Rivan Codex Series

by Eddings, David

  Eldrig and Rhodar hadn't arrived yet, so Pol and I met with Brand and Cho-Ram high in one of those towers that loom up over the Citadel.

  I'd been roaming around quite a bit during the past several years, so I didn't really know the current Rivan Warder all that well. Even though the Warder's office isn't hereditary, there's always been a certain continuity of character in the men who've held the position. The Rivans don't quite go as far as the Nyissans do in selecting Salmissra, but they come fairly close when choosing Brand. The Rivan Warders have all been solid, sensible men that we've been able to rely on. This one, though, was a truly remarkable man. The putative Child of Light was a big man, but Alorns generally are quite large. Tolnedrans, who are racially small, try to make some issue of an old Tolnedran proverb contrasting physical size with mental capacity. I'm not all that large myself, but I've been jerked up short any number of times when I've come across brilliant giants. This particular Rivan Warder was intelligent, introspective, and he had a low, deep, quiet voice. I liked him right at the outset, and I grew to like him even more as the years drew us inexorably toward that meeting he was going to have in Arendia.

  "Are you certain that King Garel's going to be safe at the Stronghold?" he asked.

  "That's what the Mrin Codex says," I replied.

  "Don't worry. Brand," Cho-Ram assured him.

  "Nobody's going to get over the walls of the Stronghold."

  "We're talking about my king, Cho-Ram," Brand said.

  "I won't throw dice for his safety."

  "I'll go there myself, Brand, and I'll stand on top of the wall for twenty years and let Torak throw everything he's got at me."

  "No, you won't, Cho-Ram," I told him firmly.

  "I'm not going to let you get locked up inside the Stronghold. Any colonel can defend that place. I need the Alorn kings where I can get my hands on them."

  "I'd still feel better if my Lord Garel were here," Brand said.

  "That wouldn't be a good idea. If he comes anywhere near the Orb, Torak'll know about it immediately. If he stays at the Stronghold, he'll still be anonymous, and Torak won't even know he's there."

  "He'll have to come here eventually, Belgarath."

  "Oh? Why's that?"

  "To get his sword. If he's going to meet Torak, he's going to need that sword."

  "You're getting ahead of yourself, Brand," Pol told him.

  "Garel's not the one who's going to meet Torak in Arendia."

  "He's the Rivan King, Polgara. He has to meet Torak."

  "Not this time."

  "Well, if he isn't, who is?"

  "You are."

  "Me?" To his credit, Brand didn't add that inevitable

  "Why me?" His eyes were a little wild, though.

  I recited the passage to him.

  "It looks like you've been elected, Brand," I added.

  "I didn't even know I was a candidate. What am I supposed to do?"

  "We're not sure. You will be when the time comes, though. When you come face to face with One-eye, the Necessity's going to take over. It always does in these situations."

  "I'd be a lot more comfortable if I knew what was supposed to happen."

  "We all would, but it doesn't work that way. Don't worry, Brand.

  You'll do just fine."

  Eldrig and Rhodar joined us at Riva a month or so later, and we started mapping out our strategy. Beldin advised us that Torak didn't seem to be in any hurry to start west. He was concentrating instead on consolidating his hold on the hearts and minds of the subject races in Mallorea. I wasn't really worried about any surprises. Torak was far too arrogant to try to sneak up on us. He wanted us to know that he was coming.

  After our first few meetings, we invited King Ormik of Sendaria to join us. Ormik's mother had been an Alorn, so his inclusion was right and proper. The fact that we were all spending a lot of time at Riva didn't go unnoticed. Ran Borune's intelligence service wasn't as good as Rhodar's, but even the most half-witted spy in the world could hardly miss the fact that something was in the wind.

