She smiled at him fondly.
"There might be some hope for him after all," Aunt Pol observed, her needle busy.
Adara looked at Garion. "He has never really been that bad, Lady Polgara," she said. She inclined her head toward them both and quietly left the room.
Garion wandered around for a few moments and then flung himself into a chair. A great deal had happened that day, and he felt suddenly at odds with the whole world.
Aunt Pol continued to sew.
"Why are you doing that?" Garion demanded finally. "I'll never wear that old thing again."
"It needs fixing, dear," she told him placidly.
"There are a hundred people around who could do it for you."
"I prefer to do it myself."
"Put it down and talk to me."
She set the tunic aside and looked at him inquiringly. "And what did your Majesty wish to discuss?" she inquired.
"Aunt Pol!" Garion's voice was stricken. "Not you too."
"Don't give orders then, dear," she recommended, picking up the tunic again.
Garion watched her at her sewing for a few moments, not really knowing what to say. A strange thought occurred to him. "Why are you doing that, Aunt Pol?" he asked, really curious this time. "Probably nobody'll ever use it again, so you're just wasting time on it."
"It's my time, dear," she reminded him. She looked up from her sewing, her eyes unreadable. Then, without explanation she held up the tunic with one hand and ran the forefinger of her other hand carefully up the rip. Garion felt a very light surge, and the sound was only a whisper. The rip mended itself before his eyes, rewoven as if it had never existed. "Now you can see how completely useless mending it really is," she told him.
"Why do you do it then?"
"Because I like to sew, dear," she replied. With a sharp little jerk she ripped the tunic again. Then she picked up her needle and patiently began repairing the rip. "Sewing keeps the hands and eyes busy, but leaves the mind free for other things. It's very relaxing."
"Sometimes you're awfully complicated, Aunt Pol."
"Yes, dear. I know."
Garion paced about for a bit, then suddenly knelt beside her chair and, pushing her sewing aside, he put his head into her lap. "Oh, Aunt Pol," he said, very close to tears.
"What's the matter, dear?" she asked, carefully smoothing his hair.
"I'm so lonely."
"Is that all?"
He lifted his head and stared at her incredulously. He had not expected that.
"Everyone is lonely, dear," she explained, drawing him close to her. "We touch other people only briefly, then we're alone again. You'll get used to it in time."
"Nobody will talk to me now - not the way they did before. They're always bowing and saying 'Your Majesty' to me."
"You are the king, after all," she replied.
"But I don't want to be."
"That's too bad. It's the destiny of your family, so there's not a thing you can do about it. Did anyone ever tell you about Prince Gared?"
"I don't think so. Who was he?"
"He was the only survivor when the Nyissan assassins killed King Gorek and his family. He escaped by throwing himself into the sea."
"How old was he?"
"Six. He was a very brave child. Everyone thought that he had drowned and that his body had been washed out to sea. Your grandfather and I encouraged that belief. For thirteen hundred years we've hidden Prince Gared's descendants. For generations they've lived out their lives in quiet obscurity for the single purpose of bringing you to the throne - and now you say that you don't want to be king?"
"I don't know any of those people," he said sullenly. He knew he was behaving badly, but he couldn't seem to help himself.
"Would it help if you did know them - some of them, anyway?"
The question baffled him.
"Perhaps it might," she decided. She laid her sewing aside and stood up, drawing him to his feet. "Come with me," she told him and led him to the tall window that looked out over the city below. There was a small balcony outside; in one corner where a rain-gutter had cracked, there had built up during the fall and winter a sheet of shiny black ice, curving down over the railing and spreading out on the balcony floor.
Aunt Pol unlatched the window and it swung open, admitting a blast of icy air that made the candles dance. "Look directly into the ice, Garion," she told him, pointing at the glittering blackness. "Look deep into it."
He did as she told him and felt the force of her mind at work. Something was in the ice - shapeless at first but emerging slowly and becoming more and more visible. It was, he saw finally, the figure of a pale blond woman, quite lovely and with a warm smile on her lips. She seemed young, and her eyes were directly on Garion's face. "My baby," a voice seemed to whisper to him. "My little Garion."
