Rivan Codex Series

by Eddings, David

"I'll make a special point of it."

  By the time the troops and supplies had all been unloaded, it was late afternoon. The clouds continued to roll in, though there was as yet no rain. "I think we may as well set up a camp here," Garion said to the others as they all stood on the gently sloping riverbank. "We wouldn't get too far before dark anyway, and if we get a good night's sleep, we can start early in the morning."

  "That makes sense," Silk agreed.

  "Did you find out anything about Haldar?" Queen Porenn asked the rat-faced little man. "I know there was something about him that was bothering you."

  "Nothing really very specific." Silk shrugged. "He's been doing a lot of traveling lately, though."

  "He's a general, Kheldar, and my Chief-of-Staff. Generals do have to make inspection tours from time to time, you know."

  "But usually not alone," Silk replied. "When he makes these trips, he doesn't even take his aide along."

  "I think you're just being overly suspicious."

  "It's my nature to be suspicious, Auntie dear."

  She stamped her foot. "Will you stop calling me that?"

  He looked at her mildly. "Does it really bother you, Porenn?" he asked.

  "I've told you that it bothers me."

  "Maybe I ought to try to remember that, then."

  "You're absolutely impossible, do you know that?"

  "Of course I do, Auntie dear."

  For the next two days the Rivan army marched steadily eastward across the desolate, gray-green moors, a wasteland of barren, sparsely vegetated hills interspersed with rank patches of thorn and bramble springing up around dark pools of stagnant water. The sky remained gray and threatening, but there was as yet no rain.

  Garion rode at the head of the column with a bleakly determined look on his face, speaking infrequently except to issue commands. His scouts reported at intervals, announcing that there was no sign of cult forces ahead and with equal certainty that there was as yet no evidence that the Drasnian pikemen under General Haldar were coming up from the rear.

  When they stopped for a hasty midday meal on that second day, Polgara approached him gravely. Her blue cloak seemed to whisper through the tall grass as she came, and her familiar fragrance came to him on the vagrant breeze. "Let's walk a bit, Garion," she said quietly. "There's something we need to discuss."

  " All right." His reply was short, even curt.

  She did something then that she had rarely done in the past several years. With a kind of solemn affection, she linked her arm in his, and together they walked away from the army and the rest of their friends, moving up a grassy knoll.

  "You've grown very grim in the past few weeks, dear," she said as they stopped at the crest of the knoll.

  "I think I've got reason enough, Aunt Pol."

  "I know that you've been hurt deeply by all of this, Garion, and that you're filled with a great rage; but don't let it turn you into a savage."

  "Aunt Pol, I didn't start this," he reminded her. "They tried to kill my wife. Then they murdered one of my closest friends and tried to start a war between me and Anheg. And now they've stolen my son. Don't you think that a little punishment might be in order?"

  "Perhaps," she replied, looking directly into his face, "but you must not allow your sense of outrage to run away with you and make you decide to start wading in blood. You have tremendous power, Garion, and you could very easily use it to do unspeakable things to your enemies. If you do that, the power will turn you into something as vile as Torak was. You'll begin to take pleasure in the horrors you inflict. In time, that pleasure will come to own you."

  He stared at her, startled by the intensity in her voice and by the way the single white lock at her brow seemed to blaze up suddenly.

  "It's a very real danger, Garion. In a peculiar way, you're in more peril right now than you were when you faced Torak."

  "I'm not going to let them get away with what they've done," he said stubbornly. "I'm not just going to let them go."

  "I'm not suggesting that, dear. We'll be at Rheon soon, and there'll be fighting. You're an Alorn, and I'm sure that you'll be very enthusiastic about the fighting. I want you to promise me that you won't let that enthusiasm and your sense of outrage push you over the line into wanton slaughter."

  "Not if they surrender," he replied stiffly.

  "And what then? What will you do with your prisoners?"

  He frowned. He hadn't really considered that.

