"Remain quite still, Highness," Mandorallen warned her in a deathly quiet voice. From the corner of her eye she saw him slide out of his saddle. The lion's eyes flickered toward him with annoyance.
Carefully, one step at a time, Mandorallen crossed the intervening space until he had placed his armored body between the lion and the princess. The Lion watched him warily, not seeming to realize what he was doing until it was too late. Then, cheated of another meal, the cat's eyes went flat with rage. Mandorallen drew his sword very carefully; then, to Ce'Nedra's amazement, he passed it back hilt - first to her. "So that thou shall have means of defending thyself, should I fail to withstand him," the knight explained.
Doubtfully, Ce'Nedra took hold of the huge hilt with both hands. When Mandorallen released his grip on the blade, however, the point dropped immediately to the ground. Try though she might, Ce'Nedra could not even lift the huge sword.
Snarling, the lion crouched even lower. His tail lashed furiously for a moment, then stiffened out behind him. "Mandorallen, look out!" Ce'Nedra screamed, still struggling with the sword.
The lion leaped.
Mandorallen flung his steel-cased arms wide and stepped forward to meet the cat's charge. They came together with a resounding crash, and Mandorallen locked his arms around the beast's body. The lion wrapped his huge paws around Mandorallen's shoulders and his claws screeched deafeningly as they raked the steel of the knight's armor. His teeth grated and ground as he gnawed and bit at Mandorallen's helmeted head. Mandorallen tightened his deadly embrace.
Ce'Nedra scrambled out of the way, dragging the sword behind her, and stared wide-eyed with fright at the dreadful struggle.
The lion's clawing became more desperate, and great, deep scratches appeared on Mandorallen's armor as the Mimbrate's arms tightened inexorably. The roars became yowls of pain, and the lion struggled now not to fight or kill, but to escape. He wriggled and thrashed and tried to bite. His hind paws came up to rake furiously on Mandorallen's armored trunk. His yowls grew more shrill, more filled with panic.
With a superhuman effort, Mandorallen jerked his arms together. Ce'Nedra heard the cracking of bones with a sickening clarity, and an enormous fountain of blood erupted from the cat's mouth. The young lion's body quivered, and his head dropped. Mandorallen unclenched his locked hands, and the dead beast slid limply from his grasp to the ground at his feet.
Stunned, the princess stared at the stupendous man in blood-smeared and clawed armor standing before her. She had just witnessed the impossible. Mandorallen had killed a lion with no weapon but his mighty arms-and all for her!
Without knowing why, she found herself crowing with delight. "Mandorallen!" She sang his name. "You are my knight!"
Still panting from his efforts, Mandorallen pushed up his visor. His blue eyes were wide, as if her words had struck him with a stunning impact. Then he sank to his knees before her. "Your Highness," he said in a choked voice, "I pledge to thee here upon the body of this beast to be thy true and faithful knight for so long as I have breath."
Deep inside her, Ce'Nedra felt a profound sort of click - the sound of two things, fated from time's beginning to come together, finally meeting. Something - she did not know exactly what - but something very important had happened there in that sun-dappled glade.
And then Barak, huge and imposing, came galloping up the trail with Hettar at his side and the others not far behind. "What happened?" the big Cherek demanded, swinging down from his horse.
Ce'Nedra waited until they had all reined in to make her announcement. "The lion there attacked me," she said, trying to make it sound like an everyday occurrence. "Mandorallen killed him with his bare hands."
"I was in fact wearing these, Highness," the still-kneeling knight reminded her, holding up his gauntleted fists.
"It was the bravest thing I've ever seen in my life," Ce'Nedra swept on.
"Why are you down on your knees?" Barak asked Mandorallen. "Are you hurt?"
"I have just made Sir Mandorallen my very own knight," Ce'Nedra declared, "and as is quite proper, he knelt to receive that honor from my hands." From the corner of her eye she saw Garion in the act of sliding down from his horse. He was scowling like a thundercloud. Silently, Ce'Nedra exulted. Leaning forward then, she placed a sisterly kiss on Mandorallen's brow. "Rise, Sir Knight," she commanded, and Mandorallen creaked to his feet.
