Читать книгу Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress: 2-Book Collection - David Eddings - Страница 32

I crossed the River Arend, the traditional border between Arendia and Tolnedra, early one morning in late spring. The north bank of the river was patrolled by Mimbrate knights, of course, but that wasn’t really any problem. I do have certain advantages, after all.

I paused for a time in the Forest of Vordue to give some thought to my situation. When my Master had roused me from my drunken stupor back in Camaar, he hadn’t really given me any instructions, so I was more or less on my own. There wasn’t any place I really had to go, and no particular urgency about getting there. I still felt my responsibilities, however. I suppose I was what you might call a disciple emeritus, a vagabond sorcerer wandering around poking my nose into things that were probably none of my business. If I happened to come across anything significant, I could pass it on to my brothers back in the Vale. Aside from that, I was free to wander wherever I chose. My grief hadn’t really diminished, but I was learning to live with it and to keep it rather tightly controlled. The years in Camaar had taught me the futility of trying to hide from it.

And so, filled with a kind of suppressed melancholy, I set off toward Tol Honeth. As long as I was here anyway, I thought I might as well find out what the empire was up to.

There was a certain amount of political maneuvering going on in the Grand Duchy of Vordue as I passed through on my way south. The Honeths were in power again, and the Vordue family always took that as a personal affront. There were abundant signs that the second Honethite Dynasty was in its twilight. That’s a peculiar thing about dynasties in any of the world’s kingdoms. The founder of a dynasty is usually vigorous and gifted, but as the centuries roll by, his successors become progressively less so. The fact that they almost invariably marry their cousins might have something to do with it. Controlled inbreeding might work out all right with horses and dogs and cattle, but when it comes to humans, keeping it in the family’s not a good idea. Bad traits will breed true the same as good ones will, and stupidity seems to float to the surface a lot faster than courage or brilliance.

At any rate, the Honethite emperors had been going downhill for the past century or so, and the Vorduvians were slavering with anticipation, feeling that their turn on the throne was just around the corner.

It was early summer when I reached Tol Honeth. Since it was their native city, the Honethite emperors had devoted much of their time – and most of the imperial treasury – to improving the capital. Any time the Honeths are in power in Tolnedra, an investment in marble quarries will yield handsome returns.

I crossed the north bridge to the city and paused at the gate to answer the perfunctory questions of the legionnaires standing guard there. Their armor was very impressive, but they weren’t. I made a mental note of the fact that the legions seemed to be getting badly out of condition. Somebody was going to have to do something about that.

The streets were crowded. The streets of Tol Honeth always are. Everybody in Tolnedra who thinks he’s important gravitates to the capital. Proximity to the seat of power is very important to certain kinds of people.

In a roundabout sort of way I was a religious personage, so, as I had in Arendia, I went looking for a church. The main temple of Nedra had been moved since I’d last been in Tol Honeth, so I had to ask directions. I knew better than to ask any of the richly dressed merchant princes passing by with perfumed handkerchiefs held to their noses and haughty expressions on their faces. Instead, I found an honest man replacing broken cobblestones. ‘Tell me, friend,’ I said to him, ‘which way should I go to reach the Temple of Nedra?’

‘It’s over on the south side of the imperial palace,’ he replied. ‘Go on down to the end of this street and turn left.’ He paused and squinted at me. ‘You’ll need money to get in,’ he advised me.

‘Oh?’

‘It’s a new custom. You have to pay the priest at the door to get inside – and pay another priest to get near the altar.’

‘Peculiar notion.’

‘This is Tol Honeth, friend. Nothing’s free here, and the priests are just as greedy as everybody else.’

‘I think I can come up with something they’d rather have than money.’

‘I wouldn’t make any large wagers on that. Good luck.’

‘I think you dropped something there, friend,’ I told him, pointing at the large copper Tolnedran penny I’d just conjured up and dropped on the stones by his left knee. He had been helpful, after all.

He quickly snatched up the penny – probably the equivalent of a day’s wages – and looked around furtively.

