The queen looked at him seriously. "When are you coming home, Kheldar?" she asked. "When will you stop being this vagabond, Silk, and come back where you belong? My husband misses you very much, and you could serve Drasnia more by becoming his chief advisor than all this flitting about the world."
Silk looked away, squinting into the bright wintry sun. "Not just yet, your Highness," he said. "Belgarath needs me too, and this is a very important thing we"re doing just now. Besides, I"m not ready to settle down yet. The game is still entertaining. Perhaps someday when we"re all much older it won"t be anymore - who knows?"
She sighed. "I miss you too Kheldar," she said gently.
"Poor, lonely little queen," Silk said, half-mockingly.
"You"re impossible," she said, stamping her tiny foot.
"One does one"s best." He grinned.
Hettar had embraced his father and mother and leaped across to the deck of the small ship King Anheg had provided him. "Belgarath," he called as the sailors slipped the stout ropes that bound the ship to the quay, "I"ll meet you in two weeks at the ruins of Vo Wacune."
"We"ll be there," Mister Wolf replied.
The sailors pushed the ship away from the quay and began to row out into the bay. Hettar stood on the deck, his long scalp lock flowing in the wind. He waved once, then turned to face the sea.
A long plank was run down over the side of Captain Greldik"s ship to the snow covered stones.
"Shall we go on board, Garion?" Silk said. They climbed the precarious plank and stepped out onto the deck.
"Give our daughters my love," Barak said to his wife.
"I will, my Lord," Merel said in the same stiffly formal tone she always used with him. "Have you any other instructions?"
"I won"t be back for some time," Barak said. "Plant the south fields to oats this year, and let the west fields lie fallow. Do whatever you think best with the north fields. And don"t move the cattle up to the high pastures until all the frost is out of the ground."
"I"ll be most careful of my husband"s lands and herds," she said.
"They"re yours too," Barak said.
"As my husband wishes."
Barak sighed. "You never let it rest, do you, Merel?" He said sadly.
"My Lord?"
"Forget it."
"Will my Lord embrace me before he leaves?" she asked.
"What"s the point?" Barak said. He jumped across to the ship and immediately went below.
Aunt Pol stopped on her way to the ship and looked gravely at Barak"s wife. Then, without warning, she suddenly laughed.
"Something amusing, Lady Polgara?" Merel asked.
"Very amusing, Merel," Aunt Pol said with a mysterious smile.
"Might I be permitted to share it?"
"Oh, you"ll share it, Merel," Aunt Pol promised, "but I wouldn"t want to spoil it for you by telling you too soon." She laughed again and stepped onto the plank that led to the ship. Durnik offered his hand to steady her, and the two of them crossed to the deck.
Mister Wolf clasped hands with each of the kings on turn and then nimbly crossed to the ship. He stood for a moment on the deck looking at the ancient, snow-shrouded city of Val Alorn and the towering mountains of Cherek rising behind.
"Farewell, Belgarath," King Anheg called.
Mister Wolf nodded. "Don"t forget about the minstrels," he said.
"We won"t," Anheg promised. "Good luck."
Mister Wolf grinned and then walked forward toward the prow of Greldik"s ship. Garion, on an impulse, followed him. There were questions which needed answers, and the old man would know if anyone would.
"Mister Wolf," he said when they had both reached the high prow.
"Yes, Garion?"
He was not sure where to start, so Garion approached the problem obliquely. "How did Aunt Pol do that to old Martje"s eyes?"
"The Will and the Word," Wolf said, his long cloak whipping about him in the stiff breeze. "It isn"t difficult."
"I don"t understand," Garion said.
"You simply will something to happen," the old man said, "and then speak the word. If your will"s strong enough, it happens."
"That"s all there is to it?" Garion asked, a little disappointed.
"That"s all," Wolf said.
"Is the word a magic word?"
Wolf laughed, looking out at the sun glittering sharply on the winter sea. "No," he said. "There aren"t any magic words. Some people think so, but they"re wrong. Grolims use strange words, but that"s not really necessary. Any word will do the job. It"s the Will that"s important, not the Word. The Word"s just a channel for the Will."
"Could I do it?" Garion asked hopefully.
Wolf looked at him. "I don"t know, Garion," he said. "I wasn"t much older than you are the first time I did it, but I"d been living with Aldur for several years. That makes a difference, I suppose."
"What happened?"
"My Master wanted me to move a rock," Wolf said. "He seemed to think that it was in his way. I tried to move it, but it was too heavy. After a while I got angry, and I told it to move. It did. I was a little suprised, but my Master didn"t think it so unusual."
"You just said, "move?" That"s all?" Garion was incredulous.
"That"s all." Wolf shrugged. "It seemed so simple that I was suprised I hadn"t thought of it before. At the time I imagined that anybody could do it, but men have changed quite a bit since then. Maybe it isn"t possible anymore. It"s hard to say, really."
"I always thought that sorcery had to be done with long spells and strange signs and things like that," Garion said.
"Those are just the devices of tricksters and charlatans," Wolf said. "They make a fine show and impress and frighten simple people, but spells and incantations have nothing to do with the real thing, It"s all in the Will. Focus the Will and speak the Word, and it happens. Sometimes a gesture of sorts helps, but it isn"t really necessary. Your Aunt has always seemed to want to gesture when she makes something happen. I"ve been trying to break her of that habit for hundreds of years now."
Garion blinked. "Hundreds of years?" he gasped. "How old is she?"
"Older than she looks," Wolf said. "It isn"t polite to ask questions about a lady"s age, however."
Garion felt a sudden, shocking emptiness. The worst of his fears had been confirmed. "Then she isn"t really my Aunt, is she?" he asked sickly.
"What makes you say that?" Wolf asked.
