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Rebma, +25

[This is your Adult Content Warning: High Smut Levels ahead!]

The Court of Rebma had a new element this evening, another visiting Chaosian, introduced by the Chaosian emissary and promptly forgotten. Though a member of the Imperial House, he had not been given any formal rank. In appearance he was average in all but two respects: first, it seemed he had consulted a Rebman tailor, because the colors of his Chaosian court outfit actually appeared to match those of his House, as much as nearly-black purple and a modest amount of gold trim could be said to match them. Second, when he smiled, his plain face was transformed by a warmth of personality that would have been most unusual in a diplomat.

Because he was a new element, any number of people were willing to talk to him. He was impeccably courteous to all, but the pattern of behavior that rapidly emerged was that he was not interested in brainless beauties or in politics. He preferred to talk to people who had something interesting to say. Before long he had fallen into conversation with a matronly widow whose hobby was perfumes, quizzing her about Rebman ingredients and standards. The lady bloomed under his interested regard, and began drawing friends and acquaintances into the conversation. The newcomer, Delluth Telutci Corrino, was soon the center of a novel parlor game, in which he would sniff (very politely) at the wrist of a willing lady and attempt to identify the components of the perfume she was wearing.

It was not long before he noticed the attention of a beauty who was, at least from the sharpness of her jade-green eyes, not brainless at all. Islain, the daughter of the Queen, slid up in easy grace beside Delluth and the lady, watching without comment for the moment.

He acknowledged her arrival with a glance and a smile, but did not interrupt his technical digression on the virtues of something called 'civet' as a base scent, which he thought compared favorably with a particular Rebman substance. The lady seemed unconvinced - perhaps deliberately. "You will have to bring me some, and I will decide," she said, eyes bright.

"I could," he said thoughtfully. "Whether it will behave the same way in water as in air, I don't know."

Islain still did not choose to intrude, although a smile curved the corners of her lips as of some private joke she did not wish to share.

"But isn't experimentation part of the enjoyment?" the Lady Oveh said.

"Absolutely, dear lady," he said, the warmth of his smile suggesting that he was quite willing to let this flirtation go wherever the lady wanted it to go.

Islain did not seem inclined to interrupt, or to watch quite as closely as the Lady Oveh made her move. She turned to the side, apparently watching a popular Rebman game called lissei which bore some resemblance to Go. The fact that she was still able to watch Delluth out of the corner of her eye might have been due to any number of things.

Two giggling girls interrupted instead, pushing a third out to have her wrist gallantly sniffed at. Several more followed, as well as a few other older women, while Oveh and Delluth shared amused glances and more tidbits of perfumiers' lore. They were both aware of the Princess' presence, she was sure, but seemed perfectly willing to be ignored by her. It was not much longer, however, before the supply of would-be participants in the game ran out and the group began to dissolve.

"That was certainly new and different," Delluth said, moving to Oveh's side, with a smile just for her. "I'll have to try it back home next time I'm half-dead of boredom at some function or other."

"It's a game at which you'll have very little competition," the lady said, her face lighting up as she looked up at him. "Your talent is really quite astonishing."

He shrugged modestly. "I've found it useful from time to time," he said. They were standing very close together, but not quite touching. Now he offered his arm to her. "Perhaps you can guide me to where they keep the food around here? All that sniffing has made me hungry."

They moved off together, visiting the table of appetizers, then circulating to meet Lady Oveh's various friends. The only blot on Delluth's evening was the way Princess Islain had been watching him, but saying nothing; it made him uneasy, and he tried to put it out of his mind. Lady Oveh was no longer young and lissome, but she had a quick wit and an impressive store of knowledge about Rebma and its denizens, in addition to her expertise in perfumes. She told him about her late husband with apparent regret over his loss; it seemed she had no children.

When meeting new people began to pall, he pulled her aside a little and looked into her eyes. "Should we leave together, or separately?" he asked.

Her lips curved up. "Together, by all means," she said. "The whole court would seize up if it didn't get fed a scandal now and then."

He laughed and led her toward the exit.

Islain let them leave but memorized Delluth's face so that later when their rendezvous was past she might arrange to meet him.

She had a variety of options: he was staying at an inn near the Chaosian embassy, and had expressed interest in seeing both the castle's gardens and its art gallery, as well as the sights of the city. Lady Oveh still had her estates to run, and could not spend every waking moment with him.

