One afternoon and evening a week was allowed for personal entertainment and enrichment. Brigid spent the first such period studying in the castle library, until she was tracked down by Star, who had arranged for a small party with L’shaya and a few of the other women her ready and easy charm had also befriended. That party lasted into the middle of the night, with Brigid playing her guitar and singing rock&roll songs from her native Shadow while L’shaya accompanied her on a strange, multi-stringed instrument native to her own Shadow, and Star, with more enthusiasm than skill, pounded out the beat on a small hand drum.
All the following week the party was the talk of the entire class. When the next free evening came around, the party, whose plans had grown considerably over the week, was moved to one of the larger classrooms, with the approval of Carolan himself. Brigid suspected he, too, was not immune to Star’s charm. Over half the class attended, with the primary exception being Soraya and her group, who tried to have their own party in opposition but utterly failed to compete against Star’s.
Not really being one to carry a grudge, the following morning Star publicly invited Soraya, and indeed the whole class, to the next free evening’s festivities. It was done with such sparkling grace that even Soraya could not allow herself to seem petty by refusing the invitation. Brigid, however, noticed the conspiratorial looks Soraya’s group had traded, and was wary.
The night started easily enough: the largest classroom was insufficient for the gathering, and it wound up in the dining hall instead. Star’s charm had evidently worked its power on the kitchen staff as well, as they produced a series of culinary wonders to the wholesale approval of the partiers. It was only when Star asked for the women in general to provide entertainment for the gathering that trouble began.
Surprisingly, Soraya went first. Even more surprisingly, she possessed a piercingly sweet soprano voice as she sang a song in her native Shadow tongue, from its general tone and minor chords, a lament. A lament, she explained afterwards, of a lover and her love lost to the wiles of a demon. Brigid snickered, as her telepathic ability for languages allowed her to hear the entire song in English, and discovered that the ‘demon’ was instead a duplicitous, red-haired, green-eyed witch.
In reply, Brigid began a haunting rendition of Corwin’s well-known song “The Ballad of the Water Crossers,” accompanying herself on her guitar. As she sung, her unconscious Faerie sorcery spun images in the air above the gathering, of ships crossing the water, of the dangers and perils they face, of the courageous souls who make up Amber’s navy. When she finished, there was a momentary hush and a series of low, appreciative murmurs from the crowd.
Into that silence sprang L’shaya, who mysteriously produced a pair of blades from thin air and began a rapid sword dance on the center table. Star took up her drum and pounded out the rapidly shifting beat, the bangles and rattles on the drum matching time with the ringing of the blades together. The class clapped their hands in time with the infectious beat; even Soraya, eventually, half-heartedly, finally joined in. When she was finished, L’shaya leaped into the air and launched the blades towards a surprised Brigid: Brigid immediately took up a defensive stance, then the blades vanished like smoke halfway between them. Brigid could only feel the backwash of sorcery flow past her, and suddenly realized that L’shaya’s skills were not limited to healing.
Another girl stepped to the front, and proceeded to imitate several of the instructors so accurately that Brigid began to suspect she had shapechanger blood herself, but Brigid concentrated on Soraya and her group instead. They huddled together at a side table, whispering, and even after Brigid enhanced her hearing she could not divine their speech over the performances and general noise of the party. Still, there was something secretive and suspicious about their intentions, judging from their stances and the furtive looks some of the other women of the group gave the rest of the party.
After three other performances, one of Soraya’s circle, a thin blonde with a vapid look about her that Brigid knew was only an affectation, stepped forward. “A game!” she announced. “A hunt!”
She produced a list, hastily scribbled on a piece of parchment, and waved it before her. “Whoever brings the most of the things from this list in the passing of an hourglass, wins!”
Crowding around with the others, Brigid examined the list. Most of the things listed were magickal herbs, fetishes and other items, uncommon even here at the University at the very least, gradually becoming more and more rare, and it finished with a Trump. The last was a bit of a surprise to Brigid, although she strongly suspected that all of the items on the list were easily available to Soraya and her coterie. According to Fiona, there were only a select few people who could create Trumps, almost exclusively people connected to one of the two Great Powers like the Pattern and the Logrus, and the odds of even knowing one of them were very small. It was possible that one could obtain a Trump through a variety of means, passed down between generations, even. No matter: as a child of Amber, her cousins made sure she had at least a couple so that she could call them and travel to the Castle at need.
The blonde overturned an hourglass, and the other women split apart into informal teams and hurried out of the room, with Soraya and her circle first, leaving Star, L’shaya, and Brigid alone.
Star appeared annoyed at the very least, but she nodded to L’shaya and Brigid and together they left the room. Like all the others, Brigid memorized the list as soon as she read it: memorization was one of the skills stressed at the University. Pausing in the middle of a ritual to look up the next magickal phrase was a recommended practice.
Just under an hour later, they met outside the room. They were obviously the last team to return, as the room was filled with students showing off their prizes. When the hourglass ran out, though, there was a hush as the blonde student took up the list and started reading off the entries.
