As they came into the light, Garion was able to see the man who had captured him. He was a small man, scarcely taller than Garion himself, and his face was dominated by a long pointed nose. His eyes were small and squinted, and his straight, black hair was raggedly cut. The face was not the sort to inspire confidence, and the man"s stained and patched tunic and short, wicked-looking sword did little to contradict the implications of the face.
"Here"s our rabbit," the small, weasel-like man announced as he pulled Garion into the circle of the firelight. "And a merry chase he led me, too."
Aunt Pol was furious.
"Don"t you ever do that again," she said sternly to Garion.
"Not so quick, Mistress Pol," Wolf said. "It"s better for him to run than to fight just yet. Until he"s bigger, his feet are his best friends."
"Have we been captured by robbers?" Garion asked in a quavering voice.
"Robbers?" Wolf laughed. "What a wild imagination you have, boy. These two are our friends."
"Friends?" Garion asked doubtfully, looking suspiciously at the redbearded giant and the weasel-faced man beside him. "Are you sure?" The giant laughed then too, his voice rumbling like an earthquake.
"The boy seems mistrustful," he boomed. "Your face must have warned him, friend Silk."
The smaller man looked sourly at his burly companion.
"This is Garion," Wolf said, pointing at the boy. "You already know Mistress Pol." His voice seemed to stress Aunt Pol"s name. "And this is Durnik, a brave smith who has decided to accompany us."
"Mistress Pol?" the smaller man said, laughing suddenly for no apparent reason.
"I am known so," Aunt Pol said pointedly.
"It shall be my pleasure to call you so then, great lady," the small man said with a mocking bow.
"Our large friend here is Barak," Wolf went on. "He"s useful to have around when there"s trouble. As you can see, he"s not a Sendar, but a Cherek from Val Alorn."
Garion had never seen a Cherek before, and the fearful tales of their prowess in battle became suddenly quite believable in the presence of the towering Barak.
"And I," the small man said with one hand to his chest, "am called Silk - not much of a name, I"ll admit, but one which suits me - and I am from Boktor in Drasnia. I am a juggler and an acrobat."
"And also a thief and a spy," Barak rumbled good-naturedly.
"We all have our faults," Silk admitted blandly, scratching at his scraggly whiskers.
"And I"m called Mister Wolf in this particular time and place," the old man said. "I"m rather fond of the name, since the boy there gave it to me."
"Mister Wolf?" Silk asked, and then he laughed again. "What a merry name for you, old friend."
"I"m delighted that you find it so, old friend," Wolf said flatly. "Mister Wolf it shall be, then," Silk said. "Come to the fire, friends. Warm yourselves, and I"ll see to some food."
Garion was still uncertain about the oddly matched pair. They obviously knew Aunt Pol and Mister Wolf - and just as obviously by different names. The fact that Aunt Pol might not be whom he had always thought she was was very disturbing. One of the foundation stones of his entire life had just disappeared.
The food which Silk brought was rough, a turnip stew with thick chunks of meat floating in it and crudely hacked off slabs of bread, but Garion, amazed at the size of his appet.i.te, fell into it as if he had not eaten for days.
And then, his stomach full and his feet warmed by the crackling campfire, he sat on a log, half dozing.
"What now, Old Wolf?" he heard Aunt Pol ask. "What"s the idea behind these clumsy wagons?"
"A brilliant plan," Wolf said, "even if I do say it myself. There are, as you know, wagons going every which way in Sendaria at this time of year. Harvests are moving from field to farm, from farm to village and from village to town. Nothing is more unremarkable in Sendaria than wagons. They"re so common that they"re almost invisible. This is how we"re going to travel. We"re now honest freight haulers."
"We"re what?" Aunt Pol demanded.
"Wagoneers," Wolf said expansively. "Hard-working transporters of the goods of Sendaria - out to make our fortunes and seek adventure, bitten by the desire to travel, incurably infected by the romance of the road."
"Have you any idea how long it takes to travel by wagon?" Aunt Pol asked.
"Six to ten leagues a day," he told her. "Slow, I"ll grant you, but it"s better to move slowly than to attract attention."
She shook her head in disgust.
