No child wishes to be spoken down to." The brief walk had tired me more than I wished to admit to her. And it was tedious constantly to defend him to her.

She made no reply. I became aware of Nighteyes shadowing us. He drifted from the shelter of a cluster of trees to the snowladen bushes of a garden. I doubted his presence was a great secret, and yet he was uneasy about strolling openly through the streets. It was strangely comforting to know he was close by.

I tried to find another topic. "I have not seen Chade in some days now," I ventured. I hated to fish for news of him. But he had not come to me and I would not go to him. I did not hate him, but I could not forgive his plans for my child.

"I sang for him last night." She smiled at the recollection. "He was at his most witty. He can even bring a smile to Kettricken's face. It is hard to believe he lived in such isolation for years. He draws people to himself like a flower draws bees. He has a most gentlemanly way of letting a woman know she is admired. And…"

"Chade?" The word burst from me incredulously. "Gentlemanly?"

"Of course," she said in amusement. "He can be quite charming, when he has the time. I sang for him and Kettricken the other night, and he was quite gracious in his thanks. A courtier's tongue he has." She smiled to herself, and I could see that whatever Chade had said had stayed pleasantly with her. To try to envision Chade as a charmer of women required my mind to bend in an unaccustomed direction. I could think of nothing to say, and so left her in her pleasant reverie. After a time, she added unexpectedly, "He will not be going with us, you know."

"Who? Where?" I could not decide if my recent fever had left me slow witted or if the minstrel's mind jumped about like a flea.

She patted my arm comfortingly. "You are getting tired. We had best turn back. I can always tell when you are wearied, you ask the most inane questions." She took a breath and returned to her topic. "Chade will not be going with us to seek Verity. He has to go back to Buck, to pass the word of your quest and hearten the folk there. Of course, he will respect your wishes and make no mention of you. Only that the Queen has set forth to find the King and restore him to the throne."

She paused, and tried to say casually, "He has asked me to devise some simple ditties for him, based on the old songs so they may be easily learned and sung." She smiled at me and I could tell how pleased she was he had asked this of her. "He will spread them among the taverns and inns of the road and like seeds they will sprout and trail from there. Simple songs saying that Verity will return to set things right and that a Farseer heir will rise to the throne to unite the Six Duchies in both victory and peace. He says it is most important to keep the heart in the people, and to keep before them the image of Verity returning."

I sorted my way back through her chatter of songs and prophecies. "Us, you said. Us, who? And going where?"

She stopped off her glove and set her hand to my forehead quickly. "Are you feverish, again? A bit, perhaps. Let us turn back now." As we began retracing our steps through the quiet streets, she added patiently. "Us, you and I and Kettricken, going to find Verity. Had you forgotten that was why you came to the Mountains? Kettricken says the way will be hard. It is not terribly difficult to travel to the scene of the battle. But if Verity went on from there, then it is on one of the ancient paths marked on her old map, and they may not be paths at all anymore. Her father is plainly not enthused with her undertaking. His mind is fixed only on the waging of war against Regal. 'While you seek your husband king, your false brother seeks to make our folks his slaves!' he has told her. So she must gather what supplies are given to her willingly, and take only such folk as would go with her rather than stay to fight Regal. There are not many of those, to be sure, and…"

"I wish to go back to the Fool's house," I said faintly. My head was spinning and my stomach churning. I had forgotten that this had been the way of it at King Shrewd's court. Why had I expected it to be different here? The plans would be made, the arrangements undertaken, and then they would tell me what they wished me to do and I would do it. Had not that always been my function? To go to such and such a place, and kill that certain man, a man I'd never met before, all on someone else's say? I did not know why it suddenly shocked me so to find that all their momentous planning had moved on without any words from me, as if I were no more than a horse in a stall, waiting to be saddled, mounted, and reined to the hunt.

Well, was not that the bargain I had offered Chade, I reminded myself. That they could have my life, if they would but leave my child alone. Why be surprised? Why even be concerned at all? I should simply go back to the Fool's, to sleep and eat and build my strength until called for.