Extracts from the Journal of

Chapter II
City of the Dead, 113 PPF

Perque domos Ditis vacuas et inania regna (And through the empty dwellings and the dismal realms of Hades)

- Virgil

he first thing I noticed when I awoke was that I was no longer in the same locale as that in which I had initiated my repose. The second thing I noticed was that it was very cold. Other impressions followed in rapid succession. The room was the wrong shape; it was dark; I was lying on a hard stone floor; I was fully dressed. A refund seemed in order - the accommodation had definitely gone downhill overnight. The room in which I was now lodged was small and cubical, about ten feet on each side, and finished in a dark stone I didn't immediately recognise. A black mist seeped around the floor, occasionally puddling in the less even sections. I checked the magickal quality of the place, and found it peculiar and, again, unfamiliar, but decidedly more conducive to the sorcerous arts than my previous location on the outskirts of Amber. I was somewhere out in Shadow then. I arose and exited via the low, simple doorway, muttering "This is definitely upping the ante." The most logical explanation for my newfound circumstances was that Caine had taken it upon himself to remove me from circulation for as long as it took to dismantle my coalition against amnesties for traitors. I doubted that Random was party to this unanticipated diversion from my intended route. My campaign, as I had previously surmised, did to some extent serve his purposes: it indirectly gave him an opportunity to take note of Bleys' supporters in the city, but it also doubtless strengthened his hand in the negotiations. Thus if he had really wanted me to wind up the crusade in its entirety then he would have ordered me so to do directly and unambiguously. Consequent to this consideration, I noted glumly that as long as the public outrage against Bleys was of use to him, Random had no particular reason to call off the talks or the temporary amnesty. I was obviously going to have to try harder. The street outside was dark and narrow. The houses, flat-roofed and simple in construction, were crowded together like the dwellings at the less prosperous end of some Ottoman suq. Everything seemed drained of colour, the only illumination being from above, a faint effulgence akin to starlight. I looked up to ascertain the familiarity, or lack thereof, of the constellations, and immediately wished I hadn't. I stared at the sky for as long as I could - about two seconds - and didn't look again. The much abused cliché, to speak of a feeling of "someone walking over one's grave", was hopelessly inadequate to the sensation of mortal revulsion and nameless dread evoked by that vast and pitiless canopy. The eponymous someone did not merely walk: they danced, they jumped up and down, they sank long twisted spikes down through the worm-tunnelled earth, and rejoiced in the profusion of mephitic vapours released as the coffin splintered and the jagged points penetrated the soft corruption within. They did not, in short, pull their punches. For perhaps the first time, I truly understood what Nitocris must have experienced as she lay bandaged and immobilised in her sarcophagus, slowly suffocating, the terrible weight of mortality crushing down on her until the last spark of life was snuffed out. That she had ended up only mildly claustrophobic was still a source of amazement to me. The only difference was that this Shadow's sky tended more towards the inducement of agoraphobia. Four millennia trapped in a mummy casket seemed quite a pleasant prospect if it would mean never having to look at it again. I restricted my gaze to the level of the street. There were a couple of ragged-looking individuals lurking further along the narrow promenade, so I set off to accost them. The first one, a grey and aged fellow with the glazed expression of someone who has been obliged to sit through the entire Ring Cycle without an interval, just stared at me blankly in response to my hails. He seemed vaguely aware of me, but otherwise exhibited all the joie de vivre and animation of a brick. He also appeared to have been eviscerated some time in the not so recent past, his remaining entrails lolling listlessly in the bloodless gash that ran diagonally from hip to sternum. It looked not entirely unlike the wound inflicted by a velociraptor's sickle-claw. Another possible explanation for my relocation occurred to me. This had better not be another of Tristan's "experiments" gone wrong. I tackled the next bystander, who seemed to have been garrotted. On closer inspection, it looked more as if his head had been severed and then reattached. He was as talkative as his fellow, although perhaps with slightly more cause. I snorted. What I really needed to do was talk to someone rather less deceased. I ventured to the end of the street and turned a corner. The next thoroughfare