Pawn Of Prophecy Part 25

"That won't be necessary, Merel," Barak said.

"I would not neglect any of my duties," she said.

"Leave it alone, Merel," Barak said. "You've made your point."

"Have I my Lord's permission then to withdraw?" she asked.

"You have," he said shortly.

"Perhaps you ladies would like to join me," Queen Islena said. "We'll cast auguries and see if we can predict the outcome of the hunt."

Queen Porenn, who stood somewhat behind the Queen of Cherek, rolled her eyes upward in resignation.

Queen Silar smiled at her.

"Let's go then," Barak said. "The boars are waiting."

"Sharpening their tusks, no doubt," Silk said.

Barak led them down to the red door of the armory where they were joined by a grizzled man with enormously broad shoulders who wore a bullhide s.h.i.+rt with metal plates sewn on it.

"This is Torvik," Barak introduced the grizzled man, "Anheg's chief huntsman. He knows every boar in the forest by his first name."

"My Lord Barak is overkind," Torvik said, bowing.

"How does one go about this hunting of boars, friend Torvik?" Durnik asked politely. "I've never done it before."

"It's a simple thing," Torvik explained. "I take my huntsmen into the forest and we drive the beasts with noise and shouting. You and the other hunters wait for them with these." He gestured at a rack of stout, broad-headed boar spears. "When the boar sees you standing in his way, he charges you and tries to kill you with his tusks, but instead you kill him with your spear."

"I see," Durnik said somewhat doubtfully. "It doesn't sound very complicated."

"We wear mail s.h.i.+rts, Durnik," Barak said. "Our hunters are hardly ever injured seriously."

" 'Hardly ever' has an uncomfortable ring of frequency to it, Barak," Silk said, fingering a mail s.h.i.+rt hanging on a peg by the door.

"No sport is very entertaining without a certain element of risk." Barak shrugged, hefting a boar spear.

"Have you ever thought of throwing dice instead?" Silk asked.

"Not with your dice, my friend." Barak laughed.

They began pulling on mail s.h.i.+rts while Torvik's huntsmen carried several armloads of boar spears out to the sleighs waiting in the snowy courtyard of the palace.

Garion found the mail s.h.i.+rt heavy and more than a little uncomfortable. The steel rings dug at his skin even through his heavy clothes, and every time he tried to s.h.i.+ft his posture to relieve the pressure of one of them, a half dozen others bit at him. The air was very cold as they climbed into the sleighs, and the usual fur robes seemed hardly adequate.

They drove through the narrow, twisting streets of Val Alorn toward the great west gate on the opposite side of the city from the harbor. The breath of the horses steamed in the icy air as they rode.

The ragged old blind woman from the temple stepped from a doorway as they pa.s.sed in the bright morning sun. "Hail, Lord Barak," she croaked. "Thy Doom is at hand. Thou shalt taste of it before this day's sun finds its bed."

Without a word Barak rose in his sleigh, took up a boar spear and cast it with deadly accuracy full at the old woman.

With surprising speed, the witch-woman swung her staff and knocked the spear aside in midair. "It will avail thee not to try to kill old Martje." She laughed scornfully. "Thy spear shall not find her, neither shall thy sword. Go thou, Barak. Thy Doom awaits thee." And then she turned toward the sleigh in which Garion sat beside the startled Durnik. "Hail, Lord of Lords," she intoned. "Thy peril this day shall be great, but thou shall survive it. And it is thy peril which shall reveal the mark of the beast which is the Doom of thy friend Barak." And then she bowed and scampered away before Barak could lay his hands on another spear.

"What was that about, Garion?" Durnik asked, his eyes still surprised.

"Barak says she's a crazy old blind woman," Garion said. "She stopped us when we arrived in Val Alorn after you and the others had already pa.s.sed."

"What was all that talk about Doom?" Durnik asked with a shudder.

"I don't know," Garion said. "Barak wouldn't explain it."

"It's a bad omen so early in the day," Durnik said. "These Chereks are a strange people."

Garion nodded in agreement.

Beyond the west gate of the city were open fields, sparkling white in the full glare of the morning sun. They crossed the fields toward the dark edge of the forest two leagues away with great plumes of powdery snow flying out behind their racing sleighs.

Farmsteads lay m.u.f.fled in snow along their track. The buildings were all made of logs and had high-peaked wooden roofs.

"These people seem to be indifferent to danger," Durnik said. "I certainly wouldn't want to live in a wooden house - what with the possibility of fire and all."

"It's a different country, after all," Garion said. "We can't expect the whole world to live the way we do in Sendaria."

"I suppose not," Durnik sighed, "but I'll tell you, Garion, I'm not very comfortable here. Some people just aren't meant for travel. Sometimes I wish we'd never left Faldor's farm."

"I do too, sometimes," Garion admitted, looking at the towering mountains that seemed to rise directly out of the forest ahead. "Someday it will be over, though, and we'll be able to go home again."

