Demon Lord of Karanda

since dreaming usually involved sight as well as sound, but all there was to this one was that persistent, despairing wail and the sense of horror with which it filled him. He sat up on his bunk, trembling and sweat-covered. After a time, he drew his blanket about his shoulders, clasped his arms about his knees, and stared at the ruddy coals in the fireplace until he dozed off again.
    It was still cloudy the following morning, and they rode cautiously back down the ravine to the rutted track leading up into the foothills of the mountains. Silk and Feldegast ranged out in front of them as scouts to give them warning should any dangers arise.
    After they had ridden a league or so, the pair came back down the narrow road. Their faces were sober, and they motioned for silence.
    "There's a group of Karands camped around the road up ahead," Silk reported in a voice scarcely louder than a whisper.
    "An ambush?" Sadi asked him.
    "No," Feldegast replied in a low voice. "They're asleep fer the most part. From the look of things, I'd say that they spent the night in some sort of religious observance, an' so they're probably exhausted -or still drunk."
    "Can we get around them?" Belgarath asked.
    "It shouldn't be too much trouble," Silk replied. "We can just go off into the trees and circle around until we're past the spot where they're sleeping."
    The old man nodded. "Lead the way," he said.
    They left the road and angled off into the timber, moving at a cautious walk.
    "What sort of ceremony were they holding?" Durnik asked quietly.
    Silk shrugged. "It looked pretty obscure," Silk told him. "They've got an altar set up with skulls on posts along the back of it. There seems to have been quite a bit of drinking going on -as well as some other things."
    "What sort of things?"
    Silk's face grew slightly pained. "They have women with them," he answered disgustedly." There's some evidence that things got a bit indiscriminate."
    Durnik's cheeks suddenly turned bright red.
    "Aren't you exaggerating a bit, Kheldar?" Velvet asked him.
    "No, not really. Some of them were still celebrating."
    "A bit more important than quaint local religious customs, though," Feldegast added, still speaking quietly, "be the peculiar pets the Karands was keepin '."
    "Pets?" Belgarath asked.
    "Perhaps 'tis not the right word, Ancient One, but sittin' round the edges of the camp was a fair number of the Hounds -an' they was makin' no move t' devour the celebrants."
    Belgarath looked at him sharply. "Are you sure?"
    "I've seen enough of the Hounds of Torak t' recognize 'em when I see 'em."
    "So there is some kind of an alliance between Mengha and Urvon," the old man said.
    "Yer wisdom is altogether a marvel, old man. It must be a delight beyond human imagination t' have the benefit of ten thousand years experience t' guide ye in comin' t' such conclusions."
    "Seven thousand," Belgarath corrected.
    "Seven- ten- what matter?"
    "Seven thousand," Belgarath repeated with a slightly offended expression.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN
    They rode that afternoon into a dead wasteland, a region foul and reeking, where white snags poked the skeleton-like fingers of their limbs imploringly at a dark, roiling sky and where dank ponds of oily, stagnant water exuded the reek of decay. Clots of fungus lay in gross profusion about the trunks of long-dead trees and matted-down weeds struggled up through ashy soil toward a sunless sky.
    "It looks almost like Cthol Mishrak, doesn't it?" Silk asked, looking about distastefully.
    "We're getting very close to Ashaba," Belgarath told him. "Something about Torak did this to the ground."
    "Didn't he know?" Velvet said sadly.
    "Know what?" Ce'Nedra asked her.
    "That his very presence befouled the earth?"
    "No," Ce'Nedra replied, "I don't think he did. His mind was so twisted that he couldn't even see it. The sun hid from him, and he saw that only as a mark of his and not as a sign of its repugnance for him."
    It was a peculiarly astute observation, which to some degree surprised Garion. His wife oftentimes seemed to have a wide streak of giddiness in her nature which made it far too easy to think of her as a child, a misconception reinforced by her diminutive size. But he had frequently found it necessary to reassess this tiny, often willful little woman who shared his life. Ce'Nedra might sometimes behave foolishly, but she was never stupid. She looked out at the world with a clear, unwavering vision that saw much more than gowns and jewels and