Sorceress of Darshiva

you've been busy," Belgarath observed as Silk drove the little carriage up and stopped.
    "We needed something to carry the supplies in," Silk replied glibly.
    "Of course."
    "I hope you were able to find something beside beans," Sadi said. "Soldiers' rations tend to grow monotonous after awhile."
    "Silk swindled a shopkeeper," Garion said, opening the leather-covered box at the back of the carriage. "We did rather well, actually."
    "Swindled?" Silk protested.
    "Didn't you?" Garion moved the side of beef so that Polgara could look into the box.
    "Well—I suppose so," Silk admitted, "but swindled is such an awkward way to sum up."
    "It's perfectly all right, Prince Kheldar." Polgara almost purred as she took a mental inventory of the items in the box. "To be honest with you, I don't care how you came by all this."
    He bowed. "My pleasure, Polgara," he said grandly.
    "Yes," she said absently, "I'm sure you enjoyed it."
    "What did you find out?" Beldin asked Garion.
    "Well, for one thing, Zandramas is ahead of us again," Garion replied. "She went through here a few days ago. She knows that Urvon's army is coming down through the mountains. He might be moving a little faster than we thought, though, because she's ordering the civilian population to delay him. They're more or less ignoring her."
    "Wise decision." Beldin grunted. "Anything else?"
    "She told them that this is all going to be settled before the summer's over.''
    "That agrees with what Cyradis told us at Ashaba," Belgarath said. "All right, then. We all know when the meeting's going to happen. The only thing that's left to find out is where."
    "That's why we're all in such a hurry to get to Kell," Beldin said. "Cyradis is sitting on that information like a mother hen on a clutch of eggs."
    "What is it?" Belgarath burst out irritably.
    "What's what?"
    "I'm missing something. It's something important and it's something you told me."
    "I've told you lots of things, Belgarath. You don't usually listen, though."
    "This was a while back. It seems to me we were sitting in my tower, talking."
    "We've done that from time to time over the last several thousand years."
    "No. This was more recent. Eriond was there and he was just a boy."
    "That would put it at about ten years or so ago, then."
    "Right."
    "What were we doing ten years ago?" Belgarath began to pace up and down, scowling.
    "I'd been helping Durnik. We were making Poledra's cottage livable. You'd been here in Mallorea,"
    Beldin scratched reflectively at his stomach. "I think I remember the time. We were sharing a cask of ale you'd stolen from the twins, and Eriond was scrubbing the floor."
    "What were you telling me?"
    Beldin shrugged. "I'd just come back from Mallorea. I was describing conditions here and telling you about the Sardion—although we didn't know very much about it at that point."
    "No," Belgarath shook his head. "That wasn't it. You said something about Kell."
    Beldin frowned, thinking back. "It must not have been very important, because neither of us seems to be able to remember it."
    "It seems to me it was just something you said in passing."
    "I say a lot of things in passing. They help to fill up the blank spaces in a conversation. Are you certain it was all that important? "
    Belgarath nodded. "I'm sure of it."
    "All right. Let's see if we can track it down."
    "Won't this wait, father?" Polgara asked.
    "No, Pol. I don't think so. We're right on the edge of it, and I don't want to lose it again."
    "Let's see," Beldin said, his ugly face creased with thought. "I came in, and you and Eriond were cleaning. You offered me some of the ale you'd stolen from the twins. You asked me what I'd been doing since Belgarion's wedding, and I told you I'd been keeping an eye on the Angaraks."
    "Yes," Belgarath agreed. "I remember that part."
    "I told you that the Murgos were in general despair about the death of Taur Urgas, and that the western Grolims had gone to pieces over the death of Torak."
    "Then you told me about Zakath's campaign in Cthol Murgos and about how he'd added the Kal to his name."
    "That actually wasn't my idea," Zakath said with a slightly pained look. "Brador came up with it—as a means of unifying Mallorean society." He made a wry face. "It didn't really work all that well, I guess."
    "Things do seem a bit disorganized here," Silk agreed.
    "What did we talk about then?" Belgarath asked.
    "Well," Beldin replied, "as I remember it, we told Eriond the story of Vo Mimbre, and then you