One day when he was exploring Rebma's famous undersea gardens - which were the size of a theme park and consisted of at least seventeen different separate gardens, some of which would not even have been called gardens, but perhaps mines or coral groves, by those not of the Rebman persuasion, he heard soft footfalls behind him and a quiet, low voice said, "My grandmother designed these. Do you find them beautiful?"

"Very much so," he said, turning, and smoothly added, "Your Highness" on seeing who she was. Then he bowed in exactly the way Rebman courtesy required. In one hand he held a copy of a small guide-book devoted to the gardens.

"I am very glad. I never know what a person from a different culture will find aesthetically appealing." Islain wore very little, in the Rebman fashion - quite unlike her highly Amberish clothing of the previous party. There was a very short skirt of scaled silvery material, silver sandals which laced high up her calves, knife sheaths with knives in them, and a veritable pound or two of jewelry, mostly in blues and greens with silver settings. The eddies and currents which passed for breezes did interesting things with her loose dark hair. "I find this particular one... I don't know... predictable. For a woman known to be spontaneous, my grandmother Angharad - who laid out these gardens - seems to have formulated this one with an almost mathematical precision."

"But they are mathematical!" he said. "It's complex mathematics - an iterated function system - most people wouldn't notice. Look, I got this guidebook so I could show a friend back home -" He flipped open the guidebook to the section of garden they were in. Part of the page was now covered with notes in an alien mathematical notation system, cramped around a diagram of the garden. He pointed to a circled equation. "I had to go out and buy a ruler, but I'm pretty sure this is the function she used." He smiled at the page. "Don't tell anybody I said this, but while spontaneity is fun, truly random things rarely achieve beauty."

Islain smiled. "Your secret is safe with me, Professor. Have you seen many of the gardens already?"

"Only the first few, your Highness. I started rather late yesterday, and then decided I needed this guidebook, and didn't get back until a short time ago."

"As far as guidebooks go, that is the best you could have gotten," Islain admitted, "but it hardly compares to a real Rebman guide. I would be delighted to show you some things that aren't in that book, Professor Corrino."

He closed the book and regarded her quizzically for a moment, hiding the thought that this was probably not a good idea. "Thank you, your Highness, that would be very kind of you," he said at last, shaking off his doubts in favor of curiosity.

But it was, indeed, not a good idea. Paying no mind to her presence had been quite easy in the crowded court, and when she had been more modestly dressed. The gardens and her current garb were another matter entirely. He soon began to wonder what that mass of dark hair smelled like up close, and couldn't decide whether the way her breasts jiggled when she moved an arm or shoulder was deliberate or not (he was almost sure that she only moved that way when he was actually looking at her, but it was impossible to be certain). Then there was the marvelous curve of her lips and the bewitching flash of her eyes ...

He paused to concentrate on the scent of a particular flowering plant, crouching down to get closer to it. He hadn't come down here to get involved in anything political, including the Princess, of whom he'd heard a fair amount. But. ~One of these days, Dell, you're going to get yourself into really deep trouble.~ He should have instructed his body to forget that this 'lust' thing even existed, done something to counter the effects of whatever pheremones she was giving off. He would have been a lot more physically comfortable.

But he didn't.

He straightened up again. "I've been wondering," he said. "Why does everybody up in Amber mispronounce your name?"

For her part, Islain was as fascinated by Delluth as he was by her, though perhaps in a slightly different way. He had a certain confidence in her presence whose maturity was unusual, and the hint of mystery intrigued her - as if there were layers of secrets, history and power behind his mild smile and intelligent eyes.

"Amberites like to say things the way they appear," she said with a laugh, which did interesting things to her torso, "or the way they would be pronounced in Amberite Thari. Rebmans have what they call an accent. But mostly I think it's because when I first came there, when I was very young, I was not forthcoming about my origins, and used that pronunciation myself. Some habits are difficult to break."

"I see," he said, amused, "but the truth is that it's Amberites who have the peculiar accent, yes?"

She extended her hand. "Come. Let me show you my favorite of the gardens."

There was, perhaps, an infinitesimal hesitation before the took the offered hand. But it did not, after all, feel different from any other hand that he'd held. "What makes it your favorite?"

It was in fact, strong but soft, and a little larger and longer than that of most women of her size. The nails were quite long as well, but she was not holding his hand in such a way that he could feel them. "It's mine," she said. "And then, I will take you wherever you wish to go."

