Session 4.10 Index Session 4.12
Notes Taken by Samantha and Alastair Beadle.
Caitlin, Jihx and Godofos arrive in Vitesse by the Trump to be greeted by Renee, the innkeeper. Food, drink and accommodation is ordered, and provided.
The three of us eat, drink and then go up to our various rooms to sleep.
In shadow Fidellin, where the Chaos army was camped, there is a brief battle between the surviving Chaos forces and the attacking forces of Lillian, Finndo Junior and Whippoorwill. In addition to physical combat, this involves magic and Trump powered equipment. Lillian's Trump-powered airships and their Amberite powers are decisive and the battle is quickly won.
Once the area around the Chaos command tents have been cleared of enemy troops, some of Lillian's people come down from her command airship and begin to search the scene. This area of investigation expands as the battle continues.
After a while, some of the investigators return. They present Lillian (and Whippoorwill, who is there) with their findings so far. They have found a football-sized stone ball that has quite a lot of magic Empowered into it. They also report that they have found a number of victims of Godofos' lava gates, but cannot determine who they are. They have taken skin samples of the corpses, and Whippoorwill takes them for examination in The Hospital.
The investigators have also found some Trumps and maps.
The Trumps, some slightly charred, some burned to the level of being destroyed as Trumps, are the same as the smaller set we already have, the one taken from Anaximander.
The maps are of known shadow paths around shadow Ghenesh. Coraltown is marked on some of them and there is another mark similar to the one denoting it in the shadow of Beridge, some way from Ghenesh around the Golden Circle.
Finally the investigators hand over what looks like a diary. Lillian looks through it with Finndo Junior and Whippoorwill looking over her shoulder. It turns out to be a combined spell book and diary, written in a slightly archaic version of the Thari language, apparently belonging to the Chaosite Chimal. The spell book part contains many spells, including:
Whippoorwill tells Lillian that he would like to transcribe some of the spells.
Lillian clicks her fingers, casting a spell, and a copy of the book appears. She gives this to Whippoorwill.
He settles down to read. The diary describes Chimal's life growing up in the Courts of Chaos, apparently as a normal child. At a young age he seems to have had a 'testing', assessing his skills in various areas, such as artistry, medicine, shapeshifting, diplomacy, worship and several others. These tests apparently qualified him to enter a Coterie of chaos called the 'Spaceshifters'. He was then trained in Spaceshifting, becoming one of the best in the Coterie. However, details of this training are not including in the diary, and from what it says this is done because such writings are specifically forbidden. Having learned this much, Whippoorwill takes his copy of the diary to Vitesse for further analysis.
In Vitesse Whippoorwill orders wine and a 'full tunnel breakfast', over which he reads more of Chimal's diary.
Continuing on, there is more detail on the 'Spaceshifter' training, but still not enough to fully understand what it is actually about. From reading the diary, Whippoorwill does find that there seem to be three social classes in the courts of Chaos, the Coteries, who seem to be specialised in various powers, the Commoners and the Demons.
Chimal then writes about the coming of the 'Redheads', the Amberites Bleys, Brand and Fiona, and the pact they made with the Courts of Chaos - if the Courts would assist them in taking over Amber, they would give Chaos power to greatly expand the Empire of Chaos and its power. The Coteries apparently agreed to this and, aided by the Blood Curse of Prince Corwin, the Spaceshifter Coterie, led by one of their number, Timandra, were able to slowly drive the Black Road all the way from Chaos to Amber. The diary them describes the failed attack on Amber along the Black Road. After the failure of the attack, the 'Spaceshifters' lost credibility with the other Coteries of the courts and were blackmailed into sending their best on a 'do or die' mission to take over Amber.
The members of the Spaceshifter Coterie on the expedition are Timandra, Tannim, Kalkin, Alcina, Terrato, Garrick, Parikhan, Castalia and Olinda. Also with them, but not in the Spaceshifters were Portunus, a Trump Artist, Anaximander, a strategist, and Econstis, a priest. The diary ends with the group setting up camp in Fidellin and preparing for the attack.
