"Not well, Naradas," she replied. "His Guardsmen and his Chandim and the rabble out of Karanda outnumber our forces."
"I have a regiment of elephant cavalry behind me, mistress Naradas informed her. "They will turn the tide of battle. The grass of central Peldane will be well watered with the blood of Urvon's Guardsmen, Chandim, and Karands. We will roll them back and make Darshiva secure once and for all."
"I care nothing for Darshiva, Naradas. I seek the world, and the fate of one small principality on the eastern edge of Mallorea is a matter of sublime indifference to me. Let it stand or let it fall. I care not. It hath served its purpose, and now I am weary of it. How long will it take you to deliver your beasts to the field of battle?"
"Two days at most, mistress."
"Do so then. Put them under the command of my generals and then follow me to Kell. I will return to Hemil and gather up Otrath and Belgarion's brat. We will await thee in the shadow of the holy mountain of the seers."
"Is it true that Urvon brought the Demon Lord Nahaz and his hordes with him, mistress?"
"He did, but that no longer concerns us. Demons are not so difficult to raise, and Nahaz is not the only Demon Lord in Hell. Lord Mordja consented to aid us with his hordes. There hath long been enmity between Mordja and Nahaz. They do war upon each other now with no concern for ordinary forces."
"Mistress!" Naradas exclaimed. "Surely you would not consort with such creatures!"
"I would consort with the King of Hell himself in order to triumph in the Place Which Is No More. Mordja hath feigned flight and hath lured Nahaz away from the battlefield. Take thy beasts there so that they may destroy Urvon's hosts. Nahaz and his minions shall not be there to delay thee. Then come with all possible speed to Kell."
"I shall, mistress," Naradas promised submissively.
A slow rage had been building up in Garion. His son's abductor was no more than seconds away from him, and he knew that there was no way she could gather in her will before his fangs were into her flesh, and then it would be too late. He curled his lips back from his dreadful teeth and slunk closer, one step at a time, his hackles erect and his belly low to the ground. He thirsted for blood, and his hatred burned like a fire in his brain. Quivering in awful anticipation, he bunched his muscles, and a low, rumbling growl filled his throat.
It was that sound that ultimately brought him to his senses. The thought that had seared his brain was the thought of a animal, and it considered nothing beyond the immediate moment. If Zandramas indeed stood no more than a few bounds way, he could rend her flesh and scatter her blood in the till grass beside the track upon which she stood before the echo of her shrieks had returned from nearby hillsides.
But if the figure standing before white-eyed Naradas was but an insubstantial projection, he would clash his curved fangs on nothingness, and the Sorceress of Darshiva would escape his vengeance once again, even as she had at Ashaba. It was perhaps the thought burning in his brain that alerted her; or perhaps, as Polgara had done so often, she had merely sampled the surrounding region with her mind and had located the others.
Whatever it was, the sorceress suddenly hissed in alarm. "Danger!" she snapped to her white-eyed underling. Then she smiled a cruel, mirthless smile. "But I have a form immune to Alorn sorcery." She tensed herself, then blurred, and then the immense shape of the dragon appeared before the suddenly terrified elephants. She spread the vast sails of her wings and launched herself into the damp night air, filling the darkness with her shrieking bellow and her sooty red fire.
"Aunt Pol!" Garion's thought flew out. "The dragon's coming!"
"What?" her answering thought came back.
"Zandramas has changed form! She's flying toward you!"
"Come back here!" she commanded crisply. "Now!"
He spun, his claws digging into the damp turf, and ran toward the farmstead as fast as he could. Behind him he could hear the shrill, panicky trumpeting of the elephants, and overhead the shrieking bellow of the vast dragon. He ran on desperately, knowing that Zandramas was immune to whatever countermeasures Polgara and the others might try, and that only the flaming sword of Iron-grip could drive her away.
It was not far, though the seconds seemed like hours as be bunched and stretched in the running gait of the wolf. Ahead of him he could see the dragon's fiery breath illuminating the storm clouds roiling overhead, a fire eerily accompanied by pale blue lightning that danced in jerky streaks down from the clouds. Then she folded her huge wings and plummeted down toward the farmstead with billows of fire preceding her.
Between bounds, Garion changed and ran on toward the gate with the sword of Iron-grip flaming in the air above his head. At the last instant, the dragon extended her vast pinions and settled into the farmyard, still belching fire and smoke. She swung her snakelike neck around, sending incandescent billows of flame into the wooden structures surrounding the yard. The seasoned wood began to char and smoke, and here and there small blue flames began to flicker their way up the sides of the door frames.
Garion rushed into the yard, his burning sword aloft. Grimly, he began to flail at the dragon with it. "You may be immune to sorcery, Zandramas," he shouted at her, "but you're not immune to this!"
She shrieked, engulfing him in a sheet of flame, but he ignored it and continued to lash her with the blue flame of the Orb and the sword. Finally, unable to bear his relentless strokes any longer, she hurled herself into the air, flapping her great wings frantically. She clawed at the air and finally managed to clear the second-story roof of the farmstead. Then she settled to earth again and continued to bathe the structure in flame.
Garion dashed out through the gateway, fully intending to confront her again. But then he stopped. The dragon was not alone. Glowing with her peculiar nimbus, the blue wolf faced the altered form of the Sorceress of Darshiva. Then, even as Polgara had once expanded into immensity in Sthiss Tor to face the God Issa and as Garion himself had done in the City of Endless Night when he had come at last to his fated meeting with Torak, the blue wolf swelled into vastness.
The meeting of the two was the sort of thing nightmares are made of. The dragon fought with flame, and the wolf with her terrible fangs. Since the wolf was insubstantial— except for her teeth—the dragon's flame had no effect; and though the teeth of the wolf were very sharp, they could not penetrate the dragon's scaly hide.
Back and forth they raged in titanic but inconclusive struggle. Then Garion thought he detected something. The light was not good. The sky overhead was still obscured by the last tattered clouds of the evening's storm, and the sullen flickers of lightning seemed to obscure more than they revealed, but it appeared that each time the wolf lunged, the dragon flinched visibly. Then it came to him. Though the wolfs teeth could not injure the dragon, her blue nimbus could. It seemed in some way to be akin to the glow of the Orb and the fire of Iron-grip's sword. Somehow the blue glow surrounding Poledra, when she assumed the shape of the wolf, partook of the power of the Orb, and Garion had discovered that even in the form of the invincible dragon, Zandramas feared the Orb and anything connected with it. Her flinching became more visible, and Poledra pressed her advantage with savage, snarling lunges. Then, suddenly, they both stopped.