Blood of Amber

Chapter 6

Well, maybe.

With Julia, I mean.

I sat alone in my room, thinking by candlelight.

Vinta had stirred a few sunken memories to the surface.

It was later on, when we weren’t seeing much of each other…

I’d met Julia first in a Computer Science course I was taking. We’d started seeing each other occasionally, just coffee after class and like that, at first. Then more and more frequently, and pretty soon it was serious.

Now it was ending as it had started, a little more each time…

I felt her hand on my shoulder as I was leaving the supermarket with a bag of groceries. I knew it was her and I turned and there was no one there. Seconds later, she hailed me from across the parking lot. I went over and said hello, asked her if she were still working at the software place where she’d been. She said that she wasn’t. I recalled that she was wearing a small silver pentagram on a chain about her neck. It could easily — and more likely should — have been hanging down inside her blouse. But of course I wouldn’t have seen it then, and her body language indicated that she wanted me to see it. So I ignored it while we exchanged a few generalities, and she turned me down on dinner and a movie, though I asked after several nights.

“What are you doing now?” I inquired.

“I’m studying a lot.”

“What?”

“Oh, just — different things. I’ll surprise you one of these days.”

Again, I didn’t bite, though an over-friendly Irish setter approached us about then. She placed her hand on its head and said, “Sit!” and it did. It became still as a statue at her side, and remained when we left later. For all I know, there’s a dog skeleton still crouched there, near the cart return area, like a piece of modern sculpture.

It didn’t really seem that important at the time. But in retrospect, I wondered…

We had ridden that day, Vinta and I. Seeing my growing exasperation of the morning, she must have felt a break was in order. She was right. Following a light lunch, when she made the suggestion that we take a ride about the estate, I agreed readily. I had wanted a little more time in which to think before continuing our cross-examination and discourse game. And the weather was good, the countryside attractive.

We made our way along a curling hail through arbors, which led at length into the northern hills from where we were afforded long views across the rugged and cross-hatched land down to the sun-filled sea. The sky was full of winds and wisps of cloud, passing birds… Vinta seemed to have no special destination in mind, which was all right with me. As we rode, I recalled a visit to a Napa Valley winery, and the next time we drew rein to rest the horses I asked her, “Do you bottle the wine here at the estate? Or is that done in town? Or in Amber?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

“I thought you grew up here.”

“I never paid attention.”

I bit back a remark about patrician attitudes. Unless she were joking, I couldn’t see how she’d fail to know something like that.

She caught my expression, though, and added immediately, “We’ve done it various ways at various times. I’ve been living in town for several years now. I’m not sure where the principal bottling has been done recently.”

Nice save, because I couldn’t fault it. I hadn’t intended my question as any sort of trap, but I felt as if I had just touched on something. Possibly from the fact that she didn’t let it go at that. She went on to say that they shipped large casks all over the place and often sold them in that fashion. On the other hand, there were smaller customers who wanted the product bottled… I stopped listening after a time. On the one hand, I could see it, coming horn a vintner’s daughter. On the other, it was all stuff I could have made up myself on the spot. There was no way for me to check on any of it. I got the feeling that she was trying to snow me, to cover something. But I couldn’t figure what.

“Thanks,” I said when she paused for breath, and she gave me a strange look but took the hint and did not continue.

“You have to speak English,” I said in that language, “if the things you told me earlier are true.”

“Everything I told you is true,” she replied, in unaccented English.

“Where’d you learn it?”

“On the shadow Earth where you went to school.”

“Would you care to tell me what you were doing there?”

“I was on a special mission.”

“For your father? For the Crown?”

“I’d rather not answer you at all than lie to you.”

“I appreciate that. Of course, I must speculate.”

She shrugged.

“You said you were in Berkeley?” I asked.

A hesitation, then, “Yes.”

“I don’t remember ever seeing you around.”

Another shrug. I wanted to grab her and shake her. Instead, I said, “You knew about Meg Devlin. You said you were in New York —”

“I believe you’re getting ahead of me on questions.”

“I didn’t know we were playing the game again. I thought we were just talking.”

“All right, then: Yes.”

“Tell me one more thing and perhaps I can help you.”

She smiled. “I don’t need any help. You’re the one with problems.”

