by Anne Bishop
“Thank you,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. He brushed his lips over her forehead, over her cheek, over her lips. “Thank you.”
Something was happening here. More than a sexual wanting. Something that made her afraid…and made her feel as if she could fly.
“You have to talk to Philo and Teaser,” she said.
He rested his forehead against hers. “Yes.”
“Before you go, could you…”
He raised his head. His eyes were full of heat, hunger. Something more.
“…show me what the chiller is?”
Sebastian pulled out a chair at one of Philo’s indoor tables. Since the indoor room wasn’t used except in bad weather, they had the place to themselves.
Teaser came around the small bar at the back of the room, carrying a bottle of whiskey and glasses. “Philo will be along in a minute. Just has to finish up the last order.”
While Teaser poured the whiskey, Sebastian thought about Lynnea arguing with him to bring his sketches, carrying his art supplies in secret. Carrying his heart.
And all he’d done was made it harder for her by being difficult.
“How do you apologize to a woman for being stupid?” Sebastian muttered.
“Great sex?” Teaser replied with a cocky grin—which changed into something close to panic. “Not sex. Box of sweets. That’s better. Much better. Or flowers. If you can find any.”
Daylight, Sebastian thought, he’s like a boy who’s just realized his mother has done the same things he’s trying to get his sweetheart to do. What is it about Lynnea that brings that out in him?
Philo came through the swinging door that led into the kitchen, sparing the two incubi from saying anything more about the woman getting settled in Sebastian’s room.
“Last customer served,” Philo said, setting down a tray that held a basket of Phallic Delights and a bowl of melted cheese. “Not that there have been many customers today. Didn’t do much cooking, so there’s not much left, but I can make you a cold beef sandwich.”
“Not for me, thanks,” Sebastian replied, “but I’ll take something back to the room for Lynnea.”
Philo bobbled the tray, almost knocking over the whiskey bottle. “But…I thought you were taking her to the Landscapers’ School.”
Sebastian knocked back his whiskey. The room was warm and stuffy, but he needed the liquor’s heat. “The school is gone.”
This was why he’d wanted to talk to them in private, but it was hard to tell them what he’d seen at the school, and reliving those minutes when he and Lynnea were running for their lives put a chill down his spine even whiskey couldn’t thaw.
Philo left the table long enough to fetch another glass. After pouring a generous measure for himself, he refilled Sebastian’s and Teaser’s glasses. “So the Bridge is going to cut us off from the rest of Ephemera.”
Sebastian nodded. “From everything except the other landscapes Belladonna holds.”
“That’s going to cut down on business,” Teaser muttered.
“Business isn’t the problem.” Philo rolled his glass between his hands. “What about us? The folks who live in the Den? Where’s the food going to come from? We can’t grow our own, and if things are going bad in the daylight landscapes, folks there might not be willing to sell their surplus, especially to the likes of us.”
Had Lee considered that when making the decision to break the bridges that connected Glorianna’s landscapes to the rest of Ephemera?
“What about the lektricity?” Philo added. “I have a meat freezer and a big chiller for other kinds of food. If the lektricity goes, we won’t even be able to store up much.”
“We’ll take it a step at a time,” Sebastian said. “First we spread the word to everyone who runs a business in the Den—brothels, taverns, gambling houses, shops. Everyone. If anyone sees a change in the landscape, especially pools of water or that sand, they’re to report it.”
“To you?” Philo asked.
Sebastian hesitated, then nodded. “I promised Lee I’d do what I could to hold the Den.”
The other men shifted uneasily.
“What else?” Teaser asked.
“We need to locate the bridges that connect the Den with other landscapes,” Sebastian said. He knew the location of one, and it worried him. The bridge he and Lynnea had used to cross over to the Den from Nadia’s house had been two boulders set on either side of a woodland trail that ended at the open ground at the back of his cottage. If whatever had been inside his home returned, would it be able to follow that path back to Aunt Nadia’s house? The people who had died in the school were proof enough that Landscapers were as vulnerable as anyone else to the creatures the Eater of the World could bring into a landscape. “And I want to know about any strangers who come into the Den. Especially if they don’t feel…right.”
