“I’m fond of trees,” Eriond replied.
“That’s not exactly the way they meant it.”
“I know.”
Garion carefully pushed his blankets aside and stood up.
The Dryad’s hand moved swiftly toward the bow lying at her side, then she stopped. “Oh,” she said, “it’s you.” She looked at him critically. Her eyes were as grey as glass. “You’ve gotten older, haven’t you?”
“It’s been quite a few years,” he said, trying to remember just exactly where he had seen her before.
A faint hint of a smile touched her lips. “You don’t remember me, do you?”
“Well, sort of.”
She laughed, then picked up her bow. She set the arrow she was holding to the string and pointed it at him. “Does this help your memory at all?”
He blinked. “Weren’t you the one who wanted to kill me?”
“It was only fair, after all. I was the one who caught you, so I should have been the one who got to kill you.”
“Do you kill every human you catch?” Eriond asked her.
She lowered her bow. “Well, not every one of them. Sometimes I find other uses for them.”
Garion looked at her a bit more closely. “You haven’t changed a bit. You still look the same as before.”
“I know.” Her eyes grew challenging. “And pretty?” she prompted.
“Very pretty.”
“What a nice thing for you to say. Maybe I’m glad that I didn’t kill you after all. Why don’t you and I go someplace, and you can say some more nice things to me?”
“That’s enough, Xbel,” Ce’Nedra said tartly from her bed of leaves. “He’s mine, so don’t get any ideas.”
“Hello, Ce’Nedra,” the tawny-haired Dryad said as calmly as if they had talked together within the past week. “Wouldn’t you be willing to share him with one of your own sisters?”
“You wouldn’t lend me your comb, would you?”
“Certainly not—but that’s entirely different.”
“There’s no way that I could ever make you understand,” Ce’Nedra said, pushing back her blankets and rising to her feet.
“Humans.” Xbel sighed. “You all have such funny ideas.” She looked speculatively at Eriond, her slim little hand softly touching his cheek. “How about this one? Does it belong to you, too?”
Polgara came out of another one of their makeshift shelters. Her face was calm, although one of her eyebrows was raised. “Good morning, Xbel,” she said. “You’re up early.”
“I was hunting,” the Dryad replied. “Does this blond one belong to you, Polgara? Ce’Nedra won’t share that one of hers with me, but maybe—” Her hand lingeringly touched Eriond’s soft curls.
“No, Xbel,” Polgara said firmly.
Xbel sighed again. “None of you are any fun at all,” she pouted. Then she stood up. She was as tiny as Ce’Nedra and as slender as a willow. “Oh,” she said, “I almost forgot. Xantha says that I’m supposed to take you to her.”
“But you got sidetracked, didn’t you?” Ce’Nedra added dryly.
“The day hasn’t even got started yet.” The Dryad shrugged.
Then Belgarath and Silk came out into the open area around the cold fire pit; a moment later, Durnik and Toth joined them.
“You have such a lot of them,” Xbel murmured warmly. “Surely you can spare me one for just a little while.”
“What’s this?” Silk asked curiously.
“Never mind, Silk,” Polgara told him. “Xantha wants to see us. Right after breakfast, Xbel here will show us the way—won’t you, Xbel?”
“I suppose so.” Xbel sighed a bit petulantly. After their simple breakfast, the tawny-haired Dryad led them through the ancient Wood. Belgarath, leading his horse, walked beside her, and the two of them seemed deep in a conversation of some kind. Garion noticed that his grandfather furtively reached into his pocket from time to time and offered something to the slim Dryad—something she greedily snatched and popped into her mouth. “What’s he giving her?” Velvet asked. “Sweets,” Polgara said, sounding disgusted. “They’re not good for her, but he always brings sweets with him when he conies into this Wood.”
“Oh,” Velvet said, “I see.” She pursed her lips. “Isn’t she a bit young to be so—well—”
Ce’Nedra laughed. “Appearances can be deceiving, Liselle. Xbel is quite a bit older than she looks.”
“How old would you say?”
“Two or three hundred years at least. She’s the same age as her tree, and oak trees live for a very long time.”
Back in the forest, Garion heard giggles, whispers, and the faint tinkle of little golden bells; once in a while he caught a glimpse of a flitting patch of color as a Dryad scampered through the trees, her earrings jingling.
