DRAFT Run log for 970107

The Guardian Boulder of the Abyss

Beau turns to Ingold and asks, "What are we waiting for?" Ingold replies that they are waiting for an invisible bridge across that, and points at the chasm in front of them. They chat about invisible bridges, and the difficulties involved in locating them.

[filmies are invisible in this universe]

Ingold walks over and sits down on the Ilk/Stormy rock. Ilk gets a bad headache, and Ingold jumps up with a cry of pain.

[Okay - that one's got Pattern]

Stormy can tell that Ingold is a high level mage, Pattern based, not Clarissa, and has that sense of age about him.

Ingold starts kicking the Ilk/Stormy rock towards the edge of the Abyss. Ilk and Stormy debate internally; Stormy is in favor of just falling off the edge and hovering a foot or so down.

Cyndia: "why are you doing that?"
Ingold: "It bit me!"
Cyndia: "Rocks can't bite!"
Ingold: "I've got scorch marks!"
Cyndia: "Bites leave teeth marks, not scorch marks!"
...
Ilkandacian: "I didn't bite you!"

Ingold stops kicking the rock.

Stormy and Ilk (as two distinct voices, both speaking from the rock) chat with Ingold and the others. Ilk wants to know why they want to cross into the Courts - most beings who want to go there know how to get there.

"Are you the guardian boulder of the Abyss?" - Cyndia

The boulder laughs in two voices.

Natasha wanders over towards the boulder, builds up a bit of power between her fingers, and zaps the rock with a small bolt of Pattern-energy. "Hey! Stop that!"

Natasha concludes that they aren't demons, since that spell is supposed to drive out demons. Ilk keeps his doubts about the effaceability of her spell to himself.

They chat.

Beau finally says that they're looking for Prince Benedict of Amber. Ilk and Stormy internally debate whether Benedict would want to see these guys, and conclude that if he doesn't want to see them, he can take care of himself.

Beau asks Ingold, "So, why aren't we building a bridge across the abyss?" Ingold tells him that the Abyss tends to eat bridges.

Ilk grows rock legs, walks to the edge of the Abyss, and summons a filmy.

Carlton starts walks over to the filmy, but the others can't see it. Carlton shows them where it is, tells them that it's slightly wider than a man, and they start getting nervous, and decide that the birds wouldn't be able to walk across.

Ingold complains, "Don't you have a wider one?" "Everyone's a critic..." Ilk summons a few dozen more and makes a filmy superhighway.

"Where's the edge?" Carlton demonstrates by stretching his arms out to the edges, and Ilk creates illusionary handrails, then warns them that they handrails are only illusions. Beau tells the birds not to perch on the handrails, and tells Zephyr to knock people that are about to go over the edge back onto the bridge.

They step onto the filmy and start being pulled across. Ilk, still in rock form, starts Logrus-pulling across about ten yards or so to the side of the filmies. Half-way across the Abyss he sees some demons hiding 'around a corner', apparently lurking in ambush. "Look out!"

"What?"

"Incoming!"

Ilk hears a few curses and a skeletal hand starts chasing after Ilk, who dodges its grasp, grows a nose, and thumbs it at the demon.

The AD&D run cannot see the demons waiting in ambush, but do see a hand chasing around the boulder, who doesn't appear to be too terribly concerned. After a few minutes, they spot a hole in the bridge in front of them, which is quickly filled by a cauldron, tipped towards them so they can see that it is filled with water. Ingold zaps it with a lightning bolt and the water boils out. The cauldron shifts into a mouth, says, "Ouch!", and continues shifting into a face.

They shoot longbows and crossbows at the face, with limited success.

Cyndia pulls out her rock, which says that now is the time. She tells Beau, who pulls out his rock, and they touch the two rocks together. They see a mental image of their aunt. The image tells them that what is about to happen may not work... "together, these may help one of you to survive the cliff that is not a cliff, without the assistance of what it is that you are falling off of. One of you must jump with the two rocks, and fight that which is before you or you will all die." Cyndia gives her rock to Beau, who prepares for battle.

When they are about fifteen feet away from the demon, Beau jumps off the edge of the filmy, and is knocked back onto it by Zephyr. "Knock that off!" "But you told me to..." "Follow me"

He falls maybe one or two feet, impacts on something, and starts sliding down the surface. A small bolt of blue energy jumps from the joined rocks in his left hand and hits his sword, which starts cutting into the surface. The sword sinks in to the hilt, and then the hilt starts sinking in. Beau starts cutting around.

