Sebastian e-1 Read online

  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.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “That’s enough,” Glorianna said. As she reached for the papers her brother held, she noticed his hands trembled from exhaustion. “Lee, that’s enough.”

  He pulled the papers toward him, his fingers tightening convulsively. “There are so many,” he muttered as he stared at the papers that held the careful notations of every bridge he’d created over the y
ears, as well as the location of bridges other Bridges had formed that provided access to one of Glorianna’s or Nadia’s landscapes. “With the other landscapes unprotected, there are so many ways the Eater of the World can—”

  “Enough.” She laid her hands over his. Doubt could form heavy chains around the mind, making each decision weigh so much, no decision, no action would be taken for fear it was the wrong one. She could see him bending from the responsibility he now carried. With the weight of doubt added to the burden, she worried he might break under the strain. “Did you or did you not break the stationary bridges between Sanctuary and the landscapes in this part of Ephemera?”

  Lee nodded. “Except the ones that connect with landscapes controlled by you or Mother.”

  “And did you not break the stationary bridges that would provide a way into Mother’s landscapes from Wizard City or the Landscapers’ School?” She waited for him to nod again. “And you broke the stationary bridges that would lead to the Den from any place but my landscapes.”

  He flinched, which made her narrow her eyes.

  “There’s the bridge in the woods by Mother’s house that crosses over from the Den to Aurora,” he said.

  “That one stays. If something happens at home and Mother is blocked from reaching Sanctuary, I want her to be able to reach Sebastian.” She studied her brother. “What else?”

  “I…connected one of Mother’s landscapes to the Den. There was a stationary bridge in that landscape that led to Wizard City. When I broke the connection between those two landscapes, I felt a…hole, an emptiness that needed to be filled, but none of the landscapes I would have normally connected with that one felt right, so I had to leave it. Then, when I went to the Den to change the resonating bridge into a stationary one…something in those two landscapes resonated so strongly with each other, my presence was enough of a conduit to make a connection. Took a fair amount of stubbornness on my part to hold them apart long enough to link them properly.”

  “Then it was meant,” Glorianna said. Before he guessed her intention, she pulled the papers out of his hands, tapped them into a neat stack, and put them in the document box Jeb had made for Lee a few years ago. She took the box to the desk and set it in the bottom drawer. After locking the drawer, she slipped the key’s chain over her head and tucked it into her shirt.

  This suite of rooms in the guesthouse at Sanctuary was the closest thing Lee had to a home of his own. Oh, he had a sitting room and bedroom in her house on the island, and his bedroom at their mother’s house, but that wasn’t the same as having his own place.

  He was twenty-eight and had never had a sweetheart. Because of her. Not that he’d ever admit that, but she knew whatever liaisons he enjoyed were kept casual because he hadn’t trusted those women enough to expose his strong connection with his sister, the rogue Landscaper.

  It made her sad. He should have a wife to come home to, children to play with. He wanted those things. She knew he did. After all, no heart held secrets from Glorianna Belladonna.

  But sadness and doubt weren’t what he needed from her right now, so she held out her hand and said, “Let’s take a walk.”

  He gave her a weary smile. “Do you know how many miles I’ve walked in the past few days?”

  “You should rent a horse when you can.”

  He just grunted, pushed himself to his feet, and took her hand. “A short walk.”

  She led him through the gardens and felt him begin to relax when he realized where she was taking him.

  Lee might not have a home, but he did have a place of his own.

  A stream separated the gardens from the open land beyond. Two bridges spanned the water at different points to provide access to the countryside. A third bridge went to a small island that had been formed by the stream splitting around that rough circle of land. Trees guarded the circle of stone that sheltered the heart of that small place.

  No flowers bloomed here. This was the silence, the peace at the heart of a wood. Ferns grew in the dappled light, and in the center was the fountain—a bowl of black stone that was fed by a length of hollowed-out cane. The mechanics of bringing water from the stream to the fountain were cleverly hidden, just as the drainage pipe that gave the water back to the stream was cleverly hidden. A bench provided an invitation to sit and linger, to listen to the song of water and stone, to breathe in the green of silence.

  The people from the various Places of Light that made up Sanctuary had helped her build this place as a private sanctuary, but the little island had resonated with Lee from the moment he’d set foot within the stone circle.

  And it was this place he could impose over any other landscape. A safe place because, when he shifted it, it existed nowhere except on the bridge of his will and yet was still rooted in Sanctuary. He could walk among the trees and see what lay beyond, but another person’s eyes couldn’t see the island. Only the right kind of heart could find it when it was imposed over another landscape.

