Warped

by Maurissa Guibord

  Tessa shook her head.

  Her father grinned. “Ten thousand dollars.” He stood up and did a little shuffling dance step.

  Tessa’s gaze traveled up as she thought of the tapestry hanging on the wall in her bedroom. “Wow,” she said in a flat tone.

  Her father’s smile faded. “I thought you’d be thrilled, Tessa. Ten thousand dollars would cover a good chunk of your tuition for college this fall.”

  “Yeah,” she answered slowly. It was a lot of money. But the thought of selling the unicorn tapestry left Tessa with a sudden feeling of … she wasn’t sure exactly what.

  “What did you tell him?” she asked.

  Her father threw his hands up with a perplexed look. “I didn’t really have a chance to tell him anything. He said he’s on his way here. Driving from New York. He’ll be here tomorrow morning. If it was an honest mistake, I think we should give them back. Don’t you?”

  “I—I guess so,” Tessa answered. But she wasn’t so sure.

  “Well, it didn’t sound like the fellow was taking no for an answer. I’m going drive down to Portsmouth and pick up the book from the appraiser.

  “Polly should be able to handle the counter. Just give her a hand if things get busy. I’ll bring home some supper.”

  After her father left, Tessa went up to her bedroom and closed the door. She walked over to the tapestry. She wondered how old it was. She hadn’t given it a lot of thought before, but it must have been made hundreds of years ago. Weird to think that a real person, living so long ago, had made this. And now it was here, in her room.

  Now someone was going to waltz in and take it away, Tessa thought angrily. She bet that lawyer had just realized how valuable the tapestry and the book were and wanted them back. Maybe he even wanted to sell them himself. It would probably end up in some locked display case in a mansion somewhere. Maybe even a museum. It wasn’t fair.

  Tessa felt a stab of sadness and knew: she wanted to keep the tapestry. She was meant to have it. The weight of the feeling brought sadness but also a fierce burst of pride; her gaze drifted over the tapestry. Then she noticed it.

  A loose thread was dangling from the bottom. It was a single strand of silver, drifting in the air like a piece of a spider’s web. Tessa caught it and twined it around her finger. She hesitated for a second. It was only a tiny thread; she wouldn’t damage the tapestry. Besides, it was the kind of thing that would drive her crazy. She tugged. It didn’t snap off. Pretty strong for something so fragile-looking.

  She stepped back and pulled harder. The thread, rather than breaking, drew out of the tapestry in one long, glittering trail. As it came out, Tessa felt a blaze of heat run from her fingertips, race along her arm and rush through her, leaving a warm, tingling sensation in its wake.

  Before Tessa could react, a deep rumbling noise began and the floor beneath her feet tilted with a sickening lurch. She staggered, fighting to keep her balance. The whole room began to shake. Tessa gave a strangled cry and reached for the wall to steady herself—but where her hand should have met the firm surface of the tapestry and the wall beneath, all she felt was a cool, moist … nothing.

  Tessa, thrown backward by the push of some unseen force, crashed into her dresser and fell. Her whole room shook as though it were a dollhouse in the hands of a giant toddler. The floorboards rose and fell like piano keys as their nails shrieked. The room pitched to darkness as a violent, tearing noise shredded the air. Then, quiet.

  She was on the floor. The lights flickered on. Tessa let out a groan and eased herself up to a sitting position. Her shoulder was sore where she’d jammed it against the dresser, and she’d fallen pretty hard on her rear end; otherwise, she was okay.

  Tessa looked around. Everything was still, and except for some books fallen from her bookcase and a spill of papers from her desk, her room looked pretty normal.

  “What the—?” she whispered. “When was the last earthquake in Maine?”

  Then she realized she wasn’t alone.

  A young man crouched on the floor beside her, gasping for breath and shaking. Tessa stared as he raised his head to look at her. Dark blond hair fell in coarse tangles across his forehead and reached to his shoulders. His eyes, an intense, startling golden brown, were ringed with dark lashes.

  Tessa was so surprised, her scream came out only as a strangled gasp. She scuttled backward, away from him, and scrambled to her feet. Her heart was pounding. “Okay, wake up,” Tessa told herself. “Wake up.”