The rest of the group sees Beau jump off and disappear, except for Carlton who keeps up a play-by-play.

Imps, Imps, Everywhere...

Malachai is standing over an inverted chest. Galantine is stuck into the chest. He pulls it out, and it is covered with imps.

"GUARDS!"

After a few seconds, armored footsteps troop in, 15 strong.

Malachai asks the guards for rope; he binds up the chest.

Malachai trumps Serena, and asks her for Tazik. She's in the bathroom (a bush)

Serena trumps him back, and they come through. Tazik has a ring of flowers around her head. The gardeners were complaining about prize roses...

Malachai fills Tazik in on the imp situation and asks her to seal up the chest. Tazik picks up the chest and follows some guards to the armory.

"How did your shpping trip go?

"Not very well..." Serena waffles, claiming that they had to mislay the bodyguards so Tazik could find a bush to relieve herself behind.

[A litterbox for Tazik?]

Malachai convinces Serena to wander off while he conducts business.

Some guards are being swarmed by imps; Malachai gives them permission to kill the imps. Those so afflicted leave attention and start whacking imps.

Malachai chases most of the imps out of his room; the only ones left are being well hidden.

Malachai tries Zack's trump - no response, out of range
Malachai tries Corwin's trump - no response, doesn't know which direction to reach in. sorta like Findo or Osric's trump.
Malachai tries Flora, distance problem.
Malachai tries Benedict, distance problem
Malachai tries Rhiannon, nothing, blocked hard.

Malachai tries the not yet wand, still not yet.

Malachai tries Caine, and contacts. He's out at sea, one shadow out of Amber, and the coastline is familiar to Malachai. Malachai tells Caine that he's just calling around, and Caine replies that he's just dealing with the seas. Malachai asks Caine if he wants to be regent - "No, no - I always wanted to be the power behind the crown, not the crown" Malachai says that he would be willing to accept advice... Malachai expresses concern that he is the only family member in Amber. Caine offers to return, and Malachai accepts the offer. Caine asks if he should leave his troops elsewhere, and says that there is the rumor of some new sea defenses about - any new passwords? "No, they're still in the planning state." "I'll be there in two hours." "Good sailing." "Good ruling."

There is nobody at the next lower level for Malachai to delegate authority to - the council consists of him, Caine, Ingold, and Sir Erik, and the next level down is Zack, and none of them are around.

There are no petitioners - the heralds' staff all quit when Flora quit.

Malachai looks for someone to arrange audiences for tomorrow morning. The only branch of government that wasn't controlled by Flora was the ambassadors, and the time to meet the ambassadors is at meals.

Malachai tells Prospero to get together a group of competent people to run things.

"I'll tell you what - you go downstairs, walk that Pattern thing, and then you can be king." - Malachai to Prospero

Most of the military matters are going smoothly, with the exception of the gryphons - it would take about 25 years for them to recover from the recent battle unless someone imports some more. Malachai doesn't know where Ivy found them, and doesn't have the time to look.

A runner comes back in with a list of names. Prospero crosses out two of them. Malachai looks at the list, and the two that were crossed out are good people. "Why the x's?" "I'm using them." Malachai tells Prospero to get those people together in a conference room first thing tomorrow morning.

Malachai trumps to Serena. Tazik is working in a silvery-grey metal. She has set up a forge to create the stuff - it's no metal that Malachai recognizes. He notices that the inside of what the doorway used to be is coated with that silvery-grey metal stuff.

Malachai: "What did she make that out of?"
Serena: "I'm not sure, but she had me gather cobwebs."

Serena goes over and picks up a small plug of that material with great effort, and hands it to Malachai. it's very dense.

After Serena's brief rest, she continues hunting down and squashing imps. She's not very good at it. Malachai joins in, and things get much better.

A few that they kill on their bodies give off a bright red splat instead of a blackish smear.

Tazik finishes working. When she closes the box, there is a bright arc of light and the box is sealed. She hands it to Malachai. It's extremely heavy. He leans it up against the wall.

"So, how do we get out?" Tazik gets a hammer and chisel and starts cutting a new door to the side of the original door, which is now covered in the silver-grey material. The chisel is actually indenting the wall.

Dangling Over the Abyss

Carlton tells the group that Beau is attacking the demon. Cyndia tells the others, "Only one of the two of us will make it out of here..."

