Read Online Belgarath the Sorcerer by David Eddings - Free Book Online

me out of Gara, and I looked sharply at my Master. Would you believe that he actually managed to look slightly embarrassed?
    Belzedar spluttered for a while, but, since there was nothing he could do about it anyway, he muffled his objections.
    The next to join us was Sambar, an Angarak. Sambar - or Belsambar as he later became - was not his real name, of course. Angarak names are so universally ugly that my Master did him a favor when he renamed him. I felt a greatdeal of sympathy for the boy - he was only about fifteen when he joined us. I’ve never seen anyone so abject. He simply came to the tower, seated himself on the earth, and waited for either acceptance or death. Beltira and Belkira fed him, of course. They were shepherds, after all, and shepherds won’t let anything go hungry. After a week or so, when it became obvious that he absolutely would not enter the tower, our Master went down to him . Now that was something I’d never seen Aldur do before. He spoke with the lad at some length in a hideous language - old Angarak, I’ve since discovered - and turned him over to Beltira and Belkira for tutelage. If anyone ever needed gentle handling, it was Belsambar.
    In time, the twins taught him to speak a normal language that didn’t involve so much spitting and snarling, and we learned his history. My distaste for Torak dates from that point in time. It may not have been entirely Torak’s fault, however. I’ve learned over the years that the views of any priesthood are not necessarily the views of the Gods they serve. I’ll give Torak the benefit of the doubt in this case - the practice of human sacrifice might have been no more than a perversion of his Grolim priests. But he did nothing to put a stop to it, and that’s unforgivable.
    To cut all this windy moralizing short, Belsambar’s parents - both of them - had been sacrificed, and Belsambar had been required to watch as a demonstration of his faith. It didn’t really work out that way, though. Grolims can be so stupid sometimes. Anyway, at the tender age of nine, Belsambar became an atheist, rejecting not only Torak and his stinking Grolims, but all Gods.
    That was when our Master summoned him. In his particular case, the summoning must have been a bit more spectacular than the vague urge that turned my face toward the Vale. Belsambar was clearly in a state of religious ecstasy when he reached us. Of course he was an Angarak, and they’re always a little strange in matters of religion.
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    It was Belmakor who first raised the notion of building our own towers. He was a Melcene, after all, and they’re obsessed with building things. I’ll admit that our Master’s tower was starting to get a bit crowded, though.
    The construction of those towers took us several decades, as I recall. It was actually more in the nature of a hobby than it was a matter of any urgency. We did use what you might call our advantages in the construction, of course, but squaring off rocks is a tedious business, even if you don’t have to use a chisel. We did manage to clear away a lot of rock, though, and building material got progressively scarcer as the years rolled by.
    I think it was late summer one year when I decided that it was time to finish up my tower so that I wouldn’t have it hanging over my head nagging at me. Besides, Belmakor’s tower was almost finished, and I was first disciple, after all. I didn’t think it would really be proper for me to let him outstrip me. We sometimes do things for the most childish of reasons, don’t we?
    Since my brothers and I had virtually denuded the Vale of rocks, I went up to the edge of the forest lying to the north in search of building materials. I was poking around among the trees looking for a stream-bed or an outcropping of stone when I suddenly felt a baleful stare boring into the back of my neck. That’s an uncomfortable feeling that’s always