headed toward them.
They were lost to my sight much of the way, as the course I had taken bore me through areas of fairly dense foliage. Abruptly, however, I knew the pressures of the wind. It was as if I had entered the still eye of a hurricane.
Cautiously, I continued my advance, winding up on my belly, peering amid branches at the two old men. Both regarded the invisible cubes of a three-dimensional game, pieces hung above a board on the ground between them, squares of their aerial positions limned faintly in fire. The man seated upon the ground was a hunchback, and he was smiling, and I knew him. It was Dworkin Barimen, my legendary ancestor, filled with ages and wisdom and godlike powers, creator of Amber, the Pattern, the Trumps, and maybe reality itself as I understood it. Unfortunately, through much of my dealing with him in recent times, he`d also been more than a little bit nuts.
Merlin had assured me that he was recovered now, but I wondered. Godlike beings are often noted for some measure of nontraditional rationality. It just seems to go with the territory. I wouldn`t put it past the old bugger to be using sanity as a pose while in pursuit of some paradoxical end.
The other man, whose back was to me, reached forward and moved a piece that seemed to correspond to a pawn. It was a representation of the Chaos beast known as a Fire Angel. When the move was completed the lightning flashed again and the thunder cracked and my body tingled. Then Dworkin reached out and moved one of his pieces, a Wyvern. Again, the thunder and lightning, the tingling. I saw that a rearing Unicorn occupied the place of the King among Dworkin`s pieces, a representation of the palace at Amber on the square beside it. His opponent`s King was an erect Serpent, the Thelbane - the great needlelike palace of the Kings of Chaos - beside it.
Dworkin`s opponent advanced a Piece, laughing as he did so. 'Mandor,' he announced. 'He thinks himself puppet-master and king-maker.' After the crash and dazzle, Dworkin moved a piece. 'Corwin,' he said.
'He is free again.'
'Yes. But he does not know he is in a race with destiny. I doubt he will make it back to Amber in time to encounter the hall of mirrors. Without their clues, how effective will he be?'
Dworkin smiled and raised his eyes. For a moment, he seemed to be looking right at me. 'I think his timing is perfect, Suhuy,' he said then, 'and I have several pieces of his memory I found years ago drifting above the Pattern in Rebma. I wish I had a golden piss-pot for each time he`s been underestimated.'
'What would that give you?' asked the other.
'Expensive helmets for his enemies.'
Both men laughed, and Suhuy rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise. Dworkin rose into the air and tilted forward until he was parallel to the ground, looking down on the board. Suhuy tended a hand toward a female figure on one of the higher levels, then drew it back. Abruptly, he moved the Fire Angel again. Even as the air was burned and beaten Dworkin made a move, so that the thunder continued into a roll and the brightness hung there. Dworkin said something I could not hear over the din. Suhuy`s response to the probable naming was, 'But she`s a Chaos figure!'
'So? We set no rule against it. Your move.'
'I want to study this,' Suhuy said. 'More than a little.'
'Take it with you,' Dworkin responded. 'Bring it back tomorrow night?'
'I`ll be occupied. The night after?'
'I will be occupied. Three nights hence?'
'Yes. Until then?'
' - good night.'
The blast and the crash that followed blinded me and deafened me for several moments. Suddenly, I felt the rain and the wind. When my vision cleared, I saw that the hollow was empty. Retreating, I made my way back over the crest and down to my camp, which the rain had found again, also. The trail was wider now.
I rose at dawn and fed myself while I waited for Shask to stir. The night`s doings did not seem like a dream.
'Shask,' I said later, 'do you know what a hellride is?'
'I`ve heard of it,' he replied, 'as an arcane means of traveling great distances in a short time, employed by the House of Amber. Said to be hazardous to the mental health of the noble steed.'
'You strike me as being eminently stable, emotionally and intellectually.'
'Why, thank you - I guess. Why the sudden rush?'
'You slept through a great show,' I said, 'and now I`ve a date with a gang of reflections if I can catch them before they fade.'
'If it must be done...'
'We race for the golden piss-pot, my friend. Rise up and be a horse.'
The Shroudling and The Guisel
1994
Preface from 'Realms of Fantasy': This story takes up the affairs of Merlin, son of Corwin, from where I left him at the end of 'Prince of Chaos', the 10th and most recent book in my Amber series. As a Prince of Amber on his father's side and a Prince of Chaos on his mother's, Merlin has some problems - not the least of these being that he finds himself in the line of succession for the recently vacated Throne of Chaos, a position he is not anxious to assume. He had felt himself well-protected from it by the number of claimants ahead of him. Unfortunately, they have been dying off most rapidly, generally by means other than the natural. He suspects his mother, Dara, and his half-brother, Mandor, of having a hand in this. But he recently faced both of them down in a magical duel, and they seem to have had second thoughts about his tractability, should one of them manage to seat him on the Throne. Time will tell. In the meantime, he went off to one of Mandor's guest houses, hoping for a good night's sleep.
I awoke in a dark room, making love to a lady I did not recall having gone to bed with. Life can be strange. Also oddly sweet at times. I hadn't the will to destroy our congress, and I went on and on with what I was doing and so did she until we came to that point of sudden giving and taking, that moment of balance and rest.
I made a gesture with my left hand and a small light appeared and glowed above our heads. She had long black hair and green eyes, and her cheekbones were high and her brow wide. She laughed when the light came on, revealing the teeth of a vampire. Hermouth held not a trace of blood, making it seem somehow impolite for me totouch my throat seeking after any trace of soreness. 'It's been a long time, Merlin,' she said softly.
'Madam, you have the advantage of me,' I said.
She laughed again. 'Hardly,' she answered, and she moved in such a fashion as to distract me entirely, causing the entire chain of events to begin again on my part.
'Unfair,' I said, staring into those sea-deep eyes, stroking that pale brow. There was something terribly familiar there, but I could not understand it.
'Think,' she said, 'for I wish to be remembered.'
'I...Rhanda?' I asked.
'Your first love, as you were mine,' she said smiling, 'there in the mausoleum. Children at play, really. But it was sweet, was it not?'
'It still is,' I replied, stroking her hair. 'No, I never forgot you. Never thought to see you again, though, after finding that note saying your parents no longer permitted you to play with me...thinking me a vampire.'
'It seemed so, my Prince of Chaos and of Amber. Your strange strengths and your magics....'
I looked at her mouth, at her unsheathed fangs. 'Odd thing for a family of vampires to forbid,' I stated.
'Vampires? We're not vampires,' she said. 'We are among the last of the shroudlings. There are only five families of us left in all the secret images of all the shadows from here to Amber - and farther, on into that place and into Chaos.'
I held her more tightly and a long lifetime of strange lore passed through my head. Later I said, 'Sorry, but I
