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Cailin has been sitting to the side since his "luck" forced him out of the card game.
The youngsters were talking with Rainbow and things were going well for a while. Then Cailin had a feeling on the back of his neck as if his father was planning something, He looks at his father, and it's not him. Cailin can't tell if the Pattern is running dry. He asks Snarsht and Rainbow, but doesn't acquire any useful information. Rainbow is cryptic; Cailin is pissy.
Rainbow asks Cailin how familiar he is with his family history. "Somewhat." Rainbow states that his relatives are (acting up?) Duncan has the grace to color.
Tate asks, "Does that mean what I think it means?"
Rainbow replies, "I never know what you're thinking."
Rainbow - "Apparently, the word 'civilization' has a different meaning depending on where you are brought up."
Cailin points out to the assembled youngsters, "by many accounts, they are considered more civilized." Hubert starts to argue with him.
Tate turns towards Snarsht and Rainbow and states, "I know that neither of you have any reason to honor the prohibition, but would you please honor Dworkin's wishes?"
Snarsht gets a very disgusted look on his face and leaves.
Cailin tries to figure out if the offending party is a member of his House, and determines that it is, by definition -- all of the Amberites present are members of House Moonlight.
Suhuy, in Chaos, sees Snarsht show up. Snarsht tears the bag open, destroys whatever was in it, and wanders off.
Ilk notifies Princess Chandra that Snarsht just dispatched the cat in the sack. She asks him why, but decides that it probably isn't worth risking confronting an annoyed Snarsht.
Rainbow tries to impress Cailin with the severity of their situation. They no longer have anyone who can perceive the anti-dragons, so they cannot determine their progress or lack thereof. He informs Cailin that the conflict between himself and Snarsht has lasted since before the last destruction of Chaos, and they have only recently reconciled.
Rainbow - "I suggest that you report your mission to whomever assigned it to you as a failure."
Cailin - "Again? Oh, no. I don't want to do that again."
Cailin tries to scold the Amberite mob.
Rainbow steps into the Sea of Chance.
Tate hands Cailin a trump of Darkstar. On the back, worked into the Pattern, are the words, "Guaranteed to work anywhere".
Hubert, Shannon, Duncan, Beldan, the Archivist, and Cailin trump out.
Cailin and the mob is now standing next to Darkstar in House Moonlight. Cailin orders Darkstar not to kill Amberites -- no members of his House is allowed to kill Amberites. Cailin's House second then reports to Cailin that some members of his House are unsuccessfully plotting against him.
Cailin asks Darkstar to ask Dworkin for intervention. Darkstar returns shortly with Hamster Dworkin.
Hamster Dworkin tries to explain matters to them, tosses them around a bit, and then decides that they need to go on a tour. Hubert is dragged by the ear by Hamster Dworkin. Shannon and Duncan follow under their own power.
Cailin looks up and discovers that it is still snowing above his House. He's annoyed.
Cailin uses a bibliomancy token to go to Thelbane. He greets a humanoid Jean there, and a saucer-Jean answers. Cailin enters Thelbane; "Jean" follows. Cailin gains audience with the King and states that his mission to destroy the anti-dragons has failed. Cailin is ordered to give a full report in no more than one turning.
Cailin chats with "Jean". Jean tells "Jean" about Toram's son. Cailin contemplates assembling a task force. "Jean" re-emphasizes the information aspect. They mention that it is being dealt with, and that it would take someone at Rainbow's level to pull off an appropriate surveillance.
A butterfly flutters out of Cailin's pocket.
Cailin yetis and runs to the place where he left his House. All that he can see there are marbles. Cailin uses a bibliomantic token to return to his House, and asks if there was an assault recently.
Cailin, Beldan, and Rainbow arrive at the place where Cailin saw the stuff related to Toram's kid.
Cagliostro's tell-tales over Castle Yellow-sky just exploded.
People move their magic-eating ammo away from themselves and anything structural. An army is gathered.
Cailin notices some crystals with no magic signature, concludes that they are his, and argues with the butterfly in his pocket for a while. Rainbow and Beldan cannot see the signature.
