{"id":4979,"date":"2026-01-04T01:00:45","date_gmt":"2026-01-04T01:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/the-farseer-trilogy-omnibus-hobb-robin\/"},"modified":"2026-01-04T01:00:45","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T01:00:45","slug":"the-farseer-trilogy-omnibus-hobb-robin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/the-farseer-trilogy-omnibus-hobb-robin\/","title":{"rendered":"The Farseer Trilogy [Omnibus] – Hobb, Robin"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Book Preview<\/h3>\n
\n

1<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Earliest History<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

A History of the Six<\/em> Duchies is of necessity a history of its ruling family, the Farseers. A complete telling would reach back beyond the founding of the First Duchy and, if such names were remembered, would tell us of Outislanders raiding from the sea, visiting as pirates a shore more temperate and gentler than the icy beaches of the Out Islands. But we do not know the names of these earliest forebears.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

And of the first real King, little more than his name and some extravagant legends remain. Taker his name was, quite simply, and perhaps with that naming began the tradition that daughters and sons of his lineage would be given names that would shape their lives and beings. Folk beliefs claim that such names were sealed to the newborn babes by magic, and that these royal offspring were incapable of betraying the virtues whose names they bore. Passed through fire and plunged through salt water and offered to the winds of the air; thus were names sealed to these chosen children. So we are told. A pretty fancy, and perhaps once there was such a ritual, but history shows us this was not always sufficient to bind a child to the virtue that named it.\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

My pen falters, then falls from my knuckly grip, leaving a worm\u2019s trail of ink across Fedwren\u2019s paper. I have spoiled another leaf of the fine stuff, in what I suspect is a futile<\/p>\n

endeavor. I wonder if I can write this history, or if on every page there will be some sneaking show of a bitterness I thought long dead. I think myself cured of all spite, but when I touch pen to paper, the hurt of a boy bleeds out with the sea-spawned ink, until I suspect each carefully formed black letter scabs over some ancient scarlet wound.<\/p>\n

Both Fedwren and Patience were so filled with enthusiasm whenever a written account of the history of the Six Duchies was discussed that I persuaded myself the writing of it was a worthwhile effort. I convinced myself that the exercise would turn my thoughts aside from my pain and help the time to pass. But each historical event I consider only awakens my own personal shades of loneliness and loss. I fear I will have to set this work aside entirely, or else give in to reconsidering all that has shaped what I have become. And so I begin again, and again, but always find that I am writing of my own beginnings rather than the beginnings of this land. I do not even know to whom I try to explain myself. My life has been a web of secrets, secrets that even now are unsafe to share. Shall I set them all down on fine paper, only to create from them flame and ash? Perhaps.<\/p>\n

My memories reach back to when I was six years old. Before that, there is nothing, only a blank gulf no exercise of my mind has ever been able to pierce. Prior to that day at Moonseye, there is nothing. But on that day they suddenly begin, with a brightness and detail that overwhelms me. Sometimes it seems too complete, and I wonder if it is truly mine. Am I recalling it<\/p>\n

from my own mind, or from dozens of retellings by legions of kitchen maids and ranks of scullions and herds of stable boys as they explained my presence to each other? Perhaps I have heard the story so many times, from so many sources, that I now recall it as an actual memory of my own. Is the detail the result of a six-year-old\u2019s open absorption of all that goes on around him? Or could the completeness of the memory be the bright overlay of the Skill, and the later drugs a man takes to control his addiction to it, the drugs that bring on pains and cravings of their own? The last is most possible. Perhaps it is even probable. One hopes it is not the case.<\/p>\n

The remembrance is almost physical: the chill grayness of the fading day, the remorseless rain that soaked me, the icy cobbles of the strange town\u2019s streets, even the callused roughness of the huge hand that gripped my small one. Sometimes I wonder about that grip. The hand was hard and rough, trapping mine within it. And yet it was warm, and not unkind as it held mine. Only firm. It did not let me slip on the icy streets, but it did not let me escape my fate, either. It was as implacable as the icy gray rain that glazed the trampled snow and ice of the graveled pathway outside the huge wooden doors of the fortified building that stood like a fortress within the town itself.<\/p>\n