  The guy stared at her. He was panting in deep, heaving breaths, as if he’d been running. He stood. He was tall, and dressed in a gray cloak and suede pants and boots; all were torn and muddy. His lean, tanned face was dirty too, and he had an ugly gash down one cheek.

  “You,” he said, in a choked voice. He took an unsteady step toward her, then stopped and looked down, staring at his feet. He stared up at her again. “Sweet Jesu,” he breathed. With that, he toppled forward, collapsing to the floor.

  “Hey!” Tessa took a step forward and stopped. The young man didn’t move but lay with long arms and legs splayed out.

  “Hello?” Tessa said nervously, then repeated it a little louder, took a step closer and gasped. “Oh my God.” Her thoughts were spinning in frantic circles. “Okay,” she said, looking around. “We had an earthquake. We had an earthquake and a strange guy in weird clothes collapsed in my bedroom.” She closed her eyes tight and shook her head. What was happening? This was way too real to be a dream. Even for her. And too strange for reality. She opened her eyes. There was still a guy on the floor.

  “Hey,” she said again, in a voice that she hoped sounded tough, authoritative. But the young man didn’t move. Tessa took another cautious step forward.

  “You’re hurt,” she said, forgetting caution and kneeling over the young man’s body. This was no dream. Being hurt was real. “Are you okay?” Tessa shook his arm. He still didn’t move. With an effort, she tugged at the dirty clothes and rolled him onto his back. A sudden memory of the CPR training she’d had the summer before came to her. “ABCs,” she whispered to herself. Right. “Airway.” Tessa reached out and gently moved his jaw to open his mouth. She knelt closer, swept her own hair out of the way impatiently and brought her ear close to his lips. Warm breath tickled her skin, and she could see the faint rise and fall of his chest. “Breathing,” she murmured. “Breathing is good.” Circulation. She pressed two fingertips to the firm column of his neck, where a pulse beat in a fast but steady rhythm. “Okay, you’re alive,” breathed Tessa, with a sigh of relief. She sat back on her heels and looked at him. Really looked at him.

  He had a face of strong lines—clean, angled jaw and arrogantly sculpted nose. A deep, ragged scratch tore across one cheekbone, and a streak of dried blood was crusted on the middle of his forehead. His skin was tanned, and his tousled hair and eyebrows were touched with a paler color than the dark lashes that shadowed deep-set eyes. He smelled, but not really unpleasantly, Tessa realized, of musky sweat and campfires and something else … horses?

  Good-looking despite the dirt. So good-looking, in fact, that if he hadn’t been filthy, he’d hardly look real. Especially dressed as he was, thought Tessa, in some kind of costume from a medieval fair. She reached out a tentative hand to touch his clothes.

  He woke up fast. At her touch, his hand struck out like a whip and captured her wrist. Tessa gasped as he leapt up, hauling her up with him. He gripped her by the shoulders and nearly carried her as he propelled her forward to push her against the wall. Tessa swore, struggling to get her knee up and wrench herself away, but he only tightened his hold and pressed closer, pinning her to the wall.

  “Where am I?” he demanded. “And what are you doing here?”

  But Tessa ignored the questions and let out a high-pitched scream. He clamped a hand over her mouth. “Quiet!” he hissed. “I’m not going to hurt you.” His face as he looked down at hers was pale, giving his tanned skin a waxy look. His eyes were furious.


  His eyes. Tessa stared, blinked and slowed her struggling. She was dreaming. She had to be. That face, those eyes, definitely came from her dream. Didn’t they? And it was impossible, but she could have sworn that she saw recognition in his expression as well. She nodded once. Okay. Slowly he took his hand from her mouth.

  “Pray don’t scream,” he said, examining her closely. “It was you who released me?”

  “Released you?” Tessa whispered, still staring into his eyes with confusion. She trembled as an eerie sort of understanding crept over her. “The tapestry.” She turned her head.

  The tapestry hung on the wall, smooth and intact. But in the center of the picture, the clearing was empty. The green grass had been replaced by a shadowy darkness of tangled threads.

  The unicorn was gone.

