Bridge of Dreams e-3

by Anne Bishop

  “That’s because they’re smaller than cows,” Glorianna said, straightening up and pushing her hair back. “And the Den does owe that farmer for three sheep.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I’ll fix it with Dalton.”

  “So now that we’ve got…that…settled,” Lee said, as he and Glorianna turned and pointed to two adolescent boys who were standing with the warriors.

  “What is it?” Morragen asked sharply. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing’s wrong,” Glorianna replied absently. Then, tipping her head toward Lee: “You felt it?”

  “I felt it.” He wagged his finger and raised his voice. “You two. Over here.”

  The boys came forward slowly, their eyes flicking between Morragen and Lee.

  *Zhahar, you take this,* Zeela said. *I think the incubus cousin will be more inclined to talk to you than me right now.*

  Zhahar came into view and whispered to Sebastian, “What’s going on?”

  He shook his head. “Landscaper and Bridge, darling. They’ll tell the rest of us once they have it sorted out.”

  “Not here,” Glorianna said when the boys stood in front of them. “But it was here.”

  Lee nodded. “We need each of your aspects to come into view and hold for a few seconds.”

  The boys glanced at Morragen, whose aspects were continually shifting because it was unclear which of them was best suited to deal with whatever was happening now.

  =Mother has never dealt with anyone like them,= Zeela said.

  *I don’t think any Tryad has even seen anyone like them,* Zhahar replied.

  ::There is so much we could learn,:: Sholeh said wistfully.

  “Go ahead,” Zephyra said, apparently having decided the heart aspect was the one who should be in view.

  The boys’ aspects changed and held for a few seconds before the next set of brothers came into view.

  “There!” Glorianna and Lee shouted, pointing to one boy. “Hold right there.”

  The boy looked scared but seemed to find reassurance in Zephyra’s presence.

  “What are you two sensing?” Sebastian asked.

  Glorianna smiled. “He’s a Bridge.”

  Lee nodded. “His brothers aren’t, but he is a Bridge.”

  “What does that mean?” Zephyra asked.

  Lee gave her a brilliant smile. “It means that, with proper training, he can help you keep Tryadnea connected to other parts of the world.”

  “Parts of the world that are compatible with your people,” Glorianna added.

  Zhahar sucked in air and swallowed hard. Heart’s hope. Heart wishes. In a few words, Glorianna and Lee had said what the Tryad had yearned to hear for generations.

  “Well,” Glorianna said. “That will have to wait until we deal with what’s in front of us.”

  “Agreed,” Lee said. “You’re sure the border is solid?”

  “I’m sure,” she replied with no hint of temper.

  “Then the first thing I need to do is break the resonating bridge I made.”

  “You think the Clubs can find their way into this land?” the Knife asked.

  Lee shook his head. “It’s unlikely anyone from the city will reach Tryadnea. But the people in Vision don’t know about these kinds of bridges, so I’m concerned with someone from that northern community accidentally crossing over and getting lost in the landscapes. They were told not to cross the bridge.…”

  “But boys of a certain age might not be able to resist a game of ‘dare you; double dare you,’” Glorianna finished. “All right. While you do that, Ephemera and I will make the cairns to mark the border.” She looked at the camp, then at Morragen, who had come into view again. “Temporary lodgings?”

  Morragen nodded. “Our village is an hour’s ride from here.”

  “Being a few miles away from a border isn’t unusual,” Glorianna said thoughtfully.

  “I’ll go with Lee,” Sebastian said.

  “So will I,” the Knife said. “There could be trouble there. A weapon could come in handy.”

  Sebastian held up his right hand and rubbed thumb and forefingers together. “I have a weapon, but yours would be more easily understood.”

  Zhahar stepped away from him. “You said you were a sex demon.”

  “He’s also a wizard, so he does control the wizards’ lightning,” Lee said absently as he turned in the direction of the bridge. “His wife is still working out how much lightning is needed to properly broil a steak.”