Some of the teams were not so lucky or diligent and dropped out of the competition early, until, at last, all that were left was Brigid and her companions and Soraya and her coterie. Each lacked only one item: Brigid’s was something Brigid was sure was not possibly available at the University, and Soraya’s missing item was something that there was only of its kind here and Sinister had quickly procured it before any of Soraya’s people knew where it was.
It all came down to the final item on the list: a Trump. Soraya produced a Trump of the University gates with a flourish, smiling in triumph as Brigid’s Trumps were still in her pocket. She held it over her head for the entire room to see, and everyone applauded until Star’s voice rang out over all the noise.
“Its a fake.”
It was what Brigid was about to say, but the exuberant Star beat her to it. No Trumps were allowed of the University grounds, by decree of the Master of the University, and that Power had the force to enforce that edict: any Trump Master would seriously think twice about doing so. Certainly no one of Amber, as on the back was the familiar sigil of the Unicorn, white on green. But of all the items, a Trump would of course be the easiest to fake, since it would have been the hardest to test, for very few people possessed the mental strength to activate one. It was even slightly difficult for Brigid.
In reply, Soraya stared mockingly at Star. “Don’t interfere, traal,” said Soraya, and Brigid’s ear easily translated the curse into an uncomplimentary term for a lower animal. “She has insulted me, and I demand satisfaction.”
“Oh? Let’s just see this supposed Trump.”
Brigid snatched the Trump from the hands of Soraya before she could defend it and examined it closely. It was cold to her touch, too cold for a Trump, she thought, and there was a faint aura of magick about it that was alien to any Trump. She began to bend one corner, but the magick flared under her fingers, preventing it, and Brigid could now determine that this so-called Trump was a magickal creation, not a Trump at all. The strength from her armband flowed into her hands and arms, and she proceeded to twist the card. Slowly, grudgingly, the card tore in two. Brigid held up the two halves to the stunned eyes of everyone around, then let them flutter to the floor.
“A Trump? I don’t think so,” said Brigid, looking about. “It’s a fake, albeit a good one.”
She turned to Soraya. “Star was right: you are a fraud and a cheat.”
“Since how do you know so much about Trumps?” spat Soraya in return.
Brigid reached into her pocket and fingered her deck in its silken pouch. She hesitated, wondering how she could explain without violating the cardinal rule of the University, then decided to trust to her own luck. She slipped the top card from the deck, not knowing which card it was, and pulled it forth. “This is a Trump.”
She showed the Trump around, seeing wondering faces: she turned it around and was surprised and pleased to find it was the Trump of Golden Gate Park in San Francisco from her home Shadow. After all, it would be hard to explain how she came to have a Trump with the Unicorn of Amber on the reverse side without revealing her past, but this one had the personal sigil of one of her cousins, instead. “I grew up here, and have family and friends there still. A friend of mine made it for me.”
“Prove it,” said Soraya coldly.
Brigid shrugged and began to concentrate on the Trump. Its coldness took on a depth of feeling, and the picture of Golden Gate Park, with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background, took on a three-dimensional quality. The image darkened as the daylight of the Trump image became the midnight reality of the Shadow. In the back of her mind, Brigid could sense Soraya begin to silently cast a spell just as the rainbow effect of Trump contact began to flare into life.
Brigid reached out her left hand: a rainbow appeared about her hand as she plucked a rose from the bush before her just as she felt Soraya begin to cast her spell.
Instantly, Brigid slammed the Trump contact closed. The spell slammed into her, apparently calculated to drive her through the Trump contact but instead only pushing her forward to stumble against a nearby table.
Brigid turned swiftly and stared at Soraya, the green witchlight sparking in her eyes mirroring the green witchlight that began to form a halo about her head. She raised her left hand and clenched the rose into her fist, and the green light began to trickle down her shoulder and arm to surround it with a hazy green nimbus. Slowly she raised that fist between her eyes and Soraya’s; the witchlight shimmered in the depths of Soraya’s raven eyes, and Brigid could see conflicting emotions within those eyes: much anger and hatred, some doubt, and a little fear.
There were a number of potent spells running through Brigid’s mind, anything from causing a minor itching curse upon Soraya to transforming her into the animal she had called Brigid just a moment ago. Instead, she concentrated on the rose, transforming it into pure silver. “You’re not worth the trouble,” she hissed softly in dismissal. She let the silver rose fall to the floor before Soraya with a clear, ringing tone, then she abruptly turned and stalked away, followed by Star and L’shaya, the three cutting easily through the surrounding crowd, who stared in reply in surprise and shock.
“Watch your back, Brigid,” said Star, with an affirming hiss from Sinister.
“Better me than you,” replied Brigid. “I can take care of myself.” After well over a decade of fighting the worst of the worst supervillains. alien invasions and more, plus a year of Uncle Benedict’s lessons on warfare, Soraya’s threats were almost inconsequential.
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