When Two Become One
***Spoilers for the Fitz and the Fool trilogy through Fool’s Quest chapter 12. Mentions of the events of The Farseer Trilogy, The Liveship Traders Trilogy, The Tawny Man Trilogy, and The Rain Wilds Chronicles are fair game, too.***
Fool’s Quest gives us quite the layered opening.
We get this sense of time folding back on itself for Fitz’s character. He’s back in Buckkeep, reunited with the Fool, Chade, Kettricken, Dutiful, et al., once again navigating complicated political maneuverings. He’s been intentionally pulled away from his life as Holder Badgerlock of Withywoods, the dominant persona he’s inhabited so far in this trilogy.
But all the while, there’s this Hitchcockian horror building beneath the surface. We know what happened at Withywoods. It’s a pressure cooker just waiting to explode and shatter the illusion Fitz is operating under.
And as we march closer to that inevitable reveal, Robin steadily rebuilds Fitz’s identity as FitzChivalry, making the rug pull all the more dramatic when it comes.
And I mean the return of FitzChivalry quite literally. What begins as a subtle shift – Fitz feeling closer to his former self – culminates in the dramatic public recognition of the witted bastard’s existence and heroism, laid bare before the Six Duchies nobles gathered for Winterfest at Buckkeep.
No matter where things go from here, I’m grateful for this beautiful moment. It’s emotional and long overdue.
I remember noting back in a Tawny Man recap that the push to destigmatize the Wit felt like it was laying the groundwork for Dutiful to eventually bring Fitz out of the shadows and back to court life. Turns out I was right, that was where we were headed, it just took a lot longer than I anticipated to get there.
And even though we know disaster is looming, it’s hard not to get swept up in Fitz’s moment of triumph. For our boy, who has been through hell and back more times than anyone should, to finally be recognized for who he is and all he’s done, crowned Prince FitzChivalry Farseer…
Hear, hear for the King in the Shadows!
But before we get that grand moment of public redemption, we get a fuckton of information about what’s really going on.
Specifically: how Bee came to be.
As Fitz Skill-heals the Fool, something strange occurs. He begins taking on some of the Fool’s ailments – a new development we haven’t seen in previous Skill-healings. He keeps this to himself (because god forbid he share what could be vital information), but we still start to piece things together.
When Fitz brought the Fool back from death, we had that powerful moment where their beings merged – who could forget! And turns out, that had lasting ramifications we didn’t understand at the time.
From Fitz:
“It was not a temporary merging. What I recall is that we were one. We were not wholes blending as we passed. We were parts, finally forming a whole. You and me and Nighteyes. One being.”
…
And from the Fool:
“We mingled. And perhaps we became, as you claim, one being. And perhaps we did not completely sort ourselves back into our own separate selves as thoroughly as you think. Perhaps there was an exchange of our very substances.”
It seems their essences never fully untangled. Which explains… quite a few things:
- Fitz’s ability to bring the Fool through the Skill-pillar
- His ease at entering the Fool’s body (mentally, you sickos!)
- The transference of injuries
- And – perhaps most importantly – how TF Molly gave birth to a White who is very clearly the Fool’s “unexpected son”
Now. This is all fascinating. But excuse me if I’m slightly aghast that this essentially makes it a second instance of someone using Fitz’s body to bring their child into the world.
Can Fitz have anything nice? (That I’m even asking that question at this point in the series is alarming.)
To be fair, the Fool didn’t set out with intention to use Fitz in this way. And it’s not a full possession situation – it’s more a merging of souls (?). So I suppose Bee is sort of a Fitz/Fool double daddy hybrid. How modern!
(Lowkey, I’m kinda relieved Molly isn’t around to process this revelation. Methinks it would freak her out.)
We’ve known their bond was extraordinary – soulmate-y, even. Now it’s just more literal.
And yet, there is still a lot of unanswered questions (or, more accurately, unasked). Everything about Bee has been strange from the beginning: her prolonged gestation, her coloring, her advanced intellect, her dreams. And no one is really asking if she’s connected to current events??
Which makes me wonder: is Fitz sharing the Fool’s blindness in a more metaphorical sense? Because that would explain a lot.
Musings!
I called for Perseverance to be the one to fill Fitz in on what went down at Withywoods, and I got my wish.
As Fitz returns to a truly creepy Skill(?)-fogged estate, everyone is behaving as if nothing happened. Worse, they have no recollection of Bee or Shun ever existing. It’s undeniably harrowing as Fitz tears through his upturned home, desperately searching for answers.
(Quick aside: I love when RotE takes a slight turn toward horror. Who can forget the pale woman’s ice palace?)
Luckily, Perseverance was off-estate, hidden under the cloak when the collective mind-mist was cast, and thus remembers events as they occurred. He fills Fitz in, and in turn, Fitz recognizes him as his first liege.
“Fatherless, unknown to his mother, and I was the only one in his world who remembered his name. Mine now, sworn to me. First vassal for the bastard prince. So fitting, somehow.”
Practically orphaned stable boy, adrift in the world?
Settle in, Per. You’ve found your leader.
There’s not a ton happening with Bee at the moment. She’s on the sled, being taken back to the Whites’ home, so we’re getting glimpses of that experience and the dynamics of her captors.
She’s also got Shun with her.
I don’t want to get too into the Shun of it all, but it’s important to acknowledge. As they are taken from Withywoods, Bee breaks up an attempted assault on Shun, and we later learn there were earlier attacks she wasn’t able to stop.
