“Come on,” I said, taking up the reins, “this way.”
I led him back the way I had come, talking the while. I realized by the time we emerged that I actually liked him. I met Luke about then, a blade in his hand.
“My God!” he said. “No wonder it took you so long! You stopped to paint it!”
“You like, huh?”
“You ever want to get rid of that one, I’ll make you a good offer.”
“I don’t think I’ll be getting rid of him,” I said.
“What’s his name?”
“Tiger,” I said without premeditation, and then I mounted.
We headed back to the trail, where even Dalt eyed my mount with something like pleasure. Nayda reached out and stroked the black and orange mane.
“Now we may be able to make it in time,” she said, if we hurry.“
I mounted, and I guided Tiger over onto the trail. I anticipated all manner of reactions to the trail, as I recalled from my father’s story the possibly intimidating effects of the thing upon animals. It didn’t seem to bother him, though, and I released the breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.
“In time for what?” I asked as we found a formation—Luke in the lead, Dalt behind him and to the right, Nayda to the left of the trail, rear, me to her right and somewhat back.
“I cannot tell for certain,” she said, “because she is still sedated. However, I do know that she is no longer being moved; and I have the impression that her abductors have taken refuge in the tower, where the trail is much wider.”
“Hm,” I said. “You wouldn’t have happened to notice the rate of change in width per unit of distance traveled on this trail, would you?”
“I was in liberal arts,” she said, smiling. “Remember?”
She turned suddenly then, glancing in Luke’s direction. He was still an entire horse’s length ahead, eyes front—though he had looked back moments before.
“Damn you!” she said softly. “Being with you both this way gets me to thinking about school. Then I start talking that way—”
“In English,” I said.
“Did I say that in English?”
“Yes.”
“Shit! Help me if you catch me at it, will you?”
“Of course,” I said. “It seems to show you’d enjoyed it somewhat, despite its being a job Dara’d laid on you. And you’re probably the only ty’iga with a degree from Berkeley.”
“Yes, I enjoyed it—confused as I was over which of you was which. Those were the happiest days in my life, with you and Luke, back in school. For years I tried to learn your mothers’ names so I’d know who I was supposed to be protecting. You were both so cagey, though.”
“It’s in the genes, I guess,” I observed. “I enjoyed your company as Vinta Bayle—appreciated your protection as others, too.”
“I suffered,” she said, “when Luke began his yearly attempts on your life. If he were the son of Dara I was supposed to protect, it shouldn’t have mattered. But it did. I was already very fond of both of you. All I could tell was that you were both of the blood of Amber. I didn’t want either of you harmed. The hardest thing was when you went away, and I was sure Luke had lured you into the mountains of New Mexico to kill you. By then, I suspected very strongly that you were the one, but I was not certain. I was in love with Luke, I had taken over the body of Dan Martinez, and I was carrying a pistol. I followed you everywhere I could, knowing that if he tried to harm you the geas I was under would force me to shoot the man I loved.”
“You shot first, though. We were just standing talking, by the side of the road. He shot back in self-defense.”
“I know. But everything seemed to indicate that you were in peril. He’d taken you to a perfect spot for an execution, at an ideal time—”
“No,” I said. “Your shot went wide, and you left yourself open for what followed.”
“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
“You solved the problem of possibly having to shoot Luke by setting up a situation where he shot you.”
“I couldn’t do that, under a geas.”
“Maybe not consciously,” I said. “So something stronger than the geas found a way.”
“You really believe that?”
“Yes, and it’s all right for you to admit it now. You’re released from the geas. My mother told me. You told me—I think.”
She nodded. “I don’t know exactly when it came undone, or how,” she said. “But it’s gone—though I’d still try to protect you if something threatened. It’s good that you and Luke are really friends, and—”
“So why the secret?” I interrupted. “Why not just tell him you were Gail? Surprise the hell out of him—pleasantly.”
“You don’t understand,” she said. “He broke up with me, remember? Now I’ve another chance. It’s like it was, all over again. He—likes me a lot. I’m afraid to say, ‘I’m really the girl you once broke up with.’ It might get him to thinking of all the reasons why, and make him decide he was right the first time.”
“That’s silly,” I said. “I don’t know what reasons he gave. He never told me about it. Just said there’d been an argument. But I’m sure they were specious. I know he liked you. I’m sure he really broke up with you because he was a son of Amber about to come home on some very nasty business, and there was no room for what he thought was a normal shadow girl in the picture. You’d played your part too well.”
“Is that why you broke up with Julia?” she asked.
“No,” I said.
“Sorry.”
I noticed the black trail had widened about a foot since we’d begun talking. I was in the market for a mathematical problem just then.
Chapter 10
And so we rode—six paces along a city street, amid the blare of horns, our black way edged by skid marks; a quarter mile along a black sand beach, beside a soft green sea, stirring palms to our left; across a tarnished snowfield; beneath a bridge of stone, our way a dead and blackened streambed; then to prairie; back to wooded way—and Tiger never flinched, even when Dalt put a booted foot through a windshield and broke off an antenna.
