Blood of Amber

Chapter 5

Walking, with the Lady Vinta and two serving men of the House of Bayle, my side still hurting from its encounter with a sword hilt, beneath a moonbright, starbright sky, through a sea mist, away from Death Alley. Lucky, actually, that a bump on the side was all I acquired in my engagement with those who would do me harm. How they had located me so quickly upon my return, I could not say. But it seemed as if Vinta might have some idea about this, and I was inclined to trust her, both because I knew her somewhat and because she had lost her man, my Uncle Caine, to my former friend Luke, from whose party anything involving a blue stone seemed to have its origin.

When we turned onto a seaward side way off Harbor Street, I asked her what she had in mind.

“I thought we were heading for Vine,” I said.

“You know you are in danger,” she stated.

“I guess that’s sort of obvious.”

“I could take you to my father’s place up in town,” she said, “or we could escort you back to the palace, but someone knows you are here and it didn’t take long to reach you.”

“True.”

“We have a boat moored down this way. We can sail along the coast and reach my father’s country place by morning. You will have disappeared. Anyone seeking you in Amber will be foiled.”

“You don’t think I’d be safe back in the palace?”

“Perhaps,” she said. “But your whereabouts may be known locally. Come with me and this won’t be the case.”

“I’ll be gone and Random will learn from one of the guards that I was heading for Death Alley. This will cause considerable consternation and a huge brouhaha.”

“You can reach him by Trump tomorrow and tell him that you’re in the country — if you have your cards with you.”

“True. How did you know where to find me this evening? You can’t persuade me that we met by coincidence.”

“No, we followed you. We were in the place across the way from Bill’s.”

“You anticipated tonight’s happenings?”

“I saw the possibility. If I’d known everything, of course I’d have prevented it.”

“What’s going on? What do you know about all of this, and what’s your part in it?”

She laughed, and I realized it was the first time I had ever heard her do it. It was not the cold, mocking thing I would have guessed at from Caine’s lady.

“I want to sail while the tide is high,” she said, “and you want a story that will take all night. Which will it be, Merlin? Security or satisfaction?”

“I’d like both, but I’ll take them in order.”

“Okay,” she said, then turned to the smaller of the two men, the one I had hit. “Jarl, go home. In the morning, tell my father that I decided to go back to Arbor House. Tell him it was a nice night and I wanted to sail, so I took the boat. Don’t mention Merlin.”

The man touched his cap to her. “Very good, m’lady.” He turned and headed back along the way we had come.

“Come on,” she said to me then, and she and the big fellow — whose name I later learned was Drew led me down among the piers to where a long sleek sailboat was tied up. “Do much sailing?” she asked me.

“Used to,” I said.

“Good enough. You can give us a hand.”

Which I did. We didn’t talk much except for business while we were getting unbuttoned and rigged and casting off. Drew steered and we worked the sails. Later, we were able to take turns for long spells. The wind wasn’t tricky. In fact, it was just about perfect. We slid away, rounded the breakwater and made it out without any problems. Having stowed our cloaks, I saw that she wore dark trousers and a heavy shirt. Very practical, as if she’d planned for something like this ahead of time. The belt she stowed bore a real, full-length blade, not some jeweled dagger. And just from watching the way she moved, I’d a feeling she might be able to use the thing pretty well. Also, she reminded me of someone I couldn’t quite place. It was more a matter of mannerisms of gesture and voice than it was of appearance. Not that it mattered. I had more important things to think about as soon as we settled into routine and I had a few moments to stare across the dark waters and do some quick reviewing.

I was familiar with the general facts of her life, and I had encountered her a number of times at social gatherings. I knew she knew that I was Corwin’s son and that I had been born and raised in the Courts of Chaos, being half of that bloodline which was linked anciently with Amber’s own. In our conversation the last time we met, it became apparent that she was aware that I had been off in Shadow for some years, going native and trying to pick up something of an education. Presumably, Uncle Caine had not wanted her ignorant of family matters — which led me to wonder how deeply their relationship might have run. I’d heard that they had been together for several years. So I wondered exactly how much she knew about me. I felt relatively safe with her, but I had to decide how much I was willing to tell her in exchange for the information she obviously possessed concerning those who were after me locally. This, because I had a feeling it would probably be a trade-off. Other than doing a favor for a member of the family, which generally comes in handy, there was no special reason for her having an interest in me personally. Her motivation in the whole matter pretty much had to be a desire for revenge, so far as I could see, for Caine’s killing. With this in mind, I was willing to deal. It is always good to have an ally. But I had to decide how much I was willing to give her of the big picture. Did I want her messing around in the entire complex of events that surrounded me? I doubted it, even as I wondered how much she would be asking. Most likely she just wanted to be in on the kill, whatever that might be. When I glanced over to where moonlight accentuated the planes of her angular face, it was not difficult to superimpose a mask of Nemesis upon those features.

