Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress

by David Eddings

  Dear Gods! That looked like fun!

  ‘Well, Pol?’ mother asked. ‘Do you think you could do that?’

  ‘It might take some practice,’ I admitted, ‘but not too much. I know exactly what she’s doing. She’s very proud of being a woman, isn’t she?’

  ‘Oh, yes. That she is.’

  ‘That’s what her dancing’s all about, and I can definitely handle that part. The steps aren’t really important. It’s her attitude that matters, and I have an attitude of my own. Give me a week, mother, and I’ll be a better dancer than she is.’

  ‘My, aren’t we confident.’

  ‘Trust me. Where to now?’

  ‘Yar Nadrak, the capital. You’ll need to select an owner and then we’ll get started.’

  Most of you are probably unfamiliar with the peculiar nature of Nadrak society. Women are property among the Nadraks, but they’re not property in the same sense that horses, boots, or wagons are property. Nadrak women select their owners, and if the chosen one doesn’t live up to her expectations, she can always fall back on her daggers to persuade him to sell her to somebody she likes better – and she gets half of her sale price every time. A Nadrak woman who pays close attention to business can die wealthy, if she wants to.

  Yar Nadrak is a mosquito-infested, tar-smeared city built on a marshy point where the surrounding forest has been cleared by setting it on fire – and those are its good points.

  There was no reason to avoid it any longer, so when I resumed my own form, I wore the leather clothing mother had provided for me. I strutted through the city gate, noting the polished steel mask of Torak gazing down at me as I did. The presence of that dreadful reminder may have had something to do with what happened next.

  ‘Don’t be in such a rush, Dearie,’ one of the half-drunk gate-guards said, leering at me suggestively and taking hold of my arm. I decided to establish some ground-rules right then and there. I swept one leg against the sides of his knees and he buckled and fell. Then I dropped on top of him, one of my knees driving into the pit of his stomach. I drew my Ulgo daggers from my belt and crossed their saw-toothed edges against his throat. ‘Any last words?’ I asked him.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he wheezed.

  ‘I’m getting ready to cut your throat,’ I explained patiently. ‘You touched me, and nobody touches Polanna and lives. Everybody knows that. Brace yourself. This’ll be over before you know it.’

  ‘It was an accident!’ he squealed. ‘I didn’t mean to touch you!’

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t realize that. You should have been more careful.’

  ‘You’ll forgive me then?’

  ‘Of course I’ll forgive you, silly boy. I’ll still have to cut your throat, but I’ll really regret it. Just lie still. This won’t take but a minute.’

  Now what was I going to do? I’m sure everybody around me was terribly impressed, but how was I going to extricate myself without actually killing this idiot?

  ‘Polanna! Let him go!’ The voice was deep and masculine, and it seemed to be coming from somewhere behind me. It was not behind me, though, and the speaker wasn’t a man. Mother had come to my rescue.

  ‘But he touched me!’ I protested.

  ‘It was a mistake. Let him up.’

  ‘I’ve been insulted. I can’t just let that slide.’

  ‘We don’t have time for this, Polanna. Nick him once and let it go at that. A little blood will wash away the insult. You don’t have to fill the gutter with it over an accident.’

  ‘Oh, all right.’ I gave in. I gave my terrified victim a little slice on the point of his chin, got up, and jammed my daggers into their sheaths. Then I marched on into the city. I don’t think anybody even noticed that I appeared to be alone.

  ‘A little excessive there, Pol’ Mother’s tone was acid.

  ‘It got out of hand, I guess.’

  ‘Polanna? Where did you come up with “Polanna”?’

  ‘It just popped into my head. I thought it sounded sort of Nadraky.’

  ‘Nadraky?’

  ‘Let it pass, mother. Let’s shop around and find me an owner.’

  I’d never shopped for an owner before, and it’s not quite the same as shopping for a pair of shoes or a side of beef. We finally settled on a rich fur trader named Gallak. He was prosperous enough to have the necessary contacts and not to live in a hovel. Like most Nadraks, he was a lean man with shrewd eyes. The only real problem we had with him was that he was much more interested in money than he was in the finer things in life – including women. It took a bit more effort to insert some memories into his mind as a result of that peculiarity, but mother and I got around that by playing on his greed. We waved the notion of the profit he’d make when he re-sold me in front of him, and that was all it took.

