The Courts Of Chaos

“I was not lying,” I said. “She is real.”

“Martin!” cried Random, who had moved up on my right. “Martin! What's going on!”

There was no response.

“I dont think he can hear you,” Gerard said. “This barrier seems to have cut us off completely.”

Random strained forward, his hands pushing against something unseen.

“Let's all of us give it a shove,” he said.

So I tried again. Gerard also threw his weight against the invisible wall.

After half a minute without success, I eased back.

“No good,” I said. “We can't move it.”

“What is the damned thing?” Random asked. “What is holding-”

I'd had a hunch-only that, though-as to what might be going on. And only because of the deja vu character of the entire piece. Now, though... Now I clasped my hand to my scabbard, to assure myself that Grayswandir still bung at my side. It did.

Then how could I explain the presence of my distinctive blade, its elaborate tracery gleaming for all to see, hanging where it had suddenly appeared, without support, in the air before the throne, its point barely touching Dara's throat? I could not.

But it was too similar to what had happened that night in the dream city in the sky, Tir-na Nog'th, to be a coincidence. Here were none of the trappings-the darkness, the confusion, the heavy shadows, the tumultuous emotions I had known-and yet the piece was set much as it had been that night. It was very similar. But not precisely so. Benedict's stance seemed somewhat off-farther back, his body angled differently. While I could not read her lips, I wondered whether Dara was asking the same strange questions, I doubted it. The tableau-like, yet unlike, that which I had experienced-had probably been colored at the other end-that is, if there were any co

“Corwin,” Random said, “that looks like Grayswandir hanging in front of her.”

“It does, doesn't it?” I said. “But as you can see, I am wearing my blade.”

“There can't be another just like it... can there? Do you know what is happening?”

“I am begi

Benedict's blade suddenly came free and engaged the other, so like my own. In a moment, he was fighting an invisible opponent.

“Give him hell, Benedict!” Random shouted.

“It is no use,” I said. “He is about to be disarmed.”

“How can you know?” Gerard asked.

“Somehow, that is me in there, fighting with him,” I said. “This is the other end of my dream in Tir-na Nog'th. I do not know how he managed it, but this is the price for Dad's recovering the Jewel.”

“I do not follow you,” he said.

I shook my head.

“I do not pretend to understand how it is being done,” I told him. “But we will not be able to enter until two thing have vanished from that room.”

“What two things?”

“Just watch.”

Benedict's blade had changed hands, and his gleaming prosthesis shot forward and fixed itself upon some unseen target. The two blades parried one another, locked, pressed, their points moving toward the ceiling. Benedict's right hand continued to tighten.

Suddenly, the Grayswandir blade was free, and moving past the other. It struck a terrific blow to Benedict's right arm at the place where the metal portion joined it. Then Benedict turned and the action was blocked to our view for several moments.

Then the sight was clear again, as Benedict dropped to one knee, turning. He clutched at the stump of his arm. The mechanical hand/arm hung in the air near Grayswandir. It was moving away from Benedict and descending, as was the blade. When both reached the floor, they did not strike it but passed on through, vanishing from sight.

I lurched forward, recovered my balance, moved ahead. The barrier was gone.

Martin and Dara reached Benedict before we did. Dara had already torn a strip from her cloak and was binding Benedict's stump when Gerard, Random and I got there. Random seized Martin by the shoulder and turned him.

“What happened?” he asked.

“Dara... Dara told me she wanted to see Amber,” he said. “Since I live here now, I agreed to bring her through and show her around. Then-”

“Bring her through? You mean on a Trump?”

“Well, yes.”

“Yours or hers?”

Martin raked his lower lip with his teeth.

“Well, you see...”

“Give me those cards,” said Random, and he snatched the case from Martin's belt. He opened it and began going through them.

“Then I thought to tell Benedict, since he was interested in her,” Martin went on. “Then Benedict wanted to come and see-”

“What the hell!” Random said. “There is one of you, one of her, and one of a guy I've never even seen before! Where did you get these?”

“Let me see them,” I said.

He passed me the three cards.

“Well?” he said. “Was it Brand? He is the only one I know who can make Trumps now.”

“I would not have anything to do with Brand,” Martin replied, “except to kill him.”

But I already knew they were not from Brand. They were simply not in his style. Nor were they in the style of anyone whose work I knew. Style was not foremost in my mind at that moment, however. Rather, it was the features of the third person, the one whom Random had said he had never seen before. I had. I was looking at the face of the youth who had confronted me with a crossbow before the Courts of Chaos, recognized me and then declined to shoot.

I extended the card.

“Martin, who is this?” I asked.

“The man who made these extra Trumps,” he said.

“He drew one of himself while he was about it. I do not know his name. He is a friend of Dara's.”

“You are lying,” Random said.

“Then let Dara tell us,” I said, and I turned to her.

She still knelt beside Benedict, though she had finished bandaging him and he was now sitting up.

“How about it?” I said, waving the card at her. “Who is this man?”

She glanced at the card, then up at me.

She smiled.

“You really do not know?” she said.

“Would I be asking if I did?”

“Then look at it again and go look in a mirror. He is your son as much as mine. His name is Merlin.”

I am not easily shocked, but this had nothing of ease about it. I felt dizzy. But my mind moved quickly. With the proper time differential the thing was possible.

“Dara,” I said, “what is it that you want?”

“I told you when I walked the Pattern,” she said, “that Amber must be destroyed. What I want is to have my rightful part in it.”

“You will have my old cell,” I said. “No, the one next to it. Guards!”

“Corwin, it is all right,” Benedict said, getting to his feet. “It is not as bad as it sounds. She can explain everything.”

“Then let her start now.”

“No. In private, just family.”

I motioned back the guards who had come at my call.

“Very well. Let us adjourn to one of the rooms up the hall.”

He nodded, and Dara took hold of his left arm. Random, Gerard, Martin and I followed them out. I looked back once to the empty place where my dream had come true. Such is the stuff.