by Anne Bishop
“I’ll know. If I’m anywhere on the island, I’ll know,” Glorianna said.
“You keep saying ‘we,’ Justice Maker,” Michael said.
Sebastian looked at Michael. “I’m going with Glorianna.”
“Why you and not me?”
“Because if we run into trouble, you have the music that will guide us home.”
“He’s right, Michael,” Glorianna said. “Besides, Sebastian should have a say in whether this unknown landscape connects with the Den.”
Nothing more to be done, she thought as the three of them went back to the house. Not yet.
A few months ago, all Lee wanted was to get away from her and everything connected to her. She had felt that truth in his heart the last time she saw him. So what did it mean that he was asking for her help now?
Chapter 23
“We’re being followed,” the Knife said as he came abreast of the driving seat.
“The same Clubs who were behind us at the traveler’s well yesterday?” Lee asked. They’d found him a hat with a soft brim that helped conceal the dark glasses as well as provide the extra protection he needed to ride on the driving seat during daylight hours.
When the Apothecary made an odd sound, Lee wondered if he’d asked a question that shouldn’t have been asked.
“Some of my brethren have made sure those Clubs are well behind you and will stay that way,” the Knife said. A moment’s silence, then he added, “Hiring this many Clubs to chase you down takes a hefty bag of coins.”
“Are you wondering if it would be worth switching sides?” Lee asked. He heard the Apothecary suck in a breath, and figured he’d deeply insulted the Knife.
“I’ve chosen my side, and I told you my reasons,” the Knife replied calmly. “But I’m wondering what makes you so valuable—or dangerous—to whoever is changing the city.”
When the Knife said nothing more, Lee thought, Whatever you give to the world comes back to you—and that includes trust. “I’m a Bridge. I have the ability to connect pieces of the world, even pieces that are distant from one another. The men who are changing the shadow streets are called wizards. They’re dangerous men who came from my part of the world.”
“Is that why they’re after you?” the Knife asked. “To force you to make this magic so they can travel to and from Vision?”
Lee shook his head. “At first they wanted to use me to reach my sister, who is their most dangerous enemy and lives in a place that they can’t find by themselves. Now I think they want to stop me from reaching her. Without my…magic…I think the journey to your city would be a long one. And I don’t think anyone in my part of the world knows about Vision, including my sister.” Well, there was Teaser, but this wasn’t the time to tell the Knife about the incubi and the way they could travel through the twilight of waking dreams.
“So the wizards’ enemy won’t be able to find Vision unless you get back to your part of the world and tell her,” the Knife said, nodding.
“Yes.” Lee sighed. “And even if I can get back, whether help can reach Vision will depend on Ephemera.”
“Then let’s hope the world is looking kindly toward us. I’m going to drop back a bit to stay between the Clubs and you, but not so far I’ll lose sight of the wagon. You need to get where you’re going before dark. My brethren will delay some of the Clubs permanently, but there aren’t enough of us who can see the northern community up ahead to keep you safe if enough Clubs have a chance to catch up.”
“If there are that many of the bastards after us, you should stay close,” the Apothecary said. “We can’t afford to lose your skills if there’s a fight.” When the Knife dropped back, he added quietly to Lee, “And I’m not sure he’ll still be able to see the road we’re traveling if he’s too far back. This isn’t a part of the city his guild usually visits. Clubs are dangerous, but they’re hired muscle and don’t stand in the shadows as deep as the Knife Guild.”
“So he could lose sight of us and the Clubs won’t,” Lee said grimly.
The second shutter behind the driving seat opened, and Zhahar muttered at Lee’s left shoulder, “Zeela says she can fight.”
Lee wasn’t sure Zeela was fit enough, but having two people with fighting skills gave both of them a better chance of surviving—and gave all of them a better chance to reach the spot where Vision was connected to Tryadnea. “How much farther?” he asked Zhahar. “Can you tell?”
“I don’t know exactly where the connection is. But it’s that way.” Reaching between Lee and the Apothecary, she pointed.
Thankfully, the road was still going in the right direction.
“We’re close,” she said, withdrawing her arm so that she was no longer immediately visible to anyone they might meet on the road.
“How long will the connection remain once you’re back in your homeland?” Lee asked.
“Since we’re the last Tryad in the city, not long,” Zhahar replied. “Less than an hour, I think. Then Tryadnea will be adrift again.”
Less than an hour is still too long, he thought. If the enemy was close behind them, having that connection last even a few minutes after they crossed it might be too long. So he would need to break that connection and change it into something else as soon as they were on Tryadnea ground.
A sound came from behind him. Not the hummm he associated with Zhahar talking with her sisters. This sounded more like annoyed buzzing. And judging by the way the Apothecary suddenly hunched his shoulders, Lee wasn’t the only one hearing it.
“If you all keep trying to come into view and talk at the same time, at least one of you is going to end up with a sore throat,” he said.
The buzzing stopped.
“You usually whack a hornet’s nest to see what happens?” the Apothecary asked quietly.
“I’m usually smarter than that,” Lee replied.
“Could you try being smarter when I’m close enough to you to get stung?”