Garion began to tremble violently. "Mother?" he gasped.
"So tall now," the whisper continued. "Almost a man."
"And already a king, Ildera," Aunt Pol told the phantom in a gentle voice.
"Then he was the chosen one," the ghost of Garion's mother exulted. "I knew it. I could feel it when I carried him under my heart."
A second shape had begun to appear beside the first. It was a tall young man with dark hair but a strangely familiar face. Garion clearly saw its resemblance to his own. "Hail Belgarion, my son," the second shape said to him.
"Father," Garion replied, not knowing what else to say.
"Our blessings, Garion," the second ghost said as the two figures started to fade.
"I avenged you, father," Garion called after them. It seemed important that they know that. He was never sure, however, if they had heard him.
Aunt Pol was leaning against the window frame with a look of exhaustion on her face.
"Are you all right?" Garion asked her, concerned.
"It's a very difficult thing to do, dear," she told him, passing a weary hand over her face.
But there was yet another flicker within the depths of the ice, and the familiar shape of the blue wolf appeared-the one who had joined Belgarath in the fight with Grul the Eldrak in the mountains of Ulgo. The wolf sat looking at them for a moment, then flickered briefly into the shape of a snowy owl and finally became a tawny-haired woman with golden eyes. Her face was so like Aunt Pol's that Garion could not help glancing quickly back and forth to compare them.
"You left it open, Polgara," the golden-eyed woman said gently. Her voice was as warm and soft as a summer evening.
"Yes, mother," Aunt Pol replied. "I'll close it in a moment."
"It's all right, Polgara," the wolf woman told her daughter. "It gave me the chance to meet him." She looked directly into Garion's face. "A touch or two is still there," she observed. "A bit about the eyes and in the shape of the jaw. Does he know?"
"Not everything, mother," Aunt Pol answered.
"Perhaps it's as well," Poledra noted.
Once again another figure emerged out of the dark depths of the ice. The second woman had hair like sunlight, and her face was even more like Aunt Pol's than Poledra's. "Polgara, my dear sister," she said.
"Beldaran," Aunt Pol responded in a voice overwhelmed with love.
"And Belgarion," Garion's ultimate grandmother said, "the final flower of my love and Riva's."
"Our blessings also, Belgarion," Poledra declared. "Farewell for now, but know that we love thee." And then the two were gone.
"Does that help?" Aunt Pol asked him, her voice deep with emotion and her eyes filled with tears.
Garion was too stunned by what he had just seen and heard to answer. Dumbly he nodded.
"I'm glad the effort wasn't wasted then," she said. "Please close the window, dear. It's letting the winter in."
Chapter Fourteen
IT WAS THE first day of spring, and King Belgarion of Riva was terribly nervous. He had watched the approach of Princess Ce'Nedra's sixteenth birthday with a steadily mounting anxiety and, now that the day had finally arrived, he
hovered on the very edge of panic. The deep blue brocade doublet over which a half dozen tailors had labored for weeks still did not seem to feel just right. Somehow it was a bit tight across the shoulders, and the stiff collar scratched his neck. Moreover, his gold crown seemed unusually heavy on this particular day, and, as he fidgeted, his throne seemed even more uncomfortable than usual.
The Hall of the Rivan King had been decorated extensively for the occasion, but even the banners and garlands of pale spring flowers could not mask the ominous starkness of the great throne room. The assembled notables, however, chatted and laughed among themselves as if nothing significant were taking place. Garion felt rather bitter about their heartless lack of concern in the face of what was about to happen to him.
Aunt Pol stood at the left side of his throne, garbed in a new silver gown and with a silver circlet about her hair. Belgarath lounged indolently on the right, wearing a new green doublet which had already become rumpled.
"Don't squirm so much, dear," Aunt Pol told Garion calmly.
"That's easy enough for you to say," Garion retorted in an accusing tone.
"Try not to think about it," Belgarath advised. "It will all be over in a little while."
Then Brand, his face seeming even more bleak than usual, entered the Hall from the side door and came to the dais. "There's a Nyissan at the gate of the Citadel, your Majesty," he said quietly. "He says that he's the emissary of Queen Salmissra and that he's here to witness the ceremony."