Beau continues cutting around. There are big, nasty, oily drops falling out of the demon. He pauses and conjures a pair of crampons on his shoes. A small zot of power arcs to them from the stones, and he starts climbing up the side of the demon.

Stormy and Ilk, who have been watching the attack, have the impression that that guy is SOL.

Ilk tells Stormy to guard his back and starts Logrus-pulling full force towards the Courts side of the Abyss. They leave the skeletal hand behind, and six to eight of the demons waiting in reserve start lining up and preparing impressive magical stuff aimed at them. Stormy casts a Word of Dismissal, and the demons *bamf* back fifty feet or so into a cave on the side of the Abyss.

Stormy conjures pebbles above the demons, and as they fall, he casts Dagnir i Dagnir on the pebbles. One of the demons dies, and the shields on the others go down. Stormy blasts them; two of them divert their attacks to defend, and one creates a chaos thing to battle the attack. They reach the side of the Abyss, and Ilk notices a note on his side, "We will get you later - the Gang of Eight"

Ilk hits the group of six still waiting in ambush behind the corner with a Demon Melt; those demons and the one Beau is fighting are destroyed. Beau starts to fall, and Zephyr plummets after him. Beau spreads out his cape like a parasail in an attempt to slow his fall.

Zephyr catches up with him, and there is a flash of blue light from the rocks to the two of them. There is a flash of unconsciousness, and he's back home looking up at his Aunt Coral.

"Were they useful?"
"I started attacking something huge, then I fell."

She takes the rocks back.

Carlton is diving after Cyndia, who is diving after an unseen Beau, and says, "No, wait - they're gone!" "Look again!" They head back up to the filmy.

The Gang of Eight are backing away, having seen what happened to the six, and there is a scream heard over the Logrus, and all of the demons within a two mile radius are bound by big nasty Pattern chains.

Stormy runs time back and does postcog trying to find the falling guy, and concludes that he was nipped out of reality.

Ilk tries to count the Pattern chains, and there are more of them than he can convince the Logrus to count, more chains than he can generate tendrils.

The group reaches the far side of the Abyss and waffles. They question the rock about Beau. He's gone, edited out of reality.

Stormy and Ilk chat internally.

Ilk sticks out an arm, and Stormy conjures two trumps, one for Beau, and one for Benedict.

Damia takes the trumps and tries Beau's - it fails to connect.

"But somebody might have backed him up somewhere" - Stormy

They chat about recovering Beau.

Ilk retrieves a status report from House Cara; there is considerable panic in the House, and he receives a return home at once. Ilk says his farewells to the run, wishes them luck, and teleports to a place within the Courts and then Logrus-pulls to House Cara.

The group talks about going to Benedict. Ingold refuses to deal with Benedict. He will stay here and wait for them to return.

Cyndia pulls out Benedict's trump and tries it, it's blocked. Ingold suggests asking for directions to the Warriors' Guild. Ingold is reluctant to go there; he suggests visiting Random - he's an ambassador here.

They mount up and are ready to head to Random's embassy.

Hey, Buddy! Wanna be Regent?

It's morning in Amber. Serena and Malachai roll off their benches; Tazik is most of the way through the wall.

She finishes chiseling through the wall. Serena and Tazik head out for a bath. Serena mentions the possibility of going into town to find one of those big baths where people work on you afterwards; Malachai remembers that most of those are tied into houses of ill repute. He says nothing, assuming that Tazik can take care of the both of them.

Malachai goes to his room to bathe, and meets a nervous looking person outside the door. He has a big list of all of the things that Malachai has told people - not to let anyone in the room, to tell various people that he isn't regent... He even faced down Caine who was trying to deliver some rum earlier. When Malachai leaves to go to breakfast, the guard is still standing there. He says that Caine changed him so he doesn't need to go to the bathroom - he's rooted to the spot. Malachai tests this assumption. Yup. His feet are stuck.

Malachai walks in to breakfast and sits down at a lesser table. A tall, thin guy sits down next to him and claims to be a Baron. They chat. Malachai can tell from his phrasing when he is lying. The guy says that he's known the king for years, and he's a good person to know... When Malachai is mostly done, Serena and Tazik enter in full regalia and sit at the high table. Malachai waves at them. Malachai's breakfast companion says that they're ambassadors, low ranking, and makes some stuff up that is completely wrong. His companion leaves, then Malachai finishes, walks up to the high table. The ambassadors stand and bow, except for Serena who kisses him and Tazik who just waves. Serena and Tazik say that they will be shopping today.