"Where first, Mister Wolf?" Silk asked.
"To Darine," Wolf announced. "If the one we"re following went to the north, he"ll have to have pa.s.sed through Darine on his way to Boktor and beyond."
"And what exactly are we carrying to Darine?" Aunt Pol asked.
"Turnips, great lady," Silk said. "Last morning my large friend and I purchased three wagonloads of them in the village of Winold."
"Turnips?" Aunt Pol asked in a tone that spoke volumes.
"Yes, great lady, turnips," Silk said solemnly.
"Are we ready, then?" Wolf asked.
"We are," the giant Barak said shortly, rising with his mail shirt clinking.
"We should look the part," Wolf said carefully, eyeing Barak up and down. "Your armor, my friend, is not the sort of garb an honest wagoneer would wear. I think you should change it for stout wool."
Barak"s face looked injured.
"I could wear a tunic over it," he suggested tentatively.
"You rattle," Silk pointed out, "and armor has a distinctive fragrance about it. From the downwind side you smell like a rusty ironworks, Barak."
"I feel undressed without a mail shirt," Barak complained.
"We must all make sacrifices," Silk said.
Grumbling, Barak went to one of the wagons, jerked out a bundle of clothes and began to pull off his mail shirt. His linen undertunic bore large, reddish rust stains.
"I"d change tunics as well," Silk suggested. "Your shirt smells as bad as the armor."
Barak glowered at him. "Anything else?" he demanded. "I hope, for decency"s sake, you don"t plan to strip me entirely."
Silk laughed.
Barak pulled off his tunic. His torso was enormous and covered with thick red hair.
"You look like a rug," Silk observed.
"I can"t help that," Barak said. "Winters are cold in Cherek, and the hair helps me to stay warm." He put on a fresh tunic.
"It"s just as cold in Drasnia," Silk said. "Are you absolutely sure your grandmother didn"t dally with a bear during one of those long winters?"
"Someday your mouth is going to get you into a great deal of trouble, friend Silk," Barak said ominously.
Silk laughed again. "I"ve been in trouble most of my life, friend Barak."
"I wonder why," Barak said ironically.
"I think all this could be discussed later," Wolf said pointedly. "I"d rather like to be away from here before the week"s out, if I can."
"Of course, old friend," Silk said, jumping up. "Barak and I can amuse each other later."
Three teams of st.u.r.dy horses were picketed nearby, and they all helped to harness them to the wagons.
"I"ll put out the fire," Silk said and fetched two pails of water from a small brook that trickled nearby. The fire hissed when the water struck it, and great clouds of steam boiled up toward the low-hanging tree limbs.
"We"ll lead the horses to the edge of the wood," Wolf said. "I"d rather not pick my teeth on a low branch."
The horses seemed almost eager to start and moved without urging along a narrow track through the dark woods. They stopped at the edge of the open fields, and Wolf looked around carefully to see if anyone was in sight.
"I don"t see anybody," he said. "Let"s get moving."
"Ride with me, good smith," Barak said to Durnik. "Conversation with an honest man is much preferable to a night spent enduring the insults of an over-clever Drasnian."
"As you wish, friend," Durnik said politely.
"I"ll lead," Silk said. "I"m familiar with the back roads and lanes hereabouts. I"ll put us on the high road beyond Upper Gralt before noon. Barak and Durnik can bring up the rear. I"m sure that between them they can discourage anyone who might feel like following us."
"All right," Wolf said, climbing up onto the seat of the middle wagon. He reached down his hand and helped up Aunt Pol.
Garion quickly climbed up onto the wagon bed behind them, a trifle nervous that someone might suggest that he ride with Silk. It was all very well for Mister Wolf to say that the two they had just met were friends, but the fright he had suffered in the wood was still too fresh in his mind to make him quite comfortable with them.
The sacks of musty-smelling turnips were lumpy, but Garion soon managed to push and shove a kind of half reclining seat for himself among them just behind Aunt Pol and Mister Woif. He was sheltered from the wind, Aunt Pol was close, and his cloak, spread over him, kept him warm. He was altogether comfortable, and, despite the excitement of the night"s events, he soon drifted into a half drowse. The dry voice in his mind suggested briefly that he had not behaved too well back in the wood, but it too soon fell silent, and Garion slept.
