"Where are you going?" Barak asked.
"I thought to go apart so that you may freely discuss this matter."
"Oh, sit down, Mandorallen," Barak said irritably. "I'm not going to say anything behind your back I wouldn't say to your face."
The mare, lying close to the fire with her head cradled in Hettar's lap, groaned again. "Is that medicine almost ready, Polgara?" the Algar asked in a worried voice.
"Not quite," she replied. She turned back to Ce'Nedra, who was carefully grinding up some dried leaves in a small cup with the back of a spoon. "Break them up a little finer, dear," she instructed.
Durnik was standing astride the mare, his hands on her distended belly. "We may have to turn the foal," he said gravely. "I think it's trying to come the wrong way."
"Don't start on that until this has a chance to work," Aunt Pol told him, slowly tapping a grayish powder from an earthen jar into her bubbling pot, She took the cup of leaves from Ce'Nedra and added that as well, stirring as she poured.
"I think, my Lord Barak," Mandorallen urged, "that thou hast not fully considered the import of what I have told thee."
"I heard you. You said you were afraid once. It's nothing to worry about. It happens to everybody now and then."
"I cannot live with it. I live in constant apprehension, never knowing when it will return to unman me."
Durnik looked up from the mare. "You're afraid of being afraid?" he asked in a puzzled voice.
"You cannot know what it was like, good friend," Mandorallen replied.
"Your stomach tightened up," Durnik told him. "Your mouth was dry, and your heart felt as if someone had his fist clamped around it?"
Mandorallen blinked.
"It's happened to me so often that I know exactly how it feels."
"Thou? Thou art among the bravest men I have ever known."
Durnik smiled wryly. "I'm an ordinary man, Mandorallen," he said. "Ordinary men live in fear all the time. Didn't you know that? We're afraid of the weather, we're afraid of powerful men, we're afraid of the night and the monsters that lurk in the dark, we're afraid of growing old and of dying. Sometimes we're even afraid of living. Ordinary men are afraid almost every minute of their lives."
"How can you bear it?"
"Do we have any choice? Fear's a part of life, Mandorallen, and it's the only life we have. You'll get used to it. After you've put it on every morning like an old tunic, you won't even notice it any more. Sometimes laughing at it helps - a little."
"Laughing?"
"It shows the fear that you know it's there, but that you're going to go ahead and do what you have to do anyway." Durnik looked down at his hands, carefully kneading the mare's belly. "Some men curse and swear and bluster," he continued. "That does the same thing, I suppose. Every man has to come up with his own technique for dealing with it. Personally, I prefer laughing. It seems more appropriate somehow."
Mandorallen's face became gravely thoughtful as Durnik's words slowly sank in. "I will consider this," he said. "It may be, good friend, that I will owe thee more than my life for thy gentle instruction."
Once more the mare groaned, a deep, tearing sound, and Durnik straightened and began rolling up his sleeves. "The foal's going to have to be turned, Mistress Pol," he said decisively. "And soon, or we'll lose the foal and the mare both."
"Let me get some of this into her first," she replied, quenching her boiling pot with some cold water. "Hold her head," she told Hettar. Hettar nodded and firmly wrapped his arms around the laboring mare's head. "Garion," Aunt Pol said, as she spooned the liquid between the mare's teeth, "why don't you and Ce'Nedra go over there where Silk and your grandfather are?"
"Have you ever turned a foal before, Durnik?" Hettar asked anxiously.
"Not a foal, but calves many times. A horse isn't that much different from a cow, really."
Barak stood up quickly. His face had a slight greenish cast to it. "I'll go with Garion and the princess," he rumbled. "I don't imagine I'd be much help here."
"And I will join thee," Mandorallen declared. His face was also visibly pale. "It were best, I think, to leave our friends ample room for their midwifery."
Aunt Pol looked at the two warriors with a slight smile on her face, but said nothing.
Garion and the others moved rather quickly away.
