by Anne Bishop
Finally Teaser asked softly, “Are we being punished, Sebastian?”
“How should I…” But he did know. Looking at the naked fear in Teaser’s eyes, he did know. He shook his head. “She wouldn’t do this. Belladonna wouldn’t bring something like this into a landscape.”
At the edge of the crowd, Mr. Finch made distressed chirpy noises.
Philo wrung his hands. “If we have done something to anger the Landscaper—”
“She wouldn’t do this!” Sebastian snapped.
Silence. Then Philo said, “Someone did.”
Keeping his eyes focused on the table, Sebastian sipped his whiskey, feeling the tug of conflicting loyalties. The Den was his home. He’d spent the past fifteen years living among these people. But every good thing that had happened in his childhood had come from Glorianna, Lee, and their mother, Nadia. Every happy memory from the years before he escaped his father for the last time had a connection to at least one of them.
And the year the wizards, those self-righteous pillars of law and justice, had tried to destroy the Den…
Six years after the Den was created, the wizards came with a Level Seven Landscaper whom they had convinced somehow to take over control of the Den and “balance” the landscape.
Sebastian stood on one side of the main street with Philo, Teaser, and Mr. Finch, watching the Landscaper take a position between the line of wizards and the line of residents, her hands slightly lifted, her head tilted back, her eyes closed. Then he stared at the wizards, at one in particular who finally met his bitter stare with eyes filled with hatred.
Demons were a blight on the world. Demons were a threat to humans. Demons had no place in Ephemera, and creating a haven for such vileness…The wizards hadn’t been able to prevent the Den’s creation, but now they were determined to put an end to it.
They could have done it anywhere. They could have picked a quiet place on the outskirts of the Den, wouldn’t have needed to go more than a few steps beyond the bridge they’d used to cross over into the landscape. It would have made no difference in terms of what the Landscaper could do. Instead, they marched into the Den’s main street, taunting the humans and demons who had gathered with the knowledge that their place in the world was going to be splintered beyond recognition. The changes were already in motion, and not even killing the Landscaper would have stopped what was to come.
Finally, when he felt something swirl around his heart and knew the Landscaper was tapping into the heart’s core of every creature that made a home in the Den, he looked away from the wizards and the woman and focused on the colored lights and the buildings and the small islands of dwarf trees and night flowers that could gather sustenance from the cold light of the moon instead of the sun’s warm glow. He wanted to remember the Den as it was in this moment—because when the wizards and Landscaper were finished, there was no telling what he and the others might be able to salvage.
The swirl faded. Everyone was silent.
Then the Landscaper, one of the most powerful of her kind, rubbed her arms as if chilled and took a hesitant step away from the wizards as she looked around. As they all looked around.
Nothing had changed.
“This landscape already has a signature resonance,” the Landscaper whispered. “A very powerful signature resonance. I’m…not welcome here anymore.”
“Stupid bitch,” Teaser whispered. “Did she really think she was welcome before?”
Sebastian just watched the woman, who looked more and more uneasy with each passing moment.
“Who controls this landscape?” the Landscaper asked.
The wizards didn’t answer her, so he did. “The Den belongs to Belladonna.”
She whirled around to face the wizards. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“It wasn’t significant,” one of the wizards replied.
“Are you mad?” she screamed. “No one touches one of Belladonna’s landscapes. No one!” Her voice broke on a sob.
Pity stirred in Sebastian. The Landscaper looked like a terrified child who suddenly realized all the bad things she feared were lurking in the dark spaces truly existed.
The wizards shifted uncomfortably. “Since there is nothing more to be done here, we will go,” one of them said.
“Where am I supposed to go?” she wailed. “There’s no safe place to go.”
The wizards stared at her in disgust. Then they walked away—and never looked back.
The Landscaper crumpled in the street.
Philo lifted his hands in a helpless gesture. “Perhaps—”
“Daylight,” Teaser muttered, looking up the street.