There was just a hint of a challenge in her green eyes, as if she could see into his mind - or she wished him to believe she could.

He smiled, acknowledging what she hinted at, but with a hint of mischief in his eyes. "Then let us see this garden of yours," he murmured, his voice deepening almost to a purr. "And explore the possibilities."

Islain led him, keeping hold of his hand, through and past the gardens of anemones, of pearl and jade statues, of shimmering coral, through an archway which resembled that which graced the Faiella-bionin, although this one was much smaller, and bore upon it wine clusters, nymphs and Aphrodite in her clamshell.

Beyond that, the inlaid paths changed color suddenly, becoming a silvery green marbled with gold, and on either side of them the strange underwater flowers rose up, swaying in the current, large and luminous and giving off a rich and heady scent, vaguely intoxicating.

Delluth slowed involuntarily, looking up at the flowers and taking in their scent. "Marvellous," he breathed.

All paths seemed to lead to a fountain, which towered above them, again the image of Aphrodite, though this time she held a pitcher. And this time it was clear that she was Islain.

The Chaosian contemplated the statue for the moment, his blood cooled a little by this reminder that it was a Princess who was still holding his hand. "I have to say I like the flesh-and-blood version better," he said at last. "But who was the lucky sculptor?"

"His name was Althis. He did a great many such sculptors for the gardens - one of my mother, one of Aunt Llewella. He wanted to do one of Aunt Maub, but..." Islain trailed off. She came to sit on the lip of the stone and patted the place next to her. "The best thing about this garden isn't the statuary. It's the flowers. You passed the astrella marinas, but I had a wide assortment planted - all very beautiful, and all very narcotic."

"I thought so," he said, taking the seat she indicated. "I wouldn't be much of a doctor if I couldn't recognize narcotics when I encountered them." He looked around at the array of flowers, amused. "It certainly must make for a more than usually mood-altering experience than is usual for a garden."

"The idea," Islain said, nodding in response to his comment, "is somewhat akin to my favorite paintings in the Gallery. When you stand at the epicenter of the garden, and you look out over the coral fields toward the Stair, they should all merge into one drug, which heightens all the senses and adds imagination into the mix. I have been told my statue moves, or that the flowers grow hundreds of feet tall. It is dangerous for Amberites to be so... intoxicated. Perhaps for Chaos Lords, too, which is why I did not take you all the way to the center."

He chuckled, turning to face her properly. "Now you've done it - suggested that an experiment might be too risky for me. Which way is it to this 'epicenter'?" His tone was light, but his eyes gleamed with rekindled interest.

"Here," Islain took his hand again and led him around the fountain and down the path a little to the south-east. Here was a fantastic view of the City, all laid before them and glimmering with phosphorescent faerie-fire. And beyond, the shrouded arch of Faiella bionin.

She set him at the middle of the path and took a few steps back herself. Here he could see the other flowers she had spoken of, gorgeous sculptured orchids, lilies, honeysuckles, and other types, but somehow different. Their colors were more vibrant than above the waves - and also more drowsy somehow, deep bloody violets, sharp whites, silvery blues, here and there a splash of yellow like gold. And the scent mingled and came on him like a sudden crush. It was beautiful - spicy and yet floral, deep and musky and rich, and he could almost taste it, and the taste had a hint of mint...

He breathed deeply, feeling the not-air moving through his lungs, watching the colors turn clearer and sharper, and the cityscape begin to undulate as if it were a flag waving in a breeze. He blinked and it settled back into place. The currents brushed across his face and hands like little fingers, moved among the flowers like laughter. Tilting his head back, he looked up into the deeps above, vast and mysterious as any sky he'd seen. Exhilaration was a good word for the feeling. He traced the line of Faiella bionin with his gaze, down once more to the City.

"Invigorating," he said, enjoying the bell-like vibrations of his own voice. He turned to face Islain, and her beauty took his breath away.

Islain saw the look in his eyes, recognized it and opened her arms. "Come to me," she said, and her face suddenly seemed to open like a flower, full of hope and longing. "Oh, come..."

Any chance of resisting this idea had flown, as in truth he had known it would. He thought he drifted forward, but then his lips were touching hers, gently at first, the flower-drug adding a nearly shocking level of sensation that he needed to explore, very carefully and thoroughly. His hands came to rest on her hips, then slid around to her lower back, stroking and drawing out shivers of delight from her.