‘Be happy in your work,’ I told him and moved off down the street.

The temple of Nedra was like a palace, an imposing marble structure that exuded all the warmth of a mausoleum. The common people prayed outside in little niches along the wall. The inside was reserved for the people who could afford to pay the bribes. ‘I need to talk with the High Priest,’ I told the clergyman guarding the huge door.

He looked me up and down disdainfully. ‘Absolutely out of the question. You should know better than even to ask.’

‘I didn’t ask. I told you. Now go fetch him – or get out of my way and I’ll find him myself.’

‘Get away from here.’

‘We’re not getting off to a good start here, friend. Let’s try it again. My name’s Belgarath, and I’m here to see the High Priest.’

‘Belgarath?’ He laughed sardonically. ‘There’s no such person. Go away.’

I translocated him to a spot several hundred yards up the street and marched inside. I was definitely going to have words with the High Priest about this practice of charging admission to a place of worship; not even Nedra would have approved of that. The temple was crawling with priests, and each one seemed to have his hand out. I avoided confrontations by the simple expedient of creating a halo, which I cocked rather rakishly over one ear. I’m not certain if Tolnedran theology includes a calendar of saints, but I did get the attention of the priests – and their wholehearted cooperation. And I didn’t even have to pay for it.

The High Priest’s name was Arthon, and he was a paunchy man in an elaborately jeweled robe. He took one look at my halo and greeted me with a certain apprehensive enthusiasm. I introduced myself, and he became very nervous. It wasn’t really any of my business that he was violating the rules, but I saw no reason to let him know that. ‘We’ve heard about your adventures in Mallorea, Holy Belgarath,’ he gushed at me. ‘Did you really kill Torak?’

‘Somebody’s been spinning moonbeams for you, Arthon,’ I replied. I’m not the one who’s supposed to do that. We just went there to recover something that’d been stolen.’

‘Oh.’ He sounded disappointed. ‘To what do we owe the honor of your visit, Ancient One?’

I shrugged. ‘Courtesy. I was passing through, and I thought I ought to look in on you. Has anyone heard from Nedra?’

‘Our God has departed, Belgarath,’ he reminded me.

‘All the Gods have departed, Arthon. They do have ways to keep in touch, though. Belar spoke to Riva in a dream, and Aldur came to me the same way no more than a couple of months ago. Pay attention to your dreams. They might be significant.’

‘I did have a peculiar dream about six months ago,’ he recalled. ‘It seemed that Nedra spoke to me.’

‘What did he say?’

‘I forget now. I think it had something to do with money.’

‘Doesn’t it always?’ I thought about it for a moment. ‘It probably involved this new custom of yours. I don’t think Nedra would approve of the practice of charging admission to the temple. He’s the God of all Tolnedrans, not just the ones who can afford to buy their way into your church.’

A wave of consternation crossed his face. ‘But – ’ he started to protest.

‘I’ve seen some of the creatures who live in Hell, Arthon,’ I told him quite firmly. ‘You don’t want to spend any time with them. It’s up to you, though. What’s happening here in Tolnedra?’

‘Oh, not too much, Belgarath.’ He said it just a bit evasively, and I could almost smell what he was trying to hide.

I sighed. ‘Don’t be coy, Arthon,’ I told him wearily. ‘The Church is not supposed to get involved in politics. You’ve been taking bribes, haven’t you?’

‘How did you know that?’ His voice was a little shrill.

‘I can read you like a book, Arthon. Give the money back and keep your nose out of politics.’

‘You must pay a call on the emperor,’ he said, skillfully sidestepping the issue.

‘I’ve met members of the Honeth family before. One’s pretty much the same as the others.’

‘His Majesty will be offended if you don’t call on him.’

‘Spare him the anguish then. Don’t tell him that I’ve been here.’

He wouldn’t hear of that, of course. He definitely didn’t want me to start probing into the question of who was bribing him, nor of how large his share of the admission fees was, so he escorted me to the palace, which was teeming with members of the Honeth family. Patronage is the absolute soul of Tolnedran politics. Even the toll-takers at the most remote bridges in the empire change when a new dynasty comes into power.

