Chapter Ninety:  "I'm kind of obligated to feel your pain whenever I have
to."

	Caine meets with Ahab in the evening and fills him in on what he's
found, which isn't much.  He also warns that Felix may be planning
something stupid in response to Gerard's disappearance.  Ahab decides to
delay the scouting party's departure, and sends pages around to inform the
relevant parties.  Bart blinks at the news, and then complains to Lyss
that she had him packing all day.  They spend the evening in their usual
pursuits.

	Felix rides out with Tamaryn to the edge of Arden, and begins to
Hellride.  He gets a Trump call from Caine, who asks what he's up to.  Oh,
nothing.  Caine relays Ahab's request that Felix return to the Navy. 
Tamaryn asks if Felix really wants to talk to that person.  Felix decides
no, and activates his pin to break the contact.  Caine is not pleased.

	Laughter and family spend the evening settling in after their move
to the castle.

	Alex goes looking for Delwin, who's not in the castle.  The pages
mention that he might be in his house in town.  Alex finds his mother, who
suggests the same.  She's miffed that he only came to see her for that
reason, and guilts him into spending the evening with her.

	Ariana spends the rest of the evening pretty much dead to the
world, thanks to her experience as a vampire chew-toy.  Don't try this at
home, kids.

	Usires realizes that his responsibilities prevent him from
slipping away to look for his ax.  Funny how that works.

	Half an hour after Caine's departure, he returns and fills Ahab in
on the Felix conversation.  Ahab isn't sure he can spare anyone, but he's
willing to check the situation out with Caine.  Uh-uh, Caine isn't going
to be responsible for losing this king.  Well, Ahab will have his guards
with him.  All right.  Ahab begins using Pattern lens to look for Felix. 
No moving Pattern imprints.  He does eventually find four disturbances
heading away from Amber and each other.  They seem to originate from
Tamaryn's estate.  There's another ripple covering the castle that's
similar to the others.  Ahab shares this with Caine, along with the fact
that he's feeling peeved.  He wants to bring in Brand.  This is where
Caine signs off.

	Felix and Tamaryn continue to Hellride.  Tamaryn observes that
they seem to be heading into Shadows with faster times.  Four hours later,
they arrive in a Shadow that feels right to Felix, about half a dozen
Shadows beyond the Golden Circle.  They find themselves in a large port
city with a good harbor.  Tamaryn suggests that Felix continue shifting
for Gerard.  He does so, and this takes them down to the harbor itself. 
There are many ships that appear to be getting outfitted for war.  They
find a tall man with bronze skin and blond hair overseeing everything, and
the shifting keeps bringing Felix back to him.  Felix notices that the
figurehead on one of the ships is of a unicorn, and asks if Tamaryn can
tell if the man's been shapeshifted.  She'd have to touch him.  Felix
plays drunk and, leaning on Tamaryn, staggers into the man, who proceeds
to toss Felix into the water.  Just before he hits, he hears Tamaryn
making excuses for him to the man.

	Brand knocks on Ahab's door, looking rather perturbed.  Ahab
explains the Felix situation.  Brand assumes that Felix has his pin on,
but Tamaryn probably isn't so lucky.  True.  Brand begins concentrating.

	Felix climbs out of the water.  No sign of Tamaryn or the man.  He
shifts for her, and finds himself at a boat.  He tries to board, but is
stopped by one of the crew.  He explains that he's looking for his lady
friend.  She's with the captain, now move off.  Felix tosses the crewman
into the water.  The rest of the crew notice this and gather around him,
drawing their guns as they do so.

	Brand frowns and says that Tamaryn is unreachable.  Ahab mentions
what Tamaryn did around her estate.  Brand begins doing something magical,
and locates Felix, but no Tamaryn.  Can Brand show him what Felix is
doing?  Sure.  They tune in as the crew aim their weapons at Felix.  Ahab
tells Brand to retrieve him.