Islain moaned softly against his mouth, her body rising gently against him, distractingly cool and soft. Her own hand slid up his chest, unfastening his shirt without seeming to bother with the normal rules of such things. It was clear she had done this before, and knew how to use the rules of Rebma's atmosphere.

He gasped at the touch of her hands on his body, pulling away from her mouth to catch his breath and to master this new level of desire. Then he kissed her again, more deeply, and one hand pressed her hips against him while the other rose to her breast. Long moments later, it was clear the he would keep up all this exploration indefinitely. "So beautiful," he murmured, burying his face in her hair, then kissing down the side of her neck before returning to her exquisite mouth.

Gently, she ran her long fingernails down the center of his chest, down his stomach toward his belt. Her lips opened softly and she pushed her tongue into his mouth, tasting him. The kiss gained passion, her free hand caught hold of his hip and held him against her. As she pulled away her teeth grazed his lower lip.

"Do you..." she was breathing deeply now, her eyes bright. "Do you want to go inside? Rebman customs may be unfamiliar. I don't want to make you uncomfortable..."

He smiled. "But I'm fascinated by the unfamiliar." His smile broadened, and he moved his body gently against hers; the pupils of his eyes were definitely rather dilated. "I will be guided by you, Islain. Show me."

She too, seemed to be showing some effect of the drug, although less than he might perhaps have expected. She kissed down his now bare chest, then undid his belt with her teeth, as she made a gesture and the fountain exploded in light, as if for a moment it was raining freezing fire.

And then she lay down on the cool cobblestones and pulled him on top of her.

Dazzled by the light and by Islain herself, he gloried in the touch of her skin on his, kissed her as if she held his breath captive, and lost the control he usually applied to wringing every possible drop of pleasure from sex. He pressed hard against her, heedless of the stones beneath them, and tugged at her short skirt to find out whether it would be an obstacle.

It slipped easily from her, apparently fastened by a simply knot at her hip. She was not having much more difficulty with his trousers, despite their sturdier construction. Her body arched upwards, her mouth opening, and she kissed him again, his shoulder, his throat, his lips... He moaned when he found his way into her and drug-enhanced pleasure washed through him. Eyes closed now, he kissed whatever parts of her he could reach and sought for the rhythm that would satisfy this need.

She pushed upwards, against him, kissing, licking, biting, nails teasing and tempting, fingers squeezing, herself gasping and moaning, high and loud and clear. She rocked and bucked and filled the rhythm, finding it easily, and somehow knowing exactly what his body, if not his mind and his soul, needed at just that moment.

At the last he cried out an unfamiliar name and then subsided across her, gasping. A moment later he moved to rest most of his weight on his forearms. He looked down toward her, his expression a bit dazed and also touched with sadness.

Islain came with him, but she said no name, only opening her mouth in a soundless gasp of pleasure. Later, much later, she reached up and smoothed back his hair, and her answering smile was as sad as his own, and tinged with a certain longing.

"I'm sorry," she said then.

He blinked and focused properly on her eyes, just inches below his own. "What?" he said hoarsely. "What for?"

"For not being Jerine," she said gently, and kissed his cheek, smoothing his hair back from his brow.

"Did I --?" he said, chagrined, and could see in her face that he had. "*I'm* sorry," he said. He glanced away, perceived the absurdity of doing so just now, and looked back. "Actually I have to thank you. We used to make love like this - lots of passion, not much finesse," he said with a lopsided smile that immediately vanished. "Since she died ... I've always held something back. Until today with you. And, well, it seems it's true that wounds heal over time. I haven't turned back into the wreck I was, when it first happened. It's a relief and it's sad and ... thank you."

"In that case, you are welcome." Islain slithered to a sitting position. "It's all right to keep scars, as long as they don't toughen your heart. I should know the danger of the latter."

Her smile was wry.

"Do you?" he said, he gentle tone inviting elaboration, if she chose to share. He got to his knees to pull his trousers back up, then sat beside her and put an arm around her. It seemed like a very natural gesture for him.

She laid her head on his shoulder, but he felt, suddenly, that her body was tense. She chuckled, but without amusement. "I'm a nasty bitch. You ask anyone. I was that way before my father died, and I will probably never be any different now that I've lost him."