The doors were tall, not just to a six-year-old boy, but tall enough to admit giants, to dwarf even the rangy old man who towered over me. And they looked strange to me, although I cannot summon up what type of door or dwelling would have looked familiar. Only that these, carved and bound with black iron hinges, decorated with a buck\u2019s head and knocker of gleaming<\/p>\n

brass, were outside of my experience. I recall that slush had soaked through my clothes, so my feet and legs were wet and cold. And yet, again, I cannot recall that I had walked far through winter\u2019s last curses, nor that I had been carried. No, it all starts there, right outside the doors of the stronghouse, with my small hand trapped inside the tall man\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Almost, it is like a puppet show beginning. Yes, I can see it thus. The curtains parted, and there we stood before that great door. The old man lifted the brass knocker and banged it down, once, twice, thrice on the plate that resounded to his pounding. And then, from offstage, a voice sounded. Not from within the doors, but from behind us, back the way we had come. \u201cFather, please,\u201d the woman\u2019s voice begged. I turned to look at her, but it had begun to snow again, a lacy veil that clung to eyelashes and coat sleeves. I can\u2019t recall that I saw anyone. Certainly, I did not struggle to break free of the old man\u2019s grip on my hand, nor did I call out, \u201cMother, Mother.\u201d Instead I stood, a spectator, and heard the sound of boots within the keep, and the unfastening of the door hasp within.<\/p>\n

One last time she called. I can still hear the words perfectly, the desperation in a voice that now would sound young to my ears. \u201cFather, please, I beg you!\u201d A tremor shook the hand that gripped mine, but whether of anger or some other emotion, I shall never know. As swift as a black crow seizes a bit of dropped bread, the old man stooped and snatched up a frozen chunk of dirty ice. Wordlessly he flung it, with great force and fury, and I cowered where I stood. I do not recall a<\/p>\n

cry, nor the sound of struck flesh. What I do remember is how the doors swung outward, so that the old man had to step hastily back, dragging me with him.<\/p>\n

And there is this. The man who opened the door was no house servant, as I might imagine if I had only heard this story. No, memory shows me a man-at-arms, a warrior, gone a bit to gray and with a belly more of hard suet than muscle, but not some mannered house servant. He looked both the old man and me up and down with a soldier\u2019s practiced suspicion, and then stood there silently, waiting for us to state our business.<\/p>\n

I think it rattled the old man a bit, and stimulated him, not to fear, but to anger. For he suddenly dropped my hand and instead gripped me by the back of my coat and swung me forward, like a whelp offered to a prospective new owner. \u201cI\u2019ve brought the boy to you,\u201d he said in a rusty voice.<\/p>\n

And when the house guard continued to stare at him, without judgment or even curiosity, he elaborated. \u201cI\u2019ve fed him at my table for six years, and never a word from his father, never a coin, never a visit, though my daughter gives me to understand he knows he fathered a bastard on her. I\u2019ll not feed him any longer, nor break my back at a plow to keep clothes on his back. Let him be fed by him what got him. I\u2019ve enough to tend to of my own, what with my woman getting on in years, and this one\u2019s mother to keep and feed. For not a man will have her now, not a man, not with this pup running at her heels. So you take him, and give him to his father.\u201d And he let go of me so suddenly that I sprawled to the stone doorstep at the guard\u2019s feet. I scrabbled to a sitting position, not much hurt that I recall, and<\/p>\n

looked up to see what would happen next between the two men.<\/p>\n

The guard looked down at me, lips pursed slightly, not in judgment but merely considering how to classify me. \u201cWhose get?\u201d he asked, and his tone was not one of curiosity, but only that of a man who asks for more specific information on a situation, in order to report well to a superior.<\/p>\n

\u201cChivalry\u2019s,\u201d the old man said, and he was already turning his back on me, taking his measured steps down the graveled pathway. \u201cPrince Chivalry,\u201d he said, not turning back as he added the qualifier. \u201cHim what\u2019s
\nKing-in-Waiting. That\u2019s who got him. So let him do for
\nhim, and be glad he managed to father one child, somewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a moment the guard watched the old man walking away. Then he wordlessly stooped to seize me by the collar and drag me out of the way so he could close the door. He let go of me for the brief time it took him to secure the door. That done, he stood looking down on me. No real surprise, only a soldier\u2019s stoic acceptance of the odder bits of his duty. \u201cUp, boy, and walk,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

