Polgara the Sorceress

‘Why are the ramblings of that senile old fool so important, Lady Polgara?’

‘Your father may or may not be senile, Luana, but that’s not really important. The speeches are coming from Belar – and from the other Gods. They’re telling my father and me what we’re supposed to do.’

Her off-center eyes went very wide.

‘Will you help us, Luana?’

‘I will, Lady Polgara – if you fix my eyes.’

‘Why don’t we take care of that right now?’ I suggested.

‘Here? Right in front of the men-folk?’

‘They won’t even notice what we’re doing.’

‘Will it hurt?’

‘Will it?’ I asked mother.

‘No. This is what you do, Pol.’ And she gave me some very detailed instructions.

It was not a surgical procedure. Balten’s tools hadn’t been quite tiny enough for that kind of precision, so I did it ‘the other way’. It involved the muscles that held Luana’s eyes in place and some other things that had to do with the way her eyes focused. The most time-consuming part of it was making those minute adjustments that eliminated all signs of her previous condition. ‘I think that’s got it,’ I said.

‘Pol,’ father said after Bormik had broken off his extended proclamation.

‘In a minute, father,’ I waved him off. I looked intently at Luana’s now-straight eyes. ‘Done,’ I told her softly.

‘Can I look at them?’

‘Of course. You have very pretty eyes, Luana. If they satisfy you, will you stick to your part of the bargain?’

‘Even if it costs me my life,’ she replied fervently. Then she went to the mirror hanging on the far wall. ‘Oh, Lady Polgara!’ She exclaimed, her now straight eyes streaming tears of pure joy. ‘Thank you!’

‘I’m glad you like it, dear,’ I told her. I stood up. ‘I’ll check with you from time to time, Luana. Be well.’ Then I followed father out through the door.

‘I think I’ll turn Hatturk into a toad,’ father muttered.

‘What on earth for?’ Then I frowned. ‘Can we actually do that?’

‘I’m not sure. Maybe this is the time to find out, and Hatturk’s the perfect subject. We’ve lost more than half of this prophecy because of that man’s idiocy.’

‘Relax, father,’ I told him. ‘We haven’t lost a thing. Luana’s going to take care of it for us. It’s all arranged.’

‘What did you do, Pol?’ he demanded.

‘I fixed her eyes. She’ll pay me for that by getting scribes to write down the whole prophecy.’

‘But some of it’s already slipped past us.’

‘Calm down, father. Luana knows how to get Bormik to repeat what he’s already said. We’ll have the whole prophecy.’ I paused. ‘The other one’s in Drasnia, isn’t it?’

He gaped at me.

‘Close your mouth, father. It makes you look like an idiot. Well, are we going on to Drasnia or not?’

‘Yes,’ he replied in an exasperated tone of voice, ‘we are going on to Drasnia.’

I smiled at him with that sweet expression that always drives him absolutely wild. ‘Were you going to hire a boat?’ I asked him, ‘or would you rather fly?’

Some of the things he said at that point don’t bear repeating.

Chapter 8 (#ulink_af0d7897-1012-510d-9e8e-a87b5929a9d9)

The Gulf of Cherek is an Alorn lake in many respects. That’s largely because of the Cherek Bore, since only Alorns are brave enough – or foolish enough – to attempt a passage through that howling maelstrom. I’ll admit in retrospect that the relative isolation of the Gulf served a purpose in antiquity. It gave the Alorns a place to play and kept them out of mischief in the rest of the kingdoms of the west.

The port city of Kotu at the mouth of the Mrin River was, like all Alorn cities at that time, built largely of logs. My father objects to log cities because of the danger of fire, but my objection to them is aesthetic. A log house is ugly, and when you get right down to it the chinking between the logs is really nothing more than dried mud. Kotu was built on an island, so there wasn’t all that much space for it to spread out. The streets were narrow, muddy, and crooked, and the houses were all jumbled together with their upper stories beetling out like belligerent brows. The harbor, like every harbor in the world, smelled like an open cesspool.

The ship which bore us from Darine to Kotu was a Cherek merchantman, which is to say that the heavy weaponry was not openly displayed on deck. We reached Kotu late on the afternoon of a depressingly murky day, and King Dras Bull-neck was there waiting for us – along with a sizeable number of colorfully dressed young Drasnian noblemen who obviously hadn’t made the trip from Boktor just to enjoy the scenery in the fens. I recognized several of them, since they’d attended Beldaran’s wedding, and they’d evidently told their friends about me.

We spent the night in a noisy Alorn inn that reeked of spilled beer, and it was late the following morning when we started upriver for the village of Braca, where the Mrin Prophet was kenneled.

I spent most of the rest of that day on deck dazzling the young Drasnians. They’d made a special trip just to see me, after all, so I felt that I owed them that much at least. I wasn’t very serious about it, but a young lady ought to keep in practice, I guess. I broke a few hearts – in a kindly sort of way – but what really interested me was the surreptitious way the Drasnians had of wriggling their fingers at each other. I was fairly certain that it wasn’t just a racial trait, so I sent out a carefully probing thought and immediately realized that they were not simply exercising their fingers. What I was seeing was a highly sophisticated sign language, the movements of which were so minute and subtle that I was frankly amazed that any thick-fingered Alorn could have devised it.

‘Dras,’ I said to Bull-neck that evening, ‘why do your people wiggle their fingers at each other all the time?’ I already knew what they were doing, of course, but it was a way to broach the subject.

‘Oh,’ he replied, ‘that’s just the secret language. The merchants invented it as a way to communicate with each other while they’re cheating somebody.’

‘You don’t seem to have a very high opinion of merchants, Dras,’ father noted.

Dras shrugged. ‘I don’t like swindlers.’

‘Right up until the time when they pay their taxes?’ I suggested.

‘That’s an entirely different matter, Pol.’

‘Of course, Dras. Of course. Does there happen to be someone among your retainers who’s more proficient at this sign-language than the others?’

He thought about it. ‘From what I hear, Khadon’s the most skilled. I think you met him at your sister’s wedding.’

‘A little fellow? Not much taller than I am? Blond curly hair and a nervous tic in his left eyelid?’

‘That’s him.’

‘I think I’ll see if I can find him tomorrow. I’d like to know a little more about this secret language.’

‘Whatever for, Pol?’ father asked.

‘I’m curious, father. Besides, I’m supposed to be getting an education right now, so I should probably learn something new, wouldn’t you say?’