Mallorean Bureaucracy. He has established relations with
the Bureau of Commerce there. If he is not so already, I
suspect that it will not be long before the little bandit is the
wealthiest man in the world. It makes me positively sick
to think about it.
Taiba and Relg have moved with their growing family
to Maragor for reasons far too obscure for me to
comprehend. The Tolnedrans, who have lurked hungrily on the
borders of that haunted region, took this as a sign that the
ghosts had departed. When they dashed in to gather up
the gold lying all over the ground, however, they
discovered that they had been grossly in error. The few who
returned were all hopelessly insane. It appears that Mara
still stands watch over Maragor.
I
I
5384
iT IS NOW eight years since the marriage of
Belgarion and Ce’Nedra, and they remain childless.
The business is rapidly becoming a matter of urgency.
The Rivan King is the Keeper of the Orb, and he must
have an heir. Even though Torak is gone, the forces
ranged against us are too powerful for us to even
consider facing them without the aid of the Orb ‘ and
only the King of Riva can wield it. I therefore summoned
Brand and Cho-Hag and Porenn to Val Alorn this spring
so that we might discuss the matter and decide what
must be done. The immediate solution, of course, is for
Belgarion to take another wife. Ce’Nedra’s barrenness is
certainly reason enough for him to set her aside. He is
extremely fond of her, however, and the proposal would
have to be broached with some delicacy. Porenn raised all
manner of objections. Although she is extraordinarily
able as a ruler, she is nonetheless still a woman, and is
therefore unable to see such matters without emotionality
creeping in. She pointed out most eloquently that she
herself had been childless for several years following her
marriage to Rhodar and that it had been only with the
guidance of Queen Layla that she had been able to
become pregnant. She urged that before we suggest
divorcement to Belgarion, we should consult with Layla
and enlist her aid. She went on to suggest that should
Layla fail, we should then appeal directly to Polgara, who
now lives in the Vale with her husband, Durnik, and the
strange, beautiful foundling they call Errand. Rhodar’s
tiny little widow can be extremely forceful when she
takes it into her head to be so. She stubbornly insisted
that we take no steps with Belgarion until both Layla and
Polgara have been unable to remedy Ce’Nedra’s
childlessness. By custom, no action may be taken in concert by
the Alorn rulers unless all of us agree, so Porenn had us
over a barrel. She declared that she would refuse to agree
until we met her conditions, and she even offered to go to
Layla herself to present our request to the Sendarian
Queen. Brand, of course, had no official standing at our
meetings, but was present to protect Rivan interests in
discussions to which Belgarion should probably not be
privy Brand has aged noticeably since the Battle of Thull
Mardu. The death of his youngest son appears to have
struck him to the heart. Cho-Hag, however, remains
much the same – although his face is so weather-beaten
that it would be well-nigh impossible to detect signs of
aging upon it.
Following our meetings, Porenn traveled to Sendar,
and there she placed the entire business so forcefully to
Layla that Fulrach’s plump little queen put aside her
morbid fear of sea travel and left immediately for Riva to
consult with Queen Ce’Nedra. I hope her efforts will be
successful. Peculiarly, I find that I love the little Rivan
Queen. She can be absolutely impossible, but at the same
time completely adorable. Belgarion would be much
poorer without her.
The Vordues have set up what they call ‘the Kingdom
of Vordue’ in northern Tolnedra. Varana is going to have
to do something about that.
This fall Prince Kheldar returned from Mallorea and,
somewhat surprisingly, traveled directly to Boktor for
discussions with Porenn rather than return to his base of
operations in Car og Nadrak. She advises me that our
wily little friend traveled through the Dalasian
protectorates in southwest Mallorea after his departure from
Melcene and that what he saw there frightened him. I
can’t for the life of me imagine anything sufficiently awful
to frighten Kheldar. I think I’d better investigate.
