The Seeress of Kell Read online

  ‘I thought I’d nose around a bit,’ the little thief said innocently. ‘It never hurts to know what you’re up against.’

  ‘All right, but be careful – and don’t let anything slip into your pockets by mistake. We’re walking on some fairly shaky ground here. If someone sees you pilfering, we could all get into a great deal of trouble.’

  ‘Belgarath,’ Silk replied in an offended tone, ‘no one has ever seen me steal anything.’ And then he went out muttering to himself.

  ‘Is he trying to say that he doesn’t steal?’ Zakath asked.

  ‘No,’ Eriond replied. ‘Only that no one ever sees him doing it.’ He smiled gently. ‘He has a few bad habits, but we’ve been trying to break him of them.’ It was the first time in quite a while that Garion had actually heard his young friend say anything. Eriond had grown increasingly more and more reticent – one might even say withdrawn. It was troubling. He had always been a strange boy, and he seemed to be able to perceive things that none of the rest of them could. A chill came over Garion as he remembered the fateful words of Cyradis at Rheon, ‘Thy quest will be fraught with great peril, Belgarion, and one of thy companions shall lose his life in the course of it.’

  And then, almost as if his memory had summoned her, the blindfolded Seeress of Kell emerged from the room in which the ladies had been conferring with their dressmakers. Immediately behind her came Ce’Nedra, clad only in a very short chemise. ‘It’s a perfectly suitable gown, Cyradis,’ she was protesting.

  ‘Suitable for thee perhaps, Queen of Riva,’ the Seeress replied, ‘but such finery is not for me.’

  ‘Ce’Nedra!’ Garion exclaimed in a shocked gasp, ‘You’re not dressed!’

  ‘Oh, bother that!’ she snapped. ‘Everyone here has seen undressed women before. I’m just trying to reason with my mystical young friend here. Cyradis, if you don’t put on the gown, I’ll be very cross with you – and we really need to do something with your hair.’

  The Seeress unerringly took the tiny queen in her arms and embraced her fondly. ‘Dear, dear Ce’Nedra,’ she said gently, ‘thy heart is larger than thyself, and thy concern doth fill mine as well. I am content, however, in this simple garb. Mayhap in time my tastes will change, and then will I gladly submit to thy gentle ministrations.’

  ‘There’s absolutely no talking to her,’ Ce’Nedra said, throwing her arms in the air. Then, with a charming flirt of the hem of her chemise, she stormed back into the room from which the two of them had emerged.

  ‘You ought to feed her more,’ Beldin told Garion. ‘She’s really very skinny, you know.’

  ‘I sort of like her the way she is,’ Garion replied. He looked at Cyradis. ‘Will you sit, Holy Seeress?’

  ‘If I may.’

  ‘Of course.’ He waved off Toth’s almost instinctive move to aid his mistress and guided the girl to a comfortable chair.

  ‘I thank thee, Belgarion,’ she said. ‘Thou art as kind as thou art brave.’ She smiled, and it was like the sun coming up. She touched one hand to her hair. ‘Doth this really look so ugly?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s just fine, Cyradis,’ he told her. ‘Ce’Nedra sometimes exaggerates. and she has an absolute passion for making people over – me, usually.’

  ‘And dost thou mind her efforts, Belgarion?’

  ‘I suppose not. I’d probably miss them if she didn’t try, at least.’

  ‘Thou art caught in the snare of love, King Belgarion. Thou art a mighty sorcerer, but methinks thy little queen hath a more powerful sorcery yet, for she holds thee in the palm of that tiny hand.’

  ‘That’s true, I suppose, but I don’t really mind all that much.’

  ‘If this gets any more cloying, I think I’ll throw up,’ Beldin said gruffly.

  And then Silk returned.

  ‘Anything?’ Belgarath asked.

  ‘Naradas beat you to the library. I stopped by there, and the man in charge—’

  ‘Librarian,’ Belgarath corrected absently.

  ‘Whatever. Anyway, he said that as soon as Naradas arrived, he ransacked the library.’

  ‘So that’s it, then,’ Belgarath said. ‘Zandramas isn’t on the island. She sent Naradas here to do her looking for her, it seems. Is he still looking?’

  ‘Apparently not.

