Amber, year three, day 276 continued Riftvan is really Vetch. I obtained this bit of information from Ahab, when I trumped him to find out what he knew about Riftvan. That bastard! He must have known about this when I talked to him earlier, but he didn't mention a word of it to me. Damn him! I asked Riftvan if we could talk alone, and took him out on the beach. I was afraid he'd catch on, but I think I caught him completely by surprise when I slapped him. Hard. I put most of my anger into that blow and it looked like it hurt. Good. He deserved it. He asked me why I did that. I told him I'd talked to Ahab, at which point he realized that I knew. To his credit, he didn't try to leave. Of course I would have acted to prevent that, which he must have known. As it is, I almost smacked him again. Especially when he answered my question of "Why?" with "Why not?" I really wanted to hit him after that. But I wanted to talk to him more, and I figured if I kept hitting him, that option would disappear. I needed to know why he left me. And if there was ever anything between us. I think there was. Does he love me? I'm not sure. Don't ask questions if you aren't ready for the answers, Ariana. Vetch claims he left me because Amber was making him uncomfortable. He certainly seems comfortable enough at Gerard's summer house! The roses were his way of apologizing. He does have style, I'll grant him that. Apparently he sought me out specifically in shadow and he claims he enjoyed our time together. I'm flattered that he went looking for me. I'm still not happy about the deception, though. How long was he willing to let it continue? My pregnancy was apparently a pleasant surprise. So he says. I asked if he has any other children. He has eight daughters! I admit I'm impressed. He figures I'm probably carrying a girl as well. It's what I've been hoping. I get the impression he'd really like a boy, though. After eight daughters I can understand why. Too bad I'm not carrying twins. Well, I could be. It's too early to tell. But it seems unlikely. Besides, they'd probably both be girls in that case. I wouldn't mind having one of each, though. I'm surprised that a shapeshifter as skilled as Vetch can't alter his sperm so that they all have the Y chromosome. Assuming genetics as I know it even applies to Chaosites. Or Amberites. It may not be possible to apply shapeshifting to something so small. It wasn't really a question I felt comfortable asking. Vetch claims he wasn't behind the attack on Murine, or the kidnappings. He believes House Hendrake is. Apparently there has been a feud between Hendrake and Vetch for several centuries and they are trying to counter his plans for the children. Which he claims are benevolent. I guess I believe that he wasn't behind the kidnappings. He's certainly had plenty of opportunity to grab Foster, but he hasn't. But what he says about the children sounds too much like he's telling me what I want to hear. We'll see. Vetch's feud with Hendrake leaves me in perilous position. Vetch believes if they knew about the pregnancy, they'd kill me. No doubt they'd switch their focus to our child when it's born. How did Vetch's other children survive? Fortunately I haven't told many people about the pregnancy at all, much less who the father is. Felix knows, and probably Foster. I don't think Felix told Gerard. I told Ahab, who no doubt told Kimdyl. She seems to support Vetch, even if she has no liking for me, so it shouldn't have gone any further. I'm going to caution both Felix and Ahab not to spread the information around. I don't think Ahab would anyway, nor would Felix intentionally, but a reminder of the stakes wouldn't hurt. Vetch claims it's good that I don't know much about Chaos. I'm not so sure. It leaves me awfully vulnerable. Look at the trouble I could have gotten into because I didn't know about the Hendrake feud. And I still don't know how or if this child will fit into things. Will it be considered a member of House Vetch? Foster apparently was, but maybe the affiliation passes through the mother if the parents are unmarried. At least there will be eight sisters ahead in the succession for Head of House. Assuming all his children are still alive. He may have told me all that were born, not all who still live. And assuming the succession doesn't only pass through males. Eral, I hope not! For one thing, it's a horribly archaic idea. And if I do have a son, he would be too much of a target. I'll have to find out, if only to put my mind at ease. Rygat was originally a member of House Vetch, before she married into another one. I asked why he was working under her during Patternfall. He says he was obligated. I'd love to know what would obligate the Head of a House to a woman who wasn't even in his house anymore. I asked, of course, but he wouldn't say directly and the conversation soon moved to other topics. He's good at that. She's not one of his daughters though, which was the only thing I could think of that would obligate him. Unless she did him some huge favor at one point. I may never know. Vetch does claim responsibility for what happened to Ariadne, in a way. He says he was continuing something Ahab started. I didn't think Ahab had ever slept with Ariadne, but maybe he has. I'll have to ask him. Vetch seems to think he helped Ariadne. I'm planning to check on that one. One question occurs to me now. How long was Vetch planing to fool me, hanging around as Riftvan? Would he have kept sending me roses? If Ahab hadn't figured out he was Riftvan, would Vetch ever have talked to me as himself? Come to think about it, I still don't know his first name. Ah well, I can ask later, when I see him again. Vetch asked me if I forgave him. I had to think for a minute, although my heart had already forgiven him. Assuming he had told me the truth. I guess that's what it all comes down to. He never actually lied to me before. He just didn't tell me the truth. A fine line, I'll admit, but I want to believe him. Besides, if I wasn't willing to forgive him, I should have killed him when I had the chance. So I forgave him for what he did to me. For deceiving me as Martin, and doing so again as Mark. For leaving me in Amber without an explanation. For making my life a living hell since he left. Perhaps the blow I gave him doesn't exactly even things up, but it will suffice. I offered no such forgiveness, of course, for any other actions he may have taken. He seemed to understand. I asked him to let me know it's him when we are together. He says that takes half the fun out of