Then, at the narrowest point of the gorge, a party of mail-skirted Murgos rode out onto the opposite precipice. Their horses were lathered from hard riding, and the Murgos themselves were gaunt-faced and travel-stained. They stopped and waited until Garion and his friends were opposite them. At the very edge, staring first across the gorge and then down at the river far below, stood Brill.
"What kept you?" Silk called in a bantering tone that had a hard edge just below the surface. "We thought perhaps you'd gotten lost."
"Not very likely, Kheldar," Brill replied. "How did you get across to that side?"
"You go back that way about four days' ride," Silk shouted, pointing back the way they had come. "If you look very carefully, you'll find the canyon that leads up here. It shouldn't take you more than a day or two to find it."
One of the Murgos pulled a short bow out from beneath his left leg and set an arrow to it. He pointed the arrow at Silk, drew back the string and released. Silk watched the arrow calmly as it fell down into the gorge, spinning in a long, slow-looking spiral. "Nice shot," he called.
"Don't be an idiot," Brill snapped at the Murgo with the bow. He looked back at Silk. "I've heard a great deal about you, Kheldar," he said.
"One has developed a certain reputation," Silk replied modestly.
"One of these days I'll have to find out if you're as good as they say."
"That particular curiosity could be the first symptom of a fatal disease."
"For one of us, at least."
"I look forward to our next meeting, then," Silk told him. "I hope you'd excuse us, my dear fellow - pressing business, you know."
"Keep an eye out behind you, Kheldar," Brill threatened. "One day I'll be there."
"I always keep an eye out behind me, Kordoch," Silk called back, "so don't be too surprised if I'm waiting for you. It's been wonderful chatting with you. We'll have to do it again-soon."
The Murgo with the bow shot another arrow. It followed his first into the gorge.
Silk laughed and led the party away from the brink of the precipice. "What a splendid fellow," he said as they rode away. He looked up at the murky sky overhead. "And what an absolutely beautiful day."
The clouds thickened and grew black as the day wore on. The wind picked up until it howled among the trees. Mister Wolf led them away from the gorge which separated them from Brill and his Murgos, moving steadily toward the northeast.
They set up for the night in a rock-strewn basin just below the timberline. Aunt Pol prepared a meal of thick stew; as soon as they had finished eating, they let the fire go out. "There's no point in lighting beacons for them," Wolf observed.
"They can't get across the gorge, can they?" Durnik asked.
"It's better not to take chances," Wolf replied. He walked away from the last few embers of the dying fire and looked out into the darkness. On an impulse. Garion followed him.
"How much farther is it to the Vale, Grandfather?" he asked.
"About seventy leagues," the old man told him.
"We can't make very good time up here in the mountains."
"The weather's getting worse, too."
"I noticed that."
"What happens if we get a real snowstorm?"
"We take shelter until it blows over."
"What if-"
"Garion, I know it's only natural, but sometimes you sound a great deal like your Aunt. She's been saying 'what if' to me since she was about seventeen. I've gotten terribly tired of it over the years."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry. Just don't do it any more."
Overhead in the pitch-blackness of the blustery sky, there was a sudden, ponderous flap as of enormous wings.
"What's that?" Garion asked, startled.
"Be still!" Wolf stood with his face turned upward. There was another great flap. "Oh, that's sad."
"What?"
"I thought the poor old brute had been dead for centuries. Why don't they leave her alone?"
"What is it?"
"It doesn't have a name. It's big and stupid and ugly. The Gods only made three of them, and the two males killed each other during the first mating season. She's been alone for as long as I can remember."
"It sounds huge," Garion said, listening to the enormous wings beat overhead and peering up into the darkness. "What does it look like?"
"She's as big as a house, and you really wouldn't want to see her."
"Is she dangerous?"
"Very dangerous, but she can't see too well at night." Wolf sighed. "The Grolims must have chased her out of her cave and put her to hunting for us. Sometimes they go too far."
"Should we tell the others about her?"
"It would only worry them. Sometimes it's better not to say anything."
The great wings flapped again, and there was a long, despairing cry from the darkness, a cry filled with such aching loneliness that Garion felt a great surge of pity welling up in him.
Wolf sighed again. "There's nothing we can do," he said. "Let's go back to the tents."
Chapter Eight
THE WEATHER CONTINUED raw and unsettled as they rode for the next two days up the long, sloping rise toward the snow-covered summits of the mountains. The trees became sparser and more stunted as they climbed and finally disappeared entirely. The ridgeline flattened out against the side of one of the mountains, and they rode up onto a steep slope of tumbled rock and ice where the wind scoured continually.Mister Wolf paused to get his bearings, looking around in the pale afternoon light. "That way," he said finally, pointing. A saddleback stretched between two peaks, and the sky beyond roiled in the wind. They rode up the slope, their cloaks pulled tightly about them.
Hettar came forward with a worried frown on his hawk face. "That pregnant mare's in trouble," he told Wolf. "I think her time's getting close."
Without a word Aunt Pol dropped back to look at the mare, and her face was grave when she returned. "She's no more than a few hours away, father," she reported.
Wolf looked around. "There's no shelter on this side."
"Maybe there'll be something on the other side of the pass," Barak suggested, his beard whipping in the wind.
Wolf shook his head. "I think it's the same as this side. We're going to have to hurry. We don't want to spend the night up here."
As they rode higher, occasional spits of stinging sleet pelted them, and the wind gusted even stronger, howling among the rocks. As they crested the slope and started through the saddle, the full force of the gale struck them, driving a tattered sleet squall before it.