Fool's Errand (Tawny Man #1) 49

“You'll do, Tom Badgerlock. There are boots by the door, made a good three fingerwidths longer than my foot, and wider, too. Best you put your things away in the chest, so that if anyone does become curious to look about our rooms, there will be nothing to arouse suspicion.”

This I did hastily while the Fool quickly tidied his own chamber. Verity's sword went under the clothing in my chest. There were scarcely enough garments to cover it. The boots fit as well as new boots usually did. Time would make them comfortable.

“I'm sure you remember the way to the kitchens. I always eat my breakfast on a tray in my room; the kitchen boys will be glad to see you're taking on the task of bringing it to me. It may give you an opening for gossip.” He paused. “Tell them I ate little last night and hence am ravenous this morning. Then bring up enough for both of us.”

It was strange to have him direct me so minutely, but, I reminded myself, I had best get used to it. So I bobbed a bow at him and essayed a “Yes, sir,” before I went out of the door of the chamber. He started to smile, caught himself, and inclined a slow nod to me.

Outside the chamber, the castle was well awake. Other servants were busy, replenishing candles and sweeping soiled rushes away or scurrying about with fresh linens or buckets of wash water. Perhaps it was my new perspective, but it seemed to me that there were far more servants in Buckkeep than I recalled. It was not the only aspect that had changed. Queen Kettricken's Mountain ways were more in evidence than ever. In her years of residence, the inside of the castle had been raised to a new standard of cleanliness. A sparse simplicity characterized the rooms passed, replacing decades of ornate clutter that had once filled them. The tapestries and banners that remained were clean and free of cobwebs.

But in the kitchens, Cook Sara still reigned. I stepped into the steam and smells and it was like stepping through a doorway back into my boyhood. As Chade had told me, the old cook was ensconced on a chair rather than bustling from hearth to table to hearth, but clearly food was cooked in Buckkeep kitchens as it had always been cooked. I wrenched my eyes from Sara's ample form, lest she catch my gaze and somehow know me. I humbly tugged at the sleeve of a servingboy to make Lord Golden 's breakfast wishes known to him. The boy pointed out the trays, dishes, and cutlery and then gestured wide at the cooking hearths. “Yer his servant, not me,” he pointed out snippily, and went back to chopping turnips. I scowled at him, but was inwardly grateful. I had soon served up enough for two very ample breakfasts onto the tray. I whisked it and myself out of the kitchen.

I was halfway up the stairs when I heard a familiar voice in conversation. I halted and then leaned on the balustrade to look down. Unbidden, a smile came to my face. Queen Kettricken strode through the hall below, a halfdozen ladies struggling valiantly to keep pace with her. I knew none of her ladies; they were all young, none much past twenty. They had been children when last I was at Buckkeep. One looked vaguely familiar, but perhaps I had known her mother. My gaze fixed on the Queen.

Kettricken's shining hair, still gloriously golden, was looped and pinned about her head in a crown of braids. She wore a simple circlet of silver atop her head. She wasdressed in russet brown with an embroidered yellow kirtle, and her skirts rustled as she walked. Her ladies emulated her simple style without being able to capture it, for it was Kettricken's innate grace that lent elegance to her unpretentious garb. Despite the years that had passed, her posture and stride were still upright and unfettered. She walked with purpose, but I saw a stillness captured in her face. Some part of her was constantly aware of her missing son, and yet she still moved through the court as a queen. My heart stood still at the sight of her. I thought how proud Verity would be of this woman and, “Oh, my Queen,” I breathed to myself.

She halted in midstride and I almost heard the intake of her breath. She glanced about and then up, her eyes meeting mine across the distance. In the shadow of the Great Hall, I could not see her blue gaze, but somehow I felt it. For an instant our eyes locked, but her face held puzzlement, not recognition.

I felt the sudden thwack of fingers against the side of my head. I turned to my attacker, too amazed to be angry. A gentleman of the Court, taller than I, looked down on me in sharp disapproval. His words were clipped. “You are obviously new to Buckkeep, oaf. Here, the servants are not permitted to stare so brazenly at the Queen. Be about your business. After this, remember your place, or soon you will have no place to remember.”

I looked down at the tray of food I gripped, struggling to control my face. Anger filled me. I knew that my face had darkened with blood. It took every bit of my will to avert my eyes and bob my head. “Your pardon, sir. I will remember.” I hoped he took my strangled voice for crushed humiliation rather than rage. Gripping the sides of the tray tightly, I continued my journey up the stairs as he went down and did not allow myself to glance over the balustrade to see if my Queen watched me go.