Winds That Will Be — Aedan's Journal
"It Doesn't Speak Thari; It Speaks Crossbow"
Aedan's Journal. Session 5-14-00.
© 2000 Todd Worrell
Gregory pulled an arrow from the ground, laid it alongside his bow. He raised his arm, sighted, and released. The arrow buried itself in the bull's-eye next to the four arrows already there.
Three of those arrows had simple green fletches. One arrow was a flamboyant purple-feathered affair, with silver tips: mine.
Yeah, I had shot an arrow into my cousin's target. Gregory and I had been shooting arrows for nearly an hour. It was boring, but I actually learned a trick or two about archery. For instance, with hours of practice, I could be as good and as boring as Gregory.
Julian's son seemed to have loosened up toward me since our initial encounter. At least, he was speaking rather openly about events in Arden. Maybe he had imbibed a liquid lunch. In any case, when I asked him about the Fey in Arden, he spilled some dirt, so to speak.
"The Fey had agreements before," he lectured, "but I don't think they have anything of the sort with Benedict or his men."
"There was some sort of compact?"
"Yes, with Julian."
"What went wrong, that they should be giving Benedict such difficulty?"
"The Fey had agreements with certain individuals, not with Amber."
"Oh," I saw where he was headed. He went there anyway.
"Benedict has apparently not negotiated with the Fey," Gregory said, "And the results have been less than beneficial for him."
That was an understatement. When Gabriel and I had ridden in Arden the month before, we had been treated as oversized playthings for the various wood imps and sprites. I had fallen off my horse no fewer than four times, which was at least two more than my average.
"And what of their spawning ground?" I asked as Gregory drew an arrow back. He hesitated, then relaxed and lowered his bow.
"I don't know exactly what you mean."
"The Fey are here in great numbers. They have even been seen about the castle. Surely there must be a Gate or something nearby. Arden seems the likely place."
"There are many monsters in Arden," he answered unhelpfully. "So many that certain areas are deemed unsafe for certain people." I sensed that this last category included myself as well as Benedict.
"Could one of those areas contain a Gate?"
"It's possible," he admitted.
"Well, then I would like to check it out. Is there a map?"
"No," he said disdainfully.
"How would I find these 'certain areas'?"
"You wouldn't." Long pause.
"Would you care to accompany me in my next trek through our primeval wood?" I asked sweetly.
"Actually," he seemed a bit amazed, "I would."
We shot some more. As we were retrieving our arrows from the targets, I spotted Magni across the courtyard. He was ambling our way.
"What do you make of the tall guy?" I asked.
"Which tall guy are you referring to?"
Well, Raj was well over six feet tall, but Magni was at least a handspan taller.
"The tall, pale guy." I explained, pointing my chin over Gregory's shoulder. He turned and looked. Magni saw us, waved, and began walking over.
"He's crafty, cautious, curious, and lots of other 'c' words." Gregory answered.
"Is he of the Blood? His M.O. seems to fit one of our nature."
"I don't know."
"Don't know what?" The object of our scrutiny stepped into hearing range.
"We don't know if we have a bow big enough for one of your extreme height," I said.
"Aww," Magni waved dismissively. "I won't shoot." He examined the targets, counting the arrows.
"Why set up four targets if you're not going to use them all?" I asked rhetorically. Keep people off-balance, Caine said.
"That seems to be Raj's attitude when he goes into a bar," Gregory chuckled. We all joined him.
It was a moment of quiet laughter, shared among cousins on a sunny day. We had no major worries. Life was pretty good.
I should have known things were going to change soon.
Gabriel stormed up, his hands clenched at his sides. He looked eager to kill someone.
"Whatever it was," Magni said, "he said it, not me." He pointed at me. I innocently retrieved my arrows from the targets.
"What?" Gabriel asked.
"I just heard you killed a guy for saying the wrong thing," Magni explained.
"Is that why you're saying the wrong thing now, Magni?" I inquired sweetly.
Gabriel ignored our witty exchange and continued muttering. Gregory stood in front of him.
"So?" Gregory asked. He has a way with words.
"The king's a bastard!" Gabriel exclaimed.
