Fool's Quest

I was, a little, but I covered it. “If he is yours, why is he not FitzFallstar? Or simply a Fallstar?”

“He should have been Lantern Fallstar. When we discovered Laurel was with child, I was willing to wed. She was not.”

I glanced at Thick. He appeared uninterested in what we were saying. I lowered my voice. “Why?”

There was pain in the lines at the corners of Chade’s mouth and in his eyes. “The obvious reason. She had come to know me too well, and knowing me could not love me. She chose to leave court and go to where she could give birth quietly and out of sight of all.” He made a small sound. “That hurt the worst of all, Fitz. That she did not want anyone to know the child was mine.” He shook his head. “I could not stop her. I made sure she had funds. She had an excellent midwife. But she did not survive his birth for long. The midwife called it a childbed fever. I had left Buckkeep as soon as the messenger bird reached me that the boy was born. I still hoped to persuade her to try having a life with me. But by the time I reached her, she was dead.”

He fell silent. I wondered why he was telling me, and why he was telling me now, but did not ask either question. I got up and put more wood on the fire. “Are there gingercakes in your kitchen?” Thick asked me.

“I don’t know but there is bound to be something sweet there. Why don’t you go and ask for something nice? Bring some back for Lord Chade and me, too.”

“Yah,” he promised, and left with alacrity.

Chade spoke as soon as the door had closed around him. “Lant was a healthy, wailing boy. The midwife had found a wet nurse for him as soon as Laurel began to fail. I gave a great deal of thought to his future, and then I approached Lord Vigilant. He was a man in a great deal of trouble. Debts and stupidity will do that to a man. In exchange for his claiming the boy and raising him as a nobleman, I paid off his debts and found him a clever steward to keep him out of trouble. He had an excellent holding; all it required to prosper was good management. I visited my son as often as I could, and saw that he was taught to ride, to read, swordplay, and archery. All a young aristocrat should master.

“I thought it an ideal arrangement for all of us. Lord Vigilant lived well on a now-prosperous estate, my son was safe and well taught. But I did not allow for that man’s stupidity. I’d made him too attractive. A stupid man with a well-run estate and money to spare. That bitch plucked him like low-hanging fruit. She never even pretended to like the boy, and as soon as her son was born, she proceeded to drive Lant out of the nest. By then, he was old enough for me to have him at Buckkeep Castle as a page. And an apprentice. I did hope he would follow in my footsteps.” He shook his head. “As you saw, he had not the temperament for it. Still, he would have been safe if that woman had not seen him as a threat to her sons’ inheritance. She saw him well liked at court and could not stand it. And she made her move.”

He fell silent. There was more to that tale and I knew it. I could have asked after her health, or the well-being of her sons. I chose not to as I did not want to know. I could accept what Chade would do for his family; doubtless, to avenge his son, he had done the sort of thing that had guaranteed that Laurel could never love him.

“And Shine was bad judgment.” It shocked me to hear him admit that. Perhaps he’d longed to tell someone. I kept silent and let no sign of judgment show on my face.

“A festival. A flirtatious, pretty woman. Wine and song and carris seed cakes. My daughter has been told one version of the incident of her conception. The truth is quite another. Her mother was neither that young nor that innocent. We danced together, we drank together, we spent time at the gaming tables. We took my winnings and went down to Buckkeep Town and spent them on trinkets and trifles for her. We drank some more. For one evening, Fitz, I was the young man I might have been, and we finished the evening in a cheap inn room under the rafters with the noise of revelry coming up through the floor and the sounds of another couple coming through the walls. For me, it was wine and impulse. I am not so sure she did not have more in mind.

“A month and a half later she came to me to tell me she would bear my child. Fitz, I tried to be honorable. But she was a stupid, vain woman, pretty as a picture and vapid as a moth. I could not hold a conversation with her. Ignorance I could have forgiven. We both know it’s a temporary state. But her level of greed and self-indulgence appalled me. My excess on the night of Shine’s conception was festival, wine, and carris seed. But for Shine’s mother, it was how she always was! I knew if I wed her and brought her to court, she would quickly bring scandal down on me and her child. It would only be a matter of time until Shine was used against me. Her parents swiftly saw that. They did not want us to wed, but they did want the child, to hold her over my head and extort money for her. I had to pay to see her, Fitz. They did not make it easy. I could not oversee her upbringing as I had with Lant. I sent tutors, and her mother sent them away as ‘unsuitable.’ I sent money for tutors; I’ve no idea what they spent it on. Her education has been sadly neglected. And when the grandparents finally died, her mother snatched her up, thinking to wring yet more money from me. They held Shine as their hostage. When I heard that the brutish lout her mother had married had begun to mistreat Shine, I stole her. And saw that her stepfather got what he deserved for looking at my daughter in that way.” He paused. I didn’t ask. His face sagged with sadness and weariness. He spoke more slowly.