Rainbow points out the almost-erased signature on a doorway. Rainbow started to wrap Beldan and Cailin in Logrus to take them to the rest of that signature, then realized that he couldn't Logrus-pull that much Pattern, and suggested getting Ilk. Cailin and Beldan agreed, and Rainbow left to acquire Ilkandacian.
Ilk notices a tugging on his tendrils in Chaos. It's Rainbow. Ilk manifests an Ilk-form nearby out of Logrus and bows from Ilkandacian to Lord Rainbow. Rainbow asks Ilk to Logrus-pull Cailin and Beldan to the target of their investigation. Ilk points out to Rainbow that he might want to check in with the person currently running the Dancers Guild on the current investigation into the situation that Cailin is... exploring, as it is currently being investigated competently. Ilk mentions that he was told by Marial to stay out of the investigation, as he wouldn't be subtle enough. Rainbow claims that he is under orders by the King to assist Cailin in this endeavor.
Jean sees Rainbow arrive in the Dancers Guild and receive the briefing from REN.
Ilk Logrus-pulls to Cailin's location. The only interesting thing here is a Jean tree. Ilk greets Cailin via bone conduction. Cailin points out the dim remains of a magical signature, and asks to be transported to the next stage. Ilk examines the signature. It's very hard to see. Ilk looks for the temporal variations caused by gating to a shadow with a different time flow, and determines that there was a gate, and that the other end was faster than here. Ilk starts looking for the signature in nearby faster-time shadows, and stalling for Rainbow's return.
Rainbow arrives, and signals Ilk that the affair is a "go".
Ilk finds a place with that signature, but no signs of the signatures from the briefing folder. He examines the area. The only people that might be Logrus-aware there are a couple of demons that Ilk recognizes from one of the more scholarly Chaosian Houses.
Ilk displays the shadow for Rainbow to pick their arrival location. Rainbow chooses a spot on the same planet as the signature, but not nearby.
Upon their arrival, Rainbow looks around and quickly shifts into a tall, almost Dragaeran-like creature. He points out that this place is hostile towards winged creatures. The group starts off.
In the middle of the night, there is a pounding at Cagliostro's door. It's his favorite scrier. "The Doom has arrived! The Doom has arrived! I have seen it!" Absalom has already been alerted, and recommended that Cagliostro be woken.
Cailin, Rainbow, Beldan, and Ilk notice little bits of metal flying through the air. The bits of metal are examined. Beldan peels some off of his armor and examines them. Ilk catches one, studies it briefly, and then returns it to its original trajectory. Rainbow and Ilk determine that these people must be Malachai-worshippers -- Malachai had weapons that threw things like these that were actually effective. One side charges the other, and mostly fall over, apparently allergic to the bits of metal. The winners charge and try to take all of the survivors as their prisoners, including Rainbow, Beldan, and Cailin. Ilk keeps them from approaching the group.
Ilk checks with Rainbow as to the level of subtlety required -- holding people and bullets in mid-air might be noticed as unusual. Rainbow points out that their group is the bait, so Ilk gleefully spreads a fine mist of tendrils throughout the entire shadow to check for any signs of attack or intrusion.
One of Cagliostro's demons turns pale, says, "Oh, shit" and dives into the gem.
A demon appears in front of the group on the battlefield. It bows very low to Rainbow, then bows very low to Ilk's tendrils, then bows as a high-ranking member of a demon House to the head of a major House to Cailin, then bows to Beldan as to a House head's Apprentice.
The demon asks if he can do anything for the Savior of Chaos or Lord Rainbow while they are in his servant's shadow. Ilk and Rainbow are noncommittal; Cailin states that they are investigating magical activity.
The demon Logrus-pulls off.
The demon returns to Cagliostro and says that all may not be lost -- negotiation may be avert the predicted doom.
Cagliostro prepares. Absalom readies his sword. Roland puts his gun aside, goes off, and returns with a sword, a crossbow, and a strange-looking gun. Cagliostro tries to make the weapons more real, but determines that they are already extremely real. Some new recruits are dressed as an honor guard. A pavilion is prepared, and pulled intact to the battlefield by the demon.