Ce'Nedra was enormously pleased with herself.
The remainder of the day passed without incident. They crossed a low range of hills and came down into a little valley as the sun settled slowly into a cloudbank off to the west. The valley was watered by a small stream, sparkling and cold, and they stopped there to set up their night's encampment. Mandorallen, in his new role as knight-protector, was suitably attentive, and Ce'Nedra accepted his service graciously, casting occasional covert glances at Garion to be certain that he was noticing everything.
Somewhat later, when Mandorallen had gone to see to his horse and Garion had stomped off to sulk, she sat demurely on a moss-covered log congratulating herself on the day's accomplishments.
"You're playing a cruel game, Princess," Durnik told her bluntly from the spot a few feet away where he was building a fire.
Ce'Nedra was startled. So far as she could remember, Durnik had never spoken directly to her since she had joined the party. The smith was obviously uncomfortable in the presence of royalty and, indeed, seemed actually to avoid her. Now, however, he looked straight into her face, and his tone was reproving.
"I don't know what you're talking about," she declared.
"I think you do." His plain, honest fact was serious, and his gaze was steady.
Ce'Nedra lowered her eyes and flushed slowly.
"I've seen village girls play this same game," he continued. "Nothing good ever comes of it."
"I'm not trying to hurt anybody, Durnik. There isn't really anything of that sort between Mandorallen and me - we both know that."
"Garion doesn't."
Ce'Nedra was amazed. "Garion?"
"Isn't that what it's all about?"
"Of course not!" she objected indignantly. Durnik's look was profoundly skeptical.
"Such a thing never entered my mind," Ce'Nedra rushed on. "It's absolutely absurd."
"Really?"
Ce'Nedra's bold front collapsed. "He's so stubborn," she complained. "He just won't do anything the way he's supposed to."
"He's an honest boy. Whatever else he is or might become, he's still the plain, simple boy he was at Faldor's farm. He doesn't know the rules of the gentry. He won't lie to you or flatter you or say things he doesn't really feel. I think something very important is going to happen to him before very long - I don't know what - but I do know it's going to take all his strength and courage. Don't weaken him with all this childishness."
"Oh, Durnik," she said with a great sigh. "What am I going to do?"
"Be honest. Say only what's in your heart. Don't say one thing and mean another. That won't work with him."
"I know. That's what makes it all so difficult. He was raised one way, and I was raised another. We're never going to get along." She sighed again.
Durnik smiled, a gentle, almost whimsical smile. "It's not all that bad, Princess," he told her. "You'll fight a great deal at first. You're almost as stubborn as he is, you know. You were born in different parts of the world, but you're not really all that different inside. You'll shout at each other and shake your fingers in each others' faces; but in time that will pass, and you won't even remember what you were shouting about. Some of the best marriages I know of started that way."
"Marriage!"
"That's what you've got in mind, isn't it?"
She stared at him incredulously. Then she suddenly laughed. "Dear, dear Durnik," she said. "You don't understand at all, do you?"
"I understand what I see," he replied. "And what I see is a young girl doing everything she possibly can to catch a young man."
Ce'Nedra sighed. "Th
at's completely out of the question, you know - even if I felt that way - which of course I don't."
"Naturally not." He looked slightly amused.
"Dear Durnik," she said again, "I can't even allow myself such thoughts. You forget who I am."
"That isn't very likely," he told her. "You're usually very careful to keep the fact firmly in front of everybody."
"Don't you know what it means?"
He looked a bit perplexed. "I don't quite follow."
"I'm an Imperial Princess, the jewel of the Empire, and I belong to the Empire. I'll have absolutely no voice in the decision about whom I'm going to marry. That decision will be made by my father and the Cauncil of Advisers. My husband will be rich and powerful - probably much older than I am - and my marriage to him will be to the advantage of the Empire and the House of Borune. I probably won't even be consulted in the matter."
Durnik looked stunned. "That's outrageous!" he objected.