“May I, anyway?”

“Go ahead and ask. Every time you question me you tell me things I wish to know.”

“You knew about Luke’s mercenaries. Did you visit New Mexico, too?”

“Yes, I’ve been there.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“That’s all?”

“That’s all.”

“You’ve come to some conclusion?”

“Perhaps.”

“Care to tell me what it is?”

I smiled and shook my head.

I left it at that. A few oblique queries on her part as we rode on led me to believe that I had her wondering what I might have guessed or suddenly seen. Good. I was determined to let it smolder. I needed something to balance her reticence on those points about which I was most curious, to lead hopefully to a full trade of information. Besides, I had reached a peculiar conclusion concerning her. It was not complete, but if it were correct I would require the rest of the answer sooner or later. So it was not exactly as if I were setting up a bluff.

The afternoon was golden, orange, yellow, red about us, with an autumn-damp smell behind the cool nips of the breezes. The sky was very blue, like certain stones…

Perhaps ten minutes later I asked her a more neutral question. “Could you show me the road to Amber?”

“You don’t know it?”

I shook my head. “I’ve never been this way before. All I know is that there are overland routes coming through here that lead to the Eastern Gate.”

“Yes,” she said. “A bit farther to the north, I believe. Let’s go find it.”

She headed back to a road we had followed for a time earlier and we turned right on it, which seemed logical. I did not remark on her vagueness, though I expected a comment from her before too long in that I had not elaborated on my plans and I’d a feeling she was hoping that I would.

Perhaps three quarters of a mile later we came to a crossroads. There was a low stone marker at the far left corner giving the distance to Amber, the distance back to Baylesport, the distance to Baylecrest in the east and to a place called Murn, straight ahead.

“What’s Murn?” I asked.

“A little dairy village.”

No way I could check that, without traveling six leagues.

“You plan on riding back to Amber?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Why not just use a Trump?”

“I want to get to know the area better. It’s my home. I like it here.”

“But I explained to you about the danger. The stones have marked you. You can be tracked.”

“That doesn’t mean I will be tracked. I doubt that whoever sent the ones I met last night would even be aware this soon that they’d found me and failed. They’d still be lurking about if I hadn’t decided to go out for dinner. I’m sure I have a few days’ grace in which to remove the markings you spoke of.”

She dismounted and let her horse nibble a few blades of grass. I did the same. Dismounted, that is.

“You’re probably right. I just don’t like to see you taking any chances,” she said. “When are you planning on heading back?”

“I don’t know. I suppose that the longer I wait the more likely it is that the person behind last night’s business will get restless and maybe send more muscle.”

She took hold of my arm and turned, so that she was suddenly pressed against me. I was somewhat surprised by the act, but my free arm automatically moved to hold the lady as it tends to on such occasions.

“You weren’t planning on leaving now, were you? Because if you are, I’m going with you.”

“No,” I answered truthfully. Actually, I’d been thinking of departing the following morning, following a good night’s sleep.

“When, then? We still have a lot of things to talk about.”

“I think we’ve pushed the question-and-answer business about as far as you’re willing to let it go.”

“There are some things —”

“I know.”

Awkward, this. Yes, she was desirable. And no, I didn’t care to have anything to do with her that way. Partly because I felt she wanted something else as well — what, I wasn’t sure — and partly because I was certain she possessed a peculiar power to which I did not wish to expose myself at intimate range. As my Uncle Suhuy used to say, speaking technically as a sorcerer, “If you don’t understand it, don’t screw around with it.” And I had a feeling that anything beyond a friendly acquaintanceship with Vinta could well turn into a duel of energies.

So I kissed her quickly to stay friendly and disengaged myself.

“Maybe I’ll head back tomorrow,” I told her.

“Good. I was hoping you’d spend the night. Perhaps several. I will protect you.”

“Yes, I’m still very tired,” I said.

“We’ll have to feed you a good meal and build up your strength.”

She brushed my cheek with her fingertips then, and I suddenly realized that I did know her from somewhere. Where? I couldn’t say. And that, too, frightened me. More than a little. As we mounted and headed back toward Arbor House I began making my plans for getting out of there that night.