Out from shore, riding the sea breeze east, passing the great rock of Kolvir, the lights of Amber like jewels in her hair, I was taken again by an earlier feeling of affection. Though I had grown up in darkness and exotic lighting amid the non-Euclidean paradoxes of the Courts, where beauty was formed of more surreal elements, I felt more and more drawn to Amber every time I visited her, until at last I realized she was a part of me, until I began to think of her, too, as home. I did not want Luke storming her slopes with riflemen, or Dalt performing commando raids in her vicinity. I knew that I would be willing to fight them to protect her.

Back on the beach, near the place where Caine had been laid to rest, I thought I saw a flash of prancing whiteness, moving slowly, then quickly, then vanishing within some cleft of the slope. I would have said it was a Unicorn, but with the distance and the darkness and the quickness of it all, I could never be certain.

We picked up a perfect wind a little later, for which I was grateful. I was tired, despite my day-long slumber. My escape from the crystal cave, my encounter with the Dweller, and the pursuit by the whirlwind and its masked master all flowed together in my mind as the nearly continuous action that they were. And now the postadrenal reaction from my latest activity was settling in. I wanted nothing more than to listen to the lapping of the waves while I watched the black and craggy shoreline slide by to port or turned to regard the flickering sea to starboard. I did not want to think, I did not want to move…

A pale hand upon my arm. “You’re tired,” I heard her say.

“I guess so,” I heard myself say.

“Here’s your cloak. Why don’t you put it on and rest? We’re holding steady. The two of us can manage easily now. We don’t need you.”

I nodded as I drew it about me. “I’ll take you up on that. Thanks.”

“Are you hungry or thirsty?”

“No. I had a big meal back in town.”

Her hand remained on my arm. I looked up at her. She was smiling. It was the first time I had seen her smile. With the fingertips of her other hand she touched the bloodstain on my shirtfront.

“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you,” she said.

I smiled back at her because it seemed she wanted me to. She squeezed my shoulder and left me then, and I stared after her and wondered whether there were some element I had omitted from my earlier equation concerning her. But I was too tired now to solve for a new unknown. My thinking machinery was slowing, slowing…

Back braced against the port gunwale, rocked gently by the swells, I let my head nod. Through half-closed eyes I saw the dark blot she had indicated upon my white shirtfront. Blood. Yes, blood…

“First blood!” Despil had cried. “Which is sufficient! Have you satisfaction?

“No!” Jurt had shouted. “I barely scratched him!” and he spun on his stone and waved the triple claws of his trisp in my direction as he prepared to have at me again.

The blood oozed from the incision in my left forearm and formed itself into beads which rose into the air and drifted away from me like a handful of scattered rubies. I raised my fandon into a high guard position and lowered my trisp, which I held far out to the right and angled forward. I bent my left knee and rotated my stone 90 degrees on our mutual axis. Jurt corrected his own position immediately and dropped a half-dozen feet. I turned another 90 degrees, so that each of us seemed to be hanging upside down in relation to the other.

“Bastard son of Amber!” he cried, and the triple lances of light raked toward me from his weapon, to be shattered into bright, mothlike fragments by the sweep of my fandon, to fall, swirling, downward into the Abyss of Chaos above which we rode.

“Up yours,” I replied, and squeezed the haft of my trisp, triggering the pulsed beams from its three hair-fine blades. I extended my arm above my head as I did so, slashing at his shins.

He swept the beams away with his fandon, at almost the full extent of their eight-foot effective range. There is about a three-second recharge pause on a trisliver, but I feinted a dead cut toward his face, before which he raised fand reflexively, and I triggered the trisp for a swirl cut at his knees. He broke the one-second pulse in low fand, triggered a thrust at my face and spun over backward through a full 360, counting on the recharge time to save his back and coming up, fandon high, to cut at my shoulder.

But I was gone, circling him, dropping and rotating erect. I cut at his own exposed shoulder but was out of range. Despil, on his beachball-sized stone, was circling also, far to my right, while my own second — Mandor high above, was dropping quickly. We clung to our small stones with shapeshifted feet, there on an outer current of Chaos, drifting, as at the whirlpool’s rim. Jurt rotated to follow me, keeping his left forearm — to which the fandon is attached, elbow and wrist — horizontal, and executing a slow circular movement with it. Its three-foot length of filmy mesh, mord-weighted at the bottom, glittered in the balefire glow, which occurred at random intervals from many directions. He held his trisp in middle attack position, and he showed his teeth but was not smiling as I moved and he moved at opposite ends of the diameter of a ten-foot circle which we described over and over, looking for an opening.

