"Oh-oh," Barak said. "Where's Hettar?"
"He's still below," Garion replied. "What's the matter?"
"Keep an eye out for him. Those are Murgos."
The shaven-headed Nyissan sailors pulled open a hatch on their ship and barked a few rough orders down into the hold. Slowly, a line of dispirited-looking men came up. Each man wore an iron collar, and a long chain fastened them together.
Mandorallen stiffened and began to swear.
"What's wrong?" Barak asked.
"Arendishmen!" the knight exclaimed. "I had heard of this, but I did not believe it."
"Heard of what?"
"An ugly rumor hath persisted in Arendia for some years," Mandorallen answered, his face white with rage. "We are told that some of our nobles have upon occasion enriched themselves by selling their serfs to the Nyissans."
"Looks like it's more than a rumor," Barak said.
"There," Mandorallen growled. "See that crest upon the tunic of that one there? It's the crest of Vo Toral. I know the Baron of Vo Toral for a notorious spendthrift, but had not thought him dishonorable. Upon my return to Arendia, I will denounce him publicly."
"What good's that going to do?" Barak asked.
"He will be forced to challenge me," Mandorallen said grimly. "I will prove his villainy upon his body."
Barak shrugged. "Serf or slave - what's the difference?"
"Those men have rights, my Lord," Mandorallen stated. "Their Lord is required to protect them and care for them. The oath of knighthood demands it of us. This vile transaction hath stained the honor of every true Arendish knight. I shall not rest until I have bereft that foul baron of his miserable life."
"Interesting idea," Barak said. "Maybe I'll go with you."
Hettar came up on deck, and Barak moved immediately to his side and began talking quietly to him, holding one of his arms firmly.
"Make them jump around a bit," one of the Murgos ordered harshly. "I want to see how many are lame."
A heavy-shouldered Nyissan uncoiled a long whip and began to flick it deftly at the legs of the chained men. The slaves began to dance feverishly on the wharf beside the slave ship.
"Dog's blood!" Mandorallen swore, and his knuckles turned white as he gripped the railing.
"Easy," Garion warned. "Aunt Pol says we're supposed to stay pretty much out of sight."
"It cannot be borne!" Mandorallen cried.
The chain that bound the slaves together was old and pitted with rust. When one slave tripped and fell, a link snapped, and the man found himself suddenly free. With an agility born of desperation, he rolled quickly to his feet, took two quick steps and plunged off the wharf into the murky waters of the river.
"This way, man!" Mandorallen called to the swimming slave.
The burly Nyissan with the whip laughed harshly and pointed at the escaping slave. "Watch," he told the Murgos.
"Stop him, you idiot," one of the Murgos snapped. "I paid good gold for him."
"It's too late." The Nyissan looked on with an ugly grin. "Watch." The swimming man suddenly shrieked and sank out of sight. When he came up again, his face and arms were covered with the slimy, footlong leeches that infested the river. Screaming, the struggling man tore at the writhing leeches, ripping out chunks of his own flesh in his efforts to pull them off.
The Murgos began to laugh.
Garion's mind exploded. He gathered himself with an awful concentration, pointed one hand at the wharf just beyond their own ship and said, "Be there!" He felt an enormous surge as if some vast tide were rushing out of him, and he reeled almost senseless against Mandorallen. The sound inside his head was deafening.
The slave, still writhing and covered with the oozing leeches, was suddenly lying on the wharf. A wave of exhaustion swept over Garion; if Mandorallen had not caught him, he would have fallen.
"Where did he go?" Barak demanded, still staring at the turbulent spot on the surface of the river where the slave had been an instant before. "Did he go under?"
Wordlessly and with a shaking hand, Mandorallen pointed at the slave, who lay still weakly struggling on the Drasnian wharf about twenty yards in front of the bow of their ship.
Barak looked at the slave, then back at the river. The big man blinked with surprise.
A small boat with four Nyissans at the oars put out from the other wharf and moved deliberately toward Greldik's ship. A tall Murgo stood in the bow, his scarred face angry.
"You have my property," he shouted across the intervening water. "Return the slave to me at once."
