Having finished with Flora’s little task we headed back to France. Her agent had found a couple villas in a Bronze-age shadow that would do. I took the opportunity to ask Merlin straight out “How do we get money?”. His reply could be boiled down to ‘Er Um….. we steal it.’ I knew I liked this guy for a reason. Imagine, someone in power actually admitting that they get their cash by just taking it. The discussion mainly centered on how and where to find large quantities of money laying around. That gave me an idea and I proposed a business venture to Archi. The three of us, plus some help from a few down-on-their-luck women from Rebma took up hunting for sunken treasure. Merlin and I would adjust the probabilities of finding a wreck, Archi and his crew would sail us there and do the actual scavenging work, and the ladies from Rebma would handle making the pressure bearable and the water breathable. We had loaded about 1/3 of the gold when we got a trump call from Random requesting (in the strongest possible manner) our attendance at a family siege of a stronghold of an organization that had been causing some problems. Archi’s crew and the ladies from Rebma continued to load the gold while the 3 of us went to answer the call. The sight we trumped into was impressive. A couple of the older family members had armies of significant size and enthusiasm. Archi joined the melee, Merlin joined the spell casters, and I looked around for the safest place to be. I have been called a coward, but I find it more common sense to avoid getting poked with pointy items whenever possible. A short distance away was Random and Fiona, surrounded by some sort of royal guard. Random was using the pattern to do something to complex for me to follow. By now I’ve had some practice helping people with pattern workings before, so I stepped over and lent a hand; actually 2 hands, one on each of Random’s shoulders. The combat went on for some time, and I spent it doing what some say I do best: being willful. I knew the combat was almost over when the high muckety muck broke and ran. I knew he was the head guy cause he tore a tunnel through shadow while trying to get away. Random took off after him taking me with. What Random did to the guy wasn’t pretty, and far more vicious than I had thought Random could be. I learned however that this guy was responsible for the death of his brother, and since every other member of the family seemed well pleased, the punishment was probably appropriate. They are going to put an appropriate message on a nearby rock so anyone passing by understands. Someone also mentioned Haiku. Here is my attempt that I am thinking of submitting:

Here burns the Adept Whose scheming killed Benedict Amber finds it fitting

Hardly world class, but associating with the Japanese as long as I have does have SOME effect. Since the older Amberites seemed particularly pleased, and I hadn’t seen Corwin, I thought I’d trump him, and pass on the news in case he wasn’t asked to come. (Deirdre had been there so I could see him not being there as a good tactical decision both on his part and on the part of the person running the attack.) I trumped him and introduced myself. He seemed a little disturbed and defensive about having a daughter he knew nothing about. I reassured him that I had had a good upbringing and didn’t hold him negligent. After visiting the new memorial to Benedict we wandered off and chatted abit. He said that Deirdre had put a few rounds into him and seemed satisfied with that. Mostly he seemed lost and lonely. I took him to the villa, where the girls had been moved in and introduced him around. I introduced him as Corwin rather than my father as 1) I was not 100% sure he was, 95% maybe, but not 100% and 2) he looked like he could use some cheering up and I noticed a couple of the girls might be interested in the job. As he looks about 30 or so, I didn’t want to mess up his chances by introducing him as some sort of authority figure. I headed back to Amber, and then the Zepher to finish the gold salvaging. Merlin Archi and I each got ¼ the take and the ladies of Rebma split the other ¼. Archi will be splitting his with his crew and Merlin and I are spending much of ours outfitting out new villa. (I need HOW many yards of fabric for curtains?!)