  ‘That means he’s found it, then.’

  ‘And probably destroyed it to keep us from getting a look at it,’ Beldin added.

  ‘Nay, gentle Beldin,’ Cyradis said. ‘The chart ye seek doth still exist, but it is not in the place where ye propose to seek.’

  ‘I don’t suppose you could give us a few hints?’ Belgarath asked her.

  She shook her head.

  ‘I didn’t think so.’

  ‘You said the chart,’ Beldin said, approaching the subject obliquely. ‘Does that mean there’s only one copy?’

  She nodded.

  The dwarf shrugged. ‘Oh, well,’ he said. ‘Looking for it gives us something to do while we’re waiting for our two heroes here to go out and start denting other people’s armor.’

  ‘That brings up a point,’ Garion said. He looked at Zakath. ‘You’re not particularly familiar with the lance, are you?’

  ‘Not really, no.’

  ‘Tomorrow morning, then, we’ll have to go some place so that I can give you some instruction.’

  ‘That seems like a sensible plan to me.’

  The two of them arose early the following morning and left the palace on horseback. ‘I think we’d better go out of town,’ Garion said. ‘There’s a practice field near the palace, but there’ll be other knights there. I’m not trying to be offensive, but the first few passes are usually very awkward. We’re supposed to be great knights, so let’s not let anybody get the idea that you’re totally inept.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Zakath said drily.

  ‘Do you enjoy public embarrassment?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Let’s do it my way, then.’

  They rode out of the city and to a meadow a few miles away.

  ‘You’ve got two shields,’ Zakath noted. ‘Is that customary.’

  ‘The other one is for our opponent.’

  ‘Opponent?’

  ‘A stump or a tree probably. We need a target.’ Garion reined in. ‘Now,’ he began, ‘we’re going to be involved in a formal tournament. The idea is not to kill anybody, since that’s considered bad form. We’ll probably be using blunted lances. That helps to keep down the fatalities.’

  ‘But sometimes people do get killed, don’t they?’

  ‘It’s not unheard of. The whole purpose of a formal joust is to knock the other fellow off his horse. You ride at him and aim your lance at the center of his shield.’

  ‘And he does the same thing to me, I suppose.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘It sounds painful.’

  ‘It is. After a few passes, you’ll probably be bruised from head to hip.’

  ‘And they do this for entertainment?’

  ‘Not entirely. It’s a form of competition. They do it to find out who’s the best.’

  ‘Now that I can understand.’

  ‘I thought the notion might appeal to you.’

  They buckled the spare shield to a springy lower limb of a cedar tree. ‘That’s about the right height,’ Garion said. ‘I’ll make the first couple of passes. Watch very closely. Then you can try.’

  Garion had become quite proficient with the lance and he hit the shield squarely on both passes.

  ‘Why do you stand up at the last second?’ Zakath asked him.

  ‘I wasn’t actually standing so much as leaning forward. The idea is to brace your feet in the stirrups, lean forward, and hold your body rigid. That way the weight of the horse is added to your own.’

  ‘Clever. Let me try it.’

  Zakath completly missed the shield on his first attempt. ‘What did I do wrong?’ he asked.

  ‘When you raised up and leaned forward, the point of your lance
dipped. You have to adjust your point of aim.’

  ‘Oh, I see. All right, let me try it again.’ On the next pass he struck the shield a glancing blow that made it spin around the limb. ‘Any better?’ he asked.

  Garion shook his head. ‘You’d have killed him. When you hit the top of the shield that way, your lance is deflected upward, and it drives right into his visor. It breaks his neck.’

  ‘I’ll try it again.’

  By noon, Zakath had made considerable progress.

  ‘That’s enough for today,’ Garion said. ‘It’s starting to get hot out here.’

  ‘I’m still all right,’ Zakath objected.

  ‘I was thinking about your horse.’

  ‘Oh. He is lathered a bit, isn’t he?’

  ‘More than just a bit. Besides, I’m starting to get hungry.’

  The day of the tourney dawned clear and sunny, and throngs of the citizens of Dal Perivor streamed through the streets in bright-colored clothing toward the field where the festivities were to take place. ‘A thought just occurred to me,’ Garion said to Zakath as they left the palace. ‘You and I aren’t really interested in who gets proclaimed the winner of the tournament, are we?’