Malachai heads off to meet with his staff. He tries to convince them to ditch protocol in private; they fail to do so. They seem competent. They suggest that he appoint a head of ambassadors who holds his interests, namely Serena.

Malachai goes looking for Caine. He asks the guards; they say that he didn't sleep in the castle, and they've lost several men trying to keep track of him.

Malachai resumes his trump list..

Benedict - Out of range
Flora - No response
Zack - Out of range
Corwin - Dead
Oberon - Dead
Gerard - Success.

Gerard is trying to see if his lady can be made immortal. Malachai tries to convince Gerard to take the regency, and fails. Gerard was actually considering retiring from the family by cutting the throat of anyone that trumps him.

Malachai: Oberon is missing and presumed dead...
Gerard: No, he's over here, talking with my wife.
Malachai: Really? Here, he's presumed dead.
Gerard: Oh? Well, then I didn't tell you that.

Gerard asks about Malachai's crowning party.

Malachai tells Gerard that Caine is in Amber, mostly because nobody else is there. Gerard tells Malachi not to trust Caine.

Gerard: "The only elder around? What about Benedict?"
Malachai: "He's off in Chaos somewhere..."

Malachai catches Gerard up on the Benedict thing.

They run down the list of prople in responsibility. Ingold is off somewhere, Fiona doesn't exist somewhere in this universe, Bleys hasn't reported back...

"In fact, you can feel free to come back. All of the people who you don't like aren't here."

"Llewella?" "Hasn't been around."

"Flora?" "Left with all of her staff."

"Zack?" "Haven't been able to get in touch with him." "Isn't he, like, your second?" "He's off someplace."

"Julian was seen carried off by the same cats that carried off Corwin's corpse."

"Random is off in the Courts of Chaos along with Martin."

"Rhiannon?" "Haven't been able to contact her."

Gerard: "I know where Velaria is, and she's not interested."

"Wow - it really is empty. My wife and I might swing by at some point. Trump me when Caine leaves, and I'll stop by. Oh, and don't bother mentioning it to Caine."

[The crown of Amber as a door prize at a concert -- is there a Rosie McDougal here? Congratulations, you're the new king of Amber!]

Malachai rides into town on Beucephalus to look for Caine. Ahead of him, he sees Serena and Tazik walking towards the town. They wave in passing. Serena throws him a flower; he pins it to his lapel.

High Tea in the Courts of Chaos

Beau is getting pleasantly drunk with his Aunt in Cobalt.

Ingold grabs something that appears to have motive force, gibbers at it, and it gibbers back. He leads them through a maze of strange turns to a dumpy-looking building with architects on the outside rebuilding it.

Ingold goes up to the door and knocks. The door opens, Ingold hands the human-looking individual inside a card, gestures the others in, and says that the birds should probably stay outside. Ingold raises his hands and a golden latticework of power springs up around the ornithals. They enter.

Damia: "Where are we?" Ingold: "The ambassadorial digs - this is where we'll see Random if he's here."

Ingold raises a finger and they return to their normal forms. Cyndia shifts back as well. A door opens, a human-looking attendant comes out, nods to Ingold, and says "he will be with you in a moment".

Someone walks in, looks zoned out and dressed like urban scum. He says, "Oh, sorry, man - should have used the back entrance", and turns around to leave. "Martin - wait!" "Ingold, hi!" Ingold asks Martin to introduce them to his father; Martin agrees. Ingold introduces them to Martin. Martin recognizes Carlton as a shifter, and asks him if he can do this beasty, and starts describing...

Ingold leaves.

Martin looks Damia and Cyndia up and down - "so, what do you want?"

Cyndia: "We're looking for someone."

They chat about connections and bands. Martin gives them tickets and directions to his next concert.

"Yeah, that guy behind the desk knows that he'll be out soon now. See, I know my protocols." The guy behind the desk looks disgusted.

Damia: "So, do you have any siblings?"

Martin: "No full - one half. She's like, head of Jesby, and really paranoid and everything. Powerful - she could have your lungs ripped out for no reason at all."

Random enters the room. His first words are, "Want a hit?"

Damia: "Random?"

... "yeah, i just got the news that my favorite brother is dead. dragged off by cats. corpse. of course, julian is dead, too, so it's not that bad."

"We just lost a brother, too, we think." "You think?" "He jumped into the abyss." "That will tend to do it. We tried to put up a memorial on the Abyss - the Abyss ate it, and spit back the bones. Funny, we didn't think that granite had bones until then."

