The Eater of the World was here, right now, changing the Landscapes' School into pieces of Its own dark landscapes. But It hadn't changed everything yet. As long as he and Lynnea stayed on ground that was still part of the school, they had a chance of getting away.

Even as the thought formed, he watched the land beyond the sand and pool of water change into a bog that stretched back to the stone walls that enclosed the school.

A feeling too primitive for words made him look back at the building. Was that just a shadow on the wall? Or was it a predator that blended in so well it was almost invisible?

Releasing Lynnea's hand, he eased the pack's other strap over his shoulder to settle it on his back. More sensible to drop it, but he didn't want to leave anything behind that might be used to trace them.

Guardians and Guides! How were they supposed to get out of here?

Sebastian's breath caught as the answer came to him: Glorianna's garden.

They'd have to go deeper into the school, run straight into the enemy's lair.

Rustling sounds of things moving closer, hidden by the fading light.

Only one chance.

He reached for Lynnea's hand. Both of them would get out of here or neither of them. He wasn't going to let her fall behind and die like the people he'd seen in that classroom.

He led her back toward the building. "We've got to reach my cousins garden," he said quietly. "When I tell you to go, you run like a rabbit. Understand me?"

Staring straight ahead, she nodded. "Something's coming."

"I know." He gave himself a moment to picture the map Glorianna had drawn, not daring to take the time to pull the linen napkin out of his jacket pocket. The sundial was the first marker.

Glorianna. He focused his will, focused on the need to find her garden... and hoped that something- Guardian, Guide, or Ephemera itself-would respond to his heartfelt call for help in finding the piece of ground that resonated with her. Glorianna. Glorianna. "Ready?"

Lynnea tightened her fingers around his in answer.

"Run!"

Things out of nightmares ran after them. Ants as long as his forearm. Spiders as big as dogs. And things he had no name for.

The flagstone path beneath their feet felt spongy, fluid, as if the stones were about to change into something else between one step and the next.

We're in the school. We're in the school. We're in the school Underneath that chant he hoped would keep them from stumbling into one of the Eater's landscapes was another chant that came from his heart: Glorianna, Glorianna, Glorianna.

The sundial should be there, right in front of them. But there was nothing but a circle of bubbling mud.

No markers anymore. Nothing to guide them.

"Where... ?" Lynnea gasped.

They had to keep moving or die.

Glorianna, Glorianna, Glorianna. "This way."

He ran, pulling Lynnea with him, letting instinct-or something more-guide him. A maze of gardens, all the same. Walls and walls and walls. The light almost gone. They'd never find their way through this maze once the light was completely gone.

But he turned from one path and followed another and another as if a string had been attached to his chest and were reeling him in.

Glorianna, Glorianna.

Then he saw it. No different on the outside from any of the others, but he knew it was hers.

"Here," he panted, rattling the wrought-iron gate as if that would be enough to break the lock. Even if he did break it, there was a wooden door behind the gate that was probably locked from the inside, since he couldn't see any way to open it from this side.

He didn't have time to figure out if wizard magic could open doors. Somewhere in the twists and turns of the paths, they'd lost the predators, but the creatures wouldn't stay lost for long. Not with fresh prey available.

"Climb." He clamped his hands on her waist and gave her a boost up to get her feet on a crossbar. "Pull yourself over." Sounds coming from the intersection of two paths. "Now!"

He took a step back to avoid getting kicked in the face as Lynnea swung her legs over the top of the gate and the wooden door. His foot came down on a stone, making him stumble. He grabbed the gate to keep his balance-which brought his face level with the brass plaque attached to the stone wall next to the locked gate.

Etched into the plaque was a date and the wizard's symbol, indicating that this was a forbidden place.

He forgot about the danger coming toward him. Everything faded to insignificance as he stared at the date on that plaque.

Then Lynnea screamed, "Sebastian.'"

Jolted back to the immediate danger, he snatched up the stone he'd stumbled on.

Giant ants and spiders raced toward him, and in front of them was something that looked like an elongated spider with two black eyes and jaws powerful enough to crush his legs.

A deadly part of the magic wizards wielded was something they called "the lightning of justice." Bolts of magic that could kill a man. It was used when a person was deemed so dangerous he or she had to be destroyed instead of being sent to a dark landscape as punishment.

Unfortunately, he had no idea how to call that kind of magic or control it. But raw power swelled inside him now, so he channeled it-and his anger-as best he could into the stone in his hand.

The spidery thing rushed toward him with terrifying speed. The others weren't far behind.

With a yell that was part fury, part desperation, he threw the stone at the spidery thing. It struck between the creature's eyes, then- Sebastian threw his arms up to protect his eyes as bolts of light exploded out of the stone, searing the spidery thing and the other creatures near it.

He blinked, shook his head, then scrambled over the gate. Coming down on the other side, he leaned back against the solid stone wall.

"Sebastian?" Lynnea rushed toward him.

"Don't!" His hand still tingled from the released magic. Since he was pretty sure the wizards' lightning didn't usually splinter like that, he didn't want her to touch him until he felt more confident that he wouldn't sizzle her, too.

"There's no door on this side of the wall," Lynnea said, looking at the solid stone. "Why isn't there a door?"

Because they tried to seal her in. Because... Damn you, Lee! You never told me why. All these years, and you never told me why.

He pushed away from the wall and looked around. An overgrown, abandoned garden-with a way to escape hidden in the fountain at its center.

"This way. Hurry." Still not daring to touch her, he followed a path to the center of the garden, Lynnea right behind him.

When he reached the fountain, he circled it, looking for whatever was hidden here that would get them out of this place. Moss on the stones that shaped the fountain's pool, green scum covering most of the water.