Noticeably there is no mention in the diary of any Amberites arriving at the Courts of Chaos other than the 'Redheads'. However, the 'Spaceshifters' left the Courts of Chaos within a year of the failed black road attack. Which implies that they left before the forces of Amber attacked Chaos. Hmmm...
Whippoorwill then goes back to the spell list part of the book and learns the Dispel and Warding spells from it.
Upstairs, the rest of us wake up and come downstairs for breakfast. We join Whippoorwill, and we discuss the battle and the discoveries made.
Caitlin informs us that she has worked out how to rewrite shadows. For example, she believes that she can make magic cease to work in a shadow. Or Trump.
When the maps and the probable Chaos camp in shadow Beridge, Caitlin Trumps Lillian to ask what she is going to do about it.
When she takes the call, Lillian is still in the Chaos camp, and says she will be here for a while, as there are prisoners to be dealt with, and her forces to get ready to move. However, she approves our plan to go to Beridge.
With that decided, we leave the auberge and find horses. Whippoorwill and Jihx find their own personal steeds. Caitlin and Godofos find normal steeds; Godofos' looks at him evilly, so he finds another.
Caitlin leads the way off through shadow on horseback, followed by Whippoorwill and Godofos also on horses and Jihx on his white hawk, which can now fly in large size in every shadow.
Caitlin's progress through shadow is very fast. The rapid shifts of environment mean that Godofos has trouble with his horse, but he manages to forcefully persuade it to comply with his wishes.
After an hour or two of shifting through shadow, we arrive in Beridge.
Upon arrival there is some surprise that the magical environment which all of us apart from Godofos sense here is exactly identical to that of the original Coraltown shadow.
Beridge is a desert shadow, a flat rocky plain broken only by triangular blades of stone, each long side at forty-five degrees to the ground, much thinner than they are long, so that the steep sides are very nearly vertical. All of these 'blades' run in the same direction. They vary in size from a few inches tall to about five hundred metres tall and a kilometre long. The largest ones have flat paths, roughly a foot wide, up the forty-five degree slopes. Some of the 'blades' have small villages clinging to their tips.
Suddenly the ground beneath Godofos' horse sounds hollow, and then crumbles away into a pit. Godofos leaps and rolls away to one side, but his horse falls down the pit. A load belch emanates from the hole, which then begins to close, the rock around its edges seeming to heal up.
Whippoorwill and Caitlin decide to stick close to the rocks in the hope that this will help them avoid any other pits; they use the Pattern to do this too. Godofos looks for another horse first. His initial attempt yields a skeleton, but on the second try he a very thin and ill-looking horse behind some rocks. He quickly finds it a bucket of water, which it is very grateful for, and joins Whippoorwill and Caitlin as they head on.
After another hour or so of riding we come across a 'blade' with what appears to be a copy of Coraltown clinging to its top.
There is some discussion regarding whether we should inform Gerard of our progress. In the end we decide that we should continue to show loyalty and so Caitlin Trumps him. However she does not get a response - perhaps he is asleep.
Caitlin says she will shift the properties of the shadow so that magic does not work here. However as she sits down to do so an alarm bell begins to ring in Coraltown II and a huge white fireball is fired from it down towards us.
Jihx intercepts the ball of fire with the anti-magic beam from his sword and it fades away.
We back off from the town.
Whippoorwill decides to go and find an explosives store so that we can blow down Coraltown II, and shifts off through shadow.
Caitlin just looks for somewhere quiet to change the shadow. Jihx covers us with his sword, fending of more fireballs as we go.
As we get some distance between Coraltown II and ourselves the ground shakes and three giant rocky humanoids, each one around a mile high, claw their way out of the ground beyond Coraltown II.
Godofos quickly Trump in his Trump jet and he and Caitlin leap in and flee. Jihx follows on his hawk.
When some distance is put between us and the giants, Caitlin continues to alter the shadow from the Trump jet's cockpit.
Godofos can feel the ripples of Pattern radiating from Caitlin as she works on changing the shadow.
Jihx flies back and monitors Coraltown II from the air. He sees the three giants move into defensive positions around the town.
Moving off through shadow away from Beridge, Whippoorwill goes off on a quest for explosives.
