"Captain," the Murgo explained patiently, "it's for the safety of the princess, after all. If she's returned to Tol Honeth, the Vorduvians are going to kill her. You've read those documents I brought you."
"She'll be safe with the Borunes," the captain said. "The Vorduvians aren't going to come into Southern Tolnedra after her."
"The Borunes are only going to turn her over to her father. You're a Borune yourself. Would you defy an Emperor of your own house?" The captain's face was troubled.
"Her only hope of safety is with the Horbites," the Murgo pressed.
"What guarantees do I have that she'll be safe with them?"
"The best guarantee of all - politics. The Horbites are doing everything in their power to block the Grand Duke Kador on his march to the throne. Since he wants the princess dead, the Horbites naturally want to keep her alive. It's the only way really to insure her safety - and you become a wealthy man in the process." He jingled a heavy purse suggestively.
The captain still looked doubtful.
"Suppose we double the amount," the Murgo said in a voice that almost purred.
The captain swallowed hard. "It is for her safety, isn't it?"
"Of course it is."
"It's not as if I were betraying the House of Borune."
"You're a patriot, Captain," the Murgo assured the officer with a cold smile.
Aunt Pol was holding Ce'Nedra's arm quite firmly as they crouched together among the trees. The tiny girl's face was outraged, and her eyes were blazing.
Later, after the legionnaires and their Murgo friend had departed, the princess exploded. "How dare they?" she raged. "And for money!"
"That Tolnedran politics for you," Silk said as they led their horses out of the stand of saplings into the drizzly morning.
"But he's a Borune," she protested, "a member of my own family."
"A Tolnedran's first loyalty is to his purse," Silk told her. "I'm surprised you haven't discovered that by now, your Highness."
A few days later they topped a hill and saw the Wood of the Dryads spreading like a green smudge on the horizon. The showers had blown off, and the sun was very bright.
"We'll be safe once we reach the Wood," the princess told them. "The legions won't follow us there."
"What's to stop them?" Garion asked her.
"The treaty with the Dryads," she said. "Don't you know anything?"
Garion resented that.
"There's no one about," Hettar reported to Mister Wolf. "We can go now or wait for dark."
"Let's make a run for it," Wolf said. "I'm getting tired of dodging patrols." They started down the hill at a gallop toward the forest lying ahead of them.
There seemed to be none of the usual brushy margin which usually marked the transition from fields to woodlands. The trees simply began. When Wolf led them beneath those trees, the change was as abrupt as if they had suddenly gone inside a house. The Wood itself was a forest of incredible antiquity. The great oaks spread so broadly that the sky was almost never visible. The forest floor was mossy and cool, and there was very little undergrowth. It seemed to Garion that they were all quite tiny under the vast trees, and there was a strange, hushed quality about the wood. The air was very still, and there was a hum of insects and, from far overhead, a chorus of birdsong.
"Strange," Durnik said, looking around, "I don't see any sign of woodcutters."
"Woodcutters?" Ce'Nedra gasped. "In here? They wouldn't dare come into this wood."
"The wood is inviolate, Durnik," Mister Wolf explained. "The Borune family has a treaty with the Dryads. No one has touched a tree here for over three thousand years."
"This is a curious place," Mandorallen said, looking around a bit uncomfortably. "Me thinks I feel a presence here - a presence not altogether friendly."
"The Wood is alive," Ce'Nedra told him. "It doesn't really like strangers - but don't worry, Mandorallen, you're safe as long as you're with me." She sounded quite smug about it.
"Are you sure the patrols won't follow us?" Durnik asked Mister Wolf. "Jeebers knew we were coming here, after all, and I'm sure he told the Borunes."
"The Borunes won't violate their treaty with the Dryads," Wolf assured him. "Not for any reason."
"I've never known of a treaty a Tolnedran wouldn't step around if it was to his advantage." Silk spoke skeptically.
