Warped (16 page)

“I—I think I must have fallen asleep and had a bad dream,” Tessa stammered.

“You fell asleep?” Her father glanced at her curiously. “At five in the afternoon? You must be sick.” He put his hand to her forehead. “You don’t feel hot.”

“I’m okay, Dad,” Tessa said, pulling away. “I’m just kind of tired. Sorry about scaring you. The snake, I mean. It couldn’t have been real. Sorry.”

Her father straightened and surveyed the room: the toppled lamp, the books strewn on the floor. “Must have been some dream,” he commented.

Tessa looked down at the comforter. There was a gash torn through the middle of it. “Yeah,” she replied to her father, bending to pick it up before he could notice the damage. Even
she
couldn’t dream that violently.

“Are you scared, Tessa? You know, about the break-in?” her father asked. “You don’t need to be. I’m putting in a security system, new locks, everything. You’re safe, honey.”

“I know. Thanks, Dad.” Tessa righted the lamp. Safe was the last thing she was, and she knew it. But she did her best to give a normal, relaxed smile. Literally lying through her teeth.

Her father left with a shake of his head, and Tessa ducked down to peek under the bed. Cautiously, she dragged the tapestry out, touching only the edges. She unfolded it. There was the snake, appearing exactly the same as before. Except for one thing: it was now lying on the grass in the foreground. It had moved.

Tessa had supper with her father, then told him she was going to make an early night of it. In her room she emptied a gym bag and with quick, gingerly motions stuffed the tapestry and the
Texo Vita
inside. When she was certain her father had gone to bed, she walked to the back stairway, up to the studio, and knocked on the thin door. “Will!” she whispered. “Let me in.”

Silence followed, and Tessa had the sudden, sickening feeling that something terrible had happened. He was gone.

But the door opened and Will stood there. The room was dark, but moonlight washed in from the tall windows and made him a dark silhouette, gleaming around the edges.

“At last,” he muttered. “Mistress Brody.” He reached out and hauled her into the room.

“Are you all right?” she demanded. She peered around. “Did anything weird happen here?”

“Weird?” he repeated coldly. “In the context of my life the term has little meaning, mistress.” He watched her as she dropped the gym bag to the floor. “You’re shaking,” he said in a softer tone. He stepped closer and took her arm in a firm clasp. “What has happened?”

For a moment Tessa’s brain refused to focus on anything except how close he was. How tall and strong he felt next to her. What would it be like, she thought, to take just one step closer? To melt against him, just for a second? The feeling was so strong, she sensed herself sway. It was like standing next to a cliff.

“There was a snake,” she said finally, in a low voice. “Like a
Jurassic Park
snake.”

“A snake? From a park? I don’t understand you.”

Tessa closed her eyes. “A really huge snake came from the tapestry. It was in my room.”

“Did you conjure it out?” Will demanded. “Did you pull another thread?”

Tessa glared. “No. I didn’t do anything. I was reading,” she said. “I heard a noise under the bed and then, boom. Or,” she corrected herself, “more like
hiss
. And there it was.”

Will gave a grimace and then a curt nod. “Was it of a rather large size?” he asked. “Yellow and green?” In the dim light she could see him watching her intently.

“Yeah. How did you know that?”

“I have seen this creature.” Will spoke in a grim, bitter tone. “A frightful thing, but not lethal. Are you all right?”

“Yes. I—I jumped on it. And whacked it with a tennis racket. Yay for sporting equipment,” Tessa answered weakly. She glanced around the studio. He hadn’t turned the lights on; only moonlight illuminated the room. But it felt safe here. She turned back to Will, who was looking at her as if she’d just grown another head. And not a very attractive one.

“You jumped on it,” he repeated. He pushed his long fingers through his hair. “Are you mad?”

“I’ll say. My room is trashed.”

Will narrowed his eyes to regard her and then shook his head, exasperated. “Did the thought of running away never strike you?”

“Oh, it struck,” Tessa replied. “But see, there was this
snake
in the way.” She did her best to drip the sarcasm.

“Oh,” he said grudgingly.

