She stood in front of me with her hair loose and swirling like dragon tails. Her eyes glowed silver, mercury vapor lights that split the darkness all around us shot with firefly sparks. Forming shadows about us that emulated mythic creatures that I knew were real. After all, wasn’t my guardian a Gargoyle?
Rearing up behind her was a female form, a giant cloaked in mist with cloven hooves and goat’s legs. I cried out and warned her, this child-maid, warned her to be afraid of the Demon Queen.
She giggled and pulled at a string near my breast pocket, unraveling it, turning me widder-shins as she wound it around her wrist and unwound me. The woman/beast roared and tightened her hold on me from her end. I was a cross-cut bow, resonating between opposite forces.
“Corbin Murphy!” Dara screeched. “I hold you spell bound.” Her eyes swiveled to the girl and her face twisted in hatred, making her look more demonic that ever. “Little bitch!” she roared. “He’s my play toy, not yours! Let him go!”
I clenched my fists. Didn’t I have any say in this matter? Taking a step forward into the taut stretch of her winding, I watched it go slack and drop. I ran closer to her, pushing the girl out of my way as she held the unwinding line I took to be the unraveling of the Witch’s spell. What I thought to do beyond that action, I didn’t know. I was just tired of standing around doing nothing while things were being done to me.
My shoulder hit my grandma mid-waist and bowled her over onto her ass even though she outweighed me and stood head and heels above me. I think it was more a case of sheer surprise than any tackling prowess or ability on my part. I sat on her, held her hands staring into her face. She was solid, no longer a formless shadow or mist and her expression softened.
“You remind me of Corwin, long ago when I was young and foolish,” she sighed and smiled. Her teeth were sharp and decidedly not human. “I was wrong about you, Raven, Dark Bird of my Desire. You are definitely a node of Power. Whether it be Pattern or Logus, I cannot tell. Let me up. I release my spell.”
I felt the thing loosen and unravel, a weight lifted off me. The second I let my grip weaken, she pushed me aside and stood, a tall graceful woman. Beautiful and queenly. “Don’t call me Grandma,” she said and disappeared.
The girl came over and helped me to my feet. I looked around. We were in a formless void, a circle within the grayness sort of like being in a pitch black room inside the perimeter of a candle’s glow.
“Where are we?” I asked and her eyes lightened back to that incredible purple color.
“You pushed me out of the way,” she started.
“Yeah, well, sorry about that. She was my granny. I couldn’t let her hurt you.”
“It was more likely she’d kill you, Prince Raven. What you did was brave. And incredibly stupid.” With that, she tapped my chest and forehead and we were back in the tiny bed chamber with Vialle waiting patiently in the small chair. “It’s done,” the girl reported. “Although I didn’t have much to do with it, my Queen. Our young hero got his...granny to release her spell by himself.” She bowed and departed the room leaving me with the Queen and the explanations.
My stomach growled and grumbled so loud that she heard it, ordering lunch to be brought as soon as it was convenient. Which was a polite way of saying, now, please and thank you.
It was brown rice and chicken, bland and filling. It didn’t irritate anything. Both us us ate slowly, she finishing with more of that green Cuke wine and a pale brown fruit that smelled of coconuts but tasted bitter to me. It was, she said, a fruit grown in Rebma and an acquired taste.
“Murphy is waiting to see you, Raven. Are you up to a visit?”
I nodded. My stomach felt okay and with his help, I thought I could go to my rooms and rest. “Is my room still available? Or whosoever that was?”
“It is Corwin’s when he is in Amber. Would you want to share with him or have your own? The Castle is certainly large enough for another Royal Suite if you so choose.”
My own room. Something I’d wanted since ...forever. Something that wasn’t a cardboard box or a dormitory with a hundred other bodies. Or an abandoned shack in the woods. “I’ll stay in his room. If it’s okay with...Corey.”
“Murphy will bring you up,” she said and rose to her feet as if she were sighted. She paused in the doorway to call over her shoulder. “Roelle will take you out and show you the Gardens and the town when you are able to move about more comfortably.”
“Great,” I muttered under my breath. “Now I have two babysitters.”