Philo and Teaser exchanged a glance, but before either could speak, someone knocked frantically on the closed door.
When Philo got up to answer the door, Teaser said, “I’ll get a demon cycle and ride around to locate the bridges. But I’m not going to cross over.”
“We’ll have to eventually to find out what landscapes they connect to,” Sebastian replied. “Especially since Philo’s right. We’re going to need food.”
Philo returned to the table with Mr. Finch trailing behind him.
“Oh,” Mr. Finch said, wringing his hands. “Sebastian. Teaser.” He glanced at Philo. “You’re busy.”
“What’s wrong?” Sebastian asked, regretting the sharpness in his voice when Mr. Finch flinched and looked ready to bolt.
“I closed my shop,” Mr. Finch said, looking at Philo pleadingly. “I said I had to meet you. Is that all right?”
“That’s fine,” Philo said, “but why did you close your shop?”
Mr. Finch shuddered. “One of them came in, and she made me feel so…strange.”
Sebastian looked at Teaser.
“Two succutits and three incubi strolled into the Den after you and Lynnea left. They’re…different.” Teaser took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “Don’t know how to describe it.”
“They smell musky,” Mr. Finch said, his voice trembling. “Like wild animals.”
Sebastian tensed. Musky. Had one or more of these newcomers spent time in his cottage?
“Yeah,” Teaser said. “Saw one of the incubi snare a woman. I spent a little time with her last moon. She’s a hard-edged bitch and not generous in any way. But even from where I was standing, watching him reel her in, I could tell there was something about him that scared her but she just couldn’t resist the lure.”
“What happened?” Sebastian asked.
Teaser shrugged. “Dunno. I saw him trolling again a few hours later, but I didn’t see her.”
“They’ve been asking about you, Sebastian,” Philo said, refilling his glass and handing it to Mr. Finch, who gulped down the whiskey.
“Yes,” Mr. Finch said, gasping. “When is Sebastian coming back? That’s what they ask.”
“Why the interest in me?”
“Dunno,” Teaser replied. “I found one of them rubbing her hands over the door of your room and licking her lips like a cat that’s cornered a particularly tasty bird. She seemed amused when I asked her what she was doing. She said something about wondering if you’d had any interesting dreams. When I went downstairs later, I found the other succubitch trying to persuade the desk clerk to give her the spare key to your room. That’s when I took your spare and mine off the hooks and made sure the doors were always locked.”
Sebastian drained his glass and set it aside. “If you could make those sandwiches, Philo, I’d be grateful.”
Philo nodded, then looked at Mr. Finch. “I’m closing down for a few hours of rest time. I’ve got a spare room if you’d rather not stay at your place alone.”
“Thank you, Philo,” Mr. Finch said.
Time crawled while Sebastian waited for Philo. Teaser dug in to the br
ead and cheese, but the thought of food knotted Sebastian’s stomach. He wouldn’t feel easy enough to eat—or do anything else—until he was back in his room with Lynnea.
As soon as Philo came back with a basket, Sebastian took his leave and strode to the bordello, watching the street, watching the people. Not as many visitors as usual, and all of them moved with hurried purpose, as if they sensed danger but couldn’t locate the source.
When he reached his room, he saw Lynnea standing in the open doorway, looking confused and stubborn…and blurry. As if he couldn’t quite bring her into focus, not when the gorgeous woman standing on the other side of the door turned and smiled at him. But there was something about the succubus’s smile that made his skin crawl—and also made him want to unfurl the power of the incubi and take her.
“Sebastian,” the succubus purred.
The sound of her voice shivered through him, full of hot promises.
She gave Lynnea a scathing look. “Is that the best you can do?”
Anger burned out lust when Lynnea winced at the insult.
“What do you want?” Sebastian snapped.