"Isn't that impossible?" Garion asked Aunt Pol, startled by the Warder's surprising announcement.
"Not entirely," she replied. "More likely, though, it's a diplomatic fiction. I'd imagine that the Nyissans would prefer to keep Salmissra's condition a secret."
"What do I do?" Garion asked. Belgarath shrugged.
"Let him in."
"In here?" Brand's voice was shocked. "A Nyissan in the throne room? Belgarath, you're not serious."
"Garion is Overlord of the West, Brand," the old man replied, "and that includes Nyissa. I don't imagine that the snake-people will be much use to us at any time, but let's be polite, at least."
Brand's face went stiff with disapproval. "What is your Majesty's decision?" he asked Garion directly.
"Well-" Garion hesitated. "Let him come in, I guess."
"Don't vacillate, Garion," Aunt Pol told him firmly.
"I'm sorry," Garion said quickly.
"And don't apologize," she added. "Kings do not apologize."
He looked at her helplessly. Then he turned back to Brand. "Tell the emissary from Nyissa to join us," he said, though his tone was placating.
"By the way, Brand," Belgarath suggested, "I wouldn't let anyone get too excited about this. The Nyissan has ambassadorial status, and it would be a serious breach of protocol if he were to die unexpectedly."
Brand bowed rather stiffly, turned, and left the Hall.
"Was that really necessary, father?" Aunt Pol asked.
"Old grudges die hard, Pol," Belgarath replied. "Sometimes it's best to get everything right out in front so that there aren't any misunderstandings later."
When the emissary of the Snake Queen entered the Hall, Garion started with surprise. It was Sadi, the chief eunuch in Salmissra's palace. The thin man with the dead-looking eyes and shaved head wore the customary iridescent blue-green Nyissan robe, and he bowed sinuously as he approached the throne. "Greetings to his Majesty, Belgarion of Riva, from Eternal Salmissra, Queen of the Snake-People," he intoned in his peculiarly contralto voice.
"Welcome, Sadi," Garion replied formally.
"My queen sends her regards on this happy day," Sadi continued.
"She didn't really, did she?" Garion asked a bit pointedly.
"Not precisely, your Majesty," Sadi admitted without the least trace of embarrassment. "I'm sure she would have, however, if we'd been able to make her understand what was happening."
"How is she?" Garion remembered the dreadful transformation Salmissra had undergone.
"Difficult," Sadi answered blandly. "Of course that's nothing new. Fortunately she sleeps for a week or two after she's been fed. She moulted last month, and it made her dreadfully short-tempered." He rolled his eyes ceilingward. "It was ghastly," he murmured. "She bit three servants before it was over. They all died immediately, of course."
"She's venomous?" Garion was a bit startled at that.
"She's always been venomous, your Majesty."
"That's not the way I mean."
"Forgive my little joke," Sadi apologized. "Judging from the reactions of people she's bitten, I'd guess that she's at least ten times more deadly than a common cobra."
"Is she terribly unhappy?" Garion felt a strange pity for the hideously altered queen.
"That's really rather hard to say, your Majesty," Sadi replied clinically. "It's difficult to tell what a snake's really feeling, you understand. By the time she'd learned to communicate her wishes to us, she seemed to have become reconciled to her new form. We feed her and keep her clean. As long as she has her mirror and someone to bite when she's feeling peevish, she seems quite content."
"She still looks at herself in the mirror? I wouldn't think she'd want to now."
"Our race has a somewhat different view of the serpent, your Majesty," Sadi explained. "We find it a rather attractive creature, and our queen is a splendid-looking snake, after all. Her new skin is quite lovely, and she seems very proud of it." He turned and bowed deeply to Aunt Pol. "Lady Polgara," he greeted her.
"Sadi," she acknowledged with a brief nod.
"May I convey to you the heartfelt thanks of her Majesty's government?"
One of Aunt Pol's eyebrows rose inquiringly.
