Edan spends a little time in the gardens of the Parisian palace, just walking about and acting out any number of possible conversations in his head; but finally, after the sun has crossed its zenith, he gives up and goes in search of his father.
Edan finds a page exiting his father's suite. He informs Edan that the Prince and the royal portraitist left for the docks about half an hour ago. He offers to take Edan to them.
[Assuming Edan follows.]
On the far side of Corwin's magnificent royal gardens is a path leading to the tree-lined bank of the slow Seine River, which meanders past the city and the palace on the way to the sea.
Prince Bleys is sitting at the tiller of a boat, next to Brij. Both are outfitted in Parisian style for boating. A painter is working on a canvas from the pier.
[OOC: Not exactly this painting, but similar to it.]
Of course they would be doing something like this. 'Awkward' doesn't even begin to cover it, Edan thinks. He pulls a little at his collar (the Parisian suit brought to him more than a little uncomfortable), stands off to the side, and smiles a little, watching the painter work.
The painter works deliberately, and seems to try different things before he settles on one approach. His treatment of water and light are magnificent, although his Brij has no left arm as of yet.
"Look, it's your son," says Brij, turning head towards him.
Bleys breaks out into a grin. "Edan, my boy! Come aboard! Don't worry, he'll paint around you, if you get in frame. If he even needs us at all."
Edan nods, first to Bleys and Brij, then to the portraitist. Carefully, he makes his way down and into the boat. "Of all the things I would have thought to do in Paris," he says, "being painted was not one of them. As-salaam alaykum... I hope that I am not intruding."
Bleys gestures with his arms, rocking the boat slightly. Neither he nor Brij have any problems keeping seated. "Well, he's run completely out of black pigment, so both Corwin and Florimel were out of the question. Poor chap saw us strolling in the garden and begged us to sit for him. Under the circumstances, how could one possibly refuse?"
Brij laughs at Bleys' story. "I'm please to have a chance to spend some time with you, Edan. Bleys has told me so much about you." She reaches out and pats Edan's knee.
"Not true!," Bleys objects. "She only says that out of politeness, to put you at ease..." Edan's father turns to the painter. "Monsieur, may we slip away for a bit. You do not mind?" The painter nods.
Bleys turns back to Edan. "Cast us off, please. A brief sail on the river will be pleasant and private at this time of day."
Brij opens the frilly parasol she's been leaning against and angles it over her shoulder to protect her from the sun.
Edan nods, casts them off, sets the oars (thanking himself for asking to learn absolutely everything while on shipboard), and rows them out to a point where they can raise the sail. While he rows, he says, "This is a nice place. It is most unfortunate, the circumstances that led us here. I would not have minded a visit in happier times."
Bleys raises the sail and sprawls in the back of the small boat. He leans on the tiller, steering with the crook of his elbow and holds the main sheet between his fingers as if it's a cigarette.
After a few minutes, he starts humming a tune to keep time with the rowing, something that stuck in his mind that he heard the Amber sailors sing weeks ago. Then he remembers the words that went with the song, flushes slightly, and falls silent.
"If you were a fugitive from the King's Justice and his nephew had made a trump of you, would you have allowed it? Taking a trump contact, even for an experienced user, is a risk. How hard would it have been for someone to mentally dominate her and make her walk to the nearest one of Corwin's officers? That's assuming her mind tolerated the contact and didn't break instantly.
"The circumstances are deplorable, but the cause was carelessness. I'm much more concerned with Cambina's death. We don't yet know the cause and I don't expect we'll like it when we do."
Brij leans into the wind, strong enough this evening to take them firmly upstream towards the city. "I didn't know either of them. It's at least as jarring to find dozens of relatives as it is to lose two new ones in rapid succession. I think more of us are in shock than we would admit to. But you know, in some ways it seems as if it's actually making us work together when we could have descended into civil war. That's what used to happen when a strong emperor died where I come from."
Bleys nods. "It happens in enough shadows that it is a reflection or echo of something. Something past or future, I don't know, but something. If I didn't think he never really considered the possibility of actually dying, I'd be convinced that Father had arranged all of this for that express purpose. It would be just like him to arrange for a trial by fire for his successor, to teach him the advantages of cooperation."
He looks back at the little boat's wake. "I shall have to ask Dworkin sometime." He turns back. "We shouldn't let the past interfere with now, though." Bleys smiles his winningest smile. "Paris is like Corwin and I enjoy them both. It's like looking at a man looking at a mirror."
Brij drops her hand over the gunwale into the water and takes up the song Edan was humming.
Edan crosses his arms and smiles. "All right, you asked for it." In his best singing voice, he starts, "In Portsmouth town there lived a maid, Mark well what I do say! In Portsmouth town there lived a maid, The British Navy was her trade..."
He only blushes a little, two or three verses in, and he keeps smiling; but his heart isn't fully in it, remembering why he sought out Bleys in the first place.
Brij laughs and claps. At a break in the song, she asks "Do you know the verse where the maid ends up being a man in a kilt whose name is 'Jock'?" She turns to Bleys. "I always liked this one."
Bleys just smiles indulgently and sails on. If the painter were still there, his father at the tiller would be a near-ideal subject in the late day's sunlight.
Edan just smiles. "Regrettably, no," he says. "I heard a number of shanties, but didn't pursue it that far. I had to leave suddenly, to visit Clarissa." He shrugs. "Of course, I kept getting delayed on the way, like the Race to Madness."
Brij smiles. "Everybody sings in Texorami, and usually about sex. What's the Race to Madness? Sounds like you'd want to lose..."