Silk and Mister Wolf were standing beyond the huge stone table, peering into another of the circular openings in the shimmering wall. "I've never seen fruits exactly like those," the little man was saying.
"I'd be surprised if you had," Wolf replied.
"They look as fresh as if they'd just been picked." Silk's hand moved almost involuntarily toward the tempting fruit.
"I wouldn't," Wolf warned.
"I wonder what they taste like."
"Wondering won't hurt you. Tasting might."
"I hate an unsatisfied curiosity."
"You'll get over it." Wolf turned to Garion and the others. "How's the horse?"
"Durnik says he's going to have to turn the foal," Barak told him. "We thought it might be better if we all got out of the way."
Wolf nodded. "Silk!" he admonished sharply, not turning around.
"Sorry." Silk snatched his hand back.
"Why don't you just get away from there? You're only going to get yourself in trouble."
Silk shrugged. "I do that all the time anyway."
"Just do it, Silk," Wolf told him firmly. "I can't watch over you every minute." He slipped his fingers up under the dirty and rather ragged bandage on his arm, scratching irritably. "That's enough of that," he declared. "Garion, take this thing off me." He held out his arm.
Garion backed away. "Not me," he refused. "Do you know what Aunt Pol would say to me if I did that without her permission?"
"Don't be silly. Silk, you do it."
"First you say to stay out of trouble, and then you tell me to cross Polgara? You're inconsistent, Belgarath."
"Oh, here," Ce'Nedra said. She took hold of the old man's arm and began picking at the knotted bandage with her tiny fingers. "Just remember that this was your idea. Garion, give me your knife."
Somewhat reluctantly, Garion handed over his dagger. The princess sawed through the bandage and began to unwrap it. The splints fell clattering to the stone floor.
"What a dear child you are." Mister Wolf beamed at her and began to scratch at his arm with obvious relief.
"Just remember that you owe me a favor," she told him.
"She's a Tolnedran, all right," Silk observed.
It was about an hour later when Aunt Pol came around the table to them, her eyes somber.
"How's the mare?" Ce'Nedra asked quickly.
"Very weak, but I think she'll be all right."
"What about the baby horse?"
Aunt Pol sighed. "We were too late. We tried everything, but we just couldn't get him to start breathing."
Ce'Nedra gasped, her little face suddenly a deathly white. "You're not going to just give up, are you?" She said it almost accusingly.
"There's nothing more we can do, dear," Aunt Pol told her sadly. "It took too long. He just didn't have enough strength left."
Ce'Nedra stared at her, unbelieving. "Do something!" she demanded. "You're a sorceress. Do something!"
"I'm sorry, Ce'Nedra, that's beyond our power. We can't reach beyond that barrier."
The little princess wailed then and began to cry bitterly. Aunt Pol put her arms comfortingly about her and held her as she sobbed.
But Garion was already moving. With absolute clarity he now knew what it was that the cave expected of him, and he responded without thinking, not running or even hurrying. He walked quietly around the stone table toward the fire.
Hettar sat cross-legged on the floor with the unmoving colt in his lap, his head bowed with sorrow and his manelike scalp lock falling across the spindle-shanked little animal's silent face.
"Give him to me, Hettar," Garion said.
"Garion! No!" Aunt Pol
's voice, coming from behind him, was alarmed.
Hettar looked up, his hawk face filled with deep sadness.
"Let me have him, Hettar," Garion repeated very quietly. Wordlessly Hettar raised the limp little body, still wet and glistening in the firelight, and handed it to Garion. Garion knelt and laid the foal on the floor in front of the shimmering fire. He put his hands on the tiny ribcage and pushed gently. "Breathe," he almost whispered.
"We tried that, Garion," Hettar told him sadly. "We tried everything."
Garion began to gather his will.
"Don't do that, Garion," Aunt Pol told him firmly. "It isn't possible, and you'll hurt yourself if you try."
