“Stop,” she said. “You’re leaving something out. What occurred in the caves?”
“What makes you say that?” I asked.
“That is a secret I do not care to share just now.” she explained. “Suffice it to say I have a means of spotchecking your veracity.”
“It’s not relevant,” I said. “It will just confuse the issue. That’s why I omitted it.”
“You said you’d give me the whole afternoon.”
“All right, lady,” I agreed, and I did.
She bit her lip while I told her about Jurt and the zombies, and she licked idly at the beads of blood that appeared thereafter.
“What are you going to do about him?” she asked suddenly.
“That’s my problem,” I said then. “I promised you the afternoon, not my memoirs and survival plans.”
“It’s just that… Remember, I offered to try to help you?”
“What do you mean? Do you think you can nail Jurt for me? I’ve got news for you: He’s practically a candidate for godhood at the moment.”
“What do you mean by ‘godhood’?” she asked.
I shook my head.
“It would take most of the night to tell you this story properly, and we don’t have the time, not if I’m going to start looking for Coral soon. Just let me finish with the business about the Pattern, will you?”
“Go ahead.”
I did, and she showed no surprise whatsoever at the matter of her sister’s paternity. I was going to question her as to her lack of reaction. Then I said, the hell with it. She’s done what I wanted, and I did what I promised. She hasn’t had a heart attack. And now it’s time to go.
“That’s it,” I said, and I added, “Thanks.”
I began to rise, and she moved quickly and was hugging me again.
I returned her embrace for a moment, then said, “I’d really better be going, Coral could be in danger.”
“The hell with her,” she said. “Stay with me. We have more important things to talk about.”
I was surprised by her callousness, but I tried not to show it.
“I’ve a duty to her,” I said, “and I’ve got to see to it now.”
“All right,” she said, sighing. “I’d better come along and give you a hand.”
“How?” I asked.
“You’d be surprised,” she told me, and she was on her feet and smiling a twisted smile.
I nodded, feeling that she was probably right.
Chapter 10
We hiked back along the hallway to my apartment. When I opened the door and summoned the lights, Nayda did a fast survey of the first room. She froze when she saw my coatrack.
“Queen Jasra!” she said.
“Yep. She had a disagreement with a sorcerer named Mask,” I explained. “Guess who won?”
Nayda raised her left hand and moved it in a slow pattern — behind Jasra’s neck and down her back, across her chest, then downward again. I did not recognize any of the movements she was performing.
“Don’t tell me that you’re a sorceress, too,” I said. “It seems that everyone I run into these days has had some training in the Art.”
“I am not a sorceress,” she answered, “and I’ve had no such training. I have only one trick and it is not sorcery, but I use it for everything.”
“And what is that trick?” I asked.
She ignored the question, then said, “My, she’s certainly tightly bound. The key lies somewhere in the region of her solar plexus. Did you know that?”
“Yes,” I replied. “I understand the spell fully.”
“Why is she here?”
“Partly because I promised her son Rinaldo I’d rescue her from Mask, and partly as an assurance against his good behavior.”
I pushed the door shut and secured it. When I turned back, she was facing me.
“Have you seen him recently?” she said in a conversational tone.
“Yes. Why?”
“Oh, no special reason.”
“I thought we were trying to help each other,” I said.
“I thought we were looking for my sister.”
“It can wait another minute if you know something special about Rinaldo.”
“I was just curious where he might be right now.”
I turned away and moved to the chest where I keep art supplies. I removed the necessary items and took them to my drawing board. While I was about it, I said, “I don’t know where he is.”
I set up the piece of pasteboard, seated myself and closed my eyes, summoning a mental image of Coral, preliminary to beginning her sketch. Again, I half wondered whether the picture in my mind, along with the appropriate magical endorsement, would be sufficient for contact. But now was not the time to mess around being experimental. I opened my eyes and began to draw. I used the techniques I’d learned in the Courts, which are different yet similar to those employed in Amber. I was qualified to execute them in either fashion, but I’m faster with the style I learned first.
Nayda came over and stood near, watching, not asking whether I minded. As it was, I did not.
“When did you see him last?” she asked.
“Who?”
“Luke.”
“This evening,” I answered.
“Where?”
“He was here earlier.”
“Is he here now?”.
“No.”
“Where did you last see him?”
“In the forest of Arden. Why?”
“It seams a strange place to part.”
I was working on Coral’s eyebrows.
“We parted under strange circumstances,” I said.
A little more work about the eyes, a bit on the her…
“Strange? In what way?” she asked.
More color to the cheeks…
“Never mind,” I told her.
“All right,” she said. “It’s probably not that important.”
I decided against rising to that bait, because I was suddenly getting something. As had occasionally happened in the past, my concentration on the Trump as I put the final touches to it was sufficiently intense to reach through and…
“Coral!” I said, as the features moved, perspectives shifted.
“Merlin…?” she answered. “I… I’m in trouble.”
Oddly, there was no background whatever. Just blackness. I felt Nayda’s hand upon my shoulder.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“Yes… It’s dark here,” she said. “Very dark.”
Of course. One cannot manipulate Shadow in the absence of light. Or even see to use a Trump.
“That’s where the Pattern sent you?” I asked.
“No,” she answered.
“Take my hand,” I said. “You can tell me about it afterward.”.
I extended my hand and she reached toward it.
“They —” she began.
And with a stinging flash the contact was broken. I felt Nayda stiffen beside me.
“What happened?” she asked.
“I don’t know. We were suddenly blocked. I can’t tell what forces were involved.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Try again in a little bit,” I said. “If it were a reaction thing, resistance will probably be high just now, and it may ease up later. At least she says she’s all right.”
I withdrew the packet of Trumps I normally carry, shufflied out Luke’s. Now seemed as good a time as any to see how he was faring. Nayda glanced at the card and smiled.
“I thought you just saw him a little while ago,” she said.
“A lot can happen in a little while.”
“I’m certain a lot has happened.”
“You think you know something about what’s going on with him?” I asked.
“Yes. I do.”