Brú na Bóinne and Woodstock

The personal diary of Sorashi, daughter of Deirdre

After my dream, I must have fallen back to sleep. I woke in the changeless day of Chaos, and after washing and dressing went in search of breakfast.

Lharsa was at table, and greeted me kindly, asking if I had slept well. I could find no trace of malice in her at this, so I told her in essence of my dream.

Over bread and fruit, she told me of Houses with expertise in entering the Abyss (and coming out whole) - a dangerous undertaking, but she had links with one House which was trustworthy - House Drobe. To render this worthwhile to her, though, I would need to meet her price - as she had mentioned before, her method of procreation rendered her vulnerable and her sister would only agree to take one of the twin offspring and thus she asked that I would foster the other. She promised to give me the information I needed to undertake this in the shifting culture of Chaos, all she needed was that House Minobee would continue.

Considering my desperate need, it was not an impossible price - although I am well aware that a task which is simple is not necessarily easy. Nevertheless, it is one I can afford - I am not unused to children. My decision will have to wait on the blessing of one of the elders.

I tried to contact Julian, but it was like conversing over a storm-swollen rapid in the midst of an electrical storm - either the cards are not working properly, or his hosts mislike his contact with his Amberite kin (however far removed).

Who shall be next? Caine - after consideration, not him. Although he would be very aware of the political ramifications, I needed someone who would tell me no if it would be detrimental to our situation.

Whilst shuffling the cards, I touched Mother’s card - it was hot, like a fevered brow, which only added to my urgency. Who was next? Benedict. Pausing only to gather my thoughts into a brief and cogent summary, I reached out through the card, and made contact after only a little resistance.

I needed little more than my name as introduction so gave him my summary. He has no objection to getting Deirdre back, his concern was whether what we got back would be her. I could not answer that - as it was Benedict, I said so but I could only try. After ascertaining that I was willing to undertake the fostering of a Chaos child, he agreed to the attempt - I did not need to be told that if it went terribly wrong, the consequences were mine alone.

I returned to Lharsa, and told her I accepted her offer - she seemed delighted and said she would make arrangements at once.

I have jumped off the ledge - let the gods guide me to the clear deep water below.

Some time later Brak N’Kumela arrived, apparently head of House Drobe. N’Kumela was a huge black-skinned male clad in the skins of hunting cats in the style of those from over the Western sea, and his manner was warm. We discussed terms - his House’s skills meant they were in demand, so in order to expedite their assistance what would I offer them?

I tried to think for what seemed like forever, but could think of nothing. Remembering Benedict’s directness, though, I asked him what he wanted. He looked at me with a little surprise and some respect whilst he considered this - Lharsa looked as though I had done something extremely clever - I wish I could claim that credit.

Having considered, Brock asked for a lock of my hair - and furthermore promised that it would not be used to my bane and he would guard it as though a jewel of great value and thus, after hands were clasped in conclusion, the deal was done. He did warn that they would not know what they would return with until after the dive was completed - it may be nothing, or my mother, or something that used to be my mother - nevertheless, the contract would be concluded. I appreciated the honesty - it seemed a good sign - and conveyed my acceptance of this caveat.

As a side-note, in my breakfast chat with Lharsa I had let my little secret slip. She said she had known there was a reason she so readily felt a bond between us, and this was obviously why. She offered to teach me more if I should be interested - if we are trapped here, it may be a useful offer to take up.

This business concluded as far as it can go, I decided to make my way to House Askaris (with Wendy’s assistance), where I found William and the rest of my male cousins as well as a new addition to our happy warm family; Caine’s son, Dirk, all bluff camaraderie and charm - well, I’m sure he thought so. The 3 or 4 concealed daggers I spotted, however, do show him to be slightly more than the harem hero he appears to be.

I run ahead of myself again - the quest for today is, yet again, Constance and her rescue from House Spectral. As there were other demons I allowed Wendy to go back to the House to look after Countess Lharsa, to which she curtseyed and left.

Sometimes I wonder what the demons really make of us all - Chaos and Amberites, both?

So we returned through tortuous deliria to the charm that is a grubby shade of turquoise without any spatial references. William, who seemed less obnoxious today, called for the lord of the land, Celadon, to show him/her/itself a request granted by the appearance of a monocoloured figure self-identified as the same, and after a short conversation we were led through some painted trees to Constance, who was still the least happy of all leopard cubs. She wanted a bed, which Havelock drew to negate a complete lack of understanding on Celadon’s part, and thus appeared a bed - admittedly floating solidly and contentedly in mid-air (Havelock forgot to draw legs on it).

I can only be grateful that my guardian genie enabled me to be placed with the kinder and more familiar House Minobee - though I suspect that in Constance’s place I would be more aggressive in my expressions of dissatisfaction, for the good or ill consequences thereof.

Back at House Askaris, Havelock did a trump reading - the upshot of which was the arrival of a female rescuer. I dare not even begin to entertain the hope that it refers to Mother, and anyway the details did not seem to fit. In private conversation, Havelock asked me about rescuing her - I was as non-committal as I could be when I replied that help had been garnered elsewhere on that score. He did not pursue the matter - it will be interesting to see who else gets to hear of this.

William declared that as members of House Barimen we were to visit the ancestral home apparently called Brứ-na-Bóinne - in the hope it would give us answers or just for something to do, I cannot say, but we went - including Dirk. Harem hero seems just so apt.

We arrived at a low, flattish hill of stone, with closed wooden doors flanked by enormous stones and a bronze gong. As we approached, one of the stones moved and revealed itself to be a large stone-featured demon with a large club and an aggressive manner. Fortunately, all-out battle was avoided by showing Cymnea’s seal and we were granted entrance.