it. I'm sure it does, for him. But I'd like to know who I'm sleeping with. We went back inside for breakfast. Even though my blow raised a nasty welt on Riftvan's cheek, neither Felix nor Foster commented. Breakfast passed uneventfully. Ironically, I'm sure all of us knew of Vetch's identity at that point, but we all pretended otherwise. I don't see how Foster could be ignorant of the fact, and Felix learned the truth from Ahab when I did. He was remarkably restrained in letting me deal with Vetch first, and I owe him for that. At the end of breakfast, Felix insisted on clearing the plates, and when he was clearing Riftvan's, he said something to him. His voice was too low to hear, but he sounded angry. He ended by dropping a plate and storming out. Riftvan observed he'd overstayed his welcome. He claimed I'd be seeing him again. I hope so. I don't know what kind of a relationship we can have, but I'd like to try. Afternoon Foster tried to follow Felix, but Felix rode off like Julian's Stormhounds were on his tail. Foster looked pretty mad about the way things had turned out and wandered down the beach. I figured I should keep an eye on him while Felix was gone. I did too, until Foster decided to go swimming and stay underwater. Watching shapeshifters is too damn difficult! I had to content myself with watching the horizon for any threats. I figured any attack would most likely come from the air or land and I should spot them before they entered the water. Fortunately, nothing happened. At least I got in a good workout. Isabeux and Gerard got a late start on the day. Isabeux wanted to know where everyone was. I gave her the bare details, although I didn't explain what had caused Felix to storm off. That's Felix's story to tell, if he wishes. Isabeux told me Driscoll and Eris will be spending the weekend. That should be interesting. Foster has to stop running from Eris sometime. We figured Felix had spent enough time cooling off, so I trumped him and brought him back to look for his son, while Isabeux and I worked on dinner. I'd never been real fond of cooking until I met Mark. For most of my life, I'd never had to. It wasn't until I hit the 20th century that servants became unfashionable, so I never bothered to learn until then. But cooking was fun with Mark, even if we sometimes got so preoccupied that we forgot to watch the food. There is something satisfying about watching others enjoy what you created. Not that I'd want to have to do it all the time, but it can be fun. And Isabeux is a pleasant person to talk to. It must have been an hour or so later that Foster returned. No sign of Felix. I told Foster his father was looking for him. Foster seemed prepared to go back out into the surf to find Felix, so I offered to trump him instead. At least this way I could keep an eye on Foster. Felix came back in short order and I left them to talk. I hope they worked things out. Evening Driscoll showed up for dinner with not only Eris, but Rinaldo in tow. Odd. I'll have to ask him what's going on. I don't think Gerard and Isabeux were expecting Rinaldo either. He's quite the precocious child. And he has an amusing aversion to squash. Dinner was shaping up to be rather amusing. Eris studiously ignored Foster, which had the desired affect of making him rather nervous. Someone has been teaching her well, and I doubt it was Driscoll. He's much too oblivious of that sort of thing. No, I sense a woman's hand in this. I wonder whose? Ahab trumped me during dinner. I excused myself and took it in the study. I wasn't real happy with him, but his starting off the call with "Bastard on line one" did a lot to diffuse the situation. Ahab does have his moments. I berated him for hiding his information from me, when he's always bragged about how open he is. He pointed out that at the time, he wanted to kill Vetch, and I'd made it plain that I did not. He figured if he told me I'd try to stop him. He was right, of course. Well, I would have tried to stop him from killing Vetch, but I would have allowed him to get a few blows in. I guess I was just upset because Ahab and I have always been honest with each other, even when it came to the truth about our parents. It hurt that he had hidden this from me. He asked what I'd done to Vetch. I told him Vetch would heal and that I'd tell him the rest in person. I dislike telling secrets over trump, since you never know who's in earshot of the other person's conversation. Or your own, really. I asked Ahab what else he was hiding from me. I wasn't really expecting an answer, so I was quite surprised when he told me he'd met his daughter... sort of. Apparently his Pattern ghost found a way to become more real, and he and Ariadne ran off together. Lyss is their daughter. I guess Ariadne found a way to have Ahab after all. I'm happy for her. What takes getting used to is the fact that Lyss is in her thirties. And Ariadne only fled from Amber yesterday. I don't like how time can vary so much in shadow. It's difficult to grasp how a child that wasn't even conceived yesterday can be over thirty today. Ahab seems to handling it well. He says it's not his problem, and it really isn't. Lyss is more like the daughter of his twin brother than his own daughter. But it's got to be odd. He mentioned that Lyss walked the Pattern when she was eleven. She just had to beat his record. I think he was proud of that. He also mentioned that his Pattern ghost, who calls himself Abe, has apparently mellowed quite a bit in his seventies. Hard to picture. I'd like to meet him, just to see this for myself. Our contact was broken rather abruptly. When I couldn't reach Ahab again, I trumped to Amber and ran up to his room. OK, I probably overreacted, but this has never happened to me before, and events of late have made me jumpy. Ahab was fine. Apparently Heather trumped him while we were talking, and somehow displaced our contact. In the past I've wondered what would happen if you trump someone who's already in trump contact. Now I know. The stronger mind wins. Or that's what I assume from this. I had Ahab say hello for me. It seemed the polite thing to do. Ahab didn't think the call would take long, so I'm waiting for him in the library. I plan to tell him what I learned from Vetch. Or some of it. Quite a bit of it is rather personal to me. But he should find the information about House Hendrake interesting. And since his child seems to be one of their targets, he has a right to know. As does Felix, when he's ready to hear it. I hope there's still some dinner left when I get back.