  "For the most part, the Bear-cult is composed of the ignorant and the misguided. They're so obsessed with a single idea that they can't even comprehend the enormity of what they've done. Will you butcher them for stupidity? Stupidity is unfortunate, but it hardly deserves that kind of punishment."

  "What about Ulfgar?" he demanded.

  She smiled a bleak little smile. "Now that," she said, "is another matter."

  A large, blue-banded hawk spiraled down out of the murky sky. "Are we having a little family get-together?" Beldin asked harshly, even as he shimmered into his own form.

  "Where have you been, uncle?" Aunt Pol asked him quite calmly. "I left word with the twins for you to catch up with us."

  "I just got back from Mallorea," he grunted, scratching at his stomach. "Where's Belgarath?"

  "At Val Alorn," she replied, "and then he's going on to Mar Terrin. He's trying to follow the trail that's supposed to be hidden in the mysteries. You've heard about what's happened?"

  "Most of it, I think. The twins showed me the passage that was hidden in the Mrin Codex, and I heard about the Rivan Warder and Belgarion's son. You're moving against Rheon, right?"

  "Naturally." she answered. "That's the source of the infection."

  The hunchback looked speculatively at Garion. "I'm sure you're an expert tactician, Belgarion," he said, "but your reasoning escapes me this time."

  Garion looked at him blankly.

  "You're moving to attack a superior force in a fortified city, right?"

  "I suppose you could put it that way."

  "Then why is more than half your army camped at the shallows of the Mrin, two days behind you? Don't you think you might need them?"

  "What are you talking about, uncle?" Aunt Pol asked sharply .

  "I thought I was speaking quite plainly. The Drasnian army's camped at the shallows. They don't show signs of planning to move at any time in the near future. They're even fortifying their positions."

  "That's impossible."

  He shrugged. "Fly back and have a look for yourself."

  "We'd better go tell the others, Garion," Aunt Pol said gravely. "Something has gone terribly wrong somewhere."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  "What is that man thinking of?" Queen Porenn burst out in a sudden uncharacteristic fury. "I specifically ordered him to catch up with us."

  Silk's face was bleak. "I think we should have checked the inestimable General Haldar's feet for that telltale brand." he said.

  "You're not serious!" Porenn exclaimed.

  "He's deliberately disobeying your orders, Porenn, and he's doing it in such a way as to endanger you and all the rest of us."

  "Believe me, I'll get to the bottom of this as soon as I get back to Boktor."

  "Unfortunately, we're not going in that direction just now."

  "Then I'll go back to the shallows alone," she declared. "If necessary, I'll relieve him of his command."

  "No," he said firmly, "you won't."

  She stared at him incredulously. " Kheldar, do you realize to whom you're speaking?"

  "Perfectly, Porenn, but it's too dangerous."

  "It's my duty."

  "No," he corrected. "Actually, your duty is to stay alive long enough to raise Kheva to be King of Drasnia."

  She bit her lip. "That's unfair, Kheldar."

  "Life is hard, Porenn."

  "He's right, your Majesty," Javelin said. "General Haldar has already committed treason by disobeying you. I don't think he'd hesitate to add your murder to that crime."
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  "We're going to need some men," Barak rumbled, "A few anyway. Otherwise we're going to have to stop and wait for Brendig."

  Silk shook his head. "Haldar 's camped at the shallows. If what we suspect is true, he can keep Brendig from ever disembarking his troops."

  "Well," Ce'Nedra demanded angrily, "what do we do now?"

  "I don't think we've got much choice," Barak said. "We'll have to turn around and go back to the shallows and arrest Haldar for treason. Then we turn around and come back with the pikemen."

  "That could take almost a week," she protested.

  "What other alternatives do we have? We have to have those pikemen."

  "I think you're overlooking something, Barak," Silk said, "Have you noticed a slight chill in the air the last two days?"

  "A little -in the mornings."

  "We're in northeastern Drasnia. Winter comes very early up here."

  "Winter? But it's only early autumn."

  "We're along way north, my friend. We could get the first snowfall at any time now."

  Barak started to swear.

  Silk motioned Javelin aside, and the two of them spoke together briefly.

