Sebastian

death rollers and bonelovers and whatever else the Eater was bringing back into the world? She could alter the landscape. She had the power to rip this chunk of the world away, to take it out of the world so completely it would be lost forever. It wouldn't move, not physically, but the eye wouldn't see it, the mind wouldn't recognize it, and the heart wouldn't acknowledge it. No access. No bridge to cross over. And if a heart did acknowledge that dark place… No way out once the person stumbled into that landscape.
    Are you going to give up another piece, Glorianna? Are you going to become like the other Landscapers who thought demons didn't matter, didn't deserve a place of their own in the world, didn't need that breathless moment when something beautiful catches the eye and dazzles the heart? Are you going to give them up because they aren't human? Neither are you. Not completely. You don't have that comforting lie anymore. Whatever you came from might have bred with humans so that, all these generations later, you live in a human body, but your power isn't human. Was never human. Landscapers focus on humans because the human heart can create so much — and destroy so much .
    But other beings shouldn't be forgotten. You knew that when you were a student, felt that need from those no one else wanted to think about. Even demons need a home. Even a dark landscape should feel the warmth of the Light. Why have you forgotten that?
    Glorianna stopped. Turned around. Night had fallen, and she had no sense of how far she'd walked or in what direction. Her emotions were so churned up, she had no idea where the pond was in relation to where she stood.
    "Insidious bastard," she whispered. "I don't know how you gave me that gut-jab of fear, but I won't forget you can use my own heart as a weapon against me. I won't give up the landscapes in my care. Not even this one. And I won't let you have any of them. I'll find a way to defeat you. I'll find a way to do alone what it took hundreds like me to do the last time. And by the time I'm finished, I will lock you in a landscape even you will find unbearable."
    She closed her eyes and began to breathe slowly, evenly, until she could feel the resonance in the land.
    Until she could feel the dissonance once more.
    And something else, drawn to the strength of her feelings.
    Ephemera. Ready to manifest her feelings and make them real.
    Wait , she told it, sending gentle restraint as she walked back to the pond. Wait .
    When she smelled the blood and vomit, she stopped. In her mind, she pictured lines of power—red with anger, black with despair—running from where she stood straight into the heart of the pond. Then she let her feelings flood through her and become a channel for the world.
    "Despair makes a desert," she whispered, watching grass and rich earth turn to sand, sensing the water in the pond changing to sand. "And anger… makes… stone."
    Boulders pushed up from the earth, forming a cage around what had been the pond. Smaller stones edged the sand, separating it from the grass. As the last stone formed beneath her feet, Glorianna stepped back.
    Altered landscapes. A piece of desert in a place that knew nothing of deserts. A one-way border… but not a boundary. This place would be visible to the eye and could be avoided. Anyone who crossed the border of stones would find sand and heat and little else. And no way back to the waterhorses'
    landscape.
    The death rollers would die there.
    But there was still an anchor—or a bridge—somewhere in this landscape that had allowed the Eater of the World to return.
    Enough , she thought. Lee can locate a bridge a mile away from where he's standing, hut you can't.
    That's not your gift. It's time to go home .
    She walked for a little while, not caring about the direction, just wanting to feel the land. It was a dark landscape, but it was good land. Rich land. Oh, human fears had seeped into it, but also relief and joy.
    She smiled. The waterhorses were changing, weren't thinking of all humans as prey or the enemy anymore. They were beginning to realize it was as much fun to scare a drunken fool by giving him a fast ride and a cold dunk as it was to kill a man. And the man, given that moment to see that his life could end and have that life given back, was also given a chance to change. Opportunities and choices. For some it would change nothing. For others it would take them on a different path, lead them to another landscape,