The Courts Of Chaos

There were ghostly drummers, beings of pure light and a flock of floating machines; I saw horsemen, clad all in black, mounted on a variety of beasts; a wyvern seemed to hang in the sky for a moment, like part of a fireworks display. And the sounds - of hoofbeats and footfalls, of singing and skirling, of drumming and trumpeting - mounted to a mighty wave that washed over us. And on, on, on out over the bridge of darkness, wound the procession, its lights lining the great span for a vast distance now.

Then, as my eyes drifted back along those lines, another shape emerged from the glistening curtain. It was a cart draped all in black and drawn by a team of black horses. At each corner rose a staff which glowed with blue fire, and atop it rested what could only be a casket, draped with our Unicorn flag. The driver was a hunchback clad in purple and orange garments, and I knew even at that distance that it was Dworkin.

It is thus, then, I thought. I do not know why, but somehow it is fitting, fitting that it be the Old Country to which you travel now. There were many things that I might have said while you lived. Some of them I did say, but few of the right words were ever spoken. Now it is over, for you are dead. As dead as all of those who have gone before you into that place where the rest of us soon may follow. I am sorry. It was only after all these years, on your assuming another face and form, that I finally knew you, respected you, even came to like you - though you were a crochety old bastard in that form, too. Was the Ganelon self the real you all along, or was it only another form adopted for convenience's sake, Old Shapeshifter? I will never know, but I like to think that I finally saw you as you were, that I met someone I liked, someone I could trust, and that it was you. I wish that I might have known you even better, but I am grateful for this much…

«Dad…?» Julian said softly.

«He wanted to be taken beyond the Courts of Chaos and into the final darkness when his time came at last,» Bleys said. «So Dworkin once told me. Beyond Chaos and Amber, to a place where none reigned.»

«And so it is,» Fiona said. «But is there order somewhere beyond that wall they come through? Or does the storm go on forever? If he succeeded, it is but a passing matter and we are in no danger. But if he did not…»

«It does not matter,» I said, «whether or not he succeeded, because I did.»

«What do you mean?» she asked.

«I believe that he failed,» I said, «that he was destroyed before he could repair the old Pattern. When I saw this storm coming - actually, I experienced a part of it - I realized that I could not possibly make it here in time with the Jewel, which he had sent to me after his efforts. Brand had been trying to get it from me all along the way - to create a new Pattern, he said. Later, that gave me the idea. When I saw that all else was failing, I used the Jewel to create a new Pattern. It was the most difficult thing I ever did, but I succeeded. Things should hold together after this wave passes, whether we survive it or not. Brand stole the Jewel from me just as I completed it. When I recovered from his attack I was able to use the new Pattern to project me here. So there is still a Pattern, no matter what else happens.»

«But Corwin,» she said, «what if Dad succeeded?»

«I do not know.»

«It is my understanding,» Bleys said, «from things that Dworkin told me, that two distinct Patterns could not exist in the same universe. Those in Rebma and Tir-na Nog'th do not count, being but reflections of our own…»

«What would happen?» I said.

«I think there would be a splitting off, the founding of a new existence - somewhere.»

«Then what would its effect be upon our own?»

«Either total catastrophe or no effect whatsoever,» Fiona said. «I can make a case for its going either way.»

«Then we are right back Where we started,» I said. «Either things are going to fall apart shortly or they are going to hold.»

«So it would seem,» Bleys said.

«It does not matter, if we are not going to be around after that wave gets to us,» I said. «And it will.»

I turned my attention back to the funeral cortege. More horsemen had emerged behind the wagon, followed by marching drummers. Then pennons and torches and a long line of foot soldiers. The singing still came to us, and far, far out over the abyss it seemed the procession might finally have reached that dark citadel.