"What is it, father?" Polgara asked.
"It feels the Sardion," Eriond said in a calm voice.
"Are we that close?" Garion demanded. "Is this the Place Which Is No More?"
"I don't think so, Belgarion," the young man replied. "It's something else."
"What is it, then?"
"I'm not sure, but the Orb is responding to the other stone in some way. They talk to each other in a fashion I can't understand."
They rode on, and some time later the blue‑banded hawk came swirling in, blurred into Beldin's shape, and stood in front of them. The gnarled dwarf had a slightly self‑satisfied look on his face. "
"You look like a cat that just got into the cream, Belgarath said.
"Naturally. I just sent a dozen or so Grolims off in the general direction of the polar icecap. They'll have a wonderful time when the pan ice starts to break up and they get to float around up there for the rest of the summer."
"Are you going to scout on ahead?" Belgarath asked him.
"I suppose so," Beldin replied. He held out his arms, blurred into feathers, and drove himself into the air.
They rode more cautiously now, climbing deeper and deeper into the Mountains of Zamad. The surrounding country grew more broken. The reddish‑hued peaks were jagged, and their lower flanks were covered with dark firs and pines. Rushing streams boiled over rocks and dropped in frothy waterfalls over steep cliffs. The road, which had been straight and flat on the plains of Ganesia, began to twist and turn as it crawled up the steep slopes.
It was nearly noon when Beldin returned again. "The main party of Grolims turned south," he reported. "There are about forty of them."
"Was Zandramas with them?" Garion asked quickly.
"No. I don't think so ‑at least I didn't pick up the sense of anyone unusual in the group."
"We haven't lost her, have we?" Ce'Nedra asked in alarm.
"No," Garion replied. "The Orb still has her trail." He glanced over his shoulder. The stone on the hilt of his sword was still burning a sullen red.
"About all we can do is follow her," Belgarath said. "It's Zandramas we're interested in, not a party of stray Grolims. Can you pinpoint exactly where we are?" he asked Beldin.
"Mallorea."
"Very funny."
"We've crossed into Zamad. This road goes on down into Voresebo, though. Where's my mule?"
"Back with the packhorses," Durnik told him.
As they moved on, Garion could feel Polgara probing on ahead with her mind.
"Are you getting anything, Pol?" Belgarath asked her.
"Nothing specific, father," she replied. "I can sense the fact that Zandramas is close, but she's shielding, so I can't pinpoint her."
They rode on, moving at a cautious walk now. Then, as the road passed through a narrow gap and descended on the far side, they saw a figure in a gleaming white robe standing in the road ahead. As they drew closer, Garion saw that it was Cyradis.
"Move with great care in this place," she cautioned, and there was a note of anger in her voice. "The Child of Dark seeks to circumvent the ordered course of events and hath laid a trap for ye."
"There's nothing new or surprising about that," Beldin growled. "What does she hope to accomplish?"
"It is her thought to slay one of the companions of the Child of Light and thereby prevent the completion of one of the tasks which must be accomplished ere the final meeting. Should she succeed, all that hath gone before shall come to naught. Follow me, and I will guide you safely to the next task."
Toth stepped down from his horse and quickly led it to the side of his slender mistress. She smiled at him, her face radiant, and laid a slim hand on his huge arm. With no apparent effort, the huge man lifted her into the saddle of his horse and then took the reins in his hand.
"Aunt Pol," Garion whispered, "is it my imagination, or is she really there this time?"
Polgara looked intently at the blindfolded Seeress. "It's not a projection," she said. "It's much more substantial. I couldn't begin to guess how she got here, but I think you're right, Garion. She's really here."
They followed the Seeress and her mute guide down the steeply descending road into a grassy basin surrounded on all sides by towering firs. In the center of the basin was a small mountain lake sparkling in the sunlight.
Polgara suddenly drew in her breath sharply. "We're being watched," she said.
"Who is it, Pol?" Belgarath asked.
"The mind is hidden, father. All I can get is the sense of watching ‑and anger." A smile touched her lips. "I'm sure it's Zandramas. She's shielding, so I can't reach her mind, but she can't shield out my sense of being watched, and she can't control her anger enough to keep me from picking up the edges of it."
