Breakfast (Winnow and Fergus)

"Shut the door, lest we be disturbed. Now sit down." With something concrete to do, Winnow is all business again.

"This is commonly called a 'trump' as you have heard. Some kind of card game reference. I don't know, my people do not play cards the way they do here. But a trump is a mystical portal that connects people or places. Whatever the painting shows, that is the recipient - the target. If it is a place, the trump will take you to the place. If a person, the card will allow you to connect to the person - if the target allows it. You can then speak to them, or even connect mind to mind. It also allows for one of the two to attack the other mentally. Either of the two can also go to the other physically, or pass objects. Ot attack physically."

"In other words, these are very powerful, dangerous objects. And there are other uses, for the adept. But these are the basics."

Fergus shuts the door and sits down to listen intently to Winnow. When he is finished Fergus has a couple of questions for Winnow.

"So can anyone use these objects of power then? Also how are such things created - can anyone create them?"

"Anyone with a mind and eyes can use them, at least. Perhaps you don't even need eyes, I am not sure. Not just anyone can make them. This one and most of the ones of the Family were created by Dworkin, the King's court shaman. I heard that the traitor Brand made some as well. This means it is at least possible that others could have the knowledge and skill. So I suppose the answer is, potentially, anyone could. Or perhaps only those of the Family, or those who have walked the Pattern. I do not know for sure. It is certainly not a common thing."

Winnow turns the card in the table to face Fergus. It is an exquisite rendering of Amber as seen from up the mountainside.

"Pick it up. Feel it. What do you feel?"

Winnow will watch carefully for any rainbow effect so he can interrupt any mistaken transport.

Fergus holds the image of Amber in his hand and feels the contact on his skin somewhat cool. The picture from within the card wavers slightly as his mind connects to that place.

"I can feel the reality of the image Winnow. Should I go through? Will you be able to follow me?"

Winnow reaches suddenly, to pass his hand over the card Fergus is holding, cutting off the contact. He doesn't care how rude this may seem; his remembered role as instructor of young warriors handling dangerous tools takes over.

"If you went through holding that trump, you would take it with you. Then I would have to find or borrow another. Let's take this one step at a time."

"Feel the card, feel its smoothness, its coldness. Become familiar with it. You may want to confirm something is a trump without activating it, for if it is a trump of a person, activating it will notify them you are doing so."

Winnow drags the heavy painted metal outdoor chair around to sit beside Fergus. "Now we shall practice a bit." He places a hand on Fergus' shoulder. "Contact between us allows us to share the trump contact."

"Go ahead and stare at it again. Reach out gently with your mind. Imagine the place is real." Winnow will keep a firm mental and physical grip on Fergus to avoid any accidents.

Once the contact is firm, Winnow says, "Stand up, keeping the contact." They stand up together, and he guides them to shuffle left and right a bit, then turn around entirely. "Notice how the viewpoint does not change. The other end view is fixed. If it were a person, your view is always facing the recipient and their view is always facing you, roughly perpendicular to the plane of their torso."

To Fergus, it would seem something like he is facing a floating 3D viewscreen that moves with him but whose picture does not change.

While they are performing these exercises, Winnow mentally lists his trumps. Now I wish I had one of a cousin. All I have are elders, for official business. No one to just...practice. I hate to bother Hoa Gerah again...we can do that later.

"All right, we are ready. If you have all your things on your person...let us step through."

"That is what I was afraid of P-o-a Winnow that I would take it with me. It make logical sense to do so else you would always be leaving them behind. Still it would have only taken me a short way away and I am not averse to walking back."

Fergus finds that Winnow fusses over him a bit like a mother hen in getting him to remake the contact as Winnow puts his hand on his shoulder. Fergus finds it interesting that the point of view does not move since you will be limited to a fixed point where you will appear in a trump.

"I think we are ready now."

With that Fergus mentally steps through the trump. The transition is smooth and he appears on the mountainside overlooking Amber next to WInnow just as he had seen in the picture.

Fergus' excitement of the trump movement is marred as he realises that he has left behind the dirty plates from lunch.

I have slipped in my excitement and now I have burdened others

"Winnow" he calls his friends name urgently panic in his voice. "I have done a great wrong. I have burdened others with my mess and I have slipped already! In my excitement to use the trump I forgot those others that I burden. Will I forget myself so easily in future and consign reality to my fate?"

Exasperating!