  Chapter 13

  At the same moment that Tessa Brody pulled a loose thread from an old tapestry, something else happened. Over the ancient tree Yggdrasil a knife of green lightning split the sky. A tiny rift appeared in the Wyrd. The endless, flowing fabric was torn. Ripples cascaded from the spot, across centuries, across continents.

  The shock of it struck Weavyr into stillness. Her dusky fingers seized up as she watched her precise patterns, the symmetrical forms, become hopelessly tangled.

  “By the powers!” she shrieked. “Not again! Come. Help me, Sisters!”

  The other two Norn came swiftly.

  “What is happening?” Spyn cried.

  “Look for yourself. The Wyrd is torn.” Weavyr gasped. Her fingers began to fly, clutching at threads to straighten paths, to restore order.

  “How?” Scytha demanded in a booming voice.

  “The stolen threads,” Weavyr replied. “Hold this. No, not that one. No, too late. Here.”

  “They’ve been returned?” asked Spyn.

  “No,” Weavyr answered, working frantically. “Not returned. But something has happened. A terrible disturbance. It must be because of the stolen threads, or one of them.”

  “Can you repair it?” Scytha asked.

  “I’m trying,” said Weavyr. Her cloaked hood shook as if she was shuddering beneath it.

  Lila Gerome strode across the concourse of Logan Airport, her high Prada heels clicking on the tiles and her shiny hair swinging. Abruptly she stopped. Her face contorted into a shocked grimace. She let out a grunt. Clutching her stomach, she lurched forward. Surprised travelers swerved out of her way as she ran into a nearby washroom.

  Lila hung over one of the stainless steel sinks as a fiery pain scorched through her chest. A pain like she’d never felt before. “Wh-what’s happening?” she croaked. Her voice. It wasn’t smooth. It was as coarse as tar paper. It sounded ancient.

  She clutched her chest, her breath coming in wheezing gasps. Her hands. She lifted them up and stared. The slim fingers thickened and twisted as the joints swelled. Blue, cordlike veins rose beneath the spotty skin. In a moment her hands had shriveled into clawlike fists.

  “The tapestry,” she said. The pain was subsiding now, and in its place was an overwhelming terror. Was she dying? No. Lila staggered forward to the full-length mirror on the wall. Slowly she raised her head. Staring back at her was a hunched old woman. Her fashionable suit hung on her rickety frame as if she were a misshapen hanger. Thin gray hair hung around her face, and her small black eyes were nearly buried in wrinkled folds.

  “Shit,” she said.

  There was only one way for this to happen. It should have been impossible, but someone must have taken one of her threads from the tapestry. Taken her most precious thread, in fact, and released him. Her unicorn. He was her youth, her beauty, her strength. Stolen. Rage bubbled up, nearly choking her, and she let out a cry of frustration.

  “Are you okay, ma’am?” A chubby woman in a floral caftan pulled her luggage on wheels up next to Lila, her face concerned.

  Lila turned on her with a snarl. “Leave me alone!” she screeched.

  The woman backed up, startled. “Well, fine,” she huffed, and hurried away.

  Lila straightened as much as she could. “Moncrieff,” she said, nearly spewing the word. He had let this happen. Oh, he would pay for such incompetence. But first she must get the tapestry. And her unicorn must go back to its rightful place. And as for whoever had released him …

  “I will find you,” she promised. Yes. She would find the filthy thief and sing her black song and pull his life’s thread. Not to weave it. No. She would destroy it. Tear it into tiny pieces. Send it into the Void.

  Chapter 14

  “You came from the tapestry,” Tessa said softly, more to herself than to the stranger. He still stood close, his hands on her shoulders, his pale, tense face looking down at her. But whether he was trying to restrain her or steady himself, she couldn’t tell.

  “It’s impossible,” Tessa whispered. She closed her eyes tightly once again and shook her head. Wake up, Tessa. This had to be a dream.

  “I thought so as well,” said the young man. After a pause he added: “I had given up hope.”

  Tessa opened her eyes. He was still there.

  “So you were the …,” she began. She couldn’t even say it aloud.

  The young man frowned. He took a hand from her shoulder to reach up and touch his forehead. He dropped his hand with a long exhalation and curled long fingers into a fist.