After a couple of hours Whippoorwill finds a 'Mad Max'-like shadow, with a well-defended roadside general store.
He goes into the store and orders ten tons of nitro-glycerine.
The shopkeeper questions Whippoorwill regarding his needs, and eventually offers him 'nukes'. Whippoorwill turns down this offer.
A further description of his task results in Whippoorwill buying ten tons of C4 explosive instead.
Whippoorwill asks the storekeeper to see some vehicles to transport all of this explosive. he is taken out to the back of the store where various vehicles are parked. He picks out ten four-tracked lorries and the C4 is loaded onto them.
The shopkeeper is paid in gold and Whippoorwill uses the Pattern to summon some of his minions who can drive. With their aid, the convoy drives out of the store and off through shadow, back towards Beridge.
Meanwhile, Godofos opens up a Trump Gate link to Ahnel and through it orders high explosive rockets for the Trump jet to be prepared.
Jihx, keeping a long distance eye on Coraltown II, senses the magic seeping out of the shadow. Suddenly, without a sound, the three rocky giants disappear. Were they illusions? Jihx also notices the sky turning purple, an effect added by Caitlin just because she can.
Ahnel being a fast-time shadow, within an hour Godofos Trumps Ahnel and finds that his rockets are ready. He lands the Trump jet, brings the rockets through, and loads them onto the jet.
Another hour or so later and Whippoorwill arrives back in Beridge with his convoy of vehicles and ten tons of C4. He Trumps Jihx and they discuss plans.
The trucks are to be driven up to the base of the 'blade' containing Coraltown under cover from Jihx and Godofos. They will then be exploded simultaneously, hopefully felling the 'blade' and the town.
By now, Caitlin believes she has finished the transformation of Beridge, so the attack is initiated.
Whippoorwill's vehicles approach the 'blade'. Arrows rain down from Coraltown II towards them, so Godofos and Jihx fly in and return fire with machine guns and wide-beam sword blasts respectively.
From their viewpoint above Coraltown II, they notice that this Coraltown is much emptier than the first one.
Whippoorwill co-ordinates the positioning of the explosive trucks.
With them positioned, they hastily back off from Coraltown II, covered from the air by Godofos and Jihx, trailing more than a kilometre of detonator cable behind them.
When everyone is clear of the 'blade', Whippoorwill Trumps everyone to warn them of the coming blast. With that done, he sets off the explosives. A massive blast erupts from the base of the 'blade', and it shudders and wobbles, but then settles again. Damn.
Godofos fires a rocket at the base of the 'blade' from the Trump jet. This causes the 'blade' to slowly topple and crash to the ground, smashing Coraltown II into pieces and raising a huge cloud of dust.
With Coraltown II dealt with, we rendezvous and discuss matters.
There is some concern that the missing inhabitants of Coraltown II are attacking Amber, so Jihx Trumps Moire in Rebma to find out if this is the case, while the rest of us set off for Amber along the shadow path which links Beridge to Amber to check it for attackers.
Queen Moire answers Jihx's Trump call. When asked, she tells him that she knows of nothing untoward happening in either Rebma or Amber. "Although the Cathtle gateth did clothe early last night, which is quite unuthual." Hmmm...
Jihx goes through the Trump links and joins her in Rebma and tells her about what we have been up to recently.
Moire thanks him for the news.
With that done, Jihx heads for Amber, foregoing the Arrival Courtyard Trump just in case Amber has been invaded, and instead using the staircase of Faiella-Bionin, intending to see if anything is amiss.
On the way out of Rebma he Trumps Godofos, and when he gets through, tells him what he has found out.
[Note that, for the record, Godofos' Trumps of significant places, such as outside the Pattern Room in Amber, are stored in a tamper-proof box in Ahnel that will self-destruct if not opened in the correct manner.]
Jihx runs up the steps of Faiella-Bionin, reaches the surface, and begins to jog along the road towards Amber.
About a mile along the road he realises something, Trumps Caitlin and gets his horse passed through to him. He then rides towards Amber at speed. Doh.
Some way along the shadow path to Amber, Whippoorwill Trumps Lillian to discuss the situation.
When she takes the call, we talk.