  "It's all falling apart, isn't it, Garion?" Ce'Nedra said, her lower lip trembling.

  "We'll fix it, Ce'Nedra," he said, taking her in his arms.

  "But how?"

  "I haven't quite worked that out yet."

  "We're vulnerable, Garion," Barak said seriously. "We're marching directly into cult territory with a vastly inferior force. We're wide open to ambush."

  "You'll need somebody to scout on ahead," Beldin said, looking up from the piece of cold meat he had been tearing with his teeth. He stuffed the rest of the chunk in his mouth and wiped his fingers on the front of his filthy tunic. "I can be fairly unobtrusive if I want to be."

  "I'll take care of that, uncle," Polgara told him. "Hettar's coming north with the Algar clans. Could you go to him and tell him what's happened? We need him as quickly as he can get here."

  He gave her an appraising look, still chewing on the chunk of meat. "Not a bad idea, Pol," he admitted. "I thought that married life might have made your wits soft, but it looks as if it's only your behind that's getting flabby."

  "Do you mind, uncle?" she asked acidly.

  "I'd better get started," he said. He crouched, spread his arms, and shimmered into the form of a hawk.

  "I'll be away for a few days," Silk said, coming back to join them. "We might be able to salvage this yet." Then he turned on his heel and went directly to his horse.

  "Where's he going?" Garion asked Javelin.

  "We need men," Javelin replied. "He's going after some."

  "Porenn," Polgara said, trying to look back down over her shoulder, "does it seem to you that I've been putting on a few extra pounds in the past months ?"

  Porenn smiled gently. "Of course not, Polgara," she said. "He was only teasing you."

  Polgara, however, still had a slightly worried look on her face as she removed her blue cloak. "I'll go on ahead," she told Garion. "Keep your troops moving, but don't run. I don't want you to blunder into something before I have a chance to warn you." Then she blurred, and the great snowy owl drifted away on soft, noiseless wings.

  Garion moved his forces carefully after that, deploying them into the best possible defensive posture as they marched. He doubled his scouts and rode personally to the top of every hill along the way to search the terrain ahead.

  The pace of their march slowed to be no more than five leagues a day; though the delay fretted him, he felt that he had no real choice in the matter.

  Polgara returned each morning to report that no apparent dangers lay ahead and then she flew away again on noiseless wings.

  "How does she manage that?" Ce'Nedra asked. "I don't think she's sleeping at all."

  "Pol can go for weeks without sleep," Durnik told her. "She'll be all right -if it doesn't go on for too long."

  "Belgarion," Errand said in his light voice, pulling his chestnut stallion in beside Garion's mount, "you did know that we're being watched, didn't you?"

  "What?"

  "There are men watching us."

  "Where?"

  "Several places. They're awfully well hidden. And there are other men galloping back and forth between that town we're going to and the army back at the river."

  "I don't like that very much," Barak said. "It sounds as if they're trying to co-ordinate something."

  Garion looked back over his shoulder at Queen Porenn, who rode beside Ce'Nedra. "Would the Drasnian army attack us if Haldar ordered them to?" he asked.

  "No," she said quite finally. "The troops are absolutely loyal to me. They'd refuse that kind of order."

  "What if they thought they were rescuing you?" Errand asked. "Rescuing?"

  "That's what Ulfgar is suggesting," the young man replied. "The general's supposed to tell his troops that our army here is holding you prisoner."

  "I think they would attack under those circumstances, your Majesty." Javelin said, "and if the cult and the army catch us between them, we could be in very deep trouble."

  "What else can go wrong?" Garion fumed.

  "At least it isn't snowing," Lelldorin said. "Not yet, anyway."

  The army seemed almost to crawl across the barren landscape as the clouds continued to roll ponderously overhead.

  The world seemed locked in a chill, colorless gray, and each morning the scum of ice lying on the stagnant pools was thicker.

  "We're never going to get there at this rate, Garion," Ce'Nedra said impatiently one gloomy midday as she rode beside him.

