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.
As he made his way to the back of the courtyard, he wondered if failure, in this case, equaled success. He hadn’t seen any sign of rust-colored sand, hadn’t spotted any pools of water that were located in places they didn’t belong. He’d made note of any physical bridges, but he hadn’t crossed over any of them—and wouldn’t until he’d talked to Lee and found out which of them his cousin had created.
At least he’d managed to find residents of some of the dark landscapes that bordered the Den and warn them about the creatures that might prey on them. They would spread the word among their own.
He’d done all he could do for now, so it was time to take something for himself. He needed to feel the warmth of her presence, feel the sound of her voice wash over his skin. Just needed to be with her. That, in itself, was a wonder to him. He wanted sex. Of course he did. But that wasn’t all he wanted, wasn’t all he needed.
She dreamed of him at night, and he found the lure of those dreams irresistible. But it was like being given a taste of a banquet, then having the door shut in his face before he could feast. Problem was, he had a nagging feeling that if he pushed the door open instead of waiting to be invited into her dreams, the very best of that banquet would disappear and he’d never quite know what he’d missed.
But those were thoughts for another time. Right now, a full belly held more appeal than a hot bed—which, for an incubus, was a sad state of affairs.
Finding Lynnea turned out to be easy. Getting to her was a different matter. As he pushed his way through the crowd gathered around the table, he heard Mr. Finch say, “They fit, and they’re both blue, but not the same blue. This one is sky, I think, and this one…water? Philo, can’t we have more light?”
He heard Lynnea say, “Teaser! You’re doing it wrong.”
And Teaser replying, “The pieces fit.”
Lynnea, sounding exasperated, “But they aren’t the right colors. They’re just a jumble.”
That was when he nudged himself into the space between Teaser’s chair and Mr. Finch’s and got a look at the table—and felt a jolt go through his body.
Then Teaser said, “All right, then. I’ll do it proper,” and reached out to break apart the puzzle pieces that fit but didn’t belong together.
Without thought, simply reacting to churning emotions, Sebastian reached out and clamped a hand around Teaser’s wrist. Ignoring the other incubus’s startled yelp, he stared at the table. Even Lynnea’s delighted greeting couldn’t pull his focus away from the scattered pieces of painted wood—especially the pieces that had been put together again.
“It’s Ephemera,” he said quietly. Everyone around him became silent, waiting. “It’s like Ephemera, in the old stories.” In that moment he was a child again, sitting at the kitchen table with Glorianna and Lee, listening to Aunt Nadia tell the story of why Ephemera was the way it was.
“The world was whole once.” Releasing Teaser’s wrist, he moved his hand above the table to indicate all the pieces of wood. “Different lands, different people, but all of it connected. Then the Eater of the World came along. It had the ability to reshape pieces of the world, making them more attuned to the dark feelings in the human heart. It could take a person’s deepest, darkest fears and use those feelings to change creatures that were part of the natural world into something terrible. Something that would then prey on humans.”
Sebastian picked up Teaser’s glass and drained the last inch of ale to ease the dryness in his throat. Setting the glass down on the table, he continued the story. “It roamed the world, and as people drowned in despair, the world changed to become a reflection of their hearts. Fertile land turned into deserts, and the people suffered even more.
“In a desperate act of love for Ephemera and its people, the Guides of the Heart shattered the world, then shattered those pieces into more pieces.” Sebastian separated the pieces of the puzzle Mr. Finch had put together, spreading them out just enough so they no longer touched. “Finally, those who stood for the Light contained the Eater of the World in one small piece. There they fought, Light against Dark, driving the Eater to the place they’d chosen for a trap. Furious, It drew all the landscapes It had created to that place so that the creatures It had created would help It fight.
“And that’s when the Guides sprang the trap. They poured their power into stone and created a cage that locked the Eater of the World inside Its own landscapes.
“Ephemera was saved, but it remained a world of shattered landscapes.”
“Why didn’t they put Ephemera back together?” Teaser asked.
Sebastian stared at the puzzle. He’d lived with the nature of Ephemera all his life, had felt the frustration, like everyone else, of finding a different landscape once and never being able to find it again, even when he walked the same path, crossed over the same bridge. Sometimes a person could be certain only of where he was—and sometimes there wasn’t even that much certainty.
“The Guardians of the Light closed themselves away from the human world and the Guides disappeared, no longer able to walk in this world,” he said. “The Landscapers and Bridges who came after them were able to stabilize Ephemera enough to stop it from manifesting every emotion, but they couldn’t put the world back together.”
He nudged the puzzle pieces he’d separated until they were close together but still not fully connected. “Different landscapes resonated for each of them, so those were the ones each Landscaper took under her control and care, while the Bridges found a way to provide a link between the landscapes so that people weren’t trapped in one small piece of the world.”
Philo rubbed his chin. “It’s true that the landscapes held by a Landscaper have the same feel, for good or bad. If you get stuck in a place where your heart doesn’t feel easy, your life never feels easy, whether you become prosperous or not.”
Sebastian nodded. “And if you find the place where you belong, you can weather the hardships as well as the good times—because life will give you both.”
“What’s this, then?” Teaser waved a hand over his jumble of pieces. “You can’t have a jumble of landscapes like this.”
Sebastian felt that jolt again. “Yes, you can. Those are Belladonna’s landscapes.”
People had begun whispering among themselves, but that statement produced another wave of silence.
Seeing things Lee had said to him mirrored now in a simple human amusement, Sebastian placed his thumb on one of the dark pieces. “She brought some of Ephemera’s dark landscapes together”—he stretched his hand and rested a finger on the bright blue piece of sky—“and she brought together places of Light. In between are the landscapes that are a bit of both. Neither dark or light, just…human. The human landscapes stand between us, but the Den and Sanctuary are connected. Because of her. Which means we each have something to offer the world.” And if one is lost, the other won’t survive.
“Enough stories,” he said, easing between the people and the table to reach Lynnea. When she started to rise, he rested a hand on her shoulder. “No, sit. Finish the puzzle. I’d like to see it finished.”
“That’s enough now,” Philo said, making shooing motions at the crowd. “That’s enough. Find a chair for Sebastian so he can sit with his lady and have something to eat.”
A chair was found, the crowd dispersed to fill the other tables, and Philo brought him a bowl of stew and pieces of bread.
As he watched Lynnea, Teaser, and Mr. Finch put the puzzle together, Sebastian couldn’t shake the feeling that he was watching a promise being made—the promise that, someday, Ephemera would be whole again.