	Felix hefts a barrel of gunpowder, intending to throw it at the
crew.  They open fire.  Boom!  The barrel explodes rather nicely, to say
the least.  Ahab asks Brand to open a gate to the dock.  Brand gets a fix
and holds out a hand.  Ahab grabs hold of Lander before he takes it. 
Ariadne dives through at the last minute, as usual.  Ahab arrives at the
edge of the dock, wobbling on the edge.  Ariadne dives past him, and there
is a splash as she hits the water.  Brand falls over the edge, and begins
pulling Ahab in, since he's still holding onto Ahab's hand.  Lander and
his men dig in their heels, stopping Ahab from going over, and Brand
begins arcing back towards the dock.  Lander and the guards pull Ahab
back, and Brand hits the dock with a thud.  There is no sign of Felix. 
Suddenly, there is movement on the deck of the ship, as the tall man spies
Ahab, squints, and quick-draws.  Ahab ducks, but still gets nailed.  His
armor stops the bullet from penetrating, though.  He drops Brand, ducks
behind a pole, decides that someone must have dropped a loaded pistol
behind one of the crates, and grabs it.  Brand hits the water with a
splash.  Ahab lobs a cannonball over the ship and then fires on it. 
Shrapnel galore.  Ahab hears a woman's yelp from the ship.

	Ahab notes the standard flying over the ship, which is the flag in
his symbol, but tattered and torn to shreds.  This irritates him.  He
Trumps Deirdre and asks for a platoon.  She says it'll take at least 15
minutes.  He takes her hand to give her his location.  She pulls herself
through, wearing just a skimpy nightdress, and pulls out another Trump. 
Ahab looks for another pillar, the current one being insufficient for two. 
The rest of the fleet in the harbor begins to move.  Ahab finds cover and
quells the wind.  This works for a little while, but then the sails fill
again.  Deirdre begins pulling people through, and Ahab's forces begin
boarding the ship.  Ahab notices that the crew on the ship are being
tossed overboard by an invisible force, which is why his people haven't
been fired on recently.  Tamaryn's obviously been busy.  Ahab grabs a
cannonball and jumps off the dock, grabbing hold of the hull.  He proceeds
to cut a hole near the waterline, and toss the cannonball in.  Ariadne
grabs him by the scruff of his neck and pulls him to the dock right before
it blows.  Men begin fleeing the ship as it starts taking on water.  Ahab
makes sure a few are left alive for questioning.  The rest of the fleet
begins sailing out of the harbor.  Ariadne turns out to have retrieved a
concussed Felix from the water.  Most of his hair and clothing are gone,
not to mention much of the skin on the front of his body.  Yuck.  Brand
looks like a drowned rat, and appears to be fighting someone magically. 
Ahab boards the ship and finds Tamaryn, none the worse for wear.  She
explains that the man introduced himself as Ivan, but that's all she
knows.  She's worried about Felix.  As well she should be.

	Ahab and co. Trump back to Amber with the captives.  Tamaryn and
Ariadne work to carry Felix up to the infirmary.  Ahab asks Deirdre about
Ivan, but she's never heard of him.  By his looks, Ahab figures he's kin
to Dalt, which might explain the grudge.  Ahab mindrapes one of the
captives, and determines that they were recruited by Ivan to attack Amber. 
They have been led to believe that they are going to free the populace
from the tyranny of its unjust king.  Ivan is the son of the true king, of
course.

	Ahab asks Brand how hard it would be for him to track down Ivan. 
Very hard.  He's got an item like Felix's, but more broad based.  Ahab
informs Caine of Ivan and his navy, and thanks Deirdre and Brand for their
help.  Then he checks in on Felix.  Tamaryn is healing him with
shapeshifting, and has broken into a sweat from the effort.  Ariadne
points out that at least they uncovered a pretty little nest.

	Ahab summons Random and fills him in.  He wants to know if Random
knows anything about the Shadow Ivan was in.  Random does, and explains
that it's a Shadow with some malcontents and some restlessness, so it
wouldn't have been hard for Ivan to recruit people there.  They also turn
a blind eye to certain criminal activities, with the appropriate bribes. 
It's much like any number of Shadows in the area.  Ahab wants Random to
clean the place out at sometime in the future.  Random is more than
willing.  Ahab then goes to bed and works off his adrenaline on his wife.