“Anyway, the snake went back into the tapestry,” Tessa said. She stepped away from Will and nudged the gym bag on the floor with her foot. “I brought the tapestry here. And the book. I wasn’t sure what else to do.” She folded her arms, staring at the lumpy bag, almost expecting to see it move. “Do you think we should destroy it?” she asked. “We could burn it, maybe.”

“No!” Will’s reply burst from him. “We can’t do that.”

In answer to her puzzled expression he said, “There are all manner of creatures in the wood from which you released me. They live inside that tapestry. Suppose they are people, transformed as I was? Into beast or bird or flower. I cannot destroy the tapestry, Mistress Tessa. Not even to save myself.”

“Oh,” said Tessa. She frowned and rubbed the back of her neck. It was unbelievable, and yet she believed it. “I understand,” she said. “But then what about the snake? Was that a person?”

Will shook his head. “I do not know. But you said it returned to the tapestry.”

“Yes. But in a different place.” Tessa shivered, wondering what other surprises the tapestry held. “So what do we do now? We have the book,” she said slowly. “The
Texo Vita
. We’ll go through it again. Maybe there’s something we missed. Something that will tell us how to get them out, or return them to wherever it is they’re supposed to be, or . . . ”

Will tilted his head, and an amused smile played at the corner of his mouth. “Do you never stop?”

“Stop what?”

“Trying to fix things,” he murmured.

“Well, it seems like a good idea,” Tessa argued. “What do you suggest? I’m not going to just sit around waiting for Creepy Crawly to come back out for a midnight snack.”

“I don’t think it will return. I believe it was meant to frighten you.”

“Well, it nailed the audition,” Tessa huffed. “I’m frightened. But also really pissed off.”

Will stared at her.

“Angry,” Tessa explained.

“Ah,” he said. “Pissed off,” he repeated, seeming to consider it. “A colorful expression. I like it.” Shadows played over his features as he asked, “Why did you leave me so abruptly?”

The question took her by surprise. Tessa dropped her gaze from Will de Chaucy’s stern, tense look. “I—I’m sorry about that. I haven’t been up here in a while. It was my mother’s space.” Tessa’s hands searched for something to do. She bounced her fingertips together. “Being here brought back memories. I had to get out.”

“I didn’t know if you would return.”

The hint of regret in Will’s tone made something turn over in Tessa’s chest. But she ignored it.

“Well, that’s normal,” she said. “This is a strange place and I’m someone familiar.”
That’s good
, she told herself.
Go with that
. “Did you know a baby chick will get attached to the first thing it sees when it cracks out of its shell? It thinks that whatever it sees is its mother. A dog, a lizard, whatever. It’s called imprinting.” Now she was chattering about psychology. Perfect. Next she’d drool on him like one of Pavlov’s dogs.

Will frowned, something unreadable in his eyes. “Must you have a reason for everything?”

Tessa shrugged. “It helps.”

After a moment Will said, “Leave the tapestry and the book here. You need sleep. Tomorrow you shall repair the world.”

“You’re making fun of me.”

“Not at all. We will apply logic to the problems at hand, find a solution and plan a course of action. If that fails, you shall jump on our attackers, possibly brandishing a statuette or some bit of sporting equipment. Your arsenal seems formidable.”

Tessa smiled. “Ha-ha.” But she couldn’t suppress the wonderful feeling of having him near, sixteenth-century sarcasm or no. “Can I bring you back something?”

“There was a book in your chamber that intrigued me. The language seemed not as foreign as some of the other writings. If you would bring me
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
, I should be grateful.”

“Shakespeare? I guess that makes sense,” Tessa said. Had Shakespeare even been born yet when Will was . . . alive? Close enough, probably. Will would be perfectly at home with all the
thees
and
thous
. Though she couldn’t help but wonder if he would like
To Kill a Mockingbird
or
Around the World in Eighty Days
, and there was Sherlock Holmes. And Winnie-the-Pooh! “I’ll bring a bunch,” she said, warming up to the idea of exposing him to all the great books he had never even heard of.

“Tomorrow. Go and rest now,” he said with a smile. “You will be safe.”

“Yeah? How do you know?” she asked. She meant it to be teasing, but his smile drifted away.

“Because I will make sure of it,” he answered.

So much for sharing, being a team. Cryptic Boy was back with a vengeance.

