Chapter Five
The fire had burned down to a tiny orange flicker outside the tent, and the forest around the clearing was silent. Garion lay with a throbbing head trying to sleep. Finally, long past midnight, he gave it up. He slid out from under his blanket and went searching for Aunt Pol.
Above the silvery fog a full moon had risen, and its light made the mist luminous. The air around him seemed almost to glow as he picked his way carefully through the silent camp. He scratched on the outside of her tent flap and whispered, "Aunt Pol?" There was no answer. "Aunt Pol," he whispered a bit louder, "it's me, Garion. May I come in?" There was still no answer, nor even the faintest sound. Carefully he pulled back the flap and peered inside. The tent was empty.
Puzzled, even a bit alarmed, he turned and looked around the clearing. Hettar stood watch not far from the picketed horses, his hawk face turned toward the foggy forest and his cape drawn about him. Garion hesitated a moment and then stepped quietly behind the tents. He angled down through the trees and the filmy, luminous fog toward the brook, thinking that if he bathed his aching head in cold water it might help. He was about fifty yards from the tents when he saw a faint movement among the trees ahead. He stopped.
A huge gray wolf padded out of the fog and stopped in the center of a small open space among the trees. Garion drew in his breath sharply and froze beside a large, twisted oak. The wolf sat down on the damp leaves as if he were waiting for something. The glowing fog illuminated details Garion would not have been able to see on an ordinary night. The wolf's ruff and shoulders were silvery, and his muzzle was shot with gray. He carried his age with enormous dignity, and his yellow eyes seemed calm and very wise somehow.
Garion stood absolutely still. He knew that the slightest sound would instantly reach the sharp ears of the wolf, but it was more than that. The blow behind his ear had made him light-headed, and the strange glow of moon-drenched fog made this encounter seem somehow unreal. He found that he was holding his breath.
A large, snowy white owl swooped over the open space among the trees on ghosting wings, settled on a low branch and perched there, looking down at the wolf with an unblinking stare. The gray wolf looked calmly back at the perched bird. Then, though there was no breath of wind, it seemed somehow that a sudden eddy in the shimmering fog made the figures of the owl and the wolf hazy and indistinct. When it cleared again, Mister Wolf stood in the center of the opening, and Aunt Pol in her gray gown was seated rather sedately on the limb above him.
"It's been a long time since we've hunted together, Polgara," the old man said.
"Yes, it has, father." She raised her arms and pushed her fingers through the long, dark weight of her hair. "I'd almost forgotten what it was like." She seemed to shudder then with a strange kind of pleasure. "It's a very good night for it."
"A little damp," he replied, shaking one foot.
"It's very clear above the treetops, and the stars are particularly bright. It's a splendid night for flying."
"I'm glad you enjoyed yourself. Did you happen to remember what you were supposed to be doing?"
"Don't be sarcastic, father."
"Well?"
"There's no one in the vicinity but Arends, and most of them are asleep."
"You're sure?"
"Of course. There isn't a Grolim for five leagues in any direction. Did you find the ones you were looking for?"
"They weren't hard to follow," Wolf answered. "They're staying in a cave about three leagues deeper into the forest. Another one of them died on their way back there, and a couple more probably won't live until morning. The rest of them seemed a little bitter about the way things turned out."
"I can imagine. Did you get close enough to hear what they were saying?"
He nodded. "There's a man in one of the villages nearby who watches the road and lets them know when somebody passes by who might be worth robbing."
"Then they're just ordinary thieves?"
"Not exactly. They were watching for us in particular. We'd all been described to them in rather complete detail."
"I think I'll go talk to this villager," she said grimly. She flexed her fingers in an unpleasantly suggestive manner.
"It's not worth the time it would take," Wolf told her, scratching thoughtfully at his beard. "All he'd be able to tell you is that some Murgo offered him gold. Grolims don't bother to explain very much to their hirelings."
"We should attend to him, father," she insisted. "We don't want him lurking behind us, trying to buy up every brigand in Arendia to send after us."
"After tomorrow he won't buy much of anything," Wolf replied with a short laugh. "His friends plan to lure him out into the woods in the morning and cut his throat for him - among other things."
"Good. I'd like to know who the Grolim is, though."
Wolf shrugged. "What difference does it make? There are dozens of them in northern Arendia, all stirring up as much trouble as they can. They know what's coming as well as we do. We can't expect them to just sit back and let us pass."
"Shouldn't we put a stop to it?"
"We don't have the time," he said. "It takes forever to explain things to Arends. If we move fast enough, maybe we can slip by before the Grolims are ready."
"And if we can't?"
"Then we'll do it the other way. I've got to get to Zedar before he crosses into Cthol Murgos. If too many things get in my way, I'll have to be more direct."
"You should have done that from the beginning, father. Sometimes you're too delicate about things."
"Are you going to start that again? That's always your answer to everything, Polgara. You're forever fixing things that would fix themselves if you'd just leave them alone, and changing things when they don't have to be changed."
"Don't be cross, father. Help me down."
"Why not fly down?" he suggested.
"Don't be absurd."
Garion slipped away among the mossy trees, trembling violently as he went.
When Aunt Pol and Mister Wolf returned to the clearing, they roused the others. "I think we'd better move on," Wolf told them. "We're a little vulnerable out here. It's safer on the highway, and I'd like to get past this particular stretch of woods."
The dismantling of their night's encampment took less than an hour, and they started back along the woodcutter's track toward the Great West Road. Though it was still some hours before dawn, the moonbathed fog filled the night with misty luminosity, and it seemed almost as if they rode through a shining cloud that had settled among the dark trees. They reached the highway and turned south again.
"I'd like to be a good way from here when the sun comes up," Wolf said quietly, "but we don't want to blunder into anything, so keep your eyes and ears open."
They set off at a canter and had covered a good three leagues by the time the fog had begun to turn a pearly gray with the approach of morning. As they rounded a broad curve, Hettar suddenly raised his arm, signaling for a halt.
"What's wrong?" Barak asked him.
"Horses ahead," Hettar replied. "Coming this way."
"Are you sure? I don't hear anything."
"Forty at least," Hettar answered firmly.
"There," Durnik said, his head cocked to one side. "Hear that?"
Faintly they all heard a jingling clatter some distance off in the fog. "We could hide in the woods until they've passed," Lelldorin suggested.
"It's better to stay on the road," Wolf replied.
"Let me handle it," Silk said confidently, moving into the lead. "I've done this sort of thing before." They proceeded at a careful walk.
The riders who emerged from the fog were encased in steel. They wore full suits of polished armor and round helmets with pointed visors that made them look strangely like huge insects. They earned long lances with colored pennons at their tips, and their horses were massive beasts, also encased in armor.
"Mimbrate knights," Lelldorin snarled, his eyes going flat.
"Keep your feelings to yourself," Wolf told the young man. "If any of them say anything to you, answer in such a way that they'll think you're a Mimbrate sympathizer - like young Berentain back at your uncle's house."
Lelldorin's face hardened.
"Do as he tells you, Lelldorin," Aunt Pol said. "This isn't the time for heroics."
"Hold!" the leader of the armored column commanded, lowering his lance until the steel point was leveled at them. "Let one come forward so that I may speak with him." The knight's tone was peremptory.