Algar, of course, didn’t say anything. He almost never did. He was the most close-mouthed man I’ve ever known.
‘I’ve heard about those white bears,’ I said. ‘Isn’t hunting them just a little dangerous?’
Riva shrugged. ‘There were two of us,’ he said – as if that would make a difference to a fourteen-foot bear weighing almost a ton. ‘Anyway, the ice is very thick in the northern reaches of the Sea of the East this year. We’d wounded a bear, and he was trying to get away from us. We were chasing him, and that’s when we found the bridge.’
‘What bridge?’
‘The one that crosses over to Mallorea.’ He said it in the most off-hand way imaginable, as if the discovery of something the Alorns had been trying to find for two thousand years wasn’t really all that important.
‘I don’t suppose you’d care to give me a few details about this bridge?’ I suggested.
‘I was just getting to that. There’s a point that juts out to the east up in Morindland, and another that juts toward the west out of the lands of the Karands over in Mallorea. There’s a string of rocky little islets that connects the two. The bear had gotten away from us somehow. It was sort of foggy that day, and it’s very hard to see a white bear in the fog. Algar and I were curious, so we crossed the ice, following that string of islands. About mid-afternoon a breeze came up and blew off the fog. We looked up, and there was Mallorea. We decided not to go exploring, though. There’s no point in letting Torak know that we’ve discovered the bridge, is there? We turned around and came back. We ran across a tribe of Morindim and they told us that they’ve been using that bridge for centuries to visit the Karands. A Morind will give you anything he owns for a string of glass beads, and Karandese traders seem to know that. The Morinds will trade ivory walrus tusks and priceless sea-otter skins and the hides of those dangerous white bears for a string of beads you can buy in any country fair for a penny.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘I hate it when people cheat other people, don’t you?’ Riva definitely had opinions.
Bear-shoulders gave me a rueful smile. ‘We could have found out about this years ago if we’d taken the trouble to spend some time with the Morindim. We’ve been tearing the north apart for two thousand years trying to find some way to cross over to Mallorea and pick up the war with the Angaraks where we left off, and the Morindim knew the way all along. We’ve got to learn to pay more attention to our neighbors.’
As nearly as I can recall, that’s fairly close to the way the conversation went. Those of you who’ve read the BOOK OF ALORN will realize that the priest of Belar who wrote those early passages took a great deal of liberty with his material. It just goes to show you that you should never trust a priest to be entirely factual.
I gave Cherek Bear-shoulders a rather hard look. I could see where this was going. ‘This is all very interesting, Cherek, but why are you bringing it to me?’
‘We thought you’d like to know, Belgarath,’ he said with an ingeniously feigned look of innocence. Cherek was a very shrewd man, but he could be terribly transparent sometimes.
‘Don’t try to be coy with me, Cherek,’ I told him. ‘Exactly what have you got on your mind?’
‘It’s not really all that complicated, Belgarath. The boys and I thought we might drift on over to Mallorea and steal your Master’s Orb back from Torak One-eye.’ He said it as if he were proposing a stroll in the park. ‘Then we got to thinking that you might want to come along, so we decided to come down here and invite you.’
‘Absolutely out of the question,’ I snapped. ‘My wife’s going to have a baby, and I’m not going to leave her here alone.’
‘Congratulations,’ Algar murmured. It was the only word he spoke that whole afternoon.
‘Thank you,’ I replied. Then I turned back to his father, ‘All right, Cherek. We know that this bridge of yours is there. It’ll still be there next year. I might be willing to discuss this expedition of yours then – but not now.’
‘There might be a problem with that, Belgarath,’ he said seriously. ‘When my sons told me about what they’d found, I went to the priests of Belar and had them examine the auguries. This is the year to go. The ice up there won’t be as thick again for years and years. Then they cast my own auguries, and from what they say, this could be the most fortunate year in my whole life.’
‘Do you actually believe that superstitious nonsense?’ I demanded. ‘Are you so gullible that you think that somebody can foretell the future by fondling a pile of sheep-guts?’
He looked a little injured. ‘This was important, Belgarath. I certainly wouldn’t trust sheep’s entrails for something like this.’
‘I’m glad to hear that.’
‘We used a horse instead. Horse-guts never lie.’
Alorns!
‘I wish you all the luck in the world, Cherek,’ I told him, ‘but I won’t be going with you.’
A pained look came over his massive, bearded face. ‘There’s a bit of a problem there, Belgarath. The auguries clearly state that we’ll fail if you don’t go along.’
‘You can gut a dragon if you want to, Cherek, but I’m staying right here. Take the twins – or I’ll send for Beldin.’
‘It wouldn’t be the same, Belgarath. It has to be you. Even the stars say that.’
‘Astrology, too? You Alorns are branching out, aren’t you? Do the priests of Belar sprinkle stars on the gut-pile?’
‘Belgarath!’ he said in a shocked tone of voice, ‘that’s sacrilegious!’
‘Tell me,’ I said sarcastically, ‘have your priests tried a crystal ball yet? Or tea-leaves?’
– All right, Belgarath, that’s enough. – It was one of the very few times I’ve ever heard that voice. Garion’s been hearing it since he was a child, but it seldom had occasion to speak to me. Needless to say, I was just a bit startled. I even looked around to see where it was coming from, but there wasn’t anybody there. The voice was inside my head.
– Are you ready to listen? – it demanded.
– Who are you? –
– You know who I am. Stop arguing. You WILL go to Mallorea, and you WILL go now. It’s one of those things that has to happen. You’d better go talk with Aldur. – And then the sense of that other presence in my mind was gone.
I was more than a little shaken by this visitation. I suppose I tried to deny it, but I did know who’d been talking to me. ‘Wait here,’ I bluntly told the King of Aloria and his sons. ‘I have to go talk with Aldur.’
‘I can see that thou art troubled, my son,’ our Master said to me after I’d entered his tower.
‘Bear-shoulders and those overgrown sons of his are out there,’ I reported. ‘They’ve found a way to get to Mallorea, and they want me to go with them. It’s a very bad time for me, Master. Poledra’s due sometime in the next couple of months, and I really should be here. Cherek’s very insistent, but I told him that they’d have to go without me.’
‘And?’ My Master knew that there was more.
‘I had a visitation. I was told in no uncertain terms that I had to go along.’
‘That is most rare, my son. The Purpose doth not often speak to us directly.’
‘I was afraid you’d look at it