	Felix stumbles into consciousness in the wee hours of the morning. 
He hurts all over, and has new skin over the entire front of his body. 
It's very tender.  Tamaryn has fallen asleep in a chair next to him.  He
goes back to sleep.

	Ahab drops by to see Foster in the morning, and explains what
happened.  Foster looks stunned.  Ahab asks him to run interference with
Isabeux, so she doesn't suspect what happened.  Foster thinks she should
know, and volunteers to explain things to her.  Laughter wants to know
when Foster goes to see Felix, since she's going to come along.  She wants
to know why he did it.  They drop by the infirmary, but see that Felix is
still out, so they decide to tell Isabeux first.  She takes it all rather
quietly, with a shocked look on her face.  She immediately heads to the
infirmary to look at Felix, and he wakes up to find her smiling down at
him.  Felix explains that he thought he could throw the barrel before they
opened fire.  Laughter wanders over to Tamaryn, who's shaking her head
sadly at this.  Isabeux asks if Felix found Gerard.  Felix looks at
Tamaryn, who says she wasn't able to get a good reading from Ivan, since
he shook her off immediately.  Felix tells Isabeux about Ivan, and says
he's afraid Dara did something to Gerard.  Isabeux tells him that he needs
to focus on getting better.  He reiterates that he wasn't expecting this
to happen.  Tamaryn points out that all the men from the ship had to do
was pull the trigger.  He tells her that she's not helping.

	Ariana wakes up to find a note next to her in Shard's handwriting. 
It is a poem, and she finds the contents a bit disturbing.  She conjures
some food, then tries to transfuse herself.  No such luck.  She's not very
successful at healing the bite, either, and passes out from the effort. 
She wakes up again around noon and eats lunch with her family.  No one
notices anything wrong with her, although Mirelle seems to think she spent
the night with Riftvan, and that's why she slept in.  She plays with her
children for a while, then goes to Amber to apologize to Nicholas for
missing their morning lesson.

	Bart spends the day doing spell research, in an effort to avoid
the plot.

	Ahab talks to Tamaryn about Felix's theory.  Felix pretends to be
asleep.  Tamaryn explains that Felix had set off looking for Gerard.  The
Pattern is supposed to be able to take you to your heart's desire, and it
kept leading him to Ivan.  She confirms that she used a spell to cover
their trail.  Ahab is not pleased.  She says she only helped because Felix
wanted it so badly, and points out that at least they know about Ivan now.

	Felix opens an eye after Ahab leaves, and observes that Ahab
didn't sound happy.  Tamaryn calls him a horrible faker, and says he
should have gotten it over with.  Felix is hoping Ahab will be calmer
after more time has passed.

	Laughter takes care of "piddly shit," like dealing with her army,
and asking Meander to put her in touch Looks Twice.  Meander explains that
if she wants a quiet ride, she should ask Bart.  Uh, no, the last time she
tried that, he turned her down most firmly.  OK, but they'll have to go
outside, since he got in trouble the last time for casting the spell
indoors.  Laughter takes him to the Valley of Garneth, since she doesn't
want him to trash the castle gardens.  He opens the portal, with much raw
magic and swirling winds.  Laughter insists that he come along, so she has
a way to get back.  He does so, and lands flat on his ass, of course.  He
uses the trees to transport them to the high plains.

	Alex goes into town to talk to Delwin.  He's got some questions
about the Spikard, you see.  Delwin doesn't know much about their
background.  Teresa's been researching that recently, so perhaps he should
talk to her.  Has Delwin encountered faeries before?  Occasionally. 
They're were unhelpful more often than not.  It depends on the faerie. 
He's always gotten the impression that the faeries were rather sore at
Amberites for stealing the Spikards from them.  Alex leaves Delwin and
Trumps Teresa, but she won't answer.

