Session
16
Amber, year one, day 132 continued
Night
Alex has managed to blow up the castle. Well, not all of it, just a
goodly portion of the first floor. I do not think I have ever seen a
person so badly injured before. Under normal circumstances, I would
expect him to either be dead already, or to quickly become so. But it
seems that his Chaos shapeshifting has saved his life. I observed his
body as it lay in the infirmary, and it was constantly in motion, rippling
and shifting. It seems to not only be capable of repairing damage to
tissue, but of actually moving and setting bone! A truly marvelous
ability. I am surprised that none of my siblings has chosen to learn how
to do this. Perhaps it is one of those things, like Trump, which you must
be born with the ability to learn. Or perhaps some of them do know how,
but have kept that ability hidden. After all, my relatives are nothing if
not secretive.
Fortunately, Mebd was the only other person injured in the explosion
(other than the injury to Heather's pride). Given the damage Alex did,
things could have been much worse. Even Mebd was not injured too
severely, with some bruises, a broken arm, and a possible concussion. I
shall have to look in on her in the morning.
Felix put on quite a show tonight. Ahab took off into Shadow, neatly
avoiding the cleanup effort. Shard, Felix and Driscoll all pitched in,
though, and I granted myself a few minutes of pleasure in watching them.
Felix apparently noticed my attentions and responded by taking his shirt
off. Did not wish to get it dirty, indeed! He is very well built. I
would love to model him for a statue. I would love to do other things to
him too, but I do not think Gérard would approve. Gérard
does not approve of many things. Like Felix voicing an opinion. You see,
Shard was apparently visiting Brand when the explosion occurred. Brand
jumped down through the hole in his floor, to find out what had happened.
Shard decided to stay where he was and throw pillows at Felix instead.
Jasra apparently did not appreciate this and pushed Shard over the edge.
What a foul-tempered woman! If Felix had not caught Shard, I suspect I
would have had another patient on my hands. As Felix and I were
discussing this later on, Felix made a rather astute observation. He
claimed that only someone more moody than Brand could possibly marry him.
You should have seen the look that statement earned him from
Gérard! I can see why Felix is so quiet most of the time. I think
he is right about Jasra. It may even be that she exacerbates Brand's
moodiness. Gérard suggested we go to bed after that. As if he was
my pater and can order me around! I gave a rather suggestive look at
Felix when I left, just to needle Gérard. Felix, of course, missed
it, but Gérard looked rather unhappy about it. Good.
It seems that Heather may be human after all. I arrived too late to
see for myself, but Ahab claims the explosion interrupted Heather and
Mandor while they were making love. The fact that Heather wore very
little in the way of clothing when I saw her makes me tend to believe him.
After all of her pretensions of superiority over me, and all her claims
of being above that sort of thing, she is found sleeping with an
ambassador from Chaos! This liaison may be good for her. At the very
least, she can no longer pretend to be disinterested in sex.
Heather also showed an usual amount of concern over the well-being of
Mebd. I would feel similarly if Kira were injured, but Heather has always
been so unemotional that I would not have been surprised if she had not
reacted to Mebd's injuries at all. Instead, she seemed genuinely worried
about Mebd. She would not leave her side, and even helped me set Mebd's
arm. There may be more to Heather than I realized. Not that I will ever
completely trust her, and I may never like her, but I do not mind her
presence nearly so much as before.
I picked up a faint trace of the Logrus in Alex's room. No one else
seemed to have noticed, not even Heather. Of course, Heather was rather
distracted. I thought that perhaps the explosion had occurred when Alex
attempted to use the Logrus. After all, Ahab claims that the Logrus is
sentient, and Alex was trying help us escape from a Chaos trap. It made
sense that it might be mad at him. Mandor used one of his spheres to
investigate that possibility, and concluded that using the Logrus had not
caused the explosion directly, although its use had apparently triggered
the spell that did. He did not seem to think that further use of the
Logrus would trigger any more explosions. I wonder why someone would want
Alex dead? Or perhaps the spell was meant for Mandor? I am sure there
must be factions who dislike our current peace with Chaos, perhaps the
same factions that kidnapped Coral. Perhaps they feel that killing one,
or both, of the Ambassadors will end the peace, or threaten it in some
way. Or perhaps the same people who have plotted (quite successfully) to
worsen Amber's relations with the Golden Circle are at work here. Maybe
they are one and the same.
Looking back at this record, it seems hard to believe that so much
could happen in just one day. I am looking forward to getting a good
night's sleep.
Amber, year one, day 133 (Sunday, November 28, 2987)
Morning
I woke up to the sound of a woman screaming. It turned out to be
Mebd. Apparently she regained consciousness early this morning and asked
what had happened. Heather told her about Alex. Heather must have stayed
awake all night watching her, for she looked quite worn out when I saw
her. Her lack of sleep no doubt explains why she kept insisting that
Alex's head had exploded, even when she saw how hysterical it was making
Mebd. Besides, his head did not really explode. Well, not all of it,
anyway. Heather gave Mebd some alcohol to calm her down, while Felix and
I attempted to reassure her that Alex's head was still attached to his
body. Felix started yelling at Heather for frightening Mebd so, which was
not the best thing he could have done in that situation. Heather told him
to shut up, so he stormed out of the room. They do seem to bring out the
worst in each other. Mebd mentioned that she was seeing double images of
everything, so I gave Heather instructions in how to care for a
concussion.
Breakfast was relatively quiet. The younger generation all ate
together. I had a chance to ask Martin what had happened from his point
of view on our failed rescue attempt. His recollection was the same as
mine, up until the point when he Trumped to Amber. He says that he was
unable to reach the rest of us by Trump at that point. Obviously, he was
allowed to leave. The question that remains is why? Perhaps he might
have been able to discern a way out of the trap.
Ahab told me the purpose of his little Shadow trip last night. It
seems that Heather has established some sort of guardian that must be
passed in order to enter her Shadow. Given the number of times that
Amberites have gone tramping in and out of her home, I cannot say that I
blame her. I wonder if I could do the same? Her guardian appears to
require that large quantities of paperwork be filled out before access is
granted. I am unsure as to whether anyone filling out the paperwork would
be allowed in, or if they would simply be given more paperwork. Needless
to say, Ahab never bothered trying to find out. He has decided to obtain
a small measure of revenge by finding in Shadow what he thinks is the
appropriate paperwork for him to bring in a flying legion of some kind.
He claims he will not use this to harm her home, only to threaten her. I
do not feel this is the wisest course of action, but Ahab has shown time
and time again that he will not listen to the advice of others. I have
decided to hold my tongue in this matter. Eventually, he will have to
learn, or he will die from his mistakes. He also mentioned that his mater
was injured, shot in the back with a crossbow. Much as I may dislike
Deirdre personally, I am glad that she is still alive, for Ahab's sake.
It is a terrible thing to lose one's parents. I often wish mine were
still alive. He says that they have come to a reconciliation of sorts, so
maybe he will stop trying so hard to prove himself to everyone. Maybe.
"Outrageous Fortune"
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All text on this page is © 1993 by Kris Fazzari.
Last modified on October 12, 1993 by Kris Fazzari.