James nodded.
She took his hand, and they walked through a light mist on the patio down to her bathing room. Silently, they lit candles all around the tub and heated the water. James got in first, and Anna stepped in after him. She sat back against him, his chest hard and strong and comforting, the warm water seeping the tension out of her body. Her mind was not at ease, and she still felt the distance between them, but when James began to pour warm water over her shoulders, moving her hair aside so that he could plant light kisses on her bare shoulders, she tried to forget her worries and let herself melt into the moment. They stayed like that for a long time, until the water grew cold, and then went up to bed and fell asleep in each other’s arms.
* * *
Anna bolted awake. James was beside her, eyes shut tight. She threw the covers off, quickly dressing and tiptoeing to her satchel. Carefully, Anna reached through her tapestry squares until she touched upon the silk linen where she hid her infinity necklace when she wasn’t wearing it. She placed the chain around her neck, tucking the golden symbol into her dress. She hoped that the charm really did have a magical connection to her aunt, to her father.
Anna didn’t even have to look for Topper. When she got to the bottom of the stairs, he was sitting in a big chair in the main room, a lantern lit at his feet. They didn’t say a word as they stepped softly through the villa’s front door, closing it quietly behind them.
The Moon, high over the ocean, lit their path along the beach to Topper’s library, the sea a dark purple beside them. Anna felt like it was the one place where no one would find them.
She sat on a chair while Topper paced the length of the library, his face drawn in concentration. Anna watched him, wondering what James would say if he found them together here.
Topper stopped and looked down at her. “It’s like there are two different worlds running parallel to each other. There doesn’t seem to be a normal land border to your Hierophant Kingdom, a place you can cross with a horse or sail over in a boat. Nonetheless, these two worlds exist,” Topper continued. “And you probably are a magician, like your father, but you don’t know how to use your powers. Yet.”
“You are a very good listener,” Anna said, impressed with his recall of the details she had thrown at him earlier. “And do you think these two worlds are affecting each other?”
“It seems so,” Topper said. He tucked his blond hair behind his ear and looked up, as if the answers lay somewhere above.
“The tapestries.” Anna opened her palms in front of her on the table. “If I open my mind to the possibilities of magic, then maybe . . .” She paused.
Topper turned toward the entrance of the cave. “Then what?” he asked.
“Then perhaps there is some connection between my unfinished tapestry—the unbound threads—and the fact that Cups seems to be unraveling.”
“What is that?” Topper said suddenly.
“I know. I can’t make sense of it either—”
“No, not that.” Topper waved Anna over. “Look. There are people down on the beach.”
As Anna came closer, she saw that the figures were cloaked. The light from the Moon shone down upon them, and she noticed that one of the cloaks was a dark crimson.
“It couldn’t be.” Anna gasped. She pushed past Topper and ran down the sandy path to the beach.
Anna couldn’t believe her eyes, but there, struggling in the shallow water, was the Magician, her long braid of brown hair winding down her back and her red robes flowing in the tropical breeze. She was bent over trying to help the Hermit, who was flailing his arms and shouting. The sea was quiet and dark, and the Hermit’s hair shone silver under the light of the Moon.
“I’m drowning! Help!” he said breathlessly, his gray cloak billowing around him like a storm cloud.
“Calm down! You are in shallow water. If you just stay still, I can help you.” The Magician looked like she was circling a wild animal as she tried to grab hold of the Hermit.
“I can’t swim!” he gasped.
Anna and Topper ran to them, Anna’s heart beating madly in her chest. They reached the beach in seconds, their feet kicking up sand as they went. Topper grabbed the Hermit underneath his arms and pulled him up in one fluid movement, holding him upright until he was sure that the Hermit had his footing. The Hermit, shocked, craned his neck to get a look at Topper. When he was sure the Hermit was steady on his feet, Topper took a few steps away.
“Anna?” the Hermit said. His chest rose and fell quickly as he tried to catch his breath.
“My dear Hermit.” Anna took the Hermit’s hand and led him the few steps out of the water to the beach. She squeezed his hand tightly, fearing he might disappear. She remembered how it felt to be scared of the water. The Magician followed them, pushing her wet hair off her face, her robes heavy with seawater.
“Is it really you?” Anna said. She cupped the Hermit’s face in her hands and looked into his amber eyes. Before he could answer, she turned to her aunt and ran into her arms. The Magician wrapped Anna in a firm embrace.
“You’re safe,” the Magician whispered into Anna’s ear, stroking her hair. “Thank the stars you are safe.”
They hung on to each other for a long moment before breaking apart.
“Things are going to be okay now,” Anna whispered. Her heartbeat had slowed, and she squeezed her aunt more tightly. She wasn’t alone in this anymore.
“The tapestries!” the Hermit suddenly shouted. He started to run back into the water but stopped short at the edge of the shore. Topper and Anna looked into the water and saw a large dark shape bobbing along the surface. Anna dashed into the shallow water, but she struggled under the weight of the heavy package. The Magician and Topper quickly came to her aid, and together they dragged the large bundle out of the water and dropped it on the beach at their feet.