  ‘I don’t follow you.’

  ‘We have something much more important to do, and assorted broken bones would probably hinder us. We make a few passes and unhorse a few knights and then allow ourselves to get knocked out of the saddle. We’ll have satisfied the requirements of honor without putting ourselves in any serious danger of injury.’

  ‘Are you suggesting that we deliberately lose?’ Zakath asked incredulously.

  ‘Approximately, yes.’

  ‘I’ve never lost a contest of any kind in my whole life.’

  ‘You’re starting to sound more and more like Mandorallen every day,’ Garion sighed.

  ‘Besides,’ Zakath went on, ‘I think you’re overlooking something. We’re supposed to be mighty knights embarked on a noble quest. If we don’t try our very best, Naradas will fill the king’s ears with all sorts of innuendo and suspicion. If we win, on the other hand, we pull his teeth.’

  ‘Win?’ Garion snorted. ‘You’ve learned very quickly in the past week or so, but the knights we’ll be facing have been practicing all their lives. I don’t think we’re in any real danger of winning.’

  ‘A compromise then?’ Zakath asked slyly.

  ‘What have you got in mind?’

  ‘If we win the tournament, there’s almost nothing the king won’t grant us, right?’

  ‘That’s usually the way it works.’

  ‘Wouldn’t he be more than happy to let Belgarath have a look at that chart? I’m sure he knows where it is – or he can compel Naradas to produce it.’

  ‘You’ve got a point there, I suppose.’

  ‘You’re a sorcerer. You can fix it so that we win, can’t you?’

  ‘Wouldn’t that be cheating?’

  ‘You’re very inconsistent, Garion. First you suggest that we deliberately fall off our horses, and that’s cheating, too, isn’t it? I’ll tell you what, my friend. I’m the Emperor of Mallorea. You have my imperial permission to cheat. Now, is there a way you can do it?’

  Garion thought about it and then remembered something. ‘Do you remember the time I told you that I had to stop a war in order to get Mandorallen and Nerina safely married?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘This is how I did it. Most lances break sooner or later. By the time this tournament is over, the lists will be ankle-deep in splinters. On the day I stopped that war, though, my lance would not break, and I sort of surrounded it with pure force. It was very effective. Nobody, not even the best knights in all of Mimbre, stayed on his horse that day.’

  ‘I thought you said you conjured up a thunderstorm.’

  ‘That was a little later. The two armies were facing each other across an open field. Not even Mimbrates would charge across a field where lightning was blowing big holes in the turf. They’re not that stupid.’

  ‘You’ve had a remarkable career, my young friend,’ Zakath laughed.

  ‘I had a bit of fun that day,’ Garion admitted. ‘It’s not too often that one man gets to bully two complete armies. I got into a great deal of trouble about it later, though. When you tamper with the weather, you can’t be sure just what the consequences are going to be. Belgarath and Beldin spent the next six months running around the world quieting things down. Grandfather was very cross when he got back. He called me all sorts of names, and ‘blockhead’ was about the mildest.’

  ‘You mentioned something called “lists”. What are they?’

  ‘They sink posts into the ground and fasten a long, heavy pole to the tops of them. The pole is about shoulder high on a horse. The knights who are jousting ride towards each other on opposite sides of the pole. I think the idea is to keep the horses from running into each other. Good horses are expensive. Oh, that reminds me of something else. We’re going to have a certain advantage in this anyway. Our horses are quite a bit bigger and stronger than the local ones.’

  ‘That’s true, isn’t it? I’ll still feel more comfortable if you cheat, though.’

  ‘I probably will, too. If we were to do it legitimately, we’d still pick up so many bruises that neither one of us would be able to get out of bed for a week, and we’ve got an appointment – if we can ever find out where it’s supposed to take place.’

  The tournament field was gaily decorated with bright-colored buntings and flapping pennons. A stand had been erected for the king, the ladies of the court, and members of the gentry too old to participate on the field. The commoners stood on the far side of the lists, watching avidly. A pair of gaily dressed jugglers were entertaining the crowd while the knights made their preparations. Brightly striped pavilions stood at either end of the lists – places for knights to have their armor repaired and places where the injured could suffer out of sight, since watching people groaning and writhing tends to dampen an otherwise enjoyable afternoon.