"Who's she so angry with?"
"Cyradis, I think. She went to a great deal of trouble to lay a trap for us, and Cyradis came along and spoiled it. She still might try something, so I think we'd all better be on our guard."
He nodded bleakly. "Right." he agreed.
Toth led the horse his mistress was riding out into the basin and stopped at the edge of the lake. When the rest of them reached her, she pointed down through the crystal water. "The task lies there," she said. "Below lies a submerged grot. One of ye must enter that grot and then return. Much shall be revealed there."
Belgarath looked hopefully at Beldin.
"Not this time, old man," the dwarf said, shaking his head. "I'm a hawk, not a fish, and I don't like cold water any more than you do."
"Pol?" Belgarath said rather plaintively.
"I don't think so, father," she replied. "I think it's your turn this time. Besides, I need to concentrate on Zandramas."
He bent over and dipped his hand into the sparkling water. Then he shuddered. "This is cruel," he said.
Silk was grinning at him.
"Don't say it, Prince Kheldar." Belgarath scowled, starting to remove his clothing. "Just keep your mouth shut."
They were perhaps all a bit surprised at how sleekly muscular the old man was. Despite his fondness for rich food and good brown ale, his stomach was as flat as a board; although he was as lean as a rail, his shoulders and chest rippled when he moved.
"My, my," Velvet murmured appreciatively, eyeing the loincloth‑clad old man.
He suddenly grinned at her impishly. "Would you care for another frolic in a pool, Liselle?" he invited with a wicked look in his bright blue eyes.
She suddenly blushed a rosy red, glancing guiltily at Silk.
Belgarath laughed, arched himself forward, and split the water of the lake as cleanly as the blade of a knife.
Several yards out, he broached, leaping high into the air with the sun gleaming on his silvery scales and his broad, forked‑tail flapping and shaking droplets like jewels across the sparkling surface of the lake. Then his dark, heavy body drove down and down into the depths of the crystal lake.
"Oh, my," Durnik breathed, his hands twitching.
"Never mind, dear." Polgara laughed. "He wouldn't like it at all if you stuck a fishhook in his jaw."
The great, silver‑sided salmon swirled down and disappeared into an irregularly shaped opening near the bottom of the lake.
They waited, and Garion found himself unconsciously holding his breath.
After what seemed an eternity, the great fish shot from the mouth of the submerged cave, drove himself far out into the lake, and then returned, skipping across the surface of the water on his tail, shaking his head and almost seeming to balance himself with his fins. Then he plunged forward into the water near the shore, and Belgarath emerged dripping and shivering. "Invigorating," he observed, climbing back up onto the bank. "Have you got a blanket handy, Pol?" he asked, stripping the water from his arms and legs with his hands.
"Show‑off," Beldin grunted.
"What was down there?" Garion asked.
"It looks like an old temple of some kind," the old man answered, vigorously drying himself with the blanket Polgara had
handed him. "Somebody took a natural cave and walled up the sides to give it some kind of shape. There was an altar there with a special kind of niche in it ‑empty, naturally‑ but the place was filled with an overpowering presence, and all the rocks glowed red."
"The Sardion?" Beldin demanded intently.
"Not any more," Belgarath replied, drying his hair. "It was there, though, for a long, long time ‑and it had built a barrier of some kind to keep anybody from finding it. It's gone now, but I'll recognize the signs of it the next time I get close."
"Garion!" Ce'Nedra cried. "Look!" with a trembling hand she was pointing at a nearby crag. High atop that rocky promontory stood a figure wrapped in shiny black satin. Even before the figure tossed back its hood with a gesture of supreme arrogance, he knew who it was. Without thinking, he reached for Iron‑grip's sword, his mind suddenly aflame.
But then Cyradis spoke in a clear, firm voice. "I am wroth with thee, Zandramas," she declared. "Seek not to interfere with that which must come to pass, lest I make my choice here and now."
