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Physically, they were present. The Fool rode near me, casting worried glances in my direction. Dutiful, absorbed in his own grief, was a silent presence. Laurel spoke little, occasionally riding up alongside me and making small conversation before dropping back to speak to the Fool. Lord Golden.
The Fool’s silence hurt, even as I told myself that we had a pretense to maintain, and he could not console his servant as he would console his closest friend. I knew that he grieved, not as I did, but grieve he did. I longed to bridge the gulf that now widened between us, but I couldn’t do it any more than he could. So we all journeyed back to Buckkeep in morose silence.
Then, on the final day of our journey, although we could have pressed made it back to Buckkeep before nightfall, Lord Golden called halt.
“We will take a night to refresh ourselves,” he said. “It has been a weary journey and it won’t do for us to return with the dust of the road upon us.”
I had no heart for whatever game he played, but I went along with it. That was the task I’d taken on, after all. I ate a joyless dinner with the others in Lord Golden’s rooms, and then Lord Golden procured a bottle of brandy.
“A little nightcap for all of us. It has been a trying few days.”
I forced my eyes to meet his eyes and he held my gaze, but the pity that I saw there was too much to bear. Not when he had to be this Lord Golden, and not my friend. I looked away, drank my brandy down in one gulp, and Lord Golden poured me another cup.
Dutiful, to my surprise, followed suit. Then, abruptly, he stood up, and looked between us as we rose along with him. “I’m going to bed. Goodnight, Lord Golden. Laurel, Tom Badgerlock.”
“Goodnight, my prince,” I said. I wondered if I should follow him, console him, but I couldn’t summon the will to move from the table. In the morning, I told myself. Then, on impulse I added. “It’ll get better once you’re back home, son. People love you there. I know you probably feel as alone now as you ever have, but it won’t always feel that way.” As I said the words, I felt a fraud.
“Thank you,” Dutiful said. He looked awkward for a moment, then straightened. “No need to to worry on my account, I’m exhausted from the road is all.” He inclined his head. “Goodnight.”
With Dutiful gone, Laurel looked between Lord Golden and I, seemingly unsure whether she should depart or stay. I wondered if she hoped for a tryst with Lord Golden, and felt a flash of uncharitable anger that I could not claim a single moment of my friend’s time for myself, that others might dismiss me when I had more right to the Fool’s company than any of them.
But, just as I was working myself up to a sulk, Lord Golden stood up abruptly, steadying himself on the table. “Badgerlock,” he said. “I have a terrible headache. I’d hoped the brandy might help, but alas it has only worsened.”
“Brandy rarely helps with a headache, my lord,” I said.
“Indeed, Badgerlock. I would do well to remember that." He sighed dramatically. "You’ve got such skilled hands when it comes to such things. Would you mind?” He looked at Laurel. “Badgerlock learned the most exquisite massage techniques on his travels. From the priests of Sa, was it?”
I nodded mindlessly and searched his face, looking for some sign that this was a ruse, but he wore a pained look, and did his golden skin seem a bit pale? I pushed down a spike of worry. “Of course, my lord,” I said. I nodded to Laurel. “If you’d excuse us?”
Laurel frowned, looking slightly concerned. “Of course. Do you need me to have something sent up? A tea or a tonic?”
Lord Golden shook his head and sighed again, leaning wearily against the table, and waved a hand. “No, thank you Laurel, you’re very kind but I do not want to take any potions tonight when we must ride on the morrow.”
Laurel glanced at me, and I jerked my head towards the door, indicating she should go. She nodded curtly, taking my hint. “Goodnight then, Lord Golden. Tom Badgerlock.”
With Laurel gone, Lord Golden and I were alone, and he sighed a great sigh and at once he was my friend again. I took a step towards him. “Fool? Are you alright? Is it one of those fevers?”
He shook his head. “No, no, nothing like that.”
“You’re the one who can remedy a headache with just your fingers,” I said quietly. “But I can brew you some willowbark, if it would help.”
“Oh Fitz,” he said, and before I could react, he threw his arms around me, crushing me in an embrace. “I’m sorry,” he said against my ear. “I’m so so sorry.”
With a flash of insight I realized that he’d orchestrated this whole stop so that we might be alone together. There was no headache, and no real reason why we could not have continued on to Buckkeep. I was overcome with emotion, my grief colliding with the surprising well of sentiment that accompanied the realization, and a lump formed in my throat. Tentatively, I brought my arms around him and when he tightened his hold on me, words I hadn’t known I would say came out in a choked sob. “It’s my fault,” I gasped. “He didn’t want to go, but he did, for me.”