Looking in the same direction, Sebastian felt his heart jump.
She stood beneath one of the pole-lights, staring at the Landscaper. He walked forward to meet her, once again startled by the fact that this slim, lovely woman with green eyes so like his own and a river of silky black hair could do things to their world that terrified even the fiercest demons.
“Glorianna,” he said softly when he stood before her.
“Sebastian.” Her voice still held a hint of the country lilt that had enchanted him the first time he’d met her.
“I don’t think the Landscaper truly meant us harm.” He studied her eyes, looking for the fiery compassion he knew burned within her—and found only ice. “Judge her with your heart.”
“It is not my heart that will judge her, Sebastian,” Glorianna replied. “It is her own.” She swung around him and walked toward the Landscaper.
He caught up to her, walking close enough to make it clear he was with her, whatever she chose to do, and still keeping enough distance so that she knew he wouldn’t interfere.
They stopped a few paces away from the Landscaper, who made no move to get to her feet and face them as an equal. She just looked up at them, knowing no plea she made would change anything.
No one around them spoke. No one so much as shifted a foot while Glorianna and the Landscaper stared at each other.
Finally, Glorianna said, “Go back to your landscapes.”
The Landscaper scrambled to her feet, wobbled as she took a few steps away from them, then turned and ran in the same direction the wizards had taken.
Sebastian looked at Glorianna. The sadness in her eyes was so unexpected it made him ache. He knew she’d been cast out of the school, had been declared a rogue Landscaper. Lee had told him that much, but not why. Never why.
He sidestepped, bringing him close enough to nudge her with his elbow. “Come on. I’ll treat you to Philo’s specialties—Stuffed Tits and Phallic Delights.”
No sadness now. Just shock swiftly changing to the suspicious look she used to give him and Lee when they’d try to convince her that something preposterous could really be true. Of course, they’d all been young enough then not to understand that nothing was preposterous in Ephemera. Especially for Glorianna.
“Stuffed Tits and Phallic Delights,” she said. “And what might those be?”
He gave her a wicked grin. “Come with me and see for yourself.”
So they went to Philo’s, and when the plates were set before her, her laughter rang through the courtyard—and for a few hours, while they drank wine and ate the various offerings Philo placed before them, he saw her as the bright-eyed girl he remembered and not whatever being an outcast and a rogue was shaping her into.
Sebastian raised his glass, discovered it was empty, and reached for the whiskey bottle.
No one dared touch one of Belladonna’s landscapes. That was the lesson wizards, Landscapers, and demons alike had learned nine years ago. Which meant a Bridge had linked two landscapes recently, enabling a killer to cross over to the Den, or another Landscaper had managed to add something to the landscape—or Philo and Teaser were right and Glorianna herself had brought something into the Den.
Which he didn’t believe. Couldn’t believe. But if it wasn’t Glorianna…
“Could be a human,” Sebastian said.
&n
bsp; Philo stiffened. Teaser looked at him, shocked.
“It could be a human,” he repeated. “A sick mind, or an evil one, that’s come to hunt in the Den because it’s a dark landscape.”
“Well, daylight! What are we supposed to do about that?” Teaser said.
The words lodged in Sebastian’s throat like sharp stones, while the whiskey churned in his stomach along with heart-deep revulsion. “We have to inform the wizards.”
“Guardians and Guides, Sebastian,” Philo sputtered. “You’d give those creatures a reason to come back here?”
“What choice is there? A human died here.”
“Humans have died around here before,” Teaser muttered. “They cross over, see a pretty horse that acts tame enough to give them a ride, and they’re in the lake and drowning before they understand a waterhorse has ensnared them. Or they follow marsh lights instead of keeping to the path that leads them home and end up the guest of honor at a Merry Makers feast. Or they figure a bull demon isn’t smart enough to notice if they cheat while playing cards.”