Inside, we walked down an impossibly long corridor carved into rock of great age. Being in the front Constance and Margrave indicated they could hear something - when we caught up, we also heard two voices - one old, one younger and rather petulant - and then, from a slightly different direction, approaching footsteps.

This latter proved to be a fox-headed demon called Loeg, who ushered us into the presence of the two voices who seemed to be discussing the future of House Barimen as we entered.

The room itself was a large chamber, dimly lit by a central fire. Near the fire were two figures, one a white figure of spikes and sharp edges, the other a brownish segmented wormlike shape with a single large eye in what approximates to a face. On being made aware of our presence, the forms changed to a white bearded elderly man of some presence, and a weak-mouthed young man of unprepossessing appearance.

As they regarded us, Loeg introduced them as Suhuy of House Winter and Melvin the head of House Barimen. Suhuy inclined his head, and Melvin smiled weakly - I remembered a comment that William had passed on from ‘Grandmother’ about us being disappointed when we met House Barimen. Still, all information may be useful (how Amberite I sound!) and as food and drink were called for, Constance asked about House Barimen’s history.

This comprised a long list of battles, death, revenge - all from a male perspective, any female daring to intrude actively on the family legend meeting a violent end - ending with the death of Melvin’s father, Donal mac Conan, at Amberite hands. Melvin in an effort at humour, I think, said that he supposed he would have to seek revenge for this, finishing with a nervous laugh - or possibly a snicker of fear as we gazed impassively at this so underwhelming threat.

To cover the embarrassing silence, Suhuy claimed to recognise Darig, from somewhere - someone else had also done so, recently, who was that? - but Darig did not return the connection, claiming to be too young. Given the way time distorts here, perhaps this meeting was yet to come?

These musings were interrupted by a strangled cry from behind us - William, standing out of the light of the fire, seemed to be wrestling with an unseen assailant. Darig went right as I circled round to the left - I had no idea what the rest of the family were doing - but as we neared, a bright light burst upon the room and we could see him wrestling with a dark sinuous figure. The surprise of the light seemed to have given William an edge, which he took advantage of by managing to throw off the shape. As Darig ran it through, Suhuy launched a black blob that revealed itself as an octopus-like thing as it wrapped itself firmly round the assassin, a three-armed lizard-man.

Ignoring our questions, it tried to shapeshift out of its bonds but its increasingly frantic efforts were in vain and actually seemed fatally uncontrolled - which its liquefaction a few moments later seemed to prove. According to Suhuy, it was likely to have come from House Spandrel, a House of dedicated assassins. And we had no idea who had sent it - although we were not starved of possibilities.

Melvin’s lack of nerve was even more evident when Suhuy (I think - or possibly William) demanded that he act as head of the house and confronted this House as attackers of his guests. This prompted what could only be described as a nervous fit in the heroic head of House Barimen. Once he had recovered enough to stop quaking, I tried to help by offering some words of practical advice but I fear they fell on barren ground. Naught else helpful came to mind.

As Darig and William waited for weapons to be cleaned, we were advised that Mandor of House Sawall wished the pleasure of our company immediately at his personal residence, Woodstock - the last was not stated, but somehow it didn’t need to be. To while away the time there was a discussion about marriage and shapeshifting - I confess I followed little of it.

The demons escorted us to Woodstock but took much longer – they claimed never to have been there before.

This turned out to be a pleasant-looking single-storey timber building. On entering, we were met by an urbane man - tall, white-haired but ageless, dressed almost entirely in black with touches of white at throat and cuff. He offered us refreshment, which turned out to be of the highest quality, and professed to be sympathetic to our ‘predicament’. It seemed, as he told it, that the ruling Houses were somewhat dissatisfied with the High King for this poorly-judged political ploy and the time was ripe for a dose of practical politics in action. Unfortunately, due to a bothersome vow of loyalty to the High King, Mandor found himself unable to take part as were the rest of the parliament.

And strangely enough, by beneficent fortune, we Amberites were unencumbered by such constraints - and were invited to a function of some kind where we were to be introduced to the High King, which was even more serendipitous! Mandor seemed to have put some thought into the most successful strategy for this, but the more he described the more I was convinced that, successful or not, we would have the life expectancy of a wounded antelope kid in the midst of a pack of starving hyenas i.e. a really, really bad thing to agree to - and from the attitudes of my cousins, I was not alone in this opinion. Rejecting it out of hand seemed to be as dangerous, so we begged time to consider this plan.

We made our farewells shortly after - for some reason Constance chose to stay behind alone, claiming that she needed to see if Mandor could arrange for her to change houses - a claim I am not fully sure I believed nor did I consider it a wise move on her part if it were true. Not that Mandor would be unsubtle enough to do her harm, but of all the adjectives to describe Constance, worldly-wise and self-reliant were not ones which came to my mind.

Nevertheless, no-one protested at this - perhaps my opinion of Constance was mistaken. We returned without her to Brứ-na-Bóinne to discuss this latest turn of events - Melvin, as far as I can recall, was absent. It seemed a little arrogant to commandeer his place as our own, but we needed somewhere as private as possible.

Dirk - oh so brave - was in favour of Mandor’s plan but he was the only one, the rest sharing my view that there are easier ways to commit suicide. We can only hope that we can avoid Mandor for long enough so that the moment passes without us having to tell him.

An interesting ending to the meeting - obviously following a personal train of thought, William stated softly, to no-one in particular, that he could probably take over House Barimen.

I suppose it’s always good to have a backup plan. I wonder if the others have one.