Gorek the Wise, king of Riva and Guardian of the Orb, was a very old
man, and the Tolnedran roads were falling apart, and Salmissra had
never been the sort you wanted to trust.
I’ll grant you that it was very scanty, but the way those words kept
screaming inside my head sent me flying down the steps of my tower four
at a time.
I absolutely had to get to the Isle of the Winds immediately.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I’d begun to form the image of the falcon in my mind before I even hit
the foot of the stairs, and as soon as I was outside I started
sprouting feathers.
Falcons are faster than most other birds, and the screaming inside my
head convinced me that speed was essential here. I didn’t like
flying–I still don’t–but I’ve done a lot of things I haven’t liked
over the years. We do what we have to do, like it or not.
I don’t think it ever occurred to me not to take Polgara along. I knew
that she had something very important to do when we reached the Isle of
the Winds. I didn’t know exactly what it was, but I did know that this
would be an absolute catastrophe if she weren’t with me.
I think that perhaps I’ll go to Riva and have a talk with Garion about
that.
I’m beginning to develop a theory, and I’d like to check it with him.
That peculiar voice has spent much more time with him than it ever did
with me, so he’s far more familiar with its quirks than I am. Every
now and then, though, I get a strong feeling that I’ve been tampered
with. I’ll be plodding along about half asleep, and then something
will happen–and it doesn’t always have to be something out of the
ordinary. In fact, it usually isn’t. Most of the time it’s something
so commonplace that nobody else even notices it. But when it does
happen, something inside my head clicks together, and I’m moving before
I’m even aware of it. I suspect that certain things were planted in my
brain during that trip Cherek and his boys and I took to Cthol Mishrak.
I’m not actually aware of them until that unremarkable incident comes
along, and then I know immediately what I’m supposed to do.
All right. I’m digressing. So what?
It didn’t take me very long to reach Poledra’s cottage. It was early
spring, but it was already fairly warm, and Polgara was out spading up
her kitchen garden. Pol has very fair skin, and she sunburns quite
easily.
She’d woven herself a ridiculous-looking straw hat to keep the sun off
her nose. I probably shouldn’t say it, but it made her look just a bit
like a mushroom.
I swooped in, thrust down my talons, and had started to change back
before they even touched the ground.
“I need you, Pol,” I told her.
“I needed you once, remember?” she replied coldly.
“You didn’t seem very interested. Now I get the chance to return the
favor. Go away, father.”
“We don’t have time for this, Polgara. You can make clever remarks
later. Right now we have to go to the Isle of the Winds. Gorek’s in
danger.”
“Lots of people are in danger, father. It happens all the time.” She
paused.
“Who’s Gorek?”
“Have you had your head turned off for all these centuries? Don’t you
have any idea at all about what’s going in the world?”
“My world ended when you let the Asturians destroy Vo Wacune, Old
Man.”
“No, as a matter of fact, it didn’t. You’re still who you are, and
you’re coming with me to the Isle of the Winds even if I have to pick
you up in my talons and take you there.”
“As badly as you fly? Don’t be ridiculous. Who’s this Gorek you’re so
worried about?”
“He’s the Rivan king, Pol, the Guardian of the Orb.”
“The Chereks are still out there in the Sea of the Winds. They’ll
protect him.”
“You have been out of touch, Pol. The Chereks are letting people get
through now.”
“What? Are you insane? Why did you permit that?”
“It’s a long story, and we don’t have the leisure to go through it.
Don’t waste time with owls this time, Pol. Go to a falcon instead.”
“Not without a good reason, I won’t.”
I resisted the urge to swear at her.
“I just dredged the meaning out of a passage in the Mrin. Salmissra’s
going to make an attempt on the life of the Rivan king–and his entire
family. If she manages to pull it off, Torak wins.”
“Salmissra? Why didn’t you say so in the first place?”
“Because you wouldn’t let me.”
“Let’s move, father!”
“Hold on for just a moment. I have to warn the twins.” I concentrated
and sent out my thought.
“Brothers!” I called to them.
“Belgarath?” Beltira replied, sounding a little startled.
“What’s the matter?”
“There’s going to be an attempt on the life of the Rivan King. Pol and
I are going there right now. We’ll be falcons if you need to reach us.
Get word to Beldin. Tell him to get back home right now.”
“At once, Belgarath. Hurry!”
“All right, Pol,” I said then.
“Let’s go to Riva.”
We both slipped into the forms of those fierce hunting birds, spiraled
upward, and then struck out to the northwest across Ulgoland. At one
point, a few leagues to the east of Prolgu, we encountered a flock of
Harpies. I’ve a few suspicions about that. I’ve traveled around in
Ulgoland quite a few times over the years, and that’s the only time
I’ve ever seen Harpies. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to discover
that they’d been put in our path deliberately to delay us. Harpies,
however, don’t fly all that well–certainly not well enough to catch a
pair of streaking falcons.
Pol and I simply swooped clear of them and flew on, leaving them
floundering around in the air behind us.
The incident’s hardly worth even noting, except that it was a clear
indication that somebody out there was doing his best to delay us. I
started to keep an eye out for the dragon at that point. That could
have been a problem.
We didn’t see her, however, and we managed to reach the western border
of Ulgoland without any further incident.
It was growing dark, but Pol and I kept flying. I was hungry and
tired, but that urgent voice in my head kept pushing me on. Pol flies
better than I do, but I’m sure that our frantic pace was wearing her
down almost as much as it was exhausting me. We kept going, however.
The sky behind us was starting to turn pale with the approach of dawn
when we passed over Camaar and flew out across the dark waters of the
Sea of the Winds.
It must have been almost noon before we saw the Isle of the Winds ahead
of us to the west. We began a long, shallow descent, and the harbor at
Riva seemed to come rushing up at us as we streaked down toward the
city.
We’d nearly killed ourselves getting there, but we still arrived about
ten minutes too late.
It was as we were crossing the choppy waters of the harbor when I
discovered why Polgara had absolutely had to come along. I didn’t even
see the little boy floundering around in the chill waters of the bay,
but Pol did. We must have been about thirty feet above the water and
streaking in as fast as we could fly when she suddenly flared her wings
and blurred back into her own form in midair. She arched herself
forward effortlessly and plunged headfirst down toward the water, her
arms stretched above her head. I’ve seen a lot of young men dive
headfirst into pools and rivers and even into the sea from time to
time–usually to impress young women–but I’ve never seen a dive like
that one. She cut into the water like a knife, and it seemed to me
that she was down forever. Fortunately, the harbor at Riva is very
deep. You don’t want to make that kind of dive unless you’ve got a lot
of water under you.
She finally popped to the surface no more than ten feet from the
struggling child, and with a few strokes, she had him.
“YES!” the previously silent intruder in my head exulted.
“Oh, shut up!” I told it.
There was absolute chaos in the commercial enclave on the beach.
One glance told me that Gorek and his son and the other members of his
family were all dead. The Rivans, of course, were busy butchering a
group of Nyissan merchants. I swooped in, flared my wings, and
changed.
“Stop!” I thundered at the vengeful Rivans.
“They killed our king!” a burly fellow screamed at me. Tears were
running down his face, and he was clearly hysterical.