I tilted the plane of my orbit and he adjusted his own immediately to keep me company. I did it again, and so did he. Then I did the dive — 90 degrees forward, fandon raised and extended — and I turned my wrist and dropped my elbow, angling my raking cut upward beneath his guard.

He cursed and cut, but I scattered his light, and three dark lines appeared upon his left thigh. The trisliver only cuts to a depth of about three quarters of an inch through flesh, which is why the throat, eyes, temples, inner wrists and femoral arteries are particularly favored targets in a serious encounter. Still, enough cuts anywhere and you eventually wave goodbye to your opponent as he spins downward in a swarm of red bubbles into that place from whence no traveler returns.

“Blood!” Mandor cried, as the beads formed upon Jurt’s leg and drifted. “Is there satisfaction, gentlemen?”

“I’m satisfied,” I answered.

“I’m not!” Jurt replied, turning to face me as I drifted to his left and rotated to my right. “Ask me again after I’ve cut his throat!”

Jurt had hated me from sometime before he had learned to walk, for reasons entirely his own. While I did not hate Jurt, liking him was totally beyond my ability. I had always gotten along reasonably well with Despil, though he tended to take Jurt’s side more often than my own. But that was understandable. They were full brothers, and Jurt was the baby.

Jurt’s trisp flashed and I broke the light and riposted. He scattered my beams and spun off to the side. I followed. Our trisps flared simultaneously, and the air between us was filled with flakes of brilliance as both attacks were shattered. I struck again, this time low, as soon as I had recharge. His came in high, and again both attacks died in fand. We drifted nearer.

“Jurt,” I said, “if either of us kills the other, the survivor will be outcast. Call it off.”

“It will be worth it,” he said. “Don’t you think I’ve thought about it?” Then he slashed an attack at my face. I raised both arms reflexively, fandon and trisp, and triggered an attack as shattered light showered before me. I heard him scream.

When I lowered my fandon to eye level I saw that he was bent forward, and his trisp was drifting away. So was his left ear, trailing a red filament that quickly beaded itself and broke apart. A flap of scalp had also come loose, and he was trying to press it back into place.

Mandor and Despil were already spiraling in.

“We declare the duel ended!” they were shouting, and I twisted the head of my trisp into a safety-lock position.

“How bad is it?” Despil asked me.

“I don’t know.”

Jurt let him close enough to check, and a little later Despil said, “He’ll be all right. But Mother is going to be mad.”

I nodded. “It was his idea,” I said.

“I know. Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

He helped Jurt steer toward an outcropping of the Rim, fandon trailing like a broken wing. I lingered behind. Sawall’s son Mandor, my stepbrother, put his hand on my shoulder.

“You didn’t even mean him that much,” he said.

“I know.”

I nodded and bit my lip. Despil had been right about the Lady Dara, our mother, though. She favored Jurt, and somehow he’d have her believing this whole thing was my fault. I sometimes felt she liked both of her sons by Sawall, the old Rim Duke she’d finally married after giving up on Dad, better than me. I’d once overheard it said that I reminded her of my father, whom I’d been told I resembled more than a little. I wondered again about Amber and about other places, out in Shadow, and felt my customary twinge of fear as this recalled to me the writhing Logrus, which I knew to be my ticket to other lands. I knew that I was going to try it sooner than I had originally intended.

“Let’s go see Suhuy,” I said to Mandor, as we rose up out of the Abyss together. “There are more things I want to ask him.”

When I finally went off to college I did not spend a lot of time writing home.

“… home,” Vinta was saying, “pretty soon now. Have a drink of water,” and she passed me a flask.

I took several long swallows and handed it back. “Thanks.”

I stretched my cramped muscles and breathed the cold sea air. I looked for the moon and it was way back behind my shoulder.

“You were really out,” she said.

“Do I talk in my sleep?”

“No.”

“Good.”

“Bad dreams?”

I shrugged. “Could be worse.”

“Maybe you made a little noise, right before I woke you.”

“Oh.”

Far ahead I saw a small light at the end of a dark promontory. She gestured toward it.

“When we’ve passed the point,” she said, “we will come into sight of the harbor at Baylesport. We’ll find breakfast there, and horses.”

“How far is it from Arbor House?”

“About a league,” she replied. “An easy ride.”

