BrandIndex | Time Under Chaos | Non-Player Characters | Brand  Brand Then there was a figure both like Bleys and myself. My features, though smaller, my eyes, Bleys's hair, beardless. He wore a riding suit of green and sat atop a white horse, heading toward the dexter side of the card. There was a quality of both strength and weakness, questing and abandonment about him. I both approved and disapproved, liked and was repelled by, this one. His name was Brand, I knew. As soon as I laid eyes upon him, I knew. --Nine Princes in Amber And you Brand... With bitterness do I regard your memory, mad brother. You almost destroyed us. You nearly toppled Amber from her lofty perch on the breast of Kolvir. You would have shattered all of Shadow. You almost broke the Pattern and redesigned the universe in your own image. You were mad and evil, and you came so close to realizing your desires that I tremble even now. I am glad that you are gone, that the arrow and the abyss have claimed you, that you sully no more the places of men with your presence nor walk in the sweet airs of Amber. I wish that you had never been born and, failing that, that you had died sooner. Enough! It diminishes me to reflect so. Be dead and trouble my thinking no more. -- The Courts of Chaos “’Twixt Truth and Madness lies but a sliver of a stream…” Amongst a throng of the delusional, what do you call one that brings even an approximation of the truth to his peers? Would you call him a traitor? Would you call him insane? Or might you call him a prophet? Perhaps you would call him a pariah? The one known as Brand started life as a mere artist. Born of Clarissa, with his closest siblings Bleys and Fiona, the unassuming Brand faded into the background- content to be ignored, unnoticed, content to spread the beauty of his vision through whatever medium his brilliance sought. What happened, no one knows- or perhaps it is merely that none will say. But what is known is that Brand – this neglected, misunderstood figure – decided that he would paint his vision upon the canvas of reality instead of his art canvas. He sought out power over reality with the same fervor that he had once sought subject matter for his artistic works, and was just as successful, not only surpassing his siblings in mastery of the arts, but also keeping this mastery from them. Indeed, all of his siblings underestimated him unto the very end. Initially, when Fiona introduced him to the Court, his views were seen as moderate- a fitting manner to bring Amber back into the fold in the hands of those that would help this to come to pass. However, his true plans were a nightmare worthy of the most radical elements of Chaos, who wrong-headedly supported him in his aims. To view Chaos is to look upon madness; each one of us deals with it daily. Apparently Brand was not fit to the task, and crossed that thin line. What Brand attempted to do, rewrite reality, in the end was the wrong approach to what he wanted to bring about; though certain elements supported him until the end, most saw his plan for what it was- folly. No matter how much Chaos wanted to return to its rightful place, the madness of Brand was something obvious with which even the Courts would not parlay. But no matter how wrong, what prevented his siblings from knowledge of this madness until it was too late to give anything to him but a crossbow bolt and a trip into the Abyss remains unfathomable. In the end, Brand’s clear vision became diluted, and his patriotism subverted. But if this was a crime, it was one only of insanity and sickness that did not deserve the end that he was so earnestly given, and does not deserve to be remember with such vitriol, but instead with pity for the end to which is condition sadly brought him. Brand, an Amberite’s perspective: From the desk of Johann Payne, Son of the Eternal City. Amongst the royal family of Amber, madness is not an uncommon occurrence. Such powerful minds seem prone to a variety of mental ailments, some deliberately cultivated such as Benedict’s apparent monomania or Flora’s narcissism. Still, only one Amberite ever matched Dworkin for sheer madness in the artistic vein. Brand was a monomaniac to rival Benedict, a manic depressive, and perhaps worst of all, a megalomaniacal sociopath. Dworkin may have exceeded Brand when it came to delusions and schizophrenia, but with such power as he commanded, one could call him hubritic, but it is hard to argue he was a megalomaniac. This is what led Brand over the edge… over the edge of madness first, and over the literal edge of the Abyss in the end. Still, this was not Brand’s crime. Mental ailments are not themselves criminal in this family. With such crushing minds as Fiona and Benedict, we are able, seemingly, to overcome any obstacle. Brand stands responsible for his actions, regardless of any mental ailments that he might possess. Such are the responsibilities of a Prince of the Eternal City. He sought to destroy the universe, and remake it in his own image- and he nearly succeeded. He sought to betray Amber, and that he did. That Chaosian factions were taken in by his offers to help restore Chaos to a unique primacy in the universe is no shame, as his own brother and sister were fooled for a time. What was disgraceful was the efforts of those same factions to distance themselves from this traitor long after his repeated madness and treacheries came to light. Corwin may have been responsible for a great deal of the misery which befell Amber during Patternfall, but he still had the decency to regret his terrible mistake. As Corwin told the story, and as the scant facts substantiate, when Corwin lay within the bowels of Amber’s dungeons, blind broken and forgotten, he called upon what is one of our family’s most terrible powers. He laid his blood curse on Eric: the crown would never sit easy on his brow. Corwin’s curse might have easily spurred his brothers to constantly try to usurp him, as Corwin probably expected. This, in and of itself, would only have been spiteful- and a terrible burden upon that pretender- but Corwin was apparently not aware of the metaphysical environment in which his curse fell. Quickened by Brand’s treachery, Chaosians were fast building a highway to Amber. Their black road spread death and pestilence across shadow, and certainly made Eric’s rule a joyless one, but the form of that revenge was shaped by Brand’s actions. Corwin regretted his curse, and in the end, took whatever actions he could to correct his mistake. He threw his army, built with the purpose of conquering Amber, into the fray in her defense. He charged into battle himself. He marched across the universe at the head of another army, arm in arm with all of his brothers – all but one. Brand lived a traitor, and in the end, died a traitor. His crimes will not be forgotten, just as those of Chaos in Amber will never be forgotten. |