So I followed him, down a dim corridor, past rooms spartanly furnished, with windows still shuttered against winter\u2019s chill, and finally to another set of closed doors, these of rich, mellow wood embellished with carvings. There he paused and straightened his own garments briefly. I remember quite clearly how he went down on one knee to tug my shirt straight and smooth my hair with a rough pat or two, but whether this was from some kindhearted impulse that I make a good impression, or<\/p>\n

merely a concern that his package look well tended, I will never know. He stood again and knocked once at the double doors. Having knocked, he did not wait for a reply, or at least I never heard one. He pushed the doors open, herded me in before him, and shut the doors behind him.<\/p>\n

This room was as warm as the corridor had been chill, and alive as the other chambers had been deserted. I recall a quantity of furniture in it, rugs and hangings, and shelves of tablets and scrolls overlaid with the scattering of clutter that any well-used and comfortable chamber takes on. There was a fire burning in a massive fireplace, filling the room with heat and a pleasantly resinous scent. An immense table was placed at an angle to the fire, and behind it sat a stocky man, his brows knit as he bent over a sheaf of papers in front of him. He did not look up immediately, and so I was able to study his rather bushy disarray of dark hair for some moments.<\/p>\n

When he did look up, he seemed to take in both myself and the guard in one quick glance of his black eyes. \u201cWell, Jason?\u201d he asked, and even at that age I could sense his resignation to a messy interruption. \u201cWhat\u2019s this?\u201d<\/p>\n

The guard gave me a gentle nudge on the shoulder that propelled me a foot or so closer to the man. \u201cAn old plowman left him, Prince Verity, sir. Says it\u2019s Prince Chivalry\u2019s bastid, sir.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a few moments the harried man behind the desk continued to regard me with some confusion. Then something very like an amused smile lightened his features and he rose and came around the desk to stand with his fists on his hips, looking down on me.<\/p>\n

I did not feel threatened by his scrutiny; rather it was as if something about my appearance pleased him inordinately. I looked up at him curiously. He wore a short dark beard, as bushy and disorderly as his hair, and his cheeks were weathered above it. Heavy brows were raised above his dark eyes. He had a barrel of a chest, and shoulders that strained the fabric of his shirt. His fists were square and work-scarred, yet ink stained the fingers of his right hand. As he stared at me his grin gradually widened, until finally he gave a snort of laughter.<\/p>\n

\u201cBe damned,\u201d he finally said. \u201cBoy does have Chiv\u2019s look to him, doesn\u2019t he? Fruitful Eda. Who\u2019d have believed it of my illustrious and virtuous brother?\u201d<\/p>\n

The guard made no response at all, nor was one expected from him. He continued to stand alertly, awaiting the next command. A soldier\u2019s soldier.<\/p>\n

The other man continued to regard me curiously. \u201cHow old?\u201d he asked the guard.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlowman says six.\u201d The guard raised a hand to scratch at his cheek, then suddenly seemed to recall he was reporting. He dropped his hand. \u201cSir,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The other didn\u2019t seem to notice the guard\u2019s lapse in discipline. The dark eyes roved over me, and the amusement in his smile grew broader. \u201cSo make it seven years or so, to allow for her belly to swell. Damn. Yes. That was the first year the Chyurda tried to close the pass. Chivalry was up this way for three, four months, chivying them into opening it to us. Looks like it wasn\u2019t the only thing he chivied open. Damn.<\/p>\n

Who\u2019d have thought it of him?\u201d He paused, then: \u201cWho\u2019s the mother?\u201d he demanded suddenly.<\/p>\n

The guardsman shifted uncomfortably. \u201cDon\u2019t know, sir. There was only the old plowman on the doorstep, and all him said was that this was Prince Chivalry\u2019s bastid, and he wasn\u2019t going to feed him ner put clothes on his back no more. Said him what got him could care for him now.\u201d<\/p>\n

The man shrugged as if the matter were of no great importance. \u201cThe boy looks well tended. I give it a week, a fortnight at most, before she\u2019s whimpering at the kitchen door because she misses her pup. I\u2019ll find out then if not before. Here, boy, what do they call you?\u201d<\/p>\n

