I nodded, puffing.
“There is a reason for it,” I said. “A very good reason. I am glad to know, though, that you keep your wits about you even when you have been drinking. Thanks for telling me.”
He shrugged and took a drink.
“A good bashing is a sobering thing. Also, your welfare is my welfare.”
“True. Does this version of Avalon meet with your approval?”
“Version? It is my Avalon,” he said. “A new generation of people is in the land, but it is the same place. I visited the Field of Thorns today, where I put down Jack Hailey‘s bunch in your service. It was the same place.”
“The Field of Thorns . . .” I said, remembering.
“Yes, this is my Avalon,” he continued, “and I‘ll be coming back here for my old age, if we live trough Amber.”
“You still want to come along?”
“All my life I‘ve wanted to see Amber—well, since I first heard of it. That was from you, in happier times.”
“I do not really remember what I said. It must have been a good telling.”
“We were both wonderfully drunk that night, and it seemed but a brief while that you talked—weeping some of the time—telling me of the mighty mountain Kolvir and the green and golden spires of the city, of the promenades, the decks, the terraces, the flowers, the fountains. . . . It seemed but a brief while, but it was most of the night—for before we staggered off to bed, the morning had begun. God! I could almost draw you a map of the place! I must see it before I die.”
“I do not remember that night,” I said slowly. “I must have been very, very drunk.”
He chuckled.
“We had some good times here in the old days,” he said. “And they do remember us here. But as people who lived very long ago—and they have many of the stories wrong. But hell! How many people get their stories right from day to day?”
I said nothing, smoking, thinking back.
“. . . All of which leads me to a question or two,” he said.
“Shoot.”
“Will your attack on Amber put you at great odds with your brother Benedict?”
“I really wish that I knew the answer to that one,” I said. “I think that it will, initially. But my move should be completed before he can reach Amber from here, in response to any distress call that goes out. That is, reach Amber with reinforcements. He could get there in no time at all, personally, if someone on the other end were helping. But that would serve little purpose. No. Rather than tear Amber apart, he will support whoever can hold it together, I am certain. Once I have ousted Eric, he will want the strife to stop right there and he will go along with my holding the throne, just to put an end to it. He will not really approve of the seizure in the first place, of course.”
“That is what I am getting at. Will there be bad blood between you afterward as a result of that?”
“I do not believe so. This is purely a matter of politics, and we have known one another most of our lives, he and I, and have always been on better terms with each other than either of us with Eric.”
“I see. Since you and I are in this together and Avalon seems to be Benedict‘s now, I was wondering what his feelings would be about my returning here one day. Would he hate me for having helped you?”
“I doubt that very much. He has never been that sort of person.”
“Then let me carry things a step further. God knows I am an experienced military man, and if we succeed in taking Amber he will have ample evidence of the fact, with his right arm injured the way that it is and all, do you think he might consider taking me on as a field commander for his militia? I know this area so well. I could take him to the Field of Thorns and describe that battle. Hell! I would serve him well—as well as I served you.”