When I"d told her that my mother was named Dara she had finally begun speaking freely. She had warned me against Luke. It seemed that she might have been willing to tell me more then, too, save that the arrival of the real Meg"s husband had cut short our conversation.
To what was this the key? It placed my origin in the Courts of Chaos, to which she had at no time referred. Yet it had to be important, somehow.
I had a feeling that I already had the answer but that I would be unable to realize it until I had formulated the proper question.
Enough. I could go no further. Knowing that she was aware of my connection with the Courts still told me nothing. She was also obviously aware of my connection with Amber, and I could not see how that figured in the pattern of events either.
So I would leave it at that point and come back to it later. I had plenty of other things to think about. At Least, I now had lots of new questions to ask her the next time we met, and I was certain that we would meet again.
Then something else occurred to me. If she"d done any real protecting of me at all, it had taken place offstage. She had given me a lot of information, which I thought was probably correct but which I had had no opportunity to verify, From her phoning and lurking back in New York to her killing of my one possible source of information in Death Alley, she had really been more a bother than a help. It was conceivable that she could actually show up and enc.u.mber me with aid again, at exactly the wrong moment.
So instead of working on my opening argument for Random, I spent the next hour or so considering the nature of a being capable of moving into a person and taking over the controls. There seemed only a certain number of ways it might be done, and I narrowed the field quickly, considering what I knew of her nature, by means of the technical exercises my uncle had taught me. When I thought I had it worked out I backtracked and mused over the forces that would have to be involved.
From the forces I worked my way through the tonic vibrations of their aspects. The use of raw power, while flashy, is wasteful and very fatiguing for the operator, not to mention aesthetically barbaric. Better to be prepared.
I lined up the spoken signatures and edited them into a spell. Suhuy would probably have gotten it down even shorter, but there is a point of diminishing returns on these things, and I had mine figured to where it should work if my main guesses were correct. So I collated it and a.s.sembled it. It was fairly long-too long to rattle off in its entirety if I were in the hurry I probably would be. Studying it, I saw that three linchpins would probably hold it, though four would be better.
I summoned the Logrus and extended my tongue into its moving pattern. Then I spoke the spell, slowly and clearly, leaving out the four key words I had chosen to omit. The woods grew absolutely still about me as the words rang out. The spell hung before me like a crippled b.u.t.terfly of sound and color, trapped within the synesthetic web of my personal vision of the Logrus, to come again when I summoned it, to be released when I uttered the four omitted words.
I banished the vision and felt my tongue relax. Now she was not the only one capable of troublesome surprises.
I halted for a drink of water. The sky had grown darker and the small noises of the forest returned. I wondered whether Fiona or Bleys had been in touch, and how Bill was doing back in town. I listened to the rattling of branches. Suddenly, I had the feeling I was being watched-not the cold scrutiny of a Trump touch, but simply the sensation that there was a pair of eyes fixed upon me. I shivered. All those thoughts about enemies. . . .
I loosened my blade and rode on. The night was young, and there were more miles ahead than behind.
Riding through the evening I kept alert, but I neither heard nor saw anything untoward. Had I been wrong about Jasra, Sharu or even Luke? And was there a party of a.s.sa.s.sins at my back right now? Periodically, I drew rein and sat listening for a short while. But I heard nothing unusual on these occasions, nothing that could be taken as sounds of pursuit. I became acutely aware of the blue b.u.t.ton in my pocket. Was it acting as a beacon for some sinister sending of the wizard"s? I was loath to get rid of the thing because I could foresee a number of possible uses for it. Besides, if it had already attuned me-which it probably had-I could see no benefit in disposing of it now. I would secrete it someplace safe before I made my attempt to lose its vibes. Until such a time, I could see no percentage in doing anything else with it.
The sky continued to darken, and a number of stars had put in hesitant appearances. Smoke and I slowed even more in our course, but the road remained good and its pale surface stayed sufficiently visible to present no hazard. I heard the call of an owl from off to the right and moments later saw its dark shape rush at middle height among the trees. It would have been a pleasant night to be riding if I were not creating my own ghosts and haunting myself with them. I love the smells of autumn and the forest, and I resolved to b.u.m a few leaves in my campfire later on for that pungency unlike any other I know.