She stayed by me in silence for a while, watching the coastline and the sea. It was the first time we had simply sat together, my hands unoccupied and my mind free. And my sorcerer’s sense was stirred in that interval. I felt as if I were in the presence of magic. Not some simple spell or the aura of some charmed object she might be bearing, but something very subtle. I summoned my vision and turned it upon her. There was nothing immediately obvious, but prudence suggested I check further. I extended my inquiry through the Logrus…

“Please don’t do that,” she said.

I had just committed a faux pas. It is generally considered somewhat gauche to probe a fellow practitioner in such a fashion.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t realize you were a student of the Art.”

“I am not,” she answered, “but I am sensitive to its operations.”

“In that case, you would probably make a good one.”

“My interests lie elsewhere,” she said.

“I thought perhaps someone had laid a spell upon you,” I stated. “I was only trying to —”

“Whatever you saw,” she said, “belongs. Let it be.”

“As you would. Sorry.”

She must have known I couldn’t let it rest at that, though, when unknown magic represents possible danger. So she went on, “It is nothing that can do you harm, I assure you. Quite the contrary.”

I waited, but she did not have anything further to say on the matter. So I had to let it drop, for the moment. I shifted my gaze back to the lighthouse. What was I getting into with her, anyhow? How had she even known that I was back in town, let alone that I would visit Death Alley when I did? She must have known that the question would occur to me, and if there was to be good faith on both our parts she should be willing to explain it.

I turned back toward her, and she was smiling again.

“The wind changes in the lee of the light,” she said, and she rose.

“Excuse me. I’ve work to do.”

“May I give you a hand?”

“In a bit. I’ll call you when I need you.”

I watched her move away, and as I did I had the eerie feeling that she was watching me also, no matter where she was looking. I realized, too, that this feeling had been with me for some time, like the sea.

By the time we had docked and put everything in order and headed up a hill along a wide cobbled way toward an inn with smoke snaking from its chimney, the sky was growing pale in the east. After a hearty breakfast, morning’s light lay full upon the world. We walked then to a livery stable where three quiet mounts were obtained for the ride to her father’s estate:

It was one of those clear crisp autumn days which become rarer and dearer as the year winds down. I finally felt somewhat rested, and the inn had had coffee — which is not that common in Amber, outside the palace — and I enjoy my morning cup. It was good to move through the countryside at a leisurely pace and to smell the land, to watch the moisture fade from sparkling fields and turning leaves, to feel the wind, to hear and watch a flock of birds southbound for the Isles of the Sun. We rode in silence, and nothing happened to break my mood. Memories of sorrow, betrayal, suffering and violence are strong but they do fade, whereas interludes such as this, when I close my eyes and regard the calendar of my days, somehow outlast them, as I see myself riding with Vinta Bayle under morning skies where the houses and fences are stone and stray seabirds call, there in the wine country to the east of Amber, and the scythe of Time has no power in this corner of the heart.

When we arrived at Arbor House we gave the horses into the care of Bayle’s grooms, who would see to their eventual return to town. Drew departed for his own quarters then, and I walked with Vinta to the huge hilltop manor house. It commanded far views of rocky valleys and hillsides where the grapes were grown. A great number of dogs approached and tried to be friendly as we made our way to the house, and once we had entered their voices still reached us on occasion. Wood and wrought iron, gray flagged floors, high beamed ceilings, clerestory windows, family portraits, a couple of small tapestries of salmon, brown, ivory and blue, a collection of old weapons showing a few touches of oxidation, soot smudges on the gray stone about the hearth… We passed through the big front hall and up a stair.

“Take this room,” she said, opening a darkwood door, and I nodded as I entered and looked about. It was spacious, with big windows looking out over the valley to the south. Most of the servants were at the Baron’s place in town for the season. “There is a bath in the next room,” she told me, indicating a door to my left.

“Great. Thanks. Just what I need.”

“So repair yourself as you would.” She crossed to the window and looked downward. “I’ll meet you on that terrace in about an hour, if that is agreeable.”

I went over and looked down upon a large flagged area, well shaded by ancient trees — their leaves now yellow, red and brown, many of them dotting the patio — the place bordered by flower beds, vacant now, a number of tables and chairs arranged upon it, a collection of potted shrubs well disposed among them.

“Fine.”

She turned toward me. “Is there anything special you would like?”

“If there is any coffee about, I wouldn’t mind another cup or two when I meet you out there.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She smiled and seemed to sway slightly toward me for a moment. It almost seemed in that instant as if she wanted me to embrace her. But if she did not, it could be slightly awkward. And under the circumstances I wanted no familiarity with her anyway, having no idea as to the sort of game she was playing. So I returned her smile, reached out and squeezed her arm, said, “Thank you,” and stepped away. “I guess I’ll see about that bath now.”

I saw her to the door and let her out.

