Polgara the Sorceress (24 page)

The Vale serves us as a kind of sanctuary – a place where we can absorb our grief and come to terms with it – and the presence of the Tree there is an absolute necessity.

If you think about it for a while, I’m sure you’ll understand.

In time, word inevitably reached us that both Daran and Kamion had gone on. “They were very tired anyway, Pol,’ was all my father said before he went back to his studies.

My first century was drawing to a close when uncle Beldin returned from Mallorea. ‘Burnt-face is still at Ash-aba,’ he reported, ‘and nothing’s going to happen over there until he comes out of seclusion.’

‘Is Zedar still with him?’ father asked.

‘Oh, yes. Zedar’s stuck to Torak like a leech. Proximity to a God seems to expand Zedar’s opinion of himself.’

‘Some things never change, do they?’

‘Not where Zedar’s concerned, they don’t. Is Ctuchik doing anything interesting?’

‘Nothing momentous enough to make waves. Is Urvon still hiding at Mal Yaska?’

Beldin’s chuckle was hideous. ‘Oh, indeed he is, Belgarath. Every now and then I drift on up to his neighborhood and butcher a few Grolims. I always leave a survivor or two – just to be sure that Urvon gets word that I’m still out there waiting for the pleasure of his company. I’m told that he usually retires to the dungeon on those occasions. He seems to think that thick stone walls might keep me from getting at him.’ He squinted thoughtfully. ‘Maybe when I
go back, I’ll slip into his temple and litter the place with dead Grolims – just to let him know that there isn’t really any place where he can hide from me. Keeping Urvon nervous is one of my favorite pastimes. What kind of celebration do we have planned?’

‘Celebration? What celebration?’

‘Polgara’s hundredth birthday, you clot. You didn’t really think I came all the way back here just for the pleasure of
your
company, did you?’

The celebration of my birthday was lavish – even grotesquely overdone. Ours was a small, highly unique society, and since father, Beldin and I traveled extensively and were away for long periods of time, we seldom had the opportunity to join the twins in the Vale to draw our shared uniqueness about us. We’re sometimes wildly different from each other – except for the twins, of course – but we’re all members of a tiny closed society that shares experiences and concepts the rest of the world cannot begin to comprehend. Along toward the end of the festivities when my elders were all more than slightly tipsy and I was tidying up, mother’s voice rang gently in the vaults of my mind.
‘Happy birthday, Pol,’
was all she said, but it was nice to know that the last member of our little group was also in attendance.

The uneasy truce between Drasnia and Gar og Nadrak fell apart a few years later when the Nadraks – probably at Ctuchik’s prodding – began raiding across their common border. Ctuchik
definitely
didn’t approve of any kind of peaceful contacts between Angaraks and other races, and trade was exactly the sort of thing he most abhorred, since ideas have a way of being exchanged along with goods, and new ideas weren’t welcome in Angarak society.

In the south, the merchant princes of Tol Honeth were growing increasingly desperate because of the stubborn refusal of the Marags to even consider commercial contacts of any kind. The Marags didn’t use money and had no idea whatsoever of what it meant. They
did,
however, have access to almost unlimited amounts of free gold, since the stream-beds of Maragor are littered with it. Gold is pretty, I guess, but when you get right down to it, it has little actual value. You can’t even make cooking pots out of it,
because it melts. I think the Marags were actually amused when they discovered that a Tolnedran would give them almost anything in exchange for what they considered to be no more than another form of dirt. The problem, I think, lay in the fact that the merchants of Tolnedra didn’t really have anything the Marags wanted badly enough to take the trouble to bend over to pick up the gold littering the bed of every stream in Maragor.

The thought of all that gold just lying there with no way to get at it – except to possibly give fair value – sent the Tolnedrans to the verge of desperation. A few of the children of Nedra decided to just skip over the tedious business of swindling the Marags and to go right to the source. Those expeditions into Maragor were a mistake, of course, largely because of the Marag religious practice of ritual cannibalism. The Tolnedrans who sneaked across the border looking for gold encountered Marags – who were looking for lunch.

