"It would only unsettle your mind, Barak," she answered. "You'd probably make a mess of killing yourself if I told you about it. We'd really rather not have you lying around groaning for weeks on end. That sort of thing is so depressing, you know."

"I want to know what you're talking about!"

"Oh, very well," she said with a great sigh. "Your wife Merel is with child - the result of certain courtesies you exchanged when we visited Val Alorn, I imagine. She looks like a rising moon at the moment, and your lusty brat is making her life miserable with his kicking."

"A son?" Barak said, his eyes suddenly very wide.

"Really, Barak," she protested. "You must learn to pay attention. You'll never make anything of yourself if you keep blundering around with your ears closed like this."

"A son?" he repeated, his sword sliding out of his fingers.

"Now you've dropped it," she chided him. "Pick it up immediately, and let's get on with this. It's very inconsiderate to take all day to kill yourself like this."

"I'm not going to kill myself," he told her indignantly.

"You're not?"

"Of course not," he sputtered, and then he saw the faint flicker of a smile playing about the corners of her mouth. He hung his head sheepishly.

"You great fool," she said. Then she took hold of his beard with both hands, pulled his head down and kissed his ash-dusted face soundly. Greldik began to chortle, and Mandorallen stepped forward and caught Barak in a rough embrace. "I rejoice with thee, my friend," he said. "My heart soars for thee."

"Brink up a cask," Greldik told the sailors, pounding on his friend's back. "We'll salute Trellheim's heir with the bright brown ale of timeless Cherek."

"I expect this will get rowdy now," Aunt Pol said quietly to Garion. "Come with me." She led the way back toward the ship's prow.

"Will she ever change back?" Garion asked when they were alone again.

"What?"

"The queen," Garion explained. "Will she ever change back again?"

"In time she won't even want to," Aunt Pol answered. "The shapes we assume begin to dominate our thinking after a while. As the years go by, she'll become more and more a snake and less and less a woman."

Garion shuddered. "It would have been kinder to have killed her."

"I promised Lord Issa that I wouldn't," she said.

"Was that really the God?"

"His spirit," she replied, looking out into the hazy ashfall. "Salmissra infused the statue with Issa's spirit. For a time at least the statue was the God. It's all very complicated." She seemed a bit preoccupied. "Where is he?" She seemed suddenly irritated.

"Who?"

"Father. He should have been here days ago."

They stood together looking out at the muddy river.