"You hide it well," he observed. Then he hugged her, still gently, and kissed the top of her head. "I have lost a great deal to war, myself. That has toughened me considerably. Sometimes I wonder what I would have been like ..." His thought trailed off

"It's not worth wondering," said Islain quietly. "Or wishing. All we have is what we've become and what we hope to become in the future."

After a moment he sighed. "Well, I'm always wondering about one thing or another. It's the way I am." He turned to kiss the top of her head, as it rested on his shoulder. "For example, I wonder what we should do next, O guide?"

"Is there a part of the City you've been longing to see? The art galleries, perhaps, or the Guild Halls?" Islain was refastening her skirt absently as she spoke.

Delluth observed this process with a certain regret. "I know something I long to see again," he said.

Islain laughed, a cool, clean, throaty sound. "Perhaps later," she said.

He grinned, pleased at having made her laugh. "Other than that," he said, looking around for his shirt, "there is something - I know it's unwise, and probably impossible - but I am terribly curious about it." Finding the shirt, he began pulling it on, still smiling. "The Pattern," he said, meeting her eyes.

"Oh." She did not look surprised. "But of course. My mother and Aunt Maub keep guards on it at all times, but I think I can get you past them. I must ask you first to promise you will observe only - and do nothing."

"What would I do?" He was perplexed. "I may not even be able to get close to it; I'm told that Pattern and Logrus get along a bit like pure sodium and water. But we'll see." He finished buttoning his shirt, tucked it in, and fastened his trousers.

"That is exactly what I meant," said Islain. "I would hate to see you go up in smoke. Especially now." She straightened her hair, slipped her sandals back on and offered him her arm again.

He had recovered his jacket, but instead of putting it back on, merely draped it over one shoulder, held by a couple of fingers of one hand. The other hand he used to take hers; then he stepped closer to her and kissed her again, lingeringly. Satiation was a temporary state, after all, and the flower-drug was still working on him, though less than before.

She kissed him back, slowly, gently, her lips warm and soft.

"Going up in smoke is the last thing I want to do," he murmured. "Except figuratively."

"Then come with me," she whispered, and led him down the winding path back toward the Palace.

He went along with her willingly, though with much less tension than before. He hadn't been on this particular path, and looked around with interest, and with occasional questions about the gardens, and a few warm glances at Islain.

She was very knowledgeable, seemingly a wealth of information on the gardens she led him through, most of which seemed to have been designed by her family members.

Once they were through the gardens, there was a high arch adorned with chips of semi-precious stones and done with a pattern of coral and seashells, and through that was the Western gate to the Palace. There were guards on duty, but they did not seem as if they would have stopped anyone, and certainly did nothing but salute as Islain and Delluth walked by.

Different cultures, Delluth mused. That long stair must have made Rebma feel very secure; he wondered if anyone here had been to Caladon lately, then put that sad thought aside. He hadn't felt any particular influence from the Pattern when he'd been in the Palace before, and he wanted to be alert to the possibility as they went along.

Islain led him through the vast marbled halls of Rebma, through an oddly small and hidden door, and down, down, down a long and winding stair. At one point, she sighed and said, "We should probably swim. It's much faster that way. An option one does not have in Amber."

And she slipped from the stairwell, moving gracefully down through the darkening water.

Delluth followed her, fascinated with the concept of swimming down a staircase. Something like this would a fascinating addition to House Corrino, he was sure, if the right elements could be found. But there definitely shouldn't be a Pattern involved, he concluded a bit later, as he began to feel the its presence down below. It had to be a kind of radiation, or something like that, he mused, and his body didn't like it. Not at all.

At the bottom of the stairs there were more guards, but they contented themselves with weak protests in the face of the Queen's daughter and her calm self-assurance. Islain ignored these with her customary flair, wrenched the door open herself, and stood just inside the cavern, waiting for Delluth.

The energy didn't seem to bother any of them at all, Delluth noticed, as he forced himself to catch up. Standing made him feel a little better, except for the way his legs were trying to shake. Pale and sweating, he took the last few steps to join Islain, and abandoned dignity to clutch at her arm for support. "This must be what it's like to have a fever," he muttered.

Islain turned and regarded him with her brow furrowed. "You're not well. I wondered... what it would be like for a Chaosian. Perhaps we should go back? No one will think worse of you, dear Doctor."

