Anne Bishop - Bridge of Dreams

He’d said he would let Zhahar go, would get out of her life. But some part of him must have hoped that he wouldn’t have to mean it. Now…

“How did Michael let you go?” he asked.

“You would have to ask him,” she replied.

“What should I do?”

She kissed his cheek. “Go back to Vision. Start setting up that school with Danyal. Help him deal with the playground and make up a list of rules.”

Lee made a face. “Like ‘Don’t move the temple when someone is inside it’?”

“That’s a good rule. Make sure the two of you enforce it.”

He wasn’t sure how they were supposed to do that, but Glorianna wouldn’t be interested in excuses. “I suppose I should see about making a stationary bridge or two, since you’ll be traveling to the school a couple of times a week.”

She hesitated. “For now, let’s plan to meet in Sanctuary. We can use the island to travel back to Vision.”

“Yeah. Okay.” He tried to resist the words, but they wouldn’t be held back. “I guess I was ready to love someone, and it felt right with Zhahar. Maybe I couldn’t have handled the intimate details of living with someone as unique as her, but I wish we’d had a chance to try.”

“I know.” She kissed his cheek again. “Travel lightly, Lee.”

“Travel lightly, Glorianna Belladonna.”

He waited a few minutes after she left, telling himself it was to be sure Michael wasn’t coming back with a message, or his mother didn’t want to have a quick chat.

When he finally admitted that he wasn’t going to get a glimpse of any aspect of Sholeh Zeela a Zhahar, he sighed, hoping to ease the ache in his chest. Then he shifted the island to the city of Vision and the new life waiting for him there.

Zhahar sat in the dining room of Nadia’s house, cupping a mug of peppermint tea. The day was pleasantly warm—perfect autumnal weather—but she felt cold inside. So cold. As if she would never thaw.

::I’m scared,:: Sholeh said.

*So am I,* Zhahar replied.

=We’re all scared,= Zeela added.

::What’s going to happen? Why won’t anyone tell us?::

*No one is supposed to tell us about Heart’s Justice until Glorianna returns.* And why is that? Zhahar wondered. Lee had sounded urgent when he’d told her how to ask for it. Why hadn’t any of them noticed how he’d avoided telling her what it was or what it would do? Now no one would speak of it.

The dining room door opened. Zephyra slipped inside the room and sat across from her.

“Glorianna has returned,” Zephyra said quietly, urgently. “She’s talking to Nadia and will be here in another minute. Zhahar, ask to be released from this Heart’s Justice. Come back to Tryadnea with me.”

“To be merged because I dared to love someone who wasn’t Tryad?” Zhahar asked bitterly. “Glorianna said we couldn’t get back to Tryadnea now, and we wouldn’t go back even if I could. Zeela wasn’t the only one who wished the border would break and leave us here. We all wanted it. Even Sholeh.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the door open a crack—just enough for someone on the other side to hear what was being said.

Let them listen.

“That’s the trap, isn’t it?” she said. “In order to keep Tryadnea sufficiently connected to another piece of Ephemera, the ones sent into the one-face lands have to make an effort to live there, build a life there , until we’re exposed for what we are and have to run to avoid being locked up or killed. ‘Make friends,’ we’re told, ‘but don’t let them get too close. Find work, because that hooks you in a little deeper to that place. Be a good citizen but never forget your true loyalty.’”

Zephyra looked devastated by her words, so Morragen came into view.

“Hundreds before you have made the same sacrifice for our people and our land,” Morragen said. “Including me and my sisters.”

The Morragen aspect had always intimidated her, just as the Medusah aspect had frightened her, but Zhahar was glad it was no longer Zephyra in view. It made it easier to hold on to a hard truth when she wasn’t speaking to the aspect whose heart was breaking right now.

“You tell the Tryads who do this work that it is important work, valuable work, vital work.”

“And it is.”

“But you never tell them that making a real connection to a one-face land will change them, damage them. Because they will make friends, or begin to care about the people they work with, or fall in love. Tryadnea will no longer have their complete loyalty—until they are revealed for what they are. Until they are betrayed so they have to come home.”

Betrayed. Yes, there was truth in that word.

“You will not speak of this,” Morragen warned, her voice turned to ice.

“The leader can’t be the betrayer. That would tear the Tryad apart. But someone else? Someone who is the living proof of what it costs to love outside our own kind? How many ears within the governing circle hear her whispers?”

“Zhahar, don’t.” Zephyra came back into view, tears spilling down her face. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“Perhaps not,” Zhahar conceded. “Your mothers and Allone were rivals for the leadership of Tryadnea before she gave up her sisters in order to love a one-face man.”

“Who left her as soon as it was done,” Zephyra said. “She became a one-face and was no longer considered for the leadership. But she was always on the fringes of the governing circle, always pointing out the dangers of getting too close to anyone who wasn’t Tryad.”

::Tell her,:: Sholeh urged.

“When you get back to the capital city, you should go to the archives and check some of the family lines. There might be a reason Allone is as persuasive as she is.”

Medusah came into view, but before she could respond, Glorianna walked into the room. Or was it Belladonna?

Zhahar’s hands tightened around the mug. She couldn’t release it until Zeela loaned her the strength to let go.

“Now,” Glorianna said as she took a seat at the head of the table. “Heart’s Justice.”

Morragen came into view. “That isn’t necessary. The a Zhahar Tryad can return with us to Tryadnea.”

“I thought I’d made it clear that their returning to Tryadnea was no longer possible,” Belladonna said with an icy sweetness that made Zhahar shiver. “No. Zhahar and her sisters asked for Heart’s Justice, and that is what they will have.”

“As leader of the Tryad people, we must be the judge of that!” Morragen shouted.

“Not this time. Minor wrongdoing and disputes between people are settled through common justice, and the decisions are made by magistrates,” Belladonna said. “Until we learned the nature of the wizards and where they came from, acts of violence were punished through Wizards’ Justice, and the penalty was usually death by wizards’ lightning. But when someone’s actions require more than common justice but don’t deserve death, a Landscaper is called to perform Heart’s Justice.” She looked at Zhahar. “Heart’s Justice will forge a direct link between you and Ephemera, and you will be sent to the darkest landscape that resonates with your heart. It will be done tomorrow, at sunrise.” Now she looked at Morragen. “You will return to Tryadnea now .”

“No!” Zephyra pushed into view. “We’re going to stay and support our daughters!”

“You don’t want the same thing they do. All you’ll do now is confuse their hearts. Wait for me outside.”

“We are the leader of the Tryad,” Morragen Medusah a Zephyra said as they rose. “Who are you to speak to us that way?”