Random says that he's planning on being stoned until the funeral, which probably won't be happening for another twenty-five years, at least. Damia convinces him to go upstairs and sober up.

Martin tries to seduce Damia and Cyndia, and fails miserably. Martin and Damia chat. She is quite surprised at Random's marriage, Eric's death, and so on.

Martin: "You know, I'm realizing that my uncles don't deal with women very well."

Martin tries to be formal, and offers, "Tea, crumpets, bed?"

Damia: "If you'd leave that last one off, young man, gladly." Martin: "Young man?"

Tea arrives. Carlton is still shifting in the background. High tea happens.

Chaos in Chaos

Ilk walks through the door of House Cara.

The first thing reported is that his cousin is presumed dead. He was independently and severally by seen by several observers at the battlefield.

The second report is that Ilk is considered head of Cara.

The third thing is that someone comes up and says that there's a major invasion force of Pattern users and his presence is requested immediately in an emergency meeting of the heads of House.

A search party for Cara has disappeared with no traces. He missed several regular info drops, so they went looking for him.

They ask if the disappearance was Ilk's doing - if so, they'll stop looking. If not, how many favors can they burn in the search?

Ilk asks Stormy if he can trump Cara, and gives a mental image. "Not that I know of". The image isn't a detailed enough psychic impression.

Ilk tells the fourth messenger to continue the search, but to only use internal resources.

The third messenger comes back - transportation is ready. It's a beautiful, white winged horse.

Ilk and Stormy chat about priorities and the possibility of multitasking. Ilk tells someone that this staff (Stormy) is to be permitted to re-enter the House and should be treated well. That person comes back with a red ribbon, it's Real, and is encoded in some fashion. Stormy telekenetically ties the ribbon around him, then absorbs it into his body.

Stormy trumps to Arden to investigate the disappearance of Vlad, then pops back a few seconds later. Twenty minutes have passed for Stormy, and he had no luck tracking the burst of Clarissa magic that pulled Vlad from the battlefield.

Ilk climbs onto the back of the horse.

Ilk mentions the possibility of being disintegrated upon walking through the door to the Council chambers; Stormy sets up a spell-catcher for disintegrate and a resurrection spell contingent on being disintegrated. He's not sure if he can resurrect Chaosians, but...

They travel to the Council building and enter. It is very senatorial looking.

The Warlord looks Ilkandacian up and down, and calls over her apprentice, a young-looking girl, who looks Ilk up and down and rattles off all of his concealed weapons. "Well?" "Oh, the staff." The Warlord waves Ilk in, not relieving him of his weapons, and and starts lecturing the girl on mentioning the obvious weapons first.

Ilk and the Stormy-staff enter.

The Chamberlain shows him to his seat, at the far end of table, and returns with some food and drink.

The only other person in the room is in House Jesby colors, but isn't Cathryn or her mother. She's a redhead. Ilk doesn't recognize her - she's not one of the top dozen or so in the line of succession. She has neither food nor drink in front of her, and ignores Ilk. Ilk notices that she's radiating lots of Pattern power - it's active.

Snarsht shows up. That's strange, he's not a House head. Then again, who's going to tell him not to enter? The Chamberlain brings him a saucer of milk. He stares at the apparent head of House Jesby.

Stormy thinks, "Now that's a big cat!", and Snarsht turns his head, winks at the stick, and resumes staring at Jesby.

Benedict walks in, comes over to Snarsht, whispers in his ear, and Snarsht twitches an ear in response.

Benedict walks to Ilk, and says he doesn't recognize Jesby. Ilk stands, bows, and they converse. Ilk points out that 'Jesby' has the Pattern active. Benedict is surprised, and says that he doesn't recognize her from his side of reality. Benedict was asked to give information to the council concerning this invasion of Pattern-users. Ilk mentions that he thinks he might know what this supposed invasion is about, and tells Benedict that Ingold bound every demon within two miles of a point over the Abyss with Pattern chains, then handed the chains over to another. He tells Benedict that the group was looking for him. Benedict wonders if they are assassins, and Ilk discourages that idea, telling him that they lost one of their number just crossing the Abyss. Ilk relays the descriptions of the group, before and after the disguise spell went up, and tells Benedict that they were heading to Random's digs. Benedict thanks Ilk and heads out to investigate.