I hated these Amberite family lineage discussions. As if it mattered who was born when, and to whom. The succession was determined by the Unicorn, so what did it matter? Besides, as Deirdre's first-born, I was closest in line to Corwin and would undoubtedly be the next king anyway.
"More bastard than your regular 'kingly' bastard?" Magni asked.
"He wasn't very courteous."
"Ahh, his 'asshole button' was turned on," Magni said.
"He was extremely inconsiderate toward my father," Gabriel replied.
"I can see no reason," Magni pronounced, "why anyone would be inconsiderate toward your father." Everyone knew the story of Brand's betrayal. Perhaps Gabriel had a different view of things.
"It was rude to send a messenger. He could have trumped him through directly. My father's health should excuse him from long walks."
Like the walk he had taken with us? I thought. Why did Brand live so far away from the castle? As I was bouncing this thought around in my head, I saw Raj and Fiona on horses, cantering up the switchback toward the castle. Well, actually it looked like Fiona was riding and Raj was following her. Meanwhile, Gabriel's rant was continuing.
"…oh, some high mucky-muck meeting," he said.
"That we're not invited to," Gregory surmised.
"This," Magni decided, "is a good time to go drinking." Looking around at our serious faces, he amended. "Either that or we bust in."
"Gabriel," I asked, "Where is this meeting taking place?"
"In the Throne Room."
I left quickly, slinging my bow over my shoulder. It was considered rude to wear such things at family meetings, but I could always claim I had been in a hurry.
* * *
Raj was stationed outside the Throne Room. Two guards stood between his fuming figure and the main doors. They looked nervous. Well, if I had a three-hundred pound Amberite upset with me, I might sweat a little too.
I marched up to him.
"What are you doing out here?" I asked.
"It's a private meeting," he said.
I moved to knock on the doors. The guards lowered their spears to block my way.
"Lord Aedan," the one on the left said, "do you have urgent business with the Crown?"
"No," I said, and moved forward to try and knock again. They didn't lower their spears. I sighed and turned away.
"So," Magni strolled up and clapped a hand on Raj's shoulder in a friendly way. "Why didn't you do anything when they drummed your father out of the service?"
He was referring to Gerard's recent dismissal from the Admiralty by Random at Benedict's insistence. Raj had been known to break chairs and tables when people mentioned it in his presence. But this time he merely turned to the assembled cousins with great restraint. Maybe it was because there wasn't any furniture nearby.
"Who is the moron?" he asked. Gregory and Gabriel were hovering just out of Raj's immediate lashing range.
"Flora's latest boy toy," Gregory responded.
Raj grunted—he's so like his father sometimes—and squared his shoulders to the Throne Room doors again, dislodging Magni's hand in the process. The two guards purposefully stared straight ahead, judiciously avoiding eye contact.
I slipped off down the hall a few paces and tried the door to the staging hall that ran down the Queen's side of the Throne Room. It was locked. Probably the King's staging hall door would be locked as well.
Gregory and Gabriel rescued Magni from Raj's building fury and quickly whisked him away. I heard mention of the Pattern Room. Maybe they were going to test our theory about Magni's possible Amber blood. I hoped so. If Magni weren't of the blood, he would be vaporized like Random's cigar butt. If he were an Amberite, he would be spending the next few days sleeping. So either way he wouldn't be underfoot all the time, albeit perhaps not permanently.
My reverie was interrupted by the Throne Room doors slamming open. Well, they would have slammed if not for the unlucky guards in the way.
"—is bullshit!" Julian's voice resounded down the hallway. Then the man himself stomped into the corridor. His eyes lit up with recognition, and he took a quick breath as if to say something rude to Raj. Then he seemed to change his mind. He stomped off sullenly down the corridor.
I looked at the fallen guards and realized that this was the perfect time to make my entrance. In the room, I saw about half of my notorious aunts and uncles seated on chairs in a circle below the throne dais. Benedict had his arms crossed and held away from his chest like an angry five-year-old child. His face looked less pale than usual. Corwin looked something other than drunk for once: drunk and shocked.
"Wow," Corwin said/belched.
Flora and Gerard were doing very little other than gripping their chairs with their noble butt cheeks. Brand stood, gathered some rolled up papers, and tucked them under his arm.
