Moving my head made the room swim drunkenly around me. I spotted my half-brother Aber standing behind and to the side of Dworkin, studying me with clear concern. He seemed to be swaying like a tree in a windstorm.
Turning my head farther, I discovered I lay on my back on a high, narrow bed. Slowly, half groaning, I shifted to the other side. It seemed to take forever. The bed sat in a small, dimly lit room. My eyes didn't want to focus on the far wall. It appeared to be made of blocks of red stone flecked with green. A phosphorescent yellowish-green light oozed from between the stones and trickled up toward the ceiling, where it pooled.
I pressed my eyes shut, then rubbed them with my fists. No, I definitely was not ready to see yet. But Dad wanted me awake, and I assumed he had a damn good reason. He'd better, or I really would break his arm. And maybe his neck.
Sucking in a deep breath, using every ounce of my strength, I managed to sit up. That was a huge mistake. The room pinwheeled around me, doing its best imitation of a drunkard's stagger. My insides convulsed in response, but disgorged nothing. I had no idea of how long it had been since I'd last eaten.
“Where am I?”
“Home,” Aber said. “Our family's estates in the Beyond.” At my puzzled look, he went on. “Close to the Courts of Chaos. You know.”
I didn't know, but my head felt ready to explode, and I couldn't muster much enthusiasm to care. The roar in my ears returned. Groaning, I pressed my eyes shut and willed everything back to normal. It didn't work.
We must have been out on some drinking binge last night: too much ale, maybe a fistfight or two, hopefully a pair of comely barmaids well bedded. I had awakened from many worse things over the years.
The only thing was, I didn't remember any of it.
“How do you feel?” Dworkin asked me.
I hesitated. “Not quite dead.”
“Do you know where you are?”
The last thing I remembered—
“The Courts of Chaos,” I whispered.
“The Beyond is a Shadow of the Courts,” said Dworkin, “so close to Chaos that the... ah, atmospherics are almost identical.”
I had hated the Courts of Chaos even before I'd come here with my father and Aber. I'd seen the Courts distantly, through one of my sister Freda's Trump cards. Trumps had the power to open doorways to other worlds. Just gazing at the Courts—strangely shaped buildings, lightning-filled sky, stars that moved and whirled around like fireflies—made me physically ill. Looking back, I should have known coming here would be a mistake. I should have refused to go when my father told me he planned to go to the Courts of Chaos for help.
But I hadn't refused. I hadn't said a word. I'd gone with him because, despite a lifetime of lies and deceptions, he was still my father, and I felt the full weight of my responsibility as his son. Duty and honor had been drilled into me since I was old enough to know what they meant. He'd made sure of that.
Before Juniper could fall, we had used his Trump to get away. In the Courts of Chaos, blood dripped up, stones moved like sheep across the ground, and somewhere, a serpent in a tower made of bones worked dark sorceries to destroy our family.
If the Beyond truly was like the Courts of Chaos, that explained the walls, which now seemed to pulsate gently as they wept their phosphoric light. Overhead, the high-beamed wooden ceiling began to flicker like candles seen through a paper lantern.
Unbidden, a moan welled up from deep in my chest.
“Steady,” said Aber.
“Keep him talking,” Dworkin said to Aber, then turned and crossed to the other side of the room. I couldn't see what he was doing at the table, nor did I particularly care at that point. I wanted to curl up and go back to sleep.
Aber sat beside me on the edge of the bed. He had been my one true friend in Juniper, and I had immediately sensed a real camaraderie between us. Now he seemed to drift in and out of focus as I gazed up at him. The brown of his hair began to drip like the walls, colors running down his face. I hesitated. It was him—but not quite. He had horns. His features were heavier, thicker, almost a parody of the young man I knew. And yet… the other Aber… the Aber I knew in Juniper… seemed to be there as well, superimposed on this one. He seemed to flicker back and forth between the two.
Quickly I looked away. Hallucinations? Madness? Maybe it was an effect of being so close to the Courts of Chaos. Maybe it was me and not him at all. I had no way of knowing.
“Why are we in this place…?” I whispered, feeling my insides knot and twist like a serpent swallowing its own tail. “I don't… understand…”
“Dad's trying to figure out what's wrong with you,” he said softly, looking me in the eyes. “Don't go to sleep. It's important. He doesn't want to lose you.”
Lose me? What did that mean?
“Get me—out of—here!” I managed to gasp.
“It's more complicated than that,” he said. “We can't leave. Someone is trying to kill us, remember, and we have to find out why. And Dad's just been summoned before King Uthor. He has to go. You don't ignore the King of Chaos.”
“This place—hurts—”
His brow furrowed. “Maybe you just need to get used to it. You know, like on a ship.”
“Sea legs…” I whispered, thinking of boats, as the world moved around me.
“Yeah. Chaos legs.” He chuckled.
I tried to rise and found some leverage with my elbows, but couldn't keep my balance. I fell in the wrong direction. Aber grabbed my arm and helped pull me upright.
Why did everything want to go up instead of down? And why did up keep moving to the sides? If it would all stop for a minute, I thought I'd be able to get my bearings. My head began to pound.
“Steady.”
Without being asked, Aber rose, took my legs, and swung them around and over the side of the bed. Big mistake; I almost passed out as the room seemed to twist down and away, moving out from under me.
I gasped. This couldn't be happening, couldn't possibly be real. The room was strangely shaped. No corners met at right angles, walls curved and the ceiling sloped in an architect's nightmare. It was also sparsely furnished: a tall lookingglass, the bed on which I now sat, a table pushed up against the far wall, and two heavy wooden chairs whose high backs had been carved with the likenesses of dragons.
“Let's get you up,” Aber said.
“Wait—”
Reaching down with my feet, I touched the floor with the tips of my toes. Hard, bare, no carpet, just wood that had been polished smooth as glass. It seemed fine. I frowned. So why couldn't I get my balance? Why was everything moving?
Aber glanced over his shoulder at our father. “If you pass out again, Dad will skin you alive.”
“But—”
“Don't be a baby about it! Just get up!”
I glared, but shut up. He didn't understand. Well, I'd just have to show him. It wasn't possible for anyone to stand here with the floor moving so much.
“Stand up!” he said. “On your feet, Oberon!”
“Help me—”
With a sigh, Aber draped my right arm over his shoulder and heaved. He was stronger than he looked, like everyone in my family, and he got me up with little trouble considering I must have weighed a hundred pounds more than he did.
Leaning on him, I stood unsteadily. The room kept shifting. The corners moved. The floor kept trying to slide away from under me. Without Aber propping me up, I would have fallen.