"Not really," she told him. "My family has the right to protect its interests, and I'm an extremely valuable asset to the Borunes." She sighed again, a forlorn little sigh. "It might be nice, though - to be able to choose for myself, I mean. If I could, I might even look at Garion the way you seem to think I have been looking - even though he's absolutely impossible. The way things are, though, all he can ever be is a friend."
"I didn't know," he apologized, his plain, practical face melancholy.
"Don't take it so seriously, Durnik," she said lightly. "I've always known that this was the way things have to be."
A large, glistening tear, however, welled into the corner of her eye, and Durnik awkwardly put his work-worn hand on her arm to comfort her. Without knowing why, she threw her arms around his neck, buried her face in his chest, and sobbed.
"There, there," he said, clumsily patting her shaking shoulder. "There, there."
Chapter Three
GARION DID NOT Sleep well that night. Although he was young and inexperienced, he was not stupid, and Princess Ce'Nedra had been fairly obvious. Over the months since she had joined them, he had seen her attitude toward him change until they had shared a rather specialized kind of friendship. He liked her; she liked him. Everything had been fine up to that point. Why couldn't she just leave it alone? Garion surmised that it probably had something to do with the inner workings of the female mind. As soon as a friendship passed a certain point - some obscure and secret boundary - a woman quite automatically became overwhelmed by a raging compulsion to complicate things.
He was almost certain that her transparent little game with Mandorallen had been aimed at him, and he wondered if it might not be a good idea to warn the knight to spare him more heartbreak in the future. Ce'Nedra's toying with the great man's affections was little more than the senseless cruelty of a spoiled child. Mandorallen must be warned. His Arendish thick-headedness might easily cause him to overlook the obvious.
And yet, Mandorallen had killed the lion for her. Such stupendous bravery could quite easily have overwhelmed the flighty little princess. What if her admiration and gratitude had pushed her over the line into infatuation? That possibility, coming to Garion as it did in those darkest hours just before dawn, banished all possibility of further sleep. He arose the next morning sandy-eyed and surly and with a terrible worry gnawing at him.
As they rode out through the blue-tinged shadows of early morning with the slanting rays of the newly risen sun gleaming on the treetops above them, Garion fell in beside his grandfather, seeking the comfort of the old man's companionship. It was not only that, however. Ce'Nedra was riding demurely with Aunt Pol just ahead, and Garion felt very strongly that he should keep an eye on her.
Mister Wolf rode in silence, looking cross and irritable, and he frequently dug his fingers under the splint on his left arm.
"Leave it alone, father," Aunt Pol told him without turning around.
"It itches."
"That's because it's healing. Just leave it alone."
He grumbled about that under his breath.
"Which route are you planning to take to the Vale?" she asked him.
"We'll go around by way of Tol Rane," he replied.
"The season's moving on, father," she reminded him. "If we take too long, we'll run into bad weather in the mountains."
"I know that, Pol. Would you rather cut straight across Maragor?"
"Don't be absurd."
"Is Maragor really all that dangerous?" Garion asked.
Princess Ce'Nedra turned in her saddle and gave him a withering look. "Don't you know anything?" she asked him with towering superiority.
Garion drew himself up, a dozen suitable responses to that coming to mind almost at once.
Mister Wolf shook his head warningly. "Just let it pass," the old man told him. "It's much too early to start in on that just now."
Garion clenched his teeth together.
They rode for an hour or more through the cool morning, and Garion gradually felt his temper improving. Then Hettar rode up to speak with Mister Wolf. "There are some riders coming," he reported.
"How many?" Wolf asked quickly.
"A dozen or more - coming in from the west."
"They could be Tolnedrans."
"I'll see," Aunt Pol murmured. She lifted her face and closed her eyes for a moment. "No," she said. "Not Tolnedrans. Murgos."
Hettar's eyes went flat. "Do we fight?" he asked with a dreadful kind of eagerness, his hand going to his sabre.
"No," Wolf replied curtly. "We hide."
"There aren't really that many of them."