"Well," he said, "I think I'll retire to my rooms." He left.
I puffed up my chest and made my face look like I was constipated. Do not make any unnecessary enemies, Caine had said. I took three steps into the room.
"I'll be playing the part of Julian in Act Two of this drama," I announced.
I think Corwin smiled at me, but he probably just had gas.
"You should leave," Benedict said icily.
I imagined myself in white enameled armor, with a bad haircut.
"You... should... leave," Benedict enunciated.
I drew myself up.
"That," I shouted, "is bullshit!" I stomped into the corridor, paused as if I were about to say something rude to Raj, then pounded my feet down the hallway, going in the opposite direction than Julian. I caught up to Brand after a few turnings.
He was limping toward his rooms. I came apace, and he stopped.
"Aedan, isn't it?"
I nodded.
"I believe Benedict gave you some advice."
I thought about it, but I couldn't recall Benedict ever giving me anything but orders.
"He said it twice," Brand continued. "Does it need to be said a third time?"
Ahhh. He was trying to get rid of me.
"No," I answered. Brand resumed limping. I kept up with him.
"Impudence is not always an endearing trait," he said.
"But it is in this instance?" I asked hopefully.
"Perhaps," he smiled mischievously. Then he stopped walking and turned to me. I stopped and faced him.
"The King has asked us," he seemed to include me in this, "to refrain from using our powers while he and Fiona try to do some 'work' around the castle."
Work? I wondered. What did he mean by that? Brand paused expectantly. Or maybe he was readying a spell. Oh shit, I thought. Magni was going to walk the Pattern. If Fiona were involved in this 'work' it undoubtedly involved the Pattern. Honor, duty, crap. I would have to stop Magni.
I bowed, thanked Brand and left. He blinked at me in surprise, and for a moment he looked like someone else I knew, several centuries younger.
* * *
After my first experience with the stairs to the dungeons, I had sequestered a few miles of rope and some rappelling gear in a nearby closet. I made good use of that now.
Rappelling down the interior of the stairway, I thought about what I was doing. Had anyone ever rappelled down this before? If they had, would they admit it? Unlikely.
And why was I in such a hurry to save Magni's skinny ass? What had he ever done for me? Sure, he was a good drinking buddy, but was that enough? I told myself I wasn't doing it for his sake, but for the family. If that big puppy burst his liver on the Pattern we all would suffer. Okay, I could go through with this. Plus, I might get a chance to be the hero.
While I was thinking, I continued my journey down. When I stopped thinking, I noticed that it was dark. The stairs have lanterns illuminating them. Or at least, they did the first time I took them. This time, there was a noticeable lack of light.
So I called upon the gift my mother had given me in Tir and there was a will-o-wisp of silvery light. It was supposed to be a small wisp, but it burst into existence with enough glow to light a hundred-foot radius—enough to reveal that the inner wall of the staircase was no longer stone and mortar. I was surrounded by vines, leaves, and tree-like accessories. In fact, the stairs seemed to be made of wood.
I pushed the wall with my hand and it gave a bit. It felt fibrous. I got a splinter. It hurt.
Moving on, letting gravity work for me, I lowered myself into a sparkling mist. It glittered and bathed everything in a silvery light. There was still an overabundance of jungle. Suddenly, I ran out of rope.
That was just wrong. I had measured and re-measured so this wouldn't happen. I definitely had at least fifty feet of extra rope. Apparently the ground had moved three-hundred feet further away. Had anyone ever counted the stairs? I would have to talk to the King about this the next time I saw him.
I swung over to the stairs, slung my rappelling gear over my shoulder and sauntered down. The stairs creaked in that wooden way that stone doesn't. Creepy.
The stones shuddered with a monstrous roar. Something was in pain, and it wanted my ears to join it. The noise was too loud to tell exactly where it had originated, but I had a hunch.
The door to the Pattern room was two steps from the bottom of the stairs. I didn't recall it being so close. Wasn't there a guard station and a long corridor between the last step and the big oak door? Maybe not. I opened the door just wide enough to peer inside.
