Read the previous entry in the series here.
Read the next entry in the series here.

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After a letter to Fitz from Civil Bresinga, “Withywoods” begins with Fitz hastening to his home, using the Witness Stones to do so, despite the peril and cost. Fitz finds himself praying as he proceeds in as much haste as he can reasonably make, and he rehearses nightmarish scenarios as he does so. He also notes feeling more and more reluctant to go forward as he does proceed, and when he arrives at Withywoods and begins Skilling to Chade and others to report, he finds his magics stymied. Encountering other residents, he asks after Bee and those to whom he has entrusted her care, receiving disjointed and confused answers. The lack of clarity frustrates and confuses Fitz, and those he questions begin to suffer under his questioning.

Fitz happens to notice Perseverance, who pleads with him for recognition. Dismissing the others, Fitz confers with the boy, learning what has befallen his family and its estate. Lant brings medicine and, when he challenges Fitz about his regard for Perseverance, Fitz upbraids him, revealing his true identity, at which Perseverance is reverent. Under further questioning, Perseverance unfolds information about the raiders on Withywoods to Fitz, who arrives at ideas for the raiders’ motivations.

Fitz then turns his attention to Lant, puzzling out from what he learns from the man that some kind of ensorcellment is at work. The arrival of a royal messenger known to Fitz, Slidwell, confirms as much, as well as establishing the physical limits of the ensorcellment and its effects. Slidwell notes, too, that Chade and Thick are on their way, but Nettle is not because of potential harm to the child she carries. FItz dismisses Lant, who leaves in anger, as well as Slidwell, who takes brandy with him.

So much done, Fitz walks the halls and searches the rooms for clues. Few present themselves until he encounters the cat with whom Bee had conferred. From the cat, Fitz learns more of the raid, that Bee and Shun had been taken and that some of the raiders had no smell of their own–something that puts Fitz in mind of the Fool. Fitz considers matters in sorrow.

The present chapter is not the first in the Realm of the Elderlings corpus to carry the title “Withywoods.” Indeed, the first chapter of the Fitz and the Fool Trilogy does so, so the present chapter is necessarily calling back to that beginning in some way. As in that chapter, the present chapter happens amid winter with people making their way towards the estate bequeathed upon Molly Chandler, enwrapped in concerns of the Wit and of the maintenance of that household, so there are some textual resonances, although I readily admit they are not exact correspondences or parallels. The present chapter is much heavier and darker in tone than the first one in the present series–although it is to be expected of the second book in a trilogy that it will be in such a place, the typical sequence for such things being introduction, complication, and resolution.

I note that the present chapter touches on Fitz’s religiosity. I’ve written on the matter of religion in the Realm of the Elderlings corpus, although I do not make much in that paper of Fitz’s own practice. Rereading the present chapter, I remember why: “I had never had a deep faith” (199) does not suggest that there is much depth to that well. I do have an opinion about such things, as might be expected; there’s a little about it here, and it may be that I revisit that project as one of my many scholarly somedays. For the moment, the note that there is a note to add is worth making.

Affectively, I found the present chapter somewhat hard to read. I followed the action easily enough, unlike some parts of the Realm of the Elderlings corpus; despite the depiction of being fogged at work in the present chapter, the plot was plain enough. (So much has not been the case for all such parts of the corpus, as a recent comment reminded me.) For me, the difficulty was in the text awakening fears that already slumber uneasily in me. I’ve mentioned–once or twice–that I am a father of a daughter whom I love very much. While I know that much is sensationalized and overblown, I know there are risks to her, even absent bad actors in the world, and I do not think I am wrong to act with some eye toward them. As I write this, my daughter is well cared for and safe, but it does not take much for me to imagine that she might not be so, and the present chapter does some prompting that way. I find no fault with the writing that it does so, but it does so so.

Then again, maybe the fact that the book does command emotional responses from me is part of why I keep reading, that I have done so for some years, now, and that I am like to keep doing so for more years yet.

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