Bleys continues to busy himself with sundry nautical activites.
"Far away from here, there is a tree," Edan says. "Its name is Ygg. It marks the end of Order... or the beginning of Chaos. It is the point where different rules apply. Near to the tree there is a castle, and a Duke, and a race to the Tree and back. The Race to Madness, a race for a great prize. Madness... had already overtaken the Duke... but the race remained."
Bleys smiles at Edan. "It is a fascinating place and the race is invaluable training for a young Prince with a sorcerous bent. Not more difficult than the Pattern, of course, but it requires a longer term effort and significant determination. Edan raised the family record to two and one."
Brij adjusts her hat to block the sun and looks at Edan from under the brim, and looks young enough to be someone's child instead of a grandmother-to-be. "I remember how lost and scared I was the first time I was dragged into another shadow. I can't imagine a place where they go mad. What was it like for you, seeing it for the first time?"
"Really, it wasn't that bad," Edan says. "Fiona and Brennan prepared me for what was coming, and I ran into an escort of grackleflints... Clarissa's troops... not long after I entered. I guess the worst part was how disconcerting everything is. Time isn't, and doesn't. Space becomes something of a toy for your imagination and will. You have to learn the knack for keeping an area around you relatively stable. Sorcery becomes stronger, which was a pleasant discovery." The mention of sorcery reminds him of something, and he looks up. "Two and one?"
Bleys smiles. "You are the third of us to try, yes, but we shan't dwell on the dead. Can you see if they placed a basket under that thwart? I find myself in need of refreshment."
Brij smiles, amused. "As if you just didn't." She turns back to Edan. "It's somewhat disconcerting to meet everyone at funerals, or chases, but I suppose the wedding is too far to keep myself away from my new family. How long will you be staying in Paris, Edan?"
"Probably not long," Edan says. He reaches under the indicated seat and starts unpacking a basket if he finds one. "I'll be off travelling soon, but hopefully I will be closer to Xanadu and Amber than I have been." He smiles suddenly. "Chases, hah. You have certainly jumped in feet-first, haven't you? I came in during Daeon's funeral, but had at least a little time to acclimate myself. Father is an invaluable resource for information, though."
Brij nods, "He certainly has been. I was so lucky when I was handed to him to help me be ready to meet the family. It's been pretty amazing to be around people who are ... like us. I don't have to hold back."
Bleys smiles. "We've been practicing some of the more esoteric Bellaic martial arts. They're a good match for her gymnastic training." He takes the wine that Edan has unpacked and pours two glasses, and looks at Edan, his eyebrow up in an uncanny imitation of Julian.
Edan takes it, and stares into the glass. "He is of Shadow," he says. "I'll spend a score of years saying that in my head, and getting used to it. Fiona and I talked about that."
Brij looks at Bleys, a puzzled look on his face. He signals her in the negative and she does not interrupt to ask Edan what he means.
His head swivels back in Brij's direction. "Do you know classical ballet? Ballrooom dancing? We should dance, sometime."
Bleys hands the second glass to Brij and gets a third for himself.
Brij lights up. "I love to dance. We used music to provide tempo and cues when I was learning gymnastics. Just last year I was in a celebrity dance thing, for my charity, Find the Missing Children."
Bleys smiles. "We've found yours, of course."
"Found... what? Missing children?" He glances back and forth from Brij to Bleys. "That's new. You had missing children?"
Brij laughs. "Child. He means Folly, who disappeared from our ... shadow?" She seems hesitant, and turns to Bleys, who nods. "When she went to Amber, that is. From our point of view, Syd disappeared a long time ago, then Folly. Then Soren, but by then I was in the know, but I couldn't tell anyone. Not really. Not without getting locked up. Her band was considered cursed. Ash and his little girlfriend went looking for them, probably based on hints I gave him, and then I disappeared.
She smiles. "My first book was nonfiction, about being the mother of the missing girl. It wasn't true, mostly, although I thought it was at the time. My second was a novel about people who walk through parallel dimensions, stealing the brilliant and talented and taking them off to another world and all the loose ends they leave. It was also true, mostly, but most people thought I wrote it for catharsis."
Edan smiles reflexively, then takes a sip from his glass; the look of almost comical apprehension is replaced by an almost comical look of relief. "Oh, that's much better than... what was that stuff? Beer. Yes, that. It is good to find family again," he says with a smile. "And, I suppose, a relief to finally see tangible evidence that you're not crazy. I guess cousin Folly didn't start making Trumps until after she left."
Bleys laughs from the tiller position, "Never worry about whether you're crazy or not, son. If you are not and suspect you may be, no amount of evidence will convince you. If you are, then the authorities will be along in good time to take you to bedlam." He glances at the sail. "Prepare to come about."
Brij ducks under the rapidly approaching boom, laughing and throws herself into the seat on the now-windward side of the boat. She manages not to spill her wine, either.
Edan ducks under the boom, too, in an effortless reflex, almost like he's floating. "You're absolutely right," he says with the start of a smile. "I have so many other things to worry about. Well, two, actually. One has to do with Trumps- did the old decks in Amber, did they survive? I think I will need to ask the king if I may borrow one."
Bleys chuckles. "It takes more than a Pattern-breaking shift in reality to damage those, although they didn't work for some time, I hear. Sometime we really must sit down and work out why, and see if we can localize and induce the effect. It might come in handy. Don't let the King charge you too much for the loan of a deck. If worse comes to worse, I could probably lay hands on the deck that Corwin threw to me when I fell off Kolvir."
