Chapter Four
The following morning they rode out early while the mist still hung among the trees. Count Reldegen, wrapped in a dark cloak, stood at his gate to bid them farewell; and Torasin, standing beside his father, seemed unable to take his eyes off Garion's face. Garion kept his expression as blank as possible. The fiery young Asturian seemed to be filled with doubts, and those doubts might keep him from plunging headlong into something disastrous. It wasn't much, Garion realized, but it was the best he could manage under the circumstances.
"Come back soon, Belgarath," Reldegen said. "Sometime when you can stay longer. We're very isolated here, and I'd like to know what the rest of the world's doing. We'll sit by the fire and talk away a month or two.
Mister Wolf nodded gravely. "Maybe when this business of mine is over, Reldegen." Then he turned his horse and led the way across the wide clearing that surrounded Reldegen's house and back once again into the gloomy forest.
"The count's an unusual Arend," Silk said lightly as they rode along. "I think I actually detected an original thought or two in him last evening."
"He's changed a great deal," Wolf agreed.
"He sets a good table," Barak said. "I haven't felt this full since I left Val Alorn."
"You should," Aunt Pol told him. "You ate the biggest part of one deer by yourself."
"You're exaggerating, Polgara," Barak said.
"But not by very much," Hettar observed in his quiet voice. Lelldorin had pulled his horse in beside Garion's, but he had not spoken. His face was as troubled as his cousin's had been. It was obvious that he wanted to say something and just as obvious that he didn't know how to begin.
"Go ahead," Garion said quietly. "We're good enough friends that I'm not going to be upset if it doesn't come out exactly right."
Lelldorin looked a little sheepish.
"Am I really that obvious?"
"Honest is a better word for it," Garion told him. "You've just never learned to hide your feelings, that's all."
"Was it really true?" Lelldorin blurted. "I'm not doubting your word, but was there really a Murgo in Cherek plotting against King Anheg?"
"Ask Silk," Garion suggested, "or Barak, or Hettar-any of them. We were all there."
"Nachak isn't like that, though," Lelldorin said quickly, defensively.
"Can you be sure?" Garion asked him. "The plan was his in the first place, wasn't it? How did you happen to meet him?"
"We'd all gone down to the Great Fair, Torasin, me, several of the others. We bought some things from a Murgo merchant, and Tor made a few remarks about Mimbrates-you know how Tor is. The merchant said that he knew somebody we might be interested in meeting and he introduced us to Nachak. The more we talked with him, the more sympathetic he seemed to become to the way we felt."
"Naturally."
"He told us what the king is planning. You wouldn't believe it."
"Probably not."
Lelldorin gave him a quick, troubled look. "He's going to break up our estates and give them to landless Mimbrate nobles." He said it accusingly.
"Did you verify that with anybody but Nachak?"
"How could we? The Mimbrates wouldn't admit it if we confronted them with it, but it's the kind of thing Mimbrates would do."
"So you've only got Nachak's word for it? How did this plan of yours come up?"
"Nachak said that if he were an Asturian, he wouldn't let anybody take his land, but he said that it'd be too late to try to stop them when they came with knights and soldiers. He said that if he were doing it, he'd strike before they were ready and that he'd do it in such a way that the Mimbrates wouldn't know who'd done it. That's when he suggested the Tolnedran uniforms."
"When did he start giving you money?"
"I'm not sure. Tor handled that part of it."
"Did he ever say why he was giving you money?"
"He said it was out of friendship."
"Didn't that seem a little odd?"
"I'd give someone money out of friendship," Lelldorin protested.
"You're an Asturian," Garion told him. "You'd give somebody your life out of friendship. Nachak's a Murgo, though, and I've never heard that they were all that generous. What it comes down to, then, is that a stranger tells you that the king's planning to take your land. Then he gives you a plan to kill the king and start a war with Tolnedra; and to make sure you succeed with his plan, he gives you money. Is that about it.
Lelldorin nodded mutely, his eyes stricken.
"Weren't any of you just the least bit suspicious?"
Lelldorin seemed almost about to cry.
"It's such a good plan," he burst out finally. "It couldn't help but succeed."
"That's what makes it so dangerous," Garion replied.
"Garion, what am I going to do?" Lelldorin's voice was anguished.
"I don't think there's anything you can do right now," Garion told him. "Maybe later, after we've had time to think about it, we'll come up with something. If we can't, we can always tell my grandfather about it. He'll think of a way to stop it."
"We can't tell anybody," Lelldorin reminded him. "We're pledged to silence."
"We might have to break that pledge," Garion said somewhat reluctantly. "I don't see that either of us owes that Murgo anything, but it's going to have to be up to you. I won't say anything to anybody without your permission."
"You decide," Lelldorin pleaded then. "I can't do it, Garion."
"You're going to have to," Garion told him. "I'm sure that if you think about it, you'll see why."
They reached the Great West Road then, and Barak led them south at a brisk trot, cutting off the possibility of further discussion.
A league or so down the road they passed a muddy village, a dozen or so turf roofed huts with walls made of wattles plastered over with mud. The fields around the village were dotted with tree stumps, and a few scrawny cows grazed near the edge of the forest. Garion could not control his indignation as he looked at the misery implicit in the crude collection of hovels.
"Lelldorin," he said sharply, "look!"
"What? Where?" The blond young man came out of his troubled preoccupation quickly as if expecting some danger.
"The village," Garion told him. "Look at it."
"It's only a serfs' village," Lelldorin said indifferently. "I've seen hundreds like it." He seemed ready to return to his own inner turmoil.
"In Sendaria we wouldn't keep pigs in places like that." Garion's voice rang with fervor. If he could only make his friend see!
Two ragged serfs were dispiritedly hacking chunks of firewood from one of the stumps near the road. As the party approached, they dropped their axes and bolted in terror for the forest.
"Does it make you proud, Lelldorin?" Garion demanded. "Does it make you feel good to know that your own countrymen are so afraid of you that they run from the very sight of you?"
Lelldorin looked baffled.
"They're serfs, Garion," he said as if that explained.
"They're men. They're not animals. Men deserve to be treated better."
"I can't do anything about it. They aren't my serfs." And with that Lelldorin's attention turned inward again as he continued to struggle with the dilemma Garion had placed upon him.
By late afternoon they had covered ten leagues and the cloudy sky was gradually darkening as evening approached.