After no more than a few wealthy – but still greedy – Tolnedran merchants had gone into Marag cooking pots, their heirs and assigns began to pressure the imperial throne to do something – anything – to prevent honest thieves from ending up on a Marag supper-table. Unfortunately, Emperor Ran Vordue was new to his throne, and he eventually succumbed to the importunings of the merchant class. Thus, in 2115, the Tolnedran legions swept across the border into Maragor intent on nothing less than the extermination of the entire Marag race.

My father had always been fond of the Marags, and he was preparing to rush south to ‘take steps’ when the Master uncharacteristically paid him a call and bluntly told him to keep his nose out of things that didn’t concern him. Father’s protests were long and loud, but Aldur was adamant. ‘This
must
take place, my son,’ he told father. ‘It is a necessary part of the PURPOSE which doth guide us all.’

‘But – ’ father started to protest.

‘I will hear no more of this!’ the Master thundered. ‘Stay home, Belgarath!’

Father muttered something under his breath.

‘What was that?’ the Master demanded.

‘Nothing, Master.’

I’d have given a great deal to have witnessed
that
exchange.

And so Maragor perished – except for those few captives who were sold to the Nyissan slavers. But that’s another story.

The invasion of Maragor and the massacre of the inhabitants brought the Gods into the whole sorry business. Nedra chastised those of his children most involved, and Mara’s grief-stricken response closed haunted Maragor off from further Tolnedran incursions. That in itself would have been punishment enough, but then Belar took a hand in the chastisement of the avaricious Tolnedrans by encouraging his Chereks to start raiding up and down the Tolnedran coast. The Chereks didn’t really need
too
much encouragement, since if you scratch the surface of any normal Cherek, you’ll find a pirate lurking underneath. This gave the Tolnedrans other things to keep them busy instead of all that brooding about the gold in Maragor or worrying about being sent to the monastery at Mar Terrin, so I don’t think I need to belabor this sorry sequence of events any further.

I
am,
however, convinced that father exaggerated the contention between the Gods that supposedly erupted following the destruction of the Marags. Nedra was clearly unhappy with his people for their atrocious behavior, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that Belar sent his Chereks to the Tolnedran coast at the invitation of his brother. When you want to punish a Tolnedran, all you have to do is take the fruits of his thievery away from him.

The raids continued for several centuries until, in the mid-twenty-sixth century, Ran Borune I drove his fat, lazy legions out of their garrisons and ordered them to start earning their pay.

My father, my uncles, and I really didn’t pay too much attention to the bickering between the Tolnedrans and the Chereks, but continued our ongoing struggle with the Mrin Codex. We
did
pay attention when Ctuchik began sending more and more Murgos down the Eastern Escarpment into Algaria in probing raids that had two basic purposes. Ctuchik wanted to check the defenses of the Algars, certainly, but he also wanted to mount his warrior class on better
horses. Murgo ponies were about the size of large dogs, and Algar horses were vastly superior. My father spent a great deal of time in Algaria during the twenty-second and twenty-third centuries devising cavalry tactics which the Algars use even to this day. When Ctuchik’s losses became unacceptable, those raids were largely discontinued. Part of the charm of Torak’s personality was derived from the fact that he viewed his Angaraks as little more than breeding stock, a view that Ctuchik shared. Torak’s third disciple wanted to increase his herd, not diminish it.

The endless civil war in Arendia continued – and continued, and continued – as the three warring duchies maneuvered, connived, and formed tentative alliances – often dissolved in the middle of a battle. It was ultimately the turmoil in Arendia that took me out of the seclusion of the Vale and back into the world again.

My three hundredth birthday had passed more or less unnoticed. Father maintains that I went to Vo Wacune in the twenty-fifth century, which isn’t
too
far off the mark. He only missed by a hundred years, and old people are always a little vague about dates.

My, that was fun, wasn’t it, father?

Actually, my excursion into Arendia started in the year 2312. I was asleep one night – despite father’s snoring – and I awoke with that restless feeling that there were eyes on me. I rolled over and saw the ghostly form of the white snowy owl glowing in the moonlight in my window. It was mother.
‘Polgara,’
she said crisply,
‘you’d better pack a few things. You’re going to Vo Wacune.’

‘Whatever for?’
I demanded.

‘Ctuchik’s stirring up trouble in Arendia.’