  "If we get ambushed, we might not get there at all, Ce'Nedra," he replied. "I don't like this any more than you do, but I don't think we've really got much choice."

  "I want my baby."

  "So do I."

  "Well, do something then."

  "I'm open to suggestions."

  "Can't you-?" She made a vague sort of gesture with one hand.

  He shook his head. "You know that there are limits to that sort of thing, Ce'Nedra."

  "What good is it then?" she demanded bitterly, pulling her gray Rivan cloak more tightly about her against the chill.

  The great white owl awaited them just over the next rise. She sat on a broken limb of a dead-white snag, observing them with her unblinking golden eyes.

  "Lady Polgara," Ce'Nedra greeted her with a formal inclination of her head.

  Gravely the white owl returned her a stiff little bow. Garion suddenly laughed.

  The owl blurred, and the air around it wavered briefly. Then Polgara was there, seated sedately on the limb with her ankles crossed. "What's so amusing, Garion?" she asked him.

  "I've never seen a bird bow before," he replied. "It just struck me as funny, that's all."

  "Try not to let it overwhelm you, dear," she said primly. "Come over here and help me down."

  "Yes, Aunt Pol."

  After he had helped her to the ground, she looked at him soberly. "There's a large cult force lying in wait two leagues ahead of you," she told him.

  "How large?"

  "Half again as large as yours."

  "We'd better go tell the others," he said grimly, turning his horse.

  "Is there any way we could slip around them?" Durnik asked after Polgara had told them all of the cultists lying in ambush ahead.

  "I don't think so, Durnik," she replied. "They know we're here, and I'm sure we're being watched."

  "We must needs attack them, then," Mandorallen asserted. "Our cause is just, and we must inevitably prevail."

  "That's an interesting superstition, Mandorallen," Barak told him, "but I'd prefer to have the numbers on my side." The big man turned to Polgara. "How are they deployed? What I mean is-"

  "I know what the word means, Barak." She scraped a patch of ground bare with her foot and picked up a stick.

  "This trail we're following runs through a ravine that cuts through that low range of hills just ahead. At ab
out the deepest part of the ravine, there are several gullies running up the sides. There are four separate groups of cultists, each one hiding in a different gully." She sketched out the terrain ahead with her stick. "They obviously plan to let us march right into the middle of them and then attack us from all sides at once."

  Durnik was frowning as he studied her sketch. "We could easily defeat any one of those groups," he suggested, rubbing thoughtfully at one cheek. "All we really need is some way to keep the other three groups out of the fight."

  "That sort of sums it up," Barak said, "but I don't think they'll stay away just because they weren't invited."

  "No," the smith agreed, "so we'll probably have to put up some kind of barrier to prevent their joining in."

  "You've thought of something, haven't you, Durnik?" Queen Porenn observed.

  "What manner of barrier could possibly keep the villains from rushing to the aid of their comrades?" Mandorallen asked.

  Durnik shrugged. "Fire would probably work."

  Javelin shook his head and pointed at the low gorse bushes in the field beside them. "Everything in this area is still green," he said. "I don't think it's going to burn very well."

  Durnik smiled. "It doesn't have to be a real fire."

  "Could you do that, Polgara?" Barak asked, his eyes coming alight.

  She considered it a moment. "Not in three places at once," she replied.

  "But there are three of us, Pol," the smith reminded her. "You could block one group with an illusion of fire; I could take the second; and Garion the third. We could pen all three groups in their separate gullies, and then, after we've finished with the first group, we could move on to the next." He frowned slightly. "The only problem with it is that I'm not sure exactly how to go about creating the illusion."

  "It's not too difficult, dear " Aunt Pol assured him. "It shouldn't take long for you and Garion to get the knack of it."

  "What do you think?" Queen Porenn asked Javelin.

  "It's dangerous," he told her, "very dangerous."

  "Do we have any choice?"

  "Not that I can think of right offhand."

  That's it, then," Garion said. "If the rest of you will tell the troops what we're going to do, Durnik and I can start learning how to build imaginary bonfires."