Still, when Murphy barreled into my room all grin and teeth, his eyes suspiciously bright, I was really glad to see him. “Don’t try to hug me, Murph,” I warned. “I just ate.” Instead, he slapped me on the back of the head which stung like a bitch.
“OWW!” I yelped. “What was that for?” I demanded, peeved.
“The roof, not listening, not telling your father you were spell bound to name a few,” he came back, shifting his wings so that they lay flat on his back. His skin was gray but not stone and he looked more human than gargoyle or monster. In a weird way, he looked beautiful. Like a stature carved by Michelangelo or Cellini. “I am to return you to your room, Master,” he said and gathered me into his embrace although I stiffened and struggled.
“Put me down, please. I can walk,” I ordered but he ignored me exiting the room as he marched through the entire Palace under everyone’s gaze. I was absolutely mortified being carried like a helpless baby, finally hiding my red cheeks into his shirt so I could pretend no one saw me or my humiliation. Didn’t look until he rolled me onto a bed that smelled of fresh lavender and sunshine, scratchy sheets that spoke of hours stretched on a line to catch the day’s breezes. “You are to stay put and rest at least 12 hours a day, Master Raven,” Murph told me. “These orders are from your doctor, Grandfather and the King. They will be enforced if necessary. By me.”
He picked up my feet and pulled off my shoes, socks and tugged at my jeans and then, fumbled with my arms over my head trying to strip my shirt. “Leave me alone, Murph. You know I don’t like PJ’s,” I mumbled and stiffened when a hand skimmed my belly. That was too warm a flesh for the morph and when I peeked, it was her.
She slowly winked her violet eyes and pulled off my shirt, handing me the blue nightwear I’d worn before. I held it in front of my near naked body, hiding my equipment and new undies, looking everywhere but at her grinning face. Silently, I threatened killing Murphy. She gave me a pat on the head like a good dog, said good night, spoke what I took to be a spell and the room darkened immediately. She set herself down on the divan and started singing what could only be a lullaby. Despite my indignation, I found myself fighting the urge to sleep. Before I knew it, I was deep in slumber and dreaming.
***
Walking through a fabulous forest. Trees as old, huge and majestic as the Redwoods. I walked scuffing my ankles in deep red needles as soft as carpeting, the air smelled like Christmas, vanilla and apple pie. I could hear the murmuring of a brook somewhere off to my left behind a thick carpet of knee high ferns. Nodding flowers of brilliant orange and striped bluebells trembled with the slightest wind of my passage.
I wore only a thin nightgown, a deep blue and the bottom was wet from dew. My feet were bare yet the ground was soft enough not to bruise them. Above me in the branches of the firs, some creature like a squirrel chattered at me yet I’d never seen a squirrel attired in a black and white suit like a tuxedo. Colored flying lizards circled my head and pulled at my hair with five fingered claws. I traveled in an easterly direction although how I knew or judged was beyond my scope. The pines and firs began to mix with royal Oaks, elms and lindens. Great spreading Chestnuts showed me a diversity of hardwoods the US hadn’t seen since the Mayflower’s axes had rampaged through her forests. Above the crown of living tree, I heard the piercing cry of a hawk or falcon and the flying lizards scattered like rainbow flashes of light. Even the tuxedo squirrels were quiet and I, too stepped beneath a heavy skirted hemlock to hide.
Blue backed, gray tailed with white barred chest, a falcon the size of an eagle swept through the forest searching. I saw its eye, yellow with a black iris, not unlike my own. It pivoted on one wing and circled, its wingspan equal to the length of both my outstretched arms. I feared this noble bird and stayed hidden as it banked once more before flitting off as silently as it had appeared.
It took an hour before the creatures returned and only then did I venture out from under the shelter of the fragrant giant. A few more feet brought me to the banks of the brook; the water danced over rocks that glittered like quartz shot with gold and gemstones.
