"I think you convinced him," Belgarath said dryly. "Is there anything to eat somewhere nearby?" he asked Aunt Pol.

"Are you all right now, Grandfather?" Garion asked him.

"Aside from being as weak as a fresh-hatched baby chick and as hungry as a she-wolf with nine puppies, I'm just fine," Belgarath replied. "I could really use something to eat, Polgara."

"I'll see what I can find, father," she told him, turning to the packs.

"I don't know that you need to bother cooking it," he added.

The little boy had been looking curiously at Garion, his wide, blue eyes serious and slightly puzzled. Quite suddenly he laughed; smiling, he looked into Garion's face. "Belgarion," he said.

Chapter Four

"NO REGRETS?" SILK asked Garion that evening as they rode toward the sharply rising peaks outlined against the glittering stars ahead.

"Regrets about what?"

"Giving up command." Silk had been watching him curiously ever since the setting sun had signalled the resumption of their journey.

"No," Garion replied, not quite sure what the little man meant. "Why should there be?"

"It's a very important thing for a man to learn about himself, Garion," Silk told him seriously. "Power can be very sweet for some men, and you never know how a man's going to handle it until you give him the chance to try."

"I don't know why you went to all the trouble. It's not too likely that I'm going to be put in charge of things very often."

"You never know, Garion. You never know."

They rode on across the barren black sands of the wasteland toward the mountains looming ahead. The quarter moon rose behind them, and its light was cold and white. Near the edge of the wasteland there were a few scrubby thornbushes huddling low to the sand and silvered with frost. It was an hour or so before midnight when they finally reached rocky ground, and the hooves of their horses clattered sharply as they climbed up out of the sandy waste. When they topped the first ridge, they stopped to look back. The dark expanse of the wasteland behind them was dotted with the watch fires of the Murgos, and far back along their trail they saw moving torches.

"I was starting to worry about that," Silk said to Belgarath, "but it looks as if they found our trail after all."

"Let's hope they don't lose it again," the old man replied. "Not too likely, really. I made it pretty obvious."

"Murgos can be a bit undependable sometimes." Belgarath seemed to have recovered almost completely, but Garion noted a weary slump to his shoulders and was glad that they did not plan to ride all night.