Garion was not listening to her. The cave itself was speaking to him too loudly for him to hear anything else. He focused his every thought on the wet, lifeless body of the foal. Then he stretched out his right hand and laid his palm on the unblemished, walnut-colored shoulder of the dead animal. Before him there seemed to be a blank wall - black and higher than anything else in the world, impenetrable and silent beyond his comprehension. Tentatively he pushed at it, but it would not move. He drew in a deep breath and hurled himself entirely into the struggle. "Live," he said.
"Garion, stop."
"Live," he said again, throwing himself deeper into his effort against that blackness.
"It's too late now, Pol," he heard Mister Wolf say from somewhere. "He's already committed himself."
"Live," Garion repeated, and the surge he felt welling up out of him was so vast that it drained him utterly. The glowing walls flickered and then suddenly rang as if a bell had been struck somewhere deep inside the mountain. The sound shimmered, filling the air inside the domed chamber with a vibrant ringing. The light in the walls suddenly flared with a searing brightness, and the chamber was as bright as noon.
The little body under Garion's hand quivered, and the colt drew in a deep, shuddering breath. Garion heard the others gasp as the sticklike little legs began to twitch. The colt inhaled again, and his eyes opened.
"A miracle," Mandorallen said in a choked voice.
"Perhaps even more than that," Mister Wolf replied, his eyes searching Garion's face.
The colt struggled, his head wobbling weakly on his neck. He pulled his legs under him and began to struggle to his feet. Instinctively, he turned to his mother and tottered toward her to nurse. His coat, which had been a deep, solid brown before Garion had touched him, was now marked on the shoulder with a single incandescently white patch exactly the size of the mark on Garion's palm.
Garion lurched to his feet and stumbled away, pushing past the others. He staggered to the icy spring bubbling in the opening in the wall and splashed water over his head and neck. He knelt before the spring, shaking and breathing hard for a very long time. Then he felt a tentative, almost shy touch on his elbow. When he wearily raised his head, he saw the now steadier colt standing at his side and gazing at him with adoration in its liquid eyes.
Chapter Nine
THE STORM BLEW itself out the next morning, but they stayed in the cave for another day after the wind had died down to allow the mare to recover and the newborn colt to gain a bit more strength. Garion found the attention of the little animal disturbing. It seemed that no matter where he went in the cave, those soft eyes followed him, and the colt was continually nuzzling at him. The other horses also watched him with a kind of mute respect. All in all it was a bit embarrassing.
On the morning of their departure, they carefully removed all traces of their stay from the cave. The cleaning was spontaneous, neither the result of some suggestion or of any discussion, but rather was something in which they all joined without comment.
"The fire's still burning," Durnik fretted, looking back into the glowing dome from the doorway as they prepared to leave.
"It will go out by itself after we leave," Wolf told him. "I don't think you could put it out anyway - no matter how hard you tried."
Durnik nodded soberly. "You're probably right," he agreed.
"Close the door, Garion," Aunt Pol said after they had led their horses out onto the ledge outside the cave.
Somewhat self consciously, Garion took hold of the edge of the huge iron door and pulled it. Although Barak with all his great strength had tried without success to budge the door, it moved easily as soon as Garion's hand touched it. A single tug was enough to set it swinging gently closed. The two solid edges came together with a great, hollow boom, leaving only a thin, nearly invisible line where they met.
Mister Wolf put his hand lightly on the pitted iron, his eyes far away. Then he sighed once, turned, and led them back along the ledge the way they had come two days before.
Once they had rounded the shoulder of the mountain, they remounted and rode on down through the tumbled boulders and patches of rotten ice to the first low bushes and stunted trees a few miles below the pass. Although the wind was still brisk, the sky overhead was blue, and only a few fleecy clouds raced by, appearing strangely close.
Garion rode up to Mister Wolf and fell in beside him. His mind was filled with confusion by what had happened in the cave, and he desperately needed to get things straightened out. "Grandfather," he said.
"Yes, Garion?" the old man answered, rousing himself from his half doze.
"Why did Aunt Pol try to stop me? With the colt, I mean?"
"Because it was dangerous," the old man replied. "Very dangerous."
"Why dangerous?"