Towering over the center of the Pattern was a great blood-red lumpy creature. It writhed and grew, nearly seven feet tall and almost as wide. My chest constricted and I gasped. The thing shuddered with a fleshy popping sound and another lump emerged. I mentally ran through my list of ready spells. I cast my protection bubble spell and stepped into the room. Violet rays flashed from my spell barrier across the chamber. Well, I thought, so much for sneaking up on it.
The Pattern was glowing wildly, even more so than usual. The entire chamber was lit in electric blue and a massive wash of maroon and crimson emanating from the thing growing on it. I forced my feet to propel me closer to the evil beast. Up close I could see that it was composed of body parts of my aunts and uncles. I felt icky.
What would you have done? How much do you know about the One True City? Do you care about her children? I had only been here six months, and I was still learning where all the good bars were. Sure, Caine had lectured at me for ten years about his homeland, but in all that time he had never brought me here. I didn't want the place to be destroyed. A big, bad monster gyrating into existence on the Pattern might not destroy Amber, but I was willing to bet it wasn't a good thing. As if to emphasize my point, it roared again. Ouch. Even the blue Pattern-light flinched. Was that possible? I was sweating so much that I would almost certainly dehydrate in a matter of minutes.
The shriek thundered through my every molecule. Squinting and covering my ears, I saw the monster move with a purpose. As I watched, an arm reached out and tore Random's head and shoulders from the mass. It tossed the body parts onto the Pattern. They hit with a palpable, wet thud. Bits of flesh and bone scattered in between the silvery-blue lines of the Pattern. Red liquid coursed out. An ugly black smear covered a part of the tracery, erasing the lines where it lay. The creature emitted a satisfied growl.
When the thing stopped bellowing, I heard a distant rumble, then a prolonged crash and what might have been an explosion. Hmmm. Obviously my new friend's birthday party was wreaking havoc in the castle somewhere. I trumped Gabriel to ask him what in the name of the nine known worlds was going on. He didn't answer.
I put his card away and noticed that the ground seemed to be sparkling. It looked almost hoary. I could see my breath, but even worse, I could see what looked like a distant ocean through cracks in the floor stones. This was weird, and not in the usual way.
Whatever Random and Fiona were doing, it didn't make me happy. In fact, I felt decidedly nervous. Maybe the stresses of ruling had been too much. Random should have taken that vacation.
Caine had told me how Martin had been stabbed on the Pattern, and that it was his blood which had opened the way for Chaos to travel close to Amber. If those were really my elders, I could rule out a direct attack.
I had a telekinesis spell. Maybe I could move the brute off the Pattern. Maybe it was feeding on the energy from the big doodle, and once it was disconnected it would stop doing…whatever it was doing—getting bigger. Roaring. Stinking up the basement.
Here goes, I thought.
* * *
Cold. Cold and Dark. Too dark. But not as cold as before. Moist cold, which seemed colder, but was really warmer. My brain burbled. I opened my eyes. It was still dark. I did the spark of light trick.
Mistake.
My bubble spell was all that existed between me and a swamp of oblivion. I had a sense of movement. An air bubble flitted by outside my sphere, going up. I was falling. Another bubble. My light-wisp illuminated my surroundings further. A murky gloom enveloped me in all directions.
I was in the ocean, sinking.
Well, I thought, I had better do something.
Deirdre's gift enabled me to fly for short periods of time. It should allow me to get to the surface, maybe even before my air ran out. I wondered how long I had been unconscious.
Not too long, as it turned out. I emerged and found myself bobbing on the surface Amber's sea. The sun hung low in the afternoon sky, so I estimated I had been blacked out for only a few minutes. Kolvir broke the line of the horizon a few miles west. I pointed myself in her direction. The water sped by.
* * *
The ocean is God, kid. Caine had lectured me on nearly every topic, but this had been one of his recurring favorites. Respect her, honor her, and follow her tenets and she'll treat you well.
What about all those sailors who had drowned? Are you telling me that every single one of them in some way failed to honor the ocean?
No.
Well, the odds are good that at least one of all those dead guys must have respected, honored, and followed the tenets properly.
Of course.
Why did the ocean kill him?
She's a fickle mistress, kid. Caine laughed.
"Do everything right, get killed anyway." Some lesson.
* * *
The shore was a welcome sight. I composed myself, straightened my clothes and looked around.