"And if thou dost, sightless, creeping worm, then all will turn to chaos, and thy task will be incomplete, and blind chance will supplant prophecy. Behold, I am the Child of Dark, and I fear not the hand of chance, for chance is my servant even more than it is the servant of the Child of Light."
Then Garion heard a low snarl, a dreadful sound -more dreadful yet because it came from his wife's throat.
Moving faster than he thought was possible, Ce'Nedra dashed to Durnik's horse and ripped the smith's axe from the rope sling which held it. with a scream of rage, she ran around the edge of the tiny mountain lake brandishing the axe.
"Ce'Nedra!" he shouted, lunging after her. "No!"
Zandramas laughed with cruel glee. "Choose, Cyradis!" she shouted. "Make thine empty choice, for in the death of the Rivan Queen, I triumph!" and she raised both hands over her head.
Though he was running as fast as he could, Garion saw that he had no hope of catching Ce'Nedra before she moved fatally close to the satin‑robed sorceress atop the crag. Even now, his wife had begun scrambling up the rocks, screeching curses and hacking at the boulders that got in her way with Durniks axe.
Then the form of a glowing blue wolf suddenly appeared between Ce'Nedra and the object of her fury.
Ce'Nedra stopped as if frozen, and Zandramas recoiled from the snarling wolf. The light around the wolf flickered briefly, and there, still standing between Ce'Nedra and Zandramas stood the form of Garion's ultimate grandmother, Belgarath's wife and Polgara's mother. Her tawny hair was aflame with blue light, and her golden eyes blazed with unearthly fire.
"You!" Zandramas gasped, shrinking back even further.
Poledra reached back, took Ce'Nedra to her side, and protectively put one arm about her tiny shoulders. With her other hand she gently removed the axe from the little Queen's suddenly nerveless fingers. Ce'Nedra's eyes were wide and unseeing, and she stood immobilized as if in a trance.
"She is under my protection, Zandramas," Poledra said, "and you may not harm her." The sorceress atop the crag howled in sudden, frustrated rage. Her eyes ablaze, she once again drew herself erect.
"Will it be now, Zandramas?" Poledra asked in a deadly voice. "Is this the time you have chosen for our meeting? You know even as I that should we meet at the wrong time and in the wrong place, we will both be destroyed."
"I do not fear thee, Poledra!" the sorceress shrieked.
"Nor I you. Come then, Zandramas, let us destroy each other here and now ‑for should the Child of Light go on to the Place Which Is No More unopposed and find no Child of Dark awaiting him there, then I triumph!
If this be the time and place of your choosing, bring forth your power and let it happen ‑for I grow weary of you."
The face of Zandramas was twisted with rage, and Garion could feel the force of her will building up. He tried to reach over his shoulder for his sword, thinking to unleash its fire and blast the hated sorceress from atop her crag, but even as Ce'Nedra's apparently were, he found that his muscles were all locked in stasis. From behind him he could feel the others also struggling to shake free of the force which seemed to hold them in place as well.
"No," Poledra's voice sounded firmly in the vaults of his mind. "This is between Zandramas and me. Don't interfere."
"Well, Zandramas," she said aloud then, "What is your decision? Will you cling to life a while longer, or will you die now?"
The sorceress struggled to regain her composure, even as the glowing nimbus about Poledra grew more intense.
Then Zandramas howled with enraged disappointment and disappeared in a flash of orange fire.
"I thought she might see it my way," Poledra said calmly. She turned to face Garion and the others. There was a twinkle in her golden eyes. "What took you all so long?" she asked. "I've been waiting for you here for months." She looked rather critically at the half‑naked Belgarath, who was staring at her with a look of undisguised adoration. "You're as thin as a bone, Old Wolf," she told him. "You really ought to eat more, you know." She smiled fondly at him. "Would you like to have me go catch you a nice fat rabbit?" she asked. Then she laughed, shimmered back into the form of the blue wolf, and loped away, her paws seeming scarcely to touch the earth.
Here ends Book III of The Malloreon.
Book IV, Sorceress of Darsheva,
continues the search for Zandramas and for the Sardion, which has been at many sites, but is now to be found at the "Place Which Is No More" ‑whatever that means!
