Belgarath stood looking out over the fields toward a distant village and the barricaded lane which approached it. "How much food do we have with us, Pol?" he asked.
"If every village we come to is closed up the way the ones we've passed so far have been, it's going to be difficult to replenish our stores."
"I think we'll be all right, father," she replied. "Vella was very generous."
"I like her." Ce'Nedra smiled. "Even though she does swear all the time."
Polgara returned the smile. "It's the Nadrak way, dear," she said. "When I was in Gar og Nadrak, I had to draw on my memories of the more colorful parts of my father's vocabulary to get by."
"Hallooo!" someone hailed them.
"He's over there." Silk pointed toward the road.
A man who was wearing one of the brown robes that identified him as a Melcene bureaucrat sat looking at them longingly from the back of a bay horse.
"What do you want?" Durnik called to him.
"Can you spare a bit of food?" the Melcene shouted.
"I can't get near any of these villages and I haven't eaten in three days. I can pay."
Durnik looked questioningly at Polgara.
She nodded. "We have enough," she said.
"Which way was he coming?" Belgarath asked.
"South, I think," Silk replied.
"Tell him that it's all right, Durnik," the old man said.
"He can probably give us some recent news from the north."
"Come on in," Durnik shouted to the hungry man.
The bureaucrat rode up until he was about twenty yards away. Then he stopped warily. "Are you from Mal Zeth?" he demanded.
"We left before the plague broke out," Silk lied.
The official hesitated. "I'll put the money on this rock here," he offered, pointing at a white boulder. "Then I'll move back a ways. You can take the money and leave some food. That way neither one of us will endanger the other."
"Makes sense," Silk replied pleasantly.
Polgara took a loaf of brown bread and a generous slab of cheese from her stores and gave them to the sharp-faced Drasnian.
The Melcene dismounted, laid a few coins on the rock, and then led his horse back some distance.
"Where have you come from, friend?" Silk asked as he approached the rock.
"I was in Akkad in Katakor," the hungry man answered, eyeing the loaf and the cheese. "I was senior administrator there for the Bureau of Public Works -you know, walls, aqueducts, streets, that sort of thing. The bribes weren't spectacular, but I managed to get by. Anyway, I got out just a few hours before Mengha and his demons got there."
Silk laid the food on the rock and picked up the money. Then he backed away. "We heard that Akkad fell quite some time ago."
The Melcene almost ran to the rock and snatched up the bread and cheese. He took a large bite of cheese and tore a chunk off the loaf. "I hid out in the mountains," he replied around the mouthful.
"Isn't that where Ashaba is?" Silk asked, sounding very casual.
The Melcene swallowed hard and nodded. "That's why I finally left," he said, stuffing bread in his mouth. "The area's infested with huge wild dogs -ugly brutes as big as horses- and there are roving bands of Karands killing everyone they come across. I could have avoided all that, but there's something terrible going on at Ashaba. There are dreadful sounds coming from the castle and strange lights in the sky over it at night. I don't hold with the supernatural, my friend, so I bolted." He sighed happily, tearing off another chunk of bread. "A month ago I'd have turned my nose up at brown bread and cheese. Now it tastes like a banquet."
"Hunger's the best sauce," Silk quoted the old adage.
"That's the honest truth."
"Why didn't you stay up in Venna ? Didn't you know that there's plague in Mal Zeth?"
The Melcene shuddered. "What's going on in Venna's even worse than what's going on in Katakor or Mal Zeth," he replied. "My nerves are absolutely destroyed by all this. I'm an engineer. What do I know about demons and new Gods and magic? Give me paving stones and timbers and mortar and a few modest bribes and don't even mention any of that other nonsense to me."
"New Gods?" Silk asked. "Who's been talking about new Gods?"
"The Chandim. You've heard of them?"
"Don't they belong to Urvon the Disciple?"
"I don't think they belong to anybody right now. They've gone on a rampage in Venna . Nobody's seen Urvon for more than a month now -not even the people in Mal Yaska. The Chandim are completely out of control. They're erecting altars out in the fields and holding double sacrifices -the first heart to Torak and the second to this new God of Angarak- and anybody up there that doesn't bow to both altars gets his heart cut out right on the spot."
"That seems like a very good reason to stay out of Venna ," Silk said wryly. "Have they put a name to this new God of theirs?"
"Not that I ever heard. They just call him 'The new God of Angarak, come to replace Torak and to take dreadful vengeance on the Godslayer.' "
"That's you," Velvet murmured to Garion.
"Do you mind?"
"I just thought you ought to know, that's all."
"There's an open war going on in Venna, my friend," the Melcene continued, "and I'd advise you to give the place a wide berth."
"War?"
"Within the Church itself. The Chandim are slaughtering all the old Grolims -the ones who are still faithful to Torak. The Temple Guardsmen are taking sides and they're having pitched battles on the plains up there -that's when they're not marauding through the countryside, burning farmsteads, and massacring whole villages. You'd think that the whole of Venna's gone crazy. It's as much as a man's life is worth to go through there just now. They stop you and ask you which God you worship, and a wrong answer is fatal." He paused, still eating. "Have you heard about any place that's quiet -and safe?" he asked plaintively.
"Try the coast," Silk suggested. "Mal Abad, maybe -or Mal Camat."
"Which way are you going?"
"We're going north to the river and see if we can find a boat to take us down to Lake Penn Daka ."
"It won't be safe there for very long, friend. If the plague doesn't get there first, Mengha's demons will -or the crazed Grolims and their Guardsmen out of Venna ."
"We don't plan to stop," Silk told him. "We're going to cut on across Delchin to Maga Renn and then on down the Magan."