It’s fucking awful. Shun isn’t the most sympathetic character, but that doesn’t make this any less horrific.
I’m getting shades of Malta and the Satrap here, though Shun feels like a bizarre combo of the two.
Their pairing is interesting, and I can see the groundwork for redemption and a bond emerging.
(Also, Lant survived his stabbing after I wrote him off for dead. Just thought I’d mention that now.)
I’ll admit, I was a little harsh on the Fool last post. I probably could have been a bit kinder as he’s really been through a lot 🥺.
So I did enjoy getting some solid Fitz and Fool time, even if I remain mildly annoyed that his neediness once again supersedes Fitz’s responsibility to Bee in this opening.
But the most poignant moment for me was the Fool crowning Fitz, before the more official, public version.
“His hands felt for me, found a shoulder, the side of my face, and then fluttered up to my head and the crown there. He lifted it slightly, and then, with no self-consciousness at all, measured the length of my hair. He walked his fingers down my face, touching the break in my nose, the old scar, the scruff of beard on my chin. If anyone else had done it, it would have felt invasive. Insulting. But I knew he was comparing what I looked like now with what he recalled.
He cleared his throat then lifted the circlet in his hands. He spoke more gravely than I had ever heard him as he uttered the words, ‘FitzChivalry Farseer. I crown you King-in-the-Shadows of the Six Duchies.’ He set the circlet on my head, settling it carefully. The steel was cold and heavy. It settled there as if it would never move again. He cleared his throat once more and after a pause he added, ‘You’re a handsome man still, Fitz. Not as pretty as before Regal broke your face. But you’ve aged well, I judge.’”
No one does intimacy quite like these two.
Robin continues to dangle that dragon carrot.
First we get this discovery among Chade’s potions and salves:
“A glass vial held a dark-red liquid that swirled uneasily at the slightest touch. There were threads of silver in it that did not mingle with the red, yet did not float like oil on water.”
I know I didn’t spend four books discovering Kelsingra just so I could identify the contents of Chade’s mystery liquid.
There is also some speculation around dragons, given their mind-bending abilities – regarding the events at Withywoods.
I can feel them circling. Give them to me, Robin!
New animal friend alert!
We’ve got a lost soul – this time in the form of a crow – so naturally Web asks Fitz, patron saint of lost souls, to take it on.
“‘Having met her, I judge you two would be well matched in temperament.’
Knowing what Web thought of my temperament, I was more convinced than ever that I wanted nothing to do with that bird.”
So far, our crow friend – dubbed Motley by the Fool – has been a delight. Agitating Fitz while also pulling at his heartstrings. And, importantly, bringing some needed companionship to the down-and-out Fool.
Motley’s defining feature, and the source of his struggles, is a bit of white plumage among the black. Apparently, crows are quite judgy about this, as it makes him an outcast. But all I could think of was Fitz’s own (past) white streak – his namesake “badgerlock.” These two are a good match.
There are a handful of fun crow moments, but this one was my favorite:
“Yes, it’s me. I’ve an injured crow with me, and she’s tangled in my wig. I’ll explain in a moment, but for now I just need to set her down, get some light, and give her water.”
“You have a crow tangled in your wig?” he asked, and for a wonder there was a trace of both amusement and mockery in his voice. “Ah, Fitz. I can always trust you to have some sort of bizarre problem that breaks my ennui.”
It’s also a smart choice to introduce a new animal companion that isn’t a full Wit-bond or an attempt to replace Nighteyes. I’m open to that evolving, but by not making it a wolf or dog, it immediately feels different.
Also, crows are badass.
We didn’t have a ton of time with Fitz cosplaying as Lord Felspar, but what we got, I enjoyed.
First, I always enjoy a Fitz dress-up scene. And second, it was also nice to see him actually having a bit of fun:
“…thoroughly enjoyed playing the role of a mildly inebriated lordling who bragged indiscreetly about the newfound wealth of his holdings.”
Which had me wondering… In an alternate universe, could Fitz have been a Hollywood movie star? Can’t you just see our emotional boy as the rugged, brooding, leading man in an action movie?
No?
Just me?
GILF Alert!
This is not a drill: Nettle is pregnant, which means Fitz is entering his grandfather era.
Let’s go, Granddaddy Fitz.
I, like Fitz, am getting a little tired of everyone questioning his fitness as Bee’s parent.
(I will, for the moment, ignore the current circumstances that saw her sent home under questionable supervision and subsequently kidnapped by an evil cult.)
But Nettle is really harping on it. I did enjoy this little exchange:
“‘You have to bring her here, to Buckkeep, where she can be properly supervised and educated. You know that. You do.’
Did I?”
That internal “Did I?” absolutely killed me. That was my exact reaction.
Do we know that? Because I’ve seen how children fare at Buckkeep, and it is not exactly all lollipops and Reading Rainbow over there.
Okay, I know I’ve gone a little quote-crazy this post (what can I say, there’s so much gold!). But I have to end on this absolutely unhinged accounting of events from Fitz:
“Too much had happened already today. Kettricken was Witted. She was interested in Bee. Web wanted me to adopt a crow. I was to be a grandfather, possibly the grandfather of a Narcheska. And Riddle believed I was a failure as a father and wished to take my child from me.”
Yes, Fitz.
That is quite the day indeed.
And on that note, I’m off! Back to see this quest kickoff in earnest. But first, I must go rescue my cat, FitzWhiskery! He’s gotten all tangled in my wig!
Ta ta!
wizardwordship 