Queen Xantha’s tree was even more vast than Garion remembered it, its branches as broad as highways and the hollows in its bole opening like the mouths of caves. The Dryads in their brightly colored tunics bedecked the huge limbs like flowers, giggling and whispering and pointing at the visitors. Xbel led them into the broad, moss-covered clearing beneath the tree, put her fingers to her lips, and made a curiously birdlike whistle.
Queen Xantha, with her red-haired daughter Xera at her side, emerged from one of the hollows in the vast trunk and greeted them as they dismounted. Ce’Nedra and Xera flew into each others’ arms even as the queen and Polgara warmly embraced. Xantha’s golden hair was touched with gray at the temples, and her gray-green eyes were tired. “Are you unwell, Xantha?” Polgara asked her. The queen sighed. “The time is growing close, that’s all.” She looked up affectionately at her enormous oak. “He’s growing very tired, and his weight presses down upon his roots. He finds it harder and harder each spring to revive himself and put forth leaves.”
“Can I do anything?”
“No, dearest Polgara. There’s no pain—just a great weariness. I won’t mind sleeping. Now, what brings you into our Wood?”
“Someone has taken my baby,” Ce’Nedra cried, flying into her aunt’s arms.
“What are you saying, child?”
“It happened last summer, Xantha,” Belgarath told her. “We’re trying to find the trail of the one who stole him—a Malloreon named Zandramas. We think that the abductor sailed south aboard a Nyissan ship.”
Xbel was standing not far from the giant Toth, eyeing his awesomely muscled arms speculatively. “I saw one of the boats of the snake-people late last summer,” she mentioned, not taking her eyes off the huge mute, “down where our river empties out into the big lake.”
“You never mentioned it Xbel,” Xantha said.
“I forgot. Is anybody really interested in what the snake-people do?”
“Big lake?” Durnik said with a puzzled frown. “I don’t remember any big lakes here in this Wood.”
“It’s the one that tastes funny,” Xbel told him. “And you can’t see the other side.”
“You must mean the Great Western Sea, then.”
“Whatever you want to call it,” she replied indifferently. She continued to look Toth up and down.
“Did this Nyissan ship just sail on by?” Belgarath asked her.
“No,” she said. “It got burned up. But that was after somebody got off.”
“Xbel,” Polgara said, stepping between the tawny-haired little Dryad and the object of her scrutiny, “do you think you can remember exactly what you saw?”
“I suppose so. It wasn’t really very much, though. I was hunting, and I saw a boat go up to the beach on the south side of the river. This human in a black cloak with the hood pulled up got off with something in its arms. Then the black boat went back out into the water, and the human on the beach waved one hand at it. That’s when the ship caught on fire—all over. All at once.”
“What happened to the crew?” Durnik asked her.
“You know those big fish with all the teeth?”
“Sharks?”
“I guess so. Anyway, the water around the boat was full of them. When the humans jumped off the boat to get away from the fire, the fish ate them all up.” She sighed. “It was a terrible waste. I was hoping that maybe one or two might have gotten away—or maybe even three.” She sighed again.
“What did the human on the beach do then?” Polgara asked.
Xbel shrugged. “It waited until the ship burned all up and then it went into the woods on the south side of the river.” She stepped around Polgara, her eyes still fixed on the huge mute. “If you’re not using this one, Polgara, do you suppose I could borrow it for a little while? I’ve never seen one quite as big.”
Garion spun and ran toward his horse, but Eriond was already there. He held out the reins of his own chestnut stallion. “He’s faster, Belgarion,” he said. “Take him.”
Garion nodded shortly and swung into the saddle.
“Garion!” Ce’Nedra cried, “where are you going?”
But he was already plunging into the forest at a gallop. He was not really thinking as the stallion thundered through the leafless Wood. The only semblance of a thought in his mind was the image the indifferent Xbel had implanted there—a dark figure on the beach with something in its arms. Slowly, however, something else intruded itself on his awareness. There was something strange about the stallion’s gait. About every fourth or fifth stride, the horse gave a peculiar lurch, and the wood seemed to blur for an instant. Then the gallop would continue until the next lurch and blurring.