His jerkin was closed with an intricate buckle shaped like a buck\u2019s head. It was brass, then gold, then red as the flames in the fireplace moved. \u201cBoy,\u201d I said. I do not know if I was merely repeating what he and the guardsman had called me, or if I truly had no name besides the word. For a moment the man looked surprised and a look of what might have been pity crossed his face. But it disappeared as swiftly, leaving him looking only discomfited, or mildly annoyed. He glanced back at the map that still awaited him on the table.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell,\u201d he said into the silence. \u201cSomething\u2019s got to be done with him, at least until Chiv gets back. Jason, see the boy\u2019s fed and bedded somewhere, at least for tonight. I\u2019ll give some thought to what\u2019s to be done with him tomorrow. Can\u2019t have royal bastards cluttering up the countryside.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSir,\u201d said Jason, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, but merely accepting the order. He put a heavy hand on my shoulder<\/p>\n

and turned me back toward the door. I went somewhat reluctantly, for the room was bright and pleasant and warm. My cold feet had started to tingle, and I knew if I could stay a little longer, I would be warmed through. But the guardsman\u2019s hand was inexorable, and I was steered out of the warm chamber and back into the chill dimness of the drear corridors.<\/p>\n

They seemed all the darker after the warmth and light, and endless as I tried to match the guard\u2019s stride as he wound through them. Perhaps I whimpered, or perhaps he grew tired of my slower pace, for he spun suddenly, seized me, and tossed me up to sit on his shoulder as casually as if I weighed nothing at all. \u201cSoggy little pup, you,\u201d he observed, without rancor, and then bore me down corridors and around turns and up and down steps and finally into the yellow light and space of a large kitchen.<\/p>\n

There, half a dozen other guards lounged on benches and ate and drank at a big scarred table before a fire fully twice as large as the one in the study had been. The room smelled of food, of beer and men\u2019s sweat, of wet wool garments and the smoke of the wood and drip of grease into flames. Hogsheads and small casks ranged against the wall, and smoked joints of meats were dark shapes hung from the rafters. The table bore a clutter of food and dishes. A chunk of meat on a spit was swung back from the flames and dripping fat onto the stone hearth. My stomach clutched suddenly at my ribs at the rich smell. Jason set me rather firmly on the corner of the table closest to the fire\u2019s warmth, jogging the elbow of a man whose face was hidden by a mug.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere, Burrich,\u201d Jason said matter-of-factly. \u201cThis pup\u2019s for you, now.\u201d He turned away from me. I watched with interest as he broke a corner as big as his fist off a dark loaf, and then drew his belt knife to take a wedge of cheese off a wheel. He pushed these into my hands, and then stepping to the fire, began sawing a man-sized portion of meat off the joint. I wasted no time in filling my mouth with bread and cheese. Beside me, the man called Burrich set down his mug and glared around at Jason.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s this?\u201d he asked, sounding very much like the man in the warm chamber. He had the same unruly blackness to his hair and beard, but his face was angular and narrow. His face had the color of a man much outdoors. His eyes were brown rather than black, and his hands were long-fingered and clever. He smelled of horses and dogs and blood and leathers.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s yours to watch over, Burrich. Prince Verity says so.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re Chivalry\u2019s man, ain\u2019t you? Care for his horse, his hounds, and his hawks?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, you got his little bastid, at least until Chivalry gets back and does otherwise with him.\u201d Jason offered me the slab of dripping meat. I looked from the bread to the cheese I gripped, loath to surrender either, but longing for the hot meat, too. He shrugged at seeing my dilemma, and with a fighting man\u2019s practicality, flipped the meat casually onto the table beside my hip. I stuffed as much bread into my mouth as I could and shifted to where I could watch the meat.<\/p>\n

\u201cChivalry\u2019s bastard?\u201d<\/p>\n

Jason shrugged, busy with getting himself bread and meat and cheese of his own. \u201cSo said the old plowman what left him here.\u201d He layered the meat and cheese onto a slab of bread, took an immense bite, and then spoke through it. \u201cSaid Chivalry ought to be glad he\u2019d seeded one child, somewhere, and should feed and care for him himself now.\u201d<\/p>\n

An unusual quiet bloomed suddenly in the kitchen. Men paused in their eating, gripping bread or mugs or trenchers, and turned eyes to the man called Burrich. He himself set his mug carefully away from the edge of the table. His voice was quiet and even, his words precise. \u201cIf my master has no heir, \u2019tis Eda\u2019s will, and no fault of his manhood. The Lady Patience has always been delicate, and\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEven so, even so,\u201d Jason was quickly agreeing. \u201cAnd there sits the very proof that there\u2019s nowt wrong with him as a man, as is all I was saying, that\u2019s all.\u201d He wiped his mouth hastily on his sleeve. \u201cAs like to Prince Chivalry as can be, as even his brother said but a while ago. Not the Crown Prince\u2019s fault if his Lady Patience can\u2019t carry his seed to term.\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