"Never mind, Hettar," Wolf told him. "Silk," he called ahead, "there are some Murgos coming toward us from the west. Warn the others and find us all a place to hide."
Silk nodded curtly and galloped forward.
"Are there any Grolims with them?" the old man asked Aunt Pol.
"I don't think so," she answered with a small frown. "One of them has a strange mind, but he doesn't seem to be a Grolim."
Silk rode back quickly. "There's a thicket off to the right," he told them. "It's big enough to hide in."
"Lets go, then," Wolf said.
The thicket was fifty yards back among the larger trees. It appeared to be a patch of dense brush surrounding a small hollow. The ground in the hollow was marshy, and there was a spring at its center.
Silk had swung down from his horse and was hacking a thick bush off close to the ground with his short sword. "Take cover in here," he told them. "I'll go back and brush out our tracks." He picked up the bush and wormed his way out of the thicket.
"Be sure the horses don't make any noise," Wolf told Hettar. Hettar nodded, but his eyes showed his disappointment.
Garion dropped to his knees and wormed his way through the thick brush until he reached the edge of the thicket; then he sank down on the leaves covering the ground to peer out between the gnarled and stumpy trunks.
Silk, walking backward and swing his bush, was sweeping leaves and twigs from the forest floor over the tracks they had made from the trail to the thicket. He was moving quickly, but was careful to obliterate their trail completely.
From behind them, Garion heard a faint snap and rustle in the leaves, and Ce'Nedra crawled up and sank to the ground at his side. "You shouldn't be this close to the edge of the brush," he told her in a low voice.
"Neither should you," she retorted.
He let that pass. The princess had a warm, flowerlike smell; for some reason, that made Garion very nervous.
"How far away do you think they are?" she whispered.
"How would I know?"
"You're a sorcerer, aren't you?"
"I'm not that good at it."
Silk finished brushing away the tracks and stood for a moment studying the ground as he looked for any trace of their passage he might have missed. Then he burrowed his way into the thicket and crouched down a few yards from Garion and Ce'Nedra.
"Lord Hettar wanted to fight them," Ce'Nedra whispered to Garion. "Hettar
always wants to fight when he sees Murgos."
"The Murgos killed his parents when he was very young. He had to watch while they did it."
She gasped. "How awful!"
"If you children don't mind," Silk said sarcastically, "I'm trying to listen for horses."
Somewhere beyond the trail they had just left, Garion heard the thudding sound of horses' hooves moving at a trot. He sank down deeper into the leaves and watched, scarcely breathing.
When the Murgos appeared, there were about fifteen of them, mailshirted and with the scarred cheeks of their race. Their leader, however, was a man in a patched and dirty tunic and with coarse black hair. He was unshaven, and one of his eyes was out of line with its fellow. Garion knew him.
Silk drew in a sharp breath with an audible hiss. "Brill," he muttered.
"Who's Brill?" Ce'Nedra whispered to Garion.
"I'll tell you later," he whispered back. "Shush!"
"Don't shush me!" she flared.
A stem look from Silk silenced them.
Brill was talking sharply to the Murgos, gesturing with short, jerky movements. Then he raised his hands with his fingers widespread and stabbed them forward to emphasize what he was saying. The Murgos all nodded, their faces expressionless, and spread out along the trail, facing the woods and the thicket where Garion and the others were hiding. Brill moved farther up the trail. "Keep your eyes open," he shouted to them. "Let's go."
The Murgos started to move forward at a walk, their eyes searching. Two of them rode past the thicket so close that Garion could smell the sweat on their horses' flanks.
"I'm getting tired of that man," one of them remarked to the other.
"I wouldn't let it show," the second one advised.
"I can take orders as well as any man," the first one said, "but that one's beginning to irritate me. I think he would look better with a knife between his shoulder blades."
"I don't think he'd like that much, and it might be a little hard to manage."
"I could wait until he was asleep."
"I've never seen him sleep."
"Everybody sleeps-sooner or later."
"It's up to you," the second replied with a shrug, "but I wouldn't try anything rash - unless you've given up the idea of ever seeing Rak Hagga again."
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