"This one is a bit different," Wolf said. "The Dryads gave one of their princesses to a young noble of the House of Borune. She became the mother of the Emperor of the First Borune Dynasty. The fortunes of the Borunes are very intimately tied up with the treaty. They're not going to gamble with that - not for any reason."
"What exactly is a Dryad?" Garion asked. The strange sense of a presence, an awareness in the wood, made him want to talk to cover the oppressive, watchful silence.
"A small group," Mister Wolf said. "Quite gentle. I've always rather liked them. They aren't human, of course, but that's not all that important."
"I'm a Dryad," Ce'Nedra said rather proudly.
Garion stared at her.
"Technically she's right," Wolf said. "The Dryad line seems to breed true on the female side of the House of Borune. That's one of the things that keeps the family honest about the treaty - all those wives and mothers who'd pack up and leave if it were ever broken."
"She looks human," Garion objected, still staring at the princess.
"The Dryads are so closely related to humans that the differences are hardly significant," Wolf said. "That probably explains why they didn't go mad like the other monsters did when Torak cracked the world."
"Monsters!" Ce'Nedra protested loudly.
"Your pardon, Princess," Wolf apologized. "It's an Ulgo term used to describe the non-humans who supported Gorim at Prolgu when he met with the God UL."
"Do I look like a monster to you?" she demanded, tossing her head angrily.
"A poor choice of words, perhaps," Wolf murmured. "Forgive me."
"Monsters indeed!" Ce'Nedra fumed.
Wolf shrugged. "There's a stream not far ahead, if I remember right. We'll stop there and wait until word of our arrival reaches Queen Xantha. It's not a good idea to go into the territory of the Dryads without the queen's permission. They can get quite nasty if they're provoked."
"I thought you said they were gentle," Durnik said.
"Within reason," Wolf told him. "But it's not a good idea to irritate people who communicate with trees when you're in the middle of a forest. Unpleasant things have a way of happening." He frowned. "That reminds me. You'd better stow your axe away out of sight. Dryads have strong feelings about axes - and fires. They're most unreasonable about fire. We'll have to keep our fires small and only for cooking."
They rode in under a colossal oak beside a sparkling stream purling over mossy rocks, dismounted and set up their dun-colored tents. After they had eaten, Garion wandered around feeling bored. Mister Wolf was napping, and Silk had lured the others into a dice game. Aunt Pol had seated the Princess on a log and was stripping the purple dye from her hair.
"If you don't have anything else to do, Garion," she said, "why don't you go bathe?"
"Bathe?" he asked. "Where?"
"I'm sure you'll find a pool somewhere along the stream," she said, carefully lathering Ce'Nedra's hair.
"You want me to bathe in that water? Aren't you afraid I'll catch cold?"
"You're a healthy boy, dear," she told him, "but a very dirty one. Now go wash."
Garion gave her a dark look and went to one of the packs for clean clothing, soap, and a towel. Then he stamped off upstream, grumbling at every step.
Once he was alone under the trees, he felt even more strongly that peculiar sense of being watched. It was not anything definable. There seemed to be nothing specific about it, but rather it felt as if the oaks themselves were aware of him and were passing information about his movements among themselves with a kind of vegetative communication he could not begin to understand. There seemed to be no menace in
it, merely a kind of watchfulness.
Some distance from the tents he found a fairly large pool where the stream dropped in a waterfall from the rocks above. The water in the pool was very clear, and he could see the bright pebbles on the bottom and several large trout that eyed him warily. He tested the water with his hand and shuddered. He considered subterfuge - a quick splashing of water on his body and a bit of soap on the more obvious smudges, but on reflection, he gave up the notion. Aunt Pol would settle for nothing less than a complete bath. He sighed bitterly and began to take off his clothing.
The first shock was awful, but after a few minutes he found that he could bear it. In a short time it even became exhilarating. The waterfall provided a convenient means for rinsing off the soap, and before long he found that he was actually enjoying himself.
"You're making an awful lot of noise," Ce'Nedra said, standing on the bank and appraising him quite calmly.
