Sorceress of Darshiva

Silk whistled. "Is it dangerous at all?"

"Only if one has a weak heart. I've used it on myself on occasion—when I was particularly tired. Shall we go, then?"

"Teaming those two together may have been a moral blunder," Belgarath mused as the two rogues walked off in darkness toward the twinkling watchfires.

It was about an hour later when the little Drasnian and eunuch returned. "It's safe now," Sadi reported. "We go on through their camp. There's a low range of hills a league or so farther on where we can take shelter until night."

"Any trouble at all?" Velvet asked.

"Not a bit," Silk smirked. "Sadi's very good at that sort of thing."

"Practice, my dear Kheldar," the eunuch said deprecatingly. "I’ve poisoned a fair number of people in my time.'' He grinned mirthlessly. "Once I gave a banquet for a group of my enemies. Not a single one of them saw me season the soup course, and Nyissans are very observant when it comes to that sort of thing."

"Didn't they get suspicious when you didn't eat any soup?" Velvet asked curiously.

"But I did, Liselle. I'd spent an entire week dosing myself with the antidote." He shuddered. "Vile-tasting stuff, as I recall. The poison itself was quite tasty. A number of my guests even complimented me on the soup before they left." He sighed. "Those were the good old days," he mourned.

"I think we can reminisce later on," Belgarath said. "Let's see if we can reach those hills before the sun gets much higher."

The soldiers' encampment was silent, except for an occasional snore. The troops were all smiling happily as they slept.

The following night was cloudy, and the air smelled strongly of incipient rain. Garion and Belgarath had no trouble finding the encampments of the soldiers in their path, and a few overheard snatches of conversation revealed the fact that these troops were members of the royal army of Peldane, and further that they were approaching the impending battle with a great deal of reluctance. About morning, Garion and his grandfather trotted back to rejoin the others with Polgara ghosting just above them on silent wings.

"A sound is still a sound," Durnik was saying stubbornly to Beldin. The two were riding side by side.

"But if there's nobody to hear it, how can we call it a sound?" Beldin argued.

Belgarath shook himself into his own form. "The noise in the woods again, Beldin?" he said in a tone of profoundest disgust.

The hunchback shrugged. "You've got to start somewhere."

"Can't you think of anything new? After we argued the question for a thousand years, I thought you might have gotten tired of it."

"What's this?" Polgara asked, walking through the tall grass to join them in the shadowless light of dawn.

"Beldin and Durnik are discussing a very tired old philosophical question."

Belgarath snorted. "If there's a noise in the woods, and there's nobody around to hear it, is it really a noise?"

"Of course it is," she replied calmly. "How did you reach that conclusion?" Beldin demanded. "Because there's no such thing as an empty place, uncle. There are always creatures around—wild animals, mice, insects, birds—and they can all hear."

"But what if there weren't? What if the woods are truly empty?"

"Why waste your time talking about an impossibility?" He stared at her in frustration.

"Not only that," Ce'Nedra added just a bit smugly, "you're talking about woods, so there are trees there. Trees can hear, too, you know."

He glared at her. "Why are you all taking sides against me?"

"Because you're wrong, uncle." Polgara smiled. "Wrong, Polgara?" He spluttered. "Me?"

"It happens to everybody once in a while. Why don't we all have some breakfast?"

The sun rose while they were eating, and Belgarath looked up, squinting into the morning rays. "We haven't seen any soldiers since midnight," he said, "and all we've seen so far are troops of the army of Peldane. They're not really anything to worry about, so I think it's safe to ride on a bit farther this morning." He looked at Silk.

"How far is to the border of Darshiva?"

" Not really all that far, but we haven't been making very goodd time. It's spring, so the nights are getting shorter, and we lost time when we had to circle around those troops."

He frowned. "We might have a bit of a problem at the border, though. We're going to have to cross the River Magan, and if everyone has fled the area, we could have some trouble finding a boat."

"Is the Magan really as big as they say?" Sadi asked.

"It's the biggest river in the world. It runs for a thousand leagues and more, and it's so wide that you can't see the far shore."

Durnik rose to his feet. "I want to check over the horses before we go any farther," he said. "We've been riding them in the dark, and that's always a little dangerous. We don't want any of them pulling up lame."

Eriond and Toth also rose, and the three of them went through the tall grass to the place where the horses were picketed.

"I'll go on ahead," Beldin said. "Even if the troops are Peldanes, we still don't need any surprises." He changed form and flew off toward the west, spiraling up into the cloudless morning sky.

Garion stretched his legs out in front of him and leaned back on his elbows.

"You must be tired," Ce'Nedra said, sitting beside him and touching his face tenderly.

"Wolves don't really get that tired," he told her. "I get the feeling that I could run for a week if I really had to."

"Well, you don't have to, so don't even consider it."

"Yes, dear."

Sadi had risen to his feet with his red leather case in his hands. "As long as we're stopped, I think I'll find something to feed Zith," he said. A small frown touched his brow. "You know, Liselle," he said to Velvet, "I think you were right back in Zamad. She definitely looks as if she's gained a few ounces."

"Put her on a diet," the blond girl suggested.

"I'm not sure about that." He smiled. "It's very hard to explain to a snake why you're starving her, and I wouldn't want her to get cross with me."

They rode out not long afterward, following Toth's gestured directions.

"He says that we can probably find a village south of the big town on the river," Durnik told them.

"Ferra," Silk supplied.