“How is it that you even know him?” I asked.

“I met him during his — difficulties — some time back,” she told us. “In fact, you might say that I helped to deliver him from them. This was after I had met Martin, and I was inclined to be more sympathetic toward Amber. But then, your father is also a charming and persuasive man. I decided that I could not simply stand by and see him remain prisoner to my kin.”

“Do you know how he was captured in the first place?”

She shook her head.

“I only know that Brand effected his presence in a shadow far enough from Amber that he could be taken there. I believe it involved a fake quest for a nonexistent magical tool which might heal the Pattern. He realizes now that only the Jewel can do it.”

“Your helping him to get away… How did this affect your relations with your own people?”

“Not too damned well,” she said. “I am temporarily without a home.”

“And you want one here?”

She smiled again.

“It depends on how things turn out. If my people have their way, I would as soon go back — or stay with what shadows remain.”

I withdrew a Trump, glanced at it.

“What of Merlin? Where is he now?”

“They have him,” she said. “I fear he may be their man now. He knows his parentage, but they have had charge of his education for a long while. I do not know whether he could be gotten away.”

I raised the Trump, stared at it.

“No good,” she said. “It will not function between here and there.”

I recalled how difficult Trump communication had been when I had been to the fringes of that place. I tried anyway. The card grew cold in my hand and I reached out. There was the faintest flicker of a responding presence. I tried harder.

“Merlin, this is Corwin,” I said. “Do you hear me?”

I seemed to hear a reply. It seemed to be, “I cannot —” And then there was nothing. The card lost its coldness.