So, sitting in my room, sipping a glass of my absent host’s wine (the red) and watching the candles flicker in the breeze from an opened window, I waited — first for the house to grow quiet (which it had), then for a goodly time to pass. My door was latched. I had mentioned how tired I felt several times during dinner, and then I had retired early. I am not so egotistically male that I feel myself constantly lusted after, but Vinta had given indication that she might stop by and I wanted the excuse of heavy sleeping. Least of all did I wish to offend her. I had problems enough without turning my strange ally against me.

I wished I still had a good book about, but I’d left my last one at Bill’s place, and if I were to summon it now I did not know but that Vinta might sense the sending, just as Fiona had once known I was creating a Trump, and come pounding on the door to see what the hell was going on.

But no one came pounding, and I listened to the creakings of a quiet house and the night sounds without. The candles shortened themselves and the shadows on the wall behind the bed ebbed and howed like a dark tide beyond their swaying light. I thought my thoughts and sipped my wine. Pretty soon…

An imagining? Or had I just heard my name whispered from some undetectable place?

“Merle…”

Again.

Real, but —

My vision seemed to swim for a moment, and then I realized it for what it was: a very weak Trump contact.

“Yes,” I said, opening and extending. “Who is it?”

“Merle, baby… Give me a hand or I’ve had it…”

Luke!

“Right here,” I said, reaching, reaching, as the image grew clear, solidified.

He was leaning, his back against a wall, shoulders slumped, head hanging.

“If this is a trick, Luke, I’m ready for it,” I told him. I rose quickly and, crossing to the table where I had laid my blade, I drew it and held it ready.

“No trick. Hurry! Get me out of here!”

He raised his left hand. I extended my left hand and caught hold of it. Immediately he slumped against me, and I staggered. For an instant I thought it was an attack, but he was dead weight and I saw that there was blood all over him. He still clutched a bloody blade in his right hand. “Over here. Come on.”

I steered him and supported him for several paces, then deposited him on the bed. I pried the blade from his grip, then placed it along with mine on a nearby chair.

“What the hell happened to you?”

He coughed and shook his head weakly. He drew several deep breaths, then, “Did I see a glass of wine,” he asked, “as we passed a table?”

“Yeah. Hold on.”

I fetched it, brought it back, propped him and held it to his lips. It was still over half full. He sipped it slowly, pausing for deep breaths.

“Thanks,” he said when he’d finished, then his head turned to the side.

He was out. I took his pulse. It was fast but kind of weak.

“Damn you, Luke!” I said. “You’ve got the worst timing…”

But he didn’t hear a word. He just lay there and bled all over the place.

Several curses later I had him undressed and was going over him with a wet towel to find out where, under all that blood, the injuries lay. There was a nasty chest wound on the right, which might have hit the lung. His breathing was very shallow, though, and I couldn’t tell. If so, I was hoping he’d inherited the regenerative abilities of Amber in full measure. I put a compress on it and laid his arm on top to hold it in place while I checked elsewhere. I suspected he had a couple of fractured ribs, also. His left arm was broken above the elbow and I set it and splinted it, using loose slats from a chair I’d noticed in the back of the closet earlier, and I strapped it to him. There were over a dozen lacerations and incisions of various degrees of severity on his thighs, right hip, right arm and shoulder, his back. None of them, fortunately, involved arterial bleeding. I cleaned all of these and bound them, which left him looking like an illustration in a firstaid handbook. Then I checked his chest wound again and covered him up.

I wondered about some of the Logrus healing techniques I knew in theory but had never had a chance to practice. He was looking pretty pale, so I decided I had better try them. When I’d finished, some time later, it seemed as if his color had returned to his face. I added my cloak to the blanket which covered him. I took his pulse again and it felt stronger. I cursed again, just to stay in practice, removed our blades from the chair and sat down on it.

A little later my conversation with Ghostwheel returned to trouble me. Had Luke been trying to do a deal with my creation? He’d told me he wanted Ghost’s power, to prosecute his designs against Amber. Then Ghost had asked me earlier today whether Luke was to be trusted, and my answer had been emphatically negative.

Had Ghost terminated negotiations with Luke in the fashion I saw before me?

I fetched forth my Trumps and shuffled out the bright circle of the Ghostwheel. I focused on it, setting my mind for contact, reaching out, calling, summoning.

