King of The Murgos

King stumbled up the stairs out onto the deck, his eyes fearful.
    "Don't your people know how to set their rigging so that they can quarter into the wind?" Belgarath demanded.
    Urgit looked at him blankly. "I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about," he said.
    "Durnik!" Belgarath shouted.
    The smith, standing with Toth at the stern of the ship, was intently watching his trailing lure and did not answer.
    "Durnik!"
    "Hmmm?"
    "We have to reset the rigging. Come and show the captain how it's done."
    "In a minute."
    "Now, Durnik!"
    The smith sighed and began to coil up his line. The fish struck without warning, and Durnik's excited whoop was whipped away by the rising wind. He seized the line and jerked hard to set his hook. The great, silver-sided fish came boiling up put of the water, shaking his head angrily and threshing his way across the wind-driven chop. Durnik's shoulders bowed as he pulled hard on his line, struggling manfully to haul the huge fish in hand over hand.
    Belgarath started to swear.
    "I'll show the captain how to set his rigging, Grandfather," Garion said.
    "How much do you know about it?"
    "I've been on at least as many ships as Durnik has. I know how it's done." He went toward the bow to talk to the Murgo captain who now stood staring ahead at the tossing sea. "You want to slack off your lines on this side over here,"
    Garion explained to him, "and draw them in on the other. The idea is to angle your sails so that they catch the wind. Then you put your rudder over to compensate."
    "Nobody's ever done it that way before," the captain declared stubbornly.
    "The Alorns do, and they're the best sailors in the world."
    "The Alorns control the wind by sorcery. You can't use your sails unless the wind is behind you."
    "Just try it, Captain," Garion said patiently. He looked at the heavy-shouldered sailor and saw that he was wasting his time. "If you'd rather not do it because I ask you to," he added, "I could probably persuade Lady Polgara to ask you—as a personal favor."
    The captain stared at him. Then he swallowed hard. "How was it you said you wanted the rigging reset, my Lord?" he asked in a much milder tone.
    It took perhaps a quarter of an hour to set the lines to Garion's satisfaction. Then, with the dubious captain in tow, he went aft and took the tiller from the steersman. "All right," he said, "raise the sails."
    "It's not going to work," the captain predicted under his breath. Then he lifted his voice to a bellow. "Hoist the sails!"
    The pulleys began to creak, and the sails, flapping in the wind, crawled up the masts. Then they boomed and bellied out, angled sharply to catch the wind. Garion pulled the tiller over as the ship heeled sharply to leeward. The prow knifed sharply through the heaving waves.
    The Murgo captain gaped up at his sails. "I don't believe it!" he exclaimed. "Nobody's ever done that before."
    "You see how it works now, don't you?" Garion asked him.
    "Of course. It's so simple that I can't understand why I didn't think of it myself."
    Garion had an answer, but he decided to keep it to himself. The captain had already had a bad enough day. He turned to the steersman. "You have to keep your tiller over like this to compensate for the force of the wind coming in on your starboard beam," he explained.
    "I understand, my Lord."
    Garion relinquished the tiller and stepped back to watch Durnik and Toth. They were still hauling at their line, and the great fish, no longer dancing on the sleet-swept surface, swept back and forth in long arcs across the boiling wake; the stout rope connecting his jaw to the two fishermen sizzled through the water as if it were hot.
    "Nice fish," Garion called to the struggling pair.
    Durnik's quick answering grin was like the sun coming up.
    They quartered into an increasingly stiff wind for the remainder of the day. As the light began to fade, they were far from land. Garion was by now certain that the captain and the steersman could manage and he went forward to join the little group standing amidships around Durnik's huge fish.
    "Now that you've got him, where are you going to find a pan big enough to cook him in?" Silk was asking the smith.
    A brief frown crossed Durnik's face, but then he smiled again. "Pol will know how to take care of it," he said and went back to admiring the monster lying on the deck. "Pol knows how to take care of everything."
    The sleet had abated, and the dark-rolling waves stretched sullenly to the faintly