POLGARA THE SORCERESS BY DAVID EDDINGS

bathing, Pol.’

‘I rather doubt that, father. Run along now.’

He slammed the door behind him as he went out.

Father’s strategy for delaying the Angarak army verged on genius,

though I hate to admit that. Not only did it slow Torak’s advance

to a crawl, but it also locked a pair of Arends who’d previously

hated each other into a lifelong friendship that boded well for the

future of poor Arendia. The only fault I could find with it lay in the

fact that I was the one who was to have the dubious pleasure of

herding a group of Asturians around. I wasn’t really very fond

of Asturians for reasons that should be obvious.

Father’s plan was not particularly complex. The River Arend had

numerous tributaries, all running bank-full after a quarter century

of steady rainfall. Those tributaries were all spanned by bridges.

Father thought it might be useful to take a thousand Mimbrate

knights to the foot of the Ulgo mountains and start tearing down

those bridges. I was assigned the chore of taking a thousand

Asturian bowmen to the same vicinity to hinder the Angarak attempts to

rebuild those bridges.

The knight who led the Mimbrate bridge-wreckers was Baron

Mandor, a descendant of Mandorin and Asrana and an ancestor of

our own Mandorallen. The leader of the Asturian bowmen was the

happy-go-lucky Baron Wildantor, an irrepressible red-head from,

whom Lelldorin was descended. Necessity was tampering again,

obviously.

Despite my long-standing prejudice against Asturians, I found

Wildantor almost impossible to dislike. His bright red hair was like

a flame, and his sense of humor infectious. I think the only time he

wasn’t laughing, chuckling, or giggling was when he was drawing

his bow. Then. of course, he was all business. Baron Mandor wasn’t

really equipped to deal with someone like Wildantor. Mandor Was

a very serious man with virtually no sense of humor at all, and once

it finally dawned on him that almost everything Wildantor said was

intended to be funny, he gradually realised how fun it could be to laugh. The joke that ultimately sealed their

unnatural friendship, however, came from Mandor’s lips, and I’m sure

was unintended. When Wildantor tossed off the suggestion

‘why don’t we agree not to kill each other when this is over?’ MandOr

pondered the implications of it for several moments and then

,gravely replied, ‘Doth that not violate the precepts of our religion?’

wildantor collapsed, laughing. uncontrollably. What really made it

funny was the fact that Mandor was absolutely serious. He flushed

slightly at the Asturian’s laughter, and then, slowly realizing that

his sincere question lay at the very center of the ongoing tragedy

that was Arendia, he too began to laugh. It was rueful laughter at

first, but then it grew more joyous. The two of them had finally

realized that Arendia was really nothing more than a very bad joke.

Despite the growing friendship between the two, however, Father

and I were obliged to concentrate quite a bit of effort to keep the

other Mimbrates and Asturians separated.

Father was devious enough to let the Angaraks rebuild the bridges

across the first three tributaries unmolested. On the fourth rushing

stream, however, Murgo bridge-builders quite suddenly started

sprouting Asturian arrows. After that, the Angaraks grew very

cautious, and it took them a long time to cross each river. That was the

whole idea, of course.

The final cementing of the growing friendship came when

Wildantor was showing off. He stood alone on a trembling, undermined

bridge, singlehandedly holding off the entire Angarak force. I’ve

never seen anyone shoot arrows so fast. When an archer has four

arrows in the air all at the same time, you know that he’s really

attending to business.

‘Pol,’ mother’s voice said calmly, ‘he’s going to fall into the water.

Don’t interfere, and don’t let your-father get involved, either. Mandor will

save him. It’s supposed to happen that way.’

And it did, of course. The bridge Wildantor stood on shuddered

and collapsed, and the river swept the red-haired Asturian

downstream. Mandor raced downriver to the next destroyed bridge,

dashed out to the broken end, and reached down toward the

seething water. ‘Wildantor!’ he bellowed. ‘To me!’

And the half-drowning Asturian veered across the turbulent

stream, reached up, and their hands crashed together. In a symbolic

sense, neither of them ever let go again.

*CHAPTER33

We continued our slow withdrawal – I won’t say retreat – for the

next several days, and our little force became more adept as they

gradually came to accept the fact that their alliance was holding firm.

