Golden Fool (tawny Man, #2)

The second installment of Robin Hobb's Tawny Man Trilogy continues the story of FitzChivalry Farseer, a royal bastard and former assassin who has returned to Buckkeep Castle under the alias Tom Badgerlock. Posing as a servant to Lord Golden, a Jamaillian nobleman who is actually Fitz's oldest friend, the Fool, in disguise, Fitz navigates the political intrigues of the Farseer court. The novel opens with his grief over Nighteyes, his Wit-bonded wolf and companion of nearly two decades. The Wit is a beast-bonding magic that allows a person to share consciousness with an animal. Though surrounded by people who care for him, Fitz feels profoundly alone. The Fool observes that Fitz is choosing his isolation rather than having it forced upon him, and Fitz slowly recognizes this pattern stretching back through his entire life.

Fitz settles uneasily into his double life at Buckkeep while preparations proceed for Prince Dutiful's betrothal to Narcheska Elliania. The Narcheska is an Outislander princess offered as a token of alliance between the Six Duchies and the Outislands. On a walk back to Buckkeep one night, Piebalds, a militant faction of Witted people who pursue political power through intimidation, stalk Fitz in the dark, taunting him about his dead wolf and revealing they know he is Witted. They do not attack, instead demonstrating they could expose or kill him at will. Fitz reports the encounter to Lord Golden, then panics about personal writings left at his old cottage that could reveal his true identity and his connections to Molly, his former love, and Nettle, his secret daughter living with Molly and the former stablemaster Burrich.

A series of discoveries complicates matters. Chade, Fitz's mentor and former royal assassin, has a seemingly dim-witted servant named Thick. Fitz is staggered to discover that Thick possesses extraordinarily powerful, untrained Skill-magic, the royal telepathic ability of the Farseer line. Through Buckkeep's spy-holes, Fitz also observes a troubling scene: Elliania's uncle Peottre coaches the reluctant girl through dance steps while she weeps and begs to go home. A serving woman delivers orders from a mysterious "Lady" with cold authority, and Elliania gasps as if enduring hidden pain from elaborate serpent-and-dragon markings on her back.

The betrothal ceremony unfolds as an elaborate spectacle. Queen Kettricken enters in simple Buck blue, while the Narcheska arrives in Outislander garb with deliberate poise. Her father Arkon Bloodblade makes a dramatic blood-offering by slashing his own arm. Fitz observes the court's power dynamics from his position as Lord Golden's attendant, noting the envious glances of Civil Bresinga, a young court noble, and the presence of Rosemary, a former child spy for the traitor Prince Regal, now among the Queen's trusted ladies.

In a private audience, Queen Kettricken breaks down weeping over Nighteyes, revealing she had felt the wolf's death and had been closer to him than Fitz ever knew. Their shared grief becomes a turning point; she holds Fitz while he weeps, offering "a healing kiss" (111), the first real easing of his bereavement. She gives him a silver fox pin she crafted herself, claiming him as kin.

Fitz begins Skill-instruction with Prince Dutiful, but their first lesson nearly ends in catastrophe. Dutiful's talent proves dangerously strong: he follows Thick's Skill-music into the Skill-current, the perilous mental torrent through which Skill-energy flows, and begins to disintegrate. Fitz plunges after him and barely hauls the Prince back. Meanwhile, Fitz's personal life frays. His foster son Hap neglects his apprenticeship in pursuit of a girl named Svanja, and Fitz's cautious relationship with Jinna, a hedge-witch, remains incomplete. Chade reveals he has been secretly experimenting with herbs to open himself to the Skill, driven by decades of resentment at being denied the Farseer magic because of his illegitimate birth. He and Fitz clash bitterly.

A diplomatic crisis erupts when Dutiful publicly compliments Lady Vance over the Narcheska. This slight coincides with the arrival of Bingtown Traders proposing an alliance against Chalced, a hostile neighboring state. Their delegation includes a scaled boy named Selden Vestrit who speaks for a dragon called Tintaglia. Peottre urgently warns that any alliance with the Bingtown Traders will end the betrothal. Privately, the Fool reveals that Bingtown's dragons are real creatures born from sea serpents that spin cocoons and emerge as dragons. He passes the decision of whether to share this knowledge to Fitz as the Catalyst, the Fool's term for Fitz's role as a changer of history. Fitz decides to inform Chade and the Queen.

The Narcheska's farewell ceremony becomes the novel's dramatic turning point. Elliania challenges Dutiful to slay Icefyre, a dragon trapped in a glacier on Aslevjal Island in the Outislands, as proof of his worthiness. Dutiful accepts and counter-challenges Elliania to accompany him. Kettricken formally confirms the arrangement.

A woman named Jek arrives at Buckkeep, recognizing Lord Golden as "Amber," a persona the Fool used in Bingtown. Her assumption that Fitz and the Fool are lovers triggers a devastating confrontation. Fitz demands to know the Fool's true feelings, and the Fool responds: "I love you. I always have. I always will" (360-361). Fitz states he could never desire the Fool as a bed partner. The Fool tells Fitz both are now "doomed to recall it forever" (361), and the rift between them deepens into weeks of silence.

Fitz discovers that Thick has been unwittingly serving as a Piebald spy, reporting on Fitz, Lord Golden, and Chade in exchange for pennies. Civil, who had been coerced into informing for the Piebalds, rides to the Piebald leader Laudwine's hiding place to break ties after learning his mother died by suicide rather than endure further Piebald abuse. Laudwine orders Civil strangled. Fitz intervenes, kills Laudwine, but takes a sword-thrust through his back. Near death from sepsis and imprisoned by the city guard, Fitz is eventually freed under a fabricated cover story. Dutiful, Thick, the Fool, and Chade unite to heal him through the Skill, forming a coterie, a group of Skill-users mentally linked together. The healing is violent and uncontrollable, erasing every old scar on Fitz's body.

During convalescence, Fitz learns Kettricken has told Dutiful his true identity. The Prince shares letters his father, the late King Verity, once wrote about "the Tom-cat that Burrich adopted" (537). Chade, rejuvenated by Skill-healing performed on his own body, grows dangerously fixated on the magic, tapping Thick's strength without the man's understanding. Burrich himself arrives at Buckkeep, tracking his runaway Witted son Swift. Fitz watches through spy-holes as Burrich confesses his guilt over FitzChivalry's supposed death, blaming himself for failing to suppress Fitz's Wit. Fitz lets Burrich pass without revealing himself, choosing to preserve the family Burrich and Molly have built.

The Fool reveals his tattooed back to Fitz: serpents and dragons identical to the Narcheska's markings, applied during childhood by the Pale Woman, a rival White Prophet. White Prophets are figures believed to guide the course of history. The Fool explains that on Aslevjal, Fitz must choose between helping Dutiful slay Icefyre and freeing the dragon so it can mate with Tintaglia and restore dragonkind. He prophesies his own death on the island. Fitz tells Chade, who devises a plan to prevent Lord Golden from boarding the ship.

Kettricken convenes a historic meeting with Old Blood, or Witted, representatives, surrendering Dutiful as a hostage to demonstrate good faith. The Queen issues a proclamation restricting executions of Witted people to ducal oversight. Fitz negotiates to serve as Skillmaster if Kettricken promises to leave Nettle undisturbed with Burrich. Swift arrives at Buckkeep after Burrich disowns him, and Fitz is assigned as his tutor. Fitz reconciles with the Fool, addressing him as "Beloved, I have missed your company" (629). The novel closes with preparations for the quest to Aslevjal proceeding amid unresolved tensions, the Fool's prophecy of death hanging over all. The story continues in Fool's Fate.