hilltop was probably as good a place as any to make my stand, so I trampled my own design into the snow and stepped inside.
It was about then that several of the tribesmen in the valley below saw us, and there was a lot of pointing and shouting. Then the magicians began hurling challenges at me. That’s a customary thing among primitive people. They spend more time boasting and threatening each other than they do actually fighting. I didn’t waste my breath shouting back.
Then the demons started to appear. They were of varying sizes, depending on the skills of the magicians who summoned them. Some were no bigger than imps, and some were as big as houses. They were all hideous, of course, but that was to be expected. The one thing they all had in common was the fact that they steamed in the cold. They come from a much hotter climate, you realize.
I waited. Then, when I judged that all but a few of the demons were present, I began to gather in my Will. It was surprisingly easy, since I was bent on creating an illusion rather than actually doing anything in a physical sense. I didn’t speak the Word yet, though. I didn’t want to spring my surprise on them until the last possible moment.
You have no idea of how hard it is to keep your Will buttoned in like that. I could feel my hair rising as if it wanted to stand on end, and I felt as if I were about to explode.
Then somewhere in that mob below us somebody blew a horn. I gather that was supposed to be a signal of some kind. All the magicians began barking commands, and the howling demons started toward us, the imps skittering across the snow and the big ones lumbering up the hill like burning garbage scows, melting down the snowdrifts as they came.
‘Behold!’ I thundered – augmenting my voice, I’ll admit – and I pointed dramatically toward the south. I didn’t want the moon or the northern lights lessening the impact of what I was going to do.
Then, posing like a charlatan in a country fair, I spoke the words that released my Will in a voice they probably heard in Kell.
‘Rise up!’ I roared – and the sun came up.
Oh, come now. You know better than that. Nobody can order the sun around. Don’t be so gullible.
It looked like the sun, though. It was a very good illusion, even if I do say so myself.
The Morindim were thunderstruck, to say the very least. My clever fakery quite literally bowled them over. Would you believe that a sizeable number of them actually fainted?
The demons faltered, and most of them sort of shimmered like heat waves rising off hot rocks as they resumed their real forms. The shimmering ones turned around and went back to eat the magicians who’d enslaved them. That created a sort of generalized panic down in the valley. I expect that some of those Morindim were still running a year later.
There were still eight or ten of the magicians who’d kept their grip on their slaves though, and those fiery demons kept plowing up through the snow toward me. I’ll admit that I’d desperately hoped that the panic my imitation sun would cause would be universal. I didn’t want to have to take the next step.
-I hope you’re right about this. – I muttered to the uninvited guest inside my skull.
– Trust me. –
I hate it when people say that to me.
I didn’t bother to mutter. Nobody in his right mind would attempt to duplicate what I was about to do. I spoke the incantation quite precisely. This wasn’t a good time for blunders. I was concentrating very hard, and my illusion flickered and went out, leaving me with nothing but the moon to work with.
There was another shimmering in the air, much too close to me for my comfort – and this particular shimmering glowed a sooty red. Then it congealed and became solid. I’d decided not to try to be exotic. Most Morind magicians get very creative when they devise the shape into which they plan to imprison their demon. I didn’t bother with tentacles or scales or any of that nonsense. I chose to use a human shape, and about all I did to modify the thing was to add horns. I really concentrated on those horns, since my very life hung on them.
It was shaky there for a while. I hadn’t realized how big the thing was going to be. It was a Demon Lord, though, and size is evidently an indication of rank in the hierarchy of Hell.
It struggled against me, naturally, and icicles began to form up in my beard as the sweat rolling down my face froze in the bitter cold. ‘Stop it!’ I commanded the thing irritably. ‘Just do what I tell you to do, and then I’ll let you go back to where it’s warm.’
I can’t believe I said that!
Oddly, it might have saved my life, though. The Demon Lord was steaming in the cold. You try jumping out of Hell into the middle of an arctic winter and see how you like it. My Demon Lord was rapidly turning blue, and his fangs were chattering.
‘Go down there and run off those other demons coming up the hill,’ I commanded.
‘You are Belgarath, aren’t you?’ It was the most awful voice I’ve ever heard. I was a bit surprised to discover that my reputation extended even into Hell. That sort of thing could go to a man’s head.
‘Yes,’ I admitted modestly.
‘Tell your Master that my Master is not pleased with what you are doing.’
‘I’ll pass that along. Now get cracking before your horns freeze off.’
I can’t be entirely sure what it was that turned the trick. It might have been the cold, or it might have been that the King of Hell had ordered the Demon Lord to go along with me so that I could carry his message back to Aldur. Maybe the presence of the Necessity intimidated the thing. Or perhaps I was strong enough to control that huge beast – though that seems unlikely. For whatever reason, however, the Demon Lord drew himself up to his full height – which was really high – and bellowed something absolutely incomprehensible. The other demons vanished immediately, and the magicians who had raised them all collapsed, convulsing in the snow in the throes of assorted seizures.
‘Nicely done,’ I complimented the Demon Lord. ‘You can go home now. Sleep warm,’ As I’ve tried so many times to explain to Garion, these things have to be done with a certain style. I learned that from Belmakor.
Cherek and his sons had been standing some distance away, and after I’d dismissed the Demon Lord, they began to increase that distance. ‘Oh, stop that!’ I snapped at them. ‘Come back here.’
They seemed very reluctant, and a great deal of white was showing in their eyes, but they apprehensively approached me. ‘I’ve got something to attend to,’ I told them. ‘Keep going east. I’ll catch up with you.’
‘Ah – what have you got in mind?’ Cherek asked in an awed sort of voice.
‘Riva had it right,’ I explained. ‘This little gathering was totally out of character for the Morindim. Somebody’s out there playing games. I’m going to go find out who he is and tell him to stop. East is that way.’ I pointed toward the newly risen moon.
‘How long do you think it’s going to take?’ Riva asked me.
‘I have no idea. Just keep going.’ Then I changed back into my wolf-shape and loped off toward
