Undertow II: Ebb Tide — Philip's game log
Philip - Ebb Tide Diary
© 2005 Jack Gulick
Philip sat, deep in thought. This game was larger than he, and he was not certain yet he knew even the outline of its rules. He had done this to himself before, found shadows where gamblers settled on games alien to him, mastered tonk and fizzbin and stranger things that didn't even get to have names a mostly-human tongue could wrap itself around. But here, the players were distant, and even his own cards not clear to him. Here, he must play boldly, gamble as much as he could, and remember that there would be no second chance.Play boldly, but smart, that was the way. A plan began to form, a plan that might succeed, though if it did not he would most likely be dead or in permanent exile. Still, you cannot win if you do not bet; that was the one universal truth, all too often forgotten by those who didn't play cards. Another was the one played the players more than the cards. He needed to know what he held and what he could of what they held, but it was more important to understand who was across the table.
He rode out from the lodge and spoke to the men at several camps. Their morale held firm, and their numbers were being increased rapidly. Benedict was putting his men into the frame Duncan and Philip had assembled of the broken men, shifting their readiness from defense to offense. Philip knew this almost at once, though no one told him their orders. The men were distant in their respect... It was likely if he did not declare himself openly for Benedict and the forthcoming offense, the next time he saw them they would have orders for his arrest. He returned to his father's lodge, past the returned trophies that were signs of the Fey Folk's truce, and thought on things a bit more.
Who was the player opposite him? The Fae? Perhaps... But he could choose them as an enemy or not, the returned trophies proved that beyond doubt. No enemy you can choose is an enemy at all. But the other option was far, far more frightening. Benedict had bested nearly every opponent he had faced in millennia. Word spread through shadows that knew of Amber that any grand general was a true shadow of Benedict. Philip had served with the best of his chosen manner of shadows. Brilliant men, Lee, Grant, or Longstreet, had taken him into their council (clearly not at once... Shadow travel was an ally to the student of things military as much as it was to a gambler). He had ridden with hate-fueled Forrest, inhumanly cunning Mosbey, always-doomed but insanely bold Custer. None of that prepared him to move again Benedict. Certainly not alone.
He tried to reach Duncan by trump, but received no answer. It was possible, perhaps even likely, that Benedict had turned his son to his own cause, even as opposed as Duncan had seemed earlier, which made this gamble riskier still. Duncan was the only one of the younger generation Philip was certain had the skills to face him, and likely to spare. If he was in Benedict's camp, only the most daring of plays now had any hope, and that hope was the scantest glimpse of an out.
Sides were drawn. If he must face Benedict (and, he must assume for the moment, with Duncan at his father's side), then he must make an ally for himself, and a significant one. Benedict was between him and Amber, an ally but perhaps little more than a shelter to retreat to, and that just for him. Retreat in shame and loss. Hardly an option while any others remained. And he had a potential ally much closer to hand.
Philip went to the way to the Fae lands and stepped through, there requesting an audience with the King. He was not surprised to see Byron there already, also awaiting an audience. He did not know Byron's game or his goals, but he knew his cousin kept secrets, if poorly. As such, he offered little information in their small talk, and was told much. Gerard had (somehow) assumed the Regency, as he had held it during the war with Chaos. A truce had been reached, but Benedict was not expected to honor it. None of that was unexpected.
Byron went to his audience, and shortly after Philip was welcomed to his own. Byron was no longer present, disguised or otherwise. The King awaited him on the steps that rose to his throne.
Philip opened with an apology, that he could not keep the terms of his earlier promises, as Benedict would not be brought to peace. He made it clear that, when this was done, any offensive by Benedict would not be accepted as a change to the terms, the borders of the agreement would be those of the present. This news seemed not to surprise the king overmuch (Byron had no doubt reported much the same), and Philip's agreeability seemed to please him. The King told Philip there was a standard to which the men of Arden would answer, and which he could give him. Old tales of the Fey and their Gifts leapt unbidden to his mind, and his delay was quickly read. He was given his own time to consider, which reminded him to school his expression more carefully; these Fey were as sharp as he, or more, and inhuman expression was difficult to read for tells, particularly when it looked as close to human as theirs. Then the King took his hand and placed in it a pearl of glistening sap, which quickly melted into Philip. With that, he was told he could call on the King's attention at any time.