Bleys gets a raised eyebrow at the thought of such reality-bending mathematics, and a slight smile from Edan at the offer. He nods in agreement. "I will find out the going rate first, and get back to you," he says. "Don't go out of your way yet. The other thing, well..." He glances at Brij, smiles more fully, and looks back to his father. "...is a case of indigestion. Possibly."
Bleys looks grave. "Indigestion?" he says. "I've often thought the Faellans would have paid more attention to Master Dworkin's teachings if he'd used more prandial metaphors to describe the cosmos."
Edan snorts. "But would the Clarissans?" he asks, finishing the joke. "Now I am in a situation where I don't want to leave myself vulnerable to the next shrewd Moonrider that I meet, and yet I don't want to wander off alone and try to take care of things and end up needing help. I would only trust you and Fiona to help me here, and you know much more about me than Fiona. Either way... you could say I've learned a valuable lesson."
Bleys nods. "Moonriders are tricky. They think obliquely. It's difficult to discern their intentions. They cultivate this to the point that they do not always understand themselves. It seems an unfortunate way to live, but their Queen is insane. Unlike our monarch, of course."
Bleys gets a raised eyebrow on this one.
"All lessons are valuable to some degree, but the cost of tuition is worth considering. Tell me the lesson, and how you are sure you have truly mastered it."
"Be very careful about foreign food," Edan says, "especially when you don't know what it's going to do to you." He shakes his head. "I'm not going to speak out against experimentation or curiosity, but the lesson I learned has to deal with things Chaotic. I understand, now. We are Ordered. That is our strength, our advantage over the more distaff members of our Family. The Lords of Chaos, while interesting in their own way... theirs is not our way. Embracing their customs, doing what they do, it weakens us. Leaves us vulnerable. Doing so might be the quickest way, or the easiest way, but not the right way. The wise man does not forge the sword that will kill him. Neither does he Eat a thing that will lessen him."
Bleys nods. "It is a fascinating lesson, true, but do not learn this lesson too well. Knowing their customs allows you to take their measure. Taking the best from their ways can strengthen you. Becoming them takes it too far, and you limit yourself unnecessarily to their limits.
He turns to Brij. "We are outsiders everywhere, letting the shadows lie for us in all but the few outposts of Pattern. We all want those places because they are not shadows. No matter how much we love the places we find in shadow, we know we are different in ways that the billions of people on each of the infinite shadows cannot truly grasp.
"We fool them as a matter of course, and do not even think of it. We may not, as Corwin did not in his absence, even know we do so. It is when we fool ourselves that we can do the most damage to them and to each other."
Bleys pulls on a line, and repositions the tiller. The little ship speeds up. "It is a good lesson. How else can you apply it?"
Edan thinks a moment, then smiles. "It is unlikely that the Moonriders will be sharing their customs with me, or with Garrett or Signy. The Altamareans, perhaps... plus, there is the matter of my affine. I think Fiona mistrusts it, but then I have given my word to protect it, and it has proven its loyalty to me many times already."
Bleys nods. "Nothing that strikes closer to home than that? Hmm. Where is your affine, anyway?"
"In my rooms, at the moment," Edan says. "I have been careful to avoid situations where I brought along Kyauta and met Family who would not enjoy its presence, or have it along when I anticipated discussing it directly. Except Fiona, of course. Kyauta has had to wait without me before, but he is recently fed and I would have heard already if Paris were injuring it." He pauses. "As to the other, I'd have to ask what you meant. You could be referring to my bout of... indigestion... or learning the customs of Xanadu and leaving behind those of the Dar-es Salaam, or discoveries about religion and the Merciful One, or maybe even something else. What are your thoughts?"
Bleys smiles and pulls in the sail, sending the little boat racing up the slow river. "My thoughts? I've dozens. It's how I keep from being bored. My thought on that matter is that I cannot learn lessons for you, and can only sometimes point out where there may be more lessons to learn.
He shakes his head. "It's more useful to ask you what you might learn and watch you explore and integrate your answers than it ever would be to tell you anything."
Brij laughs. "That would never have worked with my daughter. Too hotheaded..."
Edan smiles. "Welcome to the deep thinker side of the family. Observe, analyze, predict, test. Rinse and repeat. And repeat, and repeat." To Bleys, he says, "All right, there is an obvious other item, that of my mother. And her father. I am afriti, as much as I am a Barimen. If Clarissa has not already told you, I have already taken on a fiery form, more than once. You could say that that is becoming a thing of shadow, a lessening. However, it is the only path I have found, the only link to sorcerous ability. I will never get completely away from it. It is part of who I am." He pauses. "And the affine. You think it is a weakness, also?"
Bleys shakes his head. "A weakness is anything you let be a weakness. Some would say it is a weakness that I care for you and your sister, or my own sister. It is not. The strength of total isolation keeps one from being manipulated and betrayed, but is no way for a man to live. We are social creatures, every one of us, and our relationships are our strengths. If they were of no value, we would never care enough to fight for them or within them."
He pulls on the cord again, and the boat speeds up again, the trailing edge of the sail almost, but not quite, causing the little boat to come about.
Edan's sense of balance is spectacular, but still his grip tightens on the rail as the boat enters a teeth-clenching tight turn. Otherwise, he stands there in uffish thought, wondering if Bleys is subtly trying to link up the statement about relationships with the earlier one about lessons learned.
