4.       Ambrose.

 

Upon being ushered into a guest suite by the silent guard, I find the bed, mechanically undress and climb into it.  I can’t sleep of course – too many thoughts are racing through my mind.  Tomorrow I would walk the Pattern or die trying.  Before today I’d have just laughed off that second part.  Now, the spectrum of oblivion feels ...closer.  I always thought death was something that happened to other people, but a lot of that was the belief that I could handle whatever life threw at me.  I don’t like the fact that I can’t.  I honestly doubt that I’d have survived Bleys if I hadn’t been lucky.  It's not something I really want to think about, I just need to learn to be careful.  I’m sure everything will be fine tomorrow.

 

Yes.  I’ll walk the Pattern and learn magic.  Everything will be fine and I’ll be complete.  I’ll have found the magic, and things will make sense.  No more futile searches!  No more false hopes that always lead to dead ends!  The unanswered questions that I hear whispered far back in my mind WILL be answered.  I wonder what the answers will really be.  Fiona was vague.  I like her.  I don’t totally trust her, but I do like her.  I wonder what sort of lover she’d be.  I wonder... it probably wouldn’t be a good idea anyhow...   The Pattern...  What it’ll be like?  Will it be a grueling ordeal like some Native-American rituals, or will it be an ecstatic experience?  Perhaps it’ll be somewhere in between.  Will I gain knowledge a little at a time, or will it all come to me at the end like a giant epiphany?

 

And Ele…  Elektra...  I get that they think she’s crazy.  She doesn’t seem any crazier then the others, kind of sweet in a spacey way, really.  I’ll try and avoid her father, certainly...  Fathers can be very protective of their little girls, and these people are... well, I’ll just avoid him.  The nurse said she was horribly burned…  I wonder what happened…  God, I hope they don’t plan to marry me off to her or something.  I mean she’s nice, but if they think she’s crazy maybe whatever burnt her effected her mind.  Also, I can’t imagine those burns will heal very... prettily and looks aren’t everything, but... severe burns can be pretty bad.  Maybe she’ll get a go to a plastic surgeon or the nurse exaggerated.  I hope she comes through alright, anyhow.

 

Fiona thinks I’m... one of them.  It would explain some things, but I don’t seem as strong as they are.   Maybe I’ll become stronger once I walk the Pattern.  If I... no, when I survive it, I guess I’ll know...  I can’t sleep.  I feel a bit like a kid on Christmas Eve.  I know that if I go to sleep everything will be there in the morning, and that doing this only makes it take that much longer, but I’m so keyed up that it’s hard.  It’s... the answer… tomorrow morning…

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