"What are you doing here?" The old sorcerer did not speak aloud but rather cast the question at the sky with his mind. The hawk spiraled down to the clearing, flared his wings to avoid the altar, and landed on the turf. He looked directly at Belgarath with fierce yellow eyes, then shimmered and seemed to blur. When the shimmering was gone, the misshapen sorcerer Beldin stood in his place. He was still as ragged, dirty, and irritable as he had been the last time Garion had seen him.

"Is this all the farther you've managed to come?" he demanded harshly of Belgarath. "What have you been doing - stopping at every tavern along the way?"

"We ran into a small delay," Belgarath replied calmly.

Beldin grunted with a sour look. "If you keep dawdling along like this, it will take you the rest of the year to get to Cthol Mishrak."

"We'll get there, Beldin. You worry too much."

"Somebody has to. You're being followed, you know."

"How far back are they?"

"Five leagues or so."

Belgarath shrugged. "That's far enough. They'll give up when we get to Morindland."

"What if they don't?"

"Have you been spending time with Polgara lately?" Belgarath asked dryly. "I thought I'd gotten away from all the 'what-ifs."'

Beldin shrugged, a gesture made grotesque by the hump on his back. "I saw her last week," he reported. "She has some interesting plans for you, you know."

"She came to the Vale?" Belgarath sounded surprised.

"Passed through. She was with the red-haired girl's army."

Garion threw off his blanket. "With whose army?" he demanded.

"What's going on down there?" Belgarath asked sharply.

Beldin scratched at his tangled hair. "I never really got the straight of it," he admitted. "All I know is that the Alorns are following that little redheaded Tolnedran. She calls herself the Rivan Queen - whatever that means."

"Ce'Nedra?" Garion was incredulous, though, for some reason, he knew that he shouldn't be.

"I guess she went through Arendia like a pestilence," Beldin continued. "After she passed, there wasn't an able-bodied man left in the kingdom. Then she went on down into Tolnedra and goaded her father into convulsions - I didn't know that he was subject to fits."

"It crops up in the Borune line once in a while," Belgarath said. "It's nothing all that serious, but they try to keep it quiet."

"Anyway," the hunchback went on, "while Ran Borune was still frothing at the mouth, his daughter stole his legions. She's persuaded about half the world to take up arms and follow her." He gave Garion a quizzical look. "You're supposed to marry her, aren't you?"

Garion nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

Beldin grinned suddenly. "You might want to give some thought to running away."

"Ce'Nedra?" Garion blurted again.

"His wits seem a bit scrambled," Beldin observed.