The wind whips along behind them, almost as if Bleys were manipulating probability. It seems unlikely this close to Paris, but the breeze is nearly perfect. Bleys steers towards the far bank, keeping the rudder and mainsail under tight control. The boat is now definitely heeling to one side as she speeds downriver even faster than she went up.
"All right," he finally says. "I agree with you. Every relationship I have made has turned out to be an advantage, one way or another. But it does lead me back to my problem. The one relationship exception that proved the rule. Would you watch my, er, figurative 'back' while I do a little meditation?"
Bleys beams. "Of course, my boy, of course. Right this moment or shall we wait for a more contemplative moment?"
Edan looks back in the direction of Paris. "Normally I would say as soon as possible," he says. "But we may be too close to a Pattern for you to do anything if you need to. If you think you can handle adverse events, I'd rather do it here."
Bleys nods. "How about now, if you have a few hours? We can sail far enough quickly, with this wind and current. Paris is new, even if her sewers are old."
Edan nods. "All right, then." He flashes Brij a smile, and arranges himself cross-legged on the bow side of the boat.
Bleys switches positions with Brij. "Wake me if we get to the ocean," he tells her.
With a deep cleansing breath, [Edan] lets his eyes droop closed and reaches for that part of his mind where he's walled off what he's Eaten from the Giver.
In his mind, the memories are locked inside a gem, and Edan begins, like a jeweller, to open it.
First he feels a need for water, as if he will suffocate without it. It soon subsides. The memories here are alien, as if Edan does not have a key he needs to open them. He knows, somehow, that they are the bridge to the Giver.
Already, I must take the plunge, Edan thinks. Very well. Language... there are two ways to tackle this problem. One is Chaotic, where Edan would change himself to fit the memories and then absorb them. Edan elects the other, one of the most Ordered of approaches: mathematics. He immerses himself in the memories, observing, seeking relationships between sounds and cadence, looking for patterns. He bends his will towards learning the language, approaching it as if he were trying to break a code or cipher.
[Card Draw: Overlooking the Diamond...Reversed]
The language, the code, the memory, the mathematical abstraction -- the gem is all these things. Edan studies it, turning it over in his mind, searching and probing it. Deep within the whitish-blue depths, Edan sees an imperfection. This is the handle into this watery stone.
It grows bigger in his mind, becoming a sea of purest water. The imperfection grows as well and Edan sinks in his head towards the bottom. Soon, he is submerged and in front of him are a series of carvings on round stones.
They are Uxmali code wheels. Edan knows this, but does not know how he knows.
Edan feels a sense of elation first, as he knows this is the key he needs to pursue; that quickly fades, however, because he knows the enormity of work he'll have to do, literally in his head, to make sense of this. The Giver told the truth, is his first thought; then Edan immediately gets to work. The first step is dedicated to observation, a detailed comparison of symbols from one wheel to another. Basic questions emerge. Are they true codes, a secret language invented to conceal the meaning of the message? Are they ciphers, scrambled letters meant to conceal plain words and phrases? Or are they both? Do the code symbols have any similarity to the flowing Uxmali script Edan remembers from his trip there?
The writing seems related to the Uxmali script, in the interconnectedness of meaning of the pictographs and the circular or cyclical nature of the meaning. Edan senses that the wrong approach would be to attempt to solve this by attacking a part rather than working to discern the whole.
What is most striking is that the Uxmali script is distinctive in its transience and action but this writing is more connected, as if any part of it is connected to every part but the application of action or energy to the writing might make it split apart into a new thing.
The wheel is the key, but it's not clear how.
Cyclical...
So, Edan thinks. The writing connects, closer than that of Thari. It comes back to itself. The meaning is more in the whole, not in the parts. I need a change in perspective.
Switching gears, Edan holds his hands out, palms facing, perhaps a foot apart. Water swirls as heat begins to build, slowly, until there is a sphere of moving water between his hands. He knows that his body, far removed from him at this point, is holding a sphere of fire in the same kind of position. He hopes Brij doesn't panic.
From this position, he weaves a spell. Fingers of water swirl out, dividing, stretching, until he's touched all the different pictograms on the code wheel. He eases his mind into the pictographs, absorbing them, looking for meaning in their structure and combinations; then he lets his mind move outward, observing from a higher vantage or dimension. It is as if one has drawn a line between two points on a plane, and that line is the whole world; then moving back to look at the line and the plane from the height of a third dimension. In this way, Edan tries to look at the messages around him, seeking similarities between them and the many combinations of the code wheel he's linked to all at once.
[Spell: Cipher Sight: seeking patterns and meaning in the messages using an awareness of all the code wheel pictograms at once. The concept of paradox is a big factor here. Prowess + Performance (1 minute) = Target (self) + Duration (1 minute) + Effect]
Everything Edan touches changes and disperses as he touches it, only to re-form when he withdraws his attention.
The distance helps, and Edan recognizes the central symbol of the primary wheel, which means 'water'. Where he has disturbed it, it's a related symbol that seems to be a variant on the topic. 'Firewater' is Edan's best guess.
His father's voice comes to him, as if from no place at all. "You may need to bring less of yourself to bear on the problem. It's easier to find a torch at midnight than at noon."
Edan frowns, still looking at the symbols. "Yes," is what he says. Pulling the threads back on his spell, he concentrates instead on the central symbols of the other wheels, wondering if there's meaningful connections between wheels, or perhaps a progression to follow and extrapolate from.
Edan spends an immeasurable moment concentrating on the symbols and their connections when he has an insight.
This is not a thing he should try to learn, but instead a thing that can teach him. It's all a matter of letting it wash over him rather than probing it.