Lee huffed out a soft laugh. Then he sobered.
No way to tell if this was going to work. No way to tell if his presence would negate the effort of the others to send out a call for help through the currents of the world. No way to tell anything, but he had to believe that, if Glorianna received the message he’d sent through Kobrah and Teaser, she would help him.
Glorianna would help him. He was sure of that. He believed it with all his heart. But would Belladonna help him?
He twisted on the seat to look toward the window. “Can I ask you something?”
Zhahar’s face appeared in the window. “Sholeh says the community up ahead is an artisan community. When she was researching other parts of Vision, she didn’t find mention of any shadow streets or dark places.”
“Every community has a shadow street of sorts,” the Apothecary said. “But it might not be dark enough to have shadowmen.”
“Why was Sholeh looking for a street like that?” Lee asked.
“In case we needed to try again in a different part of the city.”
“But Sholeh…” Lee paused. Thought. Sholeh definitely belonged to the daylight landscapes. Zeela? Yes, that sister would like the things that weren’t so proper—and might even need to spend time in shadowy places to feel comfortable with her surroundings. “Must be a challenge to find a place that suits all of you.”
No answer.
“Was that what you wanted to know?” Zhahar asked.
Distracted by thoughts of Zhahar and her sisters and where they could live, he’d forgotten what he’d wanted to ask. Something about sisters. Ah yes. “If one of you was upset with someone, would all of you be upset with that person? Could one of you stop the others from helping that person?”
“Damn fool,” the Apothecary muttered as he hunched his shoulders and told the horse to giddyup.
The horse made an effort, probably because it could hear the angry buzzing too.
“Why do you ask?” Zeela growled.
“My sister,” Lee replied quietly.
A pause. Then Zhahar said, “Oh.” She reached through the window and rested her hand on his arm for a moment before withdrawing again. “We might not help with a small thing if we were upset with someone, but we wouldn’t walk away from someone in real trouble. Not if we cared about him.”
Not the same. There was Light and Dark in each aspect of Sholeh Zeela a Zhahar, and that wasn’t the same as Belladonna. Not the same at all.
Heart’s hope lies within Belladonna.
He was going to hope—to believe—that was still true.
Hurry, Zhahar thought. Hurry hurry hurry.
Kobrah, keeping watch out the wagon’s door, gave them constant reports now of four riders—still following from a distance, but closing on them. The village itself was up ahead, and the Apothecary was aiming for it in the hope the Clubs wouldn’t attack them with other people around. But the connection to Tryadnea wasn’t in the village, and once they were out of sight of other people…
*Maybe if we take Lee, those Clubs will leave the others alone,* Zhahar said.
=Not anymore,= Zeela said. =At this point, everyone with us knows more than those wizards want anyone to know. Maybe the Clubs have orders to capture Lee instead of killing him, but the wizards have no reason to think the rest of us are anything but trouble if we’re left alive.=
Shaken by her sister’s assessment, Zhahar leaned out the window and pointed west. “We have to go that way.”
“Let’s see if we can get into the village itself before heading in that direction,” Lee said. “Being the only wagon on the road makes us conspicuous.”
Saying nothing, the Apothecary coaxed the horse into a trot. A short while later, they slowed to a walk as they joined the other conveyances on the main street. Being on horseback and more able to maneuver, the Knife rode up ahead, then returned in a few minutes to ride beside the wagon and report.
“The market fills the center of the village,” he said. “I don’t think wagons or carts are allowed in there once the merchants set up their booths, but even if we did go in there, we’d never get through with all the people on the street. I saw what looks like a western road just before the market begins. When I inquired, a young man confirmed the road headed west, but he said there is nothing but woodland and fields that way because the bridge doesn’t work. He said his uncle, who’s a Shaman, was up here visiting and warned the village not to use that bridge—that it didn’t lead to the fields beyond it that the eye could see.”
“That must be the connection,” Zhahar said.
Lee nodded. “Makes sense. It sounds like the connection turned an ordinary bridge into a stationary bridge that links the two landscapes. It’s not surprising that a Shaman trying to walk across that bridge would sense the other landscape, but I think most of the villagers would have crossed that bridge and ended up on the road they’d always traveled.” But a few of them would have crossed that bridge and gotten lost in Ephemera’s landscapes.
“What about us?” the Apothecary asked.
“Zhahar resonates with her homeland. Her presence should be enough to get us there.”
“Then let’s move,” the Knife said at the same time Kobrah said, “Four riders. Almost on us.”
They turned onto the narrow western road, still moving at a walk while they were in sight of houses and workshops. As soon as the fields were the only thing in front of them, the Apothecary whipped the horse into a gallop.
Zhahar grabbed the window ledge and Lee’s arm. Behind her, she heard Kobrah yelp as the wagon rocked enough to make standing precarious.
“You need to pull up on the other side of the bridge as soon as you can,” Lee said.
“We should keep going as long as the horse can,” the Apothecary argued.
“Unless there are armed Tryad waiting right on the other side, we can’t outrun the Clubs long enough to find help if all of us cross that bridge,” Lee argued. “But I can stop them from reaching Tryadnea.”
