Guardians of the West

by David Eddings

  ‘At once, your Majesty.’ the soldier grinned. ‘I should have thought of it myself.’

  They carried Ulfgar into the house and through a polished door. The room beyond that door was luxuriously furnished, but the chairs were mostly overturned, and there were sheets of parchment everywhere. A crumpled heap of them had been stuffed into a large stone fireplace built into the back wall, but the fireplace was cold.

  ‘Good,’ Javelin muttered. ‘He was interrupted before he could burn anything.’

  Silk looked around at the room. Rich, dark-colored tapestries hung on the walls, and the green carpeting was thick and soft. The chairs were all upholstered in scarlet velvet, and unlighted candles stood in silver sconces along the wall. ‘He managed to live fairly well, didn’t he?’ the little man murmured as they unceremoniously dumped the prisoner in the rust-colored doublet in one corner.

  ‘Let’s gather up these documents,’ Javelin said. ‘I want to go over them.’

  Garion unstrapped his sword, dropped his helmet on the floor and shrugged himself out of his heavy mail shirt. Then he sank wearily onto a soft couch. ‘I’m absolutely exhausted,’ he said. ‘I feel as if I haven’t slept for a week.’

  Silk shrugged. ‘One of the privileges of command.’

  The door opened, and Belgarath came into the room. ‘Durnik said I could find you here,’ he said, pushing back the hood of his shabby old cloak. He crossed the room and nudged the limp form in the corner. ‘He isn’t dead, is he?’

  ‘No,’ Garion replied. ‘Durnik put him to sleep with a club that’s all.’

  ‘Why the blindfold?’ the old man asked, indicating the strip of blue cloth tied across the captive’s face.

  ‘He was using sorcery before we captured him. I thought it might not be a bad idea to cover his eyes.’

  ‘That depends on how good he is. Durnik sent soldiers out to round up the others and then he went over to the encampment to get Pol and the other ladies.’

  ‘Can you wake him up?’ Silk asked.

  ‘Let’s have Pol do it. Her touch is a little lighter than mine, and I don’t want to break anything accidently.’

  It was perhaps three-quarters of an hour later when they all finally gathered in the green-carpeted room. Belgarath looked around, then straddled a straight-backed chair in front of the captive. ‘All right, Pol,’ he said bleakly. ‘Wake him up.’

  Polgara unfastened her blue cloak, knelt beside the prisoner and put one hand on each side of his head. Garion heard a whispered rushing sound and felt a gentle surge. Ulfgar groaned.

  ‘Give him a few minutes,’ she said, rising to her feet. ‘Then you can start questioning him.’

  ‘He’s probably going to be stubborn about it,’ Brin predicted with a broad grin.

  ‘I’ll be terribly disappointed in him if he isn’t,’ Silk said as he rifled through a drawer in a large, polished cabinet.

  ‘Have you barbarians blinded me?’ Ulfgar said in a weak voice as he struggled into a sitting position.

  ‘No,’ Polgara told him. ‘Your eyes are covered to keep you out of mischief.’

  ‘Are my captors women, then?’ There was contempt in the black-bearded man’s voice.

  ‘This one of them is,’ Ce’Nedra said, pushing her dark green cloak slightly to one side. It was the note in her voice that warned Garion and saved the prisoner’s life. With blazing eyes, she snatched one of the daggers from Vella’s belt and flew at the blindfolded man with the gleaming blade held aloft. At the last instant, Garion caught her upraised arm and wrested the knife from her grasp.

  ‘Give me that!’ she cried.

  ‘No, Ce’Nedra.’

  ‘He stole my baby!’ she screamed. ‘I’ll kill him!’

  ‘No, you won’t. We can’t get any answers out of him if you cut his throat.’ With one arm still about her, he handed the dagger back to Vella.

  ‘We have a few questions for you, Ulfgar,’ Belgarath said to the captive.

  ‘You’re going to have to wait a long time for the answers.’

  ‘I’m so glad he said that,’ Hettar murmured. ‘Who wants to start cutting on him?’

  ‘Do whatever you wish,’ Ulfgar sneered. ‘My body is of no concern to me.’

  ‘We’ll do everything we can to change your mind about that,’ Vella said in a chillingly sweet voice as she tested the edge of her dagger with her thumb.

