"All right," Silk said amiably. "Let's go inside, and you can watch me drink. I'm very good at it."
"I can imagine. You're an Alorn, after all."
"So are you, dear brother." Silk laughed. "So are you. Come along, and I'll introduce you to all the fun that goes with your heritage."
Garion was on the verge of turning to follow them, but at that moment Belgarath came out on deck, stretching and yawning. "Is Pol up yet?" he asked Garion.
Garion shook his head. "I talked with Durnik a little while ago. He said that she's very tired after what she did yesterday."
Belgarath frowned slightly. "It really shouldn't have tired her all that much," he said. "It was spectacular, I'll admit, but hardly exhausting."
"I don't think it's that kind of exhaustion, Grandfather. Durnik said she was troubled for about half the night."
The old man scratched at his beard. "Oh," he said, "sometimes I lose sight of the fact that Pol's a woman. She can't seem to put things behind her, and sometimes her compassion gets the better of her."
"That's not necessarily a bad trait, Grandfather."
"Not for a woman, perhaps."
"I seem to remember something that happened in the fens once," Garion told him. "Didn't you sort of go out of your way to do something for Vordai—more or less out of compassion?"
Belgarath looked around guiltily. "I thought we agreed that you weren't going to mention that."
"You know something, Grandfather?" Garion said with a faint smile. "You're a fraud. You pretend to be as cold as ice and as hard as a rock, but underneath you've got the same emotions as all the rest of us."
"Please, Garion, don't bandy that about too much."
"Does it bother you being human?"
"Well, not really, but after all, I do sort of have a reputation to maintain."
By late afternoon the coast line they had been following had grown even more jagged, and the surf boiled and thundered against the rocks. Silk and Urgit came up out of the aft companion way, and Garion noted that both were a trifle unsteady as they walked.
"Hello there, Belgarion," Urgit said expansively. "How would you like to join us? Kheldar and I have decided that we'd like to sing for a bit."
"Uh—thanks all the same," Garion replied carefully, "but I don't sing very well."
"That doesn't matter, old boy. It doesn't matter in the slightest. I might not be very good at it myself. I can't say for sure, because I've never sung a note in my whole life." He giggled suddenly. "There are a lot of things I've never done before, and I think it might be time I tried a few."
Ce'Nedra and the Murgo girl, Prala, came up on deck. Instead of her customary black, Prala was dressed in a stunning gown of pale rose, and her jet-black hair was caught in an intricate coil at the nape of her neck.
"My ladies," Urgit greeted them with a formal bow, marred only slightly by an unsteady lurch.
"Careful, old boy," Silk said, catching him by the elbow. "I don't want to have to fish you out of the sea."
"You know something, Kheldar?" Urgit said, blinking owlishly. "I don't think I've ever felt quite this good." He looked at Ce'Nedra and the dark-haired Prala. "You know something else? Those are a couple of awfully pretty girls there. Do you think they might like to sing with us?"
"We could ask them."
"Why don't we?"
The pair of them descended on Ce'Nedra and her Murgo companion, imploring them outrageously to join them in song. Prala laughed as the Murgo King lurched forward and back with the roll of the ship. "I think you two are drunk," she declared.
"Are we drunk?" Urgit asked Silk, still swaying on his feet.
"I certainly hope so," Silk replied. "If we aren't, we've wasted a great deal of very good wine."
"I guess we're drunk then. Now that's been settled, what shall we sing?"
"Alorns!" Ce'Nedra sighed, rolling her eyes skyward.
It was raining the following morning when they awoke, a chill drizzle that hissed into the sea and collected to run in heavy droplets down the tarred ropes of the rigging. Polgara joined them for breakfast in the larger cabin at the extreme aft end of the companionway, though she seemed silent and withdrawn.
Velvet looked brightly around the cabin, where stoutly constructed windows instead of portholes stretched across the stern and heavy beams held up a ceiling which was actually the deck above. She looked pointedly at the two conspicuously empty chairs at the breakfast table. "What's become of Prince Kheldar and his wayward royal brother?" she asked.
"I think they lingered a bit too long over their wine cups yesterday," Ce'Nedra replied with a slightly malicious smirk. "I'd imagine that they're feeling just a bit delicate this morning."
"Would you believe that they were singing?" Prala said.
"Oh?" Velvet said. "Were they doing it well?"
Prala laughed. "They frightened away the seagulls. I've never heard such dreadful noise."
Polgara and Durnik had been talking quietly at the far end of the table. "I'm perfectly fine, Durnik," she assured him. "You go right ahead."
"I don't want to leave you alone, Pol," he told her.
"I won't be alone, dear. Ce'Nedra, Prala, and Liselle will all be with me. If you don't find out for yourself, you'll wonder about it for the rest of your life and always regret the fact that you passed the opportunity by."
"Well—if you're sure, Pol."
"I'm certain, dear," she said, laying her hand fondly on his and kissing his cheek.
After breakfast, Garion pulled on a cloak and went out on deck. He stood squinting up into the drizzle for a few minutes, then turned as he heard the companionway door open behind him. Durnik and Toth emerged with fishing poles in their hands. "It only stands to reason, Toth," Durnik was saying. "With that much water, there almost have to be fish."
Toth nodded, then made a peculiar gesture, extending both his arms out as if measuring something.
"I don't quite follow you."
Toth made the gesture again.
"Oh, I'm sure they wouldn't be all that big," the smith disagreed. "Fish don't get that big, do they?"
Toth nodded vigorously.
"I don't mean to doubt you," Durnik said seriously, "but I'd have to see that."
Toth shrugged,
"Quite a beautiful morning, isn't it, Garion?" Durnik said, smiling up at the dripping sky. Then he went up the three steps to the aft deck, nodded pleasantly to the steersman at the tiller, and then made a long, smooth cast out into the frothy wake. He looked critically at his trailing lure. "I think we're going to need some weight on the lines to hold them down, don't you?" he said to Toth.