The current emperor was Ran Honeth the Twenty-something or other, and he’d discarded imbecility in favor of the unexplored territory of idiocy. As is usually the case in such situations, an officious relative had assumed his defective kinsman’s authority, scrupulously prefacing each of his personal decrees with, ‘The emperor has decided …’ or some other absurdity, thus maintaining the dignity of the cretin on the throne. The relative, a nephew in this case, kept Arthon and me cooling our heels in an anteroom for two days while he escorted all manner of high-ranking Tolnedrans immediately into the imperial presence.

Eventually, I got tired of it. ‘Let’s go, Arthon,’ I told Nedra’s priest. ‘We both have better things to do.’

‘We cannot!’ Arthon gasped. ‘It would be considered a mortal insult!’

‘So? I’ve insulted Gods in my time, Arthon. I’m not going to worry about hurting the feelings of a half-wit.’

‘Let me talk with the Lord High Chamberlain again.’ He jumped to his feet and hurried across the room to speak with the imperial nephew.

The nephew was a typical Honeth. His first response was to look down his nose at me. ‘You will await his Imperial Majesty’s pleasure,’ he told me in a lofty tone.

Since he was feeling so lofty, I stood him on a vacant patch of empty air up near the rafters so that he could really look down on people. I’ll grant you that it was petty, but then so was he. ‘Do you think that his Imperial Majesty’s pleasure might have worked its way around to us yet, old boy?’ I asked him in a pleasant tone. I left him up there for a little while to make sure that he got my point, and then I brought him down again.

We got in to see the emperor immediately.

This particular Ran Honeth was sitting on the imperial throne sucking his thumb. The blood-line had deteriorated even further than I’d imagined. I nudged at the corner of his mind and didn’t find anything in there. He haltingly recited a few imperial pleasantries – I shudder to think of how long it must have taken him to memorize them – and then he regally gave Arthon and me permission to withdraw. His entire performance was somewhat marred by the fact that forty some-odd years of sucking his thumb had grossly misaligned his front teeth. He looked like a rabbit, and he lisped outrageously.

I assessed the mood of the imperial nephew as Arthon and I bowed our way out of the throne room, and I decided that it might be a good time for me to leave Tol Honeth. As soon as the fellow regained his composure, the trees in the neighborhood were almost certainly going to flower with more of those posters. This was getting to be a habit.

I thought about that as I made my way toward Tol Borune. Ever since I’d abandoned my career as a common drunk, I’d been misusing my gift. The Will and the Word is a fairly serious thing, and I’d been turning it into a bad joke. Despite my grief, I was still my Master’s disciple, not some itinerant trickster. I suppose I could excuse myself by pointing to my emotional state during those awful years, but I don’t think I will. I’m supposed to know better.

I by-passed Tol Borune, largely to avoid any more opportunities to turn offensive people into pigs or to stick them up in the air just for fun. That was probably a good idea; I’m sure the Borunes would have irritated me. I’ve got a fair amount of respect for the Borune family, but they can be awfully pig-headed sometimes.

Sorry, Ce’Nedra. Nothing personal intended there.

At any rate, I traveled through the lands of the Anadile family and finally reached the northern edge of the Wood of the Dryads. The passing centuries have altered the countryside down there to some degree, but now that I think back on it, I followed almost exactly the same route as I did three thousand years later when a group of friends and I were going south on the trail of the Orb. Garion and I have talked about ‘repetitions’ any number of times, and this may have been another of those signals that the purpose of the universe had been disrupted. Then again, the fact that I followed the same route might have been due to the fact that it was the natural way south and also the fact that I was familiar with it. Once you get a theory stuck in your head, you’ll go to almost any lengths to twist things around to make them fit.

Even in those days the Wood of the Dryads was an ancient oak forest with a strange kind of serene holiness about it. Humans have a tendency to compartmentalize their religion to keep it separate from everyday life. The Dryads live in the center of their religion, so they don’t even have to think – or talk – about it. That’s sort of refreshing.