“He died as he lived,” the Fool said. “On the hunt. There is no other way he would rather have gone.” It was true, but hadn’t I also told him we’d return to the forest, that we’d go, him and I, and live as wolves once more? Wasn’t it my fault that he’d given up everything that might have made a wolf’s life meaningful in order to wallow with me in human concerns? I cried for the life I’d denied him, for his sacrifice, for all that I owed him. “It wasn’t fair,” I gasped.
“I know,” the Fool said. “I know.” For a long while then, he held me and as I poured out my sorrow upon his shoulder. It seemed incredible to me, now that I finally allowed myself to grieve, that I had managed to hold my feelings at bay these past days. Vaguely I was aware of a hitch in the Fool’s breathing. The bond between us felt very close, even though his Silver fingers were not upon me. He mourned too. The thought was a comfort. My wolf had been loved, if not by other wolves, then by the people who had shared our lives.
Eventually, he pulled back from me, and guided me to the big bed. I moved with him in a daze, my eyes still blurry with tears, as if I were Skill commanded, although I knew he did not compel me. He pulled back the covers, sat me down on the bed, and then, as if he were the servant and I the master, he removed my shoes and shirt. Then, he poured hot water into a basin and wet a washing cloth, which he handed to me. As I wiped my face, my wits returned to me, somewhat.
“Fool, you don’t—” I started, but he hushed me, putting a firm hand on my shoulder.
“No, Fitz. Let me. When was the last time you allowed someone to comfort you?” His words brought an unexpected tightness to my chest. When indeed? He'd relieved my headache, and watched over me through a seizure, but I hadn't been conscious through most of it. And it had been at least fifteen years since Molly had held me in her arms and I’d vanquished the horrors of bloody battles, of death and fear and pain, allowing myself, if briefly, the illusion of peace and safety.
It wasn’t blood and death that I wanted to chase away now though, it was a yawning emptiness, it was the fear that I would always be alone, that no one would care for me the way Nighteyes had. I was not bodily injured, but the pain I felt was like a physical thing, a cleaving, and I knew clearly in that moment that I could not bear it alone.
The Fool moved behind me. “Lie down,” he said. His hand on my shoulder gently guided me, and I laid down on the bed.
It felt good to give myself up to his ministrations, to for once allow myself to be coddled. I’d always seen the Fool as fragile and vulnerable, somehow needing my protection, but in that moment he seemed my champion, standing with me against the threatening darkness. When he fitted himself against my back, pulled the covers over us and wrapped his arms around me, I felt no shame, only a sense of rightness. He couldn’t keep me from pain, but he would bear it with me.
“You still have me,” he said softly, echoing my thoughts. “These roles we play, they don’t change what you are to me, Beloved.”
“Catalyst?” I asked, and although I did not mean for it to sound bitter, it did, a little. I turned in his arms and faced him.
“That too,” he said, a little bit sadly I thought. His eyes searched mine. “I loved him too, you know. Not as you did, but he— I’d never had a friend like him before.”
“He called you pack,” I admitted, my eyes filling with tears. “He was glad when you returned. I think he knew what was coming.” At the time I hadn’t wanted to acknowledge his words, why he’d told me to stay close to the Scentless One. “He knew I would need you.”
He thumbed my tears from my cheeks but quickly gave up because they still fell, all my tears I hadn't allowed myself to shed. Instead, he put his arms around me and held me close. “It’s alright to cry, Fitz,” he said. His own voice cracked and I felt the hitch in his breathing that told me he cried with me.
“I’m so alone,” I said, sobbing like a child. Distantly, I was aware that in the harsh light of the morning I might find my present behavior shameful, but in the moment I did not care. I put voice to the feelings that had, ever since I was a child, assaulted me, leaving me forever wounded and wanting. “I’ve always been so alone.”
“You’re not alone,” he said. “He’s right here, Fitz.” He pressed his palm to my chest. “And me too. You may not always see us, or hear us, but trust me Beloved, we are there, always.”
There was a truth in his words that resonated somewhere deep inside of me. A final choked sob tore from my throat and I pressed my face against the Fool’s chest. His arms tightened around me and I heard an echo of my wolf’s voice, almost as clearly as if he were still with me, almost saw his lolling tongue, his laughing eyes. You were always slow to catch on, Changer.
Not for the first time, I was forced to admit that he’d been right.