Enchanter's End Game Part 8

"It's a misleading term-,and I didn't say anything about winning or losing. "

"Isn't that what it means?"

"No. It means exactly what it says."

"What else could it mean?"

"You're getting more stubborn every day. Stop worrying so much about meanings and just do what you have to do. You almost had it right, back there. "

"If all you're going to do is talk in riddles, why bother with it at all? Why go to all the trouble of saying things that n.o.body's able to understand?"

"Because it's necessary to say it. The word determines the event. The word puts limits on the event and shapes it. Without the word, the event is merely a random happening. That's the whole purpose of what you call prophecy - to separate the significant from the random. "

"I don't understand."

"I didn't think you would, but you asked, after all. Now stop worrying about it. It has nothing to do with you."

Garion wanted to protest, but the voice was gone. The conversation, however, had made him feel a little better - not much, but a little. To take his mind off it, he pulled his horse in beside Belgarath's as they reentered the forest on the far side of the burn. "Exactly who are the Morindim, Grandfather?" he asked. "Everybody keeps talking about them as if they were terribly dangerous."

"They are," Belgarath replied, "but you can get through their country if you're careful."

"Are they on Torak's side?"

"The Morindim aren't on anybody's side. They don't even live in the same world with us."

"I don't follow that."

"The Morindim are like the Ulgos used to be - before UL accepted them. There were several groups of G.o.dless Ones. They all wandered off in various directions. The Ulgos went to the west, the Morindim went north. Other groups went south or east and disappeared."

"Why didn't they just stay where they were?"

"They couldn't. There's a kind of compulsion involved in the decisions of the G.o.ds. Anyway, the Ulgos finally found themselves a G.o.d. The Morindim didn't. The compulsion to remain separated from other people is still there. They live in that treeless emptiness up there beyond the north range - small nomadic bands, mostly."

"What did you mean when you said that they don't live in the same world with us?"

"The world is a pretty terrible place for a Morind - a demon-haunted place. They worship devils and they live more in dreams than they do in reality. Their society is dominated by the dreamers and the magicians."

"There aren't really any devils, are there?" Garion asked skeptically.

"Oh, yes. The devils are very real."

"Where do they come from?"

Belgarath shrugged. "I haven't any idea. They do exist, though, and they're completely evil. The Morindim control them by the use of magic."

"Magic? Is that different from what we do?"

"Quite a bit. We're sorcerers - at least that's what we're called. What we do involves the Will and the Word, but that's not the only way to do things."

"I don't quite follow."

"It's not really all that complicated, Garion. There are several ways to tamper with the normal order of things. Vordai's a witch. What she does involves the use of spirits - usually benign, mischievous sometimes - but not actually wicked. A magician uses devils - evil spirits."

"Isn't that sort of dangerous?"

Belgarath nodded. "Very dangerous," he replied. "The magician tries to control the demon with spells - formulas, incantations, symbols, mystic diagrams - that sort of thing. As long as he doesn't make any mistakes, the demon is his absolute slave and has to do what he tells it to do. The demon doesn't want to be a slave, so it keeps looking for a way to break the spell."

"What happens if it does?"

"It generally devours the magician on the spot. That happens rather frequently. If you lose your concentration or summon a demon too strong for you, you're in trouble."

"What did Beldin mean when he said that you weren't very good at magic?" Silk asked.

"I've never spent that much time trying to learn about it," the old sorcerer replied. "I have alternatives, after all, and magic is dangerous and not very dependable."

"Don't use it then," Silk suggested.

"I hadn't really planned to. Usually the threat of magic is enough to keep the Morindim at a distance. Actual confrontations are rather rare."

"I can see why."

"After we get through the north range, we'll disguise ourselves. There are a number of markings and symbols that will make the Morindim avoid us."

"That sounds promising."

"Of course we have to get there first," the old man pointed out. "Let's pick up the pace a bit. We've still got a long way to go." And he pushed his horse into a gallop.

Chapter Seven.