  ‘Just what was it you wanted to know, Belgarath?’ Errand asked, turning from his curious examination of a bronze statue standing in the corner. ‘I can give you the answers, if you want.’

  Belgarath looked at the blond boy sharply. ‘Do you know what’s in his mind?’ he asked, startled.

  ‘More or less, yes.’

  ‘Where’s my son?’ Garion asked quickly.

  ‘That’s one thing he doesn’t know,’ Errand replied. ‘He had nothing to do with the abduction.’

  ‘Who did it then?’

  ‘He’s not sure, but he thinks it was Zandramas.’

  ‘Zandramas?’

  ‘That name keeps cropping up, doesn’t it?’ Silk said.

  ‘Does he know who Zandramas is?’

  ‘Not really. It’s just a name he’s heard from his Master.’

  ‘Who is his Master?’

  ‘He’s afraid even to think the name,’ Errand said. ‘It’s a man with a splotchy face, though.’

  The prisoner was struggling desperately, trying to free himself from the ropes which bound him. ‘Lies!’ he screamed. ‘All lies!’

  ‘This man was sent here by his Master to make sure that you and Ce’Nedra didn’t have any children,’ Errand continued, ignoring the screaming captive, ‘or to see to it that, if you did, the children didn’t live. He couldn’t have been behind the abduction, Belgarion. If he had been the one who crept into the nursery at Riva, he would have killed your son, not taken him away.’

  ‘Where does he come from?’ Liselle asked curiously as she removed her scarlet cloak. ‘I can’t quite place his accent.’

  ‘That’s probably because he’s not really a man,’ Errand told her. ‘At least not entirely. He remembers being an animal of some sort.’

  They all stared at the boy and then at Ulfgar.

  At that point the door opened again, and the hunchbacked Beldin came into the room. He was about to say something, but stopped, staring at the bound and blindfolded prisoner. He stumped across the floor, bent, and ripped the blue cloth away from the man’s eyes to stare into his face. ‘Well, dog,’ he said. ‘What brings you out of your kennel?’

  ‘You!’ Ulfgar gasped, his face growing suddenly pale.

  ‘Urvon will have your heart for breakfast when he finds out how badly you’ve botched things,’ Beldin said pleasantly.

  ‘Do you know this man?’ Garion asked sharply.

  ‘He and I have known each other for a long, long time, haven’t we, Harakan?’

  The prisoner spat at him.

  ‘I see you still need a bit of housebreaking.’ Beldin grinned.

  ‘Who is he?’ Garion demanded.

  ‘His name is Harakan. He’s a Mallorean Grolim—one of Urvon’s dogs. The last time I saw him, he was whining and fawning all over Urvon’s feet.’

  Then, quite suddenly, the captive vanished.

  Beldin unleased a string of foul curses. Then he, too, flickered out of sight.

  ‘What happened?’ Ce’Nedra gasped. ‘Where did they go?’

  ‘Maybe Beldin isn’t as smart as I thought,’ Belgarath said. ‘He should have left that blindfold alone. Our prisoner translocated himself outside the building.’

  ‘Can you do that?’ Garion asked incredulously. ‘Without being able to see what you’re doing, I mean?’

  ‘It’s very, very dangerous, but Harakan seems to have been desperate. Beldin’s following him.’

  ‘He’ll catch him, won’t he?’

  ‘It’s hard to say.’

  ‘I still have questions that have to be answered.’

 
; ‘I can answer them for you, Belgarion,’ Errand told him quite calmly.

  ‘You mean that you still know what’s in his mind—even though he’s not here any more?’

  Errand nodded.

  ‘Why don’t you start at the beginning, Errand?’ Polgara suggested.

  ‘All right. This Harakan, I guess his real name is, came here because his Master, the one Beldin called Urvon, sent him here to make sure that Belgarion and Ce’Nedra never had any children. Harakan came here and gained control of the Bear-cult. At first he stirred up all kinds of talk against Ce’Nedra, hoping that he could force Belgarion to set her aside and marry someone else. Then, when he heard that she was going to have a baby, he sent someone to try to kill her. That didn’t work, of course, and he started to get desperate. He was terribly afraid of what Urvon would do to him if he failed. He tried to gain control of Ce’Nedra when she was asleep once, to make her smother the baby, but someone—he doesn’t know who—stepped in and stopped him.’

