Guardians of the West

"Then you won't really miss it, will you?"

"You're a hard woman, Polgara -to leave your poor old father sunk in deprivation like this."

"You've lived without money or possessions for thousands of years, father. Somehow I'm almost positive that you'll survive."

"How did you get to be the Duchess of Erat?" Durnik asked his wife.

"I did the Duke of Vo Wacune a favor," she replied. "It was something that no one else could do. He was very grateful."

Durnik looked stunned. "But Vo Wacune was destroyed thousands of years ago," he protested.

"Yes. I know."

"I think I'm going to have trouble getting used to all this."

"You knew that I wasn't like other women," she said.

"Yes, but-"

"Does it really matter to you how old I am? Does it change anything?"

"No," he said immediately, "not a thing."

"Then don't worry about it."

They moved in easy stages across southern Sendaria, stopping each night at the solid, comfortable hostels operated by the Tolnedran legionnaires who patrolled and maintained the imperial highway and arriving in Muros on the afternoon of the third day after their departure from Camaar. Vast cattle herds from Algaria were already filling the acre upon acre of pens lying to the east of the city, and the cloud of dust raised by their milling hooves blotted out the sky. Muros was not a comfortable town during the season of the cattle drives. It was hot, dirty, and noisy. Belgarath suggested that they pass it up and stop for the night in the mountains where the air would be less dust-clogged and the neighbors less rowdy.

"Are you planning to accompany us all the way to the Vale?" he asked General Brendig after they had passed the cattle pens and were moving along the Great North Road toward the mountains.

"Ah -no, actually, Belgarath," Brendig replied, peering ahead at a band of Algar horsemen approaching along the highway. "As a matter of fact, I'll be turning back about now."

The leader of the Algar riders was a tall, hawk-faced man in leather clothing, with a raven-black scalp lock flowing behind him. When he reached the wagon, he reined in his horse.

"General Brendig," he said in a quiet voice, nodding to the Sendarian officer.

"My Lord Hettar," Brendig replied pleasantly.

"What are you doing here, Hettar?" Belgarath demanded.

Hettar's eyes went very wide. "I just brought a cattle herd across the mountains, Belgarath," he said innocently. "I'll be going back now and I thought you might like some company."

"How strange that you just happen to be here at this particular time."

"Isn't it, though?" Hettar looked at Brendig and winked.

"Are we playing games?" Belgarath asked the pair of them. "I don't need supervision and I definitely don't need a military escort every place I go. I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself."

Durnik went to the wagon and took a coil.

"We all know that, Belgarath," Hettar said placatingly. He looked at the wagon. "It's nice to see you again, Polgara," he said pleasantly. Then he gave Durnik a rather sly look. "Married life agrees with you, my friend," he added. "I think you've put on a few pounds."

"I'd say that your wife has been adding a few extra spoonfuls to your plate as well." Durnik grinned at his friend.

"Is it starting to show?" Hettar asked.

Durnik nodded gravely. "Just a bit," he said.

Hettar made a rueful face and then gave Errand a peculiar little wink. Errand and Hettar had always got on well together, probably because neither of them felt any pressing need to fill up the silence with random conversation.

"I'll be leaving you now," Brendig said. "It's been a pleasant journey." He bowed to Polgara and nodded to Hettar. And then, with his detachment of troops jingling along behind him, he rode back toward Muros.

"I'm going to have words with Fulrach about this," Belgarath said darkly to Hettar, "and with your father, too."

"It's one of the prices of immortality, Belgarath," Hettar said blandly. "People tend to respect you -even when you'd rather they didn't. Shall we go?"

The mountains of eastern Sendaria were not so high as to make travel across them unpleasant. With the fierce-looking Algar clansmen riding both to the front and to the rear of the wagon, they traveled at an easy pace along the Great North Road through the deep green forests and beside mountain streams. At one point, when they had stopped to rest their horses, Durnik stepped down from the wagon and walked to the edge of the road to gaze speculatively at a deep pool at the foot of a small, churning waterfall.

"Are we in any particular hurry?" he asked Belgarath.

"Not really. Why?"

"I just thought that this might be a pleasant place to stop for our noon meal," the smith said artlessly.

Belgarath looked around. "If you want, I suppose it's all right."

"Good."

With that same slightly absent look on his face, Durnik went to the wagon and took a coil of thin, waxed cord from one of the bags. He carefully tied a hook decorated with some brightly colored yarn to one end of the cord and began looking about for a slender, springy sapling. Five minutes later he was standing on a boulder that jutted out into the pool, making long casts into the turbulent water just at the foot of the falls.

Errand drifted down to the edge of the stream to watch.

Durnik was casting into the center of the main flow of the current so that the swiftly moving green water pulled his lure down deep into the pool.

After about a half an hour, Polgara called to them. "Errand, Durnik, your lunch is ready"'

"Yes, dear"' Durnik replied absently. "In a moment."

Errand obediently went back up to the wagon, though his eyes yearned back toward the rushing water. Polgara gave him one brief, understanding look, then laid the meat and cheese she had sliced for him on a piece of bread so that he could carry his lunch back to the stream bank.

"Thank you," he said simply.

Durnik continued his fishing, his face still intent. Polgara came down to the water's edge. "Durnik," she called. "Lunch."

"Yes," he replied, not taking his eyes off the water. "I'm coming." He made another cast.

Polgara sighed. "Oh, well," she said. "I suppose every man needs at least one vice."

After about another half-hour, Durnik looked baffled. He jumped from his boulder to the stream bank and stood scratching his head and staring in perplexity at the swirling water. "I know they're in there," he said to Errand. "I can almost feel them."