"I'll need to talk with Dalian about supplies, then. And I think I'll want to check the horses' hooves before we start. This might be a good time to get them shod again."

"That's impossible!" Belgarath suddenly burst out.

"What is it, father?" Aunt Pol asked him.

"It's Korim! The meeting is supposed to take place at Korim!"

"Where's that?" Sadi asked in puzzlement.

"It's no place," Beldin growled. "It's not there anymore. It was a mountain range that sank into the sea when Torak cracked the world. The Book of Alorn mentions it as The High Places of Korim, which are no more.' "

"There's a certain perverted logic to it," Silk observed. "That's what these assorted prophecies have meant all along when they talked about a Place Which Is No More."

Beldin tugged thoughtfully at one ear. "There's something else, too," he noted. "You remember the story Senji told us back at Melcene? About the scholar who stole the Sardion? His ship was last seen founding the southern tip of Gandahar, and it never came back. Senji said he thought that it had gone down in a storm off the Dalasian coast. It's beginning to sound as if he was right. We have to go where the Sardion is, and I've got the uncomfortable feeling that it's resting on top of a mountain that sank into the sea over five thousand years ago."

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER EIGHT

The Queen of Riva was in a pensive mood as they set out from the glowing marble city of Kell . A peculiar kind of languor seemed to come over her as they rode through the forest to the west of Kell, a languor that grew more pronounced with each passing mile. She took no part in the general conversation, but was content merely to listen.

"I don't see how you can be so calm about this, Cyradis," Belgarath was saying to the blindfolded Seeress as they rode along. "Your task will fail the same as ours will if the Sardion is lying at the bottom of the sea. And why are we making this side trip to Perivor?"

"It is there that the instruction thou received from the Holy Book will be made clear to thee, Ancient Belgarath."

"Couldn't you just explain it to me yourself? We're a little pressed for time, you know."

"That I may not do. I may not give thee any aid that I do not also give to Zandramas. It is thy task—and hers—to unravel this riddle. To aid one of thee and not the other is forbidden.''

"Somehow I thought you might look at it that way," he said glumly.

"Where's Perivor?" Garion asked Zakath.