  ‘It was Poledra,’ Garion murmured. ‘I was there that night.’

  ‘Is that when he came up with the idea of murdering Brand and laying the blame at King Anheg’s door?’ General Brendig asked.

  Errand frowned slightly. ‘Killing Brand was an accident,’ he replied. ‘As closely as Harakan could work it out, Brand just happened along and caught the cultists in that hallway when they were about to do what he really sent them to Riva to do.’

  ‘And what was that?’ Ce’Nedra asked him.

  ‘They were on their way to the royal apartments to kill you and your baby.’

  Her face paled.

  ‘And then they were supposed to kill themselves. That was what was supposed to start the war between Belgarion and King Anheg. Anyway, something went wrong. Brand got killed instead of you and your baby, and we found out that the cult was responsible instead of Anheg. He didn’t dare go back to Urvon and admit that he had failed. Then Zandramas took your baby and got away from the Isle of the Winds with him. Harakan couldn’t follow because Belgarion was already marching on Rheon by the time he found out about it. He was trapped here, and Zandramas was getting away with your baby.’

  ‘That Nyissan ship!’ Kail exclaimed. ‘Zandramas stole your son, Belgarion, and then sailed off to the south and left us all floundering around here in Drasnia.’

  ‘What about the story we got from that Cherek cultist right after the abduction?’ Brin asked.

  ‘A Bear-cultist isn’t usually very bright,’ Kail replied. ‘I don’t think this Zandramas would have had too much difficulty in persuading those Chereks that the abduction was on Harakan’s orders, and all that gibberish about the prince being raised in the cult so that one day he could claim the Rivan throne is just the kind of brainsick nonsense men like that would believe.’

  ‘That’s why they were left behind, then,’ Garion said. ‘We were supposed to capture at least one of them and get the carefully prepared story that sent us off here to Rheon, while Zandramas sailed away to the south with my son.’

  ‘It looks as if we’ve all been very carefully manipulated,’ Javelin said, sorting through some parchment sheets he had stacked on a polished table. ‘Harakan as well as the rest of us.’

  ‘We can be clever, too,’ Belgarath said. ‘I don’t think Zandramas realizes that the Orb will follow Geran’s trail. If we move fast enough, we can sneak up from behind and take this clever manipulator by surprise.’

  ‘It won’t work across water,’ the dry voice in Garion’s mind said laconically.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The Orb can’t follow your son’s trail over water. The ground stays in one place. Water keeps moving around—wind, tides, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  But the voice was gone.

  ‘There’s a problem, Grandfather,’ Garion said. ‘The Orb can’t find a trail on water.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  Garion tapped his forehead. ‘He just told me.’

  ‘That complicates things a bit.’

  ‘Not too much,’ Silk disagreed. ‘There are very few places where a Nyissan ship can land without being searched from keel to topmast. Most monarchs don’t care much for the idea of having drugs and poisons slipped into their kingdoms. Zandramas would definitely not want to sail into some port and get caught with the heir to the Rivan Throne aboard ship.’

  ‘There are many hidden coves along the coast of Arendia,’ Lelldorin suggested.

  Silk shook his head. ‘I don’t think so,’ he said. ‘I think the ship would have just stayed out to sea. I’m sure Zandramas wanted to get as far away from the Alorn kingdoms as possible—and as quickly as possible. If this ruse that sent us here to Rheon hadn’t worked, Garin would have had every man and every ship in the West out looking for his son.’

  ‘How about southern Cthol Murgos?’ General Brendig suggested.

  Javelin frowned. ‘No,’ he said. ‘There’s a war going on down there and the whole west coast is being patrolled by Murgo ships. The only safe place for a Nyissan ship to land is in Nyissa itself.’

  ‘And that brings us back to Salmissra, doesn’t it?’ Polgara said.

  ‘I think that if there had been any kind of official involvement in this, my people would have found out about it, Lady Polgara,’ Javelin said. ‘I’ve got Salmissra’s palace thoroughly covered. The actual orders would have had to come from Sadi, Salmissra’s Chief Eunuch, and we watch him all the time. I don’t think this came out of the palace.’

  The door opened and Beldin, his face as dark as a thundercloud, entered. ‘By the Gods!’ he swore. ‘I lost him!’

  ‘Lost him?’ Belgarath asked. ‘How?’