Twice I felt near to something — agitated — during the several minutes I devoted to the effort. But it was as if we were separated by a sheet of glass. Was Ghost occupied? Or just not inclined to talk with me?

I put my cards away. But they had served to push my thoughts into another channel.

I gathered Luke’s gory clothing and did a quick search. I turned up a set of Trumps in a side pocket, along with several blank cards and a pencil and yes, they seemed to be rendered in the same style as the ones I had come to call the Trumps of Doom. I added to the packet the one depicting myself, which Luke had been holding in his hand when he had trumped in.

His were a fascinating lot. There was one of Jasra, and one of Victor Melman. There was also one of Julia, and a partly completed one of Bleys. There was one for the crystal cave, another for Luke’s old apartment. There were several duplicated from the Trumps of Doom themselves, one for a palace I did not recognize, one for one of my old pads, one for a rugged-looking blond guy in green and black, another of a slim, russethaired man in brown and black, and one of a woman who resembled this man so closely it would seem they must be related. These last two, strangely, were done in a different style; even by a different hand, I’d say. The only unknown one I felt relatively certain about was the blond fellow, who, from his colors, I would assume to be Luke’s old friend Dalt, the mercenary. There were also three separate attempts at something resembling Ghostwheel — none of them, I would guess, completely successful.

I heard Luke growl something, and I saw that his eyes were open and darting.

“Take it easy,” I said. “You’re safe.”

He nodded and closed his eyes. A few moments later, he opened them again.

“Hey! My cards,” he said weakly.

I smiled. “Nice work,” I remarked. “Who did them?”

“Me,” he answered. “Who else?”

“Where’d you learn?”

“My dad. He was real good at it.”

“If you can do them, you must have walked the Pattern.”

He nodded.

“Where?”

He studied me a moment, then performed a weak shrug and winced. “Tir-na Nog’th.”

“Your father took you, saw you through it?” Again, a nod.

Why not push it, since I seemed to be on a roll? I picked up a card.

“And here’s Dalt,” I said. “You used to be Cub Scouts together, didn’t you?”

He did not reply. When I looked up I saw narrowed eyes and a furrowed brow.

“I’ve never met him,” I added. “But I recognize the colors, and I know he’s from out your way — around Kashfa.”

Luke smiled. “You always did your homework back in school, too,” he said.

“And usually on time,” I agreed. “But with you I’ve been running late. Luke, I can’t find a Trump for the Keep of the Four Worlds. And here’s someone I don’t know.”

I picked up the slim lady’s card and waved it at him.

He smiled. “Gettin’ weak and losin’ my breath again,” he said. “You been to the Keep?”

“Yep.”

“Recently?”

I nodded.

“Tell you what,” he said at last. “Tell me what you saw at the Keep and how you learned some of that stuff about me and I’ll tell you who she is.”

I thought quickly. I could say things so that I probably wouldn’t be telling him anything he didn’t already know.

So, “The other way around,” I said.

“Okay. The lady,” he stated, “is Sand.”

I stared so hard that I felt the beginnings of a contact. I smothered it.

“The long-lost,” he added.

I raised the card depicting the man who resembled her. “Then this must be Delwin,” I said.

“Right.”

“You didn’t do these two cards. They’re not your style, and you probably wouldn’t have known what they looked like to begin with.”

“Perceptive. My father drew them, back in the time of the troubles for all the good it did him. They wouldn’t help him either.”

“Either?”

“They weren’t interested in helping me, despite their disaffection with this place. Count them as out of the game.”

“This place?” I said. “Where do you think you are, Luke?”

His eyes widened. He cast his gaze about the room. “The camp of the enemy,” he answered. “I had no choice. These are your quarters in Amber, right?”

“Wrong,” I replied.

“Don’t bait me, Merle. You’ve got me. I’m your prisoner. Where am I?”

“Do you know who Vinta Bayle is?”

“No.”

“She was Caine’s mistress. This is her family’s place, way out in the country. She’s just up the hall somewhere. Might even stop by. I think she’s got a crush on me.”

“Uh-oh. She a tough lady?”

“Very.”

“What you doing making out with her this soon after the funeral? That’s hardly decent.”