  Torak spent a dozen years or so establishing his absolute domination of Mallorea--all unaware that Garel had married an Algar girl, Aravino, in 4860, and that a year later she had given birth to her son, Gelane. Then in the fall of 4864 the Murgos and Nadraks closed the caravan routes to the east. The howls of anguish in Tol Honeth echoed from the jungles of Nyissa to the arctic wastes of Morindland. Ran Borune sent diplomatically worded protests to Rak Goska and Yar Nadrak, but they were generally ignored. Ad Rak Cthoros, the King of the Murgos, and Yar Lek Thun of the Nadraks were taking their orders from Ctuchik, and neither one of them was going to cross that walking corpse just because Ran Borune had his feelings hurt. I don't know if Ctuchik even bothered to tell Gethel Mardu of the Thulls about the planned invasion of the West, since Gethel probably didn't even know which way west was.

  The closing of those trade routes was a clear signal that Torak was about to move, so Brand declared the port of Riva closed "for renovations," and Eldrig's war-boats enforced that declaration. Things were definitely going downhill for the merchant princes of Tol Honeth.

  After the sealing of the port of Riva, we gathered once more in the Citadel.

  "Things are coming to a head, father," Polgara noted.

  "I think it's time for you to go have a talk with Ran Borune."

  "Maybe you're right," I conceded glumly.

  "Why so long a face, Belgarath?" Brand asked me.

  "Have you ever met Ran Borune?"

  "I've never had the pleasure."

  "That's not the right word, Brand. The Borunes are stubborn and contentious, and they absolutely refuse to believe in anything the least bit out of the ordinary."

  "Shouldn't we alert the Arends, too?" the leather-clad Cho-Ram suggested.

  "Not yet," I replied.

  "It's probably a little premature. If Torak's more than two days from their eastern frontier, they'll forget that he's coming."

  "The Arends aren't that stupid, father," Pol protested.

  "Really? Oh, Cho-Ram, see if you can get word of what's afoot to the Gorim of Ulgo, and Ormik, why don't you move your supply dumps down to the north bank of the Camaar River? If we're going to have a war in Arendia, we'll need groceries."

  "We can live off the land if we have to," Rhodar said.

  "Of course--for maybe a week. After that, we'll be eating our shoes, and you wouldn't care for that."

  I left for Tol Honeth the following morning and arrived there two days later. Ran Borune IV was a young man who'd been on the imperial throne only for a few years. The Third Borune Dynasty was still in its infancy, and the Borunes hadn't yet shaken all the Honethites and Vorduvians out of the government. The Honeths in particular were very upset about the closing of the trade routes to the East and the "renovations" at Riva. A day without profit sends a Honethite into deep mourning, and so a steady stream of officials, high and low, were beating on Ran Borune's door imploring him to do something. As a result, it was several days before I got in to see him.

  Over the centuries, the various imperial families in Tol Honeth have devised a fiction that makes them comfortable. They sagely assure each other that the names

  "Belgarath" and

  "Polgara" are hereditary titles.

  Accepting an alternative would have been out of the question for them, so I came at Ran Borune rather obliquely to avoid a long argument about something that wasn't really that important.

  "Have you heard about what's happening in Mallorea, your Majesty?" I asked him.

  "I understand that they have a new emperor." Like most members of his family, Ran Borune was a small man--probably the result of their Dryad heritage. The Imperial Throne of Tolnedra had been designed to be impressive, so it was quite large and draped in imperial crimson. Ran Borune IV looked a great deal like a child sitting on a piece of grownup furniture.

  "How much do you know about that new emperor in Mal Zeth?" I asked him.

  "N
ot all that much. Mallorea's a long way away, and I've got things closer to home to worry about."

  "You'd better start worrying about Kal Torak, because he's coming this way."

  "What makes you think so?"

  "I have sources of information that aren't available to you, Ran Borune."

  "More of that tired old nonsense, Belgarath? That might impress Alorns, but it certainly doesn't impress me."

  I sidestepped that rather smoothly.

  "I'm not referring to that, Ran Borune. The information comes from Rhodar's intelligence service. Nobody can hide things from a Drasnian spy."

  "Why didn't Rhodar let me know?"

  "He is letting you know. That's why I'm here."

  "Oh. Why didn't you say so? I'll send emissaries to Mal Zeth to ask the Mallorean Emperor what his intentions are."

  "Don't waste your time, Ran Borune. He'll probably be on your doorstep in a few months, and then you'll be able to talk to him in person."