I’ve underestimated Varana. He’s almost as foxy as Ran
Borune was. He has concluded a secret agreement with
King Korodullin, and the Mimbrate Knights have been
unleashed upon the ‘Kingdom of Vordue’. Varana
steadfastly withholds the legions, piously proclaiming that he
will not commit them against their own countrymen. The
Mimbrates are tearing up Vordue, and it will only be a
matter of time before the Vorduvians will be forced to
appeal to the Imperial Throne for protection. Varana will
thus crush their rebellion without so much as dirtying his
hands. Absolutely brilliant!
5385
KiNG DROSTA LEK THUN, the scabby monarch
of Gar og Nadrak, has expropriated the holdings
of Prince Kheldar and Yarblek. Kheldar, who
was in the Vale of Aldur consulting with Belgarath and
Polgara about what he saw in Dalasia, is positively livid
with rage. I hold no particular brief for Drosta’s
highhanded banditry, but I do take a certain amount of
pleasure at Kheldar’s discomfort. The little thief was growing
a bit too high and mighty for my taste. Eriven a bit wild
by Drosta’s open theft, Kheldar has forwarded a formal
declaration of war to the palace at Yar Nadrak. How can a
private citizen declare war on an entire kingdom? It’s an
absurdity. Kheldar, however, appears to be dead serious
about it, and he’s moving about in the west, recruiting an
army in preparation for mounting an invasion. Drosta
laughs uproariously, but if I were in his shoes, I’d be a
little nervous. Even with his Nadrak holdings out of
reach, Kheldar has vast sums at his disposal, and
mercenaries are flocking to his banner.
The Mimbrate Knights are savaging Vordue. They try,
insofar as possible, to avoid bloodshed in their
encounters. Property damage, however, mounts into the millions.
The Mimbrates move in, evacuate the towns and villages,
and then burn them. Stone buildings are pulled down and
the furnishings and other contents thrown onto huge
bonfires. Homeless refugees wander about in northern
Tolnedra, cursing the Vordues and sending appeals for aid
to Emperor Varana. Varana, however, is sitting tight in Tol
Honeth, waiting for the Vordues to capitulate.
It appears that Layla has failed. Ce’Nedra remains
childless. We must now convince Belgarion to take his
Queen to the Vale. Polgara is our last hope.
‘Zakath has completed his conquest of the plains
regions of southern Cthol Murgos. Urgit’s army, however,
has taken up strong positions in the mountains. ‘Zakath is
preparing for a long, difficult campaign. We can hope that
it will take him the rest of his life.
5386
coUNT Reldegen, the able Governor-General of
Asturia, has journeyed southward at the request of
both parties to mediate the dispute between Emperor
Varana and the Vordues. I’m not certain who first suggested
him, but the suggestion was a stroke of genius. I’ve met
Reldegen on a couple of occasions, and I’ve never met a
more fair-minded and impartial man. The fact that Varana
and the Vordues are seeking a mediator is ample evidence
that their ‘war’ is winding down. Quite obviously, Varana
has won, and Reldegen’s good offices will be somewhat in
the nature of a formality – a face-saving gesture to make
total surrender more palatable to the Vorduvians. Varana
got what he wanted, and he sees no necessity for rubbing
the Vordues’ noses in his victory.
Once again we have disturbing news out of southern
Cthol Murgos. The region was apparently inhabited before
the Murgos came, and the indigenous population was
enslaved. Despite the eons of slavery however, it appears
that those people have managed to keep their racial
identity intact. Because of their peculiar racial notions, Murgos
scrupulously avoid contact with their slaves, hence they
are almost totally unaware of what is really going on in
their slave-pens. The Malloreans, however, are more
curious. The Melcenes in particular seem to automatically
begin to search through any new population they
encounter in the search for what they call ‘talent’. Drasnian
intelligence agents, operating at great risk in ‘Zakath’s
army, have begun to send back reports of a highly
disturbing nature. The Malloreans are aghast at what they have
discovered. They have found a sort of religion among the
slaves in southern Cthol Murgos. In itself this would not
be particularly significant, but what has so alarmed the
Malloreans is that this subterranean religion is absolutely
identical to the one which exists in the Dalasian
protectorates of southwestern Mallorea. This despite the fact that
the two regions have been totally separated from each