But Burrich had stood suddenly. Jason backed a hasty step or two before he realized I was Burrich\u2019s target, not him. Burrich gripped my shoulders and turned me to the fire. When he firmly took my jaw in his hand and lifted my face to his, he startled me, so that I dropped both bread and cheese. Yet he paid no mind to this as he turned my face toward the fire and studied me as if I were a map. His eyes met mine, and there was a sort of wildness in them, as if what he saw in my face were an injury<\/p>\n

I\u2019d done him. I started to draw away from that look, but his grip wouldn\u2019t let me. So I stared back at him with as much defiance as I could muster, and saw his upset masked suddenly with a sort of reluctant wonder. And lastly he closed his eyes for a second, hooding them against some pain. \u201cIt\u2019s a thing that will try her lady\u2019s will to the edge of her very name,\u201d Burrich said softly.<\/p>\n

He released my jaw and stooped awkwardly to pick up the bread and cheese I\u2019d dropped. He brushed them off and handed them back to me. I stared at the thick bandaging on his right calf and over his knee that had kept him from bending his leg. He reseated himself and refilled his mug from a pitcher on the table. He drank again, studying me over the rim of his mug.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho\u2019d Chivalry get him on?\u201d a man at the other end of the table asked incautiously.<\/p>\n

Burrich swung his gaze to the man as he set his mug down. For a moment he didn\u2019t speak, and I sensed that silence hovering again. \u201cI\u2019d say it was Prince Chivalry\u2019s business who the mother was, and not for kitchen talk,\u201d Burrich said mildly.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven so, even so,\u201d the guard agreed abruptly, and Jason nodded like a courting bird in agreement. Young as I was, I still wondered what kind of man this was who, with one leg bandaged, could quell a room full of rough men with a look or a word.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoy don\u2019t have a name,\u201d Jason volunteered into the silence. \u201cJust goes by \u2018boy.\u2019\u00a0\u201d<\/p>\n

This statement seemed to put everyone, even Burrich, at a loss for words. The silence lingered as I finished bread and<\/p>\n

cheese and meat, and washed it down with a swallow or two of beer that Burrich offered me. The other men left the room gradually, in twos and threes, and still he sat there, drinking and looking at me. \u201cWell,\u201d he said at long last. \u201cIf I know your father, he\u2019ll face up to it square and do what\u2019s right. But Eda only knows what he\u2019ll think is the right thing to do. Probably whatever hurts the most.\u201d He watched me silently a moment longer. \u201cHad enough to eat?\u201d he asked at last.<\/p>\n

I nodded, and he stood stiffly, to swing me off the table and onto the floor. \u201cCome on, then, Fitz,\u201d he said, and moved out of the kitchen and down a different corridor. His stiff leg made his gait ungainly, and perhaps the beer had something to do with it as well. Certainly I had no trouble in keeping up. We came at last to a heavy door, and a guard who nodded us through with a devouring stare at me.<\/p>\n

Outside, a chill wind was blowing. All the ice and snow that had softened during the day had gone back to sharpness with the coming of night. The path cracked under my feet, and the wind seemed to find every crack and gap in my garments. My feet and leggings had been warmed by the kitchen\u2019s fire, but not quite dried, so the cold seized on them. I remember darkness, and the sudden tiredness that came over me, a terrible weepy sleepiness that dragged at me as I followed the strange man with the bandaged leg through the chill, dark courtyard. There were tall walls around us, and guards moved intermittently atop them, dark shadows visible only as they blotted the stars occasionally from the sky. The cold bit at me, and I stumbled and slipped on the<\/p>\n

icy pathway. But something about Burrich did not permit me to whimper or beg quarter from him. Instead I followed him doggedly. We reached a building and he dragged open a heavy door.<\/p>\n

Warmth and animal smells and a dim yellow light spilled out. A sleepy stable boy sat up in his nest of straw, blinking like a rumpled fledgling. At a word from Burrich he lay down again, curling up small in the straw and closing his eyes. We moved past him, Burrich dragging the door to behind us. He took the lantern that burned dimly by the door and led me on.<\/p>\n

