«Open it,» came a voice from within.
So he did, and we stood there.
«What do you know?» came the voice I remembered, finally. «You guys look for real.»
«We are,» said his ghost, «and as usual, at times such as this, you'd better hurry.»
«Yeah.» There came a slow tread from within, and when he emerged he was shielding his eyes with his left hand. «Either of you got a pair of shades? The light hurts.»
«Damn!» I said, wishing I'd thought of it. «No, and if I send for them the Logrus might spot me.»
«Later, later. I'll squint and stumble. Let's get the hell out.»
His ghost entered the cell.
«Now make me bearded, thin, and grimy. Lengthen the hair and tatter the clothes,» he said. «Then lock me in.
«What's going on?» my father asked.
«Your ghost will be impersonating you in your cell for a while.»
«It's your plan,» Corwin stated. «Do what the ghost says.» And so I did. He turned and extended his hand back into the cell then. «Thanks, buddy.»
«My pleasure,» the other replied, clasping his hand and shaking it. «Good luck.»
«So long.»
I closed and locked the cell door. I hung the key on its nail and steered him to the way. It took us through.
He lowered his hand as we came into the chapel. The dimness must have been sufficient for him to handle now. He drew away from me and crossed to the altar.
«We'd better go, Dad.»
He chuckled as he reached across the altar, raised a burning taper, and used it to light one of the others that had apparently gone out in some draft.
«I've pissed on my own grave,» he announced. «Can't pass up the pleasure of lighting a candle to myself in my own church.»
He extended his left hand in my direction without looking at me.
«Give me Grayswandir,» he said.
I slipped it off and passed it to him. He unfastened it and buckled it about his waist, loosened it in its sheath. «All right. What now?» he asked.
I thought fast. If Dara was aware that I had exited through the wall last time - a distinct possibility, considering - then the walls might well be booby-trapped in some fashion. On the other hand, if we went out the way I had come in we might encounter someone rushing this way in answer to the alarm.
Hell.
«Come on,» I said, activating the spikard, ready to whisk us away at the glimpse of an intruder. «It's going to be tricky because it involves levitation on the way out.»
I caught hold of him again and we approached the way. I wrapped us in energies as it took us, and I lofted us above the field of blades and flowers as we departed.
There were footfalls from up the corridor. I swirled us away to another place.
I took us to Jurt's apartment, which didn't seem a place anyone was likely to come looking for a man who was still in his cell; and I knew that Jurt had no need of it just then.
Corwin sprawled on the bed and squinted at me. «By the way,» he said, «thanks.»
«Anytime,» I told him.
«You know your way around this place pretty well?» he said.
«It doesn't seem to have changed that much,» I told him.
«Then how's about raiding an icebox for me while I borrow your brother's scissors and razor for a quick shave and haircut.»
«What would you like?»
«Meat, bread, cheese, wine, maybe a piece of pie,» he said. «Just so it's fresh and there's lots of it. Then you're going to have a lot of story to tell me.»
«I guess I am,» I said.
And so I made my way to the kitchen, down familiar halls and ways I had traversed as a boy. The place was lit by just a few tapers, the fires banked. No one was about.
I proceeded to raid the larder, heaping a tray with the various viands requested, adding a few pieces of fruit I came across. I almost dropped the wine bottle when I heard a sharp intake of breath near the doorway I had entered.
It was Julia, in a blue silk wrap.
«Merlin!»
I crossed to her.
«I owe you several apologies,» I said. «I'm ready to make them.»
«I'd heard you were back. I heard you were to be king.»
«Funny, I heard that, too.»
«Then it would be unpatriotic of me to stay mad, wouldn't it?»
«I never meant to hurt you,» I said. «Physically, or any other way.»
Suddenly, we were holding each other. It lasted a long time before she told me, «Jurt says you're friends now.»
«I guess we sort of are.»
I kissed her.
«If we got back together again,» she said, «he'd probably try to kill you again.»
«I know. This time the consequences could really be cataclysmic, too.»
«Where are you going right now?»
«I'm on an errand, and it's going to take me several hours.»
«Why don't you stop by when you're finished? We've got a lot to talk about. I'm staying in a place called the Wisteria Room for now. Know where that is?»
«Yes,» I said. «This is crazy.»
«See you later?»
«Maybe.»
The next day I traveled to the Rim, for I'd heard report that the Pit-divers - those who seek after artifacts of creation beyond the Rim - had suspended operations for the first time in a generation. When I questioned them they told me of dangerous activities in the depths - whirlwinds, wings of fire, blasts of new-minted matter.
Sitting in a secluded place and looking down, I used the spikard I wore to question the one I didn't. When I removed the shield in which I'd encased it, it commenced a steady litany, «Go to Mandor. Get crowned. See your brother. See your mother. Begin preparations.» I wrapped it again and put it away. If I didn't do something soon he was going to suspect that I was beyond its control. Did I care?
I could just absent myself, perhaps going away with my father, helping him at whatever showdown might finally develop over his Pattern. I could even ditch both spikards there, enhancing the forces in that place. I could still rely on my own magic in a pinch. But my problem was right here. I had been bred and conditioned to be a perfect royal flunky, under the control of my mother, and possibly my brother Mandor. I loved Amber, but I loved the Courts as well. Fleeing to Amber, while assuring my safety, would no more solve my personal problem than running off with my dad - or returning to the Shadow Earth I also cared for, with or without Coral. No. The problem was here - and inside me.
I summoned a filmy to bear me to an elevated way to take me back to Sawall. As I traveled, I thought of what I must do, and I realized that I was afraid. If things got pushed as far as they well might, there was a strong possibility that I would die. Alternatively, I might have to kill someone I didn't really want to.
Either way, though, there had to be some resolution or I'd never know peace at this pole of my existence.
I walked beside a purple stream beneath a green sun atop a pearly sky. I summoned a purple and gray bird, which came and sat upon my wrist. I had thought to dispatch it to Amber with a message for Random. Try as I might, however, I could phrase no simple note. Too many things depended on other things. Laughing, I released it