The air was clean and cool. Hoof sounds, our breathing and the wind seemed to be the only noises in the neighborhood until we flushed a deer a bit later and heard the diminishing crashes of its retreat for some time afterward. We crossed a small but st.u.r.dy wooden bridge a little later, but no trolls were taking tolls. The road took a turn upward, and we wound our way slowly but steadily to a higher elevation. Now there were numerous stars visible through the weave of the branches, but no clouds that I could see. The deciduous trees grew barer as we gained a bit of alt.i.tude, and more evergreens began to occur. I felt the breezes more strongly now.
I began pausing more frequently, to rest Smoke, to listen, to nibble at my supplies. I resolved to keep going at least until moonrise-which I tried to calculate from its occurrence the other night, following my departure from Amber. If I made it to that point before I camped, the rest of the ride into Amber tomorrow morning would be pretty easy.
Frakir pulsed once, lightly, upon my wrist. But h.e.l.l, that had often happened in traffic when I"d cut someone off. A hungry fox could have just pa.s.sed, regarded me and wished itself a bear. Still, I waited there longer than I had intended, prepared for an attack and trying not to appear so.
But nothing happened, the warning was not repeated and after a time I rode on. I returned to my idea for putting the screws to Luke-and, for that matter, Jasra. I couldn"t call it a plan yet, because it was lacking in almost all particulars. The more I thought of it, the crazier it seemed. For one thing, it was extremely tempting, as it held the potential for resolving a lot of problems. I wondered then why I had never created a Trump for Bill Roth. I felt a sudden need to talk to a good attorney. I might well want someone to argue my case before this was done. Too dark now to do any drawing, though . . , and not really necessary yet. Actually, I just wanted to talk with him, bring him up to date, get the views of someone not directly involved.
Frakir issued no further warnings during the next hour. We commenced a slightly downward course then, soon pa.s.sing into a somewhat more sheltered area where the smell of pines came heavy. I mused on-about wizards and flowers, Ghostwheel and his problems, and the name of the ent.i.ty who had recently occupied Vinta. There were lots of other musings, too, some of which went a long way back. . . .
Many stops later, with a bit of moonlight trickling through the branches behind me, I decided to call it quits and look for a place to bed down. I gave Smoke a brief drink at the next stream. About a quarter hour afterward, I thought I glimpsed what might be a promising spot off to the right, so I left the road and headed that way.
It turned out not to be as good a place as I"d thought, and I continued farther into the wood until I came across a small clear area that seemed adequate. I dismounted, unsaddled Smoke and tethered him, rubbed him down with his blanket and gave him something to eat. Then I sc.r.a.ped clear a small area of ground with my blade, dug a pit at its center and built a fire there. I used a spell to ignite it because I was feeling lazy, and I threw on several clumps of leaves as I recalled my earlier reflections.
I seated myself on my cloak, my back against the bole of a middle-sized tree, and ate a cheese sandwich and sipped water while I worked up the ambition to pull my boots off. My blade lay upon the ground at my side.
My muscles began to unkink. The smell of the fire was a nostalgic thing. I toasted my next sandwich over it.
I sat and thought of nothing for a long while. Gradually, in barely perceptible stages, I felt the gentle disengagements la.s.situde brings to the extremities. I had meant to gather firewood before I took my ease. But I didn"t really need it. It wasn"t all that cold. I"d wanted the fire mainly for company.
However. . . . I dragged myself to my feet and moved off into the woods. I did a long, slow reconnaissance about the area once I got moving. Though to be honest, my main reason for getting up had been to go arid relieve myself. I halted in my circuit when I thought that I detected a small flicker of light far off to the northeast. Another campfire? Moonlight on water? A torch? There had been only a glimpse and I could not locate it again, though I moved my head about, retraced my most recent few paces and even struck off a small distance in that direction.
But I did not wish to chase after some will-o"-the-wisp and spend my night beating the bushes. I checked various lines of sight back to my camp. My small fire was barely visible even from this distance. I circled my camp, entered and sprawled again. The fire was already dying and I decided to let it burn out. I wrapped my cloak about me and listened to the soft sounds of the wind.
