‘You two Skilling to each other where I can’t hear. It’s rude. It’s like whispering behind someone’s back.’

I heard the jealousy in his voice as well. Thick, the half-wit, was doing something that the Prince of all the Six Duchies could not. And I was obviously enthused about it. I’d have to go carefully here. I suspected that Skillmaster Galen would have created a rivalry between them, to urge each to try harder. But that was not my goal. Instead, these two must be hammered into a unit.

‘I’m sorry. You’re right, that was not courteous. Thick just told me that his mother used the Skill to sing to him, and that they sang together. And that sometimes she used it to make bad boys not see him.’

‘Then his mother has the Skill? Is she a half-wit, also?’

I saw Thick wince at the words, as I had once cowered from the word ‘bastard’. That cut me. I wanted to correct the Prince, sharply, but knew that was hypocrisy. Was not that how I thought of Thick, as ’the half-wit’? For now, I would let it pass, but I would make sure that Thick never again heard that epithet from our lips.

‘Thick, where is your mother?’

For a time, he just stared at me. Then, with the inflection of a wounded child, he said slowly, ‘She died.’ His voice drew out the word. He looked around himself as if he had lost something.

‘Can you tell me about it?’

He scowled in thought. ‘We come to town with the others. For the crowd time, for the Springfest. Yes.’ He nodded at having recalled the right name for it. ‘Then, one morning, she didn’t wake up. And the others took my stuff and said I didn’t travel with them any more.’ He scratched the side of his face miserably. ‘Then, it was all done, all gone, and I was here. And then… I was here.’

It was not a very satisfactory account, but I doubted I would get more from him. It was Dutiful who asked gently, ‘What did your mother and the others do when they travelled?’

Thick took a deep breath, as if aggrieved. ‘Oh, you know. Find the big crowd. Mother sings and Prokie drums and Jimu dances. And Mother goes “don’t see him, don’t see him” while I go about and get the purses with my little silver scissors. Only Prokie took them, and my tassel hat and my blanket.’

‘You were a cut-purse?’ Dutiful asked incredulously.

What a use for the Skill — to hide your son while he cut purses, I thought silently.

Thick nodded, more to himself than to us. ‘And if I do good, I get my own penny, to buy a sweet. Every day.’

‘Had you any brothers or sisters, Thick?’

He scowled, pondering. ‘Mother was old, too old for babies. So I was born stupid. Prokie said so.’

‘My, Prokie sounds charming,’ the Prince muttered sarcastically. Thick swung a suspicious glare to him.

I clarified it for him. ‘The Prince is saying that he thinks Prokie was cruel to you.’

Thick sucked at his upper lip for a moment, then nodded as he warned us, ‘Don’t call Prokie “Papa”. Not ever.’

‘Not ever,’ Dutiful agreed whole-heartedly. And I think that moment was when Dutiful’s feelings towards Thick changed. He cocked his head as he regarded the grimy, misshapen little man. ‘Thick. Can you Skill to me? So that only I can hear, not Tom?’

‘Why?’ Thick demanded.

‘To be a student here, Thick,’ I intervened. To be a student and not a servant.’

For a time, Thick sat silent. The end of his tongue curled over his upper lip. Then the Prince laughed aloud. ‘Dogstink? Why do you call him dogstink?’

Thick made a face and then rolled one shoulder as if he didn’t know. And in the moment I sensed a secret. It wasn’t that he didn’t know why. He held something back. Did he fear something?

I feigned a laugh I didn’t feel. ‘It’s okay, Thick. Go ahead and tell him, if you want.’

For a moment, it seemed to confuse him. Had someone told him that I must not be told something? Chade? He had a small frown on his brow as he regarded Dutiful. Then he spoke. I expected him to reveal to the Prince that he knew I had the Wit, and that somehow he had sensed that my Wit-beast had been a wolf. Instead, he said words that made me sick with fear. ‘S’what they call him when they ask me about him. The town ones that give me pennies for nuts and sweets. “Stinking dog of a traitor”.’ He turned to me, smirking and I forced my rictus grin wide. I chuckled.

‘They do, do they? Those rascals!’ Smile, Dutiful. Laugh aloud, but do not Skill back to me. I kept the sending as small and tight as I could. Even so, I saw Thick’s gaze flicker from me to the Prince. Dutiful’s face was white, but he laughed aloud, a stark ‘ha-ha-ha’ that sounded more like a man retching than laughter. I took a last chance. ‘That would be the one-armed man that says it most, isn’t it?’

Thick’s smile grew uncertain. I thought I had guessed wrong, but then he said, ‘No. Not him. He’s new. He hardly talks. But when I tell, and they give me pennies, then he says, sometimes, “Watch that bastard. Watch him well”. And I say, I do. I do.’

‘Well. And a fine job you do, Thick. A fine job and you earn your pennies well.’

He rocked back and forth in his chair, pleased with himself. ‘I watch the gold man, too. He’s got a pretty little horse. And a hat, with eye feathers in it.’

‘Yes, he does,’ I admitted, my mouth dry. ‘Like the eye feather you wanted.’

‘I can have it, when he’s gone,’ Thick told me complacently. ‘The town ones said so.’

I felt I could not find air to breathe. Thick sat there, nodding and pleased. Chade’s dim servant, too dim to know a secret if it bit him, had sold us for pennies. What had he seen, and to whom had he told it? And all because I was too dim to see that he who walks unknowingly among one man’s secrets may still carry other secrets of his own. ‘Lessons are over for today,’ I managed to say. I hoped he would just go, but he sat still, musing.

‘I do a fine job. I do. Not my fault the rat died. I didn’t want him anyway. He said, “the rat will be your friend”, and I said no, I got bit by a rat once, but they said “take him anyway, this rat is nice. Bring him food and bring him back to visit us each week”. So I did. Then he died, under the bowl. I think the bowl fell on him.’

‘Probably so, Thick. Probably so. But that’s not your fault. Not at all-’ I wanted to race through the corridors of Buckkeep and find Chade. But the slow, cold truth was rising up around me. Chade hadn’t seen this. Chade hadn’t known about this. Chade could no longer protect his apprentice. It was time I learned to fend for myself. I lifted a finger as if I had suddenly recalled something. ‘Oh, Thick. Today isn’t the day you go to see them, is it?’

Thick looked at me as if I were stupid. ‘No. Not on the bread-making day. On the washing day. When the sheets hang to dry. Then I go, and I get my pennies.’

‘On the washing day. Of course. That’s tomorrow. That’s good, then. Because I didn’t forget about the pink sugar cake. I wanted to give it to you today. Could you wait for me in Chade’s room for a while? I might not be fast, but I want to bring it to you.’

‘A pink sugar cake.’ I watched him search his mind. I don’t think he even recalled that I had promised him one. I tried to remember what else he had asked for. A scarf like Rowdy’s. A red one. Raisins. My mind raced. It was like one of Chade’s old games for me. What else? A knife. And a peacock feather. And pennies for sweets, or the sweets themselves. I’d have to get them all before tomorrow.

‘Yes. A pink sugar cake. Not a burned one. I know you like them.’ I prayed there would be such a thing in the kitchens.

‘Yes!’ His little eyes lit with an expression I’d never seen on his face before. Joyful anticipation. ‘Yes. I’ll wait. You’ll bring it soon?’

‘Well, not very soon. Not very fast. But today. You will wait for me there, and not go anywhere else?’

He had frowned when I said ‘not fast’, but he nodded grudgingly.