  ‘I’ll be right back,’ Garion told his friend. ‘I want to talk with Grandfather for a moment.’ He dismounted and crossed the bright green turf to the end of the stand where Belgarath sat. The old man was wearing a snowy white robe and a disgruntled expression.

  ‘Elegant,’ Garion said.

  ‘It’s somebody’s idea of a joke,’ Belgarath said.

  ‘Your obvious antiquity shines in your face, old friend,’ Silk said impudently from just behind him. ‘People instinctively want to make you as dignified-looking as possible.’

  ‘Do you mind? What is it, Garion?’

  ‘Zakath and I are going to cheat a little. If we win, the king will grant us a boon – like letting you look at that chart.’

  ‘That might actually work, you know.’

  ‘How do you cheat in a tournament?’ Silk asked.

  ‘There are ways.’

  ‘Are you sure you’ll win?’

  ‘I can almost guarantee it.’

  Silk jumped to his feet.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Belgarath demanded.

  ‘I want to lay a few wagers.’ And the little man scurried off.

  ‘He never changes,’ Belgarath observed.

  ‘One thing, though. Naradas is here. He’s a Grolim, so he’ll know what we’re doing. Please, Grandfather, keep him off my neck. I don’t want him tampering with what I’m doing at some crucial moment.’

  ‘I’ll handle him,’ Belgarath said bleakly. ‘Go out there and do your best, but be careful.’

  ‘Yes, Grandfather.’ Garion turned and went back to where Zakath waited with their horses.

  ‘We’ll stand in the second or third rank,’ Garion said. ‘It’s customary to let the winners of previous tournaments joust first. It makes us look properly modest, and it’ll give you a chance to see how to approach the lists.’ He looked around. ‘We’ll have to surrender our lances before we joust; and they’ll give us each one of those blunted ones from that rack over there. I’l
l take care of them as soon as we get our hands on them.’

  ‘You’re a devious young man, Garion. What’s Kheldar doing? He’s running through those stands like a pickpocket hard at work.’

  ‘As soon as he heard what we’re planning, he went out to place a few wagers.’

  Zakath suddenly burst out laughing. ‘I wish I’d known. I’d have given him some money to wager for me as well.’

  ‘Getting it back from him might have been a little difficult, though.’

  Their friend, Baron Astellig, was unhorsed on the second pass. ‘Is he all right?’ Zakath asked with concern.

  ‘He’s still moving,’ Garion said. ‘He probably just broke one of his legs.’

  ‘At least we won’t have to fight him. I hate hurting friends. Of course, I don’t have all that many friends.’

  ‘You probably have more than you realize.’

  After the third pass of the front rank, Zakath said, ‘Garion, have you ever studied fencing?’

  ‘Alorns don’t use light swords, Zakath. Except for the Algars.’

  ‘I know, but the theory is similar. If you twist your wrist or elbow at the last instant, you could knock your opponent’s lance aside. Then you could correct your aim and smash into the center of his shield when his lance is completely out of position. He wouldn’t have a chance at that point, would he?’

  Garion considered it. ‘It’s highly unorthodox,’ he said dubiously.

  ‘So’s using sorcery, isn’t it? Would it work?’

  ‘Zakath, you’re using a fifteen-foot lance, and it weighs about two pounds a foot. You’d need arms like a gorilla to move it around that fast.’

  ‘Not really. You don’t really have to move it that far back and forth. Just a tap would do. Can I try it?’

  ‘It’s your idea. I’ll be here to pick you up if it doesn’t work.’

  ‘I knew I could count on you.’ Zakath’s voice sounded excited – even boyish.

  ‘Oh, Gods,’ Garion murmured almost in despair.

  ‘Anything wrong?’ Zakath asked.

  ‘No, I guess not. Go ahead and try it, if you feel that you have to.’

  ‘What difference does it make? I can’t get hurt, can I?’

  ‘I wouldn’t go entirely that far. Do you see that?’ Garion pointed at a knight who had just been unhorsed and had come down on his back across the center pole of the lists, scattering bits and pieces of his armor in all directions.