“Well. We were never really that close, that way. But we are two old men, who have grown old together. Sometimes that is a greater closeness. We have come through time to your day and age. We can talk together, quietly, and share memories of a time that exists no more. I can tell you how it was, but it is not the same. It is like being two foreigners, trapped in a land we have come to, unable to return to our own, and having only each other to confirm the reality of the place we once lived. At least, once we could.”
I thought of two children running wild on the beaches of Buckkeep, plucking sheel off the rocks and eating them raw. Molly and I. It was possible to be homesick for a time, and to be lonely for the only other person who could recall it. I nodded.
“Ah. Well. Tonight we contemplate salvage. Now. Listen to me. On this I must have your word. You will not take actions of major consequence without conferring with me first. Agreed?”
I looked down. “I want to say yes. I am willing to agree to it. But lately even small actions of mine seem to take on consequences like a pebble in a landslide. And events pile up to where I have to make a choice suddenly, with no chance to consult anyone else. So I cannot promise. But I will promise to try. Is that enough?”
“I suppose. Catalyst,” he muttered.
“So the Fool calls me, too,” I complained.
Chade stopped abruptly in the midst of starting to say something. “Does he really?” he asked intently.
“He clubs me with the word every chance he gets.” I walked down to Chade’s hearth and sat down before his fire. The heat felt good. “Burrich says that too strong a dose of elfbark can lead to bleak spirits afterward.”