Prince of chaos

I halted and studied the trees, bright, dark, shiny, dull. Iron, aluminum, brass, it was most impressive. It was also a display that had not been present the last time I had passed this way, years before. Nothing odd about that, of course. There had also been changes in other areas I had passed through.

«Now. Here. Turn in. Go back.»

I moved on into the forest.

«Bear right. The tall one.»

I halted when I came to the curved trunk of the tallest tree to my right.

«This one?»

«Yess. Negotiate it - upward - pleasse.»

«You mean climb it?»

«Yess.»

«Right.»

One nice thing about a stylized tree - or, at least, this stylized tree - was that it spiraled, swelled, and twisted in such a fashion as to provide better handholds and footholds than at first seemed apparent. I caught hold, drew myself up, found a place for my foot, pulled again, pushed.

Higher. Higher, still. When I was perhaps ten feet above the floor I halted.

«Uh, what do I do now that I'm here?» I asked.

«Climb higher.»

«Why»

«Ssoon. Ssoon. You'll know.»

I drew myself about a foot higher, and then I felt it.

It is not so much a tingling as it is a kind of pressure… only feel a tingling, too, sometimes, if they lead someplace risky.

«There's a way up there,» I said.

«Yess. I wass coiled about a branch of the blue tree when a shadowmasster opened it. They sslew him afterwardss.»

«It must lead to something very important.»

«I ssuppose. I am not a good judge - of people thingss.»

«You have been through?»

«Yess.»

«Then it is safe?»

«Yess.»

«All right.»

I climbed higher, resisting the force of the way until I'd brought both feet to the same level. Then I relaxed into the tugging and let it take me through.

I extended both hands, too, in case the surface was uneven. But it wasn't. The floor was beautifully tiled in black, silver, gray, and white. To the right was a geometric design, to the left a representation of the Pit of Chaos.

My eyes were directed downward for only a few moments, though.

«Good Lord!» I said.

«Wass I right? It iss important?» Glait said.

«It is important,» I replied.

VI

There were candles all about the chapel, many of them as tall as I am, and nearly as big around. Some were silver, some were gray; a few were white, a few black. They stood at various heights, in artful disposition, on banks, ledges, pattern points on the floor. They did not provide the main illumination, however. This obtained from overhead, and I first assumed it to proceed from a skylight. When I glanced upward to gauge the height of the vault, though, I saw that the light emanated from a large blue-white globe confined behind a dark metal grate.

I took a step forward. The nearest candle flame flickered.

I faced a stone altar that filled a niche across the way. Black candles burned at either hand before it, smaller silver ones upon it. For a moment, I simply regarded it.

«Lookss like you,» Glait remarked.

«I thought your eyes didn't register two-dimensional representations.»

«I've lived a long time in a musseum. Why hide your picture up a ssecret way?»

I moved forward, my gaze on the painting.

«It's not me,» I said. «It's my father, Corwin of Amber.

A silver rose stood within a bud vase before the portrait. Whether it was a real rose or the product of art or magic, I could not tell.

And Grayswandir lay there before it, drawn a few inches from the scabbard. I'd a feeling this was the real thing, that the version worn by the Pattern ghost of my father was itself a reconstruction.

I reached forward, raised it, drew it.

There was a feeling of power as I held it, swung it, struck an en garde, lunged, advanced. The spikard came alive, center of a web of forces. I looked down, suddenly self-conscious.

«And this is m father's blade,» I said, returning to the altar, where I sheathed it. Reluctantly, I left it there.

As I backed away, Glait asked, «Thiss iss important?»

«Very,» I said as the way caught hold of me and sent me back to the treetop.

«What now, Masster Merlin?»

«I must get on to lunch with my mother.»

«In that case, you'd besst drop me here.»

«I could return you to the vase.»

«No. I haven't lurked in a tree for a time. Thiss will be fine.»

I extended my arm. She unwound herself and flowed away across gleaming branches.

«Good luck, Merlin. Vissit me.»

And I was down the tree, snagging my trousers only once, and off up the corridor at a quick pace.

Two turns later I came to a way to the main hall and decided I'd better take it. I popped through beside the massive fireplace - high flames braiding themselves within it - and turned slowly to survey the huge chamber, trying to seem as if I had been there a long while, waiting.

I seemed the only person present. Which, on reflection, struck me as a bit odd, with the fire roaring that way. I adjusted my shirtfront, brushed myself off, ran my comb through my hair. I was inspecting my fingernails when I became aware of a flash of movement at the head of the great staircase to my left.