  ‘When he got to the street, he turned himself into a hawk. I was right on his tail, but he went into the clouds and changed form on me again. When he came out, he was mixed up in the middle of a flock of geese flying south. Naturally, when the geese saw me, they flew off squawking in all directions. I couldn’t tell which one of them he was.’

  ‘You must be getting old.’

  ‘Why don’t you shut up, Belgarath?’

  ‘He’s not important anymore, anyway.’ Belgarath shrugged. ‘We got what we need out of him.’

  ‘I think I’d prefer it if he were safely dead. If nothing else, the loss of one of his favorite dogs would irritate Urvon, and I’ll go out of my way to do that any day in the week.’

  ‘Why do you keep calling him a dog?’ Hettar asked curiously.

  ‘Because he’s one of the Chandim—and that’s what they are—the Hounds of Torak.’

  ‘Would you like to explain that?’ Queen Porenn asked him.

  Beldin took a deep breath to get his irritation under control. ‘It’s not too complicated,’ he said. ‘When they built Cthol Mishrak in Mallorea, Torak set certain Grolims the task of guarding the city. In order to do that, they became hounds.’

  Garion shuddered, the memory of the huge dog-shapes they had encountered in the City of Night coming back to him with painful clarity.

  ‘Anyway,’ Beldin continued, ‘after the Battle of Vo Mimbre when Torak was put to sleep for all those centuries, Urvon went into the forbidden area around the ruins and managed to persuade a part of the pack of hounds that he was acting on behalf of old burnt-face. He took them back to Mal Yaska with him and gradually changed them back into Grolims, even though he had to kill about half of them in the process. Anyhow, they call themselves the Chandim—a sort of secret order within the Grolim church. Thy’re absolutely loyal to Urvon. They’re pretty fair sorcerers and they dabble a bit in magic as well. Underneath it all, though, they’re still dogs—very obedient and much more dangerous in packs than they are as individuals.’

  ‘What a fascinating little sidelight,’ Silk observed, looking up from a parchment scroll he had found in one of the cabinets.

  ‘You have a very clever mouth, Kheldar,’ Beldin said testily. ‘How would you like to have me brick it up for you?’

  ‘No,
that’s quite all right, Beldin.’

  ‘Well, what now, Belgarath?’ Queen Porenn asked.

  ‘Now? Now we go after Zandramas, of course. This hoax with the cult has put us a long way behind, but we’ll catch up.’

  ‘You can count on that,’ Garion said. ‘I dealt with the Child of Dark once before and I can do it again if I have to.’ He turned back to Errand. ‘Do you have any idea of why Urvon wants my son killed?’

  ‘It’s something he found in a book of some kind. The book says that if your son ever falls into the hands of Zandramas, then Zandramas will be able to use him to do something. Whatever it is, Urvon would be willing to destroy the world to prevent it.’

  ‘What is it that Zandramas would be able to do?’ Belgarath asked, his eyes intent.

  ‘Harakan doesn’t know. All he knows is that he’s failed in the task Urvon set him.’

  Belgarath smiled slowly, a cold, wintery kind of smile. ‘I don’t think we need to waste any time chasing Harakan,’ he said.

  ‘Not chase him?’ Ce’Nedra exclaimed. ‘After all he’s done to us?’

  ‘Urvon will take care of him for us and Urvon will do things to him that we couldn’t even begin to think of.’

  ‘Who is this Urvon?’ General Brendig asked.

  ‘Torak’s third disciple,’ Belgarath replied. ‘There used to be three of them—Ctuchik, Zedar, and Urvon. But he’s the only one left.’

  ‘We still don’t know anything about Zandramas,’ Silk said.

  ‘We know a few things. We know that Zandramas is now the Child of Dark, for example.’

  ‘That doesn’t fit together, Belgarath,’ Barak rumbled. ‘Why would Urvon want to interfere with the Child of Dark? They’re on the same side, aren’t they?’

  ‘Apparently not. It begins to look as if there’s a little dissension in the ranks on the other side.’

  ‘That’s always helpful.’

  ‘I’d like to know a bit more before I start gloating, though.’

  It was midafternoon before the last fanatic resistance collapsed in the southeastern quarter of Rheon and the demoralized prisoners were herded through the streets of the burning town to join the others in the town square.