Queen of Sorcery

beside it, humming softly to herself.
    Hettar came back from tending the horses, and they all stood back watching Aunt Pol prepare a supper from the stores Count Reldegen had pressed on them before they had left his house that morning.
    After they had eaten, they sat around the fire talking quietly.
    "How far have we come today?" Durnik asked.
    "Twelve leagues," Hettar estimated.
    "How much farther do we have to go to get out of the forest?"
    "It's eighty leagues from Camaar to the central plain," Lelldorin replied.
    Durnik sighed. "A week or more. I'd hoped that it'd be only a few days."
    "I know what you mean, Durnik," Barak agreed. "It's gloomy under all these trees."
    The horses, picketed near the brook, stirred uneasily. Hettar rose to his feet.
    "Something wrong?" Barak asked, also rising.
    "They shouldn't be-" Hettar started. Then he stopped. "Back!" he snapped.
    "Away from the fire. The horses say there are men out there. Many - with weapons." He jumped back from the fire, drawing his sabre.
    Lelldorin took one startled look at him and bolted for one of the tents. Garion's sudden disappointment in his friend was almost like a blow to the stomach.
    An arrow buzzed into the light and shattered on Barak's mail shirt.
    "Arm yourselves!" the big man roared, drawing his sword.
    Garion grasped Aunt Pol's sleeve and tried to pull her from the light.
    "Stop that!" she snapped, jerking her sleeve free. Another arrow whizzed out of the foggy woods. Aunt Pol flicked her hand as if brushing away a fly and muttered a single word. The arrow bounced back as if it had struck something solid and fell to the ground.
    Then with a hoarse shout, a gang of rough, burly men burst from the edge of the trees and splashed across the brook, brandishing swords. As Barak and Hettar leaped forward to meet them, Lelldorin reemerged from the tent with his bow and began loosing arrows so rapidly that his hands seemed to blur as they moved. Garion was instantly ashamed that he had doubted his friend's courage.
    With a choked cry, one of the attackers stumbled back, an arrow through his throat. Another doubled over sharply, clutching at his stomach, and fell to the ground, groaning. A third, quite young and with a pale, downy beard on his cheeks, dropped heavily and sat plucking at the feathers on the shaft protruding from his chest with a bewildered expression on his boyish face. Then he sighed and slumped over on his side with a stream of blood coming from his nose.
    The ragged-looking men faltered under the rain of Lelldorin's arrows, and then Barak and Hettar were upon them. With a great sweep, Barak's heavy sword shattered an upflung blade and crunched down into the angle between the neck and shoulder of the black-whiskered man who had held it. The man collapsed. Hettar made a quick feint with his sabre, then ran it smoothly through the body of a pockmarked ruffian. The man stiffened, and a gush of bright blood burst from his mouth as Hettar pulled out his blade. Durnik ran forward with his axe, and Silk drew his long dagger from under his vest and ran directly at a man with a shaggy brown beard. At the last moment, he dived forward, rolled and struck the bearded man full in the chest with both feet. Without pausing he came up and ripped his dagger into his enemy's belly. The dagger made a wet, tearing sound as it sliced upward, and the stricken man clutched at his stomach with a scream, trying to hold in the blue-colored loops and coils of his entrails that seemed to come boiling out through his fingers.
    Garion dived for the packs to get his own sword, but was suddenly grabbed roughly from behind. He struggled for an instant, then felt a stunning blow on the back of his head, and his eyes filled with a blinding flash of light.
    "This is the one we want," a rough voice husked as Garion sank into unconsciousness.
    He was being carried - that much was certain. He could feel the strong arms under him. He didn't know how long it had been since he had been struck on the head. His ears still rang, and he was more than a little sick to his stomach. He stayed limp, but carefully opened one eye. His vision was blurred and uncertain, but he could make out Barak's bearded face looming above him in the darkness, and merged with it, as once before in the snowy woods outside Val Alorn, he seemed to see the shaggy face of a great bear. He closed his eyes, shuddered, and started to struggle weakly.
    "It's all right, Garion," Barak said, his voice sunk in