"When you try to do something that's impossible, you can pour too much energy into it; and if you keep trying, it can be fatal."
"Fatal?"
Wolf nodded. "You drain yourself out completely, and you don't have enough strength left to keep your own heart beating."
"I didn't know that." Garion was shocked.
Wolf ducked as he rode under a low branch. "Obviously."
"Don't you keep saying that nothing is impossible?"
"Within reason, Garion. Within reason."
They rode on quietly for a few minutes, the sound of their horses' hooves muffled by the thick moss covering the ground under the trees. "Maybe I'd better find out more about all this," Garion said finally.
"That's not a bad idea. What was it you wanted to know?"
"Everything, I guess."
Mister Wolf laughed. "That would take a very long time, I'm afraid."
Garion's heart sank. "Is it that complicated?"
"No. Actually it's very simple, but simple things are always the hardest to explain."
"That doesn't make any sense," Garion retorted, a bit irritably.
"Oh?" Wolf looked at him with amusement. "Let me ask you a simple question, then. What's two and two?"
"Four," Garion replied promptly.
"Why?"
Garion floundered for a moment. "It just is," he answered lamely.
"But why?"
"There isn't any why to it. It just is."
"There's a why to everything, Garion."
"All right, why is two and two four then?"
"I don't know," Wolf admitted. "I thought maybe you might." They passed a dead snag standing twisted and starkly white against the deep blue sky.
"Are we getting anywhere?" Garion asked, even more confused now.
"Actually, I think we've come a very long way," Wolf replied. "Precisely what was it you wanted to know?"
Garion put it as directly as he knew how. "What is sorcery?"
"I told you that once already. The Will and the Word."
"That doesn't really mean anything, you know."
"All right, try it this way. Sorcery is doing things with your mind instead of your hands. Most people don't use it because at first it's much easier to do things the other way."
Garion frowned. "It doesn't seem hard."
"That's because the things you've been doing have come out of impulse. You've never sat down and thought your way through something - you just do it."
"Isn't it easier that way? What I mean is, why not jus
t do it and not think about it?"
"Because spontaneous sorcery is just third-rate magic - completely uncontrolled. Anything can happen if you simply turn the power of your mind loose. It has no morality of its own. The good or the bad of it comes out of you, not out of the sorcery."
"You mean that when I burned Asharak, it was me and not the sorcery?" Garion asked, feeling a bit sick at the thought.
Mister Wolf nodded gravely. "It might help if you remember that you were also the one who gave life to the colt. The two things sort of balance out."
Garion glanced back over his shoulder at the colt, who was frisking along behind him like a puppy. "What you're saying is that it can be either good or bad."
"No," Wolf corrected. "By itself it has nothing to do with good or bad. And it won't help you in any way to make up your mind how to use it. You can do anything you want to with it - almost anything, that is. You can bite the tops off all the mountains or stick the trees in the ground upside down or turn all the clouds green, if you feel like it. What you have to decide is whether you should do something, not whether you can do it."
"You said almost anything," Garion noted quickly.
"I'm getting to that," Wolf said. He looked thoughtfully at a lowflying cloud - an ordinary-looking old man in a rusty tunic and gray hood looking at the sky. "There's one thing that's absolutely forbidden. You can never destroy anything - not ever."
Garion was baffled by that. "I destroyed Asharak, didn't I?"
"No. You killed him. There's a difference. You set fire to him, and he burned to death. To destroy something is to try to uncreate it. That's what's forbidden."
"What would happen if I did try?"
"Your power would turn inward on you, and you'd be obliterated in an instant."
Garion blinked and then suddenly went cold at the thought of how close he had come to crossing that forbidden line in his encounter with Asharak. "How do I tell the difference?" he asked in a hushed voice. "I mean, how do I go about explaining that I only meant to kill somebody and not destroy him?"
"It's not a good area for experimentation," Wolf told him. "If you really want to kill somebody, stick your sword in him. Hopefully you won't have occasion to do that sort of thing too often."
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