Garion immediately dove to the bottom of the pool.
Unless one was a fish, however, one could hardly remain underwater indefinitely. After about a minute, he struggled to the surface and popped his head out of the water, gasping and sputtering.
"Whatever are you doing?" Ce'Nedra asked. She was wearing a short white tunic, sleeveless and belted at the waist, and open sandals with laces that crisscrossed her slender ankles and calves and tied just below her knees. She carried a towel in one hand.
"Go away," Garion spluttered.
"Don't be so silly," she said, sitting down on a large stone and beginning to unlace her sandals. Her coppery hair was still damp and tumbled in a heavy mass about her shoulders.
"What are you doing?"
"I want to bathe," she said. "Are you going to be much longer?"
"Go someplace else," Garion cried, starting to shiver, but remaining determinedly crouched over in the water with only his head sticking out.
"This place looks just fine," she said. "How's the water?"
"Cold," he chattered, "but I'm not coming out until you go away."
"Don't be such a ninny," she told him.
He shook his head stubbornly, his face flaming.
She sighed with exasperation. "Oh, very well," she said. "I won't look, but I think you're being very silly. At the baths in Tol Honeth, no one thinks anything at all about such things."
"This isn't Tol Honeth," he told her pointedly.
"I'll turn my back, if that'll make you feel better," she said, getting up and standing with her back to the pool.
Not entirely trusting her, Garion crept from the pool and, still dripping, jerked on his drawers and hose. "All right," he called, "you can have the pool now." He mopped at his streaming face and hair with his towel. "I'm going back to the tents."
"The Lady Polgara says that you're to stay with me," she said, calmly untying the cord about her waist.
"Aunt Pol said what?" he demanded, terribly shocked.
"You're supposed to stay with me to protect me," she told him. She took hold of the hem of her tunic, obviously preparing to take it off.
Garion spun about and stared determinedly at the trees. His ears flamed, and his hands trembled uncontrollably.
She laughed a small, silvery laugh, and he could hear splashing as she entered the pool. She squealed from the shock of the cold water, and then there was more splashing.
"Bring me the soap," she commanded.
Without thinking, he bent to pick up the soap and caught one brief glimpse of her standing waist-deep in the water before he shut his eyes tightly. He backed toward the pool, his eyes closed and the hand holding the soap thrust out awkwardly behind him.
She laughed again and took the soap from his hand.
After what seemed an eternity, the princess completed her bath, emerged from the pool, dried herself and put her clothes back on. Garion kept his eyes firmly shut the entire time.
"You Sendars have such curious notions," she said as they sat together in the sun-warmed glade beside the pool. She was combing her deep red hair, her head inclined to one side and the comb pulling down through the thick, damp tangles. "The baths in Tol Honeth are open to all, and athletic contests are always conducted without clothing. Just last summer I myself ran against a dozen other girls in the Imperial Stadium. The spectators were most appreciative."
"I can imagine," Garion said dryly.
"What's that?" she asked, pointing at the amulet resting against his bare chest.
"My grandfather gave it to me last Erastide," Garion answered.
"Let me see." She held out her hand.
He leaned forward.
"Take it off so I can see it," she ordered.
"I'm not supposed to take it off," he told her. "Mister Wolf and Aunt Pol say I'm never supposed to take it off for any reason. I think there's a spell of some kind on it."
"What a strange idea," she remarked as she bent to examine the amulet. "They aren't really sorcerers, are they?"
"Mister Wolf is seven thousand years old," Garion said. "He knew the God Aldur. I've seen him make a tree grow from a small twig in a matter of minutes and set rocks on fire. Aunt Pol cured a blind woman with a single word, and she can turn herself into an owl."
"I don't believe in such things," Ce'Nedra told him. "I'm sure there's another explanation."
Garion shrugged and pulled on his linen shirt and brown tunic. He shook his head and raked his fingers through his still-damp hair.
