Mister Wolf looked a bit injured.

Much later, after they had eaten their fill of venison, gravy-soaked bread, and rich cherry tarts, Aunt Pol excused herself and went with a maidservant to oversee the preparation of her bath. The men all lingered at the table over their wine cups, their faces washed with the golden light of the many candles in Reldegen's dining hall.

"Let me show you to your rooms," Torasin suggested to Lelldorin and Garion, pushing back his chair and casting a look of veiled contempt across the table at Berentain.

They followed him from the room and up a long flight of stairs toward the upper stories of the house. "I don't want to offend you, Tor," Lelldorin said as they climbed, "but your cousin has some peculiar ideas."

Torasin snorted. "Berentain's a jackass. He thinks he can impress the Mimbrates by imitating their speech and by fawning on them." His dark face was angry in the light of the candle he carried to light their way.

"Why should he want to?" Lelldorin asked.

"He's desperate for some kind of holding he can call his own," Torasin replied. "My mother's brother has very little land to leave him. The fat idiot's all calf eyed over the daughter of one of the barons in his district, and since the baron won't even consider a landless suitor, Berentain's trying to wheedle an estate from the Mimbrate governor. He'd swear fealty to the ghost of Kal Torak himself, if he thought it would get him land."

"Doesn't he realize that he hasn't got a chance?" Lelldorin inquired. "There are too many land-hungry Mimbrate knights around the governor for him to even think of granting an estate to an Asturian."

"I've told him the same thing myself," Torasin declared with scathing contempt, "but there's no reasoning with him. His behavior degrades our whole family."

Lelldorin shook his head commiseratingly as they reached an upper hall. He looked around quickly then. "I have to talk with you, Tor," he blurted, his voice dropping to a whisper.

Torasin looked at him sharply.

"My father's committed me to Belgarath's service in a matter of great importance," Lelldorin hurried on in that same hushed voice. "I don't know how long we'll be gone, so you and the others will have to kill Korodullin without me."

Torasin's eyes went wide with horror. "We're not alone, Lelldorin!" he said in a strangled voice.

"I'll go down to the other end of the hall," Garion said quickly.

"No," Lelldorin replied firmly, taking hold of Garion's arm. "Garion's my friend, Tor. I have no secrets from him."

"Lelldorin, please," Garion protested. "I'm not an Asturian - I'm not even an Arend. I don't want to know what you're planning."