  I slipped into his house late one night while he was sleeping, scattered some of my possessions around and fixed up one of his spare rooms to make it look like my personal bed chamber. Then, just as it was starting to get light, I built a fire in his kitchen and started cooking. When everything was ready, I went to his bedroom and shook him awake. ‘Your breakfast’s ready, Gallak,’ I told him. ‘Get up.’

  He stretched and yawned. ‘Good morning, Polanna,’ he said calmly. ‘Did you sleep well?’ He clearly remembered buying me in a back-country tavern about six weeks ago, and in his mind I’d been around long enough for him to get to know me.

  He ate his breakfast and complimented me on my cooking – which in his own mind he did every time I cooked for him. Then he checked my collar to make sure it was still locked, told me to have a nice day, and went off to work. So far as he knew, I was now a fixture in his life, and he had no way of knowing that he’d never seen me before that very morning.

  ‘Now then,’ mother said after he’d left, ‘we want to find a man named Yarblek. He’s going to be fairly important later on, so we’d better get to know him.’

  ‘I don’t exactly have total freedom of movement, mother,’ I reminded her.

  ‘Whatever gave you that idea?’

  ‘I’m a slave, mother. I can’t just wander the streets as I please, can I?’

  ‘You’re missing the point, Pol. Gallak’s your owner, not your master. You’re property, not a slave.’

  ‘Is there a difference?’

  ‘There’s a world of difference, Pol. Your collar gives you absolute freedom, and it tells everybody that if anyone interferes with you, Gallak will have him killed. You’ve got more freedom here than you had as the Duchess of Erat. You can go anywhere you want to go, and you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. Nadrak women have more freedom than any other females in the whole world – except for wolves, of course.’

  ‘What a fascinating concept.’

  Despite the fact that he was only fifteen or so at the time, Yarblek was already well-known in Yar Nadrak. Well-known or not, Yarblek was a little hard to find, and my search for him led me into the seedier parts of town. Evidently, word of the incident at the city gate had gotten around, because all manner of evil-looking scoundrels went out of their way to stay out of mine. Obviously, my description had accompanied those stories, so the rascals of Yar Nadrak knew me on sight. It’s hard to get information when nobody wants to talk to you, though, so I picked one scruffy fellow and pointed my finger at him. ‘You,’ I said peremptorily, ‘come here.’

  ‘I didn’t do anything,’ he protested.

  ‘I didn’t say you had. Come here.’

  ‘Do I have to?’

  ‘Yes.’ I pointed at the street in front of me. ‘Here,’ I instructed. ‘Now.’

  ‘Yes, Polanna. At once.’ He almost ran across the street, and when he stopped where I’d indicated, he carefully put his hands behind his back to avoid any mistakes.

  ‘I’m looking for a young fellow named Yarblek. Do you know him?’

  ‘Everybody knows Yarblek, Polanna.’

  ‘Good. Where can I find him?’

  ‘He usually spends his t
ime in the Rat’s Nest – that’s a tavern over near the east gate. If he’s not there, the tavern-keeper should know where you can find him.’

  ‘Thank you. See? That didn’t hurt at all, did it?’

  ‘I don’t seem to be bleeding from anyplace – yet.’ Then his eyes grew curious. ‘Did you really cut that gate-guard’s head off with those saws you carry instead of knives?’

  ‘Of course not. All I did was nick him a little.’

  ‘I sort of thought it might have been an exaggeration. You don’t seem all that blood-thirsty to me.’ Then he winked at me. ‘I won’t tell anybody, though. You’ve got the whole thieves’ quarter terrorized, and I just love to see all those rascals quaking in their boots.’

  ‘You’re a nice boy,’ I told him, patting his cheek. Then I went on down the muddy street toward the east gate of the city.