I’d been in their wood for more than a week before I even saw a Dryad. They’re timid little creatures, and they don’t really care to come into contact with outsiders – except at certain times of the year. Dryads are all females, of course, so they’re obliged to have occasional contacts with the males – of various species – in order to reproduce.

I’m sure you get the picture.

I didn’t really make an effort to find any Dryads. Technically, they’re ‘monsters,’ though certainly not as dangerous as the Eldrakyn or Algroths, but I still didn’t want any incidents.

Evidently, though, it was ‘that time of year’ for the first Dryad I encountered, because she’d laid aside her customary shyness and was aggressively trying to track me down. When I first saw her, she was standing in the middle of the forest path I was following. She had flaming red hair, and she was no bigger than a minute. She was, however, holding a fully drawn bow, and her arrow was pointed directly at my heart. ‘You’d better stop,’ she advised me.

I did that – immediately.

Once she was certain that I wasn’t going to try to run, she became very friendly. She told me that her name was Xana, and that she had plans for me. She even apologized for the bow. She explained it by telling me that travelers were rare in the Wood, and that a Dryad with certain things on her mind had to take some precautions to prevent escapes.

I tried to explain to her that what she was proposing was wildly inappropriate, but I couldn’t seem to get through to her. She was a very determined little creature.

I think I’ll just let it go at that. What happened next isn’t central to the story I’m telling, and there’s no point in being deliberately offensive.

Dryads customarily share things with their sisters, so Xana introduced me to other Dryads as well. They all pampered me, but there was no getting around the fact that I was a captive – a slave, if we want to be blunt about it – and my situation was more than a little degrading. I didn’t make an issue of it, though. I smiled a lot, did what was expected of me, and waited for an opportunity. As soon as I had a moment alone, I slipped into the form of the wolf and loped off into the wood. They searched for me, of course, but they didn’t know what they were looking for, so I had no trouble evading them.

I reached the north bank of the River of the Woods, swam across, and shook the water out of my fur. You might want to keep that in mind: if you take the form of a furred creature and you happen to get wet before you change back, always shake off the excess water first. Otherwise, your clothes will be dripping when you resume your real form.

I was in Nyissa now, so I didn’t have to worry about Dryads any more. I started keeping a sharp eye out for snakes instead. Normal humans make some effort to keep the snake-population under control, but the snake is a part of the Nyissan religion, so they don’t. Their jungles are literally alive with slithering reptiles – all venomous. I managed to get bitten three times during my first day in that stinking swamp, and that made me extremely cautious. It wasn’t hard to counteract the venom, fortunately, but being bitten by a snake is never pleasant.

The war with the Marags had seriously altered Nyissan society. Before the Marag invasion, the Nyissans had cleared away large plots of jungle and built cities and connecting highways. Highways provide invasion routes, however, and a city, by its very existence, proclaims the presence of large numbers of people and valuable property. You might as well invite attack. Salmissra realized that, and she ordered her subjects to disperse and to allow the jungle to reclaim all the towns and roads. This left only the capital at Sthiss Tor, and since I’d sort of drifted into the self-appointed task of making a survey of the kingdoms of the west, I decided to pay a call on the Serpent Queen.

The Marag invasion had occurred almost a hundred years earlier, but there were still abundant signs of the devastation it had caused. The abandoned cities, choked in vines and bushes, still showed evidence of fire and of the kind of destruction siege-engines cause. Now the Nyissans themselves scrupulously avoided those uninviting ruins. When you get right down to it, Nyissa is a theocracy. Salmissra is not only queen, but also the High Priestess of the Serpent God. Thus, when she gives an order, her people automatically obey her, and she’d ordered them to go live out in the brush with the snakes.

I was a little footsore when I reached Sthiss Tor, and very hungry. You have to be careful about what you eat in Nyissa. Virtually every plant and a fair number of the birds and animals are either narcotic, or poisonous, or both.

