They reached the land bridge two days later, and Garion stared at it in dismay. It was not at all what he had expected, but consisted of a series of round, wave-eroded white boulders sticking up out of the dark water and running in an irregular line off toward a dark smudge on the horizon. The wind was blowing out of the north, carrying with it a bitter chill and the smell of polar ice. Patches of white froth stretched from boulder to boulder as the swells ripped themselves to tatters on submerged reefs.

"How are we supposed to cross that?" Silk objected.

"We wait until low tide," Belgarath explained. "The reefs are mostly out of the water then."

"Mostly?"

"We might have to wade a bit from time to time. Let's strip these furs off our clothes before we start. It will give us something to do while we're waiting for the tide to turn, and they're starting to get a bit fragrant."

They took shelter behind a pile of driftwood far up on the beach and removed the stiff, smelly furs from their clothing. Then they dug food out of their packs and ate. Garion noted that the stain that had darkened the skin on his hands had begun to wear thin and that the tattoodrawings on the faces of his companions had grown noticeably fainter.

It grew darker, and the period of twilight that separated one day from the next seemed longer than it had no more than a week ago.

"Summer's nearly over up here," Belgarath noted, looking out at the boulders gradually emerging from the receding water in the murky twilight.

"How much longer before low tide?" Silk asked.

"Another hour or so."

They waited. The wind pushed at the pile of driftwood erratically and brushed the tall grass along the upper edge of the beach, bending and tossing it.

Finally Belgarath stood up. "Let's go," he said shortly. "We'll lead the horses. The reefs are slippery, so be careful how you set your feet down."

The passage along the reef between the first steppingstones was not all that bad, but once they moved farther out, the wind became a definite factor. They were frequently drenched with stinging spray, and every so often a wave, larger than the others, broke over the top of the reef and swirled about their legs, tugging at them. The water was brutally cold.

"Do you think we'll be able to make it all the way across before the tide comes back in again?" Silk shouted over the noise.

"No," Belgarath shouted back. "We'll have to sit it out on top of one of the larger rocks."

"That sounds unpleasant."

"Not nearly so unpleasant as swimming."