The mind of the Sorceress of Darshiva was filled with a confused welter of thoughts and emotions. The wild hope Garion’s subterfuge had raised in her seemed to have done its work. Zandramas floundered, unable to concentrate now on her next step. But step she must. Garion perceived that she simply could not leave the matter wholly in the hands of the Seeress of Kell.

‘Go thou then, Child of Light, to stand beside the Child of Dark that I may choose between ye,’ Cyradis said.

Eriond nodded. Then he turned and crossed the grotto to stand beside Geran.

‘It’s done, Cyradis,’ Poledra said. ‘All the choices have been made but yours. This is the appointed place and the appointed day. The moment for you to perform your task has arrived.’

‘Not quite yet, Poledra,’ Cyradis said, her voice trembling with anxiety. ‘The signal that the instant of the Choice hath come must be delivered from from the book of the heavens.’

‘But you cannot see the heavens, Cyradis,’ Garion’s grandmother reminded her. ‘We stand beneath the earth. The book of the heavens is obscured.’

‘I need not go to the book of the heavens. It will come to me.’

‘Consider, Cyradis,’ Zandramas urged in a wheedling tone. ‘Consider my words. There is no possible choice but Belgarion’s son.’

Garion’s mind suddenly became very alert. Zandramas had made a decision. She knew what she was going to do, but she had somehow managed to conceal it from him. He almost began to admire his enemy. She had prepared each of her moves from the very beginning – and each of her defenses in this place as well – with an almost military precision. As each defense failed, she withdrew to the next. That was why he could not pick her thought from her mind. She already knew what she was going to do, so there was no need for her to even think about it. He could feel, however, that her next move had something to do with Cyradis herself. That was Zandramas’ last line of defense. ‘Don’t do that, Zandramas,’ he told the Sorceress. ‘You know it’s not the truth. Leave her alone.’

‘Then choose, Cyradis,’ the Sorceress commanded.

‘I may not. The instant hath not yet arrived.’ The face of Cyradis was twisted with an inhuman agony.

Then Garion felt it. Wave upon wave of indecision and doubt were emanating from Zandramas, all focusing on the blindfolded Seeress. This was the final desperate attempt. Failing to attack them successfully, Zandramas was now attacking Cyradis. ‘Help her, Aunt Pol,’ Garion threw the thought out desperately. ‘Zandramas is trying to keep her from making the Choice.’

‘Yes, Garion,’ Polgara’s voice came back calmly, ‘I know.’

‘Do something!’

‘It’s not time yet. It has to come at the moment of the Choice. If I try to do anything earlier, Zandramas will feel it and take steps to counteract me.’

‘Something’s happening outside,’ Durnik said urgently. ‘There’s a light of some kind coming down the corridor.’

Garion looked quickly. The light was still dim and indistinct, but it was like no other light he had ever seen.

‘The time for the Choice hath come, Cyradis,’ Zandramas said, her voice cruel. ‘Choose!’

‘I cannot!’ the Seeress wailed, turning toward the growing light. ‘Not yet! I’m not ready yet!’ She stumbled across the floor, wringing her hands. ‘I’m not ready! I can’t choose! Send another!’

‘Choose!’ Zandramas repeated implacably.

‘If only I could see them!’ Cyradis sobbed. ‘If only I could see them!’

And then at last, Polgara moved. ‘That’s easily arranged, Cyradis,’ she said in a calm and oddly comforting tone. ‘Your vision has clouded your sight, that’s all.’ She reached out and gently removed the blindfold. ‘Look then with human eyes and make your choice.’

‘That is forbidden!’ Zandramas protested shrilly as her advantage crumbled.

‘No,’ Polgara said. ‘If it were forbidden, I would not have been able to do it.’

Cyradis had flinched back from even the faint light in the grotto. ‘I cannot!’ she cried, covering her eyes with her hands. ‘I cannot!’

Zandramas’ eyes came suddenly alight. ‘I triumph!’ she exulted. ‘The Choice must be made, but now will it be made by another. It no longer lieth in the hands of Cyradis, for the decision not to choose is also a choice.’

‘Is that true?’ Garion quickly asked Beldin.

‘There are two schools of thought on that.’

‘Yes or no, Beldin.’

‘I don’t know. I really don’t, Garion.’

There was suddenly a soundless burst of intense light from the mouth of the passageway leading to the outside. Brighter than the sun, the light swelled and grew. It was so impossibly intense that even the cracks between the stones in the grotto blazed incandescently.

‘It has come at last,’ Garion’s inner companion said unemotionally through Eriond’s lips. ‘It is the instant of the Choice. Choose, Cyradis, lest all be destroyed.’

‘It has come,’ another equally unemotional voice spoke through the lips of Garion’s son. ‘It is the instant of the Choice. Choose, Cyradis, lest all be destroyed.’

Cyradis swayed, torn by indecision, her eyes darting back and forth to the two faces before her. Again she wrung her hands.

‘She cannot!’ the Emperor of Mallorea exclaimed, starting forward impulsively.

‘She must!’ Garion said, catching his friend’s arm. ‘If she doesn’t, everything will be lost!’

Again the eyes of Zandramas filled with that unholy joy. ‘It is too much for her!’ the priestess almost crowed. ‘Thou hast made thy choice, Cyradis,’ she cried. ‘It cannot be unmade. Now will I make the Choice for thee, and I will be exalted when the Dark God comes again!’

And that may have been Zandramas’ last and fatal error. Cyradis straightened and, eyes flashing, she looked full into the starry face of the sorceress. ‘Not so, Zandramas,’ the Seeress said in an icy voice. ‘What passed before was indecision, not choice, and the moment hath not yet passed.’ She lifted her beautiful face and closed her eyes. The vast chorus of the Seers of Kell swelled its organ note in the tight confines of the grotto, but it ended on a questioning note.

‘Then the decision is wholly mine,’ Cyradis said. ‘Are all the conditions met?’ She addressed the question to the two awarenesses standing unseen behind Eriond and Geran.