Nothing! But something here tugged at him.

Crouching, he thrust a hand into the water. His fingers brushed over stones-and his heart jumped as he heard the sounds of creatures fighting over the remains of those he had killed. But charred corpses wouldn't interest them long if they sensed living prey nearby.

His hand moved through the water. Then he felt a tingle, a tug, a sense of warmth right... there.

His hand hovered over the stone-and he remembered something Lee had told him during a visit to the Den.

"People expect bridges to be large enough to physically walk over," Lee said. "But a one-shot bridge can be small enough to Jit in your hand."

Sebastian stopped picking at the remains of his dinner and frowned at his cousin. "One-shot?"

"A small object, filled with just enough of a Bridge's power for one crossing to a specific landscape."

"Doesn't sound like it would be much use."

Lee hesitated, then said quietly, "Sometimes it gives a person the only chance to escape where they are."

Too bad Lee hadn't told him how these one-shot bridges worked. Was there something he needed to do?

Or would he be pulled into another landscape the moment his hand closed over the stone?

"Sebastian," Lynnea whispered.

He looked up. Saw a spider coming over the wall.

"Take my hand," he said. He didn't dare look around to see what else might be coming over the walls.

Holding on to Lynnea with one hand, he closed his other hand over the stone. He stood up and turned away from the fountain at the same time the spider reached the ground inside the garden.

He took a step, pulling Lynnea with him.

The spider ran toward them.

He didn't know where this bridge would take them, but he trusted Lee, who was the only Bridge who would have put an escape route in this garden. And he trusted Glorianna Belladonna.

As Glorianna's name echoed in his mind, he and Lynnea took another step-and disappeared a moment before the spider reached them.

We look human, but we are not. Ephemera shaped us, manifested us, brought us into the world in answer to the cries of human hearts for guidance.

Some of us have gathered in the places where the currents of Light are the strongest. These Guardians will keep their distance from the chattering of the human heart, will live simple, peaceful lives that will feed the Light and keep those currents flowing in the world. And those currents, in turn, will nourish hope, courage, love.

The rest of us are Guides. We walk among people and feel as they do-glittering moments of joy, warm moments of contentment, moments full of the jagged shards of envy, anger, disappointment. We drink from the wells of sorrow and feast at the banquet of love.

But we understand what Ephemera cannot: That the human heart is as fluid as itself, that a heart is touched by the winds of emotions, bending with them for a moment, sometimes breaking beneath the violence of a storm. But those feelings are the wind, not the bedrock of a heart.

And yet, even bedrock is malleable. A seed can find its way into a crevice, root itself in the dark while it grows toward the light. Given time and the things it needs to grow, the plants roots can widen that crevice, become strong enough to break stone. And things change.

So it is the bedrock of the heart that resonates for us, not the winds of changing feelings. It is the true desires, the deepest yearnings, the hearts need to make its journey through life that calls to us.

Be careful what you wish for, because Ephemera will manifest that wish-but not necessarily in the way you intended... or even wanted. People hear the words, but they're full of wind wishes-things they want now, are desperate to have now, only to forget about those same things tomorrow because those things did not truly feed the heart.

So we walk among them, feeling the resonance of the bedrock wishes, the true dreams of the heart. And we whisper to Ephemera, Don't listen to that wish. It's not a true wish. Or, Yes, that's a true wish. Alter the currents around that person to provide the chance for him to take the first steps of the journey that will end with the heart having what it desires.

One of us would resonate with that yearning heart for a moment, showing it the possibility, giving it the chance to take those first steps.

Some hearts will back away from the journey, too fearful to leave the familiar even though it withers.

Others will leap forward and never look back, bruising the hearts left behind. Pain will force some to begin the journey. For others, love will be a beacon that keeps them moving forward.

We walk among the people. So do the others. As we are drawn to the Light and the feelings that resonate with the Light, the others are drawn to the darkness that dwells within the human heart.

The people call them the Dark Guides.

Ephemera manifested them, too, because we who follow the Light could not resonate with the hearts that yearned for the Dark.

There will always be such hearts. There will always be that choice. If that wasn't true, then a heart that walks in the Light has made no choice at all.

-The Lost Archives

Chapter Eleven.

Simple stone markers stood sentry at the beginning of a dirt path that curved down the hill. A step away from those markers, Sebastian pulled Lynnea into his arms.

He watched. Waited.

No nightmarish creatures appeared between the stone markers.

Weak with relief, he closed his eyes and rested his cheek against Lynnea's head, rubbing one hand up and down her back to offer comfort.

"You're all right?" he asked quietly. "You're not hurt?"

"I'm all right, but..." Lynnea turned enough to look at the markers. "Where are we?"

"I don't know. Whatever landscape this was connected to." He opened his hand and stared at the piece of smooth, white marble.

Peace folded around him like a warm, soft blanket. Fear diminished with every breath.

He could almost see the air shimmer like a veil between the sentry stones. If he stepped through them in the other direction to enter whatever landscape lay beyond, fear would have a savage bite, and the world beyond the veil might be filled with things that would rape courage and murder hope. But here...

Slipping the piece of white marble into his jacket pocket, he looked at Lynnea. "We'd better find out where we are."

She nodded, but he wasn't sure she'd heard him. She seemed quietly dazzled by the feel of this place.

They started down the hill. The trees that had blocked the view on their left ended at the curve in the path, revealing a small lake. A handful of tiny islands dotted the lake, and a light shone on each one. Another light moved steadily away from one island, and in the day's last breath, he saw a man walking across a bridge back to the shore.