Those who were trying to take Rainbow and company as prisoner advance on the pavilion that just appeared nearby, firing. Ilk removes all bullets within one hundred miles. A guy with a flaming sword leaves the pavilion and starts chasing off the soldiers. People enter the tent. Ilk notices that Absalom and Roland are Pattern initiates, and that they have a Pattern blade and several Duncan-style Pattern arrow heads, so he places a Logrus bell-jar in the next shadow over.
There is a very theatrical thunderclap, and a bright purple being that appears to have smoke for its lower half appears and says, "I am Bert, the Great and Powerful! I have come for my Master's Son! Give him to me and you will survive!" Cailin can tell that it is a simple magical signature. Crude, but powerful. No lines back -- an independent conjuration. Cagliostro conjures a magic-eating crystal in the center of the creature's head. A sphere of the creature goes away. Cailin notices something suck at him briefly, and then there is a shower of dust everywhere. The surviving lower half of the creature repeats the message again.
On the third repetition of the message, the cloud is sparking as if it were preparing to overload. Ilk prepares to ground it and makes his tendril glow so that Cailin can see it.
Roland says, "Which of you have you come to collect?" and a tendril reaches out and points at Mordred. Cagliostro states, "He is his own man" and a magical discharge begins in Mordred's direction, but is grounded by Ilk's tendril.
Ilk notices a rock being flung through a magical gate in low orbit, aimed at the site of the original pavilion. He tosses it back through the gate at the maximum velocity allowed by the local shadow.
Cagliostro conjures a rock with Mordred's original memories. The rock is passed around. It's a rock. Rainbow isn't sure how to read it without loading it into a black slate. Cagliostro agrees to show him how to do such at some point in the future.
Cailin conjures a hobbit, but it doesn't have enough room -- it was just created. Ilk tosses it into a fast-time shadow, ages it though a decade or so, then brings it back. Cagliostro wipes the hobbit and loads it with Mordred's memories. The hobbit declares that it must kill them all, but after breakfast.
Cagliostro provides a somewhat more useful test subject, who arrives in an orange jump suit and manacles. This subject is backed up, wiped, re-loaded, and interrogated. The enemy's list includes Cailin, Cagliostro, Ilk, Cassandra, Norton, many unknown people, and Princess Chandra.
Beldan points out to Cagliostro that his ward is porous and upgrades it with Pattern. Ilk drops a tendril through the Sea of Chance to maintain contact with his tendrils in the rest of the shadow. Ilk asks Cagliostro about the state of his orbital defenses -- someone threw a rock at him. He's apparently done that before. Beldan hooks a planetary-scale ward to a box with a switch that Cailin conjured.
Ilk notices a phalanx of troops show up near the former location of the pavilion. He generates a view-screen, then starts playing with them. A pile of hearts accumulates at the former location of the pavilion, and the ones with anti-Logrus amulets get swatted with variable Pattern hammers. Ilk resolves, again, to do something about those pesky amulets at some point.
Ilk and Beldan work to shuttle some of the soldiers through the ward, but they don't have any useful information. They're an independent mercenary unit that was recently hired and given weapons and directions.
Ilk asks Cagliostro how durable his planet is, in case their opponent gets carried away. Roland proposes moving the pavilion to Amber. He never mentions the place by name, but hints that their disembodied friend might be inconvenienced by the location.
Ilk pulls the pavilion to Amber, near the pass to Garnath, and gives the demon a small Logrus amulet to protect him from the order of the place. Beldan raises his wards around the pavilion, and then Ilk creates a massive blazing Logrus trail, visible from half-way across shadow, tracing from Cagliostro's shadow to Amber. Ilk also raises a massive cloud of Logrus energy over Garnath.
Rainbow asks Ilk if that hurts.
"Why should it?"
"Your tendrils are on fire."
"No, that's the Pattern doing the burning."
"You're a Realms Lord, right?"
"Last time I checked."
"Good - then I don't have to nominate you."
Rainbow approaches a Jean and asks him to collect many of him here. They're trying to start a war, but don't want any official attention.
"No official war"
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