-- Sorceress of Darshiva (1990) --
Not Yet Finished Editing
-- The Seeress of Kell (1991) --
PROLOGUE
Excerpts from The Book of Ages, Book One of THE MALLO-REAN GOSPELS:
Now These are the Ages of Man:
In the First Age was man created, and he awoke in puzzlement and wonder as he beheid the world about him. And those that had made him considered him and selected from his number those that pleased them, and the rest were cast out and driven away. And some went in search of die Spirit known as UL, and they left us and passed into the west, and we saw them no more. And some denied the Gods, and they went into the far north to wrestle with demons. And some turned to worldly matters, and they went away into the east and built mighty cities there.
But we despaired, and we sat us down upon the earth in the shadow of the mountains of Korim, and in bitterness we bewailed our fate that we had been made and then cast out.
And it came to pass that in the midst of our grief a woman of our people was seized by a rapture, and it was as if she had been shaken by a mighty hand. And she arose from the earth upon which she sat, and she bound her eyes with a cloth, signifying that she had seen that which no mortal had seen before, for lo, she was the first seeress in all the world. And with the touch of her vision still upon her, she spake unto us, saying:
"Behold! A feast hath been set before Those who made us, and this feast shall ye call the Feast of Life. And Those who made us have chosen that which pleased Them, and that which pleased Them not was not chosen.
"Now we are the Feast of Life, and ye sorrow that no Guest at the feast hath chosen ye. Despair not, however, for one Guest hath not yet arrived at the feast. The other Guests have taken their fill, but this great Feast of Life awaiteth still the Beloved Guest who cometh late, and I say unto all the people that it is He who will choose us. Abide therefore against His coming, for it is certain. Put aside thy grief and turn thy face to the sky and to the earth that thou mayest read the signs written there, for this I say unto all the people. It is upon ye that His coming rests. For behold, He may not choose ye unless ye choose Him. And this is the Fate for which we were made. Rise up, therefore, and sit no more upon the earth in vain and foolish lamentation. Take up the task which lies before ye and prepare the way for Him who will surely come."
Much we marveled at these words, and we considered them most carefully. We questioned the seeress, but her answers were dark and obs
cure. And so it was that we turned our faces to the sky and bent our ears to the whispers which came from the earth that we might see and hear and learn. And as we learned to read the book of the skies and to hear the whispers within the rocks, we found myriad warnings that two spirits would come to us and that the one was good and the other evil. Long we labored, but still were sorely troubled, for we could not determine which spirit was the true one and which the false. For truly, evil is disguised as good in the book of the heavens and in the speech of the earth, and no man is wise enough to choose between them.
Pondering this, we went out from beneath the shadow of the mountains of Korim and into the lands beyond, where we abode. And we put aside the concerns of man and bent all our efforts to the task that lay before us. Our witches and our seers sought the aid of the spirit world, our necromancers took counsel with the dead, and our diviners sought advice from the earth. But lo, none of these knew more than we.
Then gathered we at last upon a fertile plain to bring together all that we had learned. And these are the truths that we have learned from the stars, from the rocks, from the hearts of men and from the minds of the spirits:
Know ye that all adown the endless avenues of time hath division marred all that is—for there is division at the very heart of creation. And some have said that this is natural and will persist until the end of days, but it is not so. Were the division destined to be eternal, then the purpose of creation would be to contain it. But the stars and the spirits and the voices within the rocks speak of the day when the division will end and all will be made one again, for creation itself knows that the day will come.
Know ye further that two spirits contend with each other at the very center of time, and these spirits are the two sides of that which hath divided creation. And in a certain time shall those spirits meet upon this world, and then will come the time of the Choice. And if the Choice be not made, then shall this world vanish, and the Beloved Guest of whom the seeress spoke will never come. For it is this which she meant when she said to us: "Behold, He may not choose ye unless ye choose Him." And the Choice that we must make is the choice between good and evil, and the division between good and evil, and the reality that will exist after we have made the choice will be a reality of good or a reality of evil, and it will prevail so until the end of
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