The Grolim half raised, his eyes wide and his face deathly pale.
“Return to your master, dog,” Aunt Pol said scathingly. “Tell him to beat you for not learning your lessons properly.”
The Grolim spoke quickly to the Nyissans at the oars, and they immediately turned the boat and rowed back toward the slave ship.
“We had a nice little fight brewing there, Polgara,” Barak complained. “Why did you have to spoil it?”
“Grow up,” she ordered bluntly. Then she turned on Garion, her eyes blazing and the white lock at her brow like a streak of fire. “You idiot! You refuse any kind of instruction, and then you burst out like a raging bull. Have you the slightest conception of what an uproar translocation causes? You’ve alerted every Grolim in Sthiss Tor to the fact that we’re here.”
“He was dying,” Garion protested, gesturing helplessly at the slave lying on the wharf. “I had to do something.”
“He was dead as soon as he hit the water,” she said flatly. “Look at him.”
The slave had stiffened into an arched posture of mortal agony, his head twisted back and his mouth agape. He was obviously dead.
“What happened to him?” Garion asked, feeling suddenly sick.
“The leeches are poisonous. Their bites paralyze their victims so that they can feed on them undisturbed. The bites stopped his heart. You exposed us to the Grolims for the sake of a dead man.”
“He wasn’t dead when I did it!” Garion shouted at her. “He was screaming for help.” He was angrier than he had ever been in his life.
“He was beyond help.” Her voice was cold, even brutal.
“What kind of monster are you?” he asked from between clenched teeth. “Don’t you have any feelings? You’d have just let him die, wouldn’t you?”
“I don’t think this is the time or place to discuss it.”
“No! This is the time-right now, Aunt Pol. You’re not even human, did you know that? You left being human behind so long ago that you can’t even remember where you lost it. You’re four thousand years old. Our whole lives go by while you blink your eyes. We’re just an entertainment for you – an hour’s diversion. You manipulate us like puppets for your own amusement. Well, I’m tired of being manipulated. You and I are finished!”
It probably went further than he’d intended, but his anger had finally run away with him, and the words seemed to rush out before he could stop them.
She looked at him, her face as pale as if he had suddenly struck her. Then she drew herself up. “You stupid boy,” she said in a voice that was all the more terrible because it was so quiet. “Finished? You and I? How can you even begin to understand what I’ve had to do to bring you to this world? You’ve been my only care for over a thousand years. I’ve endured anguish and loss and pain beyond your ability to understand what the words mean – all for you. I’ve lived in poverty and squalor for hundreds of years at a time – all for you. I gave up a sister I loved more than my life itself – all for you. I’ve gone through fire and despair worse than fire a dozen times over – all for you. And you think this has all been an entertainment for me? – some idle amusement? You think the kind of care I’ve devoted to you for a thousand years and more comes cheaply? You and I will never be finished, Belgarion. Never! We will go on together until the end of days if necessary. We will never be finished. You owe me too much for that!”
There was a dreadful silence. The others, shocked by the intensity of Aunt Pol’s words, stood staring first at her and then at Garion.
Without speaking further, she turned and went below decks again. Garion looked around helplessly, suddenly terribly ashamed and terribly alone.
“I had to do it, didn’t I?” he asked of no one in particular and not entirely sure exactly what it was that he meant.
They all looked at him, but no one answered his question.
Chapter Twenty-six
BY MIDAFTERNOON THE CLOUDS had rolled in again, and the thunder began to rumble off in the distance as the rain swept in to drown the steaming city once more. The afternoon thunderstorm seemed to come at the same time each day, and they had even grown accustomed to it. They all moved below deck and sat sweltering as the rain roared down on the deck above them.
Garion sat stifliy, his back planted against a rough-hewn oak rib of the ship and watched Aunt Pol, his face set stubbornly and his eyes unforgiving.
She ignored him and sat talking quietly with Ce’Nedra.
Captain Greldik came through the narrow companionway door, his face and beard streaming water. “The Drasnian-Droblek-is here,” he told them. “He says he’s got word for you.”