‘The Arends don’t need any help, mother. They can stir up trouble enough by themselves without any outside assistance.’

“Things are a little more serious this time, Pol. Ctuchik has underlings posing as Tolnedran merchants in each of the duchies. They’re using various stories to persuade the three dukes that Ran Vordue is offering an alliance, but Ran Vordue doesn’t know anything about it. If Ctuchik’s plan works, there’ll be a war
between Arendia and Tolnedra. The Wacite duke’s the most intelligent of the three, so go to Vo Wacune, find out what’s going on, and put a stop to it. The Master’s depending on you, Pol.’

‘I’ll leave at once, mother,’
I promised.

The next morning I began to pack.

‘Moving, Pol?’ father asked mildly. ‘Was it something I said?’

‘I’ve got something to attend to in Arendia, father.’

‘Oh? What’s that?’

‘That’s none of your business, Old Man,’ I told him. ‘I’m going to need a horse. Get me one.’

‘Now look here, Pol – ’

‘Never mind, father. I’ll do it myself.’

‘I want to know what you think you’re going to do in Arendia, Pol.’

‘Wanting and getting are two different things, father. The Master’s told me to go to Arendia to fix something. I know the way, so you won’t have to come along. Now, will you go to the Algars and get me a horse, or am I going to have to take care of it myself?’

He spluttered a bit, but by midmorning there was a saddled chestnut mare named Lady waiting for me at the foot of the tower. Lady was not quite as large as Baron had been, but she and I got along well.

It was late afternoon before I caught the familiar sense of father’s presence coming from a few miles behind. Actually, I’d been wondering what’d been keeping him.

I rode north along the eastern fringes of Ulgoland and then crossed the Sendarian mountains into Wacite territory with father tailing along behind me, changing his form every hour or so.

I crossed the upper reaches of the Camaar River and entered the vast forest of northern Arendia, and it wasn’t too long before I encountered a Wacite patrol under the command of an obviously inexperienced young nobleman with an attitude problem. ‘Hold, wench!’ he commanded haughtily as he and his men came crashing out of the bushes.
Wench?
The young man and I weren’t getting off to a good start here. ‘Wither goest thou?’ he demanded arrogantly.

‘Vo Wacune, my Lord,’ I replied politely.

I want you all to appreciate – and admire – my inhuman self-control during that incident. I didn’t even once consider turning him into a toad – well, not very seriously anyway.

‘What is thy business in our fair city?’ he demanded.

‘It is just that, my Lord –
my
business.’

‘Rise not above thyself, wench. The commons do not speak thus to their betters. Methinks ‘twere best that I take thee into custody, for thy speech doth proclaim thee alien, and aliens are not welcome in this realm.’

‘That might explain thy lack of manners and good breeding, surly boy,’ I said bluntly. ‘Contact with civilized people would possibly have improved thee, though that is much to hope for.’ I sighed. This is burdensome, but it doth appear that the thankless task of educating thee in civil usage falleth to me. Attend to my words most acutely, uncouth knave, for thou shalt discover me to be a most exacting instructor.’ I gathered in my Will.

He gaped at me. Evidently no one had ever chided him about his bad manners before. Then he half-turned, obviously intending to speak sharply to his snickering troops.

‘At the outset I must tell thee that thou must give me thine undivided attention whilst I am instructing thee,’ I told him coldly. I was a dozen feet away from him, and there was nothing visible to account for the ringing blow that took him full in the face. It wasn’t just a little slap either, and he rocked back in his saddle, his eyes slightly glazed.

‘Moreover,’ I continued relentlessly, ‘thou shalt henceforth address me as “my Lady”. Shouldst the term “wench” cross thy lips once more, I will make certain that thou shalt regret it unto thy dying day.’
This
blow took him straight in the mouth, and it knocked him out of his saddle. He came up spitting blood and teeth.

‘Have I perchance gained thine attention, knave?’ I asked him pleasantly. Then I murmured ‘sleep’ under my breath, and his eyes and the eyes of his sniggering men all went
absolutely blank. I rode on with a faint smile, leaving the little group staring at the empty place where I’d just been. I left them in stasis for an hour or so, and by then Lady and I were several miles away. Then I sent my thought back to the place where they were. ‘Wake up,’ I told them.