"Why don't you come and claim him, Murgo?" Barak called back. He released Hettar's arm. The Algar moved to the side of the ship, stopping only to pick up a long boathook.
"Will I be unmolested?" the Murgo asked a bit doubtfully.
"Why don't you come alongside, and we'll discuss it?" Barak suggested pleasantly.
"You're denying me my rights to my own property," the Murgo complained.
"Not at all," Barak told him. "Of course there might be a fine point of law involved here. This wharf is Drasnian territory, and slavery isn't legal in Drasnia. Since that's the case, the man's not a slave anymore."
"I'll get my men," the Murgo said. "We'll take the slave by force if we have to."
"I think we'd have to look on that as an invasion of Alorn territory," Barak warned with a great show of regret. "In the absence of our Drasnian cousins, we'd almost be compelled to take steps to defend their wharf for them. What do you think, Mandorallen?"
"Thy perceptions are most acute, my Lord," Mandorallen replied. "By common usage, honorable men are morally obliged to defend the territory of kinsmen in their absence."
"There," Barak said to the Murgo. "You see how it is. My friend here is an Arend, so he's totally neutral in this matter. I think we'd have to accept his interpretation of the affair."
Greldik's sailors had begun to climb the rigging by now, and they clung to the ropes like great, evil-looking apes, fingering their weapons and grinning at the Murgo.
"There is yet another way," the Murgo said ominously.
Garion could feel a force beginning to build, and a faint sound seemed to echo inside his head. He drew himself up, putting his hands on the wooden rail in front of him. He felt a terrible weakness, but he steeled himself and tried to gather his strength.
"That's enough of that," Aunt Pol said crisply, coming up on deck with Durnik and Ce'Nedra behind her.
"We were merely having a little legal discussion," Barak said innocently.
"I know what you were doing," she snapped. Her eyes were angry. She looked coldly across the intervening stretch of river at the Murgo.
"You'd better leave," she told him.
"I have something to retrieve first," the man in the boat called back.
"I'd forget about it!"
"We'll see," he said. He straightened and began muttering as if to himself, his hands moving rapidly in a series of intricate gestures. Garion felt something pushing at him almost like a wind, though the air was completely still.
"Be sure you get it right," Aunt Pol advised quietly. "If you forget even the tiniest part of it, it'll explode in your face."
The man in the boat froze, and a faintly worried frown crossed his face. The secret wind that had been pushing at Garion stopped. The man began again, his fingers weaving in the air and his face fixed with concentration.
"You do it like this, Grolim," Aunt Pol said. She moved her hand slightly, and Garion felt a sudden rush as if the wind pushing at him had turned and begun to blow the other way. The Grolim threw his hands up and reeled back, stumbling and falling into the bottom of his boat. As if it had been given a heavy push, the boat surged backward several yards.
The Grolim half raised, his eyes wide and his face deathly pale.
"Return to your master, dog," Aunt Pol said scathingly. "Tell him to beat you for not learning your lessons properly."
The Grolim spoke quickly to the Nyissans at the oars, and they immediate
ly turned the boat and rowed back toward the slave ship.
"We had a nice little fight brewing there, Polgara," Barak complained. "Why did you have to spoil it?"
"Grow up," she ordered bluntly. Then she turned on Garion, her eyes blazing and the white lock at her brow like a streak of fire. "You idiot! You refuse any kind of instruction, and then you burst out like a raging bull. Have you the slightest conception of what an uproar translocation causes? You've alerted every Grolim in Sthiss Tor to the fact that we're here."
"He was dying," Garion protested, gesturing helplessly at the slave lying on the wharf. "I had to do something."
"He was dead as soon as he hit the water," she said flatly. "Look at him."
The slave had stiffened into an arched posture of mortal agony, his head twisted back and his mouth agape. He was obviously dead.
"What happened to him?" Garion asked, feeling suddenly sick.
"The leeches are poisonous. Their bites paralyze their victims so that they can feed on them undisturbed. The bites stopped his heart. You exposed us to the Grolims for the sake of a dead man."
