Bridge of Dreams

Chapter 30

Anger burned in him, hot and fierce, until it consumed everything except itself.

Danyal slipped out of the building that housed visiting Shamans and other guests. Everyone else was asleep now, and in the deep hours of night, no one would notice his absence.

He understood now how the wizards and their hired weapons had changed shadow places into places too dark for the Shamans to see. They had spilled innocent blood, killed the young, the old, the ones who couldn’t defend themselves. One death creates a shadow. A dozen lives taken at the same time? Darkness.

Like shadows, darkness also came in many shades.

He put on his plain white robe. As a Shaman, he was the voice of the world.

The world had many voices.

Avalanche. Earthquake.

Danyal walked away from the buildings.

Hurricane. Tidal wave.

In the city of Vision, if you can find only what you can see, can you also see what you truly want to find, need to find?

“Ephemera,” he whispered. “It’s Voice-guide. I need your help.”

???

He closed his eyes and pictured the Asylum, pictured the open ground between the inmates’ residence and the reflecting pool. “I need to go back to the Asylum. I need to reach this place. Can you help me?”

He caught a whiff of stinkweed. “I know, but I have to go there.”

The smell got stronger. Danyal opened his eyes and saw a patch of sparse grass smeared with dark stains. He swallowed hard as he considered what he was about to embrace—and what he would have to leave behind.

Then he stepped onto the patch of sparse grass that was the temporary access point to the Asylum.

“Lee.” His name whispered, followed by a pause. “Lee!”

He could have—and would have—continued to ignore the whisper, but not the thump on the shoulder that followed.

“Daylight, Glorianna,” he muttered. “Why don’t you bother the Magician? You wouldn’t even have to get out of bed to do it.”

“He offered, but I need you,” she replied, giving his shoulder another thump.

Knowing a third thump from Glorianna would be hard enough to leave bruises, he propped himself up on one elbow. “What if I’d had company?”

“She could go back to sleep. You need to get up and come with me.”

“Where?”

“The Asylum.”

“That’s not a good idea. The wizards and Dark Guide might still be there.”

“If they aren’t there now, they will be.”

Some change in her voice told him he was no longer talking to Glorianna. “Why?”

“Voice of the world,” Belladonna said with a kind of dreamy viciousness that made Lee shiver. “Someone who speaks for the world touches the Dark as well as Light. In his fury over what happened at the Asylum, Danyal is reaching out to touch dark currents that shouldn’t be touched.”

“The Eater’s landscapes?”

“Belladonna’s landscape.”

Swearing, Lee flung the sheet aside and nudged her out of the way, glad he hadn’t stripped down completely when he dropped into bed earlier.

“Do you need help?” she asked.

He wasn’t sure if that was Belladonna or Glorianna asking, but the answer was the same. “At this point, I probably can find things in the dark better than you can.”

He could almost feel her annoyed shrug.

“All right, then. I’ll—” A thump.

“Glorianna?”

“I found the door.”

He shoved his feet into his shoes and rammed his arms into the short sleeves of a shirt. “Let’s go.”

“Glasses,” she said.

He patted the side table until he found the dark glasses. Slipping them into the shirt’s pocket, he joined her at the door.

They moved through the hallways quickly and quietly, not out of stealth but out of the habit of trying not to disturb other people.

Outside, Lee called to the island—and breathed a sigh of relief when he stretched out his hand and felt the familiar bark of one of the trees. Keeping one hand on the tree, he reached back with the other and stepped onto the island, bringing Glorianna with him.

“I’m not sure how to guide us to the Asylum,” he said. “My eyesight wasn’t good most of the time I was there.”

“Don’t see with your eyes, Bridge. See with your heart.”

He nodded to indicate he understood. Not the early days of his time at the Asylum, but those last few days when he walked the paths and had regained a measure of independence, when his Bridge’s gift had helped some inmates travel to the places their hearts called home.