The Mimbrate knights and Asturian bowmen, reassured perhaps by

the growing friendship between Mandor and Wildantor, began to

lay aside their hereditary animosity to concentrate their efforts on

the task at hand. The Mimbrates grew more skilled at

bridgewrecking with practice, and several impromptu alliances began to

crop up. One little group of knights grew very adept at weakening

bridges rather than destroying them outright, and the knight in

charge spoke with his Asturian counterpart, suggesting that the

archers might restrain their enthusiasm just enough to allow the

span to become crowded with advancing Murgos. That was the

point at which several knights concealed upstream started rolling

logs into the swiftly flowing river. The weakened bridge collapsed

when the logs smashed into the already shaky underpinnings, and

several hundred Murgos went swimming – for a short while,

anyway. A suit of steel chain-mail isn’t the best swimming costume in

the world, I noticed. The celebration involving those knights and

archers that evening was rowdy, and I saw Mimbrates and Asturians

linked arm in arm singing ancient drinking songs as if they’d know”

each other all their lives.

When we’d left Vo Mimbre, our major concern had been to keep

the Mimbrates and Asturians separated. When we returned, nothing

we could have done would have kept them apart. Mutual animosity

had been replaced by comradeship. I’m fairly sure that hadn’t bee”

what Torak had in mind when he’d come west.

There was a heroes’ welcome awaiting us upon our return.

sure that some of the citizens of VO Mimbre choked a bit over cheers

directed at Asturians, but that’s not really important, is it?

Father’s scheme had won us the-requisite five days, and the twins,

who’d arrived at Vo Mimbre during our absence, advised us that

uncle Beldin and General Cerran had reached Tol Honeth with the

southern legions. Father sent out his thought and spoke briefly with

his twisted brother, and he assured us that the Tolnedrans and

Chereks would reach Vo Mimbre on schedule. We were ready, and

tomorrow the battle would begin.

Mother spoke with me briefly while father was out looking over

the defenses of the city. ‘Pol, she said, ‘when he comes back, tell him

that you’re going out to keep an eye on the Angaraks. I think you and I

should look in on Torak again.’

‘Oh?’

‘I don’t like surprises, so let’s keep an eye on Torak and Zedar.’

‘All right, mother.’

Father was a bit on edge when he came back, but that was to be

expected, I suppose. Everybody’s a little edgy on the night before

a battle.

‘I’m going out to have a look around, father,’ I told

him. ‘I don’t suppose you’d pay any attention to me if I said that I

forbid it, would you?’

‘Not really.’

‘Then I won’t waste my breath. Don’t be out all night.’

I almost laughed out loud. The tone in which he said it was

almost exactly the tone he’d used at Riva during the preparations

for Beldaran’s wedding when I’d spent my time breaking hearts

and he’d spent his chewing on his fingernails. The irony of the

situation might have escaped him, however. Back at Riva, he’d been

worried about my hordes of suitors. I had a suitor here at Vo Mimbre

as well, and this time I was the one who was worried.

mother and I merged again, and all turned inward, we were once

again totally undetectable. We located Torak’s rusting black palace

and went inside again through that convenient embrasure.

‘I Will punish them, Zedar,’ Torak was saying in his dramatically

resonant voice.

‘~well do they deserve it, Master,’ Zedar said obsequiously. ‘In

their petty squabbling, they have failed thee. Their lives are forfeit

for their misdeeds.’

‘Be not over-quick to condemn them, Zedar,’ Torak replied

ominouslY. ‘Thou hast still not yet fully atoned for thine own failure in

Morindland some several centuries back.’

‘Prithee, Master, forgive me. Let not thy wrath fall upon me,

though my punishment be richly deserved.’

‘There are no punishments or rewards, Zedar,’ Torak replied

darkly,’only consequences. Urvon and Ctuchik shall learn the

meaning of consequences in the fullness of time – even as shalt thou. For

now, however, I have need of thee and thy two brothers.’

I suspect that Zedar choked a bit at the notion of calling Urvon

and Ctuchik ‘brothers’.

Torak, his polished steel mask glowing in the lamplight, sat