was as unremarkable as the first. I vaulted onto the nearest roof, tendrils of black mist trailing behind me, to see what landmarks could be made out. The vista that greeted me was a singularly dismal one: just street after twisted street of small square buildings cramped together, no squares, no public buildings. The horizon I could look at, I discovered, as long as I was careful not to let my gaze drift upwards. Consequently, I could just about discern the edge of this veritable city of the dead in the far distance ahead of me, and I was also able to observe that the ground seemed to rise slightly to my left. I decided to head for the city limits, and set off across the rooftops. Numerous thoughts, worries and concerns nagged at me once I had gained a comfortable pace. The notion that it had been Caine who had brought me here, with or without Random's blessing, seemed less and less plausible. If I was correct that the anti-Bleys campaign was only largely, as opposed to wholly, unwelcome, then there was no cause for Caine to resort to methods as drastic as kidnapping. It made more sense for the contest to be played out as it had been hitherto, for as long as its utility remained. On the other hand, I was not unaware that the general tenor of the message that I had been called upon to deliver evinced no attempt whatsoever to utilise the popular disquiet as a negotiating tactic, which somewhat told against this interpretation of Random's - and hence Caine's - position. But then little of this half-baked plan to permit Bleys' return made any sense. The conclusion I was edging towards was that regardless of how you added it up, neither Caine nor Random had anything to gain by sidelining me in this fashion. The one person who did gain from having me out of the way at this particular juncture was Bleys. Just one more reason not to hang out the welcoming flags. It was around this point that I noticed the silver flash. It was ahead of me and slightly to the right, on the very outskirts of the necropolis. After an initial flare, it settled down into a silvery glow, accompanied by an arc of light that sprang forth into the night sky - I avoided following its path too closely - and then back down in the direction of ... myself. I considered my options. Bringing the Pattern to mind would take too long and I was not currently in possession of any hung and readied warding spells. As usual, I was forced back on the traditional combination of luck, charm and steel. I slid Dashwood from its sheath just as the silver arc reached me, bathing me in a luminescence akin to the one I had espied only seconds before. The sensation was remarkably like a Trump contact. It felt urgent, but not especially forceful, suggestive more of a conversational gambit than a full-frontal assault on my mental defences. I levelled the blade, and opened up. The young lady holding my Trump looked slightly taken aback at the point of the sword hovering a few inches from her face. "You don't know me," she began astutely, before remedying the situation, "I'm Altair. Gerard's daughter." Given the family resemblance, I was inclined to take this more or less at face value, although why Gerard would have wished to keep his offspring a secret from the rest of us was, I confess, a little obscure to me. She was a tough and somewhat weatherbeaten-looking individual, but by no means unattractive. Her appearance was however marred by two curious details. As we regarded each other, her hair was becoming increasingly streaked with grey, and little crows' feet were developing at the corners of her eyes. She also appeared to have two holes drilled in her head. Since a gentleman never comments on a lady's appearance except to compliment her, I merely dropped the point of the sabre and bowed. "Damien, Lord Mortlake," I said, "Would you care to join me?" She stepped through to me, and the silver glow around us melted away, replaced by a faint swirl of black mist that seemed reluctant to dissipate. I could not help but observe that the subtle but progressive aging that had afflicted her ceased as the last quicksilver glimmer faded. Up close, the apertures in her cranium looked not unlike the wounds displayed by the ambulatory cadavers in the streets - bloodless, yet definitely tending towards the fatal end of the spectrum. Curiosity momentarily outweighed politeness. "I hope you won't think this amiss," I said, "but do you know that you have a couple of holes in your head?" She blinked. "Do you know that you have a couple of holes in your head?" she responded. I didn't, but I was hardly going to admit to the fact. I felt my temples gingerly. The sensation when I tentatively inserted my little finger into one of the holes was singularly unpleasant, so I didn't do it again. I could tell, however, that my injuries were identical to hers - two round, smooth cavities in my forehead. Maybe there had been an outbreak of duelling