Queen of Sorcery

[sawyl]

And so to the second book of David Eddings Belgariad series, in which we finally get a bit of comprehensive world building and the party of characters go on an extensive tour of some of the southern parts of the Kingdoms of the West, setting a whole load of things in motion ready for the rest of the series.

The book opens with two heavy duty slabs of exposition, the first in the form of a prologue which tells of the last battle many hundreds of years before between the combined forces of the west and the Angaraks before the Arendish city of Vo Mimbre where, after a great clash between the rival armies, Brand the Rivan Warden fought the god Torak in single combat and, stabbing him, bound him in a magical sleep. The second chunk of important information comes when Belgarath the Sorcerer finally explains that Zedar, one of the disciples of Torak, has somehow stolen the all-powerful and untouchable Orb of Aldur from the Rivan Citadel, and it is Zedar's trail they are following south, but the opposition they have been facing from the grolims, the priests of Torak, is mostly directed by another of the god's disciples, High Priest Ctuchik, from the great temple at Rak Cthol.

All this info-dumping comes as something of relief; for where Eddings has previous had Belgarath and Polgara shrug off all questions, he here explains exactly what is going on, who their principle opponents are and what their motives are likely to be. He also goes as far as to explain, in response to a question from Silk who really ought to have known better, how sorcery works — a combination will and word to direct it — and how it makes a mystical sound that others with the same ability, such as the grolim priests, can detect, effectively limiting the supernatural resources he and Polgara can deploy in their aid.

The company — Belgarath and Polgara, Garion and Durnik, Barak and Silk — are joined by Lelldorin, an impulsive Asturian archer and Hettar, the son of the Clan Chief of the Algars, and set off south through Arendia. Garion quickly realises that his friendship with Lelldorin is going to complicate things no end, especially when he discovers that Lelldorin is involved an Asturian plot to commit regicide in a way throws suspicion on Tolnedra, Arendia's powerful southern neighbour. After an encounter with a group of algroths, dangerous troll-like monsters, during which Lelldorin is injured and the party is only saved by the intervention of Mandorallen, the Baron of Vo Mandor and the greatest knight in the country, Garion finds the burden of dealing with the conspiracy has fallen squarely on his shoulders. Following his usual form, Garion waits until they are in the Court of Vo Mimbre before revealing the existence of the plot and accusing the ambassador from Cthol Murgos of involvement.

With Lelldorin's arrival, Garion comes to realise that not only is the Arendish civil war still going on but it is being fuelled by the likes of his new friend's hot-headed cousin, how has in turn been egged on by the Murgo ambassador. Mandorallen, when he arrives, is a fun character; he's a sort of armoured Siegfried, too self-confident and unimaginative to even think of being afraid, but he also possesses enough hidden depths from being one-note and unbearable. The court scenes in Vo Mimbre are fun, but having recently read my way through Shakespeare's history plays, I'm not at all convinced by the version of Early Modern English that Eddings puts into the mouths of the Mimbrates — he very clearly doesn't get the whole thee, thou, you thing. But my complaint misses the point of the exercise: to show that the Mimbrates are stuck in the past and to act as shibboleth that differentiates them from their Asturian counterparts.

Still following Zedar's trail the company enter Tolnedra, only to find the entire country in a state of political turmoil. With Emperor Ran Borune XXIII ageing rapidly and with no male heir to succeed him, the great houses are engaged in concerted efforts to bribe the Council of Advisors into favouring their candidate whilst also attempting to kill off their rivals. Obtaining an audience with Ran Borune Belgarath tries to explain the coming war with the Angaraks, but the Emperor is unimpressed and the group leave Tol Honeth for the south. On the road to Tol Vordue they meet a young noblewoman and her tutor, and the two groups agree to on together. But when they arrive at a fork in the road, the woman finally reveals the true: she is the Imperial Princess Ce'Nedra, travelling south to the Dryad Wood to seek sanctuary with her people until after her birthday, when the Treaty of Vo Mimbre requires he to present herself at Riva where she is pledged to marry the Rivan King, should he appear again. Needless to say, everyone else in the group had guessed the princess's true identity long since and they quickly take he on as another member of the party.

Following the established model, Tolnedran culture seems to owe a great deal to the Roman Empire, with its long straight roads, cleverly wrought imperial treaties and the iron discipline of its legions. As a people, the Tolnedrans are portrayed as being somewhat avaricious, overly keen on trade, and willing to do almost anything for a bribe. Their political culture comes across badly, with public murders and poisonings apparently the norm, but the current situation is atypical: it is the first chance any of the houses have had to replace the Borunes for five hundred years.

The princess Ce'Nedra is a fine addition to the cast. At first she's deeply spoilt and somewhat manipulative, but once she realises that the rest of the party aren't terribly impressed with either her behaviour or her title and that she isn't going to get her own way no matter how much she complains, she slowly begins to lose her spoilt manner and starts to become pretty decent. Her growing friendship with Garion, whom she initially treats rather badly, is nicely done and the way she teaches him to read and write — characteristically, he turns out to be an excellent pupil while she forgets to actually tell him quite how well he is doing — is just the sort of thing that offers hope for their future.

When the trail heads into the swamps of Nyissa, the party splits up with Belgarath and Silk following Zedar while the rest of travel to Sthiss Tor by ship. Arriving in the Nyissan capital, Garion finds himself caught up in one of Queen Salmissra's schemes until Polgara finally takes steps to prevent any further interference. Just as events come to a head both with the Queen of the Snake People and with the return of Belgarath, the Nyissan capital is plunged into darkness by a vast volcanic eruption off to the south.

There isn't really that much to say about the section in Nyissa, although it does allow Barak to shed light on a bit of history: following the Nyissan involvement in the deaths of the Kings of Riva thirteen hundred years ago, an Alorn army was sent to Nyissa and practically depopulated the place; an unpleasant little bit of genocide that gets glossed over because it happened a long time ago and because the Alorns still see the assassinations as amply justifying their extreme course of action. The Royal Palace, a crawling snake pit populated largely by the Queen's eunuchs, is nicely drawn and while queen may be a bit of a vamp, at least she has a backstory which justifies much of her behaviour.