Field Guide from a Knight

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If I make a gun while I'm in shadow, and I hand it to you and tell you to put it to my head and pull the trigger, will you do so? You've already done the same to my heart, why not finish me off? Give me a day or two and it'll be ready...

I love how I'm always optimistic that something good will happen and then get those optimistic thoughts crushed with something bad. Thank you, world.

I'm going to Brussels....

It's a funny thing that's happened to me since I became a Prince. I should have expected it. Being one with a title will destroy you if you aren't prepared for it. I perservere because I must, not necessarily because I want to. A Prince must keep to his duties.

Aside from having my child stolen away from me by the foreign king of his mother (he's a healthy, strong, dark-haired boy and I love him dearly), I thought things were going well. Yes, Lilith and I had argued to the point where I was removed from being a Karm. I knew it would happen some day. It wasn't hard to see that it should have happened sooner. Either way, Lilith was very kind to me the entire time and I simply blew up at her. I let my emotions rule me.

So I went away for a few weeks and traveled through Shadow. I visited many different places that I had never before heard of. I also went back a few times to Kitezh to visit my son. It is a hard thing living with your son off in some Shadow when he should be with you. I can do nothing of it that won't start a war, though. I must resign myself to the fact that however hard it is, I must accept it.

Just when I thought things were going good and Lilith was going to release Heulwen from her contract, things took a turn for the worse. Heulwen suddenly decided to push me away. She said she can't be with me because she's miserable and she associates my love, my affection, and my attentions to that misery. It is the second time I have received a letter that broke up a relationship. Both of the women I have loved did the same thing to me. I'm now afraid of what will happen when I try again.

But I must try again because if I don't I won't be able to live. I can't stand to be alone anymore. It feels all so wrong and has ever since I met Heulwen when I came to Amber. People think the only thing I'm looking for is sex, but that isn't true. I don't really give a damn about sex anymore. I want the relationship and I want it to grow into something more. It is the thing I want the most.

Still, I can't rush into it because that would defeat the purpose. And yet I find myself in a frustratable situation with someone else who's very dear to me and wants the same thing that I do. We start with nothing and may grow to nothing. I like her; I've liked her since I met her. But who knows. She's just out of a relationship. While I'd like nothing better than to grow to love her I don't know that that will happen and I'm not sure if she'll grow to love me because in my honest opinion I'm not worth loving.

Time will tell as it always does. Maybe things will change. I need to talk to Flora about getting a room in the palace. Need to congratulate her and Deacon. I'd still like to see what I can organize for an expedition to Sukho to further explore the Black Water. Maybe I will to give me something to do.

Ahh yes, news is definitely good. Well, not definitely, but in this case it certainly is.


I've been made a Prince. Yep, that's right. I am now Prince Felix. Don't worry. I'm not going to be expecting people to bow to me or any of that nonsense. Doesn't change who I am.

Right now I'm very upset as I find myself unable to connect to the game and I don't know why it is that I can't. Is anyone else having issues or is it just me? I can't connect through any outside sources either.

So much has been happening that I feel that my head must be spinning. In fact, I'm pretty well sure that such is exactly what it currently happening. Which could be why I seem to be all over the place at times these days.

Laila and I are no longer together as we were before. She still carries my child and she's now living in on of House Karm's guest rooms. I keep in touch with her, making sure she's alright, making sure there's nothing bad going on. Making sure I don't need to go out and kill someone because they've been messing with her. I'd damn well do it, too. I don't care who it is.

So, yeah, I've kind of just been dealing with the fact that she broke up with me, which has been.. hard, but not horribly so. I'm fortunate enough to have such good friends as Haley and Sol to talk to. Dirk always seems keen on keeping me cheered up as well. Needless to say I haven't been too down on myself and I'm actually acting like I'm back to normal. As in I'm acting like I was before I ever came to Karm and before I met Haley. Note: Not saying meeting Haley was a bad thing. She was actually one of the best things to ever happen to me.

Anyways, I've taken part in a few different things lately. The first one was going with Kincaid and some others to visit an island and see about getting supplies for the Lower City. We encountered sharkmen and a squid and fought against them, driving them off, but Arianne died in my arms. Granted she eventually came back from being dead as she's a weir and can only die in specific situations. I kind of like her a bit. She's rather interesting, beautiful, and she can kick some major ass when she wants to. I've been giving her things because I like her.