I entered a different world then, a night world where animals shifted and breathed in stalls, where hounds lifted their heads from their crossed forepaws to regard me with lambent eyes green or yellow in the lantern\u2019s glow. Horses stirred as we passed their stalls. \u201cHawks are down at the far end,\u201d Burrich said as we passed stall after stall. I accepted it as something he thought I should know.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere,\u201d he said finally. \u201cThis\u2019ll do. For now, anyway. I\u2019m jigged if I know what else to do with you. If it weren\u2019t for the Lady Patience, I\u2019d be thinking this a fine god\u2019s jest on the master. Here, Nosy, you just move over and make this boy a place in the straw. That\u2019s right, you cuddle up to Vixen, there. She\u2019ll take you in, and give a good slash to any that think to bother you.\u201d<\/p>\n

I found myself facing an ample box stall, populated with three hounds. They had roused and lay, stick tails thumping in the straw at Burrich\u2019s voice. I moved uncertainly in amongst them and finally lay down next to an old bitch with a whitened<\/p>\n

muzzle and one torn ear. The older male regarded me with a certain suspicion, but the third was a half-grown pup, and Nosy welcomed me with ear lickings, nose nipping, and much pawing. I put an arm around him to settle him, and then cuddled in amongst them as Burrich had advised. He threw a thick blanket that smelled much of horse down over me. A very large gray horse in the next stall stirred suddenly, thumping a heavy hoof against the partition, and then hanging his head over to see what the night excitement was about. Burrich absently calmed him with a touch.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s rough quarters here for all of us at this outpost. You\u2019ll find Buckkeep a more hospitable place. But for tonight, you\u2019ll be warm here, and safe.\u201d He stood a moment longer, looking down at us. \u201cHorse, hound, and hawk, Chivalry. I\u2019ve minded them all for you for many a year, and minded them well. But this by-blow of yours; well, what to do with him is beyond me.\u201d<\/p>\n

I knew he wasn\u2019t speaking to me. I watched him over the edge of the blanket as he took the lantern from its hook and wandered off, muttering to himself. I remember that first night well, the warmth of the hounds, the prickling straw, and even the sleep that finally came as the pup cuddled close beside me. I drifted into his mind and shared his dim dreams of an endless chase, pursuing a quarry I never saw, but whose hot scent dragged me onward through nettle, bramble, and scree.<\/p>\n

And with the hound\u2019s dream, the precision of the memory wavers like the bright colors and sharp edges of a drug dream.<\/p>\n

Certainly the days that follow that first night have no such clarity in my mind.<\/p>\n

I recall the spitting-wet days of winter\u2019s end as I learned the route from my stall to the kitchen. I was free to come and go there as I pleased. Sometimes there was a cook in attendance, setting meat onto the hearth hooks or pummeling bread dough or breaching a cask of drink. More often there was not, and I helped myself to whatever had been left out on the table, and shared generously with the pup that swiftly became my constant companion. Men came and went, eating and drinking, and regarding me with a speculative curiosity that I came to accept as normal. The men had a sameness about them, with their rough wool cloaks and leggings, their hard bodies and easy movements, and the crest of a leaping buck that each bore over his heart. My presence made some of them uncomfortable. I grew accustomed to the mutter of voices that began whenever I left the kitchen.<\/p>\n

Burrich was a constant in those days, giving me the same care he gave to Chivalry\u2019s beasts; I was fed, watered, groomed, and exercised, said exercise usually coming in the form of trotting at his heels as he performed his other duties. But those memories are blurry, and details, such as those of washing or changing garments, have probably faded with a six-year-old\u2019s calm assumptions of such things as normal. Certainly I remember the hound pup, Nosy. His coat was red and slick and short, and bristly in a way that prickled me through my clothes when we shared the horse blanket at night. His eyes were green as copper ore, his nose the color of cooked liver, and the insides of his mouth and tongue were mottled pink and black. When we were not<\/p>\n

eating in the kitchen, we wrestled in the courtyard or in the straw of the box stall. Such was my world for however long it was I was there. Not too long, I think, for I do not recall the weather changing. All my memories of that time are of raw days and blustery wind, and snow and ice that partially melted each day but were restored by night\u2019s freezes.<\/p>\n