“Tessa,” he said in a low voice as she walked to the door. She turned. Will’s features were set into a thoughtful frown as he stared at a place directly in front of him. “Do not run from me again. I do not like it.”

Chapter 24

T
essa took a long, scaldingly hot shower, letting the water and the heat pummel her, as if it could drive all the tension and worry away. And maybe even magically make her understand what was going on. It didn’t work.

Thinking about him was so confusing. Will de Chaucy had stepped out of a tapestry and taken over her life. Nothing was ever going to be the same. Well, to be honest, he hadn’t exactly
stepped
out. He had been yanked. By her. And somehow, it seemed
right
that he was here. Even if he was annoyingly secretive at times. And bossy. And a little stuck-up.

But she had to admit, he had good qualities. When he’d spoken about the other lives inside the tapestry, lives that he wouldn’t sacrifice to save his own, she’d seen something else. He was selfless. He was brave, maybe stupidly so.

Braver than she was, that was for sure. She didn’t think she could have gotten to sleep with the tapestry in her bedroom. Who knew what could come out of the thing next? Maybe it wasn’t the smartest move to have left it with Will either, but her choices seemed pretty limited.

Tessa dried off and slipped into her soft pink bathrobe. As she toweled her hair, she turned to the bathroom door, where she’d hung her clothes. She frowned. Strange. The frayed hole in the knee of her jeans was gone. Tessa stepped closer. No patch, no seam. Almost as if the fabric had been . . .

She froze when she saw the words in the denim. They stood out in tufts of white cotton thread:

Go to a dark glass.

Oh God. Not again. “Cut it out,” said Tessa in a shaking voice. She whirled around and cried out, “Gray Lily! Lila Gerome? Whoever you are! Can you hear me? Stop it. Leave me alone!” But nothing happened. And the tiny message woven into her jeans stayed put. With a swat she knocked the clothes from the hook.

She stepped back, sat down on the edge of the bathtub and hugged her robe closer, feeling vulnerable and exposed.

“Go to a dark glass,” Tessa said softly. What did
that
mean? A piece of glass? Sunglasses? She looked over at the steamy reflection of herself in the full-length mirror on the door and shivered, despite the warm, humid air.

She remembered her sleepover in fifth grade when Heather Landrigan convinced everybody to play Bloody Mary. Each girl was supposed to go into the bathroom by herself, turn out the lights and stare into the mirror. You were supposed to see the face of your future husband, or Bloody Mary, whoever she was. Tessa had been too scared to do it. She had gone in and sat on the closed toilet seat for a little while, and then gone out again.

But the memory did remind her of something else.
Go to a dark glass
.

“The glass,” she said slowly, “is a mirror.”

Tentatively she got up, stepped over to the wall and flipped off the light switch.

The sudden plunge into darkness was complete. There was a small, high window next to the shower, but that didn’t matter; the sky outside was dark. The bathroom was as black as a cave. Slowly Tessa’s eyes began to adjust until she was able to make out the pale gleam of the white sink and stainless fixtures.

Tessa walked to where she knew the mirror hung on the door. She couldn’t see it but stood in the darkness, watching the place where she knew it was. She waited.

Gradually she was able to see the outline of the mirror. There was nothing there.

“This is insane,” she murmured, and reached toward the light switch.

Just then, Tessa saw a faint flash in one corner of the mirror. She turned to look behind her at the high window to make sure there was nothing reflecting in from outside. A headlight from a passing car, maybe. When she looked back at the mirror, she jumped.

The mirror glowed with a luminous, neon blue light. Three hooded figures stood before her. They were huddled together, and though Tessa couldn’t see their faces, she had the distinct impression that they were staring at her.

“Definitely a mortal,” said one of them from the shadowy depths beneath its black hood. Long white fingers stuck out from the ends of its sleeves and made strange little twitching movements.

“Just a girl,” said the second, whose dark-skinned hands were calmly folded together.

“Who are you?” Tessa whispered to the faceless shapes. “Did Gray Lily send you? Is one of you Gray Lily?”

“You see?” hissed the first to the other two. “Nothing but senseless questions. We are the three sisters of Fate.”

There were several moments of eerie silence during which the three figures regarded her, tilting their hooded heads slightly. Tessa tensed. She had the creepiest sensation they were . . .
measuring
her.