King of The Murgos

something, anyway."
    "What does it mean?"
    "Just what it says. Zandramas went to Nyissa. We'll pick up the trail there."
    "Grandfather, we already knew that."
    "We suspected it, Garion. There's a difference. Zandramas has tricked us into following false trails before. Now we know for certain that we're on the right track."
    "It isn't very much, Grandfather."
    "I know, but it's better than nothing."

CHAPTER FIVE
    "Would you just look at that?" Ce'Nedra said indignantly the following morning. She had just arisen and stood at the window, wrapped in a warm robe.
    "Hmmm?" Garion murmured drowsily. "Look at what, dear?" He was burrowed deeply under the warm quilts and was giving some serious thought to going back to sleep. "You can't see it from there, Garion. Come over here " He sighed, slipped out of bed, and padded barefoot over to the window.
    "Isn't that disgusting?" she demanded.
    The grounds of the Imperial Compound were blanketed m white, and large snowflakes were settling lazily through the dead-calm air.
    "Isn't it sort of peculiar for it to snow in Tol Honeth?" he asked.
    "Garion, it never snows in Tol Honeth. The last time I saw snow here was when I was five years old."
    "It's been an unusual winter."
    "Well, I'm going back to bed, and I'm not going to get up until every bit of it melts."
    "You don't really have to go out in it, you know."
    "I don't even want to look at it." She flounced back to their canopied bed, let her robe drop to the floor, and climbed back under the quilts. Garion shrugged and started back toward the bed. Another hour or two of sleep seemed definitely in order.
    "Please pull the curtains on the bed shut," she told him, "and don't make too much noise when you leave."
    He stared at her for a moment, then sighed. He closed the heavy curtains around the bed and sleepily began to dress.
    "Do be a dear, Garion," she said sweetly. "Stop by the kitchen and tell them that I'll want my breakfast in here."
    Now that, he felt, was distinctly unfair. He pulled on the rest of his clothes, feeling surly.
    "Oh, Garion?"
    "Yes, dear?" He kept it neutral with some effort.
    "Don't forget to comb your hair. You always look like a straw stack in the morning." Her voice already sounded drowsy and on the edge of sleep.
    He found Belgarath sitting moodily before the window in an unlighted dining room. Although it was quite early, the old man had a tankard on the table beside him. "Can you believe this?" he said disgustedly, looking out at the softly felling snow.
    "I don't imagine that it's going to last very long, Grandfather."
    "It never snows in To! Honeth."
    "That's what Ce'Nedra was just saying." Garion held out his hands to a glowing iron brazier.
    "Where is she?"
    "She went back to bed."
    "That's probably not such a bad idea. Why didn't you join her?"
    "She decided that it was time for me to get up,"
    "That hardly seems fair."
    "The same thought occurred to me."
    Belgarath scratched absently at his ear, still looking out at the snow. "We're too far south for this to last for more than a day or so. Besides, the day after tomorrow is Erastide. A lot of people will be traveling after the holiday, so we won't be quite so conspicuous."
    "You think we should wait?"
    "It's sort of logical. We wouldn't make very good time slogging through all that, anyway."
    "What do you plan to do today, then?"
    Belgarath picked up his tankard. "I think I'll finish this and then go back to bed."
    Garion pulled up one of the red velvet upholstered chairs and sat down. Something had been bothering him for several days now, and he decided that this might be a good time to bring it out into the open. "Grandfather?"
    "Yes?"
    "Why is it that all of this seems to have happened before?"
    "All of what?"
    "Everything. There are Angaraks in Arendia trying to stir up trouble—just as they were when we were following Zedar. There are intrigues and assassinations in Tolnedra— the same as last time. We ran into a monster—a dragon this time instead of the Algroths—but it's still pretty close to the same sort of thing. It seems almost as if we were repeating everything that happened when we were trying to find the Orb. We've even been running into the same people—Delvor, that customs man, even Jeebers."
    "You know, that's a very interesting question, Garion." Belgarath pondered for a moment, absently taking a drink from his tankard. "If you think about it in a certain way, though, it does sort of make sense."
    "I don't quite follow