One other memory I have of that time, but it is not sharp-edged. Rather it is warm and softly tinted, like a rich old tapestry seen in a dim room. I recall being roused from sleep by the pup\u2019s wriggling and the yellow light of a lantern being held over me. Two men bent over me, but Burrich stood stiffly behind them and I was not afraid.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow you\u2019ve wakened him,\u201d warned the one, and he was Prince Verity, the man from the warmly lit chamber of my first evening.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo? He\u2019ll go back to sleep as soon as we leave. Damn him, he has his father\u2019s eyes as well. I swear, I\u2019d have known his blood no matter where I saw him. There\u2019ll be no denying it to any that see him. But have neither you nor Burrich the sense of a flea? Bastard or not, you don\u2019t stable a child among beasts. Was there nowhere else you could put him?\u201d<\/p>\n

The man who spoke was like Verity around the jaw and eyes, but there the resemblance ended. This man was younger by far. His cheeks were beardless, and his scented and smoothed hair was finer and brown. His cheeks and forehead had been stung to redness by the night\u2019s chill, but it was a new thing, not Verity\u2019s weathered ruddiness. And Verity dressed as his men dressed, in practical woolens of sturdy weave and subdued colors.<\/p>\n

Only the crest on his breast showed brighter, in gold and silver thread. But the younger man with him gleamed in scarlets and primrose, and his cloak drooped with twice the width of cloth needed to cover a man. The doublet that showed beneath it was a rich cream, and laden with lace. The scarf at his throat was secured with a leaping stag done in gold, its single eye a winking green gem. And the careful turn of his words was like a twisted chain of gold compared to the simple links of Verity\u2019s speech.<\/p>\n

\u201cRegal, I had given it no thought. What do I know of children? I turned him over to Burrich. He is Chivalry\u2019s man, and as such he\u2019s cared for.\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI meant no disrespect to the blood, sir,\u201d Burrich said in honest confusion. \u201cI am Chivalry\u2019s man, and I saw to the boy as I thought best. I could make him up a pallet in the guardroom, but he seems small to be in the company of such men, with their comings and goings at all hours, their fights and drinking and noise.\u201d The tone of his words made his own distaste for their company obvious. \u201cBedded here, he has quiet, and the pup has taken to him. And with my Vixen to watch over him at night, no one could do him harm without her teeth taking a toll. My lords, I know little of children myself, and it seemed to me\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s fine, Burrich, it\u2019s fine,\u201d Verity said quietly, cutting him off. \u201cIf it had to be thought about, I should have done the thinking. I left it to you, and I don\u2019t find fault with it. It\u2019s better than a lot of children have in this village, Eda knows. For here, for now, it\u2019s fine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt will have to be different when he comes back to Buckkeep.\u201d Regal did not sound pleased.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen our father wishes him to return with us to Buckkeep?\u201d The question came from Verity.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur father does. My mother does not.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh.\u201d Verity\u2019s tone indicated he had no interest in further discussing that. But Regal frowned and continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mother the Queen is not at all pleased about any of this. She has counseled the King long, but in vain. Mother and I were for putting the boy\u00a0\u2026\u00a0aside. It is only good sense. We scarcely need more confusion in the line of succession.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI see no confusion in it now, Regal.\u201d Verity spoke evenly. \u201cChivalry, me, and then you. Then our cousin August. This bastard would be a far fifth.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI am well aware that you precede me; you need not flaunt it at me at every opportunity,\u201d Regal said coldly. He glared down at me. \u201cI still think it would be better not to have him about. What if Chivalry never does get a legal heir on Patience? What if he chooses to recognize this\u00a0\u2026\u00a0boy? It could be very divisive to the nobles. Why should we tempt trouble? So say my mother and I. But our father the King is not a hasty man, as well we know. Shrewd is as Shrewd does, as the common folk say. He forbade any settling of the matter. \u2018Regal,\u2019 he said, in that way he has. \u2018Don\u2019t do what you can\u2019t undo, until you\u2019ve considered what you can\u2019t do once you\u2019ve done it.\u2019 Then he laughed.\u201d Regal himself gave a short, bitter laugh. \u201cI weary so of his humor.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh,\u201d said Verity again, and I lay still and wondered if he<\/p>\n

were trying to sort out the King\u2019s words, or refraining from replying to his brother\u2019s complaint.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou discern his real reasons, of course,\u201d Regal informed him.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhich is?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHe still favors Chivalry.\u201d Regal sounded disgusted. \u201cDespite everything. Despite his foolish marriage and his eccentric wife. Despite this mess. And now he thinks this will sway the people, make them warmer toward him. Prove he\u2019s a man, that Chivalry can father a child. Or maybe prove he\u2019s a human, and can make mistakes like the rest of them.\u201d Regal\u2019s tone betrayed that he agreed with none of this.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd this will make the people like him more, support his future kingship more? That he fathered a child on some wild woman before he married his queen?\u201d Verity sounded confused by the logic.<\/p>\n