	Bleys and Brand come to see Ahab early in the afternoon.  Ahab
explains how Felix found Ivan.  They say that's inconclusive.  Ahab thinks
they should check out the area for any Pattern traces, other than what he
used in stopping the wind.  Brand says magic was used in filling the
sails, which is what he was fighting.  As for the first mate, they think
he was killed in the same manner as the others, but Brand did find some
traces of Trump, which implies that Dara has a Trump artist in her pocket. 
Bleys suggests that Ahab use the Jewel to turn off Logrus in Amber. 
They've set up magical defenses, but Brand also wants to monitor Trumps. 
Ahab is fine with this, but intends to warn people first.  He'll take care
of it at dinner, and Brand can begin in the morning.  Bleys offers to walk
him through how to turn off the Logrus.  This happens, and Ahab finds
himself slightly tired afterwards, much to his amazement.

	On the Disc, Meander suddenly stops and his eyes glaze over. 
After a few moments, he gasps and says he has to get back to Amber.  He
quickly opens up another gate and goes through.  Laughter opts to remain
behind.

	Ahab is listening to the nobles complaining at their usual
audience, when Meander strides into the room.  Ahab asks if something is
wrong.  Meander replies that he doesn't know yet.  Abel takes off, and
gets hit by a crossbow quarrel.  Meander turns slightly at this, Ahab
tackles him, and another quarrel hits Meander in the chest.  It was
obviously aimed at Ahab.  Ahab orders the castle sealed, brings up
Pattern, and catches the faint glimmer of Trump.  He orders Brand
summoned, and has Meander and Abel brought up to the infirmary.  Then he
attempts to return to the business at hand, much to the surprise of the
nobles.  This is when the guards burst in and tell him that Nicholas has
been shot.  Ahab tells them to take him to his son.

	Nicholas is brought into the infirmary with a quarrel in his hip,
and another in his abdomen.  He looks quite uncomfortable.  Felix goes to
pull out the quarrels, much to the nurse's dismay, since they feel he
should still be in bed.  Felix feels like he has a massive sunburn all
over the front of his body, and is still in quite a bit of pain.

	Ariana Trumps into the main hall of the castle, and has several
weapons pointed at her until the guards recognize her.  She looks for
Nicholas at his quarters and finds several guards there.  They won't tell
her what's going on, nor will they let her past them.  She notices more
guards by the infirmary, and makes the appropriate conclusion.  She
attempts to enter the infirmary, but is blocked by the guards.  She begins
arguing with them.

	Ahab arrives at the infirmary, and orders the guards to let Ariana
through.  They hear Nicholas scream at this point, as Felix removes the
first quarrel, and quickly enter the room.  Ariana decides that Meander is
in far worse shape and tends to him first, swearing as she discovers that
the wounds were caused by Takaran blades.  Felix has Ahab begin binding
Nicholas up, and goes to assist Ariana.  Ariana uses her magic to block
Meander's pain, then does the same for Felix.  She and Felix begin trying
to repair Meander's sucking chest wound.  It is an hour before they are
successful.

	Nicholas tells Ahab that the assassins weren't aiming for him,
they were aiming for Beauty.  Specifically, for her womb.  He wounded
Dara, though.  Half an hour later, Ariadne enters the room and says that
Nicholas definitely got her, but she won't be a problem now.  It was a
Logrus ghost.  Nice shot, btw, the jugular bleeds a lot.  She thinks they
ghosts have been made real, somehow.  Ahab Trumps Benedict.  No luck.  He
tries Fiona next, and asks her to come through.  When she does so, he
explains that Nimue was supposed to walk the Pattern today, and he wants
Fiona to help him watch her, to make sure that nothing goes wrong.  Sure. 
Ahab also mentions the Benedict problem.  Fiona checks, and determines
that his Trump is being blocked at the source.