  They settled on the bench and, for a while, did nothing but listen to the water and breathe in the green of silence.

  Finally Glorianna said, “For today, you’ll eat and rest. Tomorrow we’ll go to my island and walk through the gardens, and we’ll consider how to protect what we can of Ephemera.”

  Lee got up and took a few steps away from the bench. “And what if the Eater of the World finds a way into these landscapes through a stationary bridge I missed somewhere along the way? Or through a resonating bridge in a landscape I can’t reach?”

  “Then we’ll deal with it.”

  “You mean you’ll deal with it. That’s what it comes down to, doesn’t it?”

  It did, but he already sounded troubled, and she wasn’t going to let him chew on blame that was undeserved.

  She walked over to him and placed a hand on his cheek. “We’ll take each day as it comes, and if we can’t destroy the Eater of the World, we’ll find a way to close It back into Its own landscapes.”

  He placed his hands on her shoulders. “Will you promise to keep yourself safe?”

  “I don’t make promises if I’m not sure I can keep them.”

  His eyes were bleak as he wrapped his arms around her. “I know. That’s why I hoped you could give me that promise.”

  Hand in hand, Sebastian and Lynnea left the bordello and strolled down to Philo’s.

  He missed his cottage, missed making koffee for himself when he woke up, missed cooking a simple meal he could eat in private.

  “We could get a meal at the bordello if you’d prefer,” Sebastian said.

  “If you’d wanted to do that, you would have mentioned it sooner,” Lynnea replied.

  He shrugged. Meals at the bordello had been another way of trolling or were part of the seduction. He’d done plenty of trolling at Philo’s, too, but he’d also sat at one of those tables just to while away some time talking to people, so he felt more comfortable being there with Lynnea.

  “It’s a delicious night, isn’t it?” Lynnea said, smiling.

  He wished she wouldn’t use words like “delicious.” A quick glance at her was enough to make him want to lick his chops and start nibbling. “You’re bright and cheerful.”

  “I had a dream last night that…Well. Hmm.”

  I know. That dream had churned him up so much he’d gotten up to take a cold bath to cool the fever in his blood. Daylight! Why couldn’t he just give in? Resisting his own libido was hard enough—especially when he’d never felt the need to resist it before—but resisting hers was going to kill him. He’d never had this problem with any other woman.

  She’s not just another woman.

  Lynnea stopped and looked up at the sky. “There’s no moon.”

  “It will rise later.”

  “Will it?” She cocked her head. “I wonder if that means it’s day in the other landscapes.”

  He shrugged. “It’s always night here, so it makes no difference.” But it did. The endless night had delighted the youth he had bee
n—and wearied the man he now was.

  “It might make a difference,” Lynnea said. “If the moon rises and sets, that means it follows the same rhythm as it does in the rest of the landscapes. So when it’s not in the sky, most likely it’s daytime in other places.”

  “You mean it’s morning outside the Den?”

  Lynnea breathed in slowly, then shook her head. “The air doesn’t have that early-morning quality of being fresh and cool before the sun bakes the land.”

  Sebastian released Lynnea’s hand, then draped an arm around her shoulders to nudge her into walking again. “You should explain this moon rising and setting to Philo.”

  “Why?”

  “Might give him a reason to serve different dishes at different times. Just for variety. Not that he doesn’t have variety, but—”

  “Is that your way of saying you want bacon and eggs?”

  “And biscuits.” Nadia hadn’t made biscuits when he and Lynnea had shown up unexpectedly, but he relished the treat whenever Glorianna or Lee left a few of them at the cottage for him. Fresh, sometimes still a little warm, slathered with butter or fruit jam…

  “Why are you licking your lips like that?” Lynnea asked.

  “What? I’m not.” At least, he hoped he hadn’t been.

  “If you want bacon and eggs, I’ll make them for you. If Philo has bacon and eggs.”

  Sebastian snorted. “Philo doesn’t let anyone else in his kitchen.”

  “Want to bet on it?”

  There was a sparkle in her eyes and a hint of a smug female smile curving her lips. “Have you already talked Philo into using the kitchen?”

  “I have not. It wouldn’t be proper to wager if I already knew the outcome.”

  “That’s usually called having an ace up your sleeve,” he muttered.

  “So you’re not going to bet?”

  “Not in this lifetime.”