Errand nodded.
"Why don't you start at the beginning, Errand?" Polgara suggested.
"All right. This Harakan, I guess his real name is, came here because his Master, the one Beldin called Urvon, sent him here to make sure that Belgarion and Ce'Nedra never had any children. Harakan came here and gained control of the Bear-cult. At first he stirred up all kinds of talk against Ce'Nedra, hoping that he could force Belgarion to set her aside and marry someone else. Then, when he heard that she was going to have a baby, he sent someone to try to kill her. That didn't work, of course, and he started to get desperate. He was terribly afraid of what Urvon would do to him if he failed. He tried to gain control of Ce'Nedra when she was asleep once, to make her smother the baby, but someone -he doesn't know who- stepped in and stopped him."
"It was Poledra," Garion murmured. "I was there that night."
"Is that when he came up with the idea of murdering Brand and laying the blame at King Anheg's door?" General Brendig asked.
Errand frowned slightly. "Killing Brand was an accident," he replied. "As closely as Harakan could work it out, Brand just happened along and caught the cultists in that hallway when they were about to do what he really sent them to Riva to do."
"And what was that?" Ce'Nedra asked him.
"They were on their way to the royal apartments to kill you and your baby."
Her face paled.
"And then they were supposed to kill themselves. That was what was supposed to start the war between Belgarion and King Anheg. Anyway, something went wrong. Brand got killed instead of you and your baby, and we found out that the cult was responsible instead of Anheg. He didn't dare go back to Urvon and admit that he had failed. Then Zandramas took your baby and got away from the Isle of the Winds with him. Harakan couldn't follow because Belgarion was already marching on Rheon by the time he found out about it. He was trapped here, and Zandramas was getting away with your baby."
"That Nyissan ship!" Kail exclaimed. "Zandramas stole your son, Belgarion, and then sailed off to the south and left us all floundering around here in Drasnia."
"What about the story we got from that Cherek cultist right after the abduction?" Brin asked.
"A Bear-cultist isn't usually very bright," Kail replied. "I don't think this Zandramas would have had too much difficulty in persuading those Chereks that the abduction was on Harakan's orders, and all that gibberish about the prince being raised in the cult so that one day he could claim the Rivan throne is just kind of brainsick nonsense men like that would believe."
"That's why they were left behind, then," Garion said. "We were supposed to capture at least one of them and get the carefully prepared story that sent us off here to Rheon, while Zandramas sailed away to the south with my son."
"It looks as if we've all been very carefully manipulated," Javelin said, sorting through some parchment sheets he had stacked on a polished table. "Harakan as well as the rest of us. "
"We can be clever, too," Belgarath said. "I don't think Zandramas realizes that the Orb will follow Geran's trail. If we move fast enough, we can sneak up from behind and take this clever manipulator by surprise."
"It won't work across water." the dry voice in Garion's mind said laconically.
"What?"
"The Orb can't follow your son's trail over water. The ground stays in one place. Water keeps moving around -wind, tides, that sort of thing."
Are you sure?"
But the voice was gone.
"There's a problem, Grandfather," Garion said. "The Orb can't find a trail on water."
"How do you know that?"
Garion tapped his forehead. "He just told me."
"That complicates things a bit."
"Not too much," Silk disagreed. "There are very few places where a Nyissan ship can land without being searched from keel to topmast. Most monarchs don't care much for the idea of having drugs and poisons slipped into their kingdoms. Zandramas would definitely not want to sail into some port and get caught with the heir to the Rivan Throne aboard ship."
"There are many hidden coves along the coast of Arendia, " Lelldorin suggested.
Silk shook his head. "I don't think so," he said. "I think the ship would have just stayed out to sea. I'm sure Zandramas wanted to get as far away from the Alorn kingdoms as possible -and as quickly as possible. If this ruse that sent us here to Rheon hadn't worked, Garion would have had every man and every ship in the West out looking for his son."
"How about southern Cthol Murgos?" General Brendig suggested.
Javelin frowned. "No," he said. "There's a war going on down there and the whole west coast is being patrolled by Murgo ships. The only safe place for a Nyissan ship to land is in Nyissa itself."
"And that brings us back to Salmissra, doesn't it?" Polgara said.
"I think that if there had been any kind of official involvement in this, my people would have found out about it, Lady Polgara," Javelin said. "I've got Salmissra's palace thoroughly covered. The actual orders would have had to come from Sadi, Salmissra's Chief-Eunuch, and we watch him all the time. I don't think this came out of the palace."
The door opened and Beldin, his face as dark as a thundercloud, entered. "By the Gods!" he swore. "I lost him!"
"Lost him?" Belgarath asked. "How?"
"When he got to the street, he turned himself into a hawk. I was right on his tail, but he went into the clouds and changed form on me again. When he came out, he was mixed up in the middle of a flock of geese flying south. Naturally, when the geese saw me, they flew off squawking in all directions. I couldn't tell which one of them he was."
"You must be getting old."
"Why don't you shut up, Belgarath?"
"He's not important anymore, anyway." Belgarath shrugged. "We got what we needed out of him."
"I think I'd prefer it if he were safely dead. If nothing else, the loss of one of his favorite dogs would irritate Urvon, and I'll go out of my way to do that any day in the week."
"Why do you keep calling him a dog?" Hettar asked curiously.
"Because he's one of the Chandim -and that's what they are- the Hounds of Torak."
"Would you like to explain that?" Queen Porenn asked him.
Beldin took a deep breath to get his irritation under control. "It's not too complicated," he said. "When they built Cthol Mishrak in Mallorea, Torak set certain Grolims the task of guarding the city. In order to do that, they became hounds."