on my face, but I’m fairly sure he didn’t see me.
“Hear my words, for MY words are truth. The division will end, for the
Child of Light is coming.”
That was what I’d been waiting to hear. It confirmed that Bormik was
the voice of prophecy and what he’d been saying all these years had
contained vital information–and we’d missed it! I started to swear
under my breath and to think up all sorts of nasty things to do to the
thick headed Hatturk. I glanced quickly at Polgara, but she was
sitting in a corner of the room speaking intently to Bormik’s
cross-eyed daughter.
“And the Choice shall be made in the holy place of the children of the
Dragon God,” Bormik continued,
“For the Dragon God is error, and was not intended. Only in the Choice
shall error be mended, and all made whole again. Behold, in the day
that Aldur’s Orb burns hot with crimson fire shall the name of the
Child of Dark be revealed. Guard well the son of the Child of Light,
for he shall have no brother. And it shall come to pass that those
which once were one and now are two shall be rejoined, and in that
rejoining shall one of them be no more.”
Then Bormik’s weary old head drooped, as if the effort of prophecy had
exhausted him. I might have tried to shake him awake, but I knew that
it’d be fruitless. He was too old and feeble to go on. I stood,
picked up a quilt from a nearby bench, and gently covered the drowsing
old man.
I certainly didn’t want him to take a chill and die on me before he’d
said what he was supposed to say.
“Pol,” I said to my daughter.
“In a minute, father,” she said, waving me off. She continued to speak
with that same low intensity to the cross-eyed Luana.
“Agreed, then?” she said to the spindly spinster.
“As you say. Lady Polgara,” Bormik’s middle-age daughter replied.
“A bit of verification first, if you don’t mind.” She rose, crossed
the room, and looked intently at the image of her face in a polished
brass mirror.
“Done!” was all she said. Then she turned and looked around the room,
and her eyes were as straight as any I’ve ever seen–very pretty eyes,
as I recall.
What was going on here?
“All right, father,” Pol said in an offhand sort of way.
“We can go now.” And she walked on out of the room.
“What was that all about?” I asked her as I opened the front door for
her.
“Something for something, father,” she replied.
“You might call it a fair trade.”
“There’s our problem,” I told her, pointing at the brutish Hatturk
impatiently waiting in the street.
“He’s a Bear-cultist, and even if I could dragoon him into transcribing
Bormik’s ravings, he’d let the priests of the Bear-cult see them before
he passed them on to me. Revisionism is the soul of theology, so
there’s no telling what sort of garbage would filter through to me.”
“It’s already been taken care of, father,” she told me in that
offensively superior tone of hers.
“Don’t strain Hatturk’s understanding by trying to explain the need for
accuracy to him. Luana’s going to take care of it for us.”
“Bormik’s daughter?”
“Of course. She’s closest to him, after all. She’s been listening to
his ravings for years now, and she knows exactly how to get him to
repeat things he’s said in the past. All it takes is a single word to
set him off.” she paused.
“Oh,” she said, “here’s your purse.” She held out my much-lighter
money pouch, which she’d somehow managed to steal from me.
“I
gave her money to hire the scribes.”
“And?” I said, hefting my diminished purse.
“And what?”
“What’s in it for her?”
“Oh, father,” she said.
“You saw her, didn’t you?”
“Her eyes, you mean?”
“Of course. As I said, something for something.”
“She’s too old for it to make any difference, Pol,” I objected.
“She’ll never catch a husband now.”
“Maybe not, but at least she’ll be able to look herself straight in the
eye in the mirror.” She gave me that long-suffering look.
“You’ll never understand, Old Wolf. Trust me, I know what I’m doing.
What now?”
“I guess we might as well go on to Drasnia. We seem to have finished
up here.” I shrugged.
“How did you straighten her eyes?”
“Muscles, Old Wolf. Tighten some. Relax others. It’s easy if you pay
attention. Details, father, you have to pay attention to details.
Isn’t that what you told me?”
“Where did you learn so much about eyes?”
She shrugged.
“I didn’t. I just made it up as I went along. Shall we go to
Drasnia?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
We spent the night in Hatturk’s house and went down to the harbor the
following morning to sail to Kotu at the mouth of the Mrin River.
“I want to thank you, Hatturk,” I said to the Clan-Chief as we stood on
the wharf.
“My pleasure, Belgarath,” he replied.
“I’ve got a word of advice for you, if you don’t mind listening.”
“Of course.”
“You might want to give some thought to keeping your religious opinions
to yourself. The Bear-cult’s caused a great deal of trouble in Aloria
in the past, and the Alorn Kings aren’t particularly fond of it. King
Algar’s a patient man, but his patience only goes so far. The cult’s
been suppressed a number of times in the past, and I sort of feel
another one coming. I really don’t think you want to be on the wrong
side when that happens. Algar Fleet-foot can be very firm when he sets
his mind to it.”
He gave me a sullen sort of look. I did try to warn him, but I guess
he chose not to listen.
“Does Dras know we’re coming, father?” Polgara asked me as we were
boarding the ship.
I nodded.
“I talked with a Cherek sea captain yesterday. He’s on the way to
Boktor right now. His ship’s one of those war boats, so he’ll get
there long before we reach Kotu.”
“It’ll be good to see Dras again. He’s not quite as bright as his
brothers, but he’s got a good heart.”
“Yes,” I agreed.
“I guess I should have a talk with him when we get to Kotu. I think
it’s time that he got married.”
“Don’t look at me, father,” she said primly.
“I’m fond of Dras, but not that fond.”
Kotu is one of the major seaports in the world now, largely because
it’s the western terminus of the North Caravan Route. When Pol and I
went there, however, trade with the Nadraks was very limited, and Kotu
was hardly more than a village with only a few wharves jutting out into
the bay. It took us two days to make the voyage across the Gulf of
Cherek from Darine to the mouth of the Mrin River, and Dras was waiting
for us when we arrived. He had a fair number of his retainers with
him, but they hadn’t come along to see me. It was Polgara they were
interested in.
Evidently, word had filtered into the various Alorn kingdoms about the
beautiful daughter of Ancient Belgarath, and the young Drasnians had
come down-river from Boktor to have a look for themselves.
I’m sure they weren’t disappointed.
When we’d gone to the Isle of the Winds for Beldaran’s wedding, the
girls had only been sixteen, and they had never been out of the Vale.
Polgara had made me very nervous during the course of that trip. But
she was older now, and she’d demonstrated that she knew how to take
care of herself, so I could watch those young men swarming around her
with equanimity and even with a certain amusement. Pol enjoyed their
attentions, but she wasn’t going to do anything inappropriate.
Our ship docked in mid-afternoon, and we took rooms at a somewhat seedy
inn, planning to sail upriver the next morning to the village of Braca,
where the Mrin Prophet was kenneled.
Bull-neck and I talked until quite late that evening, which gave Pol
the opportunity to break a few hearts.
Dras leaned back in his chair and looked at me speculatively.
“Algar’s going to get married, you know,” he told me.
“It’s funny he didn’t mention it,” I replied.
“He went with us to Riva’s Island.”
“You know how Algar is,” Dras said with a shrug.
“I suppose I ought to be thinking about that myself.”
“I’d been intending to bring that up,” I told him.
“Ordinary people can get married or not, whichever suits them, but
kings have certain responsibilities.”
“I don’t suppose . . .” He left it hanging tentatively in the air
between us.
“No, Dras,” I replied firmly.
“Polgara’s not available. I don’t think you’d want to be married to
her anyway. She has what you might call a prickly disposition. Pick