Frogs and minnows skittered out of the way as I stuck my feet in and gasped. It was icy cold yet pleasant and when I dipped my hand in and drank, it was the sweetest, purest water I had ever tasted. Across the banks parting the underbrush stood a statue, carved of ivory of living flesh. The Unicorn snorted through her nose and dipped her horn into the stream. I nodded. I knew of the legend of the beast’s horn purifying water and negating poisons and toxins.
With a lithe bound, she jumped the creek to stand next to me, her deadly horn pointed straight at my chest. Lightly, she tapped me once on the forehead, twice on the chest, the second time her horn passing through my flesh as if it were ephemeral. It didn’t hurt, not even when I saw it sink nearly halfway up to its base. She pushed me with her head and I stumbled backwards, shocked to find no trace of blood or wound in me. Her tail twitched and she lifted her lip in a snort of derision.
“Sorry,” I spread my hands behind me on the pine needles from my graceless fall. “I’ve never been speared before. By a Unicorn. Does this make us friends? Or enemies?”
She poked me again and this time it was a definite shove; it hurt. “Alright, I get it,” I grumbled and stood up. She turned her side to me and looked over her shoulder, dropped to her knees and flicked her tail. I got the message and climbed on gingerly.
If you’ve never sat a horse bareback and in a nightgown, I don’t recommend it. First of all, the skirts pull up on your thighs and pinch, leaving nothing under your ass and the hair rubs galls on your butt bones. Not to mention it’s bloody uncomfortable on your nuts. I tucked everything out of the way, glad I was wearing tight briefs and not boxers. Gripping with my calves and winding my hands into her mane, she bounded off in a gait totally unlike that of a horse. Some of her leaps were airborne and not remotely touching the ground at all. I had no idea where she was taking me, no way to guide her. I was along for the ride, merely a passenger even though it was my dream. I knew it was a dream, it was too real to be anything but a fantasy.
Her flight through the forest took mere minutes and emerged onto the flat plain that held the Pattern. I saw it from above, its every pathway laid out although it wasn’t a maze but a challenge of endurance and fortitude. This time, she didn’t stop and set me down on the first step but put herself on the path with me still on her back. I rode the Pattern with her and whatever effort was involved did not apply to her and by association did not affect me. As she passed the First Veil, sparks flew off her legs yet she seemed little hampered either by it or my weight.
I saw the history of Amber as we pushed our way past the second Veil and the Waterfall, the Glory that was Oberon and Dworkin as they created a world torn from the blood of the Courts of Chaos and created both Amber and the Pattern. I witnessed the marriages and births of all Nine Princes and saw those that died meet their ends. I mourned them even though they were enemies and had seen what Eric had done to my Grandfather, Corwin.
I witnessed my own conception and birth and by then, we stood before the last Veil of the Pattern. I, at the Unicorn’s side somehow dismounted without knowing how or when, and she laid her head on my shoulder. Her eyes were the blue of the night sky and filled with both love and compassion. I rubbed the sides of her horn and cupped her bearded chin, kissed her, this nobly created, divinely beautiful symbol of both Magic and Power. Knew who she was and was both awed and amazed.
“Does Merlin know who you are?” I asked and she pushed me with her nose, out of the Pattern where we stood in a courtyard of faerie like beauty. Here, was the Unicorn’s bower and she took me around showing me the unearthly beauty of her abode. I felt no pain, nor hunger. Lifted my gown to stare at my chest and belly. Not only was there nothing wrong with my bare chest but the scar on my stomach was a thin white line, an injury that looked as if it had occurred years before. It no longer bothered me. I heard her laughing whinny, a high tinkle like chiming bells. Threw my arms around her neck and cried for all those years I had never known my mum. How would I have coped knowing she was no more mortal or human than Murphy?
“Why did you leave me?” I asked, my heart both broken and overfilled with joy. Into my head came the images of the Hunters from the Courts during the War searching for her, searching for the one weapon that would destroy the Pattern and remake another in a new image. A weapon that both sides could and would use if the one Dara had wound in her clutches would not work out. How ironic that I would be the weapon used against their weapon, Merlin. Son against father. And yet, Merlin broke free of her machinations and kept the Courts from destroying Amber. I vowed to keep that balance. I woke up with her assurance that I would see her again.