“It’s not the same thing,” Sebastian said. “Anyone who wanders through the dark landscapes that surround the Den is taking a chance of never getting home again. And anyone stupid enough to cheat a bull demon is asking to be gored. This is different. Besides, you said this woman had a rich husband, which means she probably has some status in her own landscape. Someone’s going to start looking for her when she doesn’t come back.”
“Maybe,” Teaser replied. “But she gave me a different name every time I saw her, and she never said which landscape she came from.”
“Which brings us back to informing the wizards,” Sebastian said, suddenly weary.
Philo said hesitantly, “Perhaps we should wait and ask the Landscaper?”
“No one knows how to find her,” Sebastian replied. Which wasn’t quite true. Aunt Nadia probably knew how to get a message to Glorianna, but he didn’t want to tell his aunt what was happening in the Den and see a horrible truth in her eyes: that Belladonna had sent that evil to walk among them.
“So that leaves the wizards, since we do know how to find those bastards. Besides, the Justice Makers are supposed to take care of this kind of…problem.” He looked at Philo and Teaser…and accepted that there really was no choice. “I’ll go.”
Teaser pushed back from the table. “I’ll try to convince a demon cycle to give us a ride.”
“Us?” Sebastian asked, surprised. “You’re coming with me?”
Teaser moved his shoulders in what was probably meant as a shrug but looked like an uneasy twitch. “As far as the bridge, anyway.”
Which was farther than he’d thought the other incubus would go. “I’ve got to go back to the cottage and pack a bag.” Even if the journey didn’t take more than one rising and setting of the moon, he’d still need a fresh shirt to wear when he presented himself to the bastards who lived behind their walls and rituals.
He borrowed Philo’s bicycle and rode back to the cottage as fast as he could. By the time he packed some toiletries and clothing, changed into the leather pants and jacket that would probably outrage the wizards but made him feel less like a supplicant, and walked out of the cottage, Teaser was waiting for him, straddling a demon cycle.
Like the motored carriages that had been invented in one of the big-city landscapes, the motored cycles had been unknown in the Den until a dozen men had crossed over a few years ago to cause some trouble and have a spree. They’d thought they were bad. They’d thought they were mean. They’d thought they were powerful—until they’d clashed with demons who were badder, meaner, and much more powerful.
The wheels were gone. So was the motor and whatever else had originally powered the cycle. The demons who had taken up residence in the cycles didn’t need those things.
The demon who inhabited this one stared at him with red eyes. Its pushed-in face and tufted ears made it look comical—if a person could ignore all the razored teeth, the powerful torso, the thick arms, and the fingers that ended with curved talons.
Satisfied that the other passenger was the person promised and not a potential meal, the demon flowed back into the hollow belly of the cycle until only its head stuck out of the hole that had once held a light.
Adjusting the straps of his pack so it settled comfortably against his back, Sebastian mounted the cycle behind Teaser.
Since the demons had the ability to float the cycles above the ground, they didn’t need roads, but this one followed the lane from the cottage back to the main street of the Den, then beyond the crowded buildings to the open countryside.
About a mile outside the Den, they stopped at a wooden bridge that crossed a stream.
There were two kinds of bridges. The stationary bridges linked one or more specific landscapes and were usually a reliable way of crossing over from one landscape to another. Resonating bridges allowed a person to cross over to any landscape that resonated with that person’s heart. Most of the time, focusing the will was sufficient to reach a particular destination. But there were other times when a resonating bridge ignored the will and listened only to the heart—and a person ended up in a landscape that wasn’t remotely close to where he intended to go. Which made traveling in Ephemera a gambler’s adventure.
And this was a resonating bridge.
Teaser looked over his shoulder. “Will this do?”
Sebastian took a deep breath, then let it out slowly. “This will do.” It wasn’t as if he had a choice. There weren’t any stationary bridges that linked any of Belladonna’s landscapes to the landscape that held Wizard City.