Winnow smiles with forced cheerfulness. "Fergus! Did you burden your teachers in your home-place with the weight of their responsibilty, and refuse their instruction? Do you burden those who made the clothes you wear, and go naked? Do you apologize for the water that comes out of the pipes, knowing that plumbers fit and maintain them? Give the staff some credit, man! Let them do their jobs! Our job is to protect the realm, to fight and die for them - for Amber, if necessary. It's a division of responsibility, one man for another. You will do your part, and they will do theirs."

Winnow slaps Fergus on the back, staggering him a bit. "So let us enjoy this beautiful afternoon. Look at the majesty that is Kolvir! Gaze upon Amber, the Eternal City." Winnow goes on to praise Amber with a convert's zeal. The fact that there are no gatherings of humanity on Tagaloa large enough to be called cities helps.

"Smell the wildflowers! Hear the gurgling of the mountain stream. Look, there is a flock of mountain sheep, the curl-horned rams ready to defend their ewes. Above us the raptors and condors fly. In the distance up the coast you can see the vineyards of Count Bayle. Below us, the farms and pastures that feed the populace. There, in the harbor, the tall ships that sail the trade routes of a double dozen shadows, laid down by our elders. They all have their place in things. Isn't it glorious!"

"But if need be, we must defend this glory. It is the obligation of nobility. Those with the gift of power must return the gift, with responsibility to use their talents to the fullest for the good of all. Your time is wasted washing plates, not from pride or laziness, but from simple reason."

"And if that still does not clear your conscience, you can always take a turn in the kitchens washing dishes, to put some labor on account." Winnow sighs. Being a young man, with a young man's passions, he finds it difficult to let a lesson go.

Three armed soldiers--in green and white--reach the crest of a nearby hill, maybe fifty yards (roughly 45 meters) away. Behind them a simple tower rises, clearly a lookout of some kind. To one side of the very top a covered area lies open to the air. One can make out what appears to be tall pile of stacked wood and hay.

A beacon.

One of the soldiers raises his hand and waves to Winnow three times. Winnow knows that if he doesn't wave back twice, the soldiers will see that as cause to raise the alarm.

Fergus is facing Winnow and does not see the watchtower or soldiers.

"My teachers taught me and I had no choice in that, perhaps they had no choice in it either. However now I am free of my prison I do have choices and that is important. For a normal person or Godling perhaps such trifles as you consider them friend Winnow are not important, but for me it is somewhat different. I am prophecised to destroy all of reality and I can go two ways. Either I can try and fight it and be the best I possibly can to try and avoid that fate, or I can give in and accept that my fate is inevitable and do what I like. I have chosen the first option. I will have to make up for it later but it will be worrying me now all afternoon."

Fergus sees Winnow look at something over his shoulder as he adds.

"Oh and those wildflowers are called Princitus Tasrae otherwise known as the Princes Tears."

Winnow automatically gives the recognition sign. He knows the basic Amber signal from his semi-honorary Captaincy in the Guard he has tried to make real by training with the common soldiery, and from the week he spent in Arden.

"And there are some of the yeomen that put their lives at risk guarding the approaches to Amber. Let us go meet them and further your education by inspecting their post."

As they walk over he replies to Fergus, "I do not expect your view will change overnight. But you'll never get anything done fretting over trifles. If you are fated to destroy all reality a few unwashed dishes won't matter much. And by the way, let me quote one of our elders, Prince Caine: All prophecy is bullshit."

The three soldiers have already turned back to return to the watch tower, as per standard procedure. Their behavior tells their fellows nothing is amiss. Fortunately it isn't far. The tower rises from the base of the hill where they appeared.

Fergus walks alongside Winnow to the tower.

"It is easy to say they are trifles but where do you draw the line between a trifle and something that has major impact. Even a small thing can ripple out and become something much bigger. It worries me."

Fergus continues on pondering the import of Caine's words.

"I do not wish to in any way disagree with Caine but there certainly a number of people who felt that it was true and I am conscious that there is thus a larger than zero percent chance that it is."

"And some say that a butterfly's wings in Amber cause a storm in the Courts of Chaos. I don't believe it. Ripples in a pond - or reality - will be damped out by the sheer mass of the medium. It takes time and power to cause significant changes. Such has been my experience anyway."