When he realizes this, he begins to feel as if he knows things. Things he has never experienced, but that he knows as if he had practiced for years.
He thinks he could make it rain.
The sense of elation Edan feels at assimilating the language rapidly drains away at this new knowledge. It's cold and it stinks and it causes his whole body to convulse in a wracking shudder. He cries out, almost a wordless bleat, as he turns away from this power.
Edan does so, but it is difficult. Everywhere he turns there is water; pure, clear, and shimmering. Each drop is an ocean at another remove, each lake a teardrop. The symbols are the way water speaks to itself, the rhythm and the flow and the pull and what it is to be the tide.
For a moment, all Edan can do is let it move around and through him. Only for a moment.
He could break the gem open, freeing what he knows, or he could bottle it up. He's not sure he can keep it bottled up, but he could try to assimilate it over time. It would, after all, still be there, waiting.
"I... I can't," Edan says, knowing Bleys can hear him. "That creature was cowardly and false. Its power smells of foulness and corruption. Just the thought of this, being a part of me... it disgusts me. It sickens me. There are cleaner ways to make rain than this. I cannot help but feel somehow infected by it. I can't keep that as a part of me, forever. I don't understand how Lords of Chaos do so."
Bleys voice is with him, instantly. "There is nothing you cannot, only what you will not. It is worthwhile to have a strength, but if you have but a single strength, it must win every fight for you, no matter the varied strengths of your competitors.
"If you have many strengths, you can choose the most advantageous one to use against your opponents.
"Before you reject water explicitly, I will remind you of two things. Primus, it's a good tool to have to surprise people with when you are known for fire. And secundus, it is the element most closely associated with your sister."
Edan falls silent. It is a long minute before he says, softly, "Damn you and your logic."
"In all likelihood, yes." Edan cannot see his father, but from the tone, he can assume his father has that small grin and is nodding as he speaks.
It is only then that he realizes he's kneeling, there in his own mind, and is slowly, nonsensically pounding at an imaginary floor with an imaginary fist. He stops, and settles back on his heels, and closes his eyes, and regulates his breathing.
"All right," he says. "If I can speak the language of fire. I can learn the language of water. Not all of its practitioners are like the Giver. Brita does it. And you say Paige..." Edan spends a moment, amused, wondering who he's trying to convince with that kind of argument. Then he opens his mind again and lets the water flow through him and speak to him.
Edan opens himself and listens to the voice. His watery tutor speaks without words, revealing things that seem more like Edan is remembering than that he is learning.
Water is about pressure, and motion, and change over time, long or short. Everything it touches changes somewhat becoming more wet if nothing else. Everything that touches water leaves an impression in the water, so it become a part of the water. Water is the element of understanding, because it goes everywhere, into everything, around and over and through, following the laws of water. Water is patient, because it cannot be otherwise.
It goes on at length, this memory, washing over him, washing through him, washing him clean, pulling away and flushing away the weak, the uncertain, the wrong, leaving a stronger, cleaner, brighter Edan behind it, and a wetter one.
"What, my son, is the difference between an Efrit an a Marid?"
Edan smiles, just a little. "Marids have patience," he says. "They follow their heads, while Afriti follow their hearts. If they embody what I have just seen, then I understand them more than I did. Marids seek for information, for knowledge. Afrits for power. Fire is quick and strong and bright. Fire is the spark of life within us, the drive to complete what we started. Water is patience, understanding. It moves at a different pace. I did not give marids enough credit. I must think on this."
Bleys seems satisfied with this. "Well, then. Good. Are you ready to come back or do you need more time now?"
Edan shakes his head. "No, I am ready to return. Thank you, Father. This matter has long sat on my mind, and it was long past time to address it."
"Yes, it did get soggy, didn't it?"
As Edan shakes his head he finds his eyes opening and himself looking out over a wide river estuary. The little boat has sailed downriver to the sea. Edan shivers, and notices that he is completely soaked. Bleys and Brij are not.
Edan pinches a bit of fabric between thumb and forefinger. "Brilliant," he says. "I don't suppose they'll consider this the latest fashion trend when we get back."
"We've sailed some distance from Paris." Bleys smiles. "I'm sure that if you look under the forward thwart, you'll find a bundle of clothes that will suit you. And some goat cheese and wine, which I will partake of."
"Coming about," says Brij, ducking under the spar. The wind, improbably, starts blowing up the river.
Edan smiles a little and heads forward. "Most appreciated. It would be hard to look princely coming in with me sneezing every few seconds. I'll change clothes and then I'll break out the-"
He stops short, scratches the back of his head, then stares at Brij, realizing finally that they're all on a small boat with almost no privacy.
Brij smiles back, obliviously, pulling on the line to trim the mainsail.
Neatly trapped between Bleys's offer of a gift, Brij's choice of duties on the boat, and his own sodden state, Edan clears his throat, turns his back, and starts removing his shirt. If his brown skin has a tinge of red, it might be from the sunlight.
The new clothes are fit for a prince, and include a ceremonial blade with a jade hilt. Neither Bleys nor Brij interrupt Edan.
The sun warms his back nicely.
Edan doesn't say anything after he's dressed; he merely decides that there's a variety of toasted bread and crackers and a second wheel of some marbled cheese, which he slices up and starts to serve along with the wine.
"I'll be away again soon," he says to Bleys. "Full speed, like the hare who burned his paws on the sand. Where would the two of you go?"