I heard the sourness in Regal\u2019s voice. \u201cSo the King seems to think. Does he care nothing for the disgrace? But I suspect Chivalry will feel differently about using his bastard in such a way. Especially as it regards dear Patience. But the King has ordered that the bastard be brought to Buckkeep when you return.\u201d Regal looked down on me as if ill-satisfied.<\/p>\n

Verity looked briefly troubled, but nodded. A shadow lay over Burrich\u2019s features that the yellow lamplight could not lift.<\/p>\n

\u201cHas my master no say in this?\u201d Burrich ventured to protest. \u201cIt seems to me that if he wants to settle a portion on the family of the boy\u2019s mother, and set him aside, then, why surely<\/p>\n

for the sake of my Lady Patience\u2019s sensibilities, he should be allowed that discretion\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

Prince Regal broke in with a snort of disdain. \u201cThe time for discretion was before he rolled the wench. The Lady Patience is not the first woman to have to face her husband\u2019s bastard. Everyone here knows of his existence; Verity\u2019s clumsiness saw to that. There\u2019s no point to trying to hide him. And as far as a royal bastard is concerned, none of us can afford to have such sensibilities, Burrich. To leave such a boy in a place like this is like leaving a weapon hovering over the King\u2019s throat. Surely even a houndsman can see that. And even if you can\u2019t, your master will.\u201d<\/p>\n

An icy harshness had come into Regal\u2019s voice, and I saw Burrich flinch from his voice as I had seen him cower from nothing else. It made me afraid, and I drew the blanket up over my head and burrowed deeper into the straw. Beside me, Vixen growled lightly in the back of her throat. I think it made Regal step back, but I cannot be sure. The men left soon after, and if they spoke any more than that, no memory of it lies within me.<\/p>\n

Time passed, and I think it was two, or perhaps three weeks later that I found myself clinging to Burrich\u2019s belt and trying to wrap my short legs around a horse behind him as we left that chill village and began what seemed to me an endless journey down to warmer lands. I suppose at some point Chivalry must have come to see the bastard he had sired and must have passed some sort of judgment on himself as regarded me. But I have no memory of such a meeting with my father. The only image I carry of him in my mind is from his portrait on the wall in Buckkeep. Years<\/p>\n

later I was given to understand that his diplomacy had gone well indeed, securing a treaty and peace that lasted well into my teens and earning the respect and even fondness of the Chyurda.<\/p>\n

In truth, I was his only failure that year, but I was a monumental one. He preceded us home to Buckkeep, where he abdicated his claim to the throne. By the time we arrived, he and Lady Patience were gone from court, to live as the Lord and Lady of Withywoods. I have been to Withywoods. Its name bears no relationship to its appearance. It is a warm valley, centered on a gently flowing river that carves a wide plain that nestles between gently rising and rolling foothills. A place to grow grapes and grain and plump children. It is a soft holding, far from the borders, far from the politics of court, far from anything that had been Chivalry\u2019s life up to then. It was a pasturing out, a gentle and genteel exile for a man who would have been King. A velvet smothering for a warrior and a silencing of a rare and skilled diplomat.<\/p>\n

And so I came to Buckkeep, sole child and bastard of a man I\u2019d never know. Prince Verity became King-in-Waiting and Prince Regal moved up a notch in the line of succession. If all I had ever done was to be born and discovered, I would have left a mark across all the land for all time. I grew up fatherless and motherless in a court where all recognized me as a catalyst. And a catalyst I became.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Read the full book by downloading it below.<\/p>\n

DOWNLOAD EPUB<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Book Preview 1 The Earliest History A History of the Six Duchies is of necessity a history of its ruling family, the Farseers. A complete telling would reach back beyond the founding of the First Duchy and, if such names were remembered, would tell us of Outislanders raiding from the sea, visiting as pirates a … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4978,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[337],"class_list":["post-4979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-robin-hobb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4979"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4979\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epub-book.com\/download\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}