Castle of Wizardry

for hours; finally, well past midnight, he rose, pulled his cloak about him and padded on stockinged feet to see if his friend had made it to bed.
    Silk had not. He still sat in the same chair. His tankard, unnoticed, had spilled, and he sat with his elbows in a puddle of ale and his face in his hands. Not far away, her face unreadable, sat the weary little blond queen of Drasnia. As Garion watched from the doorway, a muffled sound came from between Silk's hands. With a gentle, almost tender expression, Queen Porenn rose, came around the table and put her arms about his head, drawing him to her. With a despairing cry Silk clung to her, weeping openly like a hurt child.
    Queen Porenn looked across the little man's shaking head at Garion. Her face quite clearly revealed that she was aware of Silk's feelings for her. Her look was one of helpless compassion for this man of whom she was fond but not in the way he wished - and combined with that was a deep sympathy for the suffering his visit with his mother had caused him.
    Silently Garion and the Queen of Drasnia stood looking at each other. Speech was unnecessary; they both understood. When at last Porenn did speak, her tone was curiously matter-of fact. "I think you can put him to bed now," she said. "Once he's able to cry, the worst is usually over."
    The next morning they left the palace and joined an east-bound caravan. The Drasnian moors beyond Boktor were desolate. The North Caravan Route wound through low, rolling hills covered with sparse vegetation and scanty grass. Although it was the middle of spring, there seemed to be a sere quality to the moors, as if the seasons only lightly touched them; the wind, sweeping down from the polar ice, still had the smell of winter in it.
    Silk rode in silence, his eyes on the ground, though whether from grief or from the aftereffects of the ale he had drunk, Garion could not guess. Belgarath was also quiet, and the three of them rode with only the sound of the harness bells of a Drasnian merchant's mules for companionship.
    About noon, Silk shook himself and looked around - his eyes finally alert, though still a bit bloodshot. "Did anybody think to bring something to drink?" he asked.
    "Didn't you get enough last night?" Belgarath replied.
    "That was for entertainment. What I need now is something therapeutic."
    "Water?" Garion suggested.
    "I'm thirsty, Garion, not dirty."
    "Here." Belgarath handed the suffering man a wineskin. "But don't overdo it."
    "Trust me," Silk said, taking a long drink. He shuddered and made a face. "Where did you buy this?" he inquired. "It tastes like somebody's been boiling old shoes in it."
    "You don't have to drink it."
    "I'm afraid I do." Silk took another drink, then restoppered the wineskin and handed it back. He looked sourly around at the moors. "Hasn't changed much," he observed. "Drasnia has very little to reoommend it, I'm afraid. It's either too wet or too dry." He shivered in the chilly wind. "Are either of you aware of the fact that there's nothing between us and the pole to break the wind but an occasional stray reindeer?"
    Garion began to relax. Silk's sallies and comments grew broader and more outrageous as they rode through the afternoon. By the time the caravan stopped for the night, he seemed to be almost his old self again.

Chapter Twenty-one
    THE CARAVAN WOUND its slow way through the dreary moors of eastern Drasnia with the sound of mule bells trailing mournfully behind it. Sparse patches of heath, which had but lately begun to bloom with tiny, pink flowers, dotted the low, rolling hills. The sky had turned cloudy, and the wind, seemingly perpetual, blew steadily out of the north.
    Garion found his mood growing as sad and bleak as the moors around him. There was one inescapable fact which he no longer could hide from himself. Each mile, each step, brought him closer to Mallorea and closer to his meeting with Torak. Even the whispered song of the Orb, murmuring continually in his ears from the pommel of the great sword strapped to his back, could not reassure him. Torak was a God - invincible, immortal; and Garion. not even yet full-grown, was quite deliberately trekking to Mallorea to seek him out and to fight him to the death. Death was a word Garion tried very hard not to think about. It had been a possibility once or twice during their long pursuit of Zedar and the Orb; but now it seemed a certainty. He would meet Torak alone. Mandorallen or Barak or Hettar could not come