Knight of shadows. Chapter 9, 10
IX
I came around slowly. That familiar blueness was a lake of prebeing in which I drifted. Oh, yes, I was here because…I was here, as the song said. I turned over onto my other side within my sleeping bag, drew my knees up to my chest, and went back to sleep.
The next time I came around and gave it a quick glance the world was still a blue place. Fine: There is much to be said for the tried, the true. Then I recalled that Luke might be by at any time to kill me, and my lingers wrapped themselves around the hilt of the weapon beside me, and I strained my hearing after signs of anything’s approach.
Would I spend the day chipping at the wall of my crystal cave? I wondered. Or would Jasra come and try again to kill me?
Again? Something was wrong. There’d been an awful lot of business involving Jurt and Coral and Luke and Mandor, and even Julia. Had it all been a dream?
The moment of panic came and went, and then my wandering spirit returned, bringing along the rest of my memories, and I yawned and everything was all right again.
I stretched. I sat up. I knuckled my eyes.
Yes, I was back in the crystal cave. No, everything that had happened since Luke imprisoned me had not been a dream. I had returned here by choice (a) because a good night’s sleep in this time line amounted to only a brief span back in Amber, (b) because nobody could bother me here with a Trump contact, and (c) because it was possible that even the Pattern and the Logrus couldn’t track me down here.
I brushed my hair out of my eyes, rose, and headed back to the john. It had been a good idea, having Ghost‘ transport me here following my colloquy with Dworkin. I was certain I had slept for something like twelve hours -deep, undisturbed stuff, the best kind. I drained a quart water bottle. I washed my face with more of the stuff.
Later, after I had dressed and stowed the bedclothes in the storeroom, I walked to the entrance chamber and stood in the light beneath the overhead adit. What I could see of the sky through it was clear. I could still hear Luke’s words the day he had imprisoned me here and I’d learned we were related.
I drew the Jewel of Judgment up from within my shirt, removed it, held it high so that the light shone from behind it, stared into its depths. No messages this time.
Just as well. I wasn’t in the mood for two-way traffic. I lowered myself into a comfortable cross-legged position, still regarding the stone. Time to do it and be done with it, now that I felt rested and somewhat alert. As Dworkin had suggested, I sought the Pattern within that red pool.
After a time it began to take shape. It did not appear as I had been visualizing it, but this was not an exercise in visualization. I watched the structure come clear. It was not as if it were suddenly coming into existence, however, but rather as if it had been there all along and my eyes were just now adjusting to perceive it properly. Likely this was actually the case, too.
I took a deep breath and released it. I repeated the process. Then I began a careful survey of the design: I couldn’t recall everything my father had said about attuning oneself to the Jewel. When I had mentioned this to Dworkin, he had told me not to worry about it, that I needed but to locate the three-dimensional edition of the Pattern within the stone, find its point of entry, and traverse it. When I pressed him for details, he had simply chuckled and told me not to worry.
All right.
Slowly I turned it, drawing it nearer. A small break appeared, high, to the right. As I focused upon it, it seemed to rush toward me.
I went to that place, and I went in there. It was a strange roller coaster of an experience, moving along Pattern-like lines within the gemstone. I went where it drew me, sometimes with a near-eviscerating feeling of vertigo, other times pushing with my will against the ruby barriers till they yielded and I climbed, fell, slid, or pushed my way onward. I lost most of the awareness of my body, hand holding the chain high, save that I knew I was sweating profusely, as it stung my eyes with some regularity.