"You don't look to be in very good shape, friend," Silk said to him. "Where's your unit?"
"Dead, all dead, and eaten by the demons." The soldier's eyes were haunted. "Were you at Akkad ?" he asked in a terrified voice. "Were you there when the demons came?"
"No, friend. We just came up from Venna ."
"You said that you had something for me to eat."
"Durnik," Silk called, "could you bring some food for this poor fellow?"
Durnik rode to the packhorse carrying their stores and took out some bread and dried meat. Then he rode on ahead to join Silk and the fear-crazed soldier.
"Were you at Akkad when the demons came?" the fellow asked him.
Durnik shook his head. "No," he replied, "I'm with him." He pointed at Silk. Then he handed the fellow the bread and meat.
The soldier snatched them and began to wolf them down in huge bites.
"What happened at Akkad ?" Silk asked.
"The demons came," the soldier replied, still cramming food into his mouth. Then he stopped, his eyes fixed on Durnik with an expression of fright. "Are you going to kill me?" he demanded.
Durnik stared at him. "No, man," he replied in a sick voice.
"Thank you." The soldier sat down at the roadside and continued to eat.
Garion and the others slowly drew closer, not wanting to frighten the skittish fellow off.
"What did happen at Akkad ?" Silk pressed. "We're going in that direction, and we'd sort of like to know what to expect."
"Don't go there," the soldier said, shuddering. "It's horrible -horrible. The demons came through the gates with howling Karands all around them. The Karands started hacking people to pieces and then they fed the pieces to the demons. They cut off both of my captain's arms and then his legs as well, and then a demon picked up what was left of him and ate his head. He was screaming the whole time." He lowered his chunk of bread and fearfully stared at Ce'Nedra. "Lady, are you going to kill me?" he demanded.
"Certainly not!" she replied in a shocked voice.
"If you are, please don't let me see it when you do. And please bury me someplace where the demons won't dig me up and eat me."
"She's not going to kill you," Polgara told him firmly.
The man's wild eyes filled with a kind of desperate longing. "Would you do it then, Lady?" he pleaded. "I can't stand the horror any more. Please kill me gently -the way my mother would- and then hide me so that the demons won't get me." He put his face into his shaking hands and began to cry.
"Give him some more food, Durnik," Belgarath said, his eyes suddenly filled with compassion. "He's completely mad, and there's nothing else we can do for him."
"I think I might be able to do something, Ancient One," Sadi said. He opened his case and took out a vial of amber liquid. "Sprinkle a few drops of this on the bread you give him, Goodman," he said to Durnik. "It will calm him and give him a few hours of peace."
"Compassion seems out of character for you, Sadi," Silk said.
"Perhaps," the eunuch murmured, "but then, perhaps you don't fully understand me, Prince Kheldar."
Durnik took some more bread and meat from the pack for the hysterical Mallorean soldier, sprinkling them liberally with Sadi's potion. Then he gave them to the poor man, and they all rode slowly past and on down the road.
After they had gone a ways, Garion heard him calling after them. "Come back! Come back! Somebody -anybody- please come back and kill me. Mother, please kill me!"
Garion's stomach wrenched with an almost overpowering sense of pity. He set his teeth and rode on, trying not to listen to the desperate pleas coming from behind.
They circled to the north of Akkad that afternoon, bypassing the city and returning to the road some two leagues beyond. The pull of the sword Garion held on the pommel of his saddle confirmed the fact that Zandramas had indeed passed this way and had continued on along this road toward the northeast and the relative safety of the border between Katakor and Jenno.
They camped in the forest a few miles north of the road that night and started out once more early the following morning. The road for a time stretched across open fields. It was deeply rutted and still quite soft at the shoulders.
"Karands don't take road maintenance very seriously," Silk observed, squinting into the morning sun.
"I noticed that," Durnik replied.
"I thought you might have."
Some leagues farther on, the road they were following reentered the forest, and they rode along through a cool, damp shade beneath towering evergreens.
Then, from somewhere ahead they heard a hollow, booming sound.
"I think we might want to go rather carefully until we're past that." Silk said quietly.
"What is that sound?" Sadi asked.
"Drums. There's a temple ahead."
"Out here in the forest?" The eunuch sounded surprised. "I thought that the Grolims were largely confined to the cities."
"This isn't a Grolim Temple, Sadi. It was nothing to do with the worship of Torak. As a matter of fact, the Grolims used to burn these places whenever they came across them. They were a part of the old religion of the area."
"Demon worship, you mean?"
Silk nodded. "Most of them have been long abandoned, but every so often you come across one that's still in use. The drums are a fair indication that the one just ahead is still open for business."
"Will we be able to go around them?" Durnik asked.
"It shouldn't be much trouble," the little man replied. "The Karands burn a certain fungus in their ceremonial fires. The fumes have a peculiar effect on one's senses."
"Oh?" Sadi said with a certain interest.
"Never mind," Belgarath told him. "That red case of yours has quite enough in it already."
"Just scientific curiosity, Belgarath."
"Of course. "
"What are they worshipping?" Velvet asked. "I thought that the demons had all left Karanda."
Silk was frowning. "The beat isn't right," he said.
"Have you suddenly become a music critic, Kheldar?" she asked him.
He shook his head. "I've come across these places before, and the drumming's usually pretty frenzied when they're holding their rites. That beat up ahead is too measured, It's almost as if they're waiting for something."
Sadi shrugged. "Let them wait," he said. "It's no concern of ours, is it?"