Ten years. Ten years he'd spent in the wrong story. Ten years in which Death had taken one of his daughters, leaving behind nothing but memories as pale and indistinct as if she had never lived at all, while his other daughter had grown up, laughing and weeping through all those years, and he had not been there. Hypocrite! he told himself, unable to take his eyes from Brianna's face. Are you trying to tell yourself you were a devoted father before Silvertongue lured you into his story?
Cosimo's son laughed out loud. His stubby finger pointed first at one, then at another of the entertainers, and he caught the flowers that the women players threw him. How old was he? Five? Six?
Brianna had been the same age when Silvertongue's voice had enticed him away. She had only come up to his elbow, and she'd weighed so little that he scarcely noticed when she climbed up on his back. When he forgot time yet again and stayed away for weeks on end, in places with names she had never heard, she used to hit him with her little fists and throw the presents he brought her at his feet. Then she would slip out of bed the same night to retrieve them after alclass="underline" colored ribbons as soft as rabbit fur, fabric flowers to put in her hair, little pipes that could imitate the song of a lark or the hoot of an owl. She had never told him so, of course, she was proud – even prouder than her mother – but he always knew where she put the presents – in a bag among her clothes. Did she still have it?
She had kept his presents, yes, but they could never bring a smile to her face when he had stayed away for a long time. Only fire could do that, and for a moment – a seductive moment – Dustfinger was tempted to step out of the gaping crowd, take his place among the other entertainers performing tricks for the prince's grandson, and summon fire just for his daughter's sake. But he stood where he was, invisible behind the throng, watching her smooth back her hair with the palm of her hand in the same way as her mother did so often, unobtrusively rubbing her nose and shifting from foot to foot, as if she'd much rather be dancing down there than standing stiffly here.
"Eat him, bear! Eat him up this minute! So he really is back, but do you think he's planning to go and see an old friend?"
Dustfinger spun around so suddenly that he almost fell off the barrel where he was still standing. The Black Prince was looking up at him, with his bear behind him. Dustfinger had hoped to meet him here, surrounded by strangers, rather than in the strolling players' camp, where there were too many who would ask where he had been… The two of them had known each other since they were the same age as the prince's grandson enthroned in his chair on the platform – the orphaned sons of strolling players, adult before their time, and Dustfinger had missed that black face almost as much as Roxane's.
"So will he really eat me if I get off this barrel?"
The Prince laughed. His laughter sounded almost as carefree as in the old days. "Maybe. After all, he's noticed that I really do have a grudge against you for not coming to see me. And didn't you scorch his fur last time you two met?"
Jink crouched on Dustfinger's shoulder as he jumped off the barrel, chattering excitedly in his ear. "Don't worry, the bear doesn't eat your sort!" Dustfinger whispered to him – and hugged the Prince as hard as if a single embrace could make up for ten years.
"You still smell more of bear than man."
"And you smell of fire. Now tell me, where've you been?" The
Black Prince held Dustfinger at arm's length and looked at him as if he could read in his face everything that had happened during his friend's absence. "So the fire-raisers didn't string you up, then, as many folk say. You look too healthy for that. What about the other story – that the Adderhead locked you up in his dankest dungeon? Or did you turn yourself into a tree for a while, as some songs say, a tree with burning leaves deep in the Wayless Wood?"
Dustfinger smiled. "I'd have liked that. But I assure you, even you wouldn't believe the real story."
A whisper ran through the crowd. Looking over all the heads, Dustfinger saw Farid, red in the face, acknowledging their applause. Her Ugliness's son was clapping so hard that he almost fell off his chair. But Farid was searching the throng for Dustfinger's face. He smiled at the boy – and sensed that the Black Prince was looking at him thoughtfully.
"So the boy really is yours?" he said. "No, don't worry, I'll ask no more questions. I know you like to have your secrets, and I don't suppose that has changed much. All the same, I want to hear the story you spoke of, sometime. And you owe us a performance, too. We can all do with something to cheer us up. Times are bad, even on this side of the forest, though it may not seem so today…"
"Yes, so I've heard already. And the Adderhead obviously doesn't love you any better than before. What have you done, to make him threaten you with the gallows? Did the bear take one of his stags?" Dustfinger stroked Jink's bristling fur. The marten never took his eyes off the bear.
"Oh, believe me, the Adderhead scarcely guesses half of what I do, or I'd have been dangling from the battlements of the Castle of Night long ago!"
"Oh yes?" The tightrope-walker was sitting on his rope above them, surrounded by his birds and swinging his legs, as if the milling crowd down below had nothing to do with him. "Prince, I don't like that look in your eye," said Dustfinger, looking up at the men walking the rope. "You'd do better not to provoke the Adderhead anymore, or he'll have you hunted down just as he's hunted others. And then you won't be safe on this side of the forest, either!"
Someone was pulling at his sleeve. Dustfinger turned so abruptly that Farid flinched back in alarm. "I'm sorry!" he stammered, nodding rather uncertainly to the Prince. "But Meggie's here. With Fenoglio!" He sounded as excited as if he had met the Laughing Prince in person.
"Where?" Dustfinger looked around, but Farid had eyes only for the bear, who had affectionately placed his muzzle on the Black Prince's head. The Prince smiled and pushed the bear's muzzle away.
"Where?" Dustfinger repeated impatiently. For Fenoglio was the very last person he wanted to meet.
"Over there, just behind the platform!"
Dustfinger looked the way Farid's finger was pointing. Sure enough, there was the old man, with two children, just as he had first seen him. Silvertongue's daughter stood beside him. She had grown tall – and even more like her mother. Dustfinger uttered a quiet curse. What were those two after, here in his story? They had as little to do with it as he had to do with theirs. Oh yes? mocked a voice inside him. The old man won't see it that way. Did you forget he claims to have created everything here?
"I don't want to see him," he told Farid. "Bad luck clings to that old man, and worse than bad luck, too, mark my words."
"Is the boy talking about the Inkweaver?" The Prince came so close to Dustfinger's side that the marten hissed at him. "What do you have against him? He writes good songs."
"He writes other things as well." And who knows what he's already written about you, Dustfinger added in his mind. A few well-chosen words, Prince, and you're a dead man!
Farid was still looking at the girl. "What about Meggie? Don't you want to see her, either?" His voice sounded husky with disappointment. "She asked how you were."
"Give her my regards. She'll understand. Off you go, then! I can see you're still in love with her. How was it you once described her eyes? Little pieces of the sky!"
Farid blushed scarlet. "Stop it!" he said angrily.
But Dustfinger took him by the shoulders and turned him around. "Go on!" he said, "Give her my regards, but tell her to keep my name out of her magic mouth, understand?"
Farid cast a last glance at the bear, nodded – and strolled back to the girl very slowly, as if to show that he wasn't in any hurry to reach her. She was going to great pains herself not to look his way too often, as she fidgeted awkwardly with the sleeves of her dress. She looked as if she belonged here, a maidservant from a not particularly prosperous home, perhaps the daughter of a farmer or a craftsman. Well, her father was indeed a craftsman, wasn't he? If one with special talents. Perhaps she was looking around rather too freely. Girls here usually kept their heads bent – and sometimes they were already married by her age. Did his daughter Brianna have anything like that in mind? Roxane hadn't said so.