She came and put her arm around him and kissed his temple.

He leaned against her gratefully. "I wondered the same thing," he said, amazed at the effort it took to form the words. "And I'm the only experimental subject I've got, so ... if you don't mind the possibility of having to carry me out of here ..."

"Carry you?" Islain put on a look of mock indignation. "A Royal Princess descend to menial labor? Never! It's a good thing for you I have a Trump that can take us back to my rooms should you find yourself incapacitated. So what exactly did you want to do here?"

The Pattern itself was a swirling, pulsating thing of silvers and greens and blues, shimmering in the darkness.

He managed a shaky laugh. "Just look, preferably without falling over. I didn't expect to feel like my bones were about to dissolve, or something." He managed to straighten up, peering over at the source of his distress. He didn't think its power was getting easier to bear - probably the opposite - but he wasn't going to leave without taking a good look.

It was pretty - almost gaudy, he thought. Reflexively, he avoided trying to trace its lines with his gaze, as if it were like the Logrus. "And ask questions," he amended. "I've heard that Pattern initiates actually walk on it, is that right? What is it like?"

"It's like..." Islain took a breath, a little out of her league with that question. "Like nothing else I have ever done. There is a resistance to walking, a first like a mild current but growing in intensity as you near the center, as if you were trying to push against a stone wall. And after the first Veil -" she gestures to the part of the Pattern she means, "it begins to play with your mind. Sometimes it brings up bad memories, sometimes it changes them, or even seems to be trying to dissuade you from continuing to walk. But you can't stop, ever, or set a foot from the line, or you are dead."

"Hmm," he said, trying look at the Pattern more closely. "Sounds ... pleasant." He definitely needed to leave soon. "Assaying the Logrus is a bit like being turned inside out and then pressed through a sieve. And then reassembled, probably not exactly the way one was before. Time to go," he finished, almost breathless, and turned toward the door.

"I don't know that I have any desire to try the Logrus," Islain laughed. "Even if I thought I could survive it."

She followed him through the door.

In the light provided for the guards there, his face looked waxy, and he seemed to be gritting his teeth. He stopped, looking at the staircase, then gave Islain an apologetic look. "Can't make it up there," he said, and swayed a little before he grabbed at the wall for support.

Islain took hold of his arm and put it across her slim shoulders, anchoring him with her right arm at his waist. Then she slipped a deck of cards from a sheath beside her knives, fanned them and concentrated on one.

An instant later, she was moving him subtly forward and they were in airy, expansive quarters done all in pale marbles and shimmering silver and green. Islain deposited Delluth on a soft settee and went to fetch him a drink.

He collapsed across the seat in the wonderful absence of Pattern-energy, laid one arm across his eyes, and contemplated the way his hands were trembling. Well, most of him was trembling, if he was going to be honest about it, but by the time Islain returned it had passed off enough that he could push himself upright. He gave her a smile of surprising sweetness and said, "Well, that goes on my list of experiments not to repeat. Right at the top, in fact." He accepted the glass she offered him, and with a little effort his hand didn't shake at all.

"It was very brave of you to try," Islain said comfortingly. She too, had a glass, and she sipped it. "It's brandy. To put a bit more strength in you."

He chuckled. "Usually I hear words like 'rash' or 'reckless.' So thank you." He sniffed appreciatively at the brandy and took a sip. "Won't you join me?" he added, gesturing at the other half of the settee.

She settled gracefully next to him, crossing her long legs and putting one arm over the back of the seat so that she could face him easily. "There isn't much of a line between rash and reckless and bravery," Islain shrugged. "I think of it as the difference between going down there with me and trying to walk the thing."

He nearly choked on his brandy. "Between sanity and insanity, more like," he said, his voice only a little strangled. "Might explain a lot," he added under his breath, then shook his head. "No fear I'll be trying it, given today's experience," he went on. Sighing, he rubbed his forehead with his free and assessed his physical condition. Vastly improved, he concluded, but he still felt the stress-induced itch to change. Psychological, really. He looked at Islain. "Would you mind if I shifted? Ordered folk seem to find the whole idea unnerving," he explained. "But it would make me feel better."

"Not at all." In fact, her eyes seemed to sharpen with interest. "I will try not to stare, but the idea has fascinated me for some time. I think perhaps "Ordered folk" are a rare lot. I have found some of the more orderly and disciplined minds belong to Chaosians, and the most anarchic and devil-may-care to be my kin."

