Anne Bishop - Belladonna

“Luck-bringer,” the Heart of the Bog said, watching Michael. “Ill-wisher.”

“I have never wished ill on your people,” Michael replied.

“No, you have not.” A pause. “You appear without warning, deep in our piece of the world, at a time when nothing should be able to cross over into the protected dark places.”

Protected? Michael wondered. By who?

A lovely face once again filled his mind, and he was very much afraid he knew the answer.

“Why are you here, Magician?”

His life hinged on what he said next. He knew it; they knew it. So he listened to his heart and gave the Merry Maker the same answer he had given the Destroyer. “Her darkness is my fate.”

Bodies shifted. Murmurs rose and fell until the Heart of the Bog raised one hand, commanding silence.

When the Heart of the Bog just watched him, Michael added, “Heart’s hope lies within belladonna.”

The Heart of the Bog tipped its head to one side and smiled a sweetly chilling smile. “You seek Belladonna?”

Something about the look in the Merry Maker’s eyes told him he had misunderstood the riddle. It wasn’t about the plant, it was about a person . It was the name of his dream lover, who must be a dark-hearted woman if she protected this part of the world. But he sensed she was also the key to getting away from the Merry Makers.

“Yes,” Michael said. “I seek Belladonna.”

The Heart of the Bog walked over to the pack and tucked the whistle inside before fastening the pack’s straps. “We will take you to the Justice Maker. He has powerful magics.” That chilling smile again. “Deadly magics. See-bastian will decide if you are a friend…or a meal.”

A gesture of its hand, more frightening because of the gracefulness of the movement, indicated that Michael should pick up his pack.

When he had his pack settled on his shoulders, they closed in around him. He saw no weapon in any hand, but he knew all the Merry Makers carried a knife and a slingshot—and were lethal with both. So he followed the Heart of the Bog and hoped this Justice Maker with the deadly magics was someone he could reason with.

A hand pushed her shoulder into the sand, holding her down. Another hand clamped over her mouth. And a stranger’s voice said, “Stay quiet. I’m not going to hurt you. The boundaries are so thin the bonelovers can sense prey even though they can’t reach this landscape. But this place is so small, I already broke the boundaries in order to reach you, so I don’t think your access point is going to last much longer.”

The words made no sense to Caitlin, but she understood enough. Someone had come to help her, and those ant creatures—bonelovers?—were nearby. She relaxed her muscles, which was the only thing she could think to do to let him know she wasn’t going to fight him.

The hand lifted from her mouth. The other still rested on her shoulder, but now lightly enough to feel like offered comfort rather than a restraint.

She didn’t move except to turn her head enough to look at the man kneeling beside her. About her brother Michael’s age, give or take a year. A good face. Handsome even, with the black hair and those green eyes framed by lashes that were unfairly lush. And the beginnings of those crinkle lines at the corners of the eyes that gave a man’s face character and made women just look old.

When she shifted to push herself up, his hand moved from her shoulder to her arm, pulling her up to a sitting position.

She looked beyond her circle and clamped her hand over her mouth to stifle the scream. The sand all around them swarmed with bonelovers, and not too far beyond her circle…

“They found something,” the man said. “Might not be human. If there’s only a border between two landscapes, animals can cross over easily enough. Most instinctively avoid landscapes that are dangerous, but if they’re scared and running, they could end up in a landscape like this and then not be able to get back out.” He stood, then offered her a hand to help her up. “Let’s go while they’re occupied.”

Go where? Caitlin wondered, since she didn’t see horses or a buggy or any other way to outrun the bonelovers. Then again, he had gotten here. Somehow.

As she raised her hand to clasp his, she remembered the heart’s hope. She twisted around on her knees and began scooping a channel in the sand around the tiny plant. Couldn’t have many roots. Not a plant this size. And certainly not deep.

“What are you doing?” the man demanded. “That’s probably the only thing holding this access point intact.”

She looked over her shoulder and glared at him. “I’m not leaving it in this place.” She didn’t know how much time had passed between when she’d created the circle of sand and when the stranger found her, and she wasn’t sure she could explain to this man how often she’d awakened during those hours and felt like the presence of the heart’s hope was a sip of courage. “I’m not leaving it.”

He held up a hand to stop her. “Wait. Don’t pull it out of the ground. Don’t move. Just wait.”

He moved to the edge of the circle, studied the bonelovers mounded over the unknown prey. Then he took a step and disappeared.

“No.” The word came out as a whimper. Caitlin just stared. He’d left her. She hadn’t been willing to leave the plant behind, so he left her.

Then he was back, reappearing inside her circle as suddenly as he had disappeared.

“Here,” he said, handing her a sturdy bowl. “It’s been cleansed, so it doesn’t resonate with any earth that’s been put it in before.”

She understood the individual words, but the way he was stringing them together, the meaning escaped her. And his accent said plain as plain that he wasn’t from a part of the world she knew. But she wasn’t about to start asking questions that might have him thinking he’d be better off leaving her behind.

She worked her fingers under the tiny heart’s hope. Yes, just as she thought. Not much root. She scooped up the plant and the sand, but there was too little of it for the size of the bowl.

“Just hold it at the right depth,” the man said. He scooped up sand and poured it into the bowl while she held the plant in place. When he scooped up a shell, he looked at it, then at her. “Beach?”

Caitlin nodded. “I’m thinking it’s the one near the village’s harbor, but I can’t be sure.”

He set the shell aside and scooped up more sand. “And where would that be?”

“Are you asking the name of my village or my country?”

Now he looked puzzled. “Both.”

“I live in Raven’s Hill, and my country is called Elandar.”

There was less warmth and more wariness in his green eyes.

“That should do it,” she said, trying to sound cheerful as she pressed the sand down around the plant. On impulse, she set the shell next to the heart’s hope.

He brushed off his hands, then reached into his jacket pocket. “Is this yours?”

She looked at the coil of braided hair tied with blue ribbon that he pulled out of his pocket—and shivered. “Where did you find that? I left it…” She wasn’t about to tell him where she left it.

“It appeared near my mother’s house,” he said, looking and sounding more wary. Then he looked beyond the circle and stuffed the braid back into his pocket. “Let’s finish this discussion in a safer place.”

A bonelover was right at the edge of the circle, staring at them.

“It can see us!” Caitlin said.

“No, it can’t,” the man said with an oddly heavy emphasis. “But I think the boundaries have thinned to the point that it can hear us and it knows there’s prey close by, so we need to leave here now.” He helped her to her feet, then took a step closer to the bonelover and picked up her broken hoe handle. Stepping back, he wrapped a hand around her upper arm and led her to the spot where he had disappeared.