It is decided that other than Amber, the Coraltown II forces may be trying to escape to and through the site of Ghenesh. Lillian decides to go there to investigate this possibility. She comes through the Trump link to Whippoorwill and then Godofos uses his Trump of the shadow next to Coraltown I to make a link through to a place close to Ghenesh. Before departing, Lillian throws a dozen cards out of her deck to the ground. They are not Trumps, but magical. They fold themselves into origami wolves, which grow and shift into twelve real wolves. Lillian passes the wolves through the link first, then goes through herself.
We carry on, Whippoorwill using the Pattern as we go to gather his forces.
After several hours, we reach the outskirts of Forest Arden. The trees become huge and majestic as we carry on, as if we were travelling through a living cathedral. We encounter a few Arden Rangers and other travellers in the forest. When asked, they say they have not seen any armies or other suspicious activities here.
A while later we reach the edge of the Forest of Arden, on the outskirts of Amber. We leave the forces Whippoorwill has gathered on the way there and we go on towards Amber.
Jihx barrels along the road to Amber at around sixty miles per hour, blue sparks flying from the hooves of his horse. People going both ways on the road step aside as he passes.
Jihx quickly arrives at the harbour wall and is passed through by the guards. Still nothing appears to be amiss.
He then races up the steps from the harbour to the plateau, through the golden arch at the top, and up the Royal Way to the Castle. The Castle gates are open and he passes through them with no hindrance, the guards stepping out of his way as he arrives.
Whippoorwill Trumps Vialle.
Quite quickly, she answers.
Whippoorwill describes what we are up to and asks if all is well.
"Yes," she replies. She goes on to say that Gerard is out with the fleet. "Possibly near Ghenesh, which could explain why he is difficult to contact."
Whippoorwill updates Vialle on all of the recent events, then Whippoorwill drops the Trump link.
It is decided that we should divert our attention away from Amber and to Ghenesh.
Long term plans are then discussed. For example, what are we going to do with all of our Chaos prisoners?
In the main courtyard of Castle Amber, all appears normal. Jihx dismounts and walks into the Main Hall. He then goes on a tour of the castle, looking for anything amiss. The throne room is empty apart from the usual guards, so he heads for Gerard and Vialle's office. Their secretaries are absent, so he lets himself in to find a servant in the office, behind Vialle's desk, rummaging through the files there.
When Jihx demands to know what the servant is doing, she claims to have been sent here by Vialle, from the Command Centre, to look for something for her.
Jihx orders her to carry on, but Trumps Vialle to check on her story. Unfortunately, she does not answer.
Elsewhere, Godofos decides to check on Anaximander, imprisoned in a hermetically-sealed coffin in the Pattern Room. He Trumps Jihx.
At this point Jihx feels a Trump call coming on, which he identifies as being from Godofos, and so accepts the call.
Godofos explains that they have just spoken to Vialle in her office. Suspicious!
Godofos comes through to Jihx.
The servant looks even more worried than before when Godofos appears.
Godofos also tries Trumping Vialle and also fails to get through. He leaves the office and heads for the Command Centre.
Jihx remains to watch over the servant.
Godofos arrives at the Command Centre. Opening the door he is confronted by the sight of Timandra, Olinda, Garrick and Terrato along with a mixture of Amber and Chaos military types, servants and so on. Godofos quickly shuts the door, turns, and runs away as fast as he can. As he goes he pulls out Caitlin's Trump and begins to concentrate on it. Unfortunately, he knows he has been spotted by this point.
The door behind him crashes open, and he hears something that does not sound human running down the corridor towards him. He does not look back, and keeps running.
From behind him, he hears the shout of a word he does not know, and his legs briefly fail him. He stumbles and falls to the floor, losing his concentration on Caitlin's Trump as he does so. As he gets up, he catches sight of a bush of armoured, silver thorn-covered black metal tentacles rushing up behind him with a large, barbed sword held in one tentacle.
Upstairs in Gerard and Vialle's office, Jihx hears the slamming of the door and sprints to fore scene, leaving the servant behind.
Elsewhere, Caitlin briefly feels a Trump call coming on; then it goes away. She mentions this to Whippoorwill. This occurrence bothers them both.