The way continued to widen, to perhaps twice its width when I had first come upon it. Stark trees were more common within it now, standing like photographic negatives of their bright mates but a few feet off the trail. While the leaves and branches of these latter were regularly stirred, we felt no wind at all. The sounds of our voices, of our mounts’ hooves, came somehow muted now, also. Our entire course had a constant, wavery twilight atmosphere to it, no matter that a few paces away—which brief excursion we essayed many times—it might be high noon or midnight. Dead-looking birds were perched within the blackened trees, though they seemed on occasion to move, and the raspy, croaking sounds that sometimes came to us may well have been theirs.
At one time, a fire raged to our right; at another, we seemed to be passing near the foot of a glacier on the left. Our trail continued to widen—nothing like the great Black Road Corwin had described to me from the days of the war, but big enough now for us all to ride abreast.
“Luke,” I said, after a time.
“Yeah?” he answered, from my left. Nayda rode to my right now, and Dalt to her right. “What’s up?”
“I don’t want to be king.”
“Me neither,” he said. “How hard they pushing you?”
“I’m afraid they’re going to grab me and crown me if I go back. Everybody in my way died suddenly. They really plan to stick me on the throne, to marry me to Coral—”
“Uh-huh,” he said, “and I’ve two questions about it. First, will it work?”
“The Logrus seems to think it will, at least for a time—which is all politics is about, anyhow.”
“Second,” he said, “if you feel about the place the way I feel about Kashfa, you’re not going to let it go to hell if you can help it—even if it means some personal misery. You don’t want to take the throne, though, so you must have wor
ked out some alternative remedy. What is it?”
I nodded as the trail turned sharply to the left and headed uphill. Something small and dark scuttled across our path.
“I’ve a notion—not even a full idea,” I said, “which I want to discuss with my father.”
“Tall order,” he said. “You know for sure that he’s even alive?”
“I talked to him not all that long ago—very briefly. He’s a prisoner, somewhere. All I know for sure is that it’s somewhere in the vicinity of the Courts—because I can reach him by Trump from there, but nowhere else.”
“Tell me about this communication,” he said.
And so I did, black bird and all.
“Sounds like busting him out’s going to be tricky,” he said. “And you think your mom’s behind it?”
“Yep.”
“I thought I was the only one with these maternal problems. But it figures, seeing as yours trained mine.”
“How come we turned out so normal?” I said.
He just stared at me for several seconds. Then he started to laugh.
“Well, I feel normal,” I said.
“Of course,” he said quickly then, “and that’s what counts. Tell me, if it came to an out-and-out crossing of powers, do you think you could beat Dara?”
“Hard to say,” I told him. “I’m stronger now than I ever was before, because of the spikard. But I’m beginning to believe she’s very good.”
“What the hell’s a spikard?” So I told him that story, too.
“That’s why you were so flashy back in the church when you were fighting with Jurt?” he said.
“That’s right.”
“Let’s see it.”
I tried to pull it off, but it wouldn’t pass the knuckle.
So I simply extended my hand. Luke reached for it. His fingers halted a couple of inches above it.
“It’s holding me off, Merle. Protective little devil.”
“Hell,” I said, “I’m not a shapeshifter for nothing.” I took hold of it then, slimmed my finger suddenly, and slid it off. “Here.”
He held it in the palm of his left hand as we bounced along, regarding it through narrowed eyes. Suddenly, I felt dizzy. Withdrawal symptoms from the thing? I forced myself upright, reversed my breathing, refused to let it show.
“Heavy,” Luke said at last. “I can feel the power there. Other things, too. It won’t let me in, though.”
I reached for it and he drew his hand away.
“I can feel it in the air all around us,” he said. “Merle, this thing lays a spell on anybody who wears it.
I shrugged.
“Yes,” I said. “A benign one, though. It’s done nothing to harm me, and it’s helped me a number of times.”
“But can you trust anything that came to you in such an odd way—almost by trickery, caused you to abandon Frakir when she tried to warn you about it, and for all you know has been influencing your behavior ever since you put it on?”
“I admit to a kind of disorientation at first,” I said, “but I think that was just in the way of accommodation to the levels of voltage it draws. I’ve been back to normal for some time now.”
“How can you tell for sure? Maybe it’s brainwashed you.”
“Do I seem brainwashed to you?”
“No. I was just trying to say that I wouldn’t completely trust anything with such questionable credentials.”
“Well taken,” I agreed, holding forth my hand. “But so far the benefits have outweighed any hypothetical dangers. Consider me warned, and I’ll take my chances.”
He handed it back.
“If I think it’s making you act weird I’m going to hit you over the head and pull it off, though.”
“Fair enough,” I said, slipping it back on. Immediately, I felt a rush of energy throughout my system as the lines of control were reestablished.
“If you’re not sure you can force the information out of your mother,” he said, “how do you propose finding Corwin and freeing him?”