Philip left the court proper shortly after that, after hearing more news from Byron (who had returned from some Trump conversations in a waiting room). The Truce was formalized, Byron would be Amber's Ambassador to the Court of Thorns, and others would perform his role in Amber, now it was just a matter of the two powers dealing with Benedict. Philip withdrew to a place where he could Trump, trying Duncan again in the hopes he had misread the earlier silence. Duncan had not seemed the sort easily turned, but his father seemed immutable and the greater of the two strengths was difficult to determine until they had faced one another.
He reached Duncan quickly, finding the other holding his Trump. Philip did not allow his relief to show. His cousin, who was in Amber's throne room, confirmed Byron's words of the Truce and Gerard's ascendance. There was no time to ask for details. Philip told him that their work to shore Arden's defenses had been turned from shield to sword, and asked that the Regent contact him at his convenience. Before that, there was one more conversation he needed to have...
His father also responded quickly, still looking most poorly. Philip summed up the situation, then the Fey King's offerings. Julian looked troubled, but offered no clear explanation. He reinforced Philip's understanding that the Court of Thorns did not offer gifts without a price (he did not mention the gift he had accepted already). For his part, Julian told Philip that Gerard or Caine would know the status and location of the Morgenstern and Hellhound 'breeding program' and could provide Julian's armor as well, and that he should ask for these. Father and son shared what, for these two deeply restrained men, likely qualifies as an open moment, though only one really knew the significance of their discussion as it occurred.
Gerard returned Philips call shortly after he had spoken with his father. Philip then shared his plan, now full-formed and ready to play out. He would take his father's armor, his father's titles, and he would ride the Arden. A great portion of Benedict's men were Julian's first, still Arden's men at heart despite their regiments being fragmented and re-absorbed into Amber's. The Captain of the Arden, the King in Green as Philip now knew the Fae standard would name him, could rally these men back to him, to his side, out of the fray. It was a daring play. If it failed, if he faltered or could not show the firmness of the role, or if the men had indeed forgotten, Benedict's loyalists would end it all with arrow and blade. But if it succeeded, and it might succeed unlike every other gambit Philip had considered, nearly a third (Philip promised Gerard, estimating optimistically) of Benedict's force would split away, perhaps blunting any offensive on Amber's newest ally. The Regent took his oath of loyalty and told him to proceed with his plan. Morgenstern and the Hounds were not available, but the armor was passed through to him. It would serve.
With that, Philip put away his Trumps and returned to the Court of Thorns. He told the King he would take that which he was offered. The King seemed somewhat saddened by this, but just the barest hint of it. There were other maters to which the King must attend; he made his dismissal of Philip clear, if perfectly polite. And then he added "When the time comes to bury your father, speak to Us." It was only then that the true price, that his father's strange discomfort and unexpected generosity with secrets was understood. Philip left the Court shaken, his polite words barely considered, simple habit. He stepped back to the Arden and sat in his father's lodge for long hours.
The crown he had accepted sat and awaited him to take it up. If followed him from room to room, haunting and tempting. Its power was clear. His duty was clear. The time he spent meant fewer men he could reach, more death in the war that shouldn't happen between Benedict and Fey. Perhaps it even meant the end of the Truce, so new and doubtless fragile for it. But he knew, though no one had said it explicitly, that the moment he took that green and gold leafed circlet up, the price would be irrevocable. He could not call his father; it was beyond his strength to speak to him again, knowing this. There was no one he could talk to about this. He just needed to weigh price and odds of success. Just weeks before, neither would have mattered to him. His father had been little more than a stranger, a cold, distant figure. Amber was a place he cared little about, Arden just a family heirloom he'd seen to often to ever really look at. Now, he weighed the one against the two, and had to choose.
Cards were on the table.
Call or fold.
He whispered a quiet request for forgiveness, though from whom he did not know, and raised the crown to settle on his brow. At once, the Lodge was not itself. Or, more certainly, it was what he had never seen it to be until then, the rooms larger, more regal; the halls long, rich, and powerful. This was the castle of the King in Green. Philip's castle. Soon, he would need to know it better. Now, he had to ride.
The first two men he saw as he left stood silent, shocked, at the site. Philip had left behind his suit, taken up his father's armor that Gerard had provided. "Bring me a horse," he ordered, a confidence he hadn't felt suddenly filling him. He mounted and rode. And as he rode, he shouted a cry to rally the rangers of Arden. Quickly, he was not alone. Within moments, he led a long train.
