Queen of Sorcery

Polgara-"
    "Be still, father," she said absently, examining Garion's blue doublet.
    Wolf's face darkened, and his eyes bulged dangerously.
    "Was there something else?" she asked with a level gaze.
    Mister Wolf let it drop.
    "He's as wise as they say he is," Silk observed.
    An hour later they were on the high road to Vo Mimbre under a sunny sky. Mandorallen, once again in full armor and with a blue and silver pennon streaming from the tip of his lance, led the way with Barak in his gleaming mail shirt and black bearskin cape riding immediately behind him. At Aunt Pol's insistence, the big Cherek had combed the tangles out of his red beard and even rebraided his hair. Mister Wolf in his white robe rode sourly, muttering to himself, and Aunt Pol sat her horse demurely at his side in a short, fur-lined cape and with a blue satin headdress surmounting the heavy mass of her dark hair. Garion and Durnik were ill at ease in their finery, but Silk wore his doublet and black velvet cap with a kind of exuberant flair. Hettar's sole concession to formality had been the replacement of a ring of beaten silver for the leather thong which usually caught in his scalp lock.
    The serfs and even the occasional knight they encountered along the way stood aside and saluted respectfully. The day was warm, the road was good, and their horses were strong. By midafternoon they crested a high hill overlooking the plain which sloped down to the gates of Vo Mimbre.

Chapter Ten
    THE CITY OF THE MIMBRATE ARENDS reared almost like a mountain beside the sparkling river. Its thick, high walls were surmounted by massive battlements, and great towers and slender spires with bright banners at their tips rose within the walls, gleaming golden in the afternoon sun.
    "Behold Vo Mimbre," Mandorallen proclaimed with pride, "queen of cities. Upon that rock the tide of Angarak crashed and recoiled and crashed again. Upon this field met they their ruin. The soul and pride of Arendia loth reside within that fortress, and the power of the Dark One may not prevail against it."
    "We've been here before, Mandorallen," Mister Wolf said sourly.
    "Don't be impolite, father," Aunt Pol told the old man. Then she turned to Mandorallen and to Garion's amazement she spoke in an idiom he had never heard from her lips before. "Wilt thou, Sir Knight, convey us presently into the palace of thy king? We must needs take council with him in matters of gravest urgency." She delivered this without the least trace of self-consciousness as if the archaic formality came quite naturally to her. "Forasmuch as thou art the mightiest knight on life, we place ourselves under the protection of thy arm."
    Mandorallen, after a startled instant, slid with a crash from his warhorse and sank to his knees before her. "My Lady Polgara," he replied in a voice throbbing with respect - with reverence even, "I accept thy charge and will convey thee safely unto King Korodullin. Should any man question thy paramount right to the king's attention, I shall prove his folly upon his body."
    Aunt Pol smiled at him encouragingly, and he vaulted into his saddle with a clang and led the way at a rolling trot, his whole bearing seething with a willingness to do battle.
    "What was that all about?" Wolf asked.
    "Mandorallen needed something to take his mind off his troubles," she replied. "He's been out of sorts for the last few days."
    As they drew closer to the city, Garion could see the scars on the great walls where heavy stones from the Angarak catapults had struck the unyielding rock. The battlements high above were chipped and pitted from the impact of showers of steel-tipped arrows. The stone archway that led into the city revealed the incredible thickness of the walls, and the ironbound gate was massive. They clattered through the archway and into the narrow, crooked streets. The people they passed seemed for the most part to be commoners, who quickly moved aside. The faces of the men in dun-colored tunics and the women in patched dresses were dull and uncurious.
    "They don't seem very interested in us," Garion commented quietly to Durnik.
    "I don't think the ordinary people and the gentry pay much attention to each other here," Durnik replied. "They live side by side, but they don't know anything about each other. Maybe that's what's wrong with Arendia."
    Garion nodded soberly.
    Although the commoners were indifferent, the nobles at the palace seemed afire with curiosity. Word of the party's entrance