  “I wouldn’t mind the experiments so much if we didn’t have to eat the failures,” Sebastian muttered, lowering his hand.

  ::Do you think he’s teasing?:: Sholeh asked.

  =Yes,= Zeela replied.

  *I don’t know,* Zhahar said. *They’re strange enough that he might mean it.*

  Lee turned back to Morragen. “Could we borrow a couple of horses?”

  “Horses?” Sebastian sounded pained. “We’ll have to ride horses?” He sighed.

  “The man doesn’t blink about riding demon cycles, but he whines about horses,” Lee muttered.

  Morragen gave the orders, and three horses were saddled. Kobrah handed Lee his hat. As the men mounted, Glorianna said, “Travel lightly.”

  Lee looked at her, standing between Morragen and Zhahar. He smiled. “We won’t be long.”

  They rode off, the Knife in the lead.

  Glorianna watched them ride away, and when they were distant enough to hide details, Belladonna came into view.

  Zhahar stared at the face so alike and yet so different from Glorianna’s. So cold and deadly. She glanced at her mother and saw how intensely Morragen watched the woman who now controlled their homeland.

  Belladonna closed her eyes, and Zhahar felt shocked when she heard the faint notes of a tune instead of a third aspect coming into view.

  “I hear the music, Magician,” Glorianna and Belladonna whispered. “I hear it.” Then she opened her eyes and said briskly, “Let’s define the border in a way your people will recognize.”

  She walked away from them.

  Medusah came into view and studied Zhahar. “Who have you brought among us?”

  “I don’t know,” Zhahar replied. “Lee was in danger. He could have gotten away alone, but he wouldn’t save himself until he got me home. I did what I thought best.”

  “They have powers and magics unlike anything we’ve ever seen, but they recognized that same magic in one of us.” Medusah hesitated. “Zephyra says she felt music when the woman’s core aspect tried to come into view. You felt it too?”

  Zhahar nodded.

  “A core aspect being remade with music,” Medusah said thoughtfully. “That too is unknown to us. But even if the core can be remade to some degree, I don’t think she will ever be a single aspect again.”

  “Do you think you can help her accept what she is now?” Will Lee listen to me when I tell him how I see his sister?

  Morragen Medusah a Zephyra looked at her daughter. “I will try.”

  Lee reached for the end of the bridge, swore quietly, and stepped back. He turned to look at his two companions.

  “Problem?” Sebastian asked.

  “Besides having the two of you ready to stab or sizzle anyone who comes over the bridge? No problem at all,” Lee replied.

  “Then the sooner you take care of this, the sooner we can step back,” Sebastian said.

  The Knife didn’t indicate in any way that he would step back or lower his guard.

  Not that Lee blamed the man for being wary of having an enemy reach them from the bridge, but having a wizard and an assassin standing behind him made his shoulder blades twitch. He figured it was a waste of breath to talk to either of them right now, so he focused on the task of changing a resonating bridge back into an ordinary bridge.

  Within moments of his breaking the power he had put into it, the physical bridge disappeared.

  “Where…?” the Knife asked, looking around.

  “It was never part of this landscap
e,” Lee replied, turning toward the men. “Now it’s completely back in Vision and connects nothing but the road on either side of that creek, just like it used to.”

  “Can you give us a minute?” Sebastian asked the Knife.

  “I’ll wait by the horses.”

  Stepping in front of Lee, Sebastian said, “Glorianna won’t feel easy about asking, and Aunt Nadia and Lynnea won’t feel comfortable asking either. So I will. Your eyes. How bad are they?”

  Lee shifted so his back was to the sun. Then he removed the dark glasses, keeping the hat on to provide some protection.

  “I can see you well enough to know who you are. This close, I can see your expressions. I know your hair is dark, but if I didn’t already know they’re green, I wouldn’t be able to tell the color of your eyes. Sunlight hurts. Colors are mostly light or dark. Can’t see well enough to read. The eyedrops the Apothecary supplied are reversing the damage the wizards did, but there’s no way to know until the treatment is complete how much of my sight I’ll regain. I can get around on my own in a familiar place, but I’m not sure my eyes will ever be good enough to travel alone the way I used to.”