It was the change of sound that woke him. T"he soft thud of the horses" hooves on the dirt road became a clatter as they came to the cobblestones of a small village sleeping in the last chill hours of the autumn night. Garion opened his eyes and looked sleepily at the tall, narrow houses with their tiny windows all dark.
A dog barked briefly, then retreated back to his warm place under some stairs. Garion wondered what village it might be and how many people slept under those steep-peaked tile roofs, unaware of the pa.s.sage of their three wagons.
The cobbled street was very narrow, and Garion could almost have reached out and touched the weathered stones of the houses as they pa.s.sed.
And then the nameless village was behind them, and they were back on the road again. The soft sound of the horses" hooves lured him once more toward sleep.
"What if he hasn"t pa.s.sed through Darine?" Aunt Pol asked Mister Wolf in a low tone.
It occurred to Garion that in all the excitement he had never actually found out exactly what it was that they were seeking. He kept his eyes closed and listened.
"Don"t start with the "what ifs," " Wolf said irritably. "If we sit around saying "what if," we"ll never do anything."
"I was merely asking," Aunt Pol said.
"If he hasn"t gone through Darine, we"ll turn south - to Muros. He may have joined a caravan there to take the Great North Road to Boktor."
"And if he hasn"t gone through Muros?"
"Then we go on to Camaar."
"And then?"
"We"ll see when we get to Camaar." His tone was final, as if he no longer wished to discuss the matter.
Aunt Pol drew in a breath as if she were about to deliver some final retort, but apparently she decided against it and settled back instead on the wagon seat.
To the east, ahead of them, the faint stain of dawn touched the lowering clouds, and they moved on through the tattered, windswept end of the long night in their search for something which, though he could not yet even identify it, was so important that Garion"s entire life had been uprooted in a single day because of it.
Chapter Seven.
IT TOOK THEM FOUR DAYS to reach Darine On the north coast. The first day went quite well, since, though it was cloudy and the wind kept blowing, the air was dry and the roads were good. They pa.s.sed quiet farmsteads and an occasional farmer bent to his labor in the middle of a field. Inevitably each man stopped his work to watch them pa.s.s. Some waved, but some did not.
And then there were villages, cl.u.s.ters of tall houses nestled in valleys. As they pa.s.sed, the children came out and ran after the wagons, shouting with excitement. The villagers watched, idly curious, until it became obvious that the wagons were not going to stop, and then they sniffed and went back to their own concerns.
As afternoon of that first day lowered toward evening, Silk led them into a grove of trees at the roadside, and they made preparations for the night. They ate the last of the ham and cheese Wolf had filched from Faldor"s pantry and then spread their blankets on the ground beneath the wagons. The ground was hard and cold, but the exciting sense of being on some great adventure helped Garion to endure the discomfort.
The next morning, however, it began to rain. It was a fine, misty rain at first, scattering before the wind, but as the morning wore on, it settled into a steady drizzle. The musty smell of the turnips in their wet sacks became stronger, and Garion huddled miserably with his cloak pulled tightly around him. The adventure was growing much less exciting.
The road became muddy and slick, and the horses struggled their way up each hill and had to be rested often. On the first day they had covered eight leagues; after that they were lucky to make five.
Aunt Pol became waspish and short-tempered.
"This is idiocy," she said to Mister Wolf about noon on the third day.
"Everything is idiocy if you choose to look at it in the proper light," he replied philosophically.
"Why wagoneers?" she demanded. "There are faster ways to travels wealthy family in a proper carriage, for instance, or Imperial messengers on good horses - either way would have put us in Darine by now."
"And left a trail in the memories of all these simple people we"ve pa.s.sed so wide that even a Thull could follow it," Wolf explained patiently. "Brill has long since reported our departure to his employers. Every Murgo in Sendaria is looking for us by now."
"Why are we hiding from the Murgos, Mister Wolf?" Garion asked, hesitant to interrupt, but impelled by curiosity to try to penetrate the mystery behind their flight. "Aren"t they just merchants-like the Tolnedrans and the Drasnians?"