“Ce’Nedra!”
“I have to know, Garion. She was so grim about it before she went inside that place. She was going to kill the baby. Then she came out and told us that the mother and baby had both died in the birth. Wasn’t that very convenient?”
He drew in a deep breath. “Ce’Nedra, think back.You’ve known Aunt Pol for a long time now. Has she ever told you a lie—ever?”
“Well—sometimes she hasn’t told me the whole truth. She’s told me part of it and kept the rest a secret.”
“That’s not the same as lying, Ce’Nedra, and you know it.”
“Well—”
“You’re angry because she said we might have to kill that thing.”
“Baby,” she corrected firmly.
He took her by the shoulders and looked directly into her face. “No, Ce’Nedra. It was a thing—half human, half demon, and all monster.”
“But it was so little—so helpless.”
“How do you know that?”
“All babies are little when they’re born.”
“I don’t think that one was. I saw the woman for just a minute before Aunt Pol told me to leave the temple. Do you remember how big you were just before Geran was born? Well, that woman’s stomach was at least five times as big as yours was—and she wasn’t a great deal taller than you are.”
“You aren’t serious!”
“Oh, yes, I am. There was no way that the demon could have been born without killing its mother. For all I know, it might just simply have clawed its way out.”
“It’s own mother?” she gasped.
“Did you think it would love its mother? Demons don’t know how to love, Ce’Nedra. That’s why they’re demons. Fortunately the demon died. It’s too bad that the woman had to die, too, but it was much too late to do anything for her by the time we got there.”
“You’re a cold, hard person, Garion.”
“Oh, Ce’Nedra, you know better than that. What happened back there was unpleasant, certainly, but none of us had any choice but to do exactly what we did.”
She turned her back on him and started to stalk away.
“Ce’Nedra,” he said, hurrying to catch her.
“What?” She tried to free her arm from his grasp.
“We didn’t have any choice,” he repeated. “Would you want Geran to grow up in a world filled with demons?”
She stared at him. “No,” she firmly admitted. “It’s just that . . .” She left it hanging.
“I know,” He put his arms about her.
“Oh, Garion.” She suddenly clung to him, and everything was all right again.
After they had eaten, they rode on through the forest, passing occasional villages huddled deep among the trees. The villages were rude, most of them consisting of a dozen or so rough log houses and surrounded by crude log palisades. There were usually a rather surprising number of hogs rooting among the stumps that surrounded each village.
“There don’t seem to be very many dogs,” Durnik observed.
These people prefer pigs as house pets,” Silk told him. “As a race, Karands have a strong affinity for dirt, and pigs satisfy certain deep inner needs among them.”
“Do you know something, Silk,” the smith said then.
“You’d be a much more pleasant companion if you didn’t try to turn everything into a joke.”
“It’s a failing I have. I’ve looked at the world for quite a few years now and I’ve found that if I don’t laugh, I’ll probably end up crying.”
“You’re really serious, aren’t you?”
“Would I do that to an old friend?”
About midafternoon, the road they were following curved slightly, and they soon reached the edge of the forest and a fork in the rutted track.
“All right. Which way?” Belgarath asked.
Garion lifted his sword from the pommel of his saddle and swept it slowly back and forth until he felt the familiar tug. “The right fork,” he replied.
“I’m so glad you said that,” Silk told him. “The left fork leads to Calida, I’d expect that news of Harakan’s death has reached there by now. Even without the demons, a town full of hysterics doesn’t strike me as a very nice place to visit. The followers of Lord Mengha might be just a bit upset when they hear that he’s gone off and left them.”
“Where does the right fork go?” Belgarath asked him.
“Down to the lake,” Silk replied, “Lake Karanda, It’s the biggest lake in the world. When you stand on the shore, it’s like looking at an ocean.”
Garion frowned. “Grandfather,” he said, starting to worry, “Do you think that Zandramas knows that the Orb can follow her?”
“It’s possible, yes.”
“And would she know that it can’t follow her over water?”
“I couldn’t say for sure.”
“But if she does, isn’t it possible that she went to the lake in order to hide her trail from us? She could have sailed out a ways, doubled back, and come ashore just about anyplace. Then she could have struck out in a new direction, and we’d never pick up her trail again.”
Belgarath scratched at his beard, squinting in the sunlight. “Pol,” he said. “Are there any Grolims about?”
She concentrated a bit. “Not in the immediate vicinity, father,” she replied.
“Good. When Zandramas was trying to tamper with Ce’Nedra back at Rak Hagga, weren’t you able to lock your thought with hers for a while?”
“Yes, briefly.”
“She was at Ashaba then, right?”
She nodded.
“Did you get any kind of notion about which direction she was planning to go when she left?”
She frowned. “Nothing very specific, father—just a vague hint about wanting to go home.
“Darshiva,” Silk said, snapping his fingers. “We know that Zandramas is a Darshivan name, and ’Zakath told Garion that it was in Darshiva that she started stirring up trouble.”
Belgarath grunted. “It’s a little thin,” he said. “I’d feel a great deal more comfortable with some confirmation.” He looked at Polgara. “Do you think you could reestablish contact with her—even for just a moment? All I need is a direction.”
“I don’t think so, father. I’ll try, but . . .” she shrugged. Then her face grew very calm, and Garion could feel her mind reaching out with a subtle probing. After a few minutes, she relaxed her will. “She’s shielding, father,” she told the old man. “I can’t pick up anything at all.”
He muttered a curse under his breath. “We’ll just have to go on down to the lake and ask a few questions. Maybe somebody saw her.”
“I’m sure they did,” Silk said, “but Zandramas likes to drown sailors, remember? Anyone who saw where she landed is probably sleeping under thirty feet of water.”
“Can you think of an alternative plan?”
“Not offhand, no.”
“Then we go on to the lake.”
As the sun began to sink slowly behind them, they passed a fair-sized town set perhaps a quarter of a mile back from the road. The inhabitants were gathered outside the palisade surrounding it. They had a huge bonfire going, and just in front of the fire stood a crude, skull-surmounted altar of logs. A skinny man wearing several feathers in his hair and with lurid designs painted on his face and body was before the altar, intoning an incantation at the top of his lungs. His arms were stretched imploringly at the sky, and there was a note of desperation in his voice.
“What’s he doing?” Ce’Nedra asked.
“He’s trying to raise a demon so that the townspeople can worship it,” Eriond told her calmly.
“Garion!” she said in alarm. “Shouldn’t we run?”
“He won’t succeed,” Eriond assured her. “The demon won’t come to him anymore. Nahaz has told them all not to.
The wizard broke off his incantation. Even from this distance, Garion could see that there was a look of panic on his face.
An angry mutter came from the townspeople.
“That crowd is starting to turn ugly,” Silk observed.
“The wizard had better raise his demon on the next try, or he might be in trouble.”