I kissed my wife’s pouty lower lip and left for Maragor – although I’m not sure exactly what Beldin thought I might be able to do. Attempting to rein in the Marags was what you might call an exercise in futility. Marag men were all athletes who carried their brains in their biceps. The women of Maragor encouraged that, I’m afraid. They wanted stamina, not intelligence.
All right, Polgara, don’t beat it into the ground. I liked the Marags. They had their peculiarities, but they did enjoy life.
The Marag invasion of Nyissa turned out to be an unmitigated disaster. The Nyissans, like the snakes they so admired, simply slithered off into the jungle, but they left a few surprises behind to entertain the invaders. Pharmacology is an art-form in Nyissa, and not all of the berries and leaves that grow in their jungles make people feel good. Any number of them seem to have the opposite effect – although it’s sort of hard to say for sure. It’s entirely possible that the thousands of Marags who stiffened, went into convulsions, and died as the result of eating an apparently harmless bit of food were made ecstatic by the various poisons that took them off.
Grimly, the Marags pressed on, stopping occasionally to roast and eat a few prisoners of war. They reached Sthiss Tor, the Nyissan capital, but Queen Salmissra and all of the inhabitants had already melted into the jungles, leaving behind warehouses crammed to the rafters with food. The dim-witted Marags feasted on the food – which proved to be a mistake.
Why am I surrounded by people incapable of learning from experience? I wouldn’t have to see too many people die from ‘indigestion’ to begin to have some doubts about my food source. Would you believe that the Nyissans even managed to poison their cattle herds in such a subtle way that the cows looked plump and perfectly healthy, but when a Marag ate a steak or roast or chop from one of those cows, he immediately turned black in the face and died frothing at the mouth? Fully half of the males of the Marag race died during that abortive invasion.
Things were getting out of hand. Mara wouldn’t just sit back and watch the Nyissans exterminate his children for very long before he’d decide to intervene, and once he did that, torpid Issa would be obliged to wake up and respond. Issa was a strange God. After the cracking of the world, he’d simply turned the governance of the snake-people over to his High Priestess, Salmissra, and had gone into hibernation. I guess it hadn’t occurred to him to do anything to prolong her life, and so in time she died. The snake-people didn’t bother to wake him when she did. They simply selected a replacement.
Beldin and I went looking for the then-current Queen Salmissra so that we could offer to mediate a withdrawal of the Marags. We finally found her in a house deep in the jungles, a house almost identical to her palace in Sthiss Tor. She’s probably got those houses scattered all over Nyissa.
We presented ourselves to her eunuchs, and they took us to her throne room, where she lounged, admiring her reflection in a mirror. Salmissra – like all the other Salmissras – absolutely adored herself.
‘I think you’ve got a problem, your Majesty,’ I told her bluntly when Beldin and I were ushered into her presence. ‘Do you want my brother and me to try to end this war?’
The snake-woman didn’t seem to be particularly interested. ‘Do not expend thine energy, Ancient Belgarath,’ she yawned. All of the Salmissras have been virtually identical to the first one. They’re selected because of their resemblance to her and trained from early childhood to have that same chill, indifferent personality. Actually it makes them easier to deal with. Salmissra – any one of the hundred or so who’ve worn the name – is always the same person, so you don’t have to adjust your thinking.
Beldin, however, managed to get her attention. ‘All right,’ he told her with an indifference that matched her own, ‘it’s the dry season. Belgarath and I’ll set fire to your stinking jungles. We’ll burn Nyissa to the ground. Then the Marags will have to go home.’
That was the only time I’ve ever seen any of the Salmissras display any emotion other than sheer animal lust. Her pale eyes widened, and her chalk-white skin turned even whiter. ‘Thou wouldst not!’ she exclaimed.
Beldin shrugged. ‘Why not? It’ll put an end to this war, and if we get rid of all the assorted narcotics, maybe your people can learn to do something productive. Don’t toy with me, Snake-Woman, you’ll find that I play rough. Let the Marags go home, or I’ll burn Nyissa from the mountains to the sea. There won’t be a berry or a leaf left – not even the ones that sustain you. You’ll get old almost immediately, Salmissra, and all those pretty boys you’re so fond of will lose interest in you almost as fast.’
She glared at him, and then her colorless eyes began to smolder. ‘You interest me, ugly one,’ she told him. ‘I’ve never coupled with an ape before.’
‘Forget it,’ he snarled. ‘I like my women fat and hot-blooded. You’re too cold for me, Salmissra.’ That was my brother for you. He was never one to beat around the bush. ‘Do we agree then?’ he pressed. ‘If you let the Marags go home, I won’t burn your stinking swamp.’
‘The time will come when you’ll regret this, Disciple of Aldur.’
‘Ah, me little sweetie,’ he replied in that outrageous Wacite brogue. ‘I’ve regretted many things in me long, long life, don’t y’ know, but I’ll be after tellin’ y’ one thing, darlin’. Matin’ with a snake ain’t likely t’ be one of ‘em.’ Then his face hardened. ‘This is the last time I’m going to ask you, Salmissra. Are you going to let the Marags go, or am I going to start lighting torches?’
And that more or less ended the war.
‘You were moderately effective there, old boy,’ I complimented my brother as we left Salmissra’s jungle hideout. ‘I thought her eyes were going to pop out when you offered to burn her jungle.’
‘It got her attention.’ Then he sighed. ‘It might have been very interesting,’ he said rather wistfully.
‘What might have?’
‘Never mind.’
We nursed the limping Marag column back to their own borders, leaving thousands of dead behind us in those reeking swamps, and then Beldin and I returned to the Vale.
When we got there, our Master sent me back to Aloria. ‘The Queen of the Alorns is with child,’ he told me. ‘The one for whom we have waited is about to be born. I would have thee present at this birth and at diverse other times during his youth.’
‘Are we sure he’s the right one, Master?’ I asked him.
He nodded. ‘The signs are all present. Thou wilt know him when first thou seest him. Go thou to Val Alorn, therefore. Verify his identity and then return.’
And that’s how I came to be present when Cherek Bear-shoulders was born. When one of the midwives brought the red-faced, squalling infant out of the queen’s bedroom, I knew immediately that my Master had been right. Don’t ask me how I knew, I just did. Cherek and I had been linked since the beginning of time, and I recognized him the moment I laid eyes on him. I congratulated his father and then went back to the Vale to report to my Master, and, I hoped, to spend some time with my wife.
I went back to Aloria a number of times during Cherek’s boyhood, and we got to know each other quite well. By the time he was ten, he was as big as a full-grown man, and he kept on growing. He was over seven feet tall when he ascended the throne of Aloria at the age of nineteen. We gave him some time to get accustomed to his crown, and then I went back to Val Alorn and arranged a marriage for him. I can’t remember what the girl’s name was, but she did what she was supposed to do. Cherek was about twenty-three when his first son, Dras, was born, and about twenty-five when Algar came along. Riva, his third son, was born when the King of Aloria was twenty-seven. My Master was pleased. Everything was happening the way it was supposed to.
Cherek’s three sons grew as fast as he had. Alorns are large people anyway, but Dras, Algar, and Riva took that tendency to extremes.