Guardians of the West

And there it was! Garion stared at it incredulously, not believing what he saw. The blot was exactly the same as it was on all the copies. He almost screamed with frustration. With a sick feeling of defeat, he read once again that fatal line: "And the Child of Light shall meet with the Child of Dark and shall overcome him, and the Darkness shall flee.

But behold, the Stone which lies at the center of the Light shall-" And there was that accursed blot again.

A peculiar thing happened as he read it again. An odd sort of indifference seemed to come over him. Why was he making such a fuss about a single blotted word? What difference could one word make? He almost rose from his chair with the intention of putting the scroll back in its case and leaving this foul-smelling place for home. Then he stopped quite suddenly, remembering all the hours he had spent trying to puzzle out the meaning of that blot on the page. Perhaps it wouldn't hurt to read it one more time. He had, after all, come a very long way.

He started over again, but his distaste became so acute that he could hardly stand it. Why was he wasting his time with this nonsense? He had traveled all this way to wear out his eyes on this moldering scrap of insane gibberish -this stinking, half-rotten sheet of poorly tanned sheepskin. He shoved the Codex away in disgust. This was sheer idiocy. He pushed back the chair and stood up, shifting Iron-grip's great sword on his back. His ship would still be there, moored to that rickety dock. He could be halfway to Kotu by nightfall and back at Riva within the week. He would lock the library once and for all and tend to his business. A king, after all, did not have time for all this idle, brainsickly speculation. Decisively, he turned his back on the scroll and started toward the door.

As soon as he was no longer looking at the scroll, however, he stopped. What was he doing? The puzzle was still there. He had made no effort to solve it. He had to find out. But as he turned back and looked at the scroll again, that same wave of insupportable disgust almost overwhelmed him. It was so strong that it made him feel faint. Once again he turned his back, and once again the feeling vanished. There was something about the scroll itself that was trying to drive him away.

He began to pace up and down, carefully keeping his eyes away from the scroll. What had the dry voice in his mind told him? "There are several words there. If you look at them in the right kind of light, you should be able to see them." What kind of light? The candles in this vaulted room obviously weren't what the voice had meant. Sunlight? That hardly seemed likely. Poledra had said that he must read the hidden words, but how could he, when the Codex literally drove him away each time he looked at it?

Then he stopped. What else had she said? Something about not being able to see without . . .

The wave of disgust which struck him was so strong that he felt his stomach constrict. He spun quickly so that his back was toward that hateful document; as he did so, the hilt of Iron-grip's sword jabbed him painfully in the side of the head. Angrily he reached over his shoulder to grasp the handle and push it back, but instead, his hand touched the Orb. The feeling of revulsion evaporated instantly, and his mind became clear, and his thoughts lucid. The light! Of course! He had to read the Codex by the light of the Orb! That is what both Poledra and the dry voice had been trying to tell him. Awkwardly, he reached up and back, seizing the Orb. "Come off," he muttered to it. With a faint click, the Orb came free in his hand. The sudden weight of the huge sword strapped across his back very nearly drove him to his knees. In astonishment, he realized that the seeming weightlessness of the great weapon had been the work of the Orb itself. Struggling under that gross weight, he fumbled with the buckle at his chest, unfastened it, and felt the enormous bulk slide free. Iron-grip's sword fell to the floor with a loud clatter.

Holding the Orb in front of him, Garion turned and looked directly at the scroll. He could almost hear an angry snarl hovering in the air, but his mind remained clear. He stepped to the table and pulled the scroll open with one hand, holding the glowing Orb above it with the other.

At last he saw the meaning of the blot that had frustrated him for so long. It was not some random splotch of spilled ink. The message was there -all of it, but the words had all been written down on top of one another! The entire prophecy lay in that one single spot! By the blue, unwavering light of Aldur's Orb, his eyes seemed actually to plunge down and down beneath the surface of the parchment, and the words, hidden for eons, rose like bubbles out of the substance of the scroll.

"But Behold," the crucial passage read, "the Stone which lies at the center of the Light shall burn red, and my voice shall speak unto the Child of Light and reveal the name of the Child of Dark. And the Child of Light will take up the Guardian's sword and go forth to seek out that which is hidden. Long will be his quest, and it shall be threefold. And ye shall know that the quest hath begun when the Keeper's Line is renewed. Guard well the seed of the Keeper, for there shall be no other. Guard it well, for should that seed fall into the hands of the Child of Dark and be taken to the place where the evil dwells, then blind choice alone can decide the outcome. Should the Keeper's seed be reft away, then must the Beloved and Eternal lead the way. And he shall find the path to the place where the evil dwells in the Mysteries. And in each Mystery shall lie but a part of the path, and he must find them all -all- or the path will lead awry, and the Dark shall triumph. Hasten therefore to the meeting where the three-fold quest will end. And this meeting will come to pass in a place which is no more, and there will the choice be made."

Garion read it again, and then a third time, feeling an ominous chill as the words echoed and thundered through his consciousness. Finally he rose and went to the door of the candlelit, vaulted chamber. "I'll need something to write with," he told the priest standing just outside. " And send someone down to the river. Have him tell the captain of my ship to get things ready. Just as soon as I finish here, I have to leave for Kotu." The priest was staring wide-eyed at the incandescently glowing Orb in Garion's hand. "Don't just stand there, man, move!" Garion told him. "The whole world's hanging on this!" The priest blinked and then scurried away.

The following day, Garion was in Kotu, and about a day and a half later, he reached Aldurford in northern Algaria. As luck had it, a herd of half-wild Algarian cattle was being driven across that wide, shallow place in the mighty river on their way to Muros, and Garion went immediately in search of the herdmaster.

"I'm going to need two horses," he said, skipping the customary courtesies. "The best you have. I have to be in the Vale of Aldur before the week is out."