Delluth put his brandy glass down on a convenient table. "Just shows the folly of generalizations," he said, shrugging out of his jacket and prying off his shoes, just to simplify things. "Or maybe the ability of ideology to reduce arguments to absurdity." He stepped away from the settee and crouched, turning his attention inward.

Islain saw him blur, as if her eyes could not properly register what was happening; his shape seemed to flow and swirl with subdued colors. A slight current flowing toward him touseled her hair. And the shape she couldn't seem to focus on grew. She leaned forward a little, straining to see, and then it was done. There stood a dog, not merely the size of the man he had been, but a muscular dog the size of a small pony. Its short coat was a smooth rust-red, shading almost to black at ears and muzzle. The ears were short and floppy, and the long tail seemed inclined to curl upward. His clothing appeared to have changed into a braided collar-like item around his neck.

He stretched, forelegs and then back legs, and then, with apparent deliberation, shook himself from nose to tail. Short red hairs drifted in the water, after that. "Aaah," he said, in a perfectly comprehensible human tone. "There's something about a good shake ..." He sat, facing Islain, and cocked his head, one ear perked upward. He was definitely a male dog.

Islain could not quite help stroking his head. "Amazing... nothing overly gross or fleshy at all, contrary to what I had been told... It is elegant, effective... I find myself rather jealous I cannot do the same. As pleasant as this form is visually, I think that to be able to change it would add to my appeal."

He leaned into the caress. "Told by whom?" he wondered. "Everyone's alternate forms are different. Some are more pleasant to look at than others, naturally. Some would criticize this one because it has no hands and doesn't look fearsome enough." He turned his head so that she might scratch behind his ear. "As for you changing your form, lovely one, that seems superfluous to me. Though I suppose it's possible you could learn. As I understand it, your family started out in the Courts, and the ability seems to be a dominant trait." His look turned thoughtful.

"As gallant as the compliment was, and I do appreciate it, there are obviously many uses for the ability. For example, you felt the need to shift to center yourself after a traumatic experience. Is that because you prefer this shape, or does the act of changing your form itself calm you?" Islain seemed fascinated by the whole thing, although she kept stroking his head, almost absently.

"I do find it soothing," he admitted. "One's outlook is affected to a certain degree by one's form. And I shook off a lot of tension just now, partly because a shifter's natural response to environmental stress is to shift, to relieve it. But I suppressed the urge. I'm sure it would have helped not at all, and been a distracting waste of energy, too."

"In the Pattern room, you mean? I wonder..." Islain idly twirled a curl around her index finger.

"You wonder?" he prompted.

"If it would help, at that," Islain continued with an apologetic smile. "It is your natural reaction. It could not, of course, remove the fact that your Logrus energies are anathema to Pattern and vice versa, but if constant shifting might relieve some of your stress and discomfort and allow you to stay in the chamber longer... But a waste of energy, you say? Then perhaps not.

"I was thinking of the woman Dara, who was of Chaos, though she also claimed the blood of Benedict, and who took the Pattern the day my father died. I had always been curious how she managed it."

"Hmm ... you may be right," he said, "but there are limits to my recklessness. Or bravery, as you would have it," he said, with a doggy smile that revealed the large, sharp teeth that came with the form.

"I've wondered about Dara, and Merlin, too," he continued. "And even more so now that I've gotten a dose of Pattern myself. I suppose ..." He looked up at the ceiling, thinking. "Feeling so ill was a novel experience for me, I must say. It's possible that I could've stood up to it better if I really wanted to. But on the other hand, I'm not evenly remotely related to you, and I've had the impression that's a requirement for becoming a Pattern initiate?"

"I believe so. Certainly all those who cannot trace their lineage to Dworkin in some way have died upon it so far," said Islain. "I did not mean you should have made the attempt simply to indulge my curiosity." She laughed a little. "I am not quite so cruel - at least to those I like."

"I'm glad to hear it," he said lightly. "And it never crossed my mind that you might mean that - or not for more than an instant or two, at least. Curiosity does need to be reined in from time to time, I find." Then he pushed her hand away from his head, shimmered, and changed back into a man, sitting cross-legged on the floor. The warm brown eyes and smile were the same, but he'd changed the style of his shirt to something a little looser and more comfortable. "Though I probably don't do it often enough, myself," he added wryly.

