Golden Fool Read Online Free PDF

pitcher and set the flowers on a small table adjacent to his bed. When I returned, he had donned his blue jacket and the white nosegay was pinned to the front of it.
    “I need to speak to Chade as soon as I can,” I said as I poured his tea. “But I can’t very well go hammer on his door.”
    He lifted the cup and sipped. “Don’t the secret passages offer you access to his rooms?”
    I gave Lord Golden a look. “You know that old fox. His secrets belong to him alone, and he will not risk anyone spying on him in an unguarded moment. He must have access to the corridors, but I don’t know how. Was he up very late last night?”
    Lord Golden winced. “He was still dancing when I decided to seek my bed. For an old man, he finds an amazing wealth of energy when he wishes to enjoy himself. But I’ll send a page round with a message to him. I’ll invite him to ride with me this afternoon. Is that soon enough?” He had caught the anxiety in my voice but was not asking questions. I was grateful for that.
    “It will do,” I assured him. “It will probably be the soonest that his mind is clear.” I rattled my own head as if it would settle my thoughts. “There is suddenly so much to think about, so many things I must worry about. If these Piebalds know about me, then they know about the Prince.”
    “Did you recognize any of them? Were they from Laudwine’s band?”
    “It was dark. And they stayed well back from me. I heard a woman’s voice and a man’s, but I’m sure there were at least three of them. One was bonded with a dog, and another with a small swift mammal, a rat or a weasel or a squirrel, perhaps.” I took a breath. “I want the guards at Buckkeep’s gates to be put on alert. And the Prince should have someone accompanying him at all times. ‘A tutor of the well-muscled sort,’ as Chade himself once suggested. And I need to make arrangements with Chade, for ways to contact him if I need his help or advice immediately. And the keep should be patrolled daily for rats, especially the Prince’s chambers.”
    He took a breath to speak, then bit down on his questions. Instead, he said, “I fear I must give you one more thing to think about. Prince Dutiful passed a note to me last night, demanding to know when you will begin his Skill lessons.”
    “He wrote down those words?”
    At Lord Golden’s reluctant nod, I was horrified. I had been aware that the Prince missed me. Linked by the Skill as we were, I must be aware of such things. I had put up my own Skill walls to keep my thoughts private from the young man, but he was not so adept. Several times I had felt his feeble efforts to reach toward me, but I had ignored them, promising myself that a better time would soon present itself. Evidently my prince was not so patient. “Oh, the boy must be taught caution. Some things should never be committed to paper, and those—”
    My tongue suddenly faltered. I must have gone pale, for Lord Golden abruptly stood and became my friend the Fool as he offered me his chair. “Are you all right, Fitz? Is it a seizure coming on?”
    I actually dropped into the chair. My head was spinning as I pondered the depth of my folly. I could scarcely get the breath to admit my idiocy. “Fool. All my scrolls, all my writings. I came so swiftly to Chade’s summons, I left them there in my cottage. I told Hap to close up the house before he came to Buckkeep, but he would not have hidden them, only shut the door to my study. If the Piebalds are clever enough to connect me with Hap . . .”
    I let the thought trail away. I needed to say no more to him. His eyes were huge. The Fool had read all that I had so recklessly committed to paper. Not only my own identity was bared there, but also many Farseer matters better left forgotten. And personal vulnerabilities also were exposed in those cursed scrolls. Molly, my lost love. Nettle, my bastard daughter. How could I have been so stupid as to set such thoughts to paper? How