  “How far along in the treatment are you?”

  “About two-thirds. Yesterday Zhahar said there was a third of the bottle of eyedrops left.”

  “Can’t the Apothecary make more of the eyedrops?”

  “I’ll ask, but he told Zeela that what can be restored of my sight will happen in the time it takes to use up that bottle.”

  Sebastian sighed. “Then we’ll hope for the best.” He gave Lee a strained smile. “And I hope you and Glorianna work things out so you can spend time in her landscapes again. Lynnea and I would like the baby to know Uncle Lee.”

  “What…? Baby?” He gave Sebastian a bruising hug and laughed. Then he released his cousin and slipped the dark glasses back on—and felt awkward, almost shy. “We’ll work things out. Maybe not having one kind of sight has helped me see a few things.”

  “Then let’s get back to it.”

  They joined the Knife, mounted the horses, and rode back to the camp.

  *I think Sholeh should handle this,* Zhahar said as she followed Glorianna to a piece of ground that didn’t look any different from the rest. Medusah also followed, but stayed back far enough to indicate that the a Zhahar Tryad was expected to take the lead.

  ::Me? Why?:: Sholeh sounded surprised—and thrilled.

  *You’re the one who was learning about Vision and different races in Ephemera, so you have a better chance of understanding what Glorianna is doing.*

  =And you’re more likely to know what questions to ask,= Zeela added.

  Sholeh came into view and watched Glorianna walk back and forth. She wanted to learn, to know about so many things, but it wasn’t easy to ask questions anymore when the asking felt so formal. Before she had been dismissed from the school in Vision, some of the instructors had implied—or said outright—that her lack of intellect wasted time they could spend on more deserving students. Even the ones who didn’t think her stupid were curt because she missed classes. Those things hadn’t diminished her desire to learn, but they had made it harder to approach people—something neither Zeela nor Zhahar would understand.

  Before Zeela and Zhahar realized something was wrong—or worse, before the a Zephyra Tryad realized something was wrong—Sholeh blurted out, “What are you doing?”

  “Waiting for you to ask me what I’m doing,” Glorianna replied with a smile.

  Stunned, Sholeh looked into Glorianna’s eyes.

  The heart has no secrets. She’d heard those words when Lee and Glorianna were fighting in the mud, but she hadn’t considered the significance of those words.

  Glorianna knew. Sholeh wasn’t sure how she knew, but Glorianna knew why she was hesitant to ask questions.

  “Borders and boundaries,” Glorianna said. “A boundary is a place that connects two landscapes that belong to the same Landscaper or connects landscapes that resonate with each other but belong to different Landscapers. Those require a bridge in order to cross between one part of Ephemera to the other. Borders are places that connect two landscapes that belong to one Landscaper and that resonate with each other. No bridge is needed.” She gave Sholeh a considering look. “Until we have a chance to discuss what challenges your people may face when crossing a bridge, having a border is the safer choice. Limits where you can go, but my sense is what you need first is a solid connection to another part of Ephemera.”

  Sholeh nodded, struggling to sort through all the words. “Borders,” “boundaries,” “landscapes,” “bridges.” Common words that had uncommon meanings. Lee had talked about these things, but talking about them wasn’t the same as seeing physical things appear and disappear just because someone spoke a few words.

  “Give it time,” Glorianna said. “It will make sense. Right now, some decisions need to be made.”

  “I—” Sholeh looked back at Medusah, who didn’t step forward. “What kind of decisions?”

  Glorianna wagged a finger in a “come here” movement. When Sholeh stood beside her, she pointed at the ground. “This is one end of the border. You stay there.” She took several long steps, then pointed again. “This is the other end. Which means this one is wide enough to accommodate a wagon.”

  “Aren’t all of them?” Sholeh asked.

