"I compliment you on your sense of duty to your family, but sadly I have other duties to take care of. Make yourselves at home, since you aren't going anywhere. Muhaha ha ha ha ha..."

It isn't much to go on, but it is about all I know about Brandon. Since we found Martin's body here in Corwin's universe I had suspected that Brandon was really Brand. Now I think otherwise. This is mostly based on meeting someone who claims to be Brand (more about him later), but close examination of his soliloquy also yields clues to this. For instance, he speaks of Corwin and the others as "your family" instead of "our family" or simply "family".

When Brandon said that we won't be going anywhere he is surely referring to the notion that we will be trapped at Castle Amber. This must mean that Brandon cannot sense unactivated Trumps. If he could sense Trump contacts he would have noticed us Trumping Merlin and would know we had a way out. Of course Quinn had the Trump of Merlin, so that option is no longer available. Still, Brandon must not have known about Dworkin's Trump sketches in the dungeon of Castle Amber or he would have made them unavailable to us or destroyed them. Actually I have my doubts about what Trump powers Brandon has at all. If he sensed us Trumping to Dworkin's lab he should have followed us and captured or killed us. He either did not sense that Trump activation, or he has more dangerous problems elsewhere. It could well be that he's not even a Trump Artist.

A quick review of my other knowledge of Brandon:

• He has magical and Logrus abilities.
• He engineered the conquering of RoseAmber.
• Quinn told me that Corwin said Brandon had gained the upper hand with a maneuver that should have been impossible.
• According to Ganelon's recollection, it appeared that Brandon was intent on tormenting Corwin. The fact that he found it "ironic (for Corwin) to be locked up in (Corwin's) very own dungeons." pointed to some sort of obsession with rubbing Corwin's nose in her loss.

I mentioned that Quinn had the Trump of Merlin. This is very disturbing, since now Brandon has it. I wish there were some way to warn Merlin. Possibly Ghost can get a message to him somehow.

When Ghost went out searching for things that might be of use to us he returned with a friend who had the imprint of our Pattern, Brand. At first I was worried, thinking that this was the man who had captured Corwin, Quinn, Jessica, and Luke, but he was calm and non-threatening. He did not act like the villain who taunted us after capturing our friends. Furthermore he had an explanation for himself. He told us that when he drank from a fount, just before the events of Patternfall, he gained the powers of a living Trump and in the process lost his ability to make moral judgments. Somehow his fall into the Abyss returned his morals and he lost his living Trump abilities. His recount of the events leading up to and following his fall into the Abyss leads me to be nearly certain that this is indeed Brand. I also believe (with a good deal less certainty) that Brand is not also Brandon. Perhaps Brandon is the morality-less portion of Brand split off by some power of the Abyss.

I'm am still planning to capture Brandon and bring him back to Fiona so that his vitality can be drained into Ygg. The fact that Brandon is not actually Brand may make my job easier since I won't be opposed by Connie or Luke. On the other hand it may be that Brandon is not sufficiently 'real', being only a reflection or shard of real Brand.