“Did you reach him?” she asked.

“I am not sure,” I said. “But I think so. Just for a moment.”

“Better than I thought,” she said. “Either conditions are good or your minds are very similar.”

“When you began waving Dad’s signet around you spoke of orders,” Random said. “What orders? And why is he sending them through you?”

“It is a matter of timing.”

“Timing? Hell! He just left here this morning!”

“He had to finish one thing before he was ready for another. He had no idea how long it would take. But I was just in touch with him before I came here — though I was hardly prepared for the reception I walked into — and he is now ready to begin the next phase.”

“Where did you speak with him?” I asked. “Where is he?”

“I have no idea where he is. He contacted me.”

“And…?”

“He wants Benedict to attack immediately.”

Gerard finally stirred from the huge armchair in which he had sat listening. He rose to his feet, hooked his thumbs in his belt and looked down at her.

“An order like that would have to come directly from Dad.”

“It did,” she said.

He shook his head.

“It makes no sense. Why contact you — someone we have small reason to trust — rather than one of us?”

“I do not believe that he can reach you at the moment. On the other hand, he was able to reach me.”

“Why?”

“He did not use a Trump. He does not have one for me. He used a reverberation effect of the black road, similar to the means by which Brand once escaped Corwin.”

“You know a lot of what has been going on.”

“I do. I still have sources in the Courts, and Brand transported himself there after your struggle. I hear things.”

“Do you know where our father is right now?” Random asked.