‘They are,’ the one said from Eriond’s lips.

‘They are,’ the other said from Geran’s.

‘Then hear my Choice,’ she said. Once again she looked full into the faces of the little boy and the young man. Then with a cry of inhuman despair, she fell into Eriond’s arms. ‘I choose thee!’ she wept. ‘For good or for ill, I choose thee!’

There was a titanic lateral lurch – not an earthquake certainly, for not one single pebble was dislodged from the walls or ceiling of the grotto. For some reason, Garion was positive that the entire world had moved – inches perhaps, or yards or even thousands of leagues – to one side. And as a corollary to that certainty, he was equally sure that the same movement had been universal. The amount of power Cyradis’ agonized decision had released was beyond human comprehension.

Gradually, the blazing light diminished somewhat, and the Sardion’s glow became wan and sickly. In the instant of the Choice of the Seeress of Kell, Zandramas had shrunk back, and the whirling lights beneath the skin of her face seemed to flicker. Then they began to whirl and to glow more and more brightly. ‘No!’ she shrieked. ‘No!’

‘Perhaps these lights in thy flesh are thine exaltation, Zandramas,’ Poledra said. ‘Even now it may be that thou wilt shine brighter than any constellation. Well hast thou served the Prophecy of Dark, and it may yet find some way to exalt thee.’ Then Garion’s grandmother crossed the grotto floor to the satin-robed sorceress.

Zandramas shrank back even more. ‘Don’t touch me,’ she said.

‘It is not thee I would touch, Zandramas, but thy raiment. I would see thee receive thy reward and thine exaltation.’ Poledra tore back the satin hood and ripped the black robe away. Zandramas made no attempt to conceal her nakedness, for indeed, there was no nakedness. She was now no more than a faint outline, a husk filled with swirling, sparkling light that grew brighter and brighter.

Geran ran on sturdy little legs to his mother’s arms, and Ce’Nedra, weeping with joy, enfolded him and held him close to her. ‘Is anything going to happen to him?’ Garion demanded of Eriond. ‘He’s the Child of Dark, after all.’

‘There is no Child of Dark any more, Garion,’ Eriond answered the question. ‘Your son is safe.’

Garion felt an enormous wave of relief. Then, something which he had felt since the moment in which Cyradis had made her choice began to intrude itself increasingly upon his awareness. It was that overwhelming sense of presence which he had always felt when he had come face to face with a God. He looked more closely at Eriond, and that sense grew stronger. His young friend even looked different. Before, he had appeared to be a young man of probably not much over twenty. Now he appeared to be about the same age as Garion, although his face seemed strangely ageless. His expression, which before had been sweetly innocent, had now become grave and even wise. ‘We have one last thing to do here, Belgarion,’ he said in a solemn tone. He motioned Zakath and then gently placed the still-weeping Cyradis into the Mallorean’s arms. ‘Take care of her, please,’ he said.

‘For all of my life, Eriond,’ Zakath promised, leading the sobbing girl back to the others.

‘Now, Belgarion,’ Eriond continued, ‘give me my brother’s Orb from off the hilt of Iron-grip’s sword. It’s time to finish what was started here.’

‘Of course,’ Garion replied. He reached back over his shoulder and put his hand on the pommel of his sword. ‘Come off,’ he told the Orb. The stone came free in his hand, and he held it out to the young God.

Eriond took the glowing blue stone and turned to look at the Sardion and then down at the Orb in his hand. There was something inexplicable in his face as he looked at the two stones that were at the center of all division. He raised his face for a moment, his expression now serene. ‘So be it then,’ he said finally.

And then to Garion’s horror, he gripped the Orb even more tightly and pushed his hand quite deliberately, Orb and all, into the glowing Sardion.

The reddish stone seemed to flinch. Like Ctuchik in his last moment, it first expanded, then contracted. Then it expanded one last time. And then, like Ctuchik, it exploded – and yet that explosion was tightly confined, enclosed somehow within some unimaginable globe of force that came perhaps from Eriond’s will or from the power of the Orb or from some other source. Garion knew that had that force not been in place, all the world would have been torn apart by what was happening in this tightly confined place.

Even though it was partially muffled by Eriond’s immortal and indestructable body, the concussion was titanic, and they were all hurled to the floor by its force. Rocks and pebbles rained down from the ceiling, and the entire pyramidal islet which was all that was left of Korim shuddered in an earthquake even more powerful than that which had destroyed Rak Cthol. Confined within the grotto, the sound was beyond belief. Without thinking, Garion rolled across the surging floor to cover Ce’Nedra and Geran with his armored body, noting as he did so that many of his companions were also protecting loved ones in the same fashion.

The earth continued its convulsive shuddering, and what lay confined on the altar now with Eriond’s hand still buried within it was no longer the Sardion but an intense ball of energy a thousand times brighter than the sun.

Then Eriond, his face still calm, removed the Orb from the center of the incandescent ball which once had been the Sardion. As if the removal of Aldur’s Orb had also removed the constraint which had held the Sardion in one shape and place, the blazing fragments of Cthrag Sardius blasted upward through the roof of the grotto, ripping the top off the shuddering pyramid and sending the huge stone blocks out in all directions as if they were no more than pebbles.

The suddenly revealed sky was filled with a light brighter than the sun, a light which extended from horizon to horizon. The fragments of the Sardion streamed upward to lose themselves in that light.

Zandramas wailed, an inhuman, animal-like sound. The faint outline which was all that was left of her was writhing, twisting. ‘No!’ she cried, ‘It cannot be! You promised!’ Garion did not know, could not know, to whom she spoke. She extended her hands to Eriond in supplication. ‘Help me, God of Angarak!’ she cried. ‘Do not let me fall into the hands of Mordja or the foul embrace of the King of Hell! Save me!’

And then her shadowy husk split apart, and the swirling lights which had become her substance streamed inexorably upward to follow the fragments of the Sardion into that vast light in the sky.