"Cthol Mishrak is deserted except for a few Grolims," the sorceress replied. "Torak smashed the city and drove its people out the day my father and King Cherek and his sons stole the Orb back from the iron tower."

"When was that?"

"A very long time ago, Ce'Nedra. As nearly as we've been able to determine, it was precisely on the same day that Beldaran and I were born - and the day our mother died. It's a bit hard to say for sure. We were a bit casual about keeping track of time in those days."

"If your mother had died and Belgarath was here, who took care of you?"

"Beldin, of course." Polgara smiled. "He wasn't a very good mother, but he did the best he could until father returned."

"Is that why you're so fond of him?"

"One of the reasons, yes."

The ominous cloudbank still did not move. It stretched across the sky as stationary as a range of mountains; as they rode toward it, it loomed higher and higher.

"That's a very strange cloud," Durnik noted, looking speculatively at the thick curtain of purple ahead. "The storm is coming in behind us, but that cloud doesn't seem to be moving at all."

"It doesn't move, Durnik," Polgara told him. "It never has moved. When the Angaraks built Cthol Mishrak, Torak put that cloud there to hide the city. It's been there ever since."

"How long is that?"

"About five thousand years."

"The sun never shines there?"

"Never."

The Grolim Archpriests had begun to look about with a certain apprehension, and finally Urtag called a halt. "We must make ourselves known," he declared. "We don't want the watchers to mistake us for intruders."

The other Archpriests nodded nervously, and then all removed polished steel masks from beneath their robes and carefully covered their faces with them. Then each of them untied a thick torch from his saddle and ignited it with a brief, mumbled incantation. The torches burned with a peculiarly green-tinged flame and gave off a reeking, sulfurous smoke.

"I wonder what would happen if I were to blow out your torches," Polgara suggested with a hint of a mischievous smile. "I could, you know."

Urtag gave her a worried look. "This is no time for foolishness, my Lady," he warned her. "The watchers are very savage with intruders. Our lives depend on those torches. Please don't do anything to bring down a disaster on us all."

She laughed lightly and let it go at that.