Kolvir met the beach rather abruptly. There were a few caves toward the south. North was the harbor. In front of me was a stair cut into the mountain. Forget that. I trumped Gabriel again. This time he answered, and at my request, he pulled me through.
He was standing, oddly enough, at the top of the stairs that led down to the dungeons and the Pattern. In his hands, he held my rope. He looked puzzled. I unslung the rappelling gear and explained its use to him. Gabriel spoke with Gregory via trump. He mentioned the word "plan" a few times and looked inquisitively in my direction.
I nodded reaffirmingly and found the second set of gear from the nearby closet. A moment or three of wrestling with the harnesses and we were bounding downwards.
It all went well. The smart thing to do would have been making Gabriel go first. That way if he fell, he wouldn't land on me. However, politeness dictated that I lead the way, so I did. Besides, if Gabriel fell, his dad would probably turn me into a newt.
After about a hundred yards, a large rumble echoed off the walls and our ear drums. It had that same good timpani army sound. I stopped and placed the palm of my hand against the stone. It was vibrating.
"Look out!" Gabriel shouted. A large chunk of something vaguely stair-like careened past his head, bounced off the wall and disappeared into the darkness below. Around the stairs, some of the lanterns went out.
The wall had stopped vibrating, so we pressed on. After a while, we saw the beginnings of mother nature's invasion. The inner wall of the stair somehow turned to wood. It felt fibrous, like matted branches. Gabriel had stopped even with me and completed his own investigation.
"This," he said, "is really fucked up."
I certainly couldn't disagree with him. Below us the shrubbery thickened. What could we do? We continued down until nearly all the light was blocked. It became apparent we weren't alone. It sounded like something else was forcing its way through the brush. We stopped and listened. Suddenly, a blood-curdling scream rent the air. It was a man's voice, and it cut off in mid shriek.
I did my trick with the silver wisp yet a third time. Once more would be a one-day record. The branches disappeared, the ropes went slack, and we fell.
* * *
Growing up, I had spent most of my time away from my tutors wandering the wild places of the island. Being an only child in a castle full of grown-ups wasn't exactly an ongoing party.
So I trekked back and forth, usually haunting a few favorite places with my imaginary friends. At least once a week I made the hour-long trip to the Bone Orchard. It was always windy, and the sounds the trees made frightened everyone I brought with me so much that they never wanted to come back. It was also one of the last places my nurse would look for me, probably for the same reason.
The first time I climbed the Old Man Tree, the winds were particularly fierce. I can't remember if that was why I chose that day or if the wind picked up after I was climbing. I was nearly swept off the branches and made into dead bones myself.
As I neared the top, the trunk of the tree narrowed until I could get my arms all the way around it. My weight caused the whole tree to buck and sway. I felt weightless, small, and unimportant. Old Man Tree was letting me know that even though I could climb him, I couldn't conquer him. He was a permanent power in the Bone Orchard, and I was only a temporary intruder.
The air rushed past me, blowing my hair all over my face. I held on as the world spun and danced until I realized that I wasn't scared. I had been too busy focusing on my handholds and footrests to think about being afraid. Opening my eyes I saw the leafless branches whipping around me and it felt like I was riding some giant serpent, like Sigurd in the stories. I felt my face break out in a smile.
I began to laugh. My voice sounded incredibly loud in my ears. I couldn't stop laughing. I let go with one hand and grabbed at the air rushing through my fingers. It felt wonderful. This lasted for a long time.
At some point I noticed that the ride was slowing down. The orchard stopped swirling. Old Man Tree swung in decreasing arcs, then stood still.
Hand over hand, I crawled the trunk until I could reach out and touch the absolute tip of the tree. I stared out over the landscape. Trees that looked like human bones, the color of bleached sand, stretched in one direction toward the Glymmere. It shimmered almost like water does, perhaps two miles distant. Surrounding the orchard was the sparse black rock that people said came out of the volcano a few thousand years before.
As far as I could see, I was above everything. I had won. I raised both hands high in the air and shouted out my victory. At that moment, Old Man Tree chose to jerk violently in an imaginary gust of wind, just enough to topple me from my post. I fell.