Not long after that adventure a bunch of us Karm's and a few others took a trip to an island near Minos. We encountered Tama and Frederick there, as well as a gate. There were scarabs at the gate and we had to kill them as we had done in the lower city. Lilith managed to seal the gate. And I eventually found out that Tama is my daughter. Yes, it seems that the same situation I had with my father is now happening between me and Tama. Guess it goes to further prove that I really am a descendant of Prince Gerard.

Subsequently I also met a woman named Kirie who I danced with on Peril's ship. She intrigues me. She's so very shy and it's way too easy to make her blush. She can also be incredibly warrior like as I saw when we were on the island and she was protecting Lilith. I can't help but like her as well. Guess I really am back to being my normal self. Liking two women at once.

So what do I do now?

I guess I've just been really busy of late and haven't gotten around to writing anything in my journal. Perhaps it was all of the getting to know people in Amber that took up my time, but then again, maybe it wasn't. I still don't know as many people as I would like to have known. And I have yet to even meet my grandfather which annoys me more and more as I very much want to meet him. But here we go with a list of things I've done.

1. I arrived in Amber and enlisted myself in the Knight of Oisen as per my reason for coming to Amber in the first place. Currently I believe I hold the rank of Lieutenant, but don't quote me on that. I met Kincaid who has been training me, and the first thing he did was give me a bunch of books to read. That was fun.

2. I met Haley. That's about enough in itself, but not only did I meet her, she and I got quite close. She was with my father at the time so I had to be careful, though. She and I went to Sukho because she wanted to see where I was from. We got attacked there, but we both survived and ended up having fun on the Island afterwards. Then, naturally, we had to come back which really kind of sucked.

3. I made many new friends after that, mostly because Haley introduced me to a lot of her friends which was actually really good because her friends are cool. I need to visit with them more.

4. I met Laila. I was sitting in the mead hall one day when she walks in. She was stunningly beautiful in what she was wearing, but I was just a bit infatuated with Haley at the time. Laila moved to walk past me and as she did she reached up and ran her fingers along the scar on my face and said "Scar on face, scar on heart." I don't think I'll ever forget those first words or that first touch of her fingers. It was the calmest, most real thing I have ever felt because I did not expect it. And that was my first time meeting her.

5. Later on I ran into her again when she was sitting with Martin and Haley in some little place that I forget the name of. This was after Haley and I had talked many times about the fact that I needed to get over my infatuation with Haley which I ended up doing. So I sat down with the group and we all talked and the like until Martin left, then Haley left, and I was alone with Laila. She interested me so I was asking her a good many questions. And she kept giving me a drink which I found out she'd put a drug in which was really quite calming. It also made me a bit loopy and things happened.

6. Laila and I started seeing each other and she's been staying with me at the Karm House ever since then. We've had a good few adventures, like her taking me on a trip to see Kitezh. It was COLD in Kitezh. I about turned into a popsicle. If it weren't for Sol keeping me warm, Laila keeping me warm, and Krieger letting me borrow furs I would be in a block of ice right now with nowhere to go. I thank them all for that.

7. Amber was attacked. The Road put up the offensive and attacked the city. I participated in the main siege and defended the southern wall of the east gate along with Sol. We managed to defeat the enemy with some heavy losses, but we did defeat them. Laila took up a position with a group of healers as assigned by Kincaid and she was kept quite busy at the same time as I was.

8. Surprise! I'm going to be a father! Laila has gotten pregnant and we've just now figured this out. She's not really had any of the usual signs so it took quite a while. My father was happy about it. Seems my sister, his prediction, will have a playmate in Laila and I's child. That should be good for both of them. Now, I think, it's time to go farther.

But that's all that's been happening. For me it's quite a lot as I spent most of my life on my Island and everything became routine. Here nothing is routine. New things happen all the time and I quite like it.

When I arrived here in Amber I was expecting only two things. 1) That I would eventually meet my father and 2) that I would receive training from the Knight known as Kincaid. These things I was counting on. That and probably finding myself in a place that either didn't like me, or a place that was just too full of itself.

I can attest to the fact that they live really comfortably here. Well, if you can call it comfort. Comfort for me involves being in the jungle, but they don't have that here. Except in the Solarium at the Karm House. I've taken to staying there now.

And I have met my father. Thankfully so because he seems like an incredibly good man. He and I are a lot alike and I want to get to know him more. In fact, I want him to teach me the things that he knows, these mystical things people have told me about. It's also a good way for us to get closer given that we only just met.

Then there's Haley. But you, journal, don't even get to know what I think of her. Never know who's hands this might slip into.