"I thought it was only speculation," the captain replied. "We don't even know that these foreigners are in this quadrant."

"My information is that they're going south, captain," the Murgo told him. "I think you can be quite certain that they're somewhere in your quadrant."

"There's no guarantee that we'll find them, though," the captain said. "And even if we do, it'd be very difficult to do what you propose."

"Captain," the Murgo explained patiently, "it's for the safety of the princess, after all. If she's returned to Tol Honeth, the Vorduvians are going to kill her. You've read those documents I brought you."

"She'll be safe with the Borunes," the captain said. "The Vorduvians aren't going to come into Southern Tolnedra after her."

"The Borunes are only going to turn her over to her father. You're a Borune yourself. Would you defy an Emperor of your own house?" The captain's face was troubled.

"Her only hope of safety is with the Horbites," the Murgo pressed.

"What guarantees do I have that she'll be safe with them?"

"The best guarantee of all - politics. The Horbites are doing everything in their power to block the Grand Duke Kador on his march to the throne. Since he wants the princess dead, the Horbites naturally want to keep her alive. It's the only way really to insure her safety - and you become a wealthy man in the process." He jingled a heavy purse suggestively.

The captain still looked doubtful.

"Suppose we double the amount," the Murgo said in a voice that almost purred.

The captain swallowed hard. "It is for her safety, isn't it?"

"Of course it is."

"It's not as if I were betraying the House of Borune."

"You're a patriot, Captain," the Murgo assured the officer with a cold smile.

Aunt Pol was holding Ce'Nedra's arm quite firmly as they crouched together among the trees. The tiny girl's face was outraged, and her eyes were blazing.

Later, after the legionnaires and their Murgo friend had departed, the princess exploded. "How dare they?" she raged. "And for money!"

"That Tolnedran politics for you," Silk said as they led their horses out of the stand of saplings into the drizzly morning.

"But he's a Borune," she protested, "a member of my own family."

"A Tolnedran's first loyalty is to his purse," Silk told her. "I'm surprised you haven't discovered that by now, your Highness."

A few days later they topped a hill and saw the Wood of the Dryads spreading like a green smudge on the horizon. The showers had blown off, and the sun was very bright.

"We'll be safe once we reach the Wood," the princess told them. "The legions won't follow us there."

"What's to stop them?" Garion asked her.

"The treaty with the Dryads," she said. "Don't you know anything?"

Garion resented that.

"There's no one about," Hettar reported to Mister Wolf. "We can go now or wait for dark."