* * *
So when the rope went slack, and I began to become intimate with gravity again, I had to smile. As they say, "It's not the fall that hurts…." I had a spell that would help the landing, but I didn't need it. After only a few thousand split-seconds, the ropes tightened, and Gabriel and I didn't stain the dungeon floor.
We steadied ourselves and kept going. No more branches, leaves, or strange forest creatures lurking just out of sight. Sooner than I expected, we saw the floor.
This time, the rope was long enough. Actually, maybe fifty feet of rope was coiled on the flagstones. I thought about mentioning the rope/ground disparity to Gabriel but decided against it.
Six guards huddled at the guard station. They lacked that discipline I had come to associate with Amber's watch. In fact, they milled about like sheep in a pen, their eyes darting fearfully down the hall.
"Report!" I barked.
"That noise," one said. "It hasn't stopped."
"Have you heard any screaming?" Gabriel asked intently. Wow, I thought, what a sick-minded freak.
"No."
I interrogated the sergeant further. They had been unable to contact Benedict via Trump. I ordered one of them to find him and report in person what was going on down here.
What was going on down here?
Gabriel and I crept toward the heavy oak door. It was still open a crack. A great and deafening, low-end roar burst forth combined with a decidedly feminine sounding scream. We retreated around a corner.
"That's it," I said. "That's our beast."
"And you say it's on the Pattern?" Gabriel asked.
"Yes. Come on. I'll show you." I took a couple steps down the hall, but stopped when I noticed that Gabriel wasn't with me. I returned to him.
"Perhaps we should call the others."
"And tell them what?"
"Um," he ummed, "it's… I would feel better if there were more of us here." Sick-minded and cowardly, I amended.
"I was in there with it by myself for some time earlier."
"Well…"
While Gabriel was equivocating I received that mind-tingling feeling which can only be the after-effects of Sedillic mushrooms or a Trump call. In this case, it was the latter.
"Have you seen Brand's whelp?" Gerard managed to speak irritatingly loudly while clenching his teeth at the same time. In his hand was a big sword.
"Gabriel is here with—" Gerard pushed through the Trump contact. I hadn't thought that was possible. Trailing in his wake were Gregory and Magni.
Gerard looked at Gabriel, who, to his credit, quivered only slightly. His face seemed to have sprouted a few new acne spots in the last few seconds, however.
My uncle breathed at Gabriel. He noticed that he could see his breath. "Where are we?" he asked.
"We're in a shadow veil," Brand's son gulped. "It's similar to the dungeons near the Pattern room, but different."
In one smooth motion, Gerard drew his big sword and slashed it through the wall. Where the sword had touched, a rainbow scar now lit the corridor.
"We're not in Amber," he announced.
But this was the same place I had been before. I fought to remember the details. In the Pattern room, I had seen distant water through the floor that sparkled like moonlight. "We're in Tir," I said.
Gregory nodded.
"Ooh, I've heard of this place," Magni said. We all looked at him.
Gerard harrumphed disgustedly and barreled down the hall. We scurried to catch up.
Through the still-open oak door, cobalt and crimson light danced. Shouldn't the light made of red and blue be violet? I thought. Gerard pushed open the door and set foot inside. So did I. The others stopped at the doorway.
There was the monster, over eight feet tall, all limbs and heads writhing. The Pattern was brighter than usual, casting some sparks up to thirty feet in the air. Another part of the line had been smeared black. I saw part of a head with long red hair.
Gabriel entered the room and tapped Gerard on the shoulder.
"Should I trump Brand?" he asked innocently.
"Oh yeah. Great idea," Gerard scorned him. He waved his big sword and Gabriel took a quick leap away from him as Gerard disappeared in a wash of rainbow hues.
The floor where he had been standing erupted upwards. Bright moonlight burst through.
"We're in Tir!" I heard my cousin Raj's deep voice from the doorway. When had he arrived? He plodded into the room, and stared at the Thing.
"Monster, can you speak?" Raj yelled. We already knew the thing could roar. Did he think it was going to start spouting sonnets?
I decided on a different approach and cast a careful probe spell its way. A vibrant ellipse of Pattern and Trump formed between the beast and my sorcerous wisp. My brain spasmed and the next thing I knew Gabriel and Raj were assisting me to my feet. The ground seemed to have crumbled.