I fell asleep quickly. For how long I slept, I do not know. There were no dreams that I can recall.
I was awakened by Frakir"s frantic pulsing. I opened my eyes the barest slits and tossed, as if in sleep, so that my right hand fell near the haft of my blade. I maintained my slow breathing pattern. I heard and felt that the wind had risen, and I saw that it had fanned the embers to the point where my fire flared once again. I saw no one before me, however. I strained my hearing after any sounds, but all I heard was the wind and the popping of the fire.
It seemed as foolish to spring to my feet into a guard position when I did not know from which direction the danger was approaching as it did to remain a target. On the other hand, I had intentionally cast my cloak so that I lay with a large, low-limbed pine at my back. It would have been very difficult for someone to have approached me from the rear, let alone to have done so quietly. So it did not seem I was in danger of an imminent attack from that direction.
I turned my head slightly and studied Smoke, who had begun to seem a little uneasy. Frakir continued her now distracting warning till I willed her to be still.
Smoke was twitching his ears and moving his head about, nostrils dilated. As I watched, I saw that his attention seemed directed toward my right. He began edging his way across the camp, his long tether snaking behind him.
I heard a sound then, beyond the noise of Smoke"s retreat, as of something advancing from the right. It was not repeated for a time, and then I heard it again. It was not a footfall, but a sound as of a body brushing against a branch which suddenly issued a weak protest.
I visualized the disposition of trees and shrubs in that direction and decided to let the lurker draw nearer before I made my move. I dismissed the notion of summoning the Logrus and preparing a magical attack. It would take a bit more time than I thought I had remaining. Also, from Smoke"s behavior and from what I had heard, it seemed that there was only a single individual approaching. I resolved, though, to lay in a decent supply of spells the first chance I got, both offensive and defensive, on the order of the one I had primed against my guardian ent.i.ty. The trouble is that it can take several days of solitude to work a really decent array of them out properly, enact them and rehea.r.s.e their releases to the point where you can spring them at a moment"s notice-and then they have a tendency to start decaying after a week or so. Sometimes they last longer and sometimes less long, depending both on the amount of energy you"re willing to invest in them and on the magical climate of the particular shadow in which you"re functioning. It"s a lot of bother unless you"re sure you"re going to need them within a certain period of time. On the other hand, a good sorcerer should have one attack, one defense and one escape spell hanging around at all times. But I"m generally somewhat lazy, not to mention pretty easygoing, and I didn"t see any need for that sort of setup until recently. And recently, I hadn"t had much time to be about it.
So any use I might make of the Logrus now, were I to summon it and situate myself within its ambit, would pretty much amount to blasting away with raw power-which is very draining on the operator.
Let him come a little nearer, that"s all, and it would be cold steel and a strangling cord that he would face.
I could feel the presence advancing now, hear the soft stirring of pine needles. A few more feet, enemy. . . . Come on. That"s all I need. Come into range. . . .
He halted. I could hear a steady, soft breathing.
Then, "You must be aware of me by now, Magus," came a low whisper, "for we all have our little tricks, and I know the source of yours."
"Who are you?" I asked, as I clasped the haft of my blade and rolled into a crouch, facing the darkness, the point of my weapon describing a small circle.
"I am the enemy," was the reply. "The one you thought would never come."
9.
Power.
I remembered the day I had stood atop a rocky prominence.
Fiona-dressed in lavender, belted with silverstood in a higher place before me and somewhat to my right. She held a silver mirror in her right hand, and she looked downward through the haze to the place where the great tree towered. There was a total stillness about us, and even our own small sounds came m.u.f.fled. The upper portions of the tree disappeared into a low-hanging fog bank. The light that filtered through limned it starkly against another pile of fog which hung at its back, rising to join with the one overhead. A bright, seemingly self-illuminated line was etched into the ground near the base of the tree, curving off to vanish within the fog. Far to my left, a brief arc of a similar intensity was also visible, emerging from and returning to the billowing white wall.
"What is it, Fiona?" I asked. "Why did you bring me to this place?"
"You"ve heard of it;" she replied. "I wanted you to see it."
I shook my head. "I"ve never heard of it. I"ve no idea what I"m looking at."
"Come," she said, and she began to descend.
