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If I shout, 'You are only a pack of cards!' I feel we will all fly into the air, a hand of painted pasteboards.

-- Corwin, The Courts of Chaos


In any case, since the death of Oberon, we've faced a civil war in Arcadia and Arden, a war amongst the godlings and priestlings of Rilsa's home shadow, unhappy, unpleasant Moonriders, spies, infiltrating Duchesses of Chaos, infiltrating Dragons, faked deaths, pirates, visions, murders, and worst of all, a picnic with your Grandmother. Better to ask 'who hasn't fought a war with Amber?', to which the answer is 'no one to speak of'.

-- Bleys, to Edan


Moonriders, the Queen of Air and Darkness, Huon, the civil war in Rebma, dragons, missing nephews, newly discovered children, and Patterns that may be broken. Sounds about like the last time we did this.

-- Corwin to Random, at a family meeting


May I ask, however, what or whom do you fear has ~found~ him?

Any number of things or people. Moonriders, angry Chaosian relatives, or the sort of people who were working with Huon in Rebma. The family has a lot of enemies, internal and external. Any one of them could find Reid useful--to his detriment.

-- Silhouette and Corwin


So if someone is looking for eternal life ... and they fscked it up with magic, that would certainly be one way to get a zombie apocalypse.

-- Martin

House of Cards is the story of the younger members of the royal house of Amber--children and grandchildren of the Princes and Princesses--as they learn about the greater universe and struggle to keep the universe safe from their many enemies.

More than five years passed in Amber while the armies of Amber fought in Chaos and attended Oberon's funeral. When the family returned, they discovered Amber's Pattern had been broken. In the collapse of one wing of Castle Amber, Prince Gerard, the Regent, had broken his back.

Random accepted the crown of Amber and the fealty of the family. Driven by the imperatives of the Jewel of Judgement, he immediately inscribed his own new Pattern on the River Alph, calling it Xanadu. Corwin moved to his own new city of Paris, which seemed to have a history of its own even before he created its Pattern. Xanadu and Paris drew refugees from Shadow and from the diminishing city of Amber.

Meanwhile, in Shadow, old foes long put to rest and others long forgotten have emerged: the Moonriders, tied to Tir-na Nog'th; the Tritons, the undersea servants of the royal house of Rebma; the Klybesians, a religious order identified by the sign of the eye in the pyramid, who track the royal family to learn their secrets; kin such as Huon, exiled into Shadow on Oberon's orders. Nearer to hand, the ancient Dragon of Arden has struck at Amber and was driven off only by the self-sacrifice of Julian's son Daeon.

So many questions yet to be answered: Who is helping the Klybesians travel across Shadow? What is the Dragon of Arden? Where did the Moonriders find a Pattern blade equal to Grayswandir and Werewindle? When did Reid die and under what circumstances? Why did the Queen of Air and Darkness possess Vialle? How does the Pattern of Rebma stand if its creator is dead? And if you cannot answer them, Amber and the entire universe may yet collapse like a house of cards ...