  "What sort of man is he? And why did he choose that particular name?"

  "He's arrogant, implacable, and driven by an overwhelming ambition.

  The word

  "Kal" means King and God in Old Angarak. Does that give you any clues about him?"

  "A madman?" Ran Borune looked startled.

  "He probably wouldn't see it that way--and the Angaraks certainly don't. He's convinced them that he's really Torak--largely by having the Grolims gut anybody who didn't believe. He's coming west, and he'll be driving all of Mallorea in front of him."

  "They'll have to get past the Murgos first. Murgos despise Malloreans, and they certainly won't bow down to a Mallorean Emperor."

  "The Murgos do what the Grolims tell them to do, Ran Borune, and the Grolims have accepted this Kal Torak as the real Torak."

  He began to gnaw on one of his fingernails.

  "I think we might have a problem," he conceded.

  "Have Rhodar's spies found out why he wants to invade us?"

  "To rule the world, I suppose," I said with a shrug.

  "We don't know exactly why, yet, but his ultimate destination seems to be Arendia."

  "Arendia? That doesn't make any sense at all!"

  "I know, but that's what Drasnian intelligence is picking up. If we don't do something to stop him, you're going to have a very large, unfriendly army camped on your northern border."

  "He'll have to come through Algaria to get to Arendia."

  "That's our best guess, too."

  "Are the Algars ready for him?"

  "The Algars have been getting ready for an Angarak invasion for the past three millennia. So have the Chereks and the Drasnians. Alorns and Angaraks don't get along at all."

  "So I've heard. I think maybe I'll put the legions on standby alert."

  "I'd go a little further than "standby," Ran Borune. I had a look at some of your legionnaires on my way here. They're pitifully out of condition.

  You'd better toughen them up a bit. I'm going back to Riva now. I think it's time to beef up the defenses of Algaria. We'll keep you advised if Rhodar's spies pick up anything else." Then I bowed and left.

  I've used that ploy many times in dealing with Tolnedrans. The supposed omniscience of Drasnian Intelligence can be very useful at times.

  It's easier to lie to them than to tell them where I'm really getting my information.

  In the spring of 4865, Kal Torak led his Malloreans across the land-bridge to Morindland, and then he started south along the coast. After he'd passed the mountains of Gar og Nadrak, however, his entire army disappeared into that vast primeval forest that blankets the North.

  I've been involved in a lot of wars over the years, and I think that might have contributed to my failure to predict what Torak was going to do. A human general will take the shortest, easiest route to get to a battlefield. He doesn't want to waste the lives of his troops, and he doesn't want them to be exhausted when the fighting starts. Torak, however, was most definitely not a human general. The lives of his troops meant nothing to him, and he had ways to make them fight, no matter how exhausted they were.

  At any rate, the Alorn kings and I were so convinced that Torak would continue down the coast to Mishrak ac Thull that we were taken completely by surprise when he led his army of northern Murgos, Nadraks, Thulls, and Malloreans down out of the mountains in western Gar og Nadrak and out onto the moors of eastern Drasnia early in the summer of 4865.

  Torak himself made the journey in a silly-looking iron castle, complete with useless towers and ostentatious battlements. It had wheels on it, but it still took a herd of horses and about a thousand Grolims to pull it. I shudder to think of the amount of labor it took to clear a road through the forests of Gar og Nadrak for that ridiculous thing.

  It became clear almost immediately that Kal Torak came not as a conqueror, but as a destroyer. He was not interested in occupying Drasnia and enslaving the people. He wanted to kill them all. Such Drasnians as were captured were immediately sacrificed by the Grolim priests.

  In retrospect, I can understand what he was doing. He had to reach Arendia, of course, but he gave himself enough time to exterminate the Drasnians before he proceeded into Algaria or Cherek to do the same thing there. Arendia was secondary in his thinking. He wanted to wipe out the Alorns before he got there.