	Nimue arrives in the infirmary, and Ahab explains that he thinks
she should go ahead and walk the Pattern now.  They go to do this thing. 
Benedict's guards are at the entrance to the Pattern room.  Ahab asks if
they've seen Benedict recently, but they haven't.  Ahab orders his guards
to protect Nimue, and they proceed down the stairs.  Suddenly the guards
turn on Nimue, and Ariadne goes ballistic.  One of the guards melts into
Dara and manages to stab Nimue, before she's wounded and throws herself
over the edge of the stairs.  Ariadne follows.  Nimue is OK, but she's
lost some blood.  It was a Takaran blade, of course.  Fiona was also
wounded, and looks quite annoyed.  She casts a rather powerful spell that
will cause everyone in the castle to resume their true form.  All of the
sorcerers in the castle notice this, of course.  There is the sound of
steel hitting steel from below.

	Back on the Disc, Laughter uses the talking bones to contact Looks
Twice and ask for directions to his location.  He gives them to her, and
after half an hour rides out to meet her.  She asks if he'll come to Amber
and train her men in archery.  No, he's kind of bound to his tribe right
now, since he is their only healer.  Oh well.  It is at this point that
she realizes that she's stranded on the Disc.  Shit.

	Meander becomes semi-conscious, and begins mumbling something
about leaving Laughter on the Disc.  Ariana sends a page for Bart and
assures Meander that they're talking care of it.  Bart gets the message
and tells Lyss that he's meeting Ariana for a liaison in the infirmary. 
Lyss falls for it, and protests that Ariana is married.  Bart grins.  He
goes up to the infirmary, and Ariana explains the situation.  Bart
eventually agrees to retrieve Laughter.  He stops by Beauty on the way
out, to ask if she's all right.  She and Nicholas stop talking at his
approach.  Bart asks what's going on.  A few assassinations.  Why was the
Disco one of them?  Nicholas looks confused, not understanding that Bart
is referring to Meander.

	Bart leaves the infirmary, sets up a romantic setting in one of
the sitting rooms, including chocolates, and contacts Laughter.  She asks
if there's any chance she could beg him to bring her out of the Disc. 
Perhaps.  She offers to kill someone for him.  No, not necessary.  He
brings her through and offers her chocolate.  She accepts and asks if he's
seen Meander.  Bits.  She might want to check in the infirmary.  No one's
in critical condition any longer.  Especially not Beauty.  Laughter leaves
immediately.  Bart shares the chocolate with Ariel.

	Alex spends time talking with Mebd, who doesn't seem to be quite
right.  She's not quite all there, more so than usual, and her short term
memory is shot to hell.  She's also very hungry and very thirsty, but
nothing he gives her appeals to her.

	Laughter runs into the infirmary.  Beauty throws herself into
Laughter's arms and begins sobbing.  Laughter takes her into a corner and
hears how Nicholas threw himself in front of her, and how they were aiming
at the baby.

	Ariana and Felix finish up with Meander and go to work on
Nicholas.  Ariana blocks his pain and begins digging out the bone
fragments from the hip wound.

	Fiona casts a light spell on Dara and Ariadne, so Ahab can see
them.  Ahab then catches the Logrus ghost up in a Shadow pocket and
empties it out over the Pattern.  The Logrus ghost makes a very satisfying
sizzle.  Fiona decides to go join the game and blips out.  All hell has
broken loose in the castle, as Dara's spies are revealed by Fiona's spell.

	Bart hears the noise and goes to protect his family.  Laughter
goes to guard the infirmary door.  Felix leaves the infirmary and joins
the general fray.  Kimdyl arrives at the infirmary and sits with Nicholas,
watching Ariana work on his injuries.  Ahab eventually fights his way to
the infirmary, while Nimue throws combat spells.  In the end, there turns
out to be 20-30 of Dara's spies in the castle.  Bridget turns out to have
been attacked as well, but she and her baby are fine.  The castle is down
some crockery, however.