It was good to get my boots off. It was far better to soak, fox a long, warm time.

Later, in fresh-conjured attire, I made my way downstairs and located a side door that let of the kitchen onto the patio. Vinta, also scrubbed and refitted, in brown riding pants and a loose tan blouse, sat beside a table at the east end of the patio. Two places were set upon it, and I saw a coffeepot and a tray of fruit and cheeses. I crossed over, leaves crunching beneath my feet, and sat down.

“Did you find everything to your satisfaction?” she asked me.

“Entirely,” I replied.

“And you’ve notified Amber of your whereabouts?”

I nodded. Random had been a bit irritated at my taking off without letting him know, but then he had never told me not to. He was less irritated, however, when he Learned that I hadn’t gone all that far, and he even acknowledged finally that perhaps I had done a prudent thing in disappearing following such a peculiar attack. “Keep your eyes open and keep me posted,” were his final words.

“Good. Coffee?”

“Please.”

She poured and gestured toward the tray. I took an apple and took a bite.

“Things have begun happening,” she said ambiguously, as she filled her own cup.

“I can’t deny it,” I acknowledged.

“And your troubles have been manifold.”

“True.”

She took a sip of coffee. “Would you care to tell me about them?” she finally said.

“They’re a little too manifold,” I replied. “You said something last night about your story being a long one, too.”

She smiled faintly. “You must feel you have no reason to trust me more than necessary at this point,” she said. “I can see that. Why trust anyone you don’t have to when something dangerous is afoot, something you do not completely understand? Right?”

“It does strike me as a sound policy.”

“Yet I assure you that your welfare is of the highest concern to me.”

“Do you think I may represent a means of getting at Caine’s killer?”

“Yes,” she said, “and insofar as they may become your killers I would like to get at them.”

“Are you trying to tell me that revenge is not your main objective?”

“That’s right. I would rather protect the living than avenge the dead.”

“But that part becomes academic if it’s the same individual in both cases. Do you think it is?”

“I am not certain,” she said, “that it was Luke who sent those men after you last night.”

I placed my apple beside my cup and took a long drink of coffee. “Luke?” I said.

“Luke who? What do you know of any Luke?”

“Lucas Raynard,” she said steadily, “who trained a band of mercenaries in the Pecos Wilderness in northern New Mexico, issued them supplies of a special ammunition that will detonate in Amber, and sent them all home with it to await his orders to muster and be transported here — to attempt something your father once tried years ago.”

“Holy shit!” I said.

That would explain a lot — like Luke’s showing up in fatigues back at the Hilton in Santa Fe, with his story about liking to hike around in the Pecos, with that round of peculiar ammunition I’d found in his pocket; and all the other trips he’d been making there — more, actually, than seemed absolutely necessary on his sales route… That angle had never occurred to me, but it made a lot of sense in light of everything I’d since learned.

“Okay,” I acknowledged, “I guess you know Luke Raynard. Mind telling me how you came by this?”

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“Yes, I mind. I’m afraid I’m going to have to play this game your way and trade you information a piece at a time. Now that I think of it, it will probably make me feel more comfortable too. How does that sound to you?”

“Either one of us can call it quits at any time?”

“Which stops the trading, unless we can negotiate it.”

“All right.”

“So you owe me one. You just returned to Amber the other day. Where had you been?”

I sighed and took another bite of the apple. “You’re fishing,” I said finally. “That’s a big question. I’ve been to a lot of places. It all depends on how far back you want to go.”

“Let’s take it from Meg Devlin’s apartment to yesterday,” she said.

I choked on a piece of apple. “Okay, you’ve made the point — you have some damn good sources of information,” I observed. “But it has to be Fiona for that one. You’re in league with her some way, aren’t you?”

“It’s not your turn for a question,” she said. “You haven’t answered mine yet.”

“Okay, Fi and I came back to Amber after I left Meg’s place. The next day Random sent me on a mission, to turn off a machine I’d built called Ghostwheel. I failed in this but I ran into Luke along the way. He actually helped me out of a tight spot. Then, following a misunderstanding with my creation, I used a strange Trump to take both Luke and myself to safety. Luke subsequently imprisoned me in a crystal cave —”

“Aha!” she said.

“I should stop there?”

“No, go on.”

“I was a prisoner for a month or so, though it amounted to only a few days, Amber time. I was released by a couple of fellows working for a lady named Jasra, had an altercation with them and with the lady herself and trumped out to San Francisco, to Flora’s place. There, I revisited an apartment where a murder had occurred —”

“Julia’s place?”