Mandor walks in, passes Snarsht, and offers his condolences to Ilk as to the loss of Cara. "Should I be offering condolences to you as well?" Mandor says that he sent Despil off to search for Sawall. Ilk determines that Mandor's presence at this meeting definitely undermines Despil's chances to be taken seriously by the Council ever again, as Mandor supposedly permanently stepped aside in favor of Despil centuries ago.

They chat.

Mandor looks at the staff and asks Ilkandacian if it is his advisor. "Travelling companion." "Only advisors are allowed into the chamber." "Advisor." "Well, since the meeting has not yet been called to order, it doesn't matter yet." Mandor then greets Stormy by name. Mandor recognized Stormy's handiwork in that town around Amber. Snarsht told him to tell Stormy that if he ever wanted to visit, he was welcome. Stormy replies that there are some sympathies between dragons and cats.

Ilk glances in Jesby's direction and mentions that Benedict didn't recognize her from his end of reality. Mandor says that he recognized her from the old books, and that she is a bastard child of one of the Jesby women. Nobody outside the house recognizes her as Jesby, and she rose to power suddenly, without using any favors outside House Jesby.

Ilk asks Mandor if any other houses are similarly hindered. "Just our three Houses, except for House Xartys, which is missing entirely.

Mandor, Ilk, and Stormy chat.

Ilk mentions that the last time he saw the Lady Cathryn, she was wearing the seal of Jesby, and she was Somewhere Else. Mandor states that the person in Jesby's seat could have taken it from her. Not likely, considering where she was. Stormy and Ilk explain just where they last saw Cathryn. They chat about inter-dimensional stuff briefly, and Mandor says that he'd like to borrow Ilk's advisor at some point to discuss these matters further. "NOOOOO - DON'T GIVE ME TO MANDOR!" Ilkandacian replies that he and Stormy have been discussing these matters frequently as of late, and that they would be honored to have Mandor join them during one of their discussions. Mandor states that he would be extremely interested in doing so, as one of his primary goals in life is the expansion of his knowledge base.

Mandor mentions that there were some severe problems recently with the Logrus; Ilk inquires for details, stating that he has been out of this Logrus's range recently, and Mandor tells him that he shouldn't have even mentioned it, and that Ilk should ask his guildmaster.

Their conversation continues until almost all of the House heads have arrived.

Helgram shows up, nods to Snarsht, bows to Mandor, and ignores Ilk. Ilk bows slightly more deeply than appropriate in return, blatantly ignoring the snub.

House Seconds show up for Trantor and Yigrin. Xartys, Holtiharna, and Pharaban don't show up, although Pharaban is a perpetual no-show.

When almost all of heads have arrives (Chanicut, Swayville, Corona, Ganda, Arantantic, Kulakkarakka, Llatronataran, and Barimen), Mandor takes his seat near the head of the table. All of those entering pointedly ignore the Pattern-weenie in the Jesby seat. The Chamberlain is passing notes to Mandor.

Mandor stands up and calls the meeting to order.

Rescuing Turvalen

Stormy meets his family, and they assemble everyone but fiona2, Bronwyn, and Illyana. Stormy trumps them to Dragaera, armed to the teeth.

He trump-looks for Turvalen, and finds him pent in a construct containing Clarissa's signature, and Clarissa herself sitting nearby dining on some (cooked) rabbit.

[As the logger's hands were getting tired at this point in the run, a long battle is reduced to a few sentences.]

He saves Turvalen with the help of Clarissa, and squashes most of a Seroli shrine, along with the attendant Seroli.

Clarissa hits on Turvalen. Turvalen is unimpressed.

Clarissa claims to not be the source of the grey spheres imprisoning her decendants, and asks Stormy to tell her to tell her how to open them at some point. She just collects the spheres. Stormy zips the description of the entire successful working to her, omitting the failed attempts.

Stormy leaves after being formally banished by Clarissa, then opens a trump contact to her and chats.

Clarissa wants to see her mostly-broken other-Amber children and see if she can fix them, and would then tell Stormy how to do it afterwards.

Clarissa doesn't want to be shown fallible, which proves to be the largest factor in her decision not to interfere with fixing her kids.

Clarissa sets Stormy after Mikail, as well.

Clarissa doesn't believe that the Seroli have souls, which is why they are immmune to Morganti weapons.

Clarissa is more interested in Turvalen than Stormy because he is more durable - it would be quite annoying to accidentally destroy someone during sex.

Stormy closes the trump contact.

Turvalen still has the thread that he was following from Julian's body. Stormy decides to follow it.

--EORun--