"There's something I have to do first," Wolf replied, squinting into the sunlight. "Barak and his cousin will come along with me. The rest of you go on back to Grinneg's house and wait there."

"We'll stop by the central market on our way," Aunt Pol told him. "There are a few things I need."

"This isn't a shopping expedition, Pol."

"The Grolims already know we're here, father," she said, "so there's no point in creeping about like sneak thieves, is there?"

He sighed. "All right, Pol."

"I knew you'd see it my way," she said.

Mister Wolf shook his head helplessly and rode off with Barak and Grinneg. The rest of them rode down the hill from the palace toward the gleaming city below. The streets at the foot of the hill were broad and lined on either side by magnificent houses-each almost a palace in itself.

"The rich and the noble," Silk said. "In Tol Honeth, the closer you live to the palace, the more important you are."

"'Tis oft times thus, Prince Kheldar," Mandorallen observed. "Wealth and position sometimes need the reassurance of proximity to the seat of power. By ostentation and propinquity to the throne, small men are able to avoid facing their own inadequacy."

"I couldn't have said it better myself," Silk said.

The central marketplace of Tol Honeth was a vast square filled with bright-colored booths and stalls where a significant portion of the goods of the world were on display. Aunt Pol dismounted, left her horse with one of the Cherek guards, and moved busily from booth to booth, buying, it appeared, almost everything in sight. Silk's face blanched often at her purchases, since he was paying for them.

"Can't you talk to her?" the small man pleaded with Garion. "She's destroying me."

"What makes you think she'd listen to me?" Garion asked.

"You could at least try, " Silk said desperately.

Three richly mantled men stood near the center of the market, arguing heatedly.

"You're mad, Haldor," one of them, a thin man with a snub nose, said agitatedly. "The Honeths would strip the Empire for their own profit." His face was flushed, and his eyes bulged dangerously.

"Would Kador of the Vorduvians be any better?" the stout man named Haldor demanded. "You're the one who's mad, Radan. If we put Kador on the throne, he'll grind us all under foot. There's such a thing as being too imperial."

"How dare you?" Radan almost screamed, his perspiring face growing darker. "Grand Duke Kador is the only possible choice. I'd vote for him even if he hadn't paid me." He flung his arms about wildly as he talked, and his tongue seemed to stumble over his words.