Anna walked to the Hermit and put her arms around his shoulders.
“You’re okay!” The Hermit laughed. “She’s okay,” he said, turning to the Magician to share the news.
“I see that.” The Magician nodded, but she understood that the Hermit was overwhelmed. She felt the same way.
“This is Topper,” Anna said, tearing her eyes away from her friends. “Topper, this is the Hermit and the Magician. My aunt and friend who I told you about!”
Topper’s eyes shone brightly. “It is an honor to meet you both,” he said. “And I must admit, your presence here confirms that I am not crazy.” He pumped their hands heartily, and the Magician looked at Anna, clearly uncomfortable. “I know, you must think I’m a bit mad.” He dropped their hands. “I just knew there was more to this life than Cups, and for years I was alone with my thoughts and theories.” He wiped his brow with the back of his hand. “I’ll compose myself. I’m just stunned and delighted. And thrilled for Anna to have this reunion.”
Anna had never seen Topper so animated. She smiled as she watched him, her own eyes glassy with emotion. She knew what a miracle the appearance of her advisors must be for him. It was a miracle for her to see them standing on this beach beneath the Moon.
“The enthusiasm of your spirit is a thing of beauty,” the Hermit said, and placed a hand on Topper’s shoulder.
“Anna! You look so different, so strong and healthy,” the Hermit said with admiration, taking in Anna’s tanned limbs and glowing complexion. “Oh, and the Moon!” the Hermit exclaimed, staring upward, openmouthed.
“We don’t have a lot of time,” the Magician interjected. She was twisting her hair back into its braid, wringing out the ends. “I’d like nothing more than to have a good catch-up and hear everything that has happened since you left us, but we need to get back before we are found missing.” She paused. “He’s coming after you, Anna.”
“I’ve known he would since the day I left.” Anna pressed her lips together. “I don’t want you to go, when you’
ve only just gotten here.” She smiled at them. “You both would love it here. There’s so much to see, and it’s so different from where we come from.”
Anna paused again. If anyone would have advice on the recent events in Cups, it would be her advisors. “But strange things have been happening here since I arrived.” She scrunched up her face. “Something isn’t right.”
“What do you mean?” the Magician asked. She shook off her wet slippers and wrung them out onto the sand. The Hermit watched her and then did the same.
“It started with a storm brewing over the water. The sea became angry and violent, which, as you can see, is not its natural state.”
They all turned to look at the ocean. It stared back at them, smooth as glass, nearly still save for the gentle swell of low tide ebbing back and forth near their feet.
“Then there were the quakes where the earth itself shook, with terrible winds and a deafening buzzing sound.” She shook her hands out in front of her. “And today the ground split in two.”
The Magician eyed Topper. “This has not happened here before, young man?”
Topper shook his head vigorously. “Absolutely not.”
The Magician took this in.
“But Anna has a theory,” Topper offered.
“I was just thinking,” Anna mused, “that this land is so similar to my tapestry—”
“The land of youth,” the Hermit interrupted. “Yes, it’s how we got here.”
“What do you mean?” Anna squinted at him.
“We used your tapestry, or what was left of it anyway. Through our Magician’s newly rekindled magic, we were able to make them whole again—at least temporarily.” He pointed to the Magician. “We saw you walking along this very beach,” the Hermit said, shifting from foot to foot.
“I don’t understand,” Anna said, trying to follow. “And, wait, where is the Fool?” she asked, spinning around, hoping to catch a glimpse of his blond curls on the beach.
“There’s something I have to tell you, Anna.” Her aunt looked up at her. “The King has imprisoned the Fool.”
“No.” Anna’s voice trembled. “Why him?” But before her aunt could speak, the answer dawned on her. “Because he helped me.”
“He would do it again if he had to, Anna,” her aunt promised. “We all would. But we have to go back and figure out a way to get him out.”
Anna tilted her head back, blinking away the tears that threatened to spill from her eyes. Topper put his hand on her arm to comfort her, but she shook him off. “How did you find me?”
“I performed a tracking spell,” the Magician began carefully. “We saw you cross a mossy bridge and then disappear, so we knew you must have gone to another land.”
“A bridge no one had ever seen in the Hierophant’s Kingdom,” the Hermit added. “The King himself even suggested you had crossed over to another world.”
Anna gaped at them. “He has the Fool and he knows where I am?”
“No, no,” her aunt reassured her. “I only let him see a glimpse of you to make him believe I was on his side, that I was still loyal to him. Tonight I enchanted your tapestries, the worlds you created. Anna, they came alive. Right beneath our gaze.”
Anna’s expression was blank. “I still don’t understand.”
“The people got up and walked around,” the Hermit said. “The trees swayed in the wind and the nobles feasted and danced.”
“These were worlds I created in my imagination,” Anna said, incredulous. “Created with thread and my loom.”
The three went silent. She heard Topper suck in his breath behind her.
“Cups is a real world with living, breathing human beings! It’s not a land I dreamed up and wove. It’s real,” Anna said, looking around at the sand, the sea, and the wall of black rock behind her.