I located a ferry-landing and crossed the River of the Serpent to the garish city of Sthiss Tor. The Nyissans are an inspired people. The rest of the world likes to believe that inspiration is a gift from the Gods, but the Nyissans have found a simpler way to achieve that peculiar ecstasy. Their jungles abound with various plants with strange properties, and the snake-people are daring experimenters. I knew a Nyissan once who was addicted to nine different narcotics. He was the happiest fellow I’ve ever known. It’s probably not a good idea to have your house designed by an architect with a chemically augmented imagination, however. Assuming that it doesn’t collapse on the workmen during construction, it’s likely to have any number of peculiar features – stairways that don’t go anyplace, rooms that there’s no way to get into, doors that open out into nothing but air, and assorted other inconveniences. It’s also likely to be painted a color which doesn’t have a name and has never appeared in any rainbow.

I knew where Salmissra’s palace was, since Beldin and I had been in Sthiss Tor during the Marag invasion, so I wasn’t obliged to ask directions of people who didn’t even know where they were, much less where anything else was.

The functionaries in the palace were all shaved-headed eunuchs. There’s probably a certain logic there. From puberty onward, the assorted Salmissras are kept on a regimen of various compounds that slow the normal aging process. It’s very important that Salmissra forever looks the same as the original handmaiden of Issa. Unfortunately, one of the side-effects of those compounds is a marked elevation of the Queen’s appetite – and I’m not talking about food. Salmissra does have a kingdom to run, and if her servants were functional adult males, she’d probably never get anything done.

Please, I’m trying to put this as delicately as possible.

The queen knew that I was coming, of course. One of the qualifications for the throne of Nyissa is the ability to perceive things that others can’t. It’s not exactly like our peculiar gift, but it serves its purpose. The eunuchs greeted me with genuflections and various other fawning gestures of respect and immediately escorted me to the throne room. The current Salmissra, naturally, looked the same as all her predecessors, and she was reclining on a divanlike throne, admiring her reflection in a mirror and stroking the bluntly pointed head of a pet snake. Her gown was diaphanous, and it left very little to the imagination. The huge stone statue of Issa, the Serpent God, loomed behind the dals where his current handmaiden lay.

‘Hail, Eternal Salmissra,’ the eunuch who was escorting me intoned, prostrating himself on the polished floor.

‘The Chief Eunuch approaches the throne,’ the dozen red-robed functionaries intoned in unison.

‘What is it, Sthess?’ Salmissra replied in an indifferent sort of voice.

‘Ancient Belgarath entreats audience with the Beloved of Issa.’

Salmissra turned her head slowly and gazed at me with those colorless eyes of hers. ‘The Handmaiden of Issa greets the Disciple of Aldur,’ she proclaimed.

‘Fortunate the Disciple of Aldur to be received by the Serpent Queen,’ the chorus intoned.

‘You’re looking well, Salmissra,’ I responded, cutting across about a half-hour of tedious formality.

‘Do you really think so, Belgarath?’ She said it with a kind of girlish ingenuousness which suggested that she was quite young – probably no more than two or three years on the throne.

‘You always look well, dear,’ I replied. The little endearment was probably a violation of all sorts of rules, but I felt that, considering her age, I could get away with it.

‘The honored guest greets Eternal Salmissra,’ the chorus announced.

‘Do you suppose we could dispense with that?’ I asked, jerking my thumb over my shoulder at the kneeling eunuchs. ‘You and I need to talk, and all that singing distracts my attention.’

‘A private audience, Belgarath?’ she asked me archly.

I winked at her with a sly smirk.

It is our pleasure that the Ancient One shall divulge his mind to us in private,’ she announced to her worshipers. ‘You have our permission to withdraw.’

‘Well, really!’ I heard one of them mutter in an outraged tone.

‘Remain if you wish, Kass,’ Salmissra said to the protestor in an indifferent tone of voice. ‘Know, however, that no one living will hear what passes between me and the disciple of Aldur. Go and live – or stay and die.’ She had style, I’ll give her that. Her offer cleared the throne room immediately.