The succubus’s smile sharpened, became surly and yet malevolent. “I can give you dreams you can’t even imagine.”
He looked her up and down. “I can imagine just fine what kind of dreams I’d get with the likes of you.”
Fury flashed in her eyes. This one wasn’t used to being resisted. She moved, which brought her a little closer to Lynnea.
Sebastian raised his hand, felt the rush and tingle of power flowing through him. Wizard’s power. He didn’t want to call the lightning, not when he still didn’t know how to control it, not with Lynnea standing so close. But the succubus must have sensed the power—or understood she was being threatened in some way. She bared her teeth like a predator who had just discovered its prey wasn’t as helpless as it had thought. Then she backed away.
Sebastian watched her until she was far enough away for him to get into the room and lock the door. Leaning against the door, he waited for his heart to slow to a normal beat.
Lynnea looked uncertain. “It was rude not to let her in, but—”
“No, it was smart.” Sebastian set the basket down. “I’m betting she’s one of the newcomers who showed up recently.”
Lynnea frowned. “She smelled…odd. That’s what made me uncomfortable about letting her in. She smelled…” Her eyes widened. “Like the cottage.”
He nodded. “If it wasn’t her, one of the others had spent some time in the cottage.”
“Why would they enter someone else’s home?”
“I don’t know.” Closing the distance between them, he put his arms around her. Like holding sunlight, he thought, the feel of her cleansing him of the lust the succubus had drawn from him—and filling him with a different kind of lust. Just as hot, but sweeter.
“Don’t wander around the Den without me,” he said.
“I can’t live pinned to your shirttails.”
He eased back enough to look at her. Stubborn rabbit. “Just until I find out where these newcomers came from and what they want. They’re not like the other incubi and succubi, Lynnea. Look, you don’t have to stay pinned to my shirttails, as you put it. You could give Philo a hand or…or spend time with Teaser.” Did she have any idea what it cost him to surrender his prize to another incubus, even temporarily? “Please.”
She studied his face for so long. “All right,” she finally said, but she didn’t stop studying him. “Can you all do that?”
“Do what?”
“Change your face. It was subtle, but I was sure her face didn’t look the same when she was talking to you as it did when I first opened the door.” She shrugged. “Maybe it was a trick of the light.”
“And maybe it wasn’t.” Uneasy again, he stepped back. “There are stories—old stories—about the incubi and succubi, about how they lure men and women by appearing to be a friend or lover.” Hand in hand with those stories were the ones about incubi and succubi providing such intense pleasure the sex was lethal.
“Do you know me?” he demanded suddenly. “Can you feel me?”
“If you’re asking if I could tell the difference between you and someone wearing your face, then, yes, I know you. I would always know you, Sebastian. Even if the face was the same, that other person couldn’t be you.”
He hadn’t realized how much he’d needed that answer until he felt the tension drain out of him. Weary now, he rubbed his hands over his face. “I brought some food. Let’s eat. Then we’ll consider what comes next.”
While they shared the food in companionable silence, Sebastian chewed on one thought: Why were these newcomers so interested in him?
Chapter Fourteen
Koltak rapped on the door, then barely waited for an acknowledgment before rushing into the room.
“You sent for me, Harland?” he asked.
Harland turned away from the window. “The council has received news. It is terrible—and terrifying.”
A chill went through Koltak, but he just waited, saying nothing.
“Belladonna has shown her true nature. She attacked the Landscapers’ School, Koltak. She killed all of the Landscapers and Bridges who were at the school, leaving Ephemera’s landscapes vulnerable to her malevolence.”
Koltak staggered to a chair and sank into it. “How is that possible?”
“Her power has turned vicious, and she’s far stronger than any of us imagined.” Harland moved away from the window. “Already the dark feelings in human hearts are forming a veil over some of the landscapes.”
“But…what will killing the other Landscapers gain her? She can’t control a landscape if she doesn’t resonate with it.”
