His brief smile was a grimace. “Ah. Well, better that you know. Did you bring the poppy?”

“Yes. But perhaps we should wait for the healer?”

He gave his head a quick shake. “No. I need it, boy. I can’t think. And I can’t keep them out.”

“Keep who out?” I looked around his room hastily. Nothing here to mix with the poppy to make it go down more easily.

“You know,” he said in a conspiratorial whisper. “The ones from the stones.”

That froze me where I stood. In two strides I was beside his bed. I touched his brow. Hot and dry. “Chade, I don’t know what you mean. You have a fever. I think you might be hallucinating.”

He stared at me. His eyes were glittery green. “No one spoke to you during our passage? No one tries to speak to you now?” They weren’t questions. They were accusations.

“No, Chade.” I feared for him.

He chewed on his lower lip. “I recognized his voice. All these years gone, but I knew my brother’s voice.”

I waited.

His fingers beckoned me closer. He flicked them toward the portrait on the wall. He whispered, “Shrewd spoke to me, in the stones. He asked if I were coming to join him now.”

“Chade, your wound has gone foul and your fever has gone up. Your mind is wandering.” Why did I bother speaking the words? I knew he would not accept them. Just as I knew with plummeting despair that he could not Skill with me just now.

“You could come with us, Fitz. Whisper away with us. You’d find it a kinder awareness.” He spoke in a tone so like old King Shrewd’s that a chill ran down my spine. It was too late. If I helped him reach out with the Skill right now, would he open Shine? Or willfully tatter us both away to nothing?

“Chade. Please.” I did not even know what I was asking him for. I took a breath. “Let me look at that wound.”

He shook his head slowly. “It’s not the wound, Fitz. It’s not the infection. At least, not that one. It’s the Skill. That’s what festers in me now.” He paused. He stared at the wall, taking long, slow breaths. I could not resist the impulse. I turned to look at the portrait. Nothing there. Only paint on canvas. Then he asked me, “Do you remember August Farseer?”

“Of course I do.” He’d been nephew to King Shrewd, and nephew to Chade, too, I supposed. Son of their younger sister, who had died giving birth to him. Not much older than me when we had both been sent off to the Mountain Kingdom. He was supposed to be the intermediary for Verity to speak his vows to the Mountain princess Kettricken. But even at that early stage, Regal’s treachery had been at work. Verity had not meant to burn out August’s mind when he had Skilled through him to assure Kettricken that he was an honorable man, and had had nothing to do with her brother’s assassination. But he had. After that, August had come and gone like a flame dancing above a guttering wick. Some days he had seemed sensible. On others his mind had wandered like an old man succumbing to dotage. The Farseer throne had quietly moved him away from the court. I recalled now that he had died at Withywoods in the early days of the Red-Ship War. By then his passing had scarcely been noticed, for his mind had long since departed.

“So do I. Fitz, I should have listened to you. Maybe Shrewd was right when he said no. All those years ago. Envy cut me like a knife when he said you might have the Skill-training. They’d denied it to me, you know. And I’d wanted it so. So much.” He gave me a sickly smile. “And then … I got what I wanted. Or perhaps it got me.”

There was a brisk tap at the door. The healer. I felt a burst of relief that ebbed as rapidly as it had risen when Nettle swept into the room. I felt her Skill come with her as if it were a strong perfume. It flavored the air in the room, and I could not step back from it. She looked at me in dismay. “Not you, too,” she begged. She drew a sharp breath. “I could feel him spilling out into the Skill. I’ve summoned the others. I didn’t expect to find you here, spilling with him.”

I stared at her. “No. I’m fine. But Chade has a high fever. I think his wound has become toxic. He’s hallucinating.” I spoke quickly.

She looked at me pityingly. “No,” she said quietly. “It’s worse than that. And I think you know that. It’s the Skill. Once, you told me that it was like a great river, and that if a Skill-user wasn’t careful, she could be swept away in it. You warned me of the danger of that pull.” She met my eyes and lifted her chin. “Not that long ago, I caught you at it. Tempting yourself with it. Letting yourself unravel into that flow of threads.”