THEY RODE HARD for the better part of a week, moving steadily northward and avoiding the scattered settlements which dotted the Nadrak forest. Garion noticed that the nights grew steadily shorter; by the time they reached the foothills of the north range, darkness had virtually disappeared. Evening and morning merged into a few hours of luminous twilight as the sun dipped briefly below the horizon before bursting into view once more.

The north range marked the upper edge of the Nadrak forest. It was not so much a mountainous region as it was a string of peaks, a long finger of upthrusting terrain reaching out toward the east from the broad ranges that formed the spine of the continent. As they rode up a scarcely defined trail toward a saddle that stretched between two snowy peaks, the trees around them grew more stunted and finally disappeared entirely. Beyond that point, there would be no more trees. Belgarath stopped at the edge of one of these last groves and cut a half dozen long saplings.

The wind that came down off the peaks had a bitter chill to it and the arid smell of perpetual winter. When they reached the boulder-strewn summit, Garion looked out for the first time at the immense plain stretching below. The plain, unmarked by trees, was covered with tall gra.s.s that bent before the vagrant wind in long, undulating waves. Rivers wandered aimlessly across that emptiness, and a thousand shallow lakes and ponds scattered, blue and glistening under a northern sun, toward the horizon.

"How far does it reach?" Garion asked quietly.

"From here to the polar ice," Belgarath replied. "Several hundred leagues."

"And no one lives out there but the Morindim?"

"n.o.body wants to. For most of the year, it's buried in snow and darkness. You can go for six months up here without ever seeing the sun."

They rode down the rocky slope toward the plain and found a lowroofed, shallow cave at the base of the granite cliff that seemed to be the demarcation line between the mountains and the foothills. "We'll stop here for a while," Belgarath told them, reining in his tired mount. "We've got some preparations to make, and the horses need some rest."

They were all kept quite busy for the next several days while Belgarath radically altered their appearances. Silk set crude traps among the maze of rabbit runs twisting through the tall gra.s.s, and Garion roamed the foothills in search of certain tuberous roots and a peculiar smelling white flower. Belgarath sat at the mouth of the cave, fashioning various implements from his saplings. The roots Garion had gathered yielded a dark brown stain, and Belgarath carefully applied it to their skins. "The Morindim are dark-skinned," he explained as he sat painting Silk's arms and back with the stain. "Somewhat darker than Tolnedrans or Nyissans. This will wear off after a few weeks, but it will last long enough to get us through."

After he had stained all their skins into swarthiness, he crushed the odd-smelling flowers to produce a jet black ink. "Silk's hair is the right color already," he said, "and mine will get by, but Garion's just won't do." He diluted some of the ink with water and dyed Garion's sandy hair black. "That's better," he grunted when he had finished, "and there's enough left for the tattoos."

"Tattoos?" Garion asked, startled at the thought.

"The Morindim decorate themselves extensively."

"Will it hurt?"

"We're not really going to tattoo ourselves, Garion," Belgarath told him with a pained look. "They take too long to heal. Besides, I'm afraid your Aunt would go into hysterics if I took you back to her with designs engraved all over you. This ink will last long enough for us to get through Morindland. It will wear off-eventually."

Silk was sitting cross-legged in front of the cave, looking for all the world like a tailor as he sewed fresh rabbit pelts to their clothing.

"Won't they start to smell after a few days?" Garion asked, wrinkling his nose.

"Probably," Silk admitted, "but I don't have time to cure the pelts." Later, as Belgarath was carefully drawing the tattoos on their faces, he explained the guise they were going to a.s.sume. "Garion will be the quester," he said.

"What's that?" Garion asked.

"Don't move your face," Belgarath told him, frowning as he drew lines under Garion's eyes with a raven-feather quill. "The quest is a Morind ritual. It's customary for a young Morind of a certain rank to undertake a quest before he a.s.sumes a position of authority in his clan. You'll wear a white fur headband and carry that red spear I fixed up for you. It's ceremonial," he cautioned, "so don't try to stab anybody with it. That's very bad form."

"I'll remember that."

"We'll disguise your sword to look like some sort of relic or something. A magician might see past the Orb's suggestion that it's not there - depending on how good he is. One other thing - the quester is absolutely forbidden to speak under any circ.u.mstances, so keep your mouth shut. Silk will be your dreamer. He'll wear a white fur band on his left arm. Dreamers speak in riddles and gibberish for the most part, and they tend to fall into trances and have fits." He glanced over at Silk. "Do you think you can handle that?"