“What she can’t control will be torn apart by the storm of human emotions,” Harland replied. “Unless we stop her, Ephemera will become an insane world that will destroy everything humans have built. Music, literature, cultured society. All lost. Crushed by the desperate need to survive in a world that keeps changing so fast there will be no chance to survive in those landscapes. And what is left will belong to Belladonna and will be a dark place full of terrors.” He paused. “There is evidence that she’s pulled some of the darkest landscapes back into the world. You know the ones I mean.”
Koltak struggled for any coherent thought like a drowning man flailing to grab hold of anything that will keep him from going under. “Nadia. What about Nadia? Surely she’s not trying to protect—”
“We will try to reach Nadia. Right now, we cannot confirm that she and her son, Lee, are still living—or if they, too, were victims of the rogue Landscaper’s viciousness.” Harland looked at Koltak with an expression of harsh sympathy. “Belladonna must be destroyed.”
“But we can’t find her!”
“We must find her,” Harland said. “Since we don’t know what happened to her mother and brother, there’s only one person left who might be able to draw Belladonna to Wizard City, where the council will be able to gather its full strength and destroy her. There’s only one person left, Koltak, and you’re the only person who can reach him.”
Stunned, Koltak stared at Harland. “Sebastian? What do you expect Sebastian to do against Belladonna?”
Harland smiled a terrible smile. “Nothing.”
“You don’t have to stay,” Lynnea said. “I’m just going to sit here for a while.”
“Uh-huh,” Teaser replied, following her to a table at the back of Philo’s courtyard. “Sebastian told me to stay with you.” He flashed a cocky grin. “Besides, you won’t tell me what you’ve got in the box.”
Lynnea sighed. She should have told him what was in the box the first time he’d asked. But she’d felt so flustered and guilty about doing something idle that her denials that the box held anything important had only sharpened the incubus’s curiosity.
Setting the box on the table, she chose the seat that put her back to the courtyard’s wall and let her watch the courtyard and the street
beyond. Let her watch for Sebastian’s return.
Philo came up to the table. “What’ll you have?”
“Ale for me,” Teaser replied. He looked inquiringly at Lynnea.
“I’ll find something for the lady,” Philo said when she hesitated. He tipped his head to one side. “What’s in the box?”
“She won’t tell anyone,” Teaser said.
Lynnea huffed. “It’s just a game a friend of Sebastian’s auntie made.” She opened the box and carefully poured out the pieces of thin wood. “It’s called a puzzle. See? There’s a picture painted on one side. You put all the pieces together in the correct way, and you get to see the picture.”
Teaser picked up a piece and studied it. “It’s got bumps sticking out of it on two sides and round bites taken out of the other two.”
“That’s part of the puzzle. The bumps of one piece fit into the openings of another.”
“Oh, I know that game.”
“Mind who you’re talking to,” Philo said sharply.
“What?” Teaser looked at Lynnea. “Oh. Right.”
Lynnea kept her eyes on the puzzle pieces she was turning over so that the painted side was on top. “If I’m going to live in the Den, there’s no reason why everyone should avoid talking about…sex stuff…when I’m around.”
Loooong pause.
“I’ll see what’s in the kitchen,” Philo said, hurrying away from the table.
Feeling like an outsider, and resenting it, Lynnea concentrated on righting all the pieces so she could begin putting the puzzle together, aware that Teaser seemed to be concentrating equally hard.
Finally Teaser said quietly, “You’re different. That’s why it feels all right to be a little bit naughty around you, but not bad, not…blatant.”
Pondering that, Lynnea fit two blue pieces together. Sky? Water? “Why?”
“Dunno, exactly. No one like you has ever come to the Den before.”
She couldn’t think of anything to say, so she nibbled on the food Philo brought to the table, focused on the puzzle—and waited for Sebastian.
Tired and hungry, Sebastian thanked the demon cycle for its assistance, then scanned Philo’s courtyard. He didn’t see Lynnea, but one of the people crowded around the table in the back would be able to tell him where she and Teaser had gone.