Bleys smiles. "I think Brij has some wedding preparations to make here in Paris, then she'll return to Xanadu and the scene of the Bride." He doesn't answer about his own plans, and the wind picks up speed. Brij has the little boat well in hand and it flies up the broad river.
"Back soon, I think," she says.
Edan nods, then turns to Bleys. "There was one other thing," he says, making it sound nonchalant as opposed to something he planned to say all along. "I may have misjudged you. I've seen your hedonistic side, but someone reminded me that, apparently, you were quite the dutiful son. I wanted to let you know that I was wrong about you." Pause. "It was a conversation regarding Huon and Ysabeau."
"In fairness, you saw what I allowed you to see, what I hoped would be useful to you to see." Bleys smiles. "Was I 'dutiful'? Perhaps, long ago. More recently, my sister and I joined forces with our insane brother and his allies, the sworn enemies of our people, in an attempt to topple my father's kingdom. It was a chain of events that led to the death of our liege lord.
"I have not always been the dutiful son." He pauses. "I shall have to consider what having such a reputation amongst your associates might mean." Bleys strokes his beard.
"Who cares about my associates? What matters is that I know." Edan grins. "Don't worry, I'll keep your terrible secret. But before we landed, I did want to ask one thing, regarding Huon - would he strike at me or Paige, in order to seek revenge against you? Do you have any advice, if he did?"
Bleys' eyes narrow slightly and he straightens. His voice is terrible. "If he strikes at my grandchilden, I shall kill him and salt the earth where his bones lie and scatter his ashes on the winds that cross the shadows. His name shall be whispered throughout Shadow for a thousand generations as a god killed for his hubris."
There's a bit of a stutter in the boat's movement, and if Edan looks to see what caused it, Brij is looking at his father with a bit of wonder and not a little fear.
Glancing back at Brij, Bleys relaxes and smiles, a bit lazily. "Worry not, my dear, it will be a mercy killing. It's not as if I'd give him over to my mother."
Edan, his head bowed, still has the remnants of a smile on his face; it's hard to see his eyes. His hand is still outstretched towards the boom, as if he were ready to grab it and hold the sail in position if Brij lost control.
That was a calculated answer. You mentioned your grandchildren, Father, not Paige or me. You're not worried about us. A pause.
Thank you.
Brita has ordered a wide swath of options for Prince Martin's meal including various meats, breads, and cheeses. For herself, she has included some seafood, although she has requested no sauces, and a selection of fresh fruits. She arrived at the Green Salon early to note that the food is attractively arranged on the side bar in various tiers so that all the selections are easily accessed. She is not surprised to see that the ever-present Parisian pastries including all flavors of eclairs and several fruit tarts have also been added to the menu. She selects a small plate with a couple of shrimp and some orange slices to pass the time until her cousin arrives.
She turns from the buffet and scans the room, wincing slightly at the abundance of delicately worked chairs with flowery cushions. Finally, she settles down on a somewhat more sturdy green velvet covered divan positioned near the window to await Prince Martin.
Martin arrives on the late end of on-time for lunch. He's dressed in the local fashions instead of his usual Amber or Xanadu jeans and shirt. Someone made an effort to neaten him up at some point, but he's already come a bit un-pressed by midday.
"Sorry I'm late," he says. "I had business in town, following up on some of Lucas's connections. How are you, Brita?" His eyes linger on the spread Brita's arranged for lunch, and he grins in approval.
Brita has stopped with a slice of orange half way to her mouth as she gapes at Martin for a second. One eyebrow raises slightly as she returns the slice back to her plate. "I am Well, Cousin. Please, Help Yourself to the Array. What would you Like to Discuss First?"
"There's a lot of stuff about Dara and Cleph that we can discuss, but some of it might put you off your feed." Martin nods to the orange slice that just landed on Brita's plate. "In some ways there's not that much to tell: I sort of blew Cleph up, but he's a Lord of Chaos. Without using a lot of power to back it up--something like Werewindle or Greyswandir or using a hell of a lot of Pattern to impose raw will on Chaos--that's not going to keep him from re-forming afterwards. He may change some, but he'll still be Cleph."
Brita glances down to her plate, back up at Martin, and then gets up and fills her plate with a heap of food in defiance of the subject. She begins to tuck into the food and notes as she swallows a bite of shrimp, "cleph is Always cropping up Where he is Not Wanted. I am Glad you Damaged him, though. He Deserved it. Feel Free to Discuss what I Should Know. It will Not Affect my Appetite." She proceeds to make inroads into the pile before her as she awaits enlightenment.
Martin shrugs at Brita's metaphysical finger to the nastiness of Dara and Cleph, and starts filling his own plate. Conveniently, it means he's not looking at her and she's on her way back to her chair before he starts talking.
"So, it goes like this: when we were in your mother's lab, before I headed off to rescue Meg, you mentioned a black pearl bracelet--the one Celina was showing off yesterday--and I realized that it was probably the same piece I'd commissioned in shadow for Dara to thank her for saving my life after Brand tried to kill me. Could have been a different piece, but now, having seen it, I'm sure it's not." If Brita's looking at him, she can see the outline of Martin's grimace even though he's looking down at his plate and not at her.
[GM note: the discussion Martin is talking about is at the bottom of this log page.]
"So I headed out to Borel with Lilly, although we split up at Madoc, so she missed the showdown with Cleph and Dara. I made my way into Borel--eventually I'm going to remember to stop calling it that and start calling it Dara--and it was the usual sort of nightmare: hostile building, hostile furniture, hostile environment generally. I knew she was going to stop me, so I'd stocked up on high explosives just in case, and I planted them as I was going along. When she sent Cleph to stop me, I used some on him. So he's probably still putting himself back together."
