The Chronicles of Amber

He smiled at her lovingly, then passed me another Trump. I gazed at it.

A winter palace, with snow falling. White horses decked in bells and ribbons. Twin statues of Freda and Pella being worshipped as goddesses.

I smiled. Yes, they would be happy here, I thought. I pushed them through as the world came to life before me, and just before I crumpled the page, I heard wild cheering as they appeared. The goddesses had arrived. They would be well cared for.

That only left Aber and Blaise. I would never have paired them, but with Fenn and Isadora gone, there didn’t seem much choice.

“Ready?” I asked.

“I suppose,” Aber said, stepping forward bravely. “Coming, Sis?”

She glared at him. “Don’t call me that!”

Oh yes, I thought, rolling my eyes, they were going to have a lot of fun together. If they didn’t rip each other’s throats out first.

Without comment, Dworkin passed me another Trump. I gazed down at an elegant whitewashed villa. As it came to reality before me, I smelled the ocean’s brine and heard the soft calls of gulls as they wheeled in a cloudless azure sky. It seemed almost idyllic.

I helped Blaise through, then reached for Aber. But as he stepped close, he snatched the Trump from my hand, ripped it in half, and the doorway into Shadow vanished. My last glimpse of Blaise showed her with hands on her hips and a furious expression on her face.

“Are you crazy!” I demanded. “What’s the idea?”

Grinning, Aber thrust the ruined Trump into a candle’s flame. It burned fast and bright.

“You have to ask?” he said. “I’m not living with her for a year or two! I’d rather face a legion of hell-creatures naked and unarmed!”

I took a deep breath, then let it out with a laugh. “All right,” I said, looking at our father. He looked distinctly nonplussed. “I guess we don’t have any choice now. Like it or not, you’re coming with us.”

“Where?” he asked eagerly.

Dworkin held up the last Trump.

“Where they least expect us,” he said, smiling like a shark about to devour its prey.

I looked down, a horrible cold feeling reaching up inside my chest.

He had drawn the Courts of Chaos.

Chaos and Amber

2003

John Gregory Betancourt

In CHAOS AND AMBER, Dworkin and his son Oberon arrive at the Courts of Chaos to discover, and confront, their hidden enemies. But things don‘t go as planned. Oberon has a terrible physical reaction to being in Chaos, while assassination attempts are made on both his and Dworkin‘s live and the traitor in their family remains a hidden but quite real threat. Dworkin takes Oberon on a desperate journey, pressing deeper into Shadow than ever before. Here, Oberon discovers more of the true nature of his father . . . and of his real mother. But they have been followed, and a horde of hell-creatures attacks. Ultimately, Dworkin must create a new Pattern with his own blood to save himself, his family, and the future.

Chapter 1

“Oberon!”

Over a roaring wind, I heard a distant calling of my name. I had been dreaming of sailing a small boat across a churning, wind-swept sea; the dream clung to me, and I could not easily shake its tendrils away.

Where was I? My eyes were closed, but I sensed no light beyond them. Could it be nighttime, or was I in a dark room? I heard what might have been either the rush of wind or the beating of a thousand wings around me. My skin prickled all over with goosebumps, and I felt at once cold and hot, wet and dry.

When I tried to sit up and open my eyes, however, I could not. I found my lack of strength vaguely troubling. But it was so easy not to care, to let myself slide back into the dreaming—

“Oberon! Wake up!”

Ships. I had just begun to dream of ships for a second time when that nagging voice broke in again. The motion around me—a gentle rocking as from waves—reminded me of a ship's deck… but there came no susurrant lap from the waves, no cries of gulls nor smell of briny sea.

No, not a ship, I decided, trying to focus my attention on the problem. Also not a horse; no stamping hooves nor neighs nor smells of dung and horse-sweat. A moving carriage, perhaps? That almost made sense. My father had a magnificent carriage, like a giant pumpkin made of spun glass. I remembered my first and only ride in it; we had passed through dozens, maybe hundreds of nightmare worlds. But that didn't explain why I felt both hot and cold. It didn't explain a lot of things.

What was that roaring noise?

And why couldn't I open my eyes?

“Oberon!”

I tried to turn my head toward that distant voice but couldn't quite figure out where it came from. Above me? Below? I had gotten turned around; every direction felt wrong, as though I teetered on the edge of a cliff, about to fall. I shivered, and an impulse to flee came over me. I didn't like this place. I didn't like the sensations of being here. I had to get out, now, before something horrible happened.

Once more I tried to rouse myself from sleep. With that effort, colors suddenly pulsed in my head; lights sang and danced before my closed eyelids, and strange tastes and smells and textures flooded my senses. The flavors of lemon and salt and roast chicken and straw all mixed together, the smells of mud and sweat and honey —

If I dreamed, I dreamed strangely. Yet, somehow, I knew I was not dreaming… not quite, anyway. This was something else, something strange and unnatural and unpleasant.

“Oberon!” that distant voice bellowed. “Get your lazy ass out of bed! The king needs you! Now!”

The king. Yes, King Elnar needed me. I was one of his lieutenants. I tried to reach for my sword. It must be time to muster the men

No, that was wrong. King Elnar had died a long time ago… it now seemed a lifetime past. A sour, discordant note crept into the sounds in my head; the dancing lights pulsed, bright and dark, dark and bright. I reached for the memory, found it, shuddered at the sudden chill it brought. Yes, I remembered too well… remembered how King Elnar fell at the hands of hell-creatures in Ilerium. I had seen his severed head stuck on a pole in the mud outside of Kingstown, a warning and a trap for me when I returned there unexpectedly.

“You killed me!” I had heard his accusing voice say, impossibly coming from that severed head on the pole. “Traitor!” it called. “Traitor…!”

I'd opened my mouth to argue, but the words disappeared in a sudden roar of wind. In my mind, I pressed my eyes shut, refusing to see, but the image lingered. And I knew he had been right.

King Elnar, the entire population of Kingstown, and countless thousands of soldiers—all had died because of