It was just after midnight when I was awakened by a thunderous detonation and a great flash of intense light. I leaped from my bed and dashed to the window, and stared in total disbelief at the ruins of Belsambar’s tower. It was no more than a stump now, and a great column of seething fire was spouting upward from it. The noise and that fire were bad enough, but I also felt a great vacancy as if something had been wrenched out of my very soul. I knew what it was. I no longer had the sense of Belsambar’s presence.
I really can’t say how long I stood frozen at that window staring at the horror that had just occurred.
‘Belgarath! Get down here!’ It was Beldin. I could clearly see him standing at the foot of my tower.
‘What happened?’ I shouted down to him.
‘I told you to keep an eye on Belsambar! He just willed himself out of existence! He’s gone, Belgarath! Belsambar’s gone!’
The world seemed to come crashing down around me. Belsambar had been a little strange, but he was still my brother. Ordinary people who live ordinary lives can’t begin to understand just how deeply you can become involved with another person over the course of thousands of years. In a peculiar sort of way, Belsambar’s self-obliteration maimed me. I think I’d have preferred to lose an arm or a leg rather than my mystic Angarak brother, and I know that my other brothers felt much the same. Beldin wept for days, and the twins were absolutely inconsolable.
That sense of vacancy that had come over me when Belsambar ended his life echoed all across the world. Even Belzedar and Belmakor, who were both in Mallorea when it happened, felt it, and they came soaring in a week or so afterward, although I’m not sure what they thought they could do. Belsambar was gone, and there was no way we could bring him back.
We comforted our Master as best we could, although there wasn’t really anything we could do to lessen his suffering and sorrow.
You wouldn’t have thought it to look at him, but Beldin did have a certain sense of delicacy. He waited until he got Belzedar outside the Master’s tower before he started to berate him for his behavior in Mallorea. Belmakor and I happened to be present at the time, and we were both enormously impressed by our distorted brother’s eloquence. ‘Irresponsible’ was perhaps the kindest word he used. It all went downhill from there.
Belzedar mutely accepted his abuse, which wasn’t really at all like him. For some reason, the death of Belsambar seemed to have hit him harder even than it had the rest of us. This is not to say that we all didn’t grieve, but Belzedar’s grief seemed somehow excessive. With uncharacteristic humility, he apologized to Beldin – not that it did any good. Beldin was in full voice, and he wasn’t about to stop just because Belzedar admitted his faults. He eventually started repeating himself, and that was when Belmakor rather smoothly stepped in. ‘What have you been doing in Mallorea, old boy?’ he asked Belzedar.
Belzedar shrugged. ‘What else? I’ve been attempting to recover our Master’s Orb.’
‘Isn’t that just a little dangerous, dear chap? Torak’s still a God, you know, and if he catches you, he’ll have your liver for breakfast.’
‘I think I’ve come up with a way to get around him,’ Belzedar replied.
‘Don’t be an idiot,’ Beldin snapped. ‘The Master’s got enough grief already without your adding to it by getting yourself obliterated following some half-baked scheme.’
‘It’s thoroughly baked, Beldin,’ Belzedar replied coolly. ‘I’ve taken plenty of time to work out all the details. The plan will work, and it’s the only way we’ll ever be able to get the Orb back.’
‘Let’s hear it.’
‘No, I don’t think so. I don’t need help, and I definitely don’t need any interference.’ And with that he turned on his heel and walked off toward his tower with Beldin’s curses chasing after him.
‘I wonder what he’s up to,’ Belmakor mused.
‘Something foolish,’ Beldin replied sourly. ‘Belzedar’s not always the most rational of men, and he’s been absolutely obsessed with the Master’s Orb since he first laid eyes on it. Sometimes you’d almost think it was something of his own that Torak stole.’
‘You’ve noticed that too, I see,’ Belmakor said with a faint smile.
‘Noticed it? How could anyone miss it? What were you doing in Mallorea?’
‘I wanted to see what had happened to my people, actually.’
‘Well? What did?’
‘Torak didn’t do them any favors when he cracked the world.’
‘I don’t think he was trying to. What happened?’
‘I can’t be entirely positive. Melcena was an island kingdom off the east coast, and when Torak started rearranging the world’s geography, he managed to sink about half of those islands. That inconvenienced my people just a bit. Now they’re all jammed together in what little space they’ve got left. They appointed a committee to look into it.’
‘They did what?’
‘That’s the first thing a Melcene thinks of when a crisis of any kind crops up, old boy. It gives us a sense of accomplishment – and we can always blame the committee if things don’t work out.’
‘That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard in my life.’
‘Of course it is. We Melcenes are a ridiculous people. It’s part of our charm.’
‘What did the committee come up with?’ I asked him.
‘They studied the problem from all angles – for about ten years, actually – and then they filed their report to the government.’
‘And what were their findings?’ I asked.
‘The report was five hundred pages long, Belgarath. It’d take me all night to repeat it.’
‘Boil it down.’
‘Well, the gist of it was that the Melcene empire needed more land.’
‘It took them ten years to come up with that?’ Beldin demanded incredulously.
‘Melcenes are very thorough, old boy. They went on to suggest expansion to the mainland.’
‘Isn’t it already occupied?’ I asked him.
‘Well, yes, but all of the people along the east coast are of Dallish extraction anyway – until you get farther north into the lands of the Karands – so there’s a certain kinship. The emperor sent emissaries to our cousins in Rengel and Celanta to explore possible solutions to our predicament.’
‘When did the war start?’ Beldin asked bluntly.
‘Oh, there wasn’t any war, old boy. We Melcenes are far too civilized for that. The emperor’s emissaries simply pointed out to the petty kinglets the advantages of becoming a part of the Melcene empire – and the disadvantages of refusing.’