“Send him in,” Barak said.
Droblek squeezed his vast bulk through the narrow door. He was totally drenched from the rain and stood dripping on the Hoor. He wiped his face. “It’s wet out there,” he commented.
“We noticed,” Hettar said.
“I’ve received a message,” Droblek told Aunt Pol. “It’s from Prince Kheldar.”
“Finally,” she said.
“He and Belgarath are coming downriver,” Droblek reported. “As closely as I can make out, they should be here in a few days – a week at the most. The messenger isn’t very coherent.”
Aunt Pol looked at him inquiringly.
“Fever,” Droblek explained. “The man’s a Drasnian, so he’s reliable – one of my agents at an upcountry trading post – but he’s picked up one of the diseases that infest this stinking swamp. He’s a little delirious just now. We hope we can break the fever in a day or so and get some sense out of him. I came as soon as I got the general idea of his message. I thought you’d want to know immediately.”
“We appreciate your concern,” Aunt Pol said.
“I’d have sent a servant,” Droblek explained, “but messages sometimes go astray in Sthiss Tor, and servants sometimes get things twisted around.” He grinned suddenly. “That’s not the real reason, of course.”
Aunt Pol smiled, “Of course not.”
“A fat man tends to stay in one place and let others do his walking around for him. From the tone of King Rhodar’s message, I gather that this business might be the most important thing happening in the world just now. I wanted to take part in it.” He made a wry face. “We all lapse into childishness from time to time, I suppose.”
“How serious is the condition of the messenger?” Aunt Pol asked.
Droblek shrugged. “Who can say? Half of these pestilential fevers in Nyissa don’t even have names, and we can’t really tell one from another. Sometimes people die very quickly from them; sometimes they linger for weeks. Now and then someone even recovers. About all we can do is make them comfortable and wait to see what happens.”
“I’ll come at once,” Aunt Pol said, rising. “Durnik, would you get me the green bag from our packs? I’ll need the herbs I have in it.”
“It’s not always a good idea to expose oneself to some of these fevers, my Lady,” Droblek cautioned.
“I won’t be in any danger,” she said. “I want to question your messenger closely, and the only way I’ll be able to get any answers from him is to rid him of his fever.”
“Durnik and I’ll come along,” Barak offered.
She looked at him.
“It doesn’t hurt to be on the safe side,” the big man said, belting on his sword.
“If you wish.” She put on her cloak and turned up the hood. “This may take most of the night,” she told Greldik. “There are Grolims about, so have your sailors stay alert. Put a few of the more sober ones on watch.”
“Sober, my Lady?” Greldik asked innocently.
“I’ve heard the singing coming from the crew’s quarters, Captain,” she said a bit primly, “Chereks don’t sing unless they’re drunk. Keep the lid on your ale-barrel tonight. Shall we go, Droblek?”
“At once, my Lady,” the fat man assented with a sly look at Greldik.
Garion felt a certain relief after they had gone. The strain of maintaining his rancor in Aunt Pol’s presence had begun to wear on him. He found himself in a difficult position. The horror and self-loathing which had gnawed at him since he had unleashed the dreadful fire upon Chamdar in the Wood of the Dryads had grown until he could scarcely bear it. He looked forward to each night with dread, for his dreams were always the same. Over and over again he saw Chamdar, his face burned away, pleading, “Master, have mercy.” And over and over again he saw the awful blue flame that had come from his own hand in answer to that agony. The hatred he had carried since Val Alorn had died in that flame. His revenge had been so absolute that there was no possible way he could evade or shift the responsibility for it. His outburst that morning had been directed almost more at himself than at Aunt Pol, He had called her a monster, but it was the monster within himself he hated. The dreadful catalogue of what she had suffered over uncounted years for him and the passion with which she had spoken – evidence of the pain his words had caused her – twisted searingly in his mind. He was ashamed, so ashamed that he could not even bear to look into the faces of his friends. He sat alone and vacant-eyed with Aunt Pol’s words thundering over and over in his mind.