‘Well,’ she said, her colorless eyes smoldering, ‘now that we’re alone.’ She left it hanging suggestively.

‘Ah, don’t y’ be after temptin’ me, Darlin’,’ I said, grinning. Beldin had gotten away with that; why couldn’t I?

She actually laughed. That was the only time I ever heard one of the hundred or more Salmissras do that.

‘Let’s get down to business, Salmissra,’ I suggested briskly. ‘I’ve been conducting a survey of the western kingdoms, and I think we might profitably exchange some information.’

‘I hunger for your words, Ancient One,’ she said, her face taking on an outrageously vapid expression. This one had a very sharp mind and a highly developed sense of humor. I quickly altered my approach. An intelligent Salmissra was a dangerous novelty.

‘You know what happened in Mallorea, of course,’ I began.

‘Yes,’ she replied simply. ‘Congratulations.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Would you like to sit here?’ she invited, rising to a half-sitting position and patting the seat of the divan beside her.

‘Ah – thanks, but I think better on my feet. Aloria’s been divided into four separate kingdoms now.’

‘Yes, I know. How did you ever browbeat Cherek into permitting that?’

‘I didn’t. Belar did.’

‘Is Cherek really that religious?’

‘He didn’t like it, but he saw the necessity for it Riva’s got the Orb now, and he’s on the Isle of the Winds. You might want to warn your sea-captains to stay away from the Isle. Cherek’s got a fleet of war-boats, and they’ll sink any ship that goes within fifty leagues of Riva’s island.’

Her colorless eyes grew speculative. ‘I just had a very interesting thought, Belgarath.’

‘Oh?’

‘Is Riva married yet?’

‘No. He’s still a bachelor.’

‘You might tell him that I’m not married, either. Doesn’t that suggest something rather interesting to you? It certainly does to me.’

I almost choked on that one. ‘You’re not really serious, are you?’

‘It’s something worth exploring, don’t you think? Nyissa’s a small nation, and my people don’t make very good soldiers. The Marag invasion taught us that. If Riva and I were to marry, it’d form a very interesting alliance.’

‘Don’t the rules say that you’re not supposed to marry?’

‘Rules are tiresome, Belgarath. People like you and me can ignore them when it suits us. Let’s be honest here. I’m the figurehead ruler of a weak nation, and I don’t like that very much. I think I’d like to take real power instead. An alliance with the Alorns might just make that possible.’

‘You’d be flying in the face of tradition, you know.’

‘Traditions are like rules, Belgarath. They’re made to be ignored. Issa’s been dormant for a long time now. The world’s changing, and if Nyissa doesn’t change, too, we’ll be left behind. We’ll be a small, primitive backwater. I think I might just be the one to change that.’

‘It wouldn’t work, Salmissra,’ I told her.

‘My sterility, you mean? I can take care of that. All I have to do is stop taking those drugs, and I’ll be as fertile as any young woman. I’ll be able to give Riva a son to rule his island, and he can give me a daughter to rule here. We could alter the balance of power in this part of the world.’

I laughed. ‘It’d send the Tolnedrans into hysterics, if nothing else.’

‘That in itself would be worth the trouble.’

‘It would indeed, but I’m afraid it’s out of the question. Riva’s already been spoken for.’

‘Oh? Who’s the lucky girl?’

‘I haven’t any idea. It’s one of those marriages made in heaven. The Gods have already selected Riva’s bride.’

She sighed. ‘Pity,’ she murmured. ‘Ah, well. Riva’s still only a boy. I suppose I could educate him, but that’s sort of tiresome. I prefer experienced men.’

I moved on rather quickly. This was a very dangerous young lady. ‘The Arendish civil war’s heating up. Asturia and Wacune are currently allied against Mimbre – at least they were when I was there. It was two whole months ago, though, so the situation might have changed by now.’

‘Arends,’ she sighed, rolling her eyes upward.

‘Amen to that. The second Honethite Dynasty’s winding down in Tolnedra. They might be able to squeeze out one or two more emperors, but that well’s almost dry. The Vorduvians are waiting in the wings – not very patiently.’