"Trust me," Silk replied, grinning.

"Not very likely," Belgarath grunted. "I'll be Garion's magician. I'll carry a staff with a horned skull on it that will make most Morindim avoid us."

"Most?" Silk asked quickly.

"It's considered bad manners to interfere with a quest, but it happens now and then." The old man looked critically at Garion's tattoos. "Good enough," he said and turned to Silk with his quill.

When it was all done, the three of them were scarcely recognizable. The markings the old man had carefully drawn on their arms and faces were not pictures so much as they were designs. Their faces had been changed into hideous devil masks, and the exposed parts of their bodies were covered with symbols etched in black ink. They wore fur-covered trousers and vests and bone necklaces clattered about their necks. Their stained arms and shoulders were bared and intricately marked.

Then Belgarath went down into the valley lying just below the cave, seeking something. It did not take his probing mind long to find what he needed. As Garion watched with revulsion, the old man casually violated a grave. He dug up a grinning human skull and carefully tapped the dirt out of it. "I'll need some deer horns," he told Garion. "Not too large and fairly well-matched." He squatted, fierce-looking in his furs and tattoos, and began to scrub at the skull with handfuls of dry sand.

There were weather-bleached horns lying here and there in the tall gra.s.s, since the deer of the region shed their antlers each winter. Garion gathered a dozen or so and returned to the cave to find his grandfather boring a pair of holes in the top of the skull. He critically examined the horns Garion had brought him, selected a pair of them and screwed them down into the holes. The grating sound of horn against bone set Garion's teeth on edge. "What do you think?" Belgarath asked, holding up the horned skull.

"It's grotesque," Garion shuddered.

"That was the general idea," the old man replied. He attached the skull firmly to the top of a long staff, decorated it with several feathers and then rose to his feet. "Let's pack up and leave," he said.

They rode down through the treeless foothills and out into the bending, waist-high gra.s.s as the sun swung down toward the southwestern horizon to dip briefly behind the peaks of the range they had just crossed. The smell of the uncured pelts Silk had sewn to their clothing was not very pleasant, and Garion did his best not to look at the hideously altered skull surmounting Belgarath's staff as they rode.

"We're being watched," Silk mentioned rather casually after an hour or so of riding.

"I was sure we would be," Belgarath replied. "Just keep going."

Their first meeting with the Morindim came just as the sun rose. They had paused on the sloping gravel bank of a meandering stream to water their mounts, and a dozen or so fur-clad riders, their dark faces tattooed into devil masks, cantered up to the opposite bank and stopped. They did not speak, but looked hard at the identifying marks Belgarath had so painstakingly contrived. After a brief, whispered consultation, they turned their horses and rode back away from the stream. Several minutes later, one came galloping back, carrying a bundle wrapped in a fox skin. He paused, dropped the bundle on the bank of the stream, and then rode off again without looking back.

"What was that all about?" Garion asked.

"The bundle's a gift-of sorts," Belgarath answered. "It's an offering to any devils who might be accompanying us. Go pick it up."

"What's in it?"

"A bit of this, a bit of that. I wouldn't open it, if I were you. You're forgetting that you're not supposed to talk."

"There's n.o.body around," Garion replied, turning his head this way and that, looking for any sign of their being watched.

"Don't be too sure of that," the old man replied. "There could be a hundred of them hiding in the gra.s.s. Go pick up the gift and we'll move along. They're polite enough, but they'll be a lot happier when we take our devils out of their territory."

They rode on across the flat, featureless plain with a cloud of flies, drawn by the smell of their untanned fur garments, plaguing them. Their next meeting, several days later, was less congenial. They had moved into a hilly region where huge, rounded, white boulders rose out of the gra.s.s and where s.h.a.ggy-coated wild oxen with great, sweeping horns grazed. A high overcast had moved in, and the gray sky diffused the light, making the brief twilight that marked the pa.s.sage of one day into the next an only slightly perceptible darkening. They were riding down a gentle slope toward a large lake, which lay like a sheet of lead under the cloudy sky, when there suddenly arose from the tall gra.s.s all around them tattooed and fur-clad warriors holding long spears and short bows that appeared to be made of bone.

