Aunt Pol carefully drew the shutters in their chamber before lighting a single candle. "It's going to be colder now," she said, opening the large bundle she'd had him carry up from the wagons. She took out a pair of heavy woolen hose and winter boots lined with lambswool. "Put these on," she instructed Garion, "and your heavy cloak."

"I'm not a baby any more, Aunt Pol," Garion said.

"Do you enjoy being cold?"

"Well, no, but " He stopped, unable to think of any words to explain how he felt. He began to dress. He could hear the faint murmur of the others talking softly in the adjoining chamber in that curious, hushed tone that men always assume when they rise before the sun.

"We're ready, Mistress Pol," Silk's voice came through the doorway.

"Let's leave then," she said, drawing up the hood of her cloak.

The moon had risen late that night and shone brightly on the frostsilvered stones outside the inn. Durnik had hitched the horses to the wagons and had led them out of the stable.

"We'll lead the horses out to the road," Wolf said very quietly. "I see no need of rousing the villagers as we pass."

Silk again took the lead, and they moved slowly out of the innyard. The fields beyond the village were white with frost, and the pale, smoky-looking moonlight seemed to have leeched all color from them.

"As soon as we're well out of earshot," Wolf said, climbing up into his wagon, "let's put some significant distance between us and this place. The wagons are empty, and a little run won't hurt the horses."

"Truly," Silk agreed.

They all mounted their wagons and set off at a walk. The stars glittered overhead in the crisp, cold sky. The fields were very white in the moonlight, and the clumps of trees back from the road very dark.

Just as they went over the first hilltop, Garion looked back at the dark cluster of houses in the valley behind. A single flicker of light came from a window somewhere, a lone, golden pinpoint that appeared and then vanished.

"Someone's awake back there," he told Silk. "I just saw a light."

"Some early riser perhaps," Silk suggested. "But then again, perhaps not." He shook the reins slightly, and the horses increased their pace. He shook them again, and they began to trot.

"Hang on, boy," he instructed, reached forward and slapped the reins down smartly on the rumps of the horses.

The wagon bounced and clattered fearfully behind the running team, and the bitterly chill air rushed at Garion's face as he clung to the wagon seat.

At full gallop the three wagons plunged down into the next valley, rushing between the frost-white fields in the bright moonlight, leaving the village and its single light far behind.

By the time the sun rose, they had covered a good four leagues, and Silk reined in his steaming horses. Garion felt battered and sore from the wild ride over the iron-hard roads and was glad for the chance to rest. Silk handed him the reins and jumped down from the wagon. He walked back and spoke briefly to Mister Wolf and Aunt Pol, then returned to the wagon.

"We turn off at that lane just ahead," he told Garion as he massaged his fingers.

Garion offered him the reins.

"You drive," Silk told him. "My hands are frozen stiff. Just let the horses walk."

Garion clucked at the horses and shook the reins slightly. Obediently, the team started out again.

"The lane circles around to the back of that hill," Silk said, pointing with his chin since his hands were tucked inside his tunic. "On the far side there's a copse of fir trees. We'll stop there to rest the horses."

"Do you think we're being followed?" Garion asked.

"This'll be a good time to find out," Silk said.

They rounded the hill and drove on down to where the dark firs bordered the road. Then Garion turned the horses and moved in under the shadowy trees.

"This will do fine," Silk said, getting down. "Come along."

"Where are we going?"

"I want to have a look at that road behind us," Silk said. "We'll go up through the trees to the top of the hill and see if our back trail has attracted any interest."

And he started up the hill, moving quite rapidly but making absolutely no sound as he went. Garion floundered along behind him, his feet cracking the dead twigs underfoot embarrassingly until he began to catch the secret of it. Silk nodded approvingly once, but said nothing.

The trees ended just at the crest of the hill, and Silk stopped there. The valley below with the dark road passing through it was empty except for two deer who had come out of the woods on the far side to graze in the frosty grass.

"We'll wait a while," Silk said. "If Brill and his hireling are following, they shouldn't be far behind."

He sat on a stump and watched the empty valley.

After a while, a cart moved slowly along the road toward Winold. It looked tiny in the distance, and its pace along the scar of the road seemed very slow.

The sun rose a bit higher, and they squinted into its full morning brightness.

"Silk," Garion said finally in a hesitant tone.

"Yes, Garion?"

"What's this all about?" It was a bold question to ask, but Garion felt he knew Silk well enough now to ask it.

"All what?"

"What we're doing. I've heard a few things and guessed a few more, but it doesn't really make any sense to me."

"And just what have you guessed, Garion?" Silk asked, his small eyes very bright in his unshaven face.

"Something's been stolen-something very important—and Mister Wolf and Aunt Pol—and the rest of us—are trying to get it back."

"All right," Silk said. "That much is true."

"Mister Wolf and Aunt Pol are not at all what they seem to be," Garion went on.

"No," Silk agreed, "they aren't."

"I think they can do things that other people can't do," Garion said, struggling with the words. "Mister Wolf can follow this thing—whatever it is—without seeing it. And last week in those woods when the Murgos passed, they did something—I don't even know how to describe it, but it was almost as if they reached out and put my mind to sleep. How did they do that? And why?"

Silk chuckled.

"You're a very observant lad," he said. Then his tone became more serious. "We're living in momentous times, Garion. The events of a thousand years and more have all focused on these very days. The world, I'm told, is like that. Centuries pass when nothing happens, and then in a few short years events of such tremendous importance take place that the world is never the same again."

"I think that if I had my choice, I'd prefer one of those quiet centuries," Garion said glumly.

"Oh, no," Silk said, his lips drawing back in a ferretlike grin. "Now's the time to be alive—to see it all happen, to be a part of it. That makes the blood race, and each breath is an adventure."

Garion let that pass.

"What is this thing we're following?" he asked.

"It's best if you don't even know its name," Silk told him seriously, "or the name of the one who stole it. There are people trying to stop us; and what you don't know, you can't reveal."

"I'm not in the habit of talking to Murgos," Garion said stiffly.

"It's not necessary to talk to them," Silk said. "There are some among them who can reach out and pick the thoughts right out of your mind."

"That isn't possible," Garion said.

"Who's to say what's possible and what isn't?" Silk asked. And Garion remembered a conversation he had once had with Mister Wolf about the possible and the impossible.

Silk sat on the stump in the newly risen sun looking thoughtfully down into the still-shadowy valley, an ordinary-looking little man in ordinary-looking tunic and hose and a rough brown shoulder cape with its hood turned up over his head.

"You were raised as a Sendar, Garion," he said, "and Sendars are solid, practical men with little patience for such things as sorcery and magic and other things that can't be seen or touched. Your friend, Durnik, is a perfect Sendar. He can mend a shoe or fix a broken wheel or dose a sick horse, but I doubt that he could bring himself to believe in the tiniest bit of magic."