Golden Fool

There were no windows in the workroom, and time lost all meaning for me. I returned to the wolfish habits I had shared for years. At dawn and at twilight I was most alert, and during those times I studied the scrolls. Then I ate, and dozed before the fire, or slept in the bed for the rest of the day’s circle. Not all my waking hours were spent in reading. I amused myself and Gilly by hiding bits of meat when he was not in the room and then watching him ferret them out when he returned. I did simple projects such as suited my fancy. I made a board for playing the Stone game, burning the lines into it, and then carved the markers for it from a whale tusk that Chade had said I might use. I dyed them red and black, and left an equal quantity unmarked. I hoped for a game with Chade in vain, however. He spoke little to me of his Skill studies, and when he came and went, he seemed always in a hurry. Likely it was for the best. I slept more deeply when I was left alone.

He was very closemouthed about the other news of the keep. What little I squeezed out of him worried me. The Queen was still in negotiations with the Bingtown Traders, but had graciously given the Dukes of Shoaks and Farrow permission to pressure Chalced along their borders as they wished. There would be no formal declaration of warfare, but the normal harrying and raiding that went on along the boundary between Chalced and the Six Duchies would be increased, with her tacit blessings. There was little new in that. The slaves of Chalced had known for generations that they could claim freedom if they could manage to escape to the Six Duchies. Once free, they often turned against their old masters, raiding across the border the flocks and herds that once they had tended. For all that, trade between Chalced and those Six Duchies remained lively and prosperous. For the Six Duchies to openly side with Bingtown could put an end to that.

The Bingtown war with Chalced had disrupted horribly Chade’s flow of spy information from that area. He had to rely on second- and third-hand accounts, and as with all such heavily handled information, there were contradictions. We were both skeptical of the “facts” we received. Yes, the Bingtown Traders had a dragon-breeding plantation far up the Rain Wild River. One, or perhaps two, full-grown dragons had been seen in flight. They were variously described as blue, silver, or blue and silver. The Bingtown Traders fed the dragons, and in return, the dragons guarded Bingtown Harbor. But they would not fly out of sight of shore; that was why the Chalcedean ships still were able to menace and plunder Bingtown’s trading fleet. The dragon-breeding farm was tended by a race of changelings, half-dragon and half-human. It was in the midst of a beautiful city, where wondrous gems glowed from the walls at night. The humans who also dwelt there preferred to live in lofty timber castles high in the tops of immense trees.

Such information more frustrated than enlightened us. “Do you think they lied to us when they told us about the dragons?” I asked him.

“They likely told us their truth,” Chade replied tersely. “That is the whole purpose of spies: to give us the other truths of the story, so that from all of them, we can cobble together our own truth. There is not enough meat here to make a meal from, only enough to torment us. What can we deduce for certain from these rumors? Only that a dragon has been seen, and that something peculiar is going on somewhere on the Rain Wild River.”

And that was as much as he would say on that subject. But I suspected he knew far more than he admitted, and that he had other irons in the fire than the ones he discussed with me. So my days passed in sleep, study, and rest. Once, when rustling through Chade’s scrolls for one I recalled on the history of Jamaillia, I found the feathers from the treasure beach. I stood looking at them in the dimness, and then carried them over to Chade’s worktable. I examined them there in a better light. Just touching them was unsettling. They stirred to life my memories of my days on that desolate beach, and awoke a hundred questions in me.

There were five feathers in all, about the size of the curving feathers in a cockerel’s tail. They were carved in extreme detail, so that each separate rib of the feather lay against the next. They seemed to be made from a gray wood, though they weighed oddly heavy in my hands. I tried several blades against them; the sharpest one made only a fine silvery scratch. If this was wood, it was near as hard as metal. Some trick of their carving seemed to catch the light strangely. They were plain and gray, and yet, seen from the tail of my eye, color seemed to run over them. They had no discernible smell. Setting my tongue to one gave me a faint taste of brine followed by bitterness. That was all.

And having tested all of my senses against them, I surrendered to the mystery. I suspected they would fit the Fool’s Rooster Crown. I wondered again whence that strange artifact had come. He had unwrapped it from a length of fabric so wondrous that it could only have come from Bingtown. Yet the old wooden circlet seemed too humble to have come from a city of marvels and magic. When he had shown the ancient crown to me, I had recognized it immediately. I had seen it once before, in a dream. In my vision, it had been colorfully painted and bright feathers had stood up above the circlet to nod in the breeze. A woman had worn it, pale even as the Fool had been pale then, and the folk of some ancient Elderling city had paused in their celebration to listen and laugh at her mocking words. I had interpreted her status as jester to the folk. Now I wonder if I had missed a subtler meaning. I looked at them, spread like a fan, and a sudden shiver ran over me. They linked us, I knew with a sudden chill. They linked the Fool and me, not only to one another, but also to another life. Hastily I wrapped them in a cloth. I hid them under my pillow.