  Glorianna shook her head. “Some are narrow enough that only a person on foot or horseback could use them. Even some bridges are nothing more than a couple of planks over a stream—sturdy enough for a person and maybe a horse or cow. How two landscapes connect depends on a lot of things. This”—she moved her finger to indicate the space between herself and Sholeh—“needs to be identified in some way so that people who want to find it can, and people who aren’t intending to cross over don’t find themselves in a strange place.”

  Sholeh looked at the ground. “How?”

  “At some borders, we use cairns to indicate the spot without calling too much attention to it. The border between the Merry Makers and the Den uses Sentinel Stones because those are common in Elandar, even if they usually indicate a resonating bridge. What we want here is something that would have significance to your people.”

  “A triangle of stone,” Sholeh said without thinking. Then she winced. The Tryad had needed to be careful about how much one-faced people knew about them, and they used the triangle for so many kinds of secret communications.

  Glorianna thought for a moment, then nodded and said quietly, “Ephemera.”

  Two triangles of rough-hewn stone rose out of the ground. The base of the one next to Glorianna faced them. The one next to Sholeh showed the point.

  “Coming and going,” Glorianna said, sounding pleased as she examined her triangle. “Walk around to this side and take a look. Around, not between.”

  Sholeh jerked to a stop. Or, more accurately, Zeela jerked to a stop, preventing them from darting between the triangles.

  “Between is the border,” Glorianna said sternly. “And no one walks through it until I do.”

  Blinking back tears, and self-conscious because she’d been reprimanded in front of Medusah, Sholeh scurried around the triangle.

  “Do you see?” Glorianna pointed as if nothing had happened. “The triangles point in opposite directions. That’s good.”

  “We’re still in Tryadnea,” Sholeh said, noticing how Medusah warily came around the stone to join them.

  “And that’s how it should be,” Glorianna said. “You’ll remain in your own land unless you walk between the stones.” Now she looked at Medusah. “You should come with us, since there are decisions that will have to be made for your people. You may want to leave some guards here until you have time to explain what this is and what it does.”

  “We’re still not sure what it does,” Medusah said.

  “The first time you cross over, you’ll understand.” Glorianna walked around the stones and raised a hand to the three riders. “And it looks like it�
�s time to confirm what’s on the other side of the border.”

  Chapter 24

  Lee itched to cross that border and find out what was taking Glorianna and Sebastian so long to confirm that Ephemera had connected Tryadnea to the Den, but he waited with the others.

  He wanted to go home, was ready to go home. He yearned for the familiar landscapes he’d wanted to leave a few months ago. He wanted to spend time with his mother, even wanted to talk to that ripe bastard Michael. And he wanted to talk to Yoshani about the truths he’d seen about himself in the past few days.

  He wanted those things. At least for a while. And all that separated him from those things were a couple of steps across a border.

  The Knife and the Apothecary stepped up to him.

  “Does it usually take this long to make a connection?” the Knife asked quietly, glancing over to where Zhahar was talking with Morragen.

  Lee shook his head. “A border was made the instant two landscapes connected with each other.” And what is made in an instant can be broken just as quickly, he added silently. “None of us have dealt with a race like the Tryad, so Glorianna is taking extra care to be sure people won’t be harmed when they cross over.” He didn’t mention that this was the first landscape she’d brought into her garden since she tore her heart in half, and he suspected that was a good part of the reason she was taking so long to do something she’d been doing since she was fifteen. “And since this is the only place where Tryadnea is connected to the world, no one is going to be cavalier about securing it to the Den.”

  “What about us?” The Apothecary wagged a thumb to indicate himself and the Knife. “Will we be able to get back to Vision?”

  “I don’t know. But if it can be done, my family can do it.” He hadn’t considered how much skill that extended family had now, between Sebastian’s recently awakened power as a wizard and Michael’s different way of connecting with Ephemera, not to mention his mother’s and Caitlin Marie’s talents as Landscapers. And Glorianna Belladonna, Guide of the Heart.

  “Lee?”

  He turned to find Zhahar standing nearby. He smiled and held out a hand to her. She took his hand but didn’t return the smile.