Chapter One

The human was small, old, and boring. His name was Phillip, and he was the nominal head of the Church of the Unicorn. While on the one hand, I found the thought of a living deity fascinating. On the other hand, he seemed about as full of himself as many of the Amber family, except that he could not claim nearly as much as they could. I couldn’t decide whether it was the fact that he was human, or if the fact that he was from someplace that literally considered itself to be the one true world, of which everything else is a pale, distorted reflection.

I was here because they were holding a banquet in my honor, as we had just signed a treaty bringing the Tellurian League, which they referred to quaintly as "Shadow Telluria", into the Silver Circle. Apparently the Silver Circle was the low-calorie version of the Golden Circle, where all "shadows" like to find themselves.

Some had greatly opposed the entrance of Telluria into trading status at all. The technology and the non-human residents apparently had them a bit put off, which I suppose is to be expected by a clan of medieval humans. One of them, a man with the rather vindictive name of "Lord Fumaris", glared at me venomously from across the room. Why he even bothered to come to the "celebration" is beyond me.

Most of the guests at the party had about the same questions.

"What’s the religion like there?" "Almost non-existent."

"Is it really a high tech shadow?" Smugly, "Yes."

I also had the rare honor of discovering that the Church of the Unicorn had "Inquisitors", one of whom was in attendance at this ceremony: Theron. I asked about the role of the Inquisitors, and he described some party line about the role they play in helping the community. I wondered how long it would be before I was burned at the stake. I noticed that most people didn’t want to talk to the inquisitor a good deal.

At one point, Lore, the eldest son of Princess Florimel, approached me, and asked how I felt about the demise of my predecessor. Lore, according to my records, was head of the "spoiled, lazy, and decadent trouble-makers" of Amber. He’d come around during a rather less than inspiring conversation with Flora’s other son, Aaron.

"I find it quite unfortunate," I replied succinctly.

"I take it you’re working very hard to find the person behind this," he prompted.

"Yes, we are."

"I’m surprised that you haven’t found him, since your people are able to travel five times faster than the speed of light," he said idly, drawing upon a comment I’d made to his brother, Aaron, regarding our super-luminary travel.

"Unfortunately, our technology does not work in this," I paused to refrain from using the word "primitive", "world."

"I see… So, are you planning on establishing a presence here in Amber?"

"Yes, we were hoping to establish an embassy in the city."

Lord Fumaris shouldered his way forward, his huffiness quite evident on his face. "I know that it’s too late for me to do anything, but I want to say right here that I’m quite opposed to this whole treaty. First you establish a presence, then you develop technology to take over our kingdom. Just what is it you plan?"

I granted Fumaris a look I lend to those who are quite obviously out of their right mind. As I began to explain how we could benefit from relations, there was a loud crash as one of the banquet tables collapse at a rather timely moment, drawing everyone’s attention to that. The timing was rather uncanny.

When the commotion died down, I resumed what I meant to say.

"I hope that by establishing an embassy we will be able to further the good will between our governments, and provide each other with much needed services. For example, we could provide tables that do not break."

This drew a nervous chuckle from several, and even Lore gave a surprised half-smile. I felt flush with a minor victory.

Trumpets blared, and heralds proclaimed the arrival of the King and Queen. Random and Vialle entered, heading towards where I was standing. I stood a bit straighter, avoiding the urge to examine my clothes for any furtively provided stains, and awaited their greeting. Unfortunately, Lord Fumaris intercepted. On the bright side, he didn’t spend much time doing anything, but unfortunately, that was because he died with a gurgle.

People drew back, and a silence came over the room. There was a slight disruption when Lord Aaron decided to be a bit noisy with the canapé he was eating, but otherwise everyone just generally stared at the dead Lord and the blue splotches on his face.

Blue splotches which I was unfortunately all too familiar with, and others made the connection as well.

I sought out Caine, and fortunately he was already in the process of seeking me out.

"This is bad," he said without formality.

"So I noticed," I replied. "Any suggestions?"

"I’ll talk to Random. I can get you out of this pretty easily, since you didn’t have anything to do with this." Pause. "You didn’t have anything to do with this, did you?"

I gave a sigh. "No, I had nothing to do with it."

"Good. That should be easy to get you cleared with."

It was then that I noticed a herd of guards standing sheepishly near me, asking me if I could speak to the Captain of the Guards. Theron, the inquisitor, asked to go with me.

As we were headed down, Theron said to me confidentially, "I’d like to help you, but I’m afraid I must know more of this situation. If you could trust me enough to tell me what the problem is, I may be able to do something."

"Very well," I said, hoping the dubious tone in my voice didn’t show. "The primary thing that Telluria has to offer Amber is a fruit that only grows in our shadow. Using processes in our shadow, we are able to distill it into use as an anasthetic. Distilled another way, it makes a virulent poison that leaves purple blotches."

"Ah. And are you behind this murder?"

"No. I am not."

While we were talking, there appeared to be some commotion from where we came from. The guards looked a bit concerned, but as soon as Theron offered to insure that I would be delivered safely to the Captain of the Guard, they left us to our own devices. Unfortunately, the Captain of the Guard was away dealing with some emergency in the banquet hall. Some sort of monster.

Hoping they didn’t mean me, we headed back up to the banquet hall, just to find the "melted" main doors being knocked down by Lord Fumaris, who was now undead, splotchy and pissed off. Lady Dalen, who was previously announced as being head of the White Rose Mercantile, tried attacking the creature with a sword, while several other lords of Amber had swords and the like, and were quite busy trying to look brave. She managed a neat shot through the chest, which only seemed to enrage off Fumaris even more. He was less pleased when she cut off an arm.

Regretting that I’d left my staff in my room, and not seeing anything handy that would accommodate me, I emptied a banquet table in one move, and picked it up in another. I waited calmly for the eventual attack from the creature, figuring that it wouldn’t be doing too well if it got flattened by the table. I might have charged, but as I saw Dalen having her body bent and twisted in a rippling fashion, I decided against it. Besides, it seemed far more interested in Prince Aaron. It was then that the guards, with the aid of Dalen’s urgings, found their spine and chopped the late Fumaris up into small bits.

I put the table back where I found it, and sat down in a nearby chair, awaiting guards to haul me off. Aaron and Dalen, the crisis now averted, were apparently taking a moment to share a bottle of wine. They noticed me, sitting all alone except for Inquisitor Theron. Approaching me, Dalen seemed to stop, and stare vacantly at space. I wondered to myself if she’s considered drug rehabilitation.

She says something about wanting to make sure I was safe, and then left, looking very confused. Gerard arrived, talked to the guards and Aaron, and then carted away the remains of the door. The captain of the guard approached then, since the remains of Fumaris had been carted away.

"Ambassador Lentaro. I’m assigning men to escort you back to your residence. Prince Gérard will wish to speak to you in the morning."

Standing, I followed my escort back to the consulate. filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler filler