He got off the demon cycle and walked to the edge of the bridge. He tried to clear his mind of everything but the need to reach Wizard City.
“Sebastian?”
He looked back.
Teaser shifted his shoulders, looking embarrassed. “Travel lightly.”
Heart’s Blessing. It warmed him to hear someone say it. “I’ll be back soon.” He hoped.
Wizard City. Wizard City. Other images tried to intrude—the feel of sand beneath his feet—but he chanted the words “Wizard City” under his breath as he crossed the bridge.
The land didn’t look any different, but the sky was now a predawn gray or the fading light of dusk. And when he looked back across the stream, there was no sign of Teaser or the demon cycle.
So. He’d crossed over. Now all he could do was hope he’d crossed over to the right landscape.
A rough cart path led away from the bridge. Settling the straps of his pack more comfortably on his shoulders, he followed the path to wherever it would take him.
Glorianna walked into the alley, then stopped and opened the lantern’s shutter to illuminate the ground as much as possible. One cautious step, then another. Always studying the ground, the walls, the shadows. When the light found the bones and the rust-colored sand, she stopped. Crouching, she touched a fingertip to the ground, then studied the grains of sand clinging to her skin. There were a few landscapes that had that color sand, but combined with clean bones…only one.
So this was the source of the dissonance she had felt when she’d walked through her private garden to check on her landscapes. She’d felt a ripple of uneasiness a few days ago and had intended to visit the Den and talk to Sebastian, but there had been stronger ripples of dissonance in two other landscapes. She’d crossed over to check on the disturbances in those landscapes but had found nothing unusual, so she’d decided a wizard must have been passing through those places, since their presence always created a dissonance in her landscapes. By the time she’d returned home, the ripple that had disturbed the Den had disappeared.
Until now.
She rubbed thumb against finger until she was absolutely certain she was clean of every grain of sand. Then she rose and carefully backed away.
Glorianna, these past few nights I’ve had dreams full of disturbing images, and a…sense…that something old, something evil is swimming beneath the surface
of the world.
I know, Mother. I’ve had the same dreams.
She went back to the mouth of the alley, opened the pack she’d left there, and took out a jagged piece of stone. Then she walked back into the alley and carefully studied the ground, looking for the grain of sand farthest away from the bones. Setting the stone on top of the last grain of sand, she called to the world.
Ephemera, hear me.
The currents of Dark and Light power that flowed through the Den mingled with the currents of Light and Dark inside her while the world waited to manifest her will.
Take the sand before me and send it deep into the place of stones. Let the sand have the bones. They belong to that landscape now. Let nothing remain here that does not come from my heart.
She felt the currents of Dark power flow into the alley, along with a thread of Light. She watched the sand and bones disappear, along with the jagged piece of stone that would act as the anchor point connecting the place of stones to the bonelovers’ landscape.
She watched Ephemera manifest her will, responding to her in ways it responded to no other Landscaper.
Her resonance filled the alley once more. But there was still a tingle of fear where the blood had seeped into the ground, and that fear would linger, smearing the heart of every person who passed the alley.
She felt a playful tug from the currents of Light. Before she could respond and impose her will, shoots pushed up from the hard-packed ground, rapidly growing into lush, dark green leaves. Within a minute, the blood-soaked ground was covered in living green.
It was an awkward place for plants to grow, to say the least.
There’s no light here. Even moonlight won’t reach the plants. They can’t survive here.
The Light would give them what they needed. And seeing them would make the hearts happy. Wouldn’t it make the hearts happy?
Ephemera was alive, but it didn’t have an intelligence of its own. At least, it didn’t think in a way that people would consider intelligent. But long ago, Ephemera had harnessed itself to the human heart, and it constantly made and remade itself in response to those hearts. Since it responded to her heart over any other in her landscapes, the plants must have been Ephemera’s response to her desire to somehow soften the violence that had filled the alley.
