Warped (Maurissa Guibord)

sisters have wreaked. Have you forgotten that your father lies dying? We can save him if you come with me now." Gray Lily gripped the gate and gave it an irritated heave, but the massive structure didn't budge.
    Tessa shook her head and stepped away. "I haven't forgotten anything. But I'm not leaving Will here. Or any of them."
    "Fine. Your choice," spat Gray Lily. "We'll have to do it another way. This will hurt a bit." She shot a hand through the gate, and a ping rang out as her silver ring clanged on the metal. She pointed a slender finger at Tessa and began to mutter in a guttural voice.
    Tessa gasped as she felt a tiny spear of pain strike her chest. She scrambled backward. The pain subsided. A look of fury passed over Gray Lily's countenance and she stretched her arm as far as it would reach through the square grating. "Come back here," she muttered, and clawed at Tessa.
    Gray Lily wasn't close enough, Tessa realized with a sigh of relief. She must have had to be within a certain distance of a person to pull their thread.
    With a grunt of disgust Gray Lily withdrew her hand. "Come along, Moncrieff," she snarled. "She'll come out of there. If she doesn't want me to hurt the unicorn."
    Hugh stared at the ground, his shoulders slack. At Gray Lily's words Tessa saw him mouth a word, silently. Will . When he looked up, he had a strange, lost expression on his face. But he trudged away, following Gray Lily, walking toward the distant forest, head bowed.
    Tessa was alone. She was locked inside a fortress of stone and there was nothing left to protect. She made her way to the wide, dim space of the great hall and slumped at a table strewn with wilted flowers and candle wax. Here, only the night before, firelight had flickered over Will's face as he had kissed her. She closed her eyes and traced the memory of the feeling on her lips with a finger. Why did that seem more real than anything that had happened since?
    Hugh said she would forget. He was wrong. The person Tessa had tried to dismiss as a fantasy was the only part of reality she cared to cling to. There would never be a place for her in a world without Will.
    She thought of her father; she would never see him again. Or Opal. They were from another life, another world. She hadn't returned the threads; maybe the world she knew wasn't even there anymore.
    Everything had been taken from her now, Tessa thought. She was gutted. Empty of everything except, apparently, tears. She raised her head and squeezed her wet eyes shut and flexed her cold fingers nervously. Will was gone. She would never have the chance to show him how much she loved him.
    I will never go back into the tapestry. I would rather die. Destroy the unicorn, Tessa. Kill it .
    Or maybe ... She frowned and interlaced her fingers. Maybe if she was strong enough, she would.

Chapter 43

She couldn't get the castle gate up. She couldn't turn the ponderous wheel even an inch by herself. Finally she wiped the sweat from her eyes and wiped her stinging palms on her dress.
    "Idiot," Tessa said. She ran to get Hannibal from his stall.
    "Okay, big boy," she murmured. Nervously she looped a harness over his gleaming black chest and led him out into the courtyard. She fastened a heavy rope to the harness and to one of the handles of the wheel. "C'mon." She tugged him forward until the rope stood taut. Hannibal stopped.
    Tessa pulled, trying to urge the massive horse forward with a combination of giddyups, threats and tentative slaps on his rump, which he disdainfully brushed away with his tail. He just stood there. Finally, getting weepy again with frustration, she begged him.
    "Please, Hannibal." Tessa rested her head against the horse's muscled shoulder in exhaustion. "Please open the gate. For Will."
    As if he had been waiting for her to speak his language, the proud war horse surged forward. Tessa leapt out of his way and the heavy, rattling gate began to rise.
    With a yelp of relief Tessa secured the locking mechanism and unhooked Hannibal. She had no clue how to saddle the huge animal, so she stood on a high wooden stool, slung the crossbow over one shoulder, tucked a handful of her skirts up into her knotted sash and climbed onto his bare back.
    Hannibal trotted out with Tessa clinging to him like a limpet. Her hands were knotted in his mane, and her sneakered feet dangled below dusty skirts while the crossbow banged against her back. Her old clothes had been in a damp, tangled pile where she'd left them,