‘I hate the Vorduvians,’ she said.

‘Me too. We’ll have to endure them, though.’

‘I suppose.’ She paused, her pale eyes hooded. ‘I heard about your recent bereavement,’ she said tentatively. ‘You have my sincerest sympathy.’

‘Thank you.’ I even managed to say it in a level tone.

‘Another possibility occurs to me,’ she said then. ‘You and I are both currently at liberty. An alliance between us might be even more interesting than one between Riva and me. Torak isn’t going to stay in Mallorea forever, you know. He’s already sent scouting parties across the land-bridge. It’s just a matter of time until there’s an Angarak presence on this continent, and that’ll bring in the Grolims. Don’t you think we should start to get ready?’

I got very careful at that point. I was obviously dealing with a political genius here. ‘You’re tempting me again, Salmissra.’ I was lying, of course, but I think I managed to convince her that I was interested in her obscene suggestion. Then I sighed. ‘Unfortunately, it’s forbidden.’

‘Forbidden?’

‘By my Master, and I wouldn’t even consider crossing him.’

She sighed. ‘What a shame. I guess that still leaves me with the Alorns. Maybe I’ll invite Dras or Algar to pay a visit to Sthiss Tor.’

‘They have responsibilities in the north, Salmissra, and you have yours here. It wouldn’t be much of a marriage, no matter which of them you chose. You’d seldom see each other.’

‘Those are the best kind of marriages. We wouldn’t have so much chance to bore each other.’ She brought the flat of her hand sharply down on the arm of her throne. ‘I’m not talking about love, Belgarath. I need an alliance, not entertainment. I’m in a very dangerous situation here. I was foolish enough to let a few things slip when I first came to the throne. The eunuchs know that I’m not just a silly girl consumed by her appetites. I’m sure that the candidates for my throne are already in training. As soon as one’s chosen, the eunuchs will poison me. If I can’t find an Alorn to marry, I’ll have to take a Tolnedran – or an Arend. My life depends on it, old man.’

Then I finally understood. It wasn’t ambition that was driving her so much as it was her instinct for self-preservation. ‘You do have an alternative, you know,’ I told her. ‘Strike first. Dispose of your eunuchs before they’re ready to dispose of you.’

‘I already thought of that, but it won’t work. They all dose themselves with antidotes to every known poison.’

‘As far as I know, there’s no antidote for a knife-thrust in the heart, Salmissra.’

‘We don’t do things that way in Nyissa.’

‘Then your eunuchs won’t be expecting it, will they?’

Her eyes narrowed. ‘No,’ she agreed, ‘they wouldn’t.’ She suddenly giggled. ‘I’d have to get them all at once, of course, but a bloodbath of those dimensions would be quite an object lesson, wouldn’t it?’

‘It’d be a long time before anybody ever tried to cross you again, dear.’

‘What a wonderful old man you are,’ she said gratefully. ‘I’ll have to find some way to reward you.’

‘I don’t really have any need for money, Salmissra.’

She gave me a long, smoldering look. ‘I’ll have to think of something else, then, won’t I?’

I thought it might be a good idea to change the subject at that point. ‘What’s happening to the south?’ I asked her.

‘You tell me. The people down there are western Dals. Nobody knows what the Dals are doing. Somehow they’re in contact with the Seers at Kell. I think we’d all better keep an eye on the Dals. In many ways they have a more dangerous potential than the Angaraks. Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. Torak’s left the ruins of Cthol Mishrak. He’s in a place called Ashaba in the Karandese mountains now. He’s passing orders on to the Grolims through Ctuchik and Urvon. Nobody knows where Zedar is.’ She paused. ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like to sit here beside me?’ she offered again. ‘We wouldn’t really have to get married, you know. I’m sure Aldur wouldn’t object to a more informal arrangement. Come sit beside me, Belgarath, and we can talk about that reward I mentioned. I’m sure I’ll be able to think of something you’d like.’