encampment of the old people the winter before I went to serve my
Master.
“Thou hast heard of him, I see.” There was no real point in my trying
to hide anything from my Master.
“UL, as I told thee,” he continued, “forbade the unmaking of things,
and this greatly offended several of us.
Torak in particular was put much out of countenance. Prohibitions or
restraints of any kind do not sit well with my brother Torak. It was
at his urging, methinks, that we sent such unseemly creatures to UL,
telling them that he would be their God. I do sorely repent our
spitefulness, for what UL did, he did out of a Necessity that we did
not at the time perceive.”
“It is UL with whom thou wouldst consult at Prolgu, is it not,
Master?”
I asked shrewdly. You see? I’m not totally without some degree of
perception.
My Master nodded.
“A certain thing hath come to pass,” he told me sadly.
“We had hoped that it might not, but it is another of those Necessities
to which men and Gods alike must bow.” He sighed.
“Seek thy bed, ; Belgarath,” he told me then.
“We still have far to go ere we reach Prolgu, and I have noted that
without sleep, thou art a surly companion.”
“A weakness of mine, Master,” I admitted, spreading my blankets on the
ground. My Master, of course, required sleep no more than he required
food.
In time we reached Prolgu, which is a strange place on the top of a
mountain that looks oddly artificial. We had no more than started up
its side when we were greeted by a very old man and by someone who was
quite obviously not a man. That was the first time I met UL, and the
overpowering sense of his presence quite nearly bowled me over.
“Aldur,” he said to my Master, “well met.”
“Well met indeed,” my Master replied, politely inclining his head.
The Gods, I’ve noted, have an enormous sense of propriety. Then my
Master reached inside his robe and took out that ordinary, round grey
rock he’d spent the last couple of decades studying.
“Our hopes notwithstanding,”
he announced, holding the rock out for UL to see, “it hath arrived.”
UL nodded gravely.
“I had thought I sensed its presence. Wilt thou accept the burden of
it?”
My Master sighed.
“If I must,” he said.
“Thou art brave, Aldur,” UL said, “and wiser far than thy brothers.
That which commands us all hath brought it to thy hand for a purpose.
Let us go apart and consider our course.”
I learned that day that there was something very strange about that
ordinary-looking stone.
The old man who had accompanied UL was named Gorim, and he and I got
along well. He was a gentle, kindly old fellow whose features were the
same as those of the old people I’d met some years before. We went up
into the city, and he took me to his house. We waited there while my
Master–and his–spoke together for quite some time. To pass the long
hours, he told me the story of how he had come to enter the service of
UL. It seemed that his people were Dals, the ones who had somehow been
left out when the Gods were selecting the various races of man to serve
them. Despite my peculiar situation, I’ve never been a particularly
religious man, so I had a bit of difficulty grasping the concept of the
spiritual pain the Dals suffered as outcasts. The Dals, of course,
traditionally live to the south of the cluster of mountains known only
as Korim, but it appeared that quite early in their history, they
divided themselves into various groups to go in search of a God. Some
went to the north to become Morindim and Karands; some went to the east
to become Melcenes; some stayed south of Korim and continued to be
Dals; but Gorim’s people, Ulgos, he called them, came west.
Eventually, after the Ulgos had wandered around in the wilderness for
generations, Gorim was born, and when he reached manhood, he
volunteered to go alone in search of UL. That was long before I was
born, of course. Anyway, after many years he finally found UL. He
took the good news back to his people, but not too many of them
believed him.
People are like that sometimes. Finally he grew disgusted with them
and told them to follow him or stay where they were, he didn’t much
care which. Some followed, and some didn’t. As he told me of this, he
grew pensive.
“I have oft times wondered whatever happened to those who stayed
behind,” he said sadly.
“I can clear that up for you, my friend,” I advised him.
“I happened across them some twenty-five or so years ago. They had a
large camp quite a ways north of my Master’s Vale. I spent a winter
with them and then moved on. I doubt that you’d find any of them still
alive, though.
They were all very old when I saw them.”
He gave me a stricken look, and then he bowed his head and wept.
“What’s wrong, Gorim?” I exclaimed, somewhat alarmed.
“I had hoped that UL might relent and set aside my curse on them,”
he replied brokenly.
“Curse?”
“That they would wither and perish and be no more. Their women were
made barren by my curse.”
“It was still working when I was there,” I told him.
“There wasn’t a single child in the entire camp. I wondered why they
made such a fuss over me. I guess they hadn’t seen a child in a long,
long time. I couldn’t get any details from them, because I couldn’t
understand their language.”
“They spoke the old tongue,” he told me sadly, “even as do my people
here in Prolgu.”
“How is it that you speak my language then?” I asked him.
“It is my place as leader to speak for my people when we encounter
other races,” he explained.
“Ah,” I said.
“That stands to reason, I guess.”
My Master and I returned to the Vale not long after that, and I took up
other studies. Time seemed meaningless in the Vale, and I devoted
years of study to the most commonplace of things. I examined trees and
birds, fish and beasts, insects and vermin. I spent forty-five years
on the study of grass alone. In time it occurred to me that I wasn’t
aging as other men did. I’d seen enough old people to know that aging
is a part of being human, but for some reason I seemed to be breaking
the rules.
“Master,” I said one night high in the tower as we both labored with
our studies, “why is it that I do not grow old?”
“Wouldst thou grow old, my son?” he asked me.
“I have never seen much advantage in it, myself.”
“I don’t really miss it all that much, Master,” I admitted, “but isn’t
it customary?”
“Perhaps,” he said, “but not mandatory. Thou hast much yet to learn,
and one or ten or even a hundred lifetimes would not be enough. How
old art thou, my son?”
“I think I am somewhat beyond three hundred years, Master.”
“A suitable age, my son, and thou has persevered in thy studies.
Should I forget myself and call thee “boy” again, pray correct me. It
is not seemly that the disciple of a God should be called “boy.” ” “I
shall remember that, Master,” I assured him, almost overcome with joy
that he had finally called me his disciple.
“I was certain that I could depend on thee,” he said with a faint
smile.
“And what is the object of thy present study, my son?”
“I would seek to learn why the stars fall, Master.”
“A proper study, my son.”
“And thou, Master,” I said.
“What is thy study–if I be not overbold to ask.”
“Even as before, Belgarath,” he replied, holding up that fatal round
stone.
“It hath been placed in my care by UL himself, and it is therefore upon
me to commune with it that I may know it–and its purpose.”
“Can a stone have a purpose, Master–other than to be a stone?”
The piece of rock, now worn smooth, even polished, by my Master’s
patient hand, made me apprehensive for some reason. In one of those
rare presentiments that I don’t have very often, I sensed that a great
deal of mischief would come about as a result of it.
“This particular jewel hath a great purpose, Belgarath, for through it
the world and all who dwell herein shall be changed. If I can but
perceive that purpose, I might make some preparations. That necessity
lie th heavily upon my spirit.” And then he lapsed once more into
silence, idly turning the stone over and over in his hand as he gazed
deep into its polished surface with troubled eyes.