"We may not be close enough yet, and we're still at sea. Open water confuses the Orb. Then, too, maybe it's trying to conceal itself from the Sardion.”

“Could it actually think its way through that complex an idea? It's usually fairly childish, I’ve noticed."

"Don't underestimate it, Garion."

"Everything's fitting together, then, isn't it?"

"It all has to, Garion. Otherwise what's going to happen tomorrow couldn't happen."

"Well, father?" Polgara asked as they reentered the cabin.

"There's a fire of some kind in that cave, all right," he told her. His fingers, however, were telling her something else. We'll talk about it in more detail after the captain leaves. He turned toward Kresca. "When's the next low tide?" he asked the seaman.

Kresca squinted, calculating. "We just missed one," he said. "The tide's coming in now. The next low tide will come about daybreak and, if my observations are correct, it should be a neap tide. Well, I'll leave you to get some rest now. I sort of gather that you've got a full day ahead of you tomorrow."

"Thank you, Captain Kresca," Garion said, shaking the seaman's hand.

"Don't mention it, Garion." Kresca grinned. "The King of Peldane paid me very handsomely for this voyage, so being helpful doesn't really cost me anything."

"Good." Garion grinned back. "I like to see friends get ahead in the world."

The captain laughed and went back out with a hearty wave.

"What was he talking about?" Sadi asked. "What's a neap tide?"

"It only happens a few times a year," Beldin explained. "It's an extreme low tide. It has to do with the positions of the sun and moon."

"Everything seems to be going out of its way to make tomorrow a very special day," Silk observed.

"All right, father," Polgara said crisply. "What's the story on the fire in that cave?"

"I can't be positive, Pol, but I rather strongly suspect that it's not a group of pirates not after all the trouble the prophecies have gone to keep people away from the cave."

"What do you think it is, then?"

"It's probably the Sardion."

"Would it give off a red glow?"

He shrugged. "The Orb glows blue. I suppose there's a sort of logic to the Sardion's glowing a different color."

"Why not green?" Silk asked.

"Green's an in-between color," Beldin told him. "It's a mixture of blue and yellow.”

"You're a real gold mine of useless information, you know that, Beldin? "Silk said.

"There's no such thing as useless information, Kheldar." Beldin sniffed.

"All right," Zakath said, "how are we going to go about this?"

"Cyradis," Belgarath said to the Seeress, "I'm guessing about this, but I think I'm fairly close. Nobody is going to reach that cave first, are they? What I mean is that the prophecies aren't going to let Zandramas get there before we do or let us get there first either."