  “The unicorn,” he finished. “Yes. And no.” He glanced around with a look of confusion and his gaze returned to her. “I thought I recognized you, but you are different. As is this place. It cannot be—” He broke off and shook his head. “Where am I? Where is the forest? Who are you?” he demanded.

  “Who am I?” Tessa gasped. The question snapped her back, if not to reality, then at least to the recent highlights. “You’re the one who just appeared out of nowhere!”

  When he didn’t make any move to release her, a headline flashed in Tessa’s mind. Local Teen Strangled by Escaped Lunatic Male Model. She pressed both hands to the man’s chest, which beneath the ragged clothing was firm and … not going anywhere. She tried shoving, but his hands only tightened their grip.

  She went very still. “Let go of me,” she said. It made her mad to hear how her voice warbled. She jutted her chin and stared up at him. “Right. Now.”

  He didn’t budge, but something hot blazed in his eyes and Tessa saw them as she had before. It was impossible, but his were the golden brown eyes of the unicorn. They held a mixture of anguish and rage and fierce pride. She trembled, remembering a dream. Then it was gone. He dropped his hands and stepped back, his expression neutral.

  “My name’s Tessa,” she said, rubbing her arms and sidestepping his tall form to sidle across the room.

  “Tessa.” He repeated it slowly, his gaze following her.

  Tessa snatched up a small but heavy trophy from the bookcase. She held it by the gold-plated figure on the top and loved, loved, for the first time ever, that she’d won second place in the 2005 freestyle event at Crazy Wheels.

  “That’s right. Tessa Brody,” she said, turning to face him. “And this is my room. My house.” She brandished the marble base of the tacky Rollerblader at him. “So. Who are you? Forget it. Just get out. No.” She hesitated, confused, torn between fear and curiosity. He just stood there, watching her. “Who are you?” she repeated finally.

  The stranger glanced at her would-be weapon and raised his hands slightly. “I beg pardon, mistress,” he said, although there was nothing remorseful in his cool tone. On the contrary, he lifted one brow, giving his lean, clever face a look of surprised amusement. “My name is William de Chaucy.” With this, the young man in rags gave a short, formal bow.

  Tessa stared at him. “William de Chaucy,” she repeated as he straightened. The very polite escaped lunatic. She felt a little of her bravado melt and had the sudden and really urgent need to laugh. She sat down on the end of her bed. Or rather, she let her legs wobble out from under her. The bed happened to be there.

  “What are you doing?
” William de Chaucy said, his expression guarded.

  “I think it’s called going into shock,” Tessa said. She looked up at the tapestry on the wall, then back at … Unicorn Guy, and choked back a giggle. “Cut it out,” she told herself. She took in a deep, shaky breath and let it out.

  He gave her a puzzled frown. “You speak most strangely, mistress.”

  “Really,” she said, eyeing him. “So do you.” He had spoken English. But not like Tessa had ever heard before. His voice was deep, with a strange accent. Not exactly British, not exactly French. Mostly Hugh Grant with a little Pepe Le Pew thrown in.

  That did it. She was gone. Completely psycho.

  “How did you bring me to …” He looked around her room once more and then shook his head. “How did you release me?” he demanded. Perhaps it was his accent or the way he held himself, but he seemed, thought Tessa, to act as though he owned the place. When she didn’t answer, he raised his scratched, dirty hands, looking at them as if not sure of their substance. “How did you transform me thus?” he asked. His voice rose. “Cast a spell? An incantation? Where is Gray Lily?” He glared at her now, suspicious. “Are you a witch as well?”

  Okay. That was really it. Time to muster up Tough Girl again. “Listen, William.” Tessa stood up and jabbed her trophy at him, breathing hard. “I don’t know what happened or where you came from. I didn’t do anything. I mean, I—” She broke off. What had happened, anyway? Tessa frowned and went on. “I just pulled a thread hanging from the tapestry. One little thread.” She stepped over to the tapestry and pointed to the lower edge. “From right there.”

  Instantly William leapt forward and pulled her back. “Don’t touch it!” he hissed, gripping her elbow with a shaky hand. With a visible effort, he seemed to recover, and his hand steadied. He let go and stepped away, putting an extra couple of feet between himself and the tapestry. Though he looked like he would have preferred a couple of miles.