LITMIR.BIZ

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art brave, Aldur,’ UL said, ‘and wiser far than thy brothers. That which commands us all hath brought it to thy hand for a purpose. Let us go apart and consider our course.’

      I learned that day that there was something very strange about that ordinary-looking stone.

      The old man who had accompanied UL was named Gorim, and he and I got along well. He was a gentle, kindly old fellow whose features were the same as those of the old people I’d met some years before. We went up into the city, and he took me to his house. We waited there while my Master – and his – spoke together for quite some time. To pass the long hours, he told me the story of how he had come to enter the service of UL. It seemed that his people were Dals, the ones who had somehow been left out when the Gods were selecting the various races of man to serve them. Despite my peculiar situation, I’ve never been a particularly religious man, so I had a bit of difficulty grasping the concept of the spiritual pain the Dals suffered as outcasts. The Dals, of course, traditionally live to the south of the cluster of mountains known only as Korim, but it appeared that quite early in their history, they divided themselves into various groups to go in search of a God. Some went to the north to become Morindim and Karands; some went to the east to become Melcenes; some stayed south of Korim and continued to be Dals; but Gorim’s people, Ulgos, he called them, came west.

      Eventually, after the Ulgos had wandered around in the wilderness for generations, Gorim was born, and when he reached manhood, he volunteered to go alone in search of UL. That was long before I was born, of course. Anyway, after many years he finally found UL. He took the good news back to his people, but not too many of them believed him. People are like that sometimes. Finally he grew disgusted with them and told them to follow him or stay where they were, and he didn’t much care which. Some followed, and some didn’t. As he told me of this, he grew pensive. ‘I have oft-times wondered whatever happened to those who stayed behind,’ he said sadly.

      ‘I can clear that up for you, my friend,’ I advised him. ‘I happened across them some twenty-five or so years ago. They had a large camp quite a ways north of my Master’s Vale. I spent a winter with them and then moved on. I doubt that you’d find any of them still alive, though. They were all very old when I saw them.’

      He gave me a stricken look, and then he bowed his head and wept.

      ‘What’s wrong, Gorim?’ I exclaimed, somewhat alarmed.

      ‘I had hoped that UL might relent and set aside my curse on them,’ he replied brokenly.

      ‘Curse?’

      ‘That they would wither and perish and be no more. Their women were made barren by my curse.’

      ‘It was still working when I was there,’ I told him. ‘There wasn’t a single child in the entire camp. I wondered why they made such a fuss over me. I guess they hadn’t seen a child in a long, long time. I couldn’t get any details from them, because I couldn’t understand their language.’

      ‘They spoke the old tongue,’ he told me sadly, ‘even as do my people here in Prolgu.’

      ‘How is it that you speak my language then?’ I asked him.

      ‘It is my place as leader to speak for my people when we encounter other races,’ he explained.

      ‘Ah,’ I said. ‘That stands to reason, I guess.’

      My Master and I returned to the Vale not long after that, and I took up other studies. Time seemed meaningless in the Vale, and I devoted years of study to the most commonplace of things. I examined trees and birds, fish and beasts, insects and vermin. I spent forty-five years on the study of grass alone. In time it occurred to me that I wasn’t aging as other men did. I’d seen enough old people to know that aging is a part of being human, but for some reason I seemed to be breaking the rules.

      ‘Master,’ I said one night high in the tower as we both labored with our studies, ‘why is it that I do not grow old?’

      ‘Wouldst thou grow old, my son?’ he asked me. ‘I have never seen much advantage in it, myself.’

      ‘I don’t really miss it all that much, Master,’ I admitted, ‘but isn’t it customary?’

      ‘Perhaps,’ he said, but not mandatory. Thou hast much yet to learn, and one or ten or even a hundred lifetimes would not be enough. How old art thou, my son?’

      ‘I think I am somewhat beyond three hundred years, Master.’

      ‘A suitable age, my son, and thou hast persevered in thy studies. Should I forget myself and call thee “boy” again, pray correct me. It is not seemly that the disciple of a God should be called “boy”.’

      ‘I shall remember that, Master,’ I assured him, almost overcome with joy that he had finally called me his disciple.

      ‘I was certain that I could depend on thee,’ he said with a faint smile. ‘And what is the object of thy present study, my son?’

      ‘I would seek to learn why the stars fall, Master.’

      ‘A proper study, my son.’

      ‘And thou, Master,’ I asked, ‘what is thy study – if I be not overbold to ask.’

      ‘Even as before, Belgarath,’ he replied, holding up that fatal round stone. ‘It hath been placed in my care by UL himself, and it is therefore upon me to commune with it that I may know it – and its purpose.’

      ‘Can a stone have a purpose, Master – other than to be a stone?’ The piece of rock, now worn smooth, even polished, by my Master’s patient hand made me apprehensive for some reason. In one of those rare presentiments that I don’t have very often, I sensed that a great deal of mischief would come about as a result of it.

      ‘This particular jewel hath a great purpose, Belgarath, for through it the world and all who dwell herein shall be changed. If I can but perceive that purpose, I might make some preparations. That necessity lieth heavily upon my spirit.’ And then he lapsed once more into silence, idly turning the stone over and over in his hand as he gazed deep into its polished surface with troubled eyes.

      I certainly wasn’t going to intrude upon his contemplation of the thing, so I turned back to my study of the inconstant stars.

Chapter 3

      In time, others came to us, some seemingly by accident, as I had come, and some by intent, seeking out my Master that they might learn from him. Such a one was Zedar.

      I came upon him near our tower one golden day in autumn after I’d served my Master for five hundred years or so. This stranger had built a rude altar and was burning the carcass of a goat on it. That got us off on the wrong foot right at the outset. Even the wolves knew enough not to kill things in the Vale. The greasy smoke from his offering was fouling the air, and he was prostrated before his altar, chanting some outlandish prayer.

      ‘What are you doing?’ I demanded – quite abruptly, I’ll admit, since his noise and the stink of his sacrifice distracted my mind from a problem I’d been considering for the past half-century.

      ‘Oh, puissant and all-knowing God,’ he said, groveling in the dirt, ‘I have come a thousand leagues to behold thy glory and to worship thee.’

      ‘Puissant? Quit trying to show off your education, man. Now get up and stop this caterwauling. I’m no more a God than you are.’

      ‘Art thou not the great God Aldur?’

      ‘I’m his disciple, Belgarath. What is all this nonsense?’ I pointed at his altar and his smoking goat.

      ‘It is to please the God,’ he replied, rising and dusting off his clothes. I couldn’t be sure, but he looked rather like a Tolnedran – or possibly an Arend. In either case, his babble about a thousand leagues was clearly a self-serving exaggeration.

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