At the last moment, just as he felt the island begin to resonate in a way that indicated it was about to shift, he hesitated—and the island remained within the Shaman’s compound.

“Are we going to the Asylum to stop Danyal from doing whatever he intended to do?”

“No,” Belladonna replied. Then Glorianna added, “We’re going to help him with what comes after whatever choice he made.”

The dead had been left out, exposed to heat, insects, and carrion eaters.

Inmates, Helpers, Handlers, Asylum guards and city guards, shadowmen from the assassins’ guild. Whoever had entered the grounds didn’t make it out again. But they weren’t alone. There were plenty of men among the dead who looked like hired Clubs, so despite their damn lightning, the fight hadn’t been completely in the wizards’ favor.

The inmates’ residence and the building where he and Benham had living quarters had been burned to the ground. The two-room temple was gone. Just gone. Danyal didn’t try to enter any of the buildings that were still standing. He wandered the paths, alone among the dead.

When he finally stopped walking, he took a position in front of the burned residence, no longer a man. Not even a Shaman. Now he was merely the forge that would shape the weapon.

No caution now. No timidity about what he was going to do.

Danyal raised his arms shoulder high, his palms turned skyward.

“Ephemera,” he said in a voice that carried a thousand storms. “The men who did this, who violated the trust of the damaged hearts who lived here. The men who darkened this place with pain and blood. Bring them to me. Bring all of them to me.”

His fury, burning so hot and fierce, must have scared the world, because the ground beyond him changed, and as a two-story house appeared, it tipped and settled awkwardly, one corner of its foundation missing. Moments later, a brothel appeared, its sign swinging madly as the ground under it turned to mud from the water spilling out of broken pipes. Moments after that, he heard a man’s vicious cursing as an outdoor privy appeared in the reflecting pool that now had more things fouling it than stagnant water.

While he waited, Danyal pictured the next step and thought, This. When I tell you, make this.

Ephemera didn’t answer.

The wizards Pugnos and Styks came out of the house first. A few Clubs came out of the brothel, and one from the privy. More wizards came out of the house—a dozen in all. Then the Dark Guide stepped out of the house. No hood to hide the inhuman face. Not anymore.

“Ah, so you did survive,” the Dark Guide said, smiling. “And now you’ve returned. Have you come to avenge the feeble, Shaman?”

“Yes,” Danyal replied, lowering his arms.

“Alone? Against us?”

He saw Pugnos and Styks rub their thumbs against their first two fingers, so he didn’t bother to answer. He just snarled, “Now.”

Thorn trees with sinuous limbs erupted out of the ground. The wizards didn’t have time to raise a hand against him before limbs coiled around them and lifted them off the ground. Long thorns pierced clothing and flesh, digging deeper as the coils tightened.

The Clubs thrashed and screamed. The wizards and Dark Guide unleashed their lightning against the trees. The trees screamed and the ends of the limbs sprouted bulbous pods that split open to reveal hundreds of sharp needles.

The pods hovered for a moment. Then they snapped closed over the heads of every man except the Dark Guide. Wizards and Clubs thrashed and screamed as the pods released digestive juices and began consuming the flesh on the faces of their prey.

“Shaman!” the Dark Guide howled. “Do you think you’ll be rid of us? You’ll never hide your city from all of us. Not ever again!”

“I know,” Danyal said. “Your kind may be able to find us, you may be able to enter our city, but you won’t make this place your own. We know you now.”

The Dark Guide smiled a terrible smile and said gently, “As long as you walk in this city, there will be dark places where malevolent hearts can hide.”

“But not your heart,” Danyal whispered as a pod split above the Dark Guide’s head.

Glorianna stood between the trees that marked the island’s path and tried to study the land beyond.

“You used to be better at this,” she finally said. “I don’t think we’re even close to the Asylum.”