Garion reined in sharply and looked at Belgarath for instruction. "Just look straight at them," his grandfather told him quietly, "and remember that you're not permitted to speak."

"More of them coming," Silk said tersely, jerking his chin toward the crest of a nearby hill where perhaps a dozen Morindim, mounted on paint-decorated ponies, were approaching at a walk.

"Let me do the talking," Belgarath said.

"Gladly."

The man in the lead of the mounted group was burlier than most of his companions, and the black tattooing on his face had been outlined with red and blue, marking him as a man of some significance in his clan and making the devil mask of his features all the more hideous. He carried a large wooden club, painted with strange symbols and inlaid with rows of sharp teeth taken from various animals. The way he carried it indicated that it was more a badge of office than a weapon. He rode without a saddle and with a single bridle strap. He pulled his pony to a stop perhaps thirty yards away. "Why have you come into the lands of the Weasel Clan?" he demanded abruptly. His accent was strange and his eyes were flat with hostility.

Belgarath drew himself up indignantly. "Surely the Headman of the Weasel Clan has seen the quest-mark before," he replied coldly. "We have no interest in the lands of the Weasel Clan, but follow the commands of the Devil-Spirit of the Wolf Clan in the quest he has laid upon us."

"I have not heard of the Wolf Clan," the Headman replied. "Where are their lands?"

"To the west," Belgarath replied. "We have traveled for two waxings and wanings of the Moon-Spirit to reach this place."

The Headman seemed impressed by that.

A Morind with long white braids and with a thin, dirty-looking beard drew his pony in beside that of the Headman. In his right hand he carried a staff surmounted by the skull of a large bird. The gaping beak of the skull had been decorated with teeth, giving it a ferocious appearance. "What is the name of the Devil-Spirit of the Wolf Clan?" he demanded. "I may know him."

"That is doubtful, Magician of the Weasel Clan," Belgarath answered politely. "He seldom goes far from his people. In any case, I cannot speak his name, since he has forbidden it to any but the dreamers."

"Can you say what his aspect is and his attributes?" the whitebraided magician asked.

Silk made a long-gurgling sound in the back of his throat, stiffened in his saddle and rolled his eyes gruesomely back in his head until only the whites showed. With a convulsive, jerking motion, he thrust both arms into the air. "Beware the Devil Agrinja, who stalks unseen behind us," he intoned in a hollow, oracular voice. "I have seen his three-eyed face and his hundred-fanged mouth in my dreams. The eye of mortal man may not behold him, but his seven-clawed hands reach out even now to rend apart all who would stand in the path of his chosen quester, the spear-bearer of the Wolf Clan. I have seen him feed in my nightmares. The ravener approaches and he hungers for man-meat. Flee his hunger." He shuddered, dropping his arms and slumping forward in his saddle as if suddenly exhausted.

"You've been here before, I see," Belgarath muttered under his breath. "Try to restrain your creativity, though. Remember that I might have to produce what you dream up."

Silk cast him a sidelong wink. His description of the Devil had made a distinct impression on the Morindim. The mounted men looked about nervously, and those standing in the waist-high gra.s.s moved involuntarily closer together, grasping their weapons in trembling hands.

Then a thin Morind with a white fur band around his left arm pushed through the cl.u.s.ter of frightened warriors. His right leg ended in a clubfoot, and he lurched grotesquely as he walked. He fixed Silk with a glare of pure hatred, then threw both hands wide, quivering and jerking. His back arched and he toppled over, threshing in the gra.s.s in the throes of an apparent seizure. He went completely stiff and then he started to speak. "The Devil-Spirit of the Weasel Clan, dread Horja, speaks to me. He demands to know why the Devil Agrinja sends his quester into the lands of the Weasel Clan. The Devil Horja is too awful to look upon. He has four eyes and a hundred and ten teeth, and each of his six hands has eight claws. He feeds on the bellies of men and he hungers."