Belladonna

Landscapers could have had landscapes in Elandar. The Eater could have gotten here through one of the gardens at the school."
    She heard the clank and clatter of the pots and pans hung on Michael's pack before she saw him and Sebastian. They dismounted, but this time Michael didn't shrug off the pack.
    "You said the feel of Dunberry turned dark," she said when Michael got close enough.
    He nodded. "Two boys have gone missing, and a young woman was brutally murdered."
    "After the Eater disappeared into the landscapes, two females were murdered in the Den," Sebastian said. "A succubus and a human. Those killings were brutal."
    "Is there a pond or river close to where those boys were last seen?" Glorianna asked.
    "Pond," Michael replied.
    She watched his expression harden as he began putting the pieces together.
    "The Eater of the World was hunting in Dunberry," she said quietly.
    "It brought those death roller things into that pond?" He sounded outraged.
    She shook her head. "Possible, but just as likely It took the form of a death roller and did the hunting. Just like It would have assumed a form that made It the best predator for killing that woman."
    "And the lamplighter," Michael said. "I forgot about the lamplighter. Killed the same night. Some of his bones were crushed and there were other ... odd... things about the way he died. Or so I was told."
    "When Lynnea and I were escaping from the Landscapers' School, we saw creatures that could have crushed bone," Sebastian said.
    Michael shuddered. Then his eyes filled with a mixture of anger and shock as he pointed at her. "No, I'll not have it. You will not take this on your shoulders, Glorianna Belladonna. If a man bolts the door against a beast trying to attack his family, do you blame him for protecting his own? And if the beast turns away from his door to attack another's that is less well defended, is that his fault because he didn't step aside and let it attack what he loved? You bolted your own door, but you didn't aim that beast at a neighbor."
    What was he hearing in her "music" that revealed so much of what she was thinking — and feeling? She wasn't to blame for where the Eater chose to hide after she had altered the landscapes and closed Wizard City away from the rest of the world, but she didn't like feeling this exposed, and wasn't used to someone who wasn't family reading her so clearly.
    "If the borders in this part of Ephemera are as fluid as they seem, the Eater could have gotten here from Wizard City before I broke that bridge," Lee said. "Might have avoided your landscapes altogether."
    "Maybe." If Michael and Caitlin hadn't stumbled into her life, she wouldn't have known where the Eater had gone, would have had no hope of finding It. Or stopping It.
    "This is it then," Michael said, lifting a hand to indicate the bridge. "Either the road leading into Dunberry starts when we cross the bridge, or we'll be standing on the other side of the stream waving at your brother and cousin. Coming back across the bridge in the other direction should show us the road leading to Kendall. There's a posting house about halfway, where coaches change horses and such. The road that turns off the main one leads to Foggy Downs."
    No matter what she found on the other side of the bridge, taking that step between here and there was all she needed to do in order to go home. No matter what they found when they crossed over, she could get them to a safe landscape in a heartbeat.
    But the prospect of crossing over to a landscape that wasn't hers was exciting and scary — and made her feel adventurous and foolishly young. Had Michael's mother felt like this the first time she had begun a journey with his father? Had she felt this excitement for the adventure — and for the man? And look how that had ended. Maybe ...
    She took a step back. Shook her head violently.
    "Glorianna!"
    Whose voice? She couldn't tell, didn't know. All three of them were around her. Then she felt his hands on her shoulders, felt the warmth of him. Heard the music in him.
    She'd never thought of people as songs before she met him. Still didn't for most. Lee and Sebastian were a resonance. Michael was different. Michael was unlike anyone she had known before.
    "It's sly," she said, pushing back her hair as she concentrated on taking steady breaths.
    "It's here?"
    She paused a moment, thinking something was wrong with her hearing. Then she realized all three of them had asked the same