"He wasn't dead when I did it!" Garion shouted at her. "He was screaming for help." He was angrier than he had ever been in his life.
"He was beyond help." Her voice was cold, even brutal.
"What kind of monster are you?" he asked from between clenched teeth. "Don't you have any feelings? You'd have just let him die, wouldn't you?"
"I don't think this is the time or place to discuss it."
"No! This is the time-right now, Aunt Pol. You're not even human, did you know that? You left being human behind so long ago that you can't even remember where you lost it. You're four thousand years old. Our whole lives go by while you blink your eyes. We're just an entertainment for you - an hour's diversion. You manipulate us like puppets for your own amusement. Well, I'm tired of being manipulated. You and I are finished!"
It probably went further than he'd intended, but his anger had finally run away with him, and the words seemed to rush out before he could stop them.
She looked at him, her face as pale as if he had suddenly struck her. Then she drew herself up. "You stupid boy," she said in a voice that was all the more terrible because it was so quiet. "Finished? You and I? How can you even begin to understand what I've had to do to bring you to this world? You've been my only care for over a thousand years. I've endured anguish and loss and pain beyond your ability to understand what the words mean - all for you. I've lived in poverty and squalor for hundreds of years at a time - all for you. I gave up a sister I loved more than my life itself - all for you. I've gone through fire and despair worse than fire a dozen times over - all for you. And you think this has all been an entertainment for me? - some idle amusement? You think the kind of care I've devoted to you for a thousand years and more comes cheaply? You and I will never be finished, Belgarion. Never! We will go on together until the end of days if necessary. We will never be finished. You owe me too much for that!"
There was a dreadful silence. The others, shocked by the intensity of Aunt Pol's words, stood staring first at her and then at Garion.
Without speaking further, she turned and went below decks again. Garion looked around helplessly, suddenly terribly ashamed and terribly alone.
"I had to do it, didn't I?" he asked of no one in particular and not entirely sure exactly what it was that he meant.
They all looked at him, but no one answered his question.
Chapter Twenty-Six
By midafternoon the clouds had rolled in again, and the thunder began to rumble off in the distance as the rain swept in to drown the steaming city once more. The afternoon thunderstorm seemed to come at the same time each day, and they had even grown accustomed to it. They all moved below deck and sat sweltering as the rain roared down on the deck above them.
Garion sat stiffly, his back planted against a rough-hewn oak rib of the ship and watched Aunt Pol, his face set stubbornly and his eyes unforgiving.
She ignored him and sat talking quietly with Ce'Nedra.
Captain Greldik came through the narrow companionway door, his face and beard streaming water. "The Drasnian-Droblek-is here," he told them. "He says he's got word for you."
"Send him in," Barak said.
Droblek squeezed his vast bulk through the narrow door. He was totally drenched from the rain and stood dripping on the floor. He wiped his face. "It's wet out there," he commented.
"We noticed," Hettar said.
"I've received a message," Droblek told Aunt Pol. "It's from Prince Kheldar."
"Finally," she said.
"He and Belgarath are coming downriver," Droblek reported. "As closely as I can make out, they should be here in a few days - a week at the most. The messenger isn't very coherent."
Aunt Pol looked at him inquiringly.
"Fever," Droblek explained. "The man's a Drasnian, so he's reliable - one of my agents at an upcountry trading post - but he's picked up one of the diseases that infest this stinking swamp. He's a little delirious just now. We hope we can break the fever in a day or so and get some sense out of him. I came as soon as I got the general idea of his message. I thought you'd want to know immediately."
"We appreciate your concern," Aunt Pol said.
"I'd have sent a servant," Droblek explained, "but messages sometimes go astray in Sthiss Tor, and servants sometimes get things twisted around." He grinned suddenly. "That's not the real reason, of course."
Aunt Pol smiled, "Of course not."
"A fat man tends to stay in one place and let others do his walking around for him. From the tone of King Rhodar's message, I gather that this business might be the most important thing happening in the world just now. I wanted to take part in it." He made a wry face. "We all lapse into childishness from time to time, I suppose."
"How serious is the condition of the messenger?" Aunt Pol asked.