“Yes. In it, I discovered a magical gateway which I was able to force open. I passed through it to a place called the Keep of the Four Worlds. A battle was in progress there, the attackers probably being led by a fellow named Dalt, of some small notoriety hereabouts at one time. Later, I was pursued by a magical whirlwind and called names by a masked wizard. I trumped out and came home — yesterday.”

“And that’s everything?”

“In capsule form, yes.”

“Are you leaving out anything?”

“Sure. For instance, there was a Dweller on the threshold of the gateway, but I was able to get by.”

“No, that’s part of the package. Anything else?”

“Mm. Yes, there were two peculiar communications, ending in flowers.”

“Tell me about them.”

So I did.

She shook her head when I’d finished. “You’ve got me there,” she said.

I finished my coffee and the apple. She refilled my cup.

“Now it’s my turn,” I said. “What did you mean by that ‘Aha!’ when I mentioned the crystal cave?”

“It was blue crystal, wasn’t it? And it blocked your powers.”

“How’d you know?”

“It was the color of the stone in the ring you took from that man last night.”

“Yes.”

She got to her feet and moved around the table, stood a moment, then pointed to the vicinity of my left hip.

“Would you empty that pocket onto the table, please?”

I smiled. “Sure. How’d you know?”

She didn’t answer that one, but then it was a different question. I removed the assortment of blue stones from my pocket — the chips from the cave, the carved button I’d snatcher, the ring — and placed them upon the table.

She picked up the button, studied it, then nodded.

“Yes, that’s one also,” she stated.

“One what?”

She ignored the query and dipped her right forefinger into a bit of spilled coffee within her saucer. She then used it to trace three circles around the massed stones, widdershins. Then she nodded again and returned to her seat. I’d summoned the vision in time to see her build a cage of force about them. Now, as I continued to watch, it seemed as if they were exhaling faint wisps of blue smoke that remained within the circle.

“I thought you said you weren’t a sorcerer.”

“I’m not,” she replied.

“I’ll save the question. But continue answering the last one. What is the significance of the blue stones?”

“They have an affinity for the cave, and for each other,” she told me. “A person with very little training could hold one of them and simply begin walking, following the slight psychic tugging. It would eventually lead him to the cave.”

“Through Shadow, you mean?”

“Yes.”

“Intriguing, but I fail to see any great value to it.”

“But that is not all. Ignore the pull of the cave, and you will become aware of secondary tuggings. Learn to distinguish the signature of the proper stone, and you can follow its bearer anywhere.”

“That does sound a little more useful. Do you think that’s how those guys found me last night, because I had a pocket full of the things?”

“Probably, from a practical standpoint, they helped. Actually, though, in your case, they should not even have lien necessary at this point.”

“Why not?”

“They have an additional effect. Anyone who has one in his possession for a time becomes attuned to the thing. Throw it away and the attunement remains. You can still be tracked then, just as if you had retained the stone. You would possess a signature of your own.”

“You mean that even now, without them, I’m marked?”

“Yes.”

“How long does it take to wear off?”

“I am not certain that it ever does.”

“There must be some means of deattunement.”

“I do not know for certain, but I can think of a couple of things that would probably do it.”

“Name them.”

“Walking the Pattern of Amber or negotiating the Logrus of Chaos. They seem almost to break a person apart and do a reassemblement into a purer form. They have been known to purge many strange conditions. As I recall, it was the Pattern that restored your father’s memory.”

“Yes — and I won’t even ask you how you know about the Logrus you may well be right. As with so much else in life, it seems enough of a pain in the ass to be good for me. So, you think they could be zeroing in on me right now, with or without the stones?”

“Yes.”

“How do you know all this?” I asked.

“I can sense it — and that’s an extra question. But I’ll give you a free one in the interests of expedition.”

“Thanks. I guess it’s your turn now.”

“Julia was seeing an occultist named Victor Melman before she died. Do you know why?”

“She was studying with him, looking for some sort of development — at least, that’s what I was told by a guy who knew her at the time. This was after we broke up.”

“That is not exactly what I meant,” she said. “Do you know why she desired this development?”

“Sounds like an extra question to me, but maybe I owe you one. The fellow I’d spoken with told me that I had scared her, that I’d given her to believe that I possessed unusual abilities, and that she was looking for some of her own in self-defense.”

“Finish it,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“That’s not a complete answer. Did you actually give her cause to believe that and to be afraid of you?”

“Well, I guess I did. Now my question: How could you possibly know anything about Julia in the first place?”

“I was there,” she answered. “I knew her.”

“Go ahead.”

“That’s it. Now it’s my turn.”

“That’s hardly complete.”

“But it’s all you’re getting on that one. Take it or leave it.”