with power tools. It dawned on me finally that my, indeed our, residence here in this seeming realm of the deceased might not be unmerited. Altair's presence also militated against my earlier assumption that I owed this sojourn to my stance against Bleys. Unless, of course, she'd been running her own campaign. We compared notes briefly. Neither of us could remember how we got here. The last thing either of us remembered was going to sleep; on awakening, we had found ourselves resident in this necropolis. This was really most aggravating. Well, I've brought people back from the dead before, one of them even permanently. And what I could do for Nitocris, I could do for myself. Altair mentioned that she'd Trumped me because my Trump, amongst certain others, had felt "odd". The others of which she spoke had been Tristan, Tamarind and Ibrahim. Tamarind's Trump, she noted, had been active. My own Trumps having been mislaid during my transit to Acheron, I borrowed those of Tristan and Ibrahim while she tried to contact Tamarind. Twin arcs of silver sped their parallel ways under the unwatchable sky. Things then got mildly confused. Tristan, when I got through to him, was about to accompany Tamarind though another Trump link. Eventually we let them get to where they were going, and then Altair and I came through on Tamarind's Trump. We were in a long, rather gloomy vaulted hallway in the late medieval Gothic style, lit by colourless-looking torches on the walls. There to greet us was Deirdre. Tamarind, bless him, seemed overjoyed to see her. She, naturally, was appalled to have been reunited with him on this side of the eternal divide. I introduced myself to her and kissed her hand, and then named Altair to the three of them. Altair seemed to squirm slightly when I introduced her by her royal title. "Just Altair," she murmured. I apologised at once, mentioning that I too had certain problems getting people to address me by my preferred appellation. Tristan and Tamarind, I noted, sported the same blemishes that bespoke their own encounters with the wielder of the power drill, as well as looking somewhat older. Deirdre for her part appeared to aged a couple of decades since she last sat for a portrait in Amber, and while she exhibited no obvious signs of trauma, I surmised that the half-face mask she wore was intended to be more than merely decorative. The analysis and amelioration of our situation, however, would have to wait a little longer. I still had Ibrahim's Trump, so I concentrated on it. "Hello?" he said, somewhat warily. I beheld that the ventilated skull was rapidly ceasing to be at the cutting edge of fashion. As it were. "We appear to be temporarily dead," I informed him, "Would you care to join the rest of us?" Ibrahim elected to join our little convocation of the departed. He took one look at Deirdre, paused long enough to greet her formally, and then immediately commandeered a Trump of his father. He began concentrating on it fiercely. I turned back to the others, who were speculating on the nature of our shared cranial trauma. The emerging consensus seemed to be that in their precision and regularity, they resembled nothing so much as trepanning wounds. As if someone had set out to destroy the higher brain functions ... Which inclined one towards the view that the lower brain functions might have been left untouched, in which case, although our spirits might have wandered in search of pastures new, our bodies could well be alive somewhere. Things began to come together. I now had a fairly good idea of what it was we were doing here. "Father?" I heard Ibrahim say quietly. He had evidently made contact. I watched as he pulled an aged, vacant eyed Eric through to us in a flare of silvery light, accompanied by a few faint patches of the ubiquitous black mist. Eric, sad to relate, had not adapted quite so well to the next world as had his younger sister. Deirdre noted that she had avoided ending up in the same reduced state because she had had "help". The rest of us looked at each other, except for Eric, who just looked at the nearest wall. I think we could all guess who her benefactor might have been. "It's best that you meet him," was all that she would say, refusing to confirm or deny our suspicions. So off we went to pay a call on the late Prince Brand. Ibrahim, who was bearing up to the revelation of his father's unenviable condition with the fortitude I had come to expect of him, led the shuffling Eric along by one arm. A pragmatist, he also had the presence of mind of borrow the latter's sword. As we walked through a drab array of corridors and galleries, I expounded my Orpheus theory to my companions. "We've been sent here deliberately," I suggested, "but only on a temporary basis. We're expected back. Because we've been sent here to fetch something, or rather, someone." The others mulled this over. "Bleys," I explained, when no-one else seemed capable