"The government, my Lady - not the queen herself. Your - ah - intervention, shall we say, has simplified things in the palace enormously. We no longer have to worry about Salmissra's whims and peculiar appetites. We rule by committee and we hardly ever find it necessary to poison each other any more. No one's tried to poison me for months. It's all very smooth and civilised in Sthiss Tor now." He glanced briefly at Garion. "May I also offer my congratulations on your success with his Majesty? He seems to have matured considerably. He was really very callow when last we met,"
"Whatever happened to Issus?" Garion asked him, ignoring that particular observation.
Sadi shrugged. "Issus? Oh, he's still about, scratching out a living as a paid assassin, probably. I imagine that one day we'll find him floating facedown in the river. It's the sort of end one expects for someone like that."
There was a sudden blare of trumpets from just beyond the great doors at the back of the Hall. Garion started nervously, and his mouth quite suddenly went dry.
The heavy doors swung open, and a double file of Tolnedran legionnaires marched in, their breastplates burnished until they shone like mirrors, and the tall crimson plumes on their helmets waving as they marched. The inclusion of the legionnaires in the ceremony had infuriated Brand. The Rivan Warder had stalked about in icy silence for days after he had discovered that Garion had granted ambassador Valgon's request for a proper escort for Princess Ce'Nedra. Brand did not like Tolnedrans, and he had been looking forward to witnessing the pride of the empire humbled by Ce'Nedra's forlorn and solitary entrance into the Hall. The presence of the legionnaires spoiled that, of course, and Brand's disappointment and disapproval had been painfully obvious. As much as Garion wanted to stay on Brand's good side, however, he did not intend to start off the official relationship between his bride-to-be and himself by publicly humiliating her. Garion was quite ready to acknowledge his lack of education, but he was not prepared to admit to being that stupid.
When Ce'Nedra entered, her hand resting lightly on Valgon's arm, she was every inch an Imperial Princess. Garion could only gape at her. Although the Accords of Vo Mimbre required that she present herself in her wedding gown, Garion was totally unprepared for such Imperial magnificence. Her gown was of gold and white brocade covered with seed pearls, and i
ts train swept the floor behind her. Her flaming hair was intricately curled and cascaded over her left shoulder like a deep crimson waterfall. Her circlet of tinted gold held in place a short veil that did not so much conceal her face as soften it into luminousness.
She was tiny and perfect, exquisite beyond belief, but her eyes were like little green agates.
She and Valgon moved at stately pace down between the ranks of her tall, burnished legionnaires; when they reached the front of the Hall, they stopped.
Brand, sober-faced and imposing, took his staff of office from Bralon, his eldest son, and rapped sharply on the stone floor with its butt three times. "Her Imperial Highness Ce'Nedra of the Tolnedran Empire," he announced in a deep, booming voice. "Will your Majesty grant her audience?"
"I will receive the princess," Garion declared, straightening a bit on his throne.
"The Princess Ce'Nedra may approach the throne," Brand proclaimed. Though his words were ritual formality, they had obviously been chosen with great care to make it absolutely clear that Imperial Tolnedra came to the Hall of the Rivan King as a suppliant. Ce'Nedra's eyes flashed fire, and Garion groaned inwardly. The little princess, however, glided to the appointed spot before the dais and curtsied regally. There was no submission in that gesture.
"The Princess has permission to speak," Brand boomed. For a brief, irrational moment Garion wanted to strangle him.
Ce'Nedra drew herself up, her face as cold as a winter sea. "Thus I, Ce'Nedra, daughter to Ran Borune XXIII and Princess of Imperial Tolnedra, present myself as required by treaty and law in the presence of His Majesty, Belgarion of Riva," she declared. "And thus has the Tolnedran Empire once more demonstrated her willingness to fulfill her obligations as set forth in the Accords of Vo Mimbre. Let other kingdoms witness Tolnedra's meticulous response and follow her example in meeting their obligations. I declare before these witnesses that I am an unmarried virgin of a suitable age. Will his Majesty consent to take me to wife?"
Garion's reply had been carefully thought out. The quiet inner voice had suggested a way to head off years of marital discord. He rose to his feet and said, "I, Belgarion, King of Riva, hereby consent to take the Imperial Princess Ce'Nedra to be my wife and queen. I declare, moreover, that she will rule jointly by my side in Riva and wheresoever else the authority of our throne may extend."
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