She couldn"t be, could she? I always thought that she was my father"s sister, but if she"s hundreds and thousands of years old, it would be impossible."
"You"re much to fond of that word, Garion," Wolf said. "When you get right down to it, nothing - or at least very little - is actually impossible."
"How could she be? My Aunt I mean?"
"All right," Wolf said. "Polgara was not strictly speaking your father"s sister. Her relationship to him is quite more complex. She was the sister of his grandmother - his ultimate grandmother, it there is such a term - and of yours as well, of course."
"Then she"d be my great-aunt," Garion said with a faint in spark of hope. It was something, at least.
"I don"t know that I"d use that precise term around her." Wolf grinned. "She might take offense. Why are you so concerned about all of this?"
"I was afraid that maybe she"d just said that she was my Aunt, and that there wasn"t really any connection between us at all," Garion said. "I"ve been afraid of that for quite a while now."
"Why were you afraid?"
"It"s kind of hard to explain," Garion said. "You see, I don"t really know who or what I am. Silk says I"m not a Sendar, and Barak says I look sort of like a Rivan - but not exactly. I always thought I was a Sendar - like Durnik - but I guess I"m not. I don"t know anything about my parents or where they come from or anything like that. If Aunt Pol isn"t related to me, then I don"t have anybody in the world at all. I"m all alone, and that"s a very bad thing."
"But now it"s alright, isn"t it?" Wolf said, your Aunt really is your Aunt - at least your blood and hers are the same."
"I"m glad you told me," Garion said. "I"ve been worried about it."
Greldik"s sailors untied the hawsers and began to push the ship away from the quay.
"Mister Wolf," Garion said as a strange thought occurred to him.
"Yes, Garion?"
"Aunt Pol really is my Aunt - or my Great-Aunt?"
"Yes."
"And she"s your daughter."
"I have to admit that she is," Wolf said wryly. "I try to forget that sometimes, but I can"t really deny it."
Garion took a deep breath and plunged directly into it. "If she"s my Aunt, and you"re her father," he said, "wouldn"t that sort of make you my Grandfather?"
Wolf looked at him with a startled expression. "Why yes," he said, laughing suddenly, "I suppose that in a way it does. I"d never thought of it exactly like that before."
Garion"s eyes suddenly filled with tears, and he impulsively embraced the old man. "Grandfather," he said, trying the word out.
""Well, well," Wolf said, his own voice strangely thick. "What a remarkable discovery." Awkwardly he patted Garion"s shoulder.
"They were both a little embarra.s.sed by Garion"s sudden display of affection, and they stood silently, watching as Greldik"s sailors rowed the ship out into the harbor.
"Grandfather," Garion said after a little while.
"Yes?"
"What really happened to my mother and father? I mean, how did they die?"
Wolf"s face became very bleak. "There was a fire," he said shortly.
"A fire?" Garion said weakly, his imagination lurching back from that awful thought - of the unspeakable pain. "How did it happen?"
"It"s not very pleasant," Wolf said grimly. "Aew you really sure you want to know?"
"I have to, Grandfather," Garion said quietly. "I have to know everything I can about them. I don"t know why, but it"s very important."
Mister Wolf sighed. "Yes, Garion," he said, "I guess it would be at that. All right, then. If you"re old enough to ask the questions, you"re old enough to hear the answers." He sat down on a sheltered bench out of the chilly wind. "Come over here and sit down." He patted the bench beside him.
Garion sat down and pulled his cloak around him.
"Let"s see," Wolf said, scratching thoughtfully at his beard, "where do we start?" He pondered for a moment. "Your family"s very old, Garion," he said finally, "and like so many old families, it has a certain number of enemies."
"Enemies?" Garion was startled. That particular idea hadn"t occurred to him before.
"It"s not uncommon," Wolf said. "When we do something someone else doesn"t like, they tend to hate us. The hatred builds up over the years until it turns into something almost like a religion. They hate not only us, but everything connected with us. Anyway, a long time ago your family"s enemies became so dangerous that your Aunt and I decided that the only way we could protect the family was to hide it."
"You aren"t telling me everything," Garion said.
"No," said Wolf blandly, "I"m not. I"m telling you as much as it"s safe for you to know right now. If you knew certain things, you"d act differently, and people would notice that. It"s safer if you remain ordinary for a while longer."
"You mean ignorant," Garion accused.
"All right, ignorant then. Do you want to hear the story, or do you want to argue?"
"I"m sorry," Garion said.
"It"s all right," Wolf said, patting Garion"s shoulder. "Since your Aunt and I are related to your family in rather a special way, we were naturally interested in your safety. That"s why we hid your people."
"Can you actually hide a whole family?" Garion asked.
"It"s never been that big a family," Wolf said. "It seems, for one reason or another, to be a single, unbroken line - no cousins or uncles or that kind of thing. It"s not all that hard to hide a man and wife with a single child. We"ve been doing it for hundreds of years now. We"ve hidden them in Tolnedra, Riva, Cherek, Drasnia - all kinds of places. They"ve lived simple lives - artisans mostly, sometimes ordinary peasants - the kind of people n.o.body would ever look at twice. Anyway, everything had gone well until about twenty years ago. We moved your father, Geran, from a place in Arendia to a little village in eastern Sendaria, about sixty leagues southeast of Darine, up in the mountains. Geran was a stonecutter - didn"t I tell you that once before?"
Garion nodded. "A long time ago," he said. "You said you liked him and used to visit him once in a while. Was my mother a Sendar then?"
"No," Wolf said. "Ildera as an Algar, actually - the second daughter of a Clan Chief. Your Aunt and I introduced her to Geran whenthey were about the right age. The usual sort of thing happened, and they got married. You were born a year or so afterward."
"When was the fire?" Garion asked.