“Huh! If it weren’t for you there wouldn’t have been any funeral.”

“Don’t give me that indignation crap, Merle. If it had been your dad, Corwin, he’d killed, wouldn’t you have gone after him?”

“That’s not fair. My father wouldn’t have done all those things Brand did.”

“Maybe, maybe not. But supposing he had? Even then. Wouldn’t you have gone after Caine?”

I turned away. “I don’t know,” I said finally. “It’s too damned hypothetical.”

“You’d have done it. I know you, Merle. I’m sure you would have.”

I sighed. “Maybe,” I said. “Well, okay. Maybe I might have. But I would have stopped there. I wouldn’t have gone after the others too. I don’t want to make you feel any worse than you do about it, but your old man was psycho; you must know that. And you’re not. I know you as well as you know me. I’ve been thinking about this for some time. You know, Amber recognizes the personal vendetta. You’ve got an arguable case there for one. And the death didn’t even occur within Amber, if Random were really looking for an out for you.”

“Why should he be?”

“Because I’d be vouching for your integrity in other matters.”

“Come on, Merle —”

“You’ve got a classic vendetta defense — a son avenging his father’s death.”

“I don’t know… Hey, you trying to get out of telling me the stuff you promised to?”

“No, but —”

“So you made it to the Keep of the Four Worlds. What did you learn there and how did you learn it?”

“Okay. You think about what I said, though,” I replied.

His expression remained unchanged.

Then, “There was an old hermit named Dave,” I began.

Luke fell asleep before I finished. I just let my voice trail off and sat there. After a time, I rose and located the wine bottle and poured a little into the glass, since Luke had drunk most of mine. I took it with me to the window and stared down and out across the patio, where the wind was rattling leaves. I wondered about what I’d said to Luke. It wasn’t a full picture I’d given him, partly because I hadn’t had time to go into it thoroughly, mainly because he hadn’t seemed interested. But even if Random did let him off the hook officially in the matter of Caine’s death, Julian or Gerard would probably be looking to kill him under the same vendetta code I’d been talking about. I didn’t really know what to do. I was obliged to tell Random about him, but I’d be damned if I’d do it yet. There were still too many things I had to learn from him, and getting at him might be a lot harder if he were a prisoner back in Amber. Why had he ever gotten himself born as Brand’s son, anyway?

I returned to the bedside seat, near which I had left our weapons and Luke’s Trumps. I moved these items across the room, to where I seated myself in the more comfortable chair I had occupied earlier. I studied his cards again. Amazing. A whole bunch of history in my hand…

When Oberon’s wife Rilga had shown less hardihood than many by aging rapidly and retiring to a reclusive life at a country shrine, he had gone off and remarried, somewhat to the chagrin of their children Caine, Julian and Gerard. But to confuse genealogists and sticklers for family legality, he had done it in a place where time flowed far more rapidly than in Amber. Interesting arguments both for and against the bigamous nature of his marriage to Harla may be made. I’m in no position to judge. I had the story from Flora years ago, and in that she’d never gotten along too well with Delwin and Sand, the offspring of that union, she was inclined to the pro-bigamy interpretation. I’d never seen pictures of Delwin or Sand until now. There weren’t any hanging around the palace, and they were seldom mentioned. But they had lived in Amber for the relatively short time Harla was queen there. Following her death, they grew unhappy with Oberon’s policies toward her homeland — which they visited often — and after a time they departed, vowing not to have anything to do with Amber again. At least that’s the way I’d heard it. There could easily have been all sorts of sibling politicking involved, too. I don’t know.

But here were two missing members of the royal family, and obviously Luke had leaed of them and approached them, hoping to revive old resentments and gain allies. He admitted that it hadn’t worked. Two centuries is a long time to hold a grudge at high pitch. That’s about how long it had been since their departure, as I understood it. I wondered fleetingly whether I should get in touch with them, just to say hello. If they weren’t interested in helping Luke I didn’t suppose they’d be interested in helping the other side either, now they were aware there was another side. It did seem proper that I should introduce myself and pay my respects, as a family member they’d never met. I decided that I would do it sometime, though the present moment was hardly appropriate. I added their Trumps to my own collection, along with good intentions.

