Read Belgarath the Sorcerer for Free Online

that began my servitude. At first the tasks my Master set me to were simple ones - ‘sweep the floor,’ ‘fetch some firewood,’ ‘wash the windows’ - that sort of thing. I suppose I should have been suspicious about many of them. I could have sworn that there hadn’t been a speck of dust anywhere when I first mounted to his tower room, and, as I think I mentioned earlier, the fire burning in his fireplace didn’t seem to need fuel. It was almost as if he were somehow making work for me to do.
    He was a good master, though. For one thing, he didn’t command in the way I’d heard the Tolnedrans command their servants, but rather made suggestions. ‘Thinkest thou not that the floor hath become dirty again, boy?’ Or, ‘Might it not be prudent to lay in some store of firewood?’ My chores were in no way beyond my strength or abilities, and the weather outside was sufficiently unpleasant to persuade me that what little was expected of me was a small price to pay in exchange for food and shelter. I did resolve, however, that when spring came and he began to look farther afield for things for me to do, I might want to reconsider our arrangement. There isn’t really very much to do when winter keeps one housebound, but warmer weather brings with it the opportunity for heavier and more tedious tasks. If things turned too unpleasant, I could always pick up and leave.
    There was something peculiar about that notion, though. The compulsion which had come over me at Gara seemed gone now. I don’t know that I really thought about it in any specific way. I just seemed to notice that it was gone and shrugged it off. Maybe I just thought I’d outgrown it.It seems to me that I shrugged off a great deal that first winter.
    I paid very little attention, for example, to the fact that my Master seemed to have no visible means of support. He didn’t keep cattle or sheep or even chickens, and there were no sheds or outbuildings in the vicinity of his tower. I couldn’t even find his storeroom. I knew there had to be one somewhere , because the meals he prepared were always on the table when I grew hungry. Oddly, the fact that I never once saw him cooking didn’t seem particularly strange to me. Not even the fact that I never once saw him eat anything seemed strange. It was almost as if my natural curiosity - and believe me, I can be very curious - had been somehow put to sleep.
    I had absolutely no idea of what he did during that long winter. It seemed to me that he spent a great deal of time just looking at a plain round rock. He didn’t speak very often, but I talked enough for both of us. I’ve always been fond of the sound of my own voice - or had you noticed that?
    My continual chatter must have driven him to distraction, because one evening he rather pointedly asked me why I didn’t go read something.
    I knew about reading, of course. Nobody in Gara had known how, but I’d seen Tolnedrans doing it - or pretending to. It seemed a little silly to me at the time. Why take the trouble to write a letter to somebody who lives two houses over? If it’s important, just step over and tell him about it. ‘I don’t know how to read, Master,’ I confessed.
    He actually seemed startled by that. ‘Is this truly the case, boy?’ he asked me. ‘I had thought that the skill was instinctive amongst thy kind.’
    I wished that he’d quit talking about ‘my kind’ as if I were a member of some obscure species of rodent or insect.
    â€˜Fetch down that book, boy,’ he instructed, pointing at a high shelf.
    I looked up in some amazement. There seemed to be several dozen bound volumes on that shelf. I’d cleaned and dusted and polished the room from floor to ceiling a dozen times or more, and I’d have taken an oath that the shelf hadn’t been there the last time I looked. I covered my confusion by asking,