“You were just saying yourself that you thought there was a connection between your tapestry and Cups, the fact that the yarns were not bound,” Topper reminded her.
Anna stepped back a few steps, trying to take in what they were implying. There was the cove where she and James swam, the one she had woven before she’d ever seen it, the library filled only with books that she had read, the sea and the earth, which seemed to rage and calm with Anna’s moods.
“This is your gift, Anna.” The Magician put her hands on Anna’s shoulders. “You do have powers, and they are formidable, my dear. Now you need to fortify this land, your land, and keep the King out.”
“If what you say is true, there is nothing I’d rather do,” Anna said. “But how? All I can do is weave!”
“Exactly,” the Hermit piped up. “That’s why we’ve brought your tapestries.”
Anna looked at the large wrapped package that lay on the sand next to where they stood.
“We think the key to barring the King from this land has something to do with your tapestries—perhaps if, like you said, you were to bind your last tapestry, he would not be able to enter.” The Magician paused. “Or perhaps . . .”
Anna looked straight at the Magician, eyes saucer-wide. “Changes to the tapestries change the world.”
“You are Marco’s daughter, Anna,” the Magician said breathlessly.
Suddenly the beach went black. The silver strip of ribbon reflected on the sea had gone, and they were left with a very familiar darkness, heavy and total. The four looked up at the sky.
The Moon had disappeared.
The King tossed and turned in his bed, unable to sleep, his bedclothes wet with sweat from a grinding anxiety. His mind whirled, listing off everything that needed to be done. He had his armor prepared, his swords were sharpened, and the general had the soldiers at the ready, sleeping in shifts and prepared to fight at any second.
“You’re a fool, John.” The voice came out of nowhere and the King jumped, his heart hammering in his chest.
“Who is that? Show yourself!” The King squinted in the darkness, trying to untangle himself from his sheets. His heart pumped with adrenaline. Where was his Guard?
“Hello, old friend.” A match was struck, and the smell of a pipe floated into the room. “Ah. How I have missed this.”
The King could just make out a figure sitting in the chair by the window.
“Guard!” he yelled, now out of bed. He shoved his feet into his slippers.
“They can’t hear you, John,” the man spoke from his table by the window.
“Where’s the damn lantern?” the King muttered angrily, fumbling around in the dark. So it was finally happening. Someone had gotten past the Guard to assassinate him in his sleep.
“I see you’ve become just like your father—a helpless old king. Here, let me help you.” The man snapped his fingers, and the room was illuminated by candlelight.
The King gasped.
“You? But how?” He put his hand to his heart, which felt like it might burst from his chest with the shock of seeing his old friend Marco sitting at his table.
“Oh, really now, John. You can’t be that surprised. You’re about to launch an attack on my daughter. You thought I wouldn’t show up?”
Recovering, the King moved to sit in the chair across from Marco.
“But you have no power here, Marco.” The King took a seat. “I made sure of that a long time ago when I stuck a knife through your heart.”
“That’s true,” Marco said, taking a long draw off the pipe. He offered it to the King, who took it and inhaled from it deeply, then handed it back. “But I thought I would appeal to you now. As an old friend.”
“It’s disgusting how you haven’t aged.” the King said, looking at Marco’s hair, still thick and black, his skin taut around his long white neck.
“She’ll beat you,” Marco said, suddenly serious. “You will lose everything.”
“So you’ve come to warn me? Is that it?” the King demanded.<
br />
“To warn you, make a request of you. Whatever you want to call it.” Marco set the pipe down on the table and peered into the orange embers of tobacco in its bowl. He looked up at the King. “Do you remember when we were boys and we used to fight with wooden swords? Do you remember how we’d go sailing with your father and pretend we were pirates?”
The King reached for the pipe again, and Marco handed it over to him.
“Of course I do,” the King answered thoughtfully. “Some of my best memories.”
“Simpler times.” A higher, softer voice had replaced Marco’s.
The King’s head jerked up and he found himself looking into Anna’s face.
This was no pale, sickly youth. Her skin was deeply tanned and covered in black tattoos. A goblet was inked into one of her bare forearms, a long sword on the other. She swept her long black hair off her neck, revealing a pentacle symbol, and she was nearly exposed but for a thick red silk scarf wrapped around her body. On one arm, she held an eagle; with the other, she stroked a large lion seated on the floor beside her.
The King bolted up in bed, drenched in sweat, his heart galloping in his chest. The room was dark and quiet.
“May the heavens help us,” he gasped. “Guard!” he shouted, and this time they came at once.
“That is the strangest thing,” Topper said. He lit a lantern and several candles in the library, and then peered out at the blackened night sky.
“It’s all we know,” said the Hermit. “We have no moon where we come from.”
“Yes, Anna told me about that. This would all be very exciting if we weren’t in mortal danger.” Topper grimaced.
The Hermit chuckled. “It’s all about perspective.”
“It’s probably just behind a cloud,” Topper said, blinking up at the inky black sky.
The Magician sat on the stone steps outside the library, feeling too claustrophobic in the small room, while Anna sat beside her.
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