By the time he's finished telling this story, Martin has a plate full of meat and starch and a few of the little Parisian pastry things, and has settled down on a chair by Brita.
"There are Thoughts that Dara may be Assisting Cousin Brennan's Sister in his Home Shadow. Was Dara actually in Chaos Borel while you were There?"
"She manifested while I was getting Meg out. I can't say for sure all of her was there since I'm pretty sure it's not Castle Borel any more, more like Castle Dara." Martin makes a nasty face, which quickly turns to something happier with a bite of his lunch.
"Not bad. I may see if Dad can't steal some of Corwin's cooks. Anyway," he continues, "Enough of her was there to conduct a conversation, and she looked ready to fight, for all that we ended up taking a quick Trump out without one. I guess she could have been across Ygg and doing that, but she'd probably have to be unconscious. And Cleph was there, so he wasn't with another body somewhere else, protecting it. It's not definitive, but it's highly suggestive."
"It is Something," Brita comments. "Do You think Dara is Behind or Assisting in Any of our current Issues?"
"Like which ones? Lilly thought Dara had poisoned her foster-mother, plus she's suspected in whatever Huon was up to and what they did to Marius, and I remember Celina said she'd seen Dara working with someone Rebman, maybe, but--I don't know. She's a badass, and she's not human, but she's got her limits. She can't be responsible for every problem we have." Martin shrugs.
"And if Dara wasn't up to something before, she's likely to be now. She struck at the coronation because we 'stole' Merlin." He airquotes the word 'stole'. "I really did steal Meg. Meg promised to come back, and I sort of agreed to that, or at least I'm not in a good position to obviously object to Meg doing it. If Dara had an unfortunate accident or--" he brightens suddenly "--somebody proved she was working with Huon, I certainly wouldn't object. But it would need to be real evidence on the Huon thing."
Brita nods in understanding. "I will Continue to Watch. How was Cousin Meg after her Visit?"
"She recovered pretty quickly, as far as I could tell at the time. She's not in the mood to talk to me now, so I'll have trouble monitoring her progress in the near term," Martin says a bit flatly.
"Why is she Not in the Mood to Talk to you?" Brita asks.
Martin makes a sort of half-snort, half-laugh noise between bites of his meal. "There's a long story there but the short version is that she wants me to whack Huon for her, and I won't. I'm a King's man, and the King doesn't want that, and I have other things to do, like watch over Folly and my other daughter."
"Your Other Daughter?" Brita asks, cocking her head to the side at the odd wording.
"Folly's carrying a girl," Martin says absently. "I forget sometimes that everyone doesn't know that. Meg probably thinks I put Folly first. Maybe I do." He looks up from his plate. "Folly's earned my loyalty."
"Congratulations!" Brita's smile is sincere. "A Daughter will be a True Joy!" Brita finishes off the crumbs from her plate and gets up to go for seconds. "Are there Other Items you would Wish to Discuss, Cousin?" she asks as she piles on the food.
"Nothing about Dara or Cleph, although I'll answer any questions I can about them." Martin makes a face about that. "I'd ask about all the business that happened while I was gone or in transit, but I don't think you were there for any of it."
"The Only Question I have about Them is How to Place myself on an Even Plane when Battling Them. Thrice, cleph has Outdone me. What can I Do to Gain the Advantage?" Brita is obviously frustrated by her limitations. "As to what has Transpired Since you Left, I was Only Part of the Search for Queen Vialle."
"Well, I'd love to hear how that went down, but let's talk about Cleph." Martin puts his plate aside for a moment and looks seriously at Brita. "What do you want to do to him? Beat him in some kind of a fair fight?"
Brita humphs. "cleph Wouldn't be Fair, so No, not a Fair Fight. I need Your Thoughts on its Weaknesses, ways Around its Strengths."
"I've got some guesses about his--its--weaknesses." Martin rolls his head back and looks upwards for a minute, clearly processing, or remembering something. "So Cleph is what used to be Borel. He was Borel until Corwin killed him with Grayswandir. There was so much of him burned away, destroyed, by the Pattern blade that he stopped being Borel."
He tilts his head back up and looks at Brita. "So this next bit is my speculation, after being in Castle Dara after having lived for a couple of decades in Castle Borel. I think what Corwin burned out of him was essentially the bit of him that, I don't know, linked him to the castle, made him part of the castle, whatever you want to call it. It used to work on his will, but now it's Dara's. If I'd done what I did to him and he'd been one with the castle, it would have done a number on the castle, and it didn't. And no Lord of Chaos ever voluntarily gives up that kind of power. They might risk it to create an offspring, but they'd never just give it up. So he lost it, and Dara picked it up.
"What that means is Cleph doesn't have the castle to draw on any more, which means he's got a lot less in the way of reserves than Borel did. But at the same time, he's self-contained; everything he has is always with him, the way Ordered beings are. Like us. So basically you'd have to be able to beat someone like, say, Bleys, to beat Cleph. That's how tough he is. And you can't get behind him, as it were, and cut him off from the castle, which would be the way to beat Dara."
"Like Fighting Uncle Bleys?" Brita seems a little aghast at that thought. "I Suppose I will need to Find Cousin Ambrose Quickly and Return to the Protection of Our Uncles." She seems put out by the concept, but shakes it off. "So, It is Self Contained and Dara is Not. I will Remember that Even If I can't Use it Right Now. Thank You for the Explanation; Not Many in our Family can be as Clear." She is silent for a bit, eating from her plate. Finally she glances back up to Martin and says, "Do you Have Questions about the Queen's Rescue?"