"You're making an awful mess of it," she observed critically. "Here." She stood up and stepped behind him. "Let me do it." She put the comb to his hair and began pulling it through carefully. "You have nice hair for a man," she said.
"It's just hair," he said indifferently.
She combed in silence for a moment or two, then took his chin in her hand, turned his head and looked at him critically. She touched his hair at the sides a time or two until it was arranged to her satisfaction. "That's better," she decided.
"Thank you." He was a bit confused by the change in her.
She sat down again on the grass, clasped her arms around one knee and gazed at the sparkling pool. "Garion," she said finally.
"Yes?"
"What's it like to grow up as an ordinary person?"
He shrugged. "I've never been anything but an ordinary person," he told her, "so I wouldn't know what to compare it to."
"You know what I mean. Tell me about where you grew up - and what you did and all."
So he told her about Faldor's farm, about the kitchen and Durnik's smithy and Doroon and Rundorig and Zubrette.
"You're in love with Zubrette, aren't you?" She asked it almost accusingly.
"I thought I was, but so much has happened since we left the farm that sometimes I can't even remember what she looks like. I think I could do without being in love anyway. From what I've seen of it, it's pretty painful most of the time."
"You're impossible," she said, and then she smiled at him, her little face framed in the blazing mass of her sun-touched hair.
"Probably," he admitted. "All right, now you tell me what it's like to grow up as a very special person."
"I'm not that special."
"You're an Imperial Princess," he reminded her. "I'd call that pretty special."
"Oh, that," she said, and then giggled. "You know, sometimes since I joined you people, I almost forget that I'm an Imperial Princess."
"Almost," he said with a smile, "but not quite."
"No," she agreed, "not quite." She looked out across the pool again. "Most of the time being a princess is very boring. It's all ceremonies and formalities. You have to stand around most of the time listening to speeches or receiving state visitors. There are guards around all the time, but sometimes I sneak away so I can be by myself. It makes them furious." She giggled again, and then her gaze turned pensive. "Let me tell your fortune," she said, taking his hand.
"Can you tell fortunes?" Garion asked.
"It's only make-believe," she admitted. "My maids and I play at it sometimes. We
all promise each other high-born husbands and many children." She turned his hand over and looked at it. The silvery mark on his palm was very plain now that the skin was clean. "Whatever is that?" she asked.
"I don't know."
"It's not a disease, is it?"
"No," he said. "It has always been there. I think it has something to do with my family. Aunt Pol doesn't like to have people see it for some reason, so she tries to keep it hidden."
"How could you hide something like that?"
"She finds things for me to do that keep my hands dirty most of the time."
"How strange," she said. "I have a birthmark too - right over my heart. Would you like to see it?" She took hold of the neck of her tunic.
"I'll take your word for it," Garion told her, blushing furiously.
She laughed a silvery, tinkling little laugh. "You're a strange boy, Garion. You're not at all like the other boys I've met."
"They were Tolnedrans probably," Garion pointed out. "I'm a Sendar - or at least that's the way I was raised - so there are bound to be differences."
"You sound as if you're not sure what you are."
"Silk says I'm not a Sendar," Garion said. "He says he isn't sure exactly what I am, and that's very odd. Silk can recognize anybody for what he is immediately. Your father thought I was a Rivan."
"Since the Lady Polgara's your Aunt and Belgarath's your Grandfather, you're probably a sorcerer," Ce'Nedra observed.
Garion laughed. "Me? That's silly. Besides, the sorcerers aren't a race - not like Chereks or Tolnedrans or Rivans. It's more like a profession, I think - sort of like being a lawyer or a merchant - only there aren't any new ones. The sorcerers are all thousands of years old. Mister Wolf says that maybe people have changed in some way so that they can't become sorcerers anymore."
Ce'Nedra had leaned back and was resting on her elbows, looking up at him. "Garion?"
"Yes?"
"Would you like to kiss me?"
Garion's heart started to pound.
Then Durnik's voice called to them from not far away, and for one flaming instant Garion hated his old friend.
Chapter Twenty