She disdained my hand, moving quickly and gracefully, and we came down from the rocks and moved nearer to the tree. There was something vaguely familiar there, but I could not place it.
"From your father," she said at last. "He spent a long time telling you his story. Surely he did not omit this part."
I halted as understanding presented itself, tentatively at first.
"That tree," I said.
"Corwin planted his staff when he commenced the creation of the new Pattern," she said. "It was fresh. It took root."
I seemed to feel a faint vibration in the ground.
Fiona turned her back on the prospect, raised the mirror she carried and angled it so that she regarded the scene over her right shoulder.
"Yes," she said, after several moments. Then she extended the mirror to me. "Take a look," she told me, "as I just did." I accepted it, held it, adjusted it and stared.
The view in the minor was not the same as that which had presented itself to my unaided scrutiny. I was able to see beyond the tree now, through the fog, to discern most of the strange Pattern which twisted its bright way about the ground, working its pa.s.sages inward to its off-center terminus, the only spot still concealed by an unmoving tower of white, within which tiny lights like stars seemed to b.u.m.
"It doesn"t look like the Pattern back in Amber," I said.
"No," she answered. "Is it anything like the Logrus?"
"Not really. The Logrus actually alters itself somewhat, constantly. Still, it"s more angular, whereas this is mostly curves and bends."
I studied it a little longer, then returned her looking gla.s.s.
"Interesting spell on the mirror," I commented, for I had been studying this also, while I held it."
"And much more difficult than you"d think," she responded, "for there"s more than fog in there. Watch."
She advanced to the beginning of the Pattern, near the great tree, where she moved as if to set her foot upon the bright trail. Before it arrived, however, a small electrical discharge crackled upward and made contact with her shoe. She jerked her foot back quickly.
"It rejects me," she said. "I can"t set foot on it. Try it."
There was something in her gaze I did not like, but I moved forward to where she had been standing.
"Why couldn"t your mirror penetrate all the way to the center of the thing?" I asked suddenly.
"The resistance seems to go up the farther you go in. It is greatest there," she replied. "But as to why,I do not know."
I hesitated a moment longer. "Has anyone tried it other than yourself?"
I brought Bleys here," she answered. "It rejected him too."
"And he"s the only other one who"s seen it?"
"No, I brought Random. But he declined to try. Said he didn"t care to screw around with it right then."
"Prudent, perhaps. Was he wearing the Jewel at the time?"
"No. Why?"
"Just curious."
"See what it does for you."
"All right."
I raised my right foot and lowered it slowly toward the line. About a foot above it, I stopped.
"Something seems to be holding me back," I said.
"Strange. There is no electrical discharge for you."
"Small blessing," I responded, and I pushed my foot a couple of inches farther downward. Finally, I sighed. "Nope, Fi. I can"t."
I read the disappointment in her features.
"I was hoping," she said as I drew back, "that someone other than Corwin might be able to walk it. His son seemed the most likely choice."
"Why is it so important that someone walk it? Just because it"s there?"
"I think it"s a menace," she said. "It has to be explored and dealt with."
"A menace? Why?"
"Amber and Chaos are the two poles of existence, as we understand it," she said, "housing as they do the Pattern and the Logrus. For ages there has been something of an equilibrium between them. Now, I believe, this b.a.s.t.a.r.d Pattern of your father"s is undermining their balance."
"In what fashion?"
"There have always been wavelike exchanges between Amber and Chaos. This seems to be setting up some interference."
"It sounds more like tossing an extra ice cube into a drink," I said. "It should settle down after a while."
She shook her head. "Things are not settling. There have been far more shadow-storms since this thing was created. They rend the fabric of Shadow. They affect the nature of reality itself."
"No good," I said. "Another event a lot more important along these lines occurred at the same time. The original Pattern in Amber was damaged and Oberon repaired it. The wave of Chaos which came out of that swept through all of Shadow. Everything was affected. But the Pattern held and things settled again. I"d be more inclined to think of all those extra shadow-storms as being in the nature of aftershocks."
"It"s a good argument," she said. "But what if it"s wrong?"
"I don"t think it is."
"Merle, there"s some kind of power here - an immense amount of power."
"I don"t doubt it."