The Chronicles of Amber

“It's not how I look, it's how I feel.”

“Yes, sir.” He hesitated. “Did you carry me in here? I do not remember falling asleep. The last thing I remember, I was sitting on the stool, watching you…”

“Don't worry about it.” I smiled to myself, realizing the truth: Rhalla must have carried him to his bed before waking me. Good thing he did fall asleep; I didn't need to be guarded from beautiful women. “You did fine,” I told him. “I'm more than satisfied.”

“Thank you, sir!” He seemed greatly relieved.

“Have you explored the house yet? Do you know the way to the dining hall?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get dressed. You have five minutes. Then you can show me the way.”

Happily, breakfast here seemed to be quite a subdued affair, in a relatively normal room and with relatively normal food. From the lamps flowed a thick golden stream of light that covered the ceiling, but I was rapidly becoming used to it. It seemed as much a part of this place as the angles that did not quite mesh with my perceptions.

Apparently I was the first one up today; though large trays of food sat ready on the sideboard, they hadn't been touched yet. Lifting the lids, I peeked into each. About half the food was recognizable. I helped myself to eggs, chops of some kind, and small honeyed rolls. To drink, pitchers of iced juices sat to one side, but I motioned a serving girl over and instructed her to find me a bottle of red wine, and this she did immediately.

Just as I was settling in at the head of the table, Aber strolled through the door.

“Good morning,” I said.

“Hi,” he said. “Bad night?”

“Why does everyone keep asking that?” I said, thinking of both Horace and Port. “I couldn't have slept better.”

“You look awful.”

“I feel better, though.”

“That's good.”

I thought of Rhalla and hid my smile behind a bite of a honeyed roll. She, more than anything else, had to be responsible for my quick recovery. Nothing like love to raise a man's spirits.

Licking my fingers, I changed the subject. “Have you seen Dad this morning?”

“He's not back yet,” Aber said. He began heaping his plate with egg-shaped purple fruits, tiny pink berries, and some kind of stringy cheeselike dish.

“What! Are you sure?”

“I'm quite sure.”

I couldn't believe it. He must have returned—hadn't he sent Rhalla last night to tend to me?

And if he hadn't… who had?

Aber joined me at the table, taking the opposite seat. He seemed his usual cheerful self.

“He must be here,” I said firmly. “You missed him.” That had to be the answer.

“I checked this morning. I thought he might have used a Trump to get back late last night, but his bed hasn't been slept in, and neither the doors nor the guards saw him come or go. He hasn't come back.”

No audience with a king would last so long, I knew. Something had happened. Something had gone wrong.

Chapter 12

“I took a deep breath. “He's been gone too long.”

“Probably.”

“Aren't you concerned?”

“I am,” he said. “At least, a little.” He looked at me seriously. “You don't think he'd abandon us here, do you? I know he's not particularly fond of me, and I forced myself on you both for the trip here. But if he saw things going badly, do you think he'd run off into the Shadows and leave us here?”

“I don't know,” I admitted. After all, everything I'd grown up believing had been an elaborate lie. And he had lied to me repeatedly in Juniper. I thought he cared about me—about us all—to try to protect us. But would he abandon us if it was the only way to save himself?

I took another bite of my honeyed roll, trying to work through the problem. Our father had powers I couldn't as yet even imagine. He might be anywhere now, from just outside the dining room door to hidden in a secret castle a thousand miles away… or he might not even be on this world. He could just as easily be hiding on a different Shadow where no one would ever find him.

Would he abandon us? If things went badly, would he leave us sitting here, alone and unknowing, while he struck off on his own for safety?

I remembered all the trouble he had gone through to rescue me in Ilerium. It would have been safer to leave me there, to let me die at the hands of the hell-creatures. And yet he had risked his own life to rescue me— and the life of his favorite daughter, my half-sister Freda. Those were not the actions of a man who would abandon his offspring.

And yet, pressed for time, feeling threatened, I could also see him dumping Aber and me here. If he convinced himself we'd be safe in the Beyond—why not leave us here? He might be my father, and he might be a powerful sorcerer, but he had lied to me for the last twenty years about my life. Everything I'd ever believed about the universe had been wrong. I realized now that I didn't know him, not really, nor could I predict his actions.

Could he abandon us? Yes.

Would he abandon us? I didn't know.

“Besides,” Aber went on between bites as he dug into a plate of steak and eggs a servant set before him, “we don't know that anything happened to him.”

I said, “Then where is he?”

“Maybe he's visiting with friends at the court.”

“I thought he didn't have any.”

“Oh, he must have a few… even if they aren't openly supportive. Maybe he's trying to rekindle old alliances.”

“Did you try his Trump?”

“Are you crazy? The last time I did, he nearly bit my head off. I ruined some sort of delicate experiment. He made he swear I'd never do it again.”

I chuckled. “I made no such promises. After breakfast, I'll try to reach him.”

“Better you than me.”

“Maybe he found an old girlfriend after his audience…”

“More likely an old wife.”

I raised my eyebrows. “How many has he had?”

“By my count,” Aber said, “at last six from the Courts and two from the Beyond… though I've heard at least one wife didn't last out the wedding night, so perhaps she shouldn't count. And who knows how many in Shadows. Your mother among them, I assume?”

“Nope.”

“Bastard.”

I didn't ask which one of us; it was literally true in my case, figuratively true in Dad's, and on occasion entirely true of us both.

“When he gets back,” Aber said, “you can ask him for an exact count. Assuming he's kept track.”

I gave a snort. “He's lied to me my whole life. He's still lying to me, as far as I can tell. I can't trust anything he says.”

“True.” Aber shrugged. “Everyone in the family knows his hold on the truth is slippery at best. It's part of his charm.”