  Our mistaken assessment of his probable strategy had pulled us seriously out of position, and his hordes had destroyed Boktor before we could get enough forces north to offer any serious resistance. Since we were hopelessly outnumbered, we didn't even pretend that we were making war. We rushed north on a rescue mission instead, gathering such refugees as we were able to find. Eldrig's war-boats took large crowds of terror-stricken Drasnian civilians off the islands at the mouths of the Aldur and Mrin rivers, and Algar cavalry rounded up those who had fled south toward Lake Atun and escorted them to the relative safety of the Algarian Stronghold. A large column of refugees from Boktor made a truly astounding trek north from their burning city to reach the valley of the River Dused, where it forms the border between Drasnia and the Cherek peninsula. For the rest of the population, the only escape was into the fens. Very few of them survived.

  Once it became clear that there was no way that we could match the army Kal Torak had hurled at us, we concluded that Drasnia was lost. I had to do some fairly brutal things at that point to salvage as much of the superb Drasnian army as I could. I didn't even bother trying to argue with the grief-stricken Rhodar. I simply drove him and his pike men south onto the plains of Algaria. I was fairly sure I was going to need them later.

  And so, by the midsummer of 4866, Drasnia had perished. When we went back there after the war, we couldn't find so much as a single house still standing, and there were only a few thousand survivors hiding out in the fens.

  When it was over, Kal Torak paused to regroup. Our problem at that point was trying to guess which way he'd go next. Would he sweep across the north and invade Cherek? Would he go southwest in an attempt to reach Arendia by marching across Sendaria? Or would he lead his hordes south into Algaria? The most frightening prospect of all was the distinct possibility, given the size of his army, that he'd simply divide his forces and do all three at the same time.

  That strategy would have defeated us. I'm really rather surprised that he didn't think of it himself.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  King Eldrig of Cherek was an old man with hair gone white and a long white beard. He stood at the window looking out over the rain-slashed harbor at Riva. It was about two weeks after we'd managed to extract the last survivors out of Drasnia.

  "You know him, Belgarath," he said.

  "How does he think? What's he going to do next?"

  "I think you're asking the wrong man, Eldrig," Rhodar said bitterly.

  In many ways, Rhodar of Drasnia was a broken man now. He lived only for vengeance.

  "Holy Belgarath hasn't had much luck with his guesses lately."

  "That'll do, Rhodar," Brand said firml
y in that deep quiet voice of his.

  "We're not here to chew old soup. We're here to decide what we're going to do now, not what we should have done last month." The revelation that Brand was going to be the Child of Light during this particular EVENT had given him a great deal of authority, and the Alorn kings all automatically deferred to him.

  "We know that he'll ultimately wind up in Arendia," Ormik of Sendaria said. Ormik was one of the most ordinary-looking men I've ever known. Even people who knew him probably couldn't have picked him out of a crowd.

  "Doesn't that mean that he'll turn south once he's regrouped his forces?"

  "And leave his rear exposed?" Eldrig scoffed.

  "Not very likely. I think he'll be at the gates of Val Alorn before the month's out."

  "Don't expect him to do what's rational," I told them.

  "I think that what happened to Drasnia more than proves that. He had no business coming through the Nadrak Forest, but he did it anyway. He doesn't think the way a human general would."

  "Why did he destroy Drasnia?" Rhodar demanded with tears in his eyes.

  I shrugged.

  "Revenge, most likely. The Drasnians almost wiped out the Nadraks in that battle during the third millennium."

  "That was nearly twenty-five hundred years ago, Belgarath," Rhodar protested.

  "Torak's got a very long memory."

  "The main question right now is whether he'll divide his forces or not," Cho-Ram said. Cho-Ram was idly sharpening his saber, and the sound of his whetstone on steel set my teeth on edge.

  "It's out of character for him," I said, "but we can't really be sure this time."

  "I'm not sure I follow that," Cho-Ram said, laying his saber and whetstone down on the table in front of him.

  "Torak doesn't like it when his people get out from under his thumb.

  Back before the War of the Gods, the Angaraks were the most tightly controlled people on earth. Things have changed a bit since then, though.

  Torak's got disciples now, and he leaves a lot of things up to them.

  Ctuchik might suggest a division of forces, and Zedar certainly would."

  "Would Torak listen to them?" Polgara asked me.