Droblek shrugged. "Who can say? Half of these pestilential fevers in Nyissa don't even have names, and we can't really tell one from another. Sometimes people die very quickly from them; sometimes they linger for weeks. Now and then someone even recovers. About all we can do is make them comfortable and wait to see what happens."
"I'll come at once," Aunt Pol said, rising. "Durnik, would you get me the green bag from our packs? I'll need the herbs I have in it."
"It's not always a good idea to expose oneself to some of these fevers, my Lady," Droblek cautioned.
"I won't be in any danger," she said. "I want to question your messenger closely, and the only way I'll be able to get any answers from him is to rid him of his fever."
"Durnik and I'll come along," Barak offered.
She looked at him.
"It doesn't hurt to be on the safe side," the big man said, belting on his sword.
"If you wish." She put on her cloak and turned up the hood. "This may take most of the night," she told Greldik. "There are Grolims about, so have your sailors stay alert. Put a few of the more sober ones on watch."
"Sober, my Lady?" Greldik asked innocently.
"I've heard the singing coming from the crew's quarters, Captain," she said a bit primly, "Chereks don't sing unless they're drunk. Keep the lid on your ale-barrel tonight. Shall we go, Droblek?"
"At once, my Lady," the fat man assented with a sly look at Greldik.
Garion felt a certain relief after they had gone. The strain of maintaining his rancor in Aunt Pol's presence had begun to wear on him. He found himself in a difficult position. The horror and self-loathing which had gnawed at him since he had unleashed the dreadful fire upon Chamdar in the Wood of the Dryads had grown until he could scarcely bear it. He looked forward to each night with dread, for his dreams were always the same. Over and over again he saw Chamdar, his face burned away, pleading, "Master, have mercy." And over and over again he saw the awful blue flame that had come from his own hand in answer to that agony. The hatred he had carried since Val Alorn had died in that flame. His revenge had been so
absolute that there was no possible way he could evade or shift the responsibility for it. His outburst that morning had been directed almost more at himself than at Aunt Pol, He had called her a monster, but it was the monster within himself he hated. The dreadful catalogue of what she had suffered over uncounted years for him and the passion with which she had spoken - evidence of the pain his words had caused her - twisted searingly in his mind. He was ashamed, so ashamed that he could not even bear to look into the faces of his friends. He sat alone and vacant-eyed with Aunt Pol's words thundering over and over in his mind.
The rain slackened on the deck above them as the storm passed. Swirling little eddies of raindrops ran across the muddy surface of the river in the fitful wind. The sky began to clear, and the sun sank into the roiling clouds, staining them an angry red. Garion went up on deck to wrestle alone with his troubled conscience.
After a while he heard a light step behind him. "I suppose you're proud of yourself?" Ce'Nedra asked acidly.
"Leave me alone."
"I don't think so. I think I want to tell you just exactly how we all felt about your little speech this morning."
"I don't want to hear about it."
"That's too bad. I'm going to tell you anyway."
"I won't listen."
"Oh yes, you will," She took him by the arm and turned him around. Her eyes were blazing and her tiny face filled with a huge anger. "What you did was absolutely inexcusable," she said. "Your Aunt raised you from a baby. She's been a mother to you."
"My mother's dead."
"The Lady Polgara's the only mother you ever knew, and what did you give her for thanks? You called her a monster. You accused her of not caring."
"I'm not listening to you," Garion cried. Knowing that it was childish - even infantile - he put his hands over his ears. The Princess Ce'Nedra always seemed to bring out the worst in him.
"Move your hands!" she commanded in a ringing voice. "You're going to hear me even if I have to scream."
Garion, afraid that she meant it, took his hands away.
"She carried you when you were a baby," Ce'Nedra went on, seeming to know exactly where the sorest spot on Garion's wounded conscience lay. "She watched your very first steps. She fed you; she watched over you; she held you when you were afraid or hurt. Does that sound like a monster? She watches you all the time, did you know that? If you even so much as stumble, she almost reaches out to catch you. I've seen her cover you when you're asleep. Does that sound like someone who doesn't care?"