"Nor I. Curiosity has always been my Achilles' heel," Islain admitted, putting her hand back in his hair, teasing the gentle curls. "Well, that and vanity. And a short temper. And not being very popular with women. My goodness, I have a lot of them, don't I?" She laughed, not seeming at all bothered by the idea.

"Shall I list my other flaws?" he smiled. "Let's see - I have a long temper, but it's unwise to be caught at the end of it. Probably overprotective. I mentioned reckless, of course. Impatient with stupidity. Wanderlust. Entirely too much of other kinds of lust, by certain standards ..." Back in this form, her touch and looks and scent had his full attention again. He turned his head swiftly and managed to kiss the inside of her wrist, caressingly, watching her face and not otherwise moving.

Islain smiled, purring slightly at the kiss. "I like your flaws. They make you a man, and not a mannequin or a mouse."

Suddenly, almost flowingly, she slid from the divan onto his lap, caressing the side of his face with her long, graceful fingers.

"What do you think of Amber, my dearest Delluth?"

His arm curved around to support her back. "Umm. Amber?" he said, briefly struggling to focus on less immediate things. "It's ... more real than I expected. I'd heard that phrase, 'the city of which all others are but shadows,' but I couldn't grasp what it meant until I saw it for myself. The place where the Logrus is ... has a similar quality. Sort of. If a place that is anything can be similar. It is different for everyone who goes there, you see. Amber doesn't do that ... it just *is*." He paused, his expression turned inward. "I've acquired a copy of a banned book that has this poem ..."

After another moment's thought he began reciting it: an ancient poem in sonnet form, which Islain knew had been attributed to Oberon and also to several of his children, in loving praise of Amber. And he spoke the feelings behind the words, as if he had some oratorical training or some real empathy with them.

When he began to recite the familiar words, a faraway look came into Islain's eyes, searching and somehow sad. She leaned her head against his shoulder and listened, almost unconsciously humming the tune that Corwin had set the ancient words to long, long ago.

"You read beautifully," she said finally. "And I was always very fond of that poem."

"Thank you. It's a lovely work." He held her gently, unwilling to disturb this mood. "I gather there's music for it?"

"Oh yes," she said, her hand around his waist beginning to gently stroke and scratch his back. "Corwin set all the old sonnets to music at one time or other. He was actually a very talented songwriter. He arranged this one beautifully. We would have sung it at my father's coronation but that seemed... unnecessarily cruel."

If she noticed the irony of her words, she made no sign.

He shivered a little under her touch, particularly the scratching. "I'll have to learn it some time," he said. "I've always liked music; I should stop saying 'one of these days' about studying it more." His free hand stroked her leg, from calf to thigh to hip, then back again. He shifted a little, so he could look down into her eyes. "Is it later yet?"

Islain nodded, smiling softly, the corners of her lips quirking upward, and then she literally lifted her leg vertically past him so that she was straddling his lap, and ran her teasing nails down his shoulders to his chest. "Will you sing to me, then, Delluth?" she asked.

"You make it hard to breathe properly," he murmured, "but I can try." He tilted his head back a little, thinking past the distraction of her hands. Something not too inappropriate, not very complicated ... He smiled, hummed for a moment, and began to chant in a warm baritone, a rhythmic and repetitive song that was either nonsense words or a very foreign language.

Islain smiled and cocked her head to the side as she listened. "What does it mean?" she asked, busying herself with kissing all along the side of his shoulder, neck and jaw.

"It's a harvest song, I'm told," he answered, his hands continuing the caresses he had begun while singing. "Something to set a rhythm for the work. Not as interesting translated as it sounds in the original, I think." He repeated the refrain, the deep notes vibrating in his throat and chest. "I've never combined singing and sex before. I think I like it."

"Mmm... I do too," said Islain, rolling herself forward on her hips, kissing him deeply and passionately. "Very much." She leaned forward and kissed him again.

His arms closed around her and he tipped backward, bringing her and the kiss along. "But you're interrupting," he managed to say, not quite laughing. He kept trying to sing while he helped her, very slowly, strip off his clothing, and while they teased and caressed each other, until he couldn't breathe properly and interrupted himself with a groan and, "Now, please, Islain!" Then she mounted him and he moved with her, without his previous desperation but with results at least as good. And he remembered who he was with; he whispered her name, after.

[End of thread]