=Can he do what he did to Teeko?= Zeela asked.
Zhahar relayed the question and saw the Apothecary tense when Lee replied, “Something like that.”
The Knife shouted. Zhahar didn’t catch the words, only the urgency.
“You sure this is the place?” the Apothecary asked.
“Doesn’t matter,” Lee said before Zhahar could reply. “Just get us over that bridge.”
“The Knife is behind us,” Kobrah shouted. “The Clubs!”
“Bridge is up ahead,” the Apothecary said.
Zhahar wasn’t sure if he said that in case Lee couldn’t see it or to make sure she was aware of it.
A few lengths from the bridge, the Apothecary eased the horse back to a less reckless speed.
Hurry, Zhahar thought. Hurry hurry hurry.
::I can feel Tryadnea,:: Sholeh said.
“Give the Knife room to get off the bridge, then pull up,” Lee said.
Horse and wagon clattered over the bridge, followed by the Knife, who turned and pulled out a long blade from a sheath on his saddle.
Lee scrambled off the driving seat and ran for the bridge.
Zhahar climbed through the window to the driving seat, jumped down, and ran after him.
Lee dropped to his knees and grabbed the post on one side of the bridge.
“Lee!” she yelled as two of the Clubs rode onto the bridge, with the other pair a length behind.
“Stay back!” Lee snapped. He flattened on the ground, but his hands still held the post.
One of the Clubs was focused on Lee; the other on the Knife. Zeela came into view, ran the few steps between her and Lee, and pulled the knife from her boot.
The Clubs came over the bridge, weapons raised—and disappeared in the moment their horses’ feet would have touched land.
The men coming behind the first pair vanished too, but Zeela could hear them.
“What happened? Where did they go? Where’s the wagon?”
A clatter of hooves, as if the second pair of horses was being turned around. Then no sound from the riders. Too quickly, there was no sound.
Releasing the post, Lee rolled onto his back. “Guardians and Guides, that was close.”
Zeela watched the Knife dismount. She didn’t think a man like him was used to feeling so wary of another man, and she didn’t know how he would respond to a man who could do…What had Lee done?
As Kobrah and the Apothecary joined them, both looking around with dazed expressions, Lee sat up, pulled off the hat, and scrubbed his fingers over his short hair.
The Knife took a step toward them. Zeela stepped in front of Lee, who didn’t seem to notice.
“What happened?” the Knife asked.
“There was a tree on this side of the bridge,” the Apothecary said. “I saw it. Now it’s gone.”
“It’s not gone,” Lee said. “It’s just not in this landscape.”
The Knife shook his head. “What happened to the Clubs?”
“For the moment, this is a resonating bridge. It can send a person to any landscape that resonates with that person’s heart. The Clubs who crossed over the bridge are now in a landscape that matches who they are.”
“Where is this landscape?”
“Don’t know. The other two are still in the northern community—unless they tried to cross the bridge. In which case, they’ve also crossed over to somewhere else.”
“You don’t seem too concerned about that.”
“Why should I be?”
The question seemed to shock everyone—even the Knife.
Chilled by the casual way Lee had just sent two men into the unknown, Zeela sheathed her knife, and Zhahar came back into view.
“What do we do now?” she asked.
“Finish this,” Lee replied. “This bridge no longer connects your homeland to Vision. I don’t know how long it will take for Tryadnea to start drifting, so we need to talk to your people’s leaders, and we need to do it fast.”
“This leads to our mothers’ village,” Zhahar said
, pointing to the cart track. “At least, it did when I left here.”
“No reason why it wouldn’t still lead to the village,” Lee said.
Isn’t there? she wondered.
He looked around, picked up his hat, and headed for the wagon.
The Knife and the Apothecary stared at her.
“Is he going to help us?” the Knife asked.
“Yes,” she replied with all the conviction she could put into her voice. “He said he would, so he will.”
Nodding, the Knife returned to his horse and mounted while the Apothecary and Kobrah returned to the wagon.
=Lee’s sister isn’t the only one who has a dark side,= Zeela said.
*I know that,* Zhahar replied. *But I wonder if it’s occurred to him?*
He had frightened a Knife. He knew plenty of demons who wouldn’t hesitate to kill a human—or kill anything else, for that matter—but in the landscapes he’d called home, he hadn’t heard of anything like a guild of assassins.
Shadowmen.
If he understood the neutral morality and position the shadowmen held in Vision, would his ability as a Bridge make him a shadowman?
He had always considered his power as something neutral. He made a bridge, and what happened to the people who crossed that bridge was none of his concern. People were drawn to the landscapes that resonated with their own hearts. Nothing to do with him.
When he’d been in Elandar and tossed a one-shot bridge at a man who was about to start a brawl, he’d known the man would end up in a rough landscape and might not live to find a gentler one. But the Dark currents in Raven’s Hill had been swollen by the Eater of the World, and that had turned his heart toward darker feelings.
Hadn’t it?
He and Glorianna had the same mother, and through Nadia’s bloodlines, they had a strong connection to the Light. But they also had the same father. A wizard. Whose power had come from the Dark.