Around him, the Arden was changed as well. Doors and gates were between almost every tree, shadow-paths more subtle than his glasses had ever shown him. Everywhere to everywhere. The Arden was showing him its secrets, it's every hidden part. And he hadn't the time to revel in the wonder of it.
A Trump touched him, or perhaps it was the King's gift... The effect felt much the same, but the contact resolved to a Fae figure he did not recognize. A decision had been reached by the Court of Thorns and Amber. Arden was to be cut off from Shadow, expelled. Those men in it were to be lost, perhaps forever. The timing of this was uncertain, but imminent. He must rescue those he can without word reaching those who they could not afford the chance to escape.
As he pondered this limit, riding and letting the cries of the re-gathered Rangers welcome their brothers, Duncan called. One of Benedict's generals was, he hoped, still persuadable. A division of men saved for Amber, should Philip speak to him. But Duncan, it seems, was blinded by his own hopes. The General angrily berated Philip for acting without loyalty or honor.
"Sir," Philip said, his anger too great for even his control, "I will keep my honor as I see fit for it." The general seemed about to reply, but Philip offered him no chance. "I have paid this day a price beyond any I ever thought to. I would have you and yours for Amber, but I will pay no more to see it so." With that, he pushed away the Trump connection, and let the man make his own destiny. His temper fueling his riding, he drove the mass to a higher pace.
He rode, and men gathered. Men and... others. The Rangers of Arden were on the hunt, hooves fell like thunder, men cheered with remembered joy in who they were, what they had thought lost. And it was not enough. Too many would be left, he could already feel the Arden shake, see the doors winking away in the darkness between the trees, see the shimmering nothing forming in the northern skies. Shadow was departing Arden. And then the idea struck him.
He called Byron by trump, hoping his part-fey cousin's magics would be sufficient, as he had no time to negotiate trust with another. The King in Green could open these gates, he was confident even if he had never done so. And Byron, he hoped, could send word through it. Amber and the Court of Thorns were at peace again. Hostility was to end at once. All loyal to Amber, all men of Arden, were to rally to their flags. Duncan could gather those who marched free; Philip would gather the Rangers and soon the Arden would change from the greatest place of freedom to a dark, unending prison.
The Rangers rode on. Numbers grew beyond Philip's imagining, well beyond his counting. They came from Benedict's lines, they came through the gates. The turned south, to come to Arden's borders near the sea. That would stay the longest; there he could have the most men join him. They kept to the Arden until the darkness gathering in the sky forced them away, until the last of the gates began to flicker away. And then, as one great beast, they left their home to the grasp their enemy. But this was no retreat, it was victory won at the greatest of costs.
The great ride settled on the storm-ruined beaches well south of Amber, Cabra barely more than a hint from here. The faintly pink sand was littered with branches and bones, but Philip raised a hand to bring the riders to a halt. He knew few of his father's men, and their order had been intentionally, even artfully, shattered by Benedict to refocus their loyalty toward him. Rebuilding them would be a long process, but was not today's task. Philip found those he knew as officers, those he felt instinctively might be trusted. They were sent to settle a camp with the others and await his return. Philip must ride to the castle and report. Oh, certainly, he could Trump there. But one rode to report victory in person, and sent word of failure by messenger. This day, for all its loss -- he could barely look to his side and see the pale imitation of the Arden that stood to the west as he rode, and he kept his father from his mind by brute force -- was a victory.
As he rode, he passed the massed infantry Duncan gathered near Garnath. Duncan was clearly worn and felt himself defeated by not rescuing each and every one of his father's men. It was a strange weakness for a soldier of Duncan's clear skill, to not recognize victory simply because it was not total, because the price was high. Time would heal his misconceptions; Philip did not let it take any more of his attention, which was already sufficiently divided.
And all too soon, he reported to the Regent of Amber that the Rangers of Arden, their numbers and organization not yet confirmed, had returned to reaffirm their loyalty to Amber's throne. Gerard accepted this with grace, but it was clear the day's successes had not yet won quiet for Amber.
And two Fae courtiers whose names Philip did not know came toward him, as if to offer him news.
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other writings: Background, Quiz, Undertow log, Ebb Tide diary