  The Rat’s Nest tavern was aptly named. It was draped with cobwebs and the floor needed shoveling more than sweeping. I marched up to the wobbly, scarred counter. ‘Which one of these drunken sots is Yarblek?’ I demanded of the fellow on the other side of the counter.

  ‘That’s him over there in the comer – the young fellow who’s still trying to sleep off what he drank last night. Are you going to kill him?’

  ‘Whatever gave you that idea?’

  ‘You’re the one they call Polanna, aren’t you? The word’s out that you kill people just for looking at you.’

  ‘Nonsense. I haven’t killed a single person yet today – so far. Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go over and have a few words with Yarblek.’

  It didn’t take much to wake Yarblek – a single creaky board, actually. His hand flashed to his dagger-hilt before he even got his eyes open. Then he looked at me boldly. ‘Have a seat, Dearie,’ he invited, pushing out a stool with one foot. ‘You’re new here, aren’t you? I don’t think I’ve seen you here before. Would you like to have me buy you something to drink?’

  ‘Aren’t you a little young to be frequenting taverns, Master Yarblek?’ I asked, sitting down on the stool he’d offered.

  ‘I’ve never been young, Dearie,’ he boasted. ‘I was all grown up the day I was bom. ‘I was weaned on strong beer, and I killed my first man when I was seven.’ And he went on – and on and on – boasting about how much he could drink, how many men he’d killed, and how no woman could resist his charms. His expression and his quick, easy laughter suggested that he didn’t really expect me to believe all his lies, but rather that he was simply trying to entertain me. All in all, I found him to be a shabby, boastful adolescent, but I picked up a few hints that he was much shrewder than he appeared to be on the surface, and I felt fairly confident that if he didn’t make any serious blunders, he might actually live long enough to reach adulthood, and that if he did, he’d be up to whatever it was that he was supposed to do.

  I’ll admit that the possibility that he’d eventually go into business with Prince Kheldar and become one of the richest men in the world never even occurred to me.

  After a while, I grew tired of all his bragging. ‘You look tired, Yarblek,’ I suggested.

  ‘Never too tired to talk with a beautiful woman,’ he said. Then his eyes drooped shut and he started to snore.

  It probably wasn’t necessary, given his condition, but just to be on the safe side, I erased his memory of our meeting – and that of the man behind the counter as well.

  ‘Mother,’ I sent out my thought as I left the Rat’s Nest.

  ‘Yes, Pol?’

  ‘I found Yarblek. He’s quite young, but he shows a lot of promise – if he lives.’

  ‘I have it on very good authority that he will, Pol. Can we trust him?’

  ‘We probably shouldn’t, but I get the feeling that we can.’

  ‘We’ll be here for quite a while. You can look in on him from time to time and see how he’s coming along.’

  ‘Who’s the other one I have to meet?’

  ‘The new king, Drosta lek Thun.’

  ‘How new?’

  ‘He was crowned in 5342. He’s about twenty or so now.’

  ‘We’re expecting help from the king of an Angarak nation?’

  ‘I’m not the one who’s making the decisions, Pol. You’re supposed to talk with him and see if you can find out why he might decide to change sides.’

  ‘Getting into his palace might be a little tricky.’

  ‘I think Gallak might be able to help us with that.’

  ‘Maybe. I’ll talk with him this evening and sound him out.’

  My adjustment to the living arrangements in Gallak’s house was probably more difficult than Gallak’s was. I was forced to keep reminding myself that he believed that I’d been living under his roof for six weeks and that he was used to having me around. ‘How did your day go, Polanna?’ he asked pleasantly after supper.

  ‘About the same as usual,’ I replied. ‘I went down to the bazaar to have a look at some of the shops I haven’t visited yet. I didn’t buy anything, though.’

  ‘Do you need some money?’

  ‘No. I’m fine. Have you ever met King Drosta?’

  ‘A couple of times, why?’

  ‘Just curious. What kind of man is he?’

  ‘Young. He might grow up some day – hopefully before he’s eighty.’

  ‘I didn’t quite follow that.’

  ‘His Majesty’s very fond of women.’ Gallak’s tone was disapproving.

  ‘I don’t find anything wrong with that.’