“According to our agreement I can call it quits over that.”

“True. Will you?”

“What do you want to know next?”

“Did Julia develop the abilities she sought?”

“I told you that we’d stopped seeing each other before she got involved in that sort of thing. So I have no way of knowing.”

“You located the portal in her apartment from which the beast that slew her had presumably emerged. Two questions now — not for you to answer for me, just for you to think over: Why would anyone want her dead in the first place? And does it not seem a very peculiar way to have gone about it? I can think of a lot simpler ways of disposing of a person.”

“You’re right,” I agreed. “A weapon is a hell of a lot easier to manage than magic any day. As for why, I can only speculate. I had assumed it was a trap for me, and that she had been sacrificed as part of the package — my annual April thirtieth present. Do you know about them, too?”

“Let’s save that business for later. You are obviously aware that sorcerers have styles, the same as painters, writers, musicians. When you succeeded in locating that gateway in Julia’s apartment, was there anything about it which we might refer to as the author’s signature?”

“Nothing special that I can recall. Of course, I was in a hung to force it. I wasn’t there to admire the aesthetics of the thing. But no, I can’t associate it with anyone with whose work I am familiar. What are you getting at?”

“I just wondered whether it were possible that she might have developed some abilities of her own along these lines, and in the course of things opened that gateway herself and suffered those consequences.”

“Preposterous!”

“All right. I am just trying to turn up some reasons. I take it then that you never saw any indication that she might possess latent abilities for sorcery?”

“No, I can’t recall any instances.”

I finished my coffee, poured a refill.

“If you don’t think Luke is after me now, why not?” I asked her then.

“He set up some apparent accidents for you, years ago.”

“Yes. He admitted that recently. He also told me that he quit doing it after the first few times.”

“That is correct.”

“You know, it’s maddening — not knowing what you know and what you do not.”

“That is why we’re talking, isn’t it? It was your idea to go about it this way.”

“It was not! You suggested this trade-off!”

“This morning, yes. But the idea was originally yours, some time ago. I am thinking of a certain telephone conversation, at Mr. Roth’s place —”

“You? That disguised voice on the phone? How could that be?”

“Would you rather hear about that or about Luke?”

“That! No, Luke! Both, damn it!”

“So it would seem there is a certain wisdom in keeping to the format we’ve agreed upon. There is much to be said for orderliness.”

“Okay, you’ve made another point. Go on about Luke.”

“It seemed to me, as an observer, that he quit that business as soon as he got to know you better.”

“You mean back about the time we became friendly — that wasn’t just an act?”

“I couldn’t tell for sure then — and he certainly countenanced the years of attacks on you — but I believe that he actually sabotaged some of them.”

“Who was behind them after he quit?”

“A red-haired lady with whom he seemed to be associated.”

“Jasra?”

“Yes, that was her name — and I still don’t know as much about her as I’d like to. Do you have anything there?”

“I think I’ll save that for a big one,” I said.

For the first time, she directed a narrow-eyed, teeth-clenched expression toward me.

“Can’t you see that I’m trying to help you, Merlin?”

“Really, what I see is that you want information I have,” I said, “and that’s okay. I’m willing to deal because you seem to know things I want, too. But I’ve got to admit that your reasons are murky to me. How the hell did you get to Berkeley? What were you doing calling me at Bill’s place? What is this power of yours you say isn’t sorcery? How —”

“That’s three questions,” she said, “and the beginning of a fourth.

Would you prefer to write them all out, and have me do the same for you? Then we can both go off to our rooms and decide which ones we want to answer?”

“No,” I replied. “I’m willing to play the game. But you are aware of my reason for wanting to know these things. It’s a matter of self-preservation to me. I thought at first that you wanted information that would help you to nail the man who killed Caine. But you said no, and you didn’t give me anything to put in its place.”

“I did, too! I want to protect you!”

“I appreciate the sentiment. But why? When it comes down to it, you hardly know me.”

“Nevertheless, that is my reason and I don’t feel like going behind it. Take it or leave it.”

I got to my feet and began pacing the patio. I didn’t like the thought of giving away information that could be vital to my security, and ultimately that of Amber — though I had to admit I was getting a pretty good return for what I’d given. Her stuff did sound right. For that matter, the Bayles had a long history of loyalty to the Crown, for whatever that was worth. The thing that bothered me the most, I decided, was her insistence that it was not actually revenge that she was after. Apart from this being a very un-Amberlike attitude, if she were any judge at all as to what would go over with me she need but have agreed that blood was what she wanted, in order to make her concern intelligible. I would have bought it without looking any further. And what did she offer in its place? Airy nothings and classified motives…

Which could well mean she was telling the truth. Disdaining the use of a workable lie and offering something more cumbersome in its place would seem the mark of genuine honesty. And she did, apparently, have more answers that I wanted.

