merchant, Gallak. I was directed to a nearby tavern, which is probably
the last place I’d have expected to find Polgara. It was a rowdy sort
of place with a low ceiling held up by tar-smeared beams, and as soon
as I entered I saw something that really surprised me.
Polgara was dancing.
She might not have been quite as good as Vella, but she came very
close. She was wearing soft leather boots of a Nadrak design, and the
hilt of a dagger protruded from the top of each one. Two more daggers
were tucked into her belt. She was wearing a rather flimsy dress made
of Mallorean silk–blue, naturally–and all sorts of interesting things
were going on under that dress as she spun on flickering feet through
the intricate steps of the dance.
The patrons of the tavern were cheering her on, and I started feeling
belligerent. Sometimes it feels as if I’ve spent eons feeling
belligerent when men have started paying too much attention to Polgara.
But aren’t fathers supposed to feel that way?
Anyway, she concluded her dance with that challenging strut that’s the
traditional finale of the dance of the Nadrak woman, and the patrons
cheered, whistled, and stamped their feet in approval. Then she
returned to the table where the man I guessed to be her owner sat
basking in reflected glory. He was a lean-faced Nadrak of middle
years, and the cut and quality of his garments proclaimed him to be a
man of some substance.
I noticed that he very carefully kept his hands to himself when Pol sat
down. It was fairly clear that she knew how to use those daggers.
I pushed my way through the crowd to his table.
“That’s quite a woman you’ve got there, friend,” I said to him.
“Would you care to sell her?” It was a little blunt, but Nadraks tend
to get right to the point in these matters.
He looked me up and down.
“You’re a Drasnian, aren’t you?” he judged from my clothes.
“Right,” I replied.
“I don’t think I’d care to sell her to a Drasnian.”
“Business is business, Gallak,” I told him, “and my money’s as good as
anybody else’s.” I hefted the saddlebags I’d brought.
“How did you come to know my name?” he asked me.
“I asked around,” I replied.
“Aren’t you a little old to be buying women?”
“I’m not buying her for myself, Gallak. I want to give Crown Prince
Rhodar a special gift when the time comes for him to assume the throne
of Drasnia. It never hurts a businessman to have his king obligated to
him.”
“That’s very true,” he conceded, “but Rhodar’s an Alorn. What makes
you think he’d be interested in a Nadrak woman?”
“You don’t know Rhodar, I see. He’s got a very large appetite–for
lots of things.”
“He might start to lose that appetite after Polanna here cuts out his
tripes for getting too familiar. She’s very quick with her daggers.”
“Is that her name?”
He nodded.
“Just for the sake of argument, what would you be willing to offer me
for her?”
I reached inside my saddlebags, took out one of my bars of gold and
laid it on the table in front of him.
Polgara had been watching us rather closely.
“Absolutely out of the question,” she snapped.
“You’d need twenty of those to buy me. Tell him to go away, Gallak.”
Gallak, however, was examining the bar rather closely.
“Don’t be in such a rush, Pol,” he told her.
“This is very good quality. I’d say that it’s almost pure.” He
squinted at me.
“How’d you come by this, friend?”
“I did some prospecting a few years back,” I replied.
“My partner and I found a stream that was running bank-full of this
stuff.”
His eyes grew very bright at that point.
“I’d like to see that stream,”
he said.
“A lot of people would, but I think I’ll just keep its location to
myself.
Well? Are you going to make a counter offer
“Polanna just did. Twenty bars.”
“Five,” I countered.
“I could go as low as fifteen, I suppose.”
“Ridiculous!” I retorted.
“I could buy this whole tavern and everybody in it for fifteen bars.
Let’s be realistic here, friend. She’s only a woman, after all.”
We haggled about it for an hour or so, and Pol’s eyes got flintier by
the moment. We finally settled on twelve. Then we each spit on our
hands, smacked our palms together, and the deal was struck. I stood
up.
“All right, girl,” I said to my daughter, “let’s go to Drasnia.”
“I have some things I need to pick up,” she replied, gathering up her
share of the gold.
“Leave them behind.”
“Not on your life, Old Man. You bought me. You didn’t buy my
possessions. It’s just a short way to Gallak’s house. It won’t take
me long.”
She turned and strutted out of the tavern with every eye upon her as
she went.
“Spirited, isn’t she?” I noted mildly.
“Indeed she is,” Gallak agreed.
“To be honest with you, friend, I’m just as happy to be rid of her. You
know your future king better than I do, but you might want to consider
some other gift. His gratitude might go downhill after a few weeks
with Polanna.”
“She’ll be just fine, Gallak. It’s been a pleasure doing business with
you.” I picked up my much-lighter saddlebags and went back out into
the street.
Polgara’s eyes were steely when she returned.
“I wasn’t particularly amused by your performance in there, Old Man.”
She said.
“It was very insulting.”
“I thought I pulled it off fairly well. Do you want to give me back my
gold?”
“Oh, no, father. That gold is mine now.”
I sighed.
“All right, Pol.” I gave up.
“If that’s the way you feel about it. Let’s find a stable. I’ll buy
you a horse and we can get started.”
After we rode out of Yar Nadrak, Pol and I were able to speak more
freely.
“Did you find the people you were looking for?” I asked her.
“Of course I did,” she replied.
“I wouldn’t have sent for you if I hadn’t.”
“Who are they?”
“One of them is Drosta lek Thun himself.”
“The Nadrak King?” That was surprising.
She nodded.
“Drosta’s a very complicated fellow, and he seems bent on getting out
from under the thumb of the Grolims. He wants to turn his kingdom into
a secular society. He’s devious and has no principles whatsoever, but
he does want what’s best for his country.”
“Who’s the other one?”
“A fellow named Yarblek. He’s a descendant of someone you used to
know, I believe.”
“You mean Rablek?”
“Of course. Nothing ever really happens by chance, father.”
I made a face.
“I get so tired of that,” I said.
“I’d have thought you’d be used to it by now. Yarblek’s a
businessman–of sorts. He’s young, but he’s already so unscrupulous
that he’s building quite a reputation. I think that when the time
comes, he’ll help us–if the price is right. You do have more of that
gold, don’t you, father?”
We followed the North Caravan Route westward toward the Drasnian
border. It was autumn by now, and the leaves of the birch and aspen
groves had begun to turn golden. That’s always very pretty, but it
does sort of hint at the onset of winter, and we still had to go
through the mountains up around Yar Gurak.
Pol and I hurried right along, but when we reached the mountains, our
luck ran out. An early blizzard swept down out of Morindland and
buried us in about five feet of snow. I put together a crude sort of
shelter in a thick grove of jack-pines, and we sat out the storm. It
blew itself out after three days, and we set out again. It was very
slow going, and Pol’s temper began to deteriorate about mid-morning.
“This is ridiculous, father!”
She snapped.
“There are other ways for us to get to where we’re going, you know.”
I shook my head.
“We’re in Angarak territory, Pol, and that means Grolims. Let’s not
make any noise if we don’t have to. We’ll get through all right–if
the weather holds.”
But of course, it didn’t. Another blizzard came along right on the
heels of the first one, and I had to build us another shelter.
It must have been about midmorning of the following day when we had a
visitor. The gale was howling around our makeshift shelter, and the
snow was coming down so thickly that we couldn’t see ten feet. Then a
voice came out of the snow.
“Hello, the camp,” it said.
“I’m coming in.
Don’t get excited.”
He seemed to be a fairly old man, lean and stringy, and his tangled
hair was as white as the snow around him. He was bundled to the ears
in furs, and his face was tanned, weatherbeaten, and deeply wrinkled.