of mastering their two plus twos, "Bleys wants us to get Fiona back. She's not dead, but she's here. Like us." "He wouldn't do that to his own son," protested Tristan, with wearisome predictability. I just gave him a look, and came to a halt, holding out my hand. "Can I trouble someone for a Trump of Fiona?" I asked. Demonstration is always better than argument. Altair obligingly handed one over. I concentrated on it, and the silver light coalesced again, flying off through the walls and into the perpetual night beyond. I edged over to the nearest window, still concentrating, to try and gauge where the silvery arc was headed. We were high up, looking down on the city, the black mist seeping up around and past the structure in which we stood. From above, the city looked not unlike Amber, even possessing a dry and dusty harbour, a few black ships grounded within its concavity, lolling listlessly. The light seemed to ground itself somewhere beyond the necropolis, amidst the elevated region I had espied earlier. I started getting some resistance. Altair offered to assist, and between us, we managed to force a contact. Fiona was lying curled up in a doorway, and on first inspection looked little different from the other faded denizens of this place. She had aged, appearing older than Deirdre, but was still considerably younger than the unfortunate Eric. And her mind, what I could sense of it, seemed to be churning away like a vast perpetual motion machine, turned in on itself, self-sustaining but trapped in an endless spiral. I wondered, as I pulled her through, if her madness had to some extent protected her from the worst of Hades' depredations. Not, I hasten to add, that I was considering adopting the catatonic trance as the optimum defence against aging. I glanced at Altair. She definitely looked older following our exertions. So, I suspected, did I. "We only have a finite reserve of self," explained Deirdre as I hoisted Fiona into my arms, "The more of yourself you put into using things like Trumps, the less of you you have left. When it's all used up, all that remains is ..." She gestured discretely at Eric. In other words, the immigration rules currently in force allowed you in only with what you could carry. Even if you were only there as a tourist. "There's another of your cousins here," she added, "His name's Evan." Mild consternation broke out. "Evan?" said Tamarind, "Not Evander?" "He's not Brand's son?" asked Tristan. Deirdre shook her head, and then shook it again when Tamarind showed her Evander's Trump. The impostor theory remained unproven. Deirdre ushered us onwards. Ahead was a door beneath which a monochrome light flickered. We found ourselves in the laboratory of a sorcerer of the old school - a vaulted, circular chamber strewn with books and scrolls and strange crystal devices piled on desks and benches, complicated items of glassware, a large enneagonal star etched into the floor in place of the traditional pentagram. Lit by guttering achromatic torches, it reminded me vaguely of Rabbi Loew ben Bezelel's establishment in Shadow Prague. The only thing missing was the large stuffed crocodile hanging from the ceiling, but perhaps that was through one of the doors at the far end. A bent and hoary methusalah with long white hair tottered towards us, leaning heavily on a cane. I wouldn't have recognised him automatically had I bumped into him whilst strolling through the Ghetto, although the single undimmed green eye, the other hidden behind an eye-patch, was a bit of a giveaway. "May I introduce you all to Prince Brand?" asked Deirdre somewhat unnecessarily, but then I suppose it had been a long time since she last got to play hostess. Brand peered up at us. "You must be Tamarind," he noted, addressing the aforementioned. His voice was high and reedy, but slightly cracked, like a clarinet left outside overnight. "I've heard of you," he added. I wasn't surprised. In Deirdre's position, I would probably have subjected him to rather a lot of "I'm never going to see my son again, and it's all your fault" as well. "I know your daughter, Beltaine," said Tamarind, just to show that he read the society pages as well. "Ah," said Brand, "She got out then. Good." He nodded in a "we shall speak more of this later" fashion, and turned to greet Tristan. "Brother," he said. Tristan, the only one of our coterie who had ever actually met Brand before, seemed noticeably cooler towards him than did the rest of us. To myself at least, the man was a historical curiosity of no particularly good repute, but when someone's been dead for over a century one can generally afford them a degree of indulgence. In any case, if the wretched Bleys or whoever had sent us here was expecting us to make our own way back, then we would probably be dependent on Brand's superior knowledge of the thanatological verities. Discourtesy could well be self-defeating, not to mention ... well, discourteous. "Brand," said Tristan stiffly. Brand grinned cheerily, seemingly unoffended. "Oberon's here," he remarked, causing Tristan to flinch noticeably, "After a fashion, that is. Maybe I'll show him to you later. I sometimes wonder who replaced him. Corwin, I suppose, or Bleys." I felt my lips twitch slightly. Tristan recovered enough to shake his head. "Random," he said. Brand snorted incredulously, and held up his hand palm down in a "What, little Random?" gesture. Tristan, ever loyal, scowled. "And he's a very good king," he snapped. Brand shook his head disbelievingly, and turned to Ibrahim. "Now you," he said, "would be Eric's at a guess. Given the way you're trailing him around like a balloon." Ibrahim blinked, as if he hadn't quite heard correctly, and then his visage darkened. Brand raised a hand in a mollifying gesture. "Definitely Eric's," he muttered. Ibrahim fumed, but refrained from any immediate jihads. Eric just gazed dully into the middle distance. Maybe he was trying to work out where the stuffed crocodile was as well. "Gerard's?" said Brand, now peering at Altair. Altair swallowed hard and nodded. "I see you've walked the Tir-na Nog'th Pattern," noted Brand casually. I wondered if he could do card tricks too. Actually, what I was really wondering was what on earth Gerard had been trying to protect her from in keeping her hidden away from the rest of us. And why he thought she needed protecting from it. Brand was now looking at me. "And you'd be Bleys' or Fiona's," he hazarded. To some parts of the Family I'd always be one of the redheads. Including, it seemed, the redheads themselves. He took in the comatose Fiona in my arms. "Fiona's?" "We can't choose our relatives," I observed sourly, meaning no. He nodded. I think he caught my drift. Once we'd all been properly introduced, the others started to bombard him with questions. Tamarind wanted to know about some wall he had apparently glimpsed earlier. "That," said Brand, "is the barrier between the realms of the living and the dead. And," he added to forestall the obvious follow-up, "you can't get past it. I've tried. It recedes as you approach." I looked for somewhere where I could put Fiona, and managed to clear some space for her on a bench. She immediately curled up again, her eyes occasionally drifting back and forth, as if trying to follow the outline of some shape her mind couldn't or wouldn't comprehend. I wondered how we could snap her out of this. Now that I'd found her, I had no intention of letting her go the way of Eurydice, and the best way of ensuring this was to get her actively involved in her own fate. I would happily send Bleys right back in the opposite direction the moment we got out, but I was damned if I was going to leave her here when she was even less dead than us. And she deserved better than being kept as the centre-piece of the Bleys Museum of Natural History, or wherever she was physically. "It's using your powers that ages you," Brand was saying in response to someone's question, "but I can give you something to keep it in check." He hobbled over to a desk and produced and handful of silver spikes, each about six inches long and terminating in a large flat disk, all engraved in intricate, apparently abstract patterns. They looked like the sort of nails with which Noah might have hammered the Ark together, had he been a man of means as opposed to a mere DIY enthusiast. "You insert them in the chest," he said, pulling his robe aside to reveal one such device buried in a sunken, scrawny torso. Well, I suppose it was a relief that he hadn't designed them as suppositories. I also assumed that it had taken a lot of time and effort on his part to affect this cure for the aging process, since otherwise he was perhaps not the best advertisement for his own treatment. The rest of us looked at each other. Tamarind volunteered, and since Deirdre didn't object, neither did I. Brand, with a strength that his wizened frame belied, rammed one of the spikes into Tamarind's chest. Tamarind's face registered the sort of expression traditional in cases of having something sharp plunged into one's heart, and then he blinked. We looked at him expectantly. He didn't seem to be getting any younger, but otherwise he appeared no worse for the experience. "I feel stronger," he admitted. This didn't exactly rule out a placebo effect, but it seemed promising. A little belatedly, I realised a possible downside. "They don't in any way bind us to this place?" I enquired carefully. Brand shook his head. "It's just that we're not planning on staying," I continued, "Someone, almost certainly a member of the Family, sent us here whilst keeping out bodies alive. We're expected back, and I for one don't intend to disappoint." On impulse, I glanced up at the ceiling. "We've got her," I called, "We're ready to leave now." Nothing happened. I looked at the others and shrugged. I'd never suggested that the