And then there was Dalt a sworn enemy of Amber, I gathered. I studied his card again, and I wondered: If he were indeed such a good friend of Luke’s, perhaps I should let him know what had happened. He might even know of the circumstances involved and mention something I could use. In fact, the more I thought about it — recalling his recent presence at the Keep of the Four Worlds — the more tempting it became to try to reach him. It seemed possible I could even pick up something about what was now going on in that place.

I gnawed a knuckle. Should I or shouldn’t I? I couldn’t see any harm that could come of it. I wasn’t planning on giving anything away. Still; there were a few misgivings.

What the hell, I decided finally. Nothing ventured…

Hello, hello. Reaching out through the suddenly cold card…

A startled moment somewhere, and the sense of an Aha!

Like a portrait come to life, my vision stirred.

“Who are you?” the man asked, hand on hilt, blade half drawn.

“My name is Merlin,” I said, “and we’ve a mutual acquaintance named Rinaldo. I wanted to tell you that he’d been badly injured.”

By now, we both hovered between our two realities, solid and perfectly clear to each other. He was bigger than I’d thought from his representation, and he stood at the center of a stone-walled room, a window to his left showing a blue sky and a limb of cloud. His green eyes, at first wide, were now narrowed and the set of his jaw seemed a bit truculent.

“Where is he?” he inquired.

“Here. With me,” I answered.

“How fortunate,” he replied, and the blade was in his hand and he moved forward.

I Sipped the Trump away, which did not sever the contact. I had to summon the Logrus to do that — and it fell between us like the blade of a guillotine and jerked me back as if I had just touched a live wire. My only consolation was that Dalt had doubtless felt the same thing.

“Merle, what’s going on?” Luke’s voice came hoarsely. “I saw Dalt…”

“Uh, yeah. I just called him.”

He raised his head slightly. “Why?”

“To tell him about you. He’s your friend, isn’t he?”

“You asshole!” he said. “He’s the one that did this to me!”

Then he began coughing and I rushed to his side.

“Get me some water, huh?” he said.

“Coming up.”

I went off to the bathroom and fetched him a glass. I propped him and he sipped it for a time.

“Maybe I should have told you,” he said finally. “Didn’t think — you’d play games — that way, though — when you don’t know — what’s going on…”

He coughed again, drank more water.

“Hard to know what to tell you — and what not to,” he continued, a while later.

“Why not tell me everything?” I suggested.

He shook his head slightly. “Can’t. Probably get you killed. More likely both of us.”

“The way things have been going, it seems as if it could happen whether you tell me or not.”

He smiled faintly and took another drink.

“Parts of this thing are personal,” he said then, “and I don’t want anyone else involved.”

“I gather that your trying to kill me every spring for a while there was kind of personal, too,” I observed, “yet somehow I felt involved.”

“Okay, okay,” he said, slumping back and raising his right hand. “I told you I cut that out a long time ago.”

“But the attempts went on.”

“They weren’t my doing.”

Okay, I decided. Try it. “It was Jasra, wasn’t it?”

“What do you know about her?”

“I know she’s your mother, and I gather this is her war too.”

He nodded. “So you know… All right. That makes it easier,” He paused to catch his breath. “She started me doing the April thirtieth stuff for practice. When I got to know you better and quit, she was mad.”

“So she continued it herself?”

He nodded.

“She wanted you to go after Caine,” I said.

“So did I.”

“But the others? She’s leaning on you about them, I’ll bet. And you’re not so sure they have it coming.”

Silence.

“Are you?” I said.

He shifted his gaze away from my own and I heard his teeth grind together.

“You’re off the hook,” he said at last. “I’ve no intention of hurting you. I won’t let her do it either.”

“And what about Bleys and Random and Fiona and Flora and Gerard and —”

He laughed, which cost him a wince and a quick clutch at his chest. “They’ve nothing to worry about from us,” he said, “right now.”

“What do you mean?”

“Think,” he told me. “I could have trumped back to my old apartment, scared hell out of the new tenants and called an ambulance. I could be in an emergency room right now.”

“Why aren’t you?”

“I’ve been hurt worse than this, and I’ve made it. I’m here because I need your help.”

“Oh? For what?”

He looked at me, then looked away again. “She’s in bad trouble, and we’ve got to rescue her.”

