Mister Wolf squinted at the sky and then at the mountainside ahead. The steep slope was covered with stunted trees, and the timberline lay not far above them. “We have to go around this and then down the other side. It’s only a couple of miles. Let’s go ahead.”
Silk nodded and led out again.
They rounded the shoulder of the mountain and looked down into a deep gorge that separated them from the peak they had crossed two days before. The rain had slackened with the approach of evening, and Garion could see the other side of the gorge clearly. It was not more than half a mile away, and his eyes caught a movement near the rim. “What’s that?” He pointed.
Mister Wolf brushed the ice out of his beard. “I was afraid of that.”
“What?”
“It’s an Algroth.”
With a shudder of revulsion, Garion remembered the scaly, goatfaced apes that had attacked them in Arendia. “Hadn’t we better run?” he asked.
“It can’t get to us,” Wolf replied. “The gorge is at least a mile deep. The Grolims have turned their beasts loose, though. It’s something we’re going to have to watch out for.” He motioned for them to continue.
Faintly, distorted by the wind that blew perpetually down the yawning gorge, Garion could hear the barking yelps of the Algroth on the far side as it communicated with the rest of its pack. Soon a dozen of the loathsome creatures were scampering along the rocky rim of the gorge, barking to one another and keeping pace with the party as they rode around the steep mountain face toward a shallow draw on the far side. The draw led away from the gorge; after a mile, they stopped for the night in the shelter of a grove of scrubby spruces.
It was colder the next morning and still cloudy, but the rain had stopped. They rode on back down to the mouth of the draw and continued following the rim of the gorge. The face on the other side fell away in a sheer, dizzying drop for thousands of feet to the tiny-looking ribbon of the river at the bottom. The Algroths still kept pace with them, barking and yelping and looking across with a dreadful hunger. There were other things as well, dimly seen back among the trees on the other side. One of them, huge and shaggy, seemed even to have a human body, but its head was the head of a beast. A herd of swift-moving animals galloped along the fir rim, manes and tails tossing.
“Look,” Ce’Nedra exclaimed, pointing. “Wild horses.”
“They’re not horses,” Hettar said grimly.
“They look like horses.”
“They may look like it, but they aren’t.”
“Hrulgin,” Mister Wolf said shortly.
“What’s that?”
“A Hrulga is a four-legged animal-like a horse-but it has fangs instead of teeth, and clawed feet instead of hooves.”
“But that would mean-” The princess broke off, her eyes wide.
“Yes. They’re meat-eaters.”
She shuddered. “How dreadful.”
“That gorge is getting narrower, Belgarath,” Barak growled. “I’d rather not have any of those things on the same side with us.”
“We’ll be all right. As I remember, it narrows down to about a hundred yards and then widens out again. They won’t be able to get across.”
“I hope your memory hasn’t failed you.”
The sky above looked ragged, tattered by a gusty wind. Vultures soared and circled over the gorge, and ravens flapped from tree to tree, croaking and squawking to one another. Aunt Pol watched the birds with a look of stern disapproval, but said nothing.
They rode on. The gorge grew narrower, and soon they could see the brutish faces of the Algroths on the other side clearly. When the Hrulgin, manes tossing in the wind, opened their mouths to whinny to each other, their long, pointed teeth were plainly visible.
Then, at the narrowest point of the gorge, a party of mail-skirted Murgos rode out onto the opposite precipice. Their horses were lathered from hard riding, and the Murgos themselves were gaunt-faced and travel-stained. They stopped and waited until Garion and his friends were opposite them. At the very edge, staring first across the gorge and then down at the river far below, stood Brill.
“What kept you?” Silk called in a bantering tone that had a hard edge just below the surface. “We thought perhaps you’d gotten lost.”
“Not very likely, Kheldar,” Brill replied. “How did you get across to that side?”
“You go back that way about four days’ ride,” Silk shouted, pointing back the way they had come. “If you look very carefully, you’ll find the canyon that leads up here. It shouldn’t take you more than a day or two to find it.”
One of the Murgos pulled a short bow out from beneath his left leg and set an arrow to it. He pointed the arrow at Silk, drew back the string and released. Silk watched the arrow calmly as it fell down into the gorge, spinning in a long, slow-looking spiral. “Nice shot,” he called.
“Don’t be an idiot,” Brill snapped at the Murgo with the bow. He looked back at Silk. “I’ve heard a great deal about you, Kheldar,” he said.
“One has developed a certain reputation,” Silk replied modestly.
“One of these days I’ll have to find out if you’re as good as they say.”
“That particular curiosity could be the first symptom of a fatal disease.”
“For one of us, at least.”
“I look forward to our next meeting, then,” Silk told him. “I hope you’d excuse us, my dear fellow – pressing business, you know.”
“Keep an eye out behind you, Kheldar,” Brill threatened. “One day I’ll be there.”
“I always keep an eye out behind me, Kordoch,” Silk called back, “so don’t be too surprised if I’m waiting for you. It’s been wonderful chatting with you. We’ll have to do it again-soon.”
The Murgo with the bow shot another arrow. It followed his first into the gorge.
Silk laughed and led the party away from the brink of the precipice. “What a splendid fellow,” he said as they rode away. He looked up at the murky sky overhead. “And what an absolutely beautiful day.”
The clouds thickened and grew black as the day wore on. The wind picked up until it howled among the trees. Mister Wolf led them away from the gorge which separated them from Brill and his Murgos, moving steadily toward the northeast.
They set up for the night in a rock-strewn basin just below the timberline. Aunt Pol prepared a meal of thick stew; as soon as they had finished eating, they let the fire go out. “There’s no point in lighting beacons for them,” Wolf observed.
“They can’t get across the gorge, can they?” Durnik asked.
“It’s better not to take chances,” Wolf replied. He walked away from the last few embers of the dying fire and looked out into the darkness. On an impulse. Garion followed him.
“How much farther is it to the Vale, Grandfather?” he asked.
“About seventy leagues,” the old man told him.
“We can’t make very good time up here in the mountains.”
“The weather’s getting worse, too.”
“I noticed that.”
“What happens if we get a real snowstorm?”
“We take shelter until it blows over.”
“What if-”
“Garion, I know it’s only natural, but sometimes you sound a great deal like your Aunt. She’s been saying ‘what if’ to me since she was about seventeen. I’ve gotten terribly tired of it over the years.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. Just don’t do it any more.”
Overhead in the pitch-blackness of the blustery sky, there was a sudden, ponderous flap as of enormous wings.
“What’s that?” Garion asked, startled.
“Be still!” Wolf stood with his face turned upward. There was another great flap. “Oh, that’s sad.”
“What?”
“I thought the poor old brute had been dead for centuries. Why don’t they leave her alone?”
“What is it?”
“It doesn’t have a name. It’s big and stupid and ugly. The Gods only made three of them, and the two males killed each other during the first mating season. She’s been alone for as long as I can remember.”
“It sounds huge,” Garion said, listening to the enormous wings beat overhead and peering up into the darkness. “What does it look like?”
“She’s as big as a house, and you really wouldn’t want to see her.”
“Is she dangerous?”
“Very dangerous, but she can’t see too well at night.” Wolf sighed. “The Grolims must have chased her out of her cave and put her to hunting for us. Sometimes they go too far.”
“Should we tell the others about her?”
“It would only worry them. Sometimes it’s better not to say anything.”
The great wings flapped again, and there was a long, despairing cry from the darkness, a cry filled with such aching loneliness that Garion felt a great surge of pity welling up in him.