tour operator with the trepanning saw had actually thought the plan through. Tristan was still staring suspiciously at the spikes. "Let me show you the power source," said Brand, gesturing towards the closed door at the end of the room. Tristan followed him in, the rest of us peering through the doorway after them. Ah. No stuffed crocodile. Just the late King Oberon of Amber reposed in a large open casket, a massive silver spike in his chest, radiating a quite palpable sense of power. Tristan didn't exactly caper, nor did he precisely turn cartwheels or point at Oberon and go "Nneeeyah-ha-ha-ha-hhaaa." He was however grinning like a lunatic as he turned to Brand and bared his chest for a spike of his own. His beatific expression remained unchanged except for the slightest of winces as the object was duly inserted. I suspected, however, that the sight of his nemesis catatonic and pinned like a butterfly was going to do him more good than Brand's magick thumb tacks. "He was here, comatose, when we arrived," Brand was explaining. After repairing a Primal Pattern, I suppose I'd want to lie down for a while as well. "And," our host continued, "I've kept him under ever since, for safety reasons if nothing else." Anyone's safety in particular? I wondered. I made a slight effort to feel sorry for the old despot, but it didn't quite happen. Any subsequent career that didn't involve heavy lifting couldn't be all bad. But morale-boosting as this new revelation might have been for those of us with a personal stake in the matter - so to speak - it was not getting us any closer to the land of the living. "Would someone like to try Trumping Bleys?" I asked generally. Tamarind, ever helpful, proffered me a Trump. I sighed, and repeated the question. Tamarind got the hint, shrugged, and began concentrating. I noticed Altair scanning through her own deck, searching for signs of life. Tamarind didn't seem to be getting anywhere, which was simultaneously reassuring - I wasn't going to have to confront the bastard yet - and disappointing - it meant he was still alive. Altair, however, was frowning, and soon Tamarind was as well. Both of them had settled on Caine's Trump. He was, they said, "flickering", seemingly alive one minute and dead the next. Indecisiveness not being a quality I usually associated with Caine, I took an interest. Altair tried Trumping him during one of his dead phases, and soon we had added to our number a blank-faced, decrepit Caine, stumbling into our midst in a blaze of silver. He had been stabbed in the chest, his throat cut, and like Eric, the missing crocodile seemed to flummox him too. The new arrival was pointed out to Brand. "He's dead," said Brand helpfully. Altair showed him the now-you-see-it-now-you-don't Trump. "Hmm," said Brand, and concentrated on it briefly. Scintillating light flicked between him and Caine. "Definitely dead," he confirmed, handing the Trump back to her, "And for some time, by the looks of things." Aha. Enigma resolved. Tristan began searching the uncomplaining shade, coming up with a ring which I noted had some echo of power in it, a Trump deck, and twelve emerald-hilted daggers. At least I assumed that they were emerald-hilted, given the enforced achromatism of our current environment. Tristan ruffled through Caine's Trumps, and announced that the youngest Amberites represented therein were himself and, interestingly enough, Altair. Altair shuffled her feet slightly. "He probably died before Patternfall," Tristan surmised. I glanced round. There were not a few "Who could have been impersonating Caine for the past hundred years?" expressions lurking on my companions' faces. I sighed. The study of history is a lost art amongst my cousins. "It's the duplicate Caine that Caine killed in order to frame Corwin," I explained wearily. Timing, cause of death, a resemblance to Caine sufficient to fool even the Trumps - it all made perfect sense. Not all of the expressions altered, however. Well, if they wanted to make a mystery out of it, they were welcome to do so. I could use a little distraction on Caine's part when we got back. I wandered back over to Fiona, and conducted a brief examination of her own accessories. Some of her rings were magickal, and she also had a deck of Trumps. Several of the latter were not from the standard deck, and were in a vaguely unfamiliar style that I assumed was her own. I didn't recognise any of the faces or places depicted, and I returned them to her person once I had finished glancing through them. No one has ever accused me of taking advantage of a lady while she was unconscious. Well, not accused me and lived, anyway. I could always ask her about them later. I was turning back to the others to suggest that it was about time she was woken up, when we finally got an answer to the question that we'd been dancing around for the past half an hour.

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