  ‘I do – if it’s the only thing a man can think about. Our king can’t seem to think of anything else. I doubt that he even knows the names of most of his advisors.’

  ‘How stupid.’

  ‘He’s not really stupid, Polanna. Actually, he’s very clever – in an erratic sort of way – but his brains shut down entirely when a woman starts to dance. Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy the performance of a good dancer as much as the next man, but Drosta starts drooling before the dancer even gets started – and I mean he actually drools. He’s an ugly young fellow to begin with, and the slobbering doesn’t improve him very much. There’s going to be a new king on the throne in Drasnia soon, and Drosta should be concentrating on some new trade agreements, but his advisors can’t drag him out of the brothels long enough to even meet with the Drasnian trade envoys.’

  ‘Shocking,’ I murmured.

  ‘My feelings exactly. Can we talk about something else? Just the thought of that lecher makes my skin crawl.’

  That gave me something to think about, and the next morning after Gallak had gone off to swindle some people, I started to practice my dancing. I didn’t need a roomful of men to clap out the beat for me, since I could keep that in my head. I cleared some furniture out of the way and mirrored one wall of the room with a single thought. Then I got down to business. As I’d noticed when I’d watched Ayalla dance, the key to a truly outstanding performance is attitude, not the steps. By mid-afternoon, it was beginning to come to me.

  I practiced faithfully for two weeks. The major obstacle I encountered had to do with flaunting. Some of the movements in Nadrak dancing embarrassed me, and I knew that I was going to have to overcome that if I hoped to give the kind of performance I had in mind. Oddly, I found that dancing with my daggers clenched in my fists helped enormously. When I held those Ulgo knives, I could flaunt myself in ways Ayalla had never dreamt of. All I had to do then was to come up with a way to suppress the blushing. My dancing even shocked me, which was probably the whole idea.

  Winter came and went, and Gallak and I settled into a Nadrakish sort of domesticity. He spent his days swindling customers, and I spent mine practicing my dancing.

  No, I wasn’t dancing just for the fun of it. Gallak’s assessment of King Drosta’s personality had suggested to me the perfect way to get close enough to the Nadrak king to evaluate him. By spring, I knew that if my dancing were only half as good as I thought it was, Drosta would be drooling bucketfuls before I was even half-way through my p
erformance.

  As the snow in the streets of Yar Nadrak started to melt, I began to feign a restlessness. Gallak and I had been sort of housebound during the winter, and he readily agreed that a bit of social life might be in order.

  Social life in Gar og Nadrak is rather rudimentary, since about all that’s involved is a visit to the local tavern. I don’t care much for taverns myself, but this was business. Before we left the house, I changed clothes. I suppose I could have given a performance dressed in leather, but I don’t think it’d have had the same impact.

  I sat with Gallak at a table in the tavern called the Wild Boar. I even drank a couple of tankards of the fruity-tasting Nadrak ale. I was just a little nervous, actually. The other people in the tavern all grew slightly tipsy, and along about mid-evening a young woman who was the property of one of Gallak’s competitors in the fur trade was urged by her owner to favor us with a dance. The tavern patrons took up the clapping in unison, and the young woman began to dance. She was no match for Ayalla, but she wasn’t really all that bad. The applause at the conclusion of her dance was thunderous.

  Silently, without even looking at him, I nudged my owner’s ego just a bit. ‘My Polanna can dance better than that,’ he asserted loudly.

  ‘That’s Gallak for you,’ the dancer’s owner snorted. ‘He always has to be better than everybody else.’

  ‘Offer him a wager,’ I whispered to Gallak.

  ‘Do you really know how to dance?’ he whispered back just a little apprehensively.

  ‘I’ll turn your bones to water,’ I assured him.

  ‘We’ll try it, I guess.’ He didn’t sound too sure. ‘All right, Rasak,’ he said to his competitor, ‘would you like to lay a wager on it?’ He reached for his money-pouch. ‘I’ve got ten gold pieces that says that Polanna’s a better dancer than your Eyana. We’ll let our friends here decide which is best.’

  ‘Ten? You sound awfully sure of yourself, Gallak.’