Winnow holds up just short of the hill's crestline, out of sight of the hilltop, if not the watchtower itself. He pulls loose his sarong and with a practiced motion rolls it into a baldric, tossing it around his shoulders. At the same time, his armor flows over his muscular form like a living carpet of enamel. It takes a few more seconds but it shapes itself with some martial detail - flares at the shoulders, the impression of boots and joints - until it looks more like fancy segmented plates than flexible plastic. He smiles and chuckles. "Best to keep up appearances."

He then strides over the crest of the hill, to informally inspect the guardpost. This is more in the nature of what they call "Leadership By Wandering Around" and certainly not anything adversarial. He greets the troopers heartily, calls them by name if he knows any, asks their names when he doesn't, and tries to commit them to memory. He asks after their circumstances, their families, their food and pay, and tries to put them at ease enough to discern if there are any complaints. He nods approvingly at everything that is in good order, frowns at anything that isn't but does not embarrass anyone. By so doing he hopes to give Fergus an example of basic military leadership.


On such foundations are successful armies built.

"But you have already said we have power P-o-a Winnow and as we have power we are much more likely to cause ripples. I have already heard how Shadows were impacted by the Patternfall war."

Winnow seeks to impress the guards at the tower but in reality all he needs to do is to be himself and that would be sufficient.

Fergus looks at the men and their condition and they seem to be well fed and maintained. That is good, but is this really just for defense?

"Yes, by the war, but not by dirty dishes. Having power is not the same as exercising it. I have power to kill one of these men with a blow. If I slap one on the shoulder, does this ripple through society? At most he will tell his lady how one of royalty visited his humble post. But if I killed him, there would be ripples of all sorts." Winnow shakes his head.

So smart, yet so dense.

"All right. Now we will give the men a real story to tell...I hope." He shuffles out a trump of Gerard, showing it to Fergus as he steps up beside the man.

"Now, if he has the time, you will experience your first trump contact with a person. You will feel a hint of mind to mind contact. It's impolite - and dangerous - to push or explore too much of this right now. Just follow along. Touch the card."

When he does, Winnow will call Gerard.

Fergus follows Winnow's instructions as he touches the card feeling its coldness once again. Given Winnow has warned him not to push Fergus does as he is bid.

It is very well for Winnow to think that who has not the fate of reality at his fingertips.

"Ready when you are friend Winnow!"

Gerard's image appears before too long, looking to be in a curtained antechamber of some kind. Something about his manner suggests a meeting of some kind is under way. He himself doesn't seem bothered much by the interruption.

"What's up?"

Gerard's voice echoes in Fergus' mind but he says nothing letting Winnow do the talking to his father.

"Sir, would it be convenient to bring Fergus and me through? I am teaching him of Trump and would like him to handle the transport to you as a safe first effort."

Gerard considers this for a moment then nods. "Only, please be quiet. There's something official going on in the next room." He reaches out his hand through the connection--

Winnow will follow Fergus along but he will wait for Fergus to do the reaching. He will withdraw his armor back to minimum status, baring his feet for silence, and step lightly.

[OOC - I don't believe it has been mentioned at all out loud. Fergus has put two and two together since Winnow has called upon Gerard (and only Gerard) several times now as though there is a close bond. He may be wrong of course.]

Fergus takes Gerard's proffered hand and reaches through the link back to the official room in Amber. The room is more opulant than he has seen previously with elaborate decorations adorning the walls and the ceiling. He turns to make sure that Winnow follows him through and notes that his friend's armour is now reduced again.

Fergus whispers as quietly as possible to Gerard

"My thanks for helping out with my training. We should withdraw lest we disturb things here."

.

Two means of exit (or entry) seem immediately obvious. A door at one end of the room, dark wood with a unicorn design carved into it. On the other side is an arch with red curtains. Some voices from beyond the curtains can be heard, muffled. Something about "a day or two early."

Gerard gestures to the door. Beyond it Winnow and Fergus find themselves in a corridor with black and white tile upon the floor and doric columns every couple of yards. Winnow recognizes the area as not far from the main throne room. Centrally located in the castle, the throne room has several meeting chambers nearby of different sizes and styles.

Fergus steps out of the room and hands Winnow back his trump of Gerard.

"Thank you for loaning me your trump to show me yet another wonder. I have my duty to do in the kitchens first. I know you do not see it as needed, but I currently do not contribute in any way here so I feel I must do something. Then I'll let you pick what wonder of this place you would like to show me next friend Winnow."