One thing we saw in all the vast confusion that now clouded the book of the heavens. The Ages of man grew shorter as each one passed, and the Events that were the meetings between the two fates were growing closer and closer together. The time for leisurely contemplation had passed, and now we must hasten lest the last Event come upon us all unaware. We decided that we must goad or deceive the participants in that final Event so that they should both come to the appointed place at the destined time.

And we sent the similitude of She Who Must Make the Choice to the veiled and hooded presence of dark and to Belgarion the Godslayer, and she set them upon the path that would lead them at last to the place of our choosing. And then we all turned to our preparations, for much remained to be done, and we knew that this Event would be the last. The division of creation had endured for too long; and in this meeting between the two fates the division would end and all would be made one again.

Part One - KELL

Part One - KELL

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

The air was thin and cool and richly scented with the odor of trees that shed no leaves but stood dark green and resinous from one end of their lives to the other. The sunlight on the snowfields above them was dazzling, and the sound of tumbling water seething down and down rocky streambeds to feed rivers leagues below on the plains of Darshiva and Gandahar was constantly in their ears. That tumble and roar of waters rushing to their destined meeting with the great River Magan was accompanied by the soft, melancholy sighing of an endless wind passing through the deep-green forest of pine and fir and spruce which clad hills that reached toward the sky in a kind of unthinking yearning. The caravan route Garion and his friends followed rose up and up, winding along streambeds and mounting the sides of ridges.