"Cleph's not unbeatable. I did it with C-6 and Pattern, but I wasn't trying to finish him, either. You've faced him twice and walked away. That's pretty respectable, Brita," Martin says in what he clearly hopes is a reassuring manner. "But you and Ambrose together can do better against him than either of you can alone. You don't have to run from him. Just don't go against him chin-first, or try to make it fair. And yeah, tell me about the Queen's rescue from your point of view."
He picks up his plate again, since this will involve a lot of Brita talking.
Brita sets down her plate as Martin picks up his and prepares to relay the story yet again. "In Searching for the Queen, Cousins Garrett and Signy and I Travelled with Uncle-King Random into a Realm that Uncle Benedict Says is Congruous with Floating Tir in the Moonlight. We travelled Into the Forest and were First Attacked by a Shadow Robin and Shadow Rangers with Pistols. She called Your Father Tyrant Brandom. Uncle Random used Magic to Disperse the Attackers. In determining what to do Next, I caught the Scent of a Rebman and we Followed it. We arrived in what Appeared to be the Grove to find a Scene: the Basin Drained and Filled with Dead Rangers and... Gracklefinks, I think they were called? The Stone was Replaced with a Stone Throne on which sat a Sighted Queen Vialle. Beside her was the Moonrider Marshal with a Shadow Random and the Shadow Robin in Chains."
Brita pauses for a bit, remembering, then continues. "The Scene was Initially Still. Something Changed and the Moonrider asked the Queen what to Do with the Prisoners. The Queen told him to Kill Shadow Robin and Leave Shadow Random for Questioning. The Scene grew Red as Uncle Random led our Attack. He and I moved to Engage the Moonrider as Shadow Robin attacked Shadow Random. I heard the Queen call to Garrett as I Diverted and Launched myself at the Prisoner's Chain Still held by the Moonrider Marshall in an Effort to Overbalance him. Signy, at the Same time, Attacked but her Strike flew Through instead of Connecting and the Scene Disappeared except the Queen and the Chain, although it was Now Smaller."
Martin listens to the story intently between bites of food, nodding at a couple of points, and correcting her on one point: "Grackleflints."
"So something sort of real and unreal at the same time. Sounds like Tir, with the mindfuckery, at least." He scowls. "Who's got the chain now?"
In answer, Brita reaches into one of the inner pockets on her jacket and draws forth a silk wrapped bundle which she unwraps to reveal a delicate silver chain. "I Know it is Not the Best Location for it, but I am Loath to let it Out of my Possession Until more is Known About it. My Mother has Looked at it and Uncle Corwin, but They did Not provide Me with any Information."
"Bleys is the Moonrider expert. Maybe talk to him, see what he thinks. Or Ben if you didn't ask him already." Martin sets down his plate. "May I?" He's too polite to reach for it until Brita agrees.
Brita offers the entire package to him, turning it slightly so he can get his hand under the silk wrapping if he desires, as she sighs, "More People to Talk to - I will Likely Not have the Time right now."
"I'm no expert on Moonriders or I'd offer an opinion of my own. Sorry." Martin takes the package and unwraps it enough to get a good look at the chain. He's careful not to touch it with bare skin, but only through the silk. "I dunno. I have a bad feeling about it, but I can't say why."
Brita nods in agreement, "It Reminds me of Valkyrie Herfjoturr's Magic Chain but hers Paralyzed the Victim. The Shadow Robin and Shadow Random were Not Paralyzed." She gingerly takes the bundle back when Martin holds it out to her and wraps the chain back in the silk. "This has Come from a Tir na Nog'th Link. Could it be Similar to Uncle Benedict's Arm?"
"Could be. I never saw it, but I heard about it, and it sounds like the same kind of thing." Martin looks up from the bundle to Brita. "You know that means you'll lose it somehow if it is, right? Something to do with Vialle, or Robin, or Dad?"
Brita cocks her head to the side, "Lose It? What do you Mean - Lose the Chain or Go Crazy?"
"I meant lose the chain, the way Ben lost his arm in whatever kind of time loop that was he and Corwin were in." Martin blows air out between his lips in a way that approximates sighing. "But anything to do with Tir could drive you nuts too."
"Hopefully, we will be Able to Determine the Nature of this chain Before I Lose It," Brita notes. It is not completely clear which definition she is using now. "What could I Do to Discern its Nature?"
"I'd be worried about doing anything you could do to it with Pattern. That's the kind of thing I'd expect to make it Go Away." Martin capitalizes the words somehow after Brita's own fashion. "After that, well, you're the sorceress." He touches the side of his head with his index finger and draws a strand out to the end of its short length between the finger and his thumb.
Brita nods. "I will Assess it when I am Away from Reality." She rises to return her plate to the buffet. "You Mentioned that you and Cousin Folly will be Remaining in Reality Xanadu for a time. I Hope to Speak to you again once I Know More."
"We may be taking a boat back from Amber, but I'm pretty sure that you can get Folly through the trump booth. And if it's an emergency, you can always ask Dad to borrow his trump of me," Martin says agreeably.
Brita nods, pauses briefly, and then pulls Martin into a quick hug. She grins as she releases him and says "Congratulations, again, on the Daughter." before bowing slightly and departing.
Martin hugs her back and says "Thanks," before letting her go.
Last modified: 26 September 2010