Durnik nodded and sighed once more.

By the time they had entered the woods, Barak had regained his temper and his good spirits, and he set about placing the hunters as if nothing had happened. He led Garion through the calf deep snow to a large tree some distance from the narrow sleigh track.

"This is a good place," he said. "There's a game trail here, and the boars may use it to try to escape the noise of Torvik and his huntsmen. When one comes, brace yourself and hold your spear with its point aimed at his chest. They don't see very well, and he'll run full into your spear before he even knows it's there. After that it's probably best to jump behind a tree. Sometimes the spear makes them very angry."

"What if I miss?" Garion asked.

"I wouldn't do that," Barak advised. "It's not a very good idea."

"I didn't mean that I was going to do it on purpose," Garion said. "Will he try to get away from me or what?"

"Sometimes they'll try to run," Barak said, "but I wouldn't count on it. More likely he'll try to split you up the middle with his tusks. At that point it's usually a good idea to climb a tree."

"I'll remember that," Garion said.

"I won't be far away if you have trouble," Barak promised, handing Garion a pair of heavy spears. Then he trudged back to his sleigh, and they all galloped off, leaving Garion standing alone under the large oak tree.

It was shadowy among the dark tree trunks, and bitingly cold. Garion walked around a bit through the snow, looking for the best place to await the boar. The trail Barak had pointed out was a beaten path winding back through the dark brush, and Garion found the size of the tracks imprinted in the snow on the path alarmingly large. The oak tree with low-spreading limbs began to look very inviting, but he dismissed that thought angrily. He was expected to stand on the ground and meet the charge of the boar, and he decided that he would rather die than hide in a tree like a frightened child.

The dry voice in his mind advised him that he spent far too much time worrying about things like that. Until he was grown, no one would consider him a man, so why should he go to all the trouble of trying to seem brave when it wouldn't do any good anyway?

The forest was very quiet now, and the snow m.u.f.fled all sounds. No bird sang, and there was only the occasional padded thump of snow sliding from overloaded branches to the earth beneath. Garion felt terribly alone. What was he doing here? What business had a good, sensible Sendarian boy here in the endless forests of Cherek, awaiting the charge of a savage wild pig with only a pair of unfamiliar spears for company?

What had the pig ever done to him? He realized that he didn't even particularly like the taste of pork.

He was some distance from the beaten forest track along which their sleighs had pa.s.sed, and he set his back to the oak tree, s.h.i.+vered, and waited.

He didn't realize how long he had been listening to the sound when he became fully aware of it. It was not the stamping, squealing rush of a wild boar he had been expecting but was, rather, the measured pace of several horses moving slowly along the snow-carpeted floor of the forest, and it was coming from behind him. Cautiously he eased his face around the tree.

Three riders, m.u.f.fled in furs, emerged from the woods on the far side of the sleigh-churned track. They stopped and sat waiting. Two of them were bearded warriors, little different from dozens of others Garion had seen in King Anheg's palace. The third man, however, had long, flaxencolored hair and wore no beard. His face had the sullen, pampered look of a sPolled child, although he was a man of middle years, and he sat his horse disdainfully as if the company of the other two somehow offended him.

After a time, the sound of another horse came from near the edge of the forest. Almost holding his breath, Garion waited. The other rider slowly approached the three who sat their horses in the snow at the edge of the trees. It was the sandy-bearded man in the green cloak whom Garion had seen creeping through the pa.s.sageways of King Anheg's palace two nights before.

"My Lord," the green-cloaked man said deferentially as he joined the other three.

"Where have you been?" the flaxen-haired man demanded.

"Lord Barak took some of his guests on a boar hunt this morning. His route was the same as mine, and I didn't want to follow too closely."

The n.o.bleman grunted sourly.

"We saw them deeper in the wood," he said. "Well, what have you heard?"

"Very little, my Lord. The kings are meeting with the old man and the woman in a guarded chamber. I can't get close enough to head what they're saying."

"I'm paying you good gold to get close enough. I have to know what they're saying. Go back to the palace and work out a way to hear what they're talking about."

"I'll try, my Lord," the green-cloaked man said, bowing somewhat stifliy.

"You'll do more than try," the flaxen-haired man snapped.

"As you wish, my Lord," the other said, starting to turn his horse.

"Wait," the n.o.bleman commended. "Were you able to meet with our friend?"

"Your friend, my Lord," the other corrected with distaste. "I met him, and we went to a tavern and talked a little."

"What did he say?"

"Nothing very useful. His kind seldom do."

"Will he meet us as he said he would?"

"He told me that he would. If you want to believe him, that's your affair."

The n.o.bleman ignored that.

"Who arrived with the King of the Sendars?"

"The old man and the woman, another old man-some Sendarian n.o.ble, I think, Lord Barak and a weasel-faced Drasnian, and another Sendar - a commoner of some sort."