Lee shouldered her to one side. “Well, daylight, Glorianna. It’s the middle of the damn night. Even if my eyesight was perfect, I still couldn’t see where we are. And it’s not like we want to set a lantern out there to see what might get curious about us.” He cocked his head, listening. “And I don’t think I’m that far off. The Asylum grounds had different areas.”

“So the vegetables we landed in on your first try…?”

“Could have been the home farm. They grow what they can, and it gives some of the inmates work and keeps them active.”

“And this?”

“Does that sound like a brook or stream to you?”

“Definitely water,” Glorianna agreed. “Could be a stream.”

“There was a stream at the farthest edge of where borderline inmates were allowed to walk without close supervision. There was a footbridge. I avoided it because I was afraid the bridge would respond to me and change into one that provided access to other landscapes.” Lee blew out a breath. “Ephemera is bringing the island as close as we can get to the buildings, isn’t it?”

“As close as you can get,” Glorianna said quietly.

He couldn’t see her in the dark, but he reached out and touched her hair. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means we’re probably close to that bridge, so I’ll take one of the shielded lanterns and walk the rest of the way to the grounds around the buildings.”

“No.” He shook his head. “No, you don’t go in alone this time.”

She linked her fingers with his. “I’m not going in to save the world this time, or even this city. I’m going in as a Guide of the Heart. To help Danyal. I don’t know if I’ll be coming back to the island with him or without him, but I’ll be coming back.”

“Do you promise?” Not a small question, because Glorianna Belladonna wouldn’t make a promise if there was any doubt in her mind that she could keep it.

“I promise.”

“Do we have any time?”

“A little.”

“Then I want one other promise.” His fingers tightened on hers, and it took effort to relax his hold instead of squeezing harder, holding on harder. “The Tryad have a way of merging aspects. Medusah has the ability to do that to someone.”

Glorianna nodded. “Yes, Zephyra mentioned it. She thought the Tryad’s magic might be able to put the Light and Dark halves of my heart back together so that I’ll always be Glorianna Belladonna instead of Glorianna or Belladonna.”

“Don’t do it.” He hadn’t meant to sound so harsh or so demanding.

She pulled her hands away from his. “I thought you, of all the family, would be anxious for me to try this.”

“A few months ago, I probably would have been—and I would have been wrong to want it. Was wrong to want it. You cast out the Light in your heart in order to trap the Eater of the World and the creatures and landscapes It made. You were split for months. And I’ve realized only recently that you are merging those two sides of your heart, using Michael’s music to weave them together. It will take time, and maybe there will always be distinct aspects that people will recognize as Belladonna or Glorianna, because they’ll feel that you’re standing more in the Dark or the Light. But you’re healing in your own way and in your own time, and when you’re done, you’ll be whole again.”

“But not the same,” she said quietly.

“Ever changing, like the world.”

“Why your change of heart?”

“Lots of reasons,” he replied. “The biggest being that I don’t trust Medusah right now. She doesn’t know you, and while her magic might be able to merge your aspects, it doesn’t mean you’ll be whole.” He hesitated. “And she’s not happy with you at the moment, so I don’t want her messing around in your head or your heart.”

“Why is she annoyed with me?”

“Because I helped Zhahar ask for Heart’s Justice instead of accepting the Tryad’s punishment for loving a man of single aspect.”

“Lee!”

He stared at her. He thought about fetching one of the lanterns, but if the light was bright enough for him to see her face, he’d end up wearing the damn glasses to cut the light and wouldn’t be able to see her anyway. At least they were both in the dark this way.

“If Zhahar and I had become lovers, the only way Tryad law would allow her to remain with me is if her sisters were merged into her. One body. One face. Two people trapped inside and unable to experience the world except vicariously through her—if any part of them survived at all. They say it’s a merging, but the end result is the death of two of the sisters, with the remaining sister looking at that one surviving face for the rest of her life. What kind of life could she have? What kind of relationship could she build?”

“But asking for Heart’s Justice,” Glorianna protested.