	Ahab talks to Eric, who says Dara's spies must have been there for
a long time.  Brand appears, and Ahab tells him to start monitoring Trump
now, adding that Brand was right, and he was wrong.  Brand is delighted to
hear this, of course, and leaves with quite a smile on his face.  Ahab
summons Bleys and asks him to secure a Trump call, then Trumps Flora. 
Ahab explains what happened in Amber, including the spies that were
uncovered, and warns her something similar may be happening in Chaos. 
Then he gets Bleys' help in Trumping Benedict, but it's still blocked.  At
this point, a page informs Ahab that Magdalyn wishes to speak to him.  She
is shown in and reports that she thinks something foul has happened to
Benedict.  He checks in with her once a day, and failed to do so today. 
He had told her that if he ever failed to check in, he was either dead or
in trouble.  Ahab invites her to stay in the castle during the current
crisis, and she quickly accepts.

	Laughter finds some armor for Beauty to wear, until she thinks of
something better.  Nicholas asks Ariana to extend the pain block on him
for a while longer, which she does for both him and Meander.  Laughter
thanks him for what he did.  As if he could ever let anything happen to
Beauty.  Laughter finds Caitt and fills her in, then returns to her
quarters.  She finds no door and a Logrus ghost of Dara dissipating on the
floor.  Iseult is screaming, and Foster is hanging onto Haris pretty
tight.  Laughter picks Iseult up and assures herself that everyone is
safe, then sits down.  Foster exchanges kids with her.  Haris seems
undisturbed by what happened.  There is a Takaran blade buried in the
wall, which Laughter takes.  Foster is rather pale, and Laughter notices
that there's a lot of blood that didn't dissipate with the ghost, but
Foster insists that he's fine, right up until he hands Iseult to her and
passes out.

	Bart finds that Lyss and family are fine.  He shares his
chocolates with her, and does some more work on his spell.

	Usires' men are antsy, since it's calm, too calm.  He runs them
through drills to take their mind off of it.

	Ariana Trumps Mirelle and makes sure her kids are fine.  Then
Laughter finds her and asks her to take a look at Foster.  Ariana does so,
and determines that he is pretty battered, but wasn't wounded by a Takaran
blade, so she is able to heal him.  She tells Laughter that he will sleep
for a while, then returns to Vetchways.  She is so tired by the day's
events that she winds up falling asleep while watching the children. 
Mirelle and Anne opt not to disturb her.

	Laughter brings the children to see Felix, who is guilting over
what's happened.  She tries to convince him that it's not his fault.

	Ahab is informed that Felix would like to see him at his
convenience.  He has Bleys verify that Magdalyn is who she appears to be,
then talks to Kimdyl and gives her a hug.  Ahab is rather frustrated with
how things have been going.  Kimdyl points out that it's Dara's plan, so
they can only react, for now.

	Ahab meets with Felix, and makes Laughter leave the room.  Felix
apologizes for what he did.  Ahab says he's forgiven.  Admittedly, it was
a foolish thing to do, but something good did come out of it.  Felix wants
to be told if anything is learned about Gerard.  Ahab says he'll keep
Felix informed, but his current priority is to make sure that no one new
gets hurt.


Quotables:

"What did Usires do with my crew?" -- Usires to GM
"You *are* Usires!" -- the rest of the group

"You have all of these guns pointed at you." -- GM
"How many is all?" -- Felix
"About 20." -- GM
"Fuck." -- Felix

"From the looks of him, (Ivan's) probably kin to Dalt, which means we have
to kill him." -- Ahab to Deirdre

"I've got bad news for you.  Well, not terribly bad, but ungood.  Your dad
tried to develop space travel last night, and failed." -- Ahab to Foster

"I'm kind of obligated to feel your pain whenever I have to." -- Laughter
to Foster

"Do be a dear and stay away from large explosives in the future." -- Tamaryn
"I'll try, but they're so tempting." -- Felix

"I was only helping because (Felix) seemed to want it so bad." -- Tamaryn
to Ahab

"When you get back to your room, you notice you don't have a door." -- GM
"I think, 'This is new.'" -- Laughter