"That's all? Wasn't there a boy with them as well?"

The spy shrugged.

"I didn't think the boy was important," he said.

"He's there then-in the palace?"

"He is, my Lord-an ordinary Sendarian boy of about fourteen, I'd judge. He seems to be some kind of servant to the woman."

"Very well. Go back to the palace and get close enough to that chamber to hear what the kings and the old man are saying."

"That may be very dangerous, my Lord."

"It'll be more dangerous if you don't. Now go, before that ape Barak comes back and finds you loitering here." He whirled his horse and, followed by his two warriors, plunged back into the forest on the far side of the snowy track that wound among the dark trees.

The man in the green cloak sat grimly watching for a moment, then he too turned his horse and rode back the way he had come.

Garion rose from his crouched position behind the tree. His hands were clenched so tightly around the shaft of his spear that they actually ached. This had gone entirely too far, he decided. The matter must be brought to someone's attention.

And then, some way ofi in the snowy depths of the wood, he heard the sound of hunting horns and the steely clash of swords ringing rhythmically on s.h.i.+elds. The huntsmen were coming, driving all the beasts of the forest before them.

He heard a crackling in the bushes, and a great stag bounded into view, his eyes wild with fright and his antlers flaring above his head. With three huge leaps he was gone. Garion trembled with excitement.

Then there was a squealing rush, and a red-eyed sow plunged down the trail followed by a half dozen scampering piglets. Garion stepped behind his tree and let them pa.s.s.

The next squeals were deeper and rang less with fright than with rage. It was the boar-Garion knew that before the beast even broke out of the heavy brush. When the boar appeared, Garion felt his heart quail.

This was no fat, sleepy porker, but rather a savage, infuriated beast. The horrid tusks jutting up past the flaring snout were yellow, and bits of twigs and bark clung to them, mute evidence that the boar would slash at anything in his path-trees, bushes or a Sendarian boy without sense enough to get out of his way.

Then a peculiar thing happened. As in the long-ago fight with Rundorig or in the scuffle with Brill's hirelings in the dark streets of Muros, Garion felt his blood begin to surge, and there was a wild ringing in his ears. He seemed to hear a defiant, shouted challenge and could scarcely accept the fact that it came from his own throat. He suddenly realized that he was stepping into the middle of the trail and crouching with his spear braced and leveled at the ma.s.sive beast.

The boar charged. Red-eyed and frothing from the mouth, with a deep-throated squeal of fury, he plunged at the waiting Garion. The powdery snow sprayed up from his churning hooves like foam from the prow of a s.h.i.+p.The snow crystals seemed to hang in the air, sparkling in a single ray of sunlight that chanced just there to reach the forest floor.

The shock as the boar hit the spear was frightful, but Garion's aim was good. The broad-bladed spearhead penetrated the coa.r.s.ely haired chest, and the white froth dripping from the boar's tusks suddenly became b.l.o.o.d.y foam. Garion felt himself driven back by the impact, his feet slipping out from under him, and then the shaft of his spear snapped like a dry twig and the boar was on him.

The first slas.h.i.+ng, upward-ripping blow of the boar's tusks took Garion full in the stomach, and he felt the wind whoosh out of his lungs. The second slash caught his hip as he tried to roll, gasping, out of the way. His chain-mail s.h.i.+rt deflected the tusks, saving him from being wounded, but the blows were stunning. The boar's third slash caught him in the back, and he was flung through the air and crashed into a tree. His eyes filled with s.h.i.+mmering light as his head banged against the rough bark.

And then Barak was there, roaring and charging through the s...o...b..t somehow it seemed not to be Barak. Garion's eyes, glazed from the shock of the blow to his head, looked uncomprehendingly at something that could not be true. It was Barak, there could be no doubt of that, but it was also something else. Oddly, as if somehow occupying the same s.p.a.ce as Barak, there was also a huge, hideous bear. The images of the two figures cras.h.i.+ng through the snow were superimposed, their movements identical as if in sharing the same s.p.a.ce they also shared the same thoughts.

Huge arms grasped up the wriggling, mortally wounded boar and crushed in upon it. Bright blood fountained from the boar's mouth, and the s.h.a.ggy, half man thing that seemed to be Barak and something else at the same time raised the dying pig and smashed it brutally to the ground. The man-thing lifted its awful face and roared in earthshaking triumph as the light slid away from Garion's eyes and he felt himself drifting down into the gray well of unconsciousness.

There was no way of knowing how much time pa.s.sed until he came to in the sleigh. Silk was applying a cloth filled with snow to the back of his neck as they flew across the glaring white fields toward Val Alorn.

"I see you've decided to live." Silk grinned at him.

"Where's Barak?" Garion mumbled groggily.

"In the sleigh behind us," Silk said, glancing back.