“Several things suggest themselves,” I said. “The simplest way may be a foot in the door technique. That is, I’d open all of the channels on the spikard and go for another Trump contact. As soon as there’s any sort of opening I’d just push ahead with full force, jamming any spells that try to stop me and burning them out.”
“Sounds as if it could be dangerous.”
“I can’t think of any way to go about this that wouldn’t be.”
“Then why haven’t you tried it?”
“It only occurred to me recently, and I haven’t had the time since then.”
“However you go about it, you’re going to need some help,” he said. “So count me in.”
“Thanks, Luke. I—”
“Now, about the king business,” he said. “What happens if you simply refuse to take the throne? Who’s next in line?”
“It’s a bit tangled when you come to Sawall,” I said. “By rights, Mandor should be first in line of succession from our House. He’d removed himself from the line years ago, though.”
“Why?”
“I believe he claimed he was unfit to rule.”
“No offense, Merle. But he seems like the only one of you who is fit for the job.”
“Oh, without a doubt,” I responded. “Most of the Houses have someone like him, though. There’s usually a nominal head and a de facto one, someone for show and someone for scheming. Mandor likes the climate behind the scenes.”
“Sounds as if your House has two,” he said.
“I’m not really clear on it,” I said. “I don’t know Dara’s status right now in her father’s House—Helgram—or her mother’s—Hendrake. But it might be worth a power struggle within Sawall if that’s where the next king is coming from. Still, the more I learn of Mandor the more intimidating such a struggle would seem. I’d guess they’re cooperating.”
“I take it you’re next in line, and then Jurt?”
“Actually, our brother Despil is next after me. Jurt said that Despil would probably step aside for him, but I think that was wishful thinking. I’m not at all sure he would. Anyhow, Jurt says now that he isn’t interested.”
“Ha! I think he’s just taking a different approach. You whipped him too many times, and he’s trying to get in good with you. Hope that spikard can protect your back.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’d like to believe him. He spent a lot of time making sure that it wouldn’t be easy, though.”
“Supposing you all decline. Who’s next?”
“I’m not certain,” I said, “but I think it would go to Hendrake then.”
“Damn,” Luke said. “It’s as twisted a place as Amber, isn’t it?”
“Neither one’s twisted, exactly. Just a little complicated, till you’ve learned the ropes.”
“What say I just listen, and you fill me in on everything that you haven’t so far?”
“Good idea.”
So I talked for a long while, breaking to summon food and water. We halted twice during that time, causing me to realize just how tired I had become. And briefing Luke reminded me yet again that I should be telling all of this to Random. But if I got in touch and tried it I was certain he would order me back to Amber. And I couldn’t disobey a direct order from the king, even if I was almost his opposite number.
“We’re getting nearer,” Nayda announced somewhat later, and I noted that our roadway had widened even more, almost to the point she’d described. I drew a jolt of energy into my system, digested it, and kept going.
Shortly thereafter, she remarked, “Much nearer.”
“Like just around the corner?” Luke asked.
“Could be,” she answered. “I can’t be more precise, the condition she’s in.”
But a little later, we heard distant shouts.
Luke drew rein.
“Something about a tower,” he said.
She nodded.
“Were they heading for it, holing up
in it, or defending themselves there?”
“All of the above,” she said. “I understand now. Her captors were pursued, headed for a place of refuge, reached it, are there now.”
“How come you’re suddenly that precise?”
She gave me a quick look that I took as a request for an explanation other than ty’iga powers.
“I was using the spikard,” I offered, “trying to see whether I could give her a clearer vision.”
“Good,” Luke said. “Can you boost it even more, so we can see what we’re up against?”
“I can try,” I said, narrowing my eyes at her in inquiry. She responded with a very slight nod.
I wasn’t certain how to go about it, so I just fed her energy in the way of that jolt I’d given myself a while back.
“Yes,” she said after a few moments, “Coral and her captors—six of them, I believe—have taken refuge in a tower near here. They are under attack.”
“How large is the party of attackers?” Luke asked.
“Small,” she said. “Quite small. I can’t give you a number.”
“Let’s go and see,” Luke said, and he led the way, Dalt behind him.
“Three or four,” Nayda whispered to me, “but they’re Pattern ghosts. That’s probably all it can maintain this far from home, on a Black Road.”
“Ouch,” I said. “This makes it tricky.”
“How so?”
“It means I have relatives on both sides.”
“It also looks as if Amber’s ghosts and the Court’s demons are only agents, and that it’s really a confrontation between the Logrus and the Pattern.”
“Damn! Of course!” I said. “It could easily escalate into another of those. I’m going to have to warn Luke what we’re riding into.”
“You can’t! Not without telling him what I am!”
“I’ll tell him I learned it myself—that I had a sudden insight into a new spell.”
“But what then? Which side are you on? What do we do?”
“Neither,” I said. “We’re on our own, and against both of them.”
“You’re crazy! There’s no place you can hide, Merle! The Powers divide the universe between them!”
“Luke!” I cried. “I just probed ahead, learned the attackers are Pattern ghosts!”
The Chronicles of Amber Page 184