“Zhahar doesn’t deserve that punishment. Neither do Zeela and Sholeh. And I don’t think this has much to do with Zhahar or me, but it does seem like someone wants to use us as an excuse to strike at the a Zephyra Tryad’s authority. ‘Prove you’re our leader. Kill your daughters.’”

Glorianna said nothing, just stood looking out over the land beyond the island. Finally, she asked softly, “What do you want for Sholeh Zeela a Zhahar, Lee? What are you hoping Heart’s Justice will do?”

“I’m hoping it will give them a chance to have a life in a place where they can be accepted as Tryad and still explore choices that their people aren’t ready or willing to accept. They were changed by their exposure to the city of Vision and by working at the Asylum. By meeting Danyal and me. I want Zhahar and her sisters to find the place they were meant to be.”

“Even if it’s not with you?”

The question made his heart ache. “Yes. Even if it’s not with me.”

Glorianna sighed. “All right. That’s a problem for another day. It’s time for me to find Danyal.”

“I’ll fetch the lantern.”

As he made his way to the shed to fetch the lantern, he wondered what Glorianna expected to find that she didn’t want him to see.

The living fruit struggled a while longer. Danyal watched them, feeling nothing but a heavy satisfaction. Some part of him knew that feeling meant he was in danger, but he couldn’t bring himself to care.

Then something shimmered through the currents of Light—and something far darker than the darkness he’d found in his own heart slid through the Dark currents as she suddenly appeared.

She looked at the thorn trees and their fruit, then looked at him—and smiled.

“It’s easy to become a monster, isn’t it?” Belladonna said. “So easy to become the terrible and sublime when you can give shape to every dark dream the human heart has ever known. Fear can be a seductive kind of worship, and when you can do anything, it’s hard to demand that the monster go back to the can’t-do-it rules everyone else lives by.”

Danyal turned his back on the thorn trees to look at her. “You did it. You turned away.”

“I do it,” she corrected. “I could find that landscape again, that place Belladonna ruled.” She lifted her chin to indicate the thorn trees. “Just as you found a piece of it tonight. The memories of people I loved, people I had cast out of my heart in order to survive in that landscape, gave me a way to return to the Light. But I remember what it felt like to be everything, do anything. I remember, and every day I choose not to do the things I did in that place. Every day I choose not to let the monster walk in the landscapes that are in my keeping. Every day I choose to hold on to both Glorianna and Belladonna, to stay among the people I love and who love me. I choose, Danyal. Every single day. And now that you’ve had a taste of what you can do with your connection to the world and what you might become if you allow yourself, you will also have to choose—every single day.”

“Have I forfeited the Light?” he asked, looking back at the thorn trees.

“Some pieces of it,” Glorianna replied. “Not all of it. You didn’t cast it out; just smothered it for a little while. I don’t think you’ll be able to find the Place of Light in the Shamans’ compound, but you can still walk in Sanctuary.”

His heart hurt from the relief her words gave him.

“I need a teacher,” he said softly. “I need a Guide to help me learn what I’m becoming.”

“I know,” she replied just as softly. “Let your heart travel lightly, Danyal. Right here, right now, let your heart travel lightly.”

He closed his eyes and used his training to empty his mind and heart of all the fury, all the dark thoughts.

Who was he now? A voice for the world. A Shaman. But those things didn’t mean the same thing as they had a few months ago. Who was he now—and what could he become that would help the people whose lives he touched?

“Well,” Glorianna said with a soft laugh, “not so far from the Light after all.”

Danyal opened his eyes and looked around. The Asylum’s dead were still all around them, but the thorn trees and their terrible fruit were gone. So were the brothel, the house held by the wizards, and the privy.

And something now glowed where the temple had been.

“Wind chimes,” he whispered, moving toward the glow. “I hear wind chimes.” Joy.

As he and Glorianna approached the small building, the chimes rang louder, almost changing to something harsh.

“Nik?” he called. “Benham? Are you in there?”