One of the creature's many arms emerged holding a loaded crossbow. It shot a bolt that Raj narrowly dodged. The bolt thunked into the wall near Magni, who set about prying the thing loose.
"It doesn't speak Thari." I said. "It speaks crossbow."
The floor began to crumble more, and we were all dancing to avoid falling through. Everybody took out various Trumps and frantically glared at them. Nobody spoke or disappeared. That was when I noticed that Gregory was no longer with us.
"Where's Gregory?" I asked.
In response, Gabriel pulled forth Gregory's Trump. He shouted "Pull us through!" and held out his hand toward us. Great holes had formed in the floor, so it was a bit of a checkerboard. Using the remaining stones, we leaped toward the multihued figure of Gabriel. I grabbed his leg and found myself on the third floor of the castle near the infirmary. Raj's big body was wrapped around Gabriel like a wet blanket. No, wait. Magni was sandwiched between them, looking even skinnier than usual.
"Well…?" Gregory inquired awkwardly.
We all disengaged ourselves from Gabriel's crushed frame and brushed imaginary dirt off our clothing while clearing our throats.
The sound of gunfire saved us from making explanations. Magni and Raj ran to the balustrade and looked down where the shots had been. They spoke, then half-ran down toward the battle.
Gabriel, Gregory and I went to the infirmary. It was in good shape, and could be defended fairly easily. While Gabriel tried to contact several people by Trump, Gregory and I fortified the rooms by barricading the only doors in and out and turning over a few tables and beds. I scrounged some first aid supplies and put them in my pack. Be prepared, Caine had said. Somehow that seemed to contradict All you need is a good knife, but when I brought that up he just shook his head.
When we had the place secured, we returned to the front room to find Gabriel sitting with his chin resting on one hand. He said he wanted to try something. I readied my healing and protection spells.
Gabriel stood, closed his eyes, and walked slowly across the room. Where he had walked, flowers rose up from the carpet. The room rattled briefly, and Gabriel stopped. He turned and looked at the row of pink tulips sprouting waist-high.
"What did you just do?" Gregory asked.
"I infused myself with the force of the Pattern by concentrating on its image." He smiled. "Then I took a few steps."
This made sense. The rents in the floor in Tir had appeared concurrently with our various uses of powers. Before that, my spells had gone off with several times their normal level of potency.
I told them what Brand had said about Random and Fiona doing some work and the recommendation that we refrain from using any spooky powers while they were about it. Now we knew why.
But I couldn't believe that the King had intended to summon that hideous thing on the Pattern.
From what we had seen and heard, there was a battle raging within the castle. Magni and Raj had gone off to find it. Gabriel had spoken with Magni. He was attempting to rally the castle guard against "little gray men." When he relayed this news to us, Gregory and I looked at each other with dawning conviction.
The fey were attacking Amber.
We had fey in Gealorea, so I knew a few things about them. There was an endless supply of their kind. Also, they were infinitely patient about certain things like combat. Add these facts together and you could be sure that a war of attrition would result in an Amber populated by boggins and pookahs eventually.
Faeries were a capricious sort, and didn't reason the same way normal people did. Therefore, negotiating with them was dangerous. We needed to find an expert, someone who was exceedingly familiar with Amber's fey. As the gist of the conversation became clear, Gregory made his feelings known.
"Is this a civil war?" he asked. We didn't answer right away, but that didn't slow Gregory down. He was just getting started.
"Who has Amber's best interests at heart? Who has always been loyal without fault? Who has sacrificed his greatest love because the King demanded it?"
By now we knew that Gregory didn't really expect an answer. Then again, the silence was becoming awkward.
"Julian?" Gabriel ventured.
"Exactly," Gregory replied.
So much for rhetorical questions.
"And I for one know whose side I am going to be on if we are dealing with the faerie folk. My father's." Gregory crossed his arms as if his argument were bulletproof.
I couldn't think of a good reason to argue with him.
So it was agreed that we would find Julian, if possible. He didn't accept Trump calls from either Gregory or Gabriel. They began to discuss the likely and unlikely reasons why the fey might be here now. I had had enough talk and decided to find the action.
* * *