“Who?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

“My mother,” he replied.

I wanted to laugh, but I couldn’t when I saw the expression on his face. It took real balls to ask me to help rescue the woman who’d tried to kill me — not once, but many times — and whose big aim in life seemed to be the destruction of my relatives. Balls, or —

“I’ve no one else left to turn to,” he said.

“If you talk me into this one, Luke, you’ll deserve the Salesman of the Year Award,” I said. “But I’m willing to listen.”

“Throat’s dry again,” he said.

I went and refilled the glass. As I returned with it, it seemed there was a small noise in the hall. I continued listening while I helped Luke to a few more sips.

He nodded when he was finished, but I had heard another sound by then. I raised my finger to my lips and glanced at the door. I put down the glass, rose and crossed the room, retrieving my blade as I did so.

Before I reached the door, however, there was a gentle knock.

“Yes?” I said, advancing to it.

“It’s me,” came Vinta’s voice. “I know that Luke is in there, and I want to see him.”

“So you can finish him off?” I asked.

“I told you before that that is not my intention.”

“Then you’re not human,” I said.

“I never claimed I was.”

“Then you’re not Vinta Bayle,” I said.

There followed a long silence, then, “Supposing I’m not?”

“Then tell me who you are.”

“I can’t.”

“Then meet me halfway,” I said, drawing upon all of my accumulated guesswork concerning her, “and tell me who you were.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yes, you do. Pick one — any one. I don’t care.”

There was another silence, then, “I dragged you from the fire,” she said, “but I couldn’t control the horse. I died in the lake. You wrapped me in your cloak…”

That was not an answer I had anticipated. But it was good enough.

With the point of my weapon I raised the latch. She pushed the door open and glanced at the blade in my hand.

“Dramatic,” she remarked.

“You’ve impressed me,” I said, “by the perils with which I am beset.”

“Not sufficiently, it would seem.” She entered, smiling.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I didn’t hear you ask him anything about the blue stones and what he might have homing in on you as a consequence of your attunement.”

“You’ve been eavesdropping.”

“A lifetime habit,” she agreed.

I turned toward Luke and introduced her. “Luke, this is Vinta Bayle sort of.”

Luke raised his right hand, his eyes never leaving her face. “I just want to know one thing,” he began.

“I’ll bet you do,” she replied. “Am I going to kill you or aren’t I? Keep wondering. I haven’t decided yet. Do you remember the time you were low on gas north of San Luis Obispo and you discovered your wallet was missing? You had to borrow money from your date to get back home. She had to ask you twice, too, before you paid her back.”

“How could you know that?” he whispered.

“You got in a fight with three bikers one day,” she went on. “You almost lost an eye when one of them wrapped a chain around your head. Seems to have healed up nicely. Can’t see the scar —”

“And I won,” he added.

“Yes. Not too many people can pick up a Harley and throw it like you did.”

“I have to know,” he said, “how you learned these things.”

“Maybe I’ll tell you that too, sometime,” she said. “I just mentioned them to keep you honest. Now I’m going to ask you some questions, and your life is going to depend on giving me honest answers. Understand —”

“Vinta,” I interrupted, “you told me that you weren’t interested in killing Luke.”

“It’s not at the top of my list,” she replied, “but if he’s in the way of what is, he goes.”

Luke yawned. “I’ll tell you about the blue stones,” he muttered. “I don’t have anybody on a blue-stone detail after Merle now.”

“Might Jasra have someone tracking him that way?”

“Possible. I just don’t know.”

“What about the ones who attacked him in Amber last night?”

“First I’ve heard of it,” he said, and he closed his eyes.

“Look at this,” she ordered, removing the blue button from her pocket.

He opened his eyes and squinted at it.

“Recognize it?”

“Nope,” he said, and closed his eyes again.

“And you don’t mean Merle any harm now?”

“That’s right,” he answered, his voice drifting off.

She opened her mouth again and I said, “Let him sleep. He’s not going anywhere.”

She gave me an almost angry look, then nodded. “You’re right,” she said.

“So what are you going to do now kill him while he’s out?”

“No,” she replied. “He was telling the truth.”

“And does it make a difference?”

“Yes,” she told me, “for now.”