“Was he Witted, then?” the Prince asked eagerly.

“No!” The question shocked me. “He simply had a great fondness for his dog. And—”

“Then why am I Witted? They say it runs in families.”

I gave a halfhearted shrug. To me, it seemed the lad’s mind leapt from topic to topic as a flea hops from dog to dog. I tried to follow it. “I suppose the Wit is like the Skill. That is supposed to be the Farseer magic, yet a child born in a fisherman’s cot may suddenly show the potential for it. No one knows why a child is born with or without magic.”

“Civil Bresinga says the Wit winds through the Farseer line. He says that perhaps the Piebald Prince got his Wit as much from his royal mother as his baseborn father. He says that sometimes it runs weak in two family lines, but when they cross, the magic shows itself. Like one kitten with a crooked tail when the rest of the litter is sound.”

“When did Civil say these things to you?” I demanded sharply.

The Prince gave me an odd look but answered. “Early this morning, when he arrived from Galekeep.”

“In public?” I was horrified. I noticed that Lord Golden had edged his horse closer to us.

“No, of course not! It was very early this morning, before I had breakfasted. He came to the door of my bedchamber himself, urgently begging audience with me.”

“And you just let him in?”

Dutiful stared at me in silence for a moment. Then he said stiffly, “He has been a friend to me. He gave me my cat, Tom. You know what she meant to me.”

“I know how that gift was intended, as do you! Civil Bresinga may be a dangerous traitor, my prince, one who has already conspired with the Piebalds to snatch you away from your throne and eventually from your own flesh. You must learn more caution!”

The Prince had gone pink about the ears at my rebuke. Yet he still managed to keep his voice level. “He says he is not. And that they didn’t. Conspire, that is. Do you think he would have come to me to explain if he had? He and his mother did not know about . . . the cat. They were not even aware I was Witted when they gave her to me. Oh, my little cat.” His voice suddenly faltered on his last words, and I knew how all his thoughts had diverted to the loss of his Wit-partner.

The chill grief of his loss blew through his words. It stirred my own loss of Nighteyes to a sharper ache. I felt as if I were probing a wound as I relentlessly asked, “Then why did they do it? It must have seemed a strange request. Someone comes to them and gives them a hunting cat and says, ‘Here, give this to the Prince.’ And they’ve never said who gave it.”