In case this is important, Caitlin Trumps Godofos while Whippoorwill Trumps Lillian.
In Amber, Godofos rises and turns to face the bush of armoured black tentacles, drawing his sword. Blows are exchanged. Unfortunately, the bush appears to be much faster than Godofos, and has more limbs. He ducks and dives around it, taking several minor blows to his armour, some of which cut through to the flesh beneath. He quickly concludes that, although he seems stronger than it, he is outmatched. He attempts to find a weak spot or an eye to attack, but the armoured bush of tentacles seems to have neither. That being so, he winds up a blow in an attempt to take off the tentacle holding its sword when he begins to receive a Trump call.
He welcomes the call and Caitlin powers into his head. This distracts him sufficiently that he is stabbed in the abdomen by the barbed sword wielded by the creature as Caitlin realises that something is up. Ouch.
Jihx appears around the corner just as Godofos is pulled out of the corridor by Caitlin.
The creature fires four dagger-sized silver thorns at him, three of which he dodges, the fourth scratching his armour. Behind the creature he sees an armoured velociraptor-thing with no head, and a vertical mouth in the neck surrounded by a mass of differently-tipped tentacles (ending in eyes, fingers, blades, pincers and so on) with vertical blade-spikes running down its back to the tip of its tail, with sideways ones on the tip of the tail. Bad.
Godofos appears with Caitlin and Whippoorwill, bleeding massively from a serious abdominal wound. Caitlin quickly Trumps him through to The Hospital while Whippoorwill, who has not yet got through to Lillian, gives up on that and instead Trumps Jihx.
In the corridor outside the Command Centre, Jihx turns and flees the scene, Trumping Moire as he goes.
A word is shouted from behind him, and he stumbles slightly but keeps his feet.
At this point he feels Whippoorwill's Trump link come on. Jihx stops Trumping Moire and leaps through the link to Whippoorwill.
Jihx explains what he knows to the rest of us.
In The Hospital, Godofos refuses a general anaesthetic as the medics there begin to treat his wounds. With his condition stabilised, he Trumps Jihx.
Jihx identifies and accepts Godofos' call from The Hospital. Over the link, Godofos fills in the details of what happened. We all go through the link and join Godofos in The Hospital.
Caitlin Trumps Lillian and when she takes the call tells her about the subversion of Amber. She and Finndo Junior come through the link and join us in The Hospital.
Caitlin then Trumps Moire to warn her of what has happened and check that she really is Moire.
When the link opens, she does this. As far as she can tell, she is talking to Moire.
While we are in The Hospital the status of Castalia is checked. She is still in status, is before.
Jim is also still as before, if a little larger than previously.
The analysis of the blood which Timandra spat on Godofos before he threw her on the Pattern and its comparison with the samples taken at the Chaos camp in Fidellin shows that all of the samples are just blood, but they are all completely different from one another.
Caitlin then sits down to modify The Hospital so that Trump calls can only be made to the actual emergency rooms which we have Trumps of.
Godofos is patched up quickly.
Lillian activates her wolf pack once more to add to our defences.
Jihx Trumps Moire and keeps the link open, just in case.
While we wait, Whippoorwill stores a number of anti-magical spells in his spell rack grenade.
By the time Caitlin has finished modifying The Hospital shadow, Godofos is back on feet.
We discuss matters and devise a plan of action. With the plan finalised, we all Trump out from The Hospital to Rebma. Upon arrival, and after being admitted by the guards there. we arm ourselves and, with the permission of Queen Moire, Jihx collects a thousand Rebman troops from the forces stationed there. With these troops in tow, we march up the staircase of Faiella-Bionin to the beach above. From there, Caitlin shifts us out of Rebma and off through shadow. Shifting back in, we collect Whippoorwill's army from the edge of the Forest of Arden, and Caitlin then shadow out again and back in to the Amber Pattern room.
As we go, Jihx starts to feel a Trump contact coming on. He identifies that the caller is Timandra. He thus resists the call with the help of the rest of us until Caitlin radiates Pattern about herself, cutting off the Trump call entirely.
And we head for the Amber Pattern room...
Session 4.10 Index Session 4.12