The door cracked open. “Danyal?” Benham said. “Is that you?”

He laughed, his heart soaring with relief. “Yes, it’s me.”

He passed through the glow as Benham pulled open the door. But the Meddik looked past him and stiffened.

“Fog hides,” Glorianna said softly, stepping up beside Danyal. “The people in here don’t need to see what is out there.”

He looked at Benham and nodded. Benham stepped back from the door. Danyal started to move aside to let Glorianna enter first, but she put a hand on his back and pushed him forward as she said, “They’re your people.”

Eight inmates, plus Benham and Nik, whose left arm was in a sling. The inmates bobbed their heads at him but stayed on the other side of the room as he, Glorianna, Benham, and Nik formed a tight circle.

“We were just leaving the temple when Nik rushed up to warn us,” Benham said, keeping his voice low. “Nik was sliced in the arm while defending the door until I got everyone back inside. It was the strangest thing. The door shouldn’t have held, but a couple inmates grabbed up wind chimes and began ringing them, and it was like this building went away from the fighting.”

A queer shiver rushed down Danyal’s spine.

“You saw the glow when you came up?” Benham asked. “That’s all we saw. Then it began to fade and someone tried to break down the door, so we all grabbed wind chimes and rang them.”

“Joy,” Glorianna said. “Dark hearts couldn’t see a place filled with the Light released through joy.”

“Odd things happened,” Benham said. “The glow gave us a little ground all around the building. Enough to make a toilet outside. And the other day, when we were feeling desperate for water, pails of fresh water appeared outside the door.”

Danyal glanced at Glorianna, who tipped her head in the briefest nod, confirming his suspicion that the pails would be the ones Racket had reported missing from the Shamans’ compound.

“We need to leave, Danyal,” Glorianna said.

Nik and Benham looked as alarmed as he felt. “We can’t leave them here.”

She huffed. “Of course not. We’ll gather up the wind chimes and any lanterns you might have in here. Lee’s waiting for us on the island. We’ll take everyone back to the Shamans’ compound and figure out the rest later.” She turned toward the door, then said over her shoulder, “You might want to bring some of the pails back too.”

Glorianna led the way, holding her lantern high as a beacon. They found two other lanterns that had a bit of oil left. It wasn’t much light, but it was enough. The inmates each carried a wind chime and filled the dark with their sound.

As Glorianna reached the footbridge, another lantern suddenly appeared and was lowered to the ground.

“Hey-a,” Lee called.

Murmurs, both happy and tearful, as Lee helped each person step onto the island.

Danyal, as the last one, hesitated and looked back. Lee and Glorianna stepped off the island.

“Problem?” Lee asked.

He shook his head. “That little temple. I don’t think I’ll miss anything else about the Asylum’s grounds or buildings, but I’ll be sorry to lose the little temple.”

He felt Glorianna staring at him before she looked at Lee.

“Does the building have water pipes or anything else that would cause a problem?”

“I never saw any,” he said blandly.

“You’re no help. Danyal? Does the building have any attachments?”

“No. It was just a simple building. No water, no drains.”

“In that case…” she said. “Ephemera?”

???

“The little building Voice-guide uses to help the hearts. I want you to shift it to Voice-guide’s playground. Just the building, not any of the land. Do you understand?”

yes yes yes

“Wait a minute,” Lee said. “You’re encouraging the world to take buildings now? You’re going to let it start rearranging villages? If neighbors are quarreling, they’ll wake up one morning and find their houses on opposite ends of the street?”

“Ephemera knows better than to shift a building in any of my landscapes without my permission,” Glorianna said sweetly. “What the two of you let the world get away with here in Vision is up to you.” She stepped up on the island and disappeared from view.

It took Danyal a moment to realize his mouth was hanging open.

“What just happened?” he finally asked.

Lee sighed and guided him onto the island. “The world has been given a new toy, and you and I are in charge of supervising playtime.”