I heard a small rattling sound from the table. I thought at first that she might be drumming on it with her fingertips as a sign of her irritation with me. But when I glanced back I saw that she was sitting perfectly still, not even looking at me.

I drew nearer, seeking the source. The ring, the pieces of blue stone and even the button were jiggling about on the tabletop, as of their own accord.

“Something you’re doing?” I asked.

“No,” she replied.

The stone in the ring cracked and fell out of its setting.

“What, then?”

“I broke a link,” she said. “I believe something may be trying to reestablish it and failing.”

“Even so, if I’m still attuned they don’t need them in order to locate me, do they?”

“There may be more than one party involved,” she observed. “I think I should have a servant ride back to town and throw the things into the ocean. If someone wishes to follow them there, fine.”

“The chips should just lead back to the cave, and the ring to the dead man,” I said. “But I’m not ready to throw the button away.”

“Why not? It represents a big unknown.”

“Exactly. But these things would have to work both ways, wouldn’t they? That would mean that I could learn to use the button to find my way to the flower thrower.”

“That could be dangerous.”

“And not doing it could prove more dangerous in the long run. No, you can throw the rest of them into the sea, but not the button.”

“All right. I’ll keep it pent for you.”

“Thanks. Jasra is Luke’s mother.”

“You’re joking!”

“Nope.”

“That explains why he didn’t lean on her directly about the later April thirtieths. Fascinating! It opens up a whole new lane of speculation.”

“Care to share them?”

“Later, later. In the meantime, I’ll take care of these stones right now.” She scooped them all out of the circle and they seemed, for a moment, to dance in her hand. She stood.

“Uh — the button?” I said.

“Yes.”

She put the button into her pocket and kept the others in her hand.

“You’re going to get attuned yourself if you keep the button that way, aren’t you?”

“No,” she said, “I won’t.”

“Why not?”

“There’s a reason. Excuse me while I find a container for the others, and someone to transport them.”

“Won’t that person get attuned?”

“It takes a while.”

“Oh.”

“Have some more coffee — or something.”

She turned and left. I ate a piece of cheese. I tried to figure out whether I’d gotten more answers or more new questions during the course of our conversation. I tried to ht some of the new pieces into the old puzzle.

“Father?”

I turned, to see who had spoken. There was no one in sight.

“Down here.”

A coin-sized disk of light lay within a nearby flower bed, otherwise empty save for a few dry stalks and leaves. The light caught my attention when it moved slightly.

“Ghost?” I asked.

“Uh-huh,” came the reply from among the leaves. “I was waiting to catch you when you were alone. I’m not sure I trust that woman.”

“Why not?”

“She doesn’t scan right, like other people. I don’t know what it is. But that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“What, then?”

“Uh-well, did you mean what you said about not really intending to turn me off?”

“Jeez! After all the sacrifices I made for you! Your education and everything… And lugging all your damn components out to a place like that where you’d be safe! How can you ask me that?”

“Well, I heard Random tell you to do it.”

“You don’t do everything you’re told either, do you? Especially when it comes to assaulting me when I just wanted to check out a few programs? I deserve a little more respect than that!”

“Uh-yeah. Look, I’m sorry.”

“You ought to be. I went through a lot of crap because of you.”

“I looked for you for several days, and I couldn’t find you.”

“Crystal caves are no fun.”

“I don’t have much time now…” The light flickered, faded almost to the point of vanishing, returned to full brilliance. “Will you tell me something fast?”

“Shoot.”

“That fellow who was with you when you came out this way — and when you left — the big red-haired man?”

“Luke. Yes?”

The light grew dimmer again.

“Is it okay to trust him?” Ghost’s voice came faintly, weakly.

“No!” I shouted. “That would be damn stupid!”

Ghost was gone, and I couldn’t tell whether he’d heard my answer.

“What’s the matter?” Vinta’s voice, from above me.

“Argument with my imaginary playmate,” I called out.

Even from that distance I could see the expression of puzzlement on her face. She sought in all directions about the patio and then, apparently persuading herself that I was indeed alone, she nodded.

“Oh,” she said. Then, “I’ll be along in a little while.”

“No hurry,” I answered.

Where shall wisdom be found, and where is the place of understanding? If I knew, I’d walk over and stand there. As it was, I felt as if I stood in the midst of a large map, surrounded by vague areas wherein were penned the visages of particularly nasty-looking random variables. A perfect place for a soliloquy, if one had anything to say.

I went back inside to use the john. All that coffee.