Cassandra Clare - Clockwork Princess

The words written on the wall of Benedict’s study echoed in Tessa’s head as she sat by Jem’s bed, watching him sleep. She was not sure what time it was exactly; certainly it was “in the wee smalls,” as Bridget would have said, no doubt past midnight. Jem had been awake when she had come in, just after Will had gone, awake and sitting up and well enough to take some tea and toast, though he’d been more breathless than she would have liked, and paler.

Sophie had come later to clear away the food, and had smiled at Tessa. “Fluff his pillows up,” she had suggested in a whisper, and Tessa had done it, though Jem had looked amused at her fussing. Tessa had never had much experience with sickrooms. Taking care of her brother when he’d been drunk was the closest she had come to playing nursemaid. She did not mind it now that it was Jem, did not mind sitting holding his hand while he breathed softly, his eyes half-closed, his eyelashes fluttering against his cheekbones.

“Not very heroic,” he said suddenly without opening his eyes, though his voice was steady.

Tessa started, and leaned forward. She had slid her fingers into his earlier, and their linked hands lay beside him on the bed. His fingers were cool in hers, his pulse slow. “What do you mean?”

“Today,” he said in a low voice, and coughed. “Collapsing and coughing up blood all over Lightwood House—”

“It only improved the look of the place,” said Tessa.

“Now you sound like Will.” Jem gave a sleepy smile. “And you’re changing the subject, just like he would.”

“Of course I am. As if I would ever think any less of you for being ill; you know that I don’t. And you were quite heroic today. Though Will was saying earlier,” she added, “that heroes all come to bad ends, and he could not imagine why anyone would want to be one anyway.”

“Ah.” Jem’s hand squeezed hers briefly, and then let it go. “Well, Will is looking at it from the hero’s viewpoint, isn’t he? But as for the rest of us, it’s an easy answer.”

“Is it?”

“Of course. Heroes endure because we need them. Not for their own sakes.”

“You speak of them as though you were not one.” She reached to brush the hair from his forehead. He leaned into her touch, his eyes closing. “Jem—have you ever—” She hesitated. “Have you ever thought of ways to prolong your life that are not a cure for the drug?”

At that his eyelids flew open. “What do you mean?”

She thought of Will, on the floor of the attic, choking on holy water. “Becoming a vampire. You would live forever—”

He scrambled upright against the pillows. “Tessa, no . Don’t—you can’t think that way.”

She darted her eyes away from him. “Is the thought of becoming a Downworlder truly so horrible to you?”

“Tessa . . .” He exhaled. “I am a Shadowhunter. Nephilim. Like my parents before me. It is the heritage I claim, just as I claim my mother’s heritage as part of myself. It does not mean I hate my father. But I honor the gift they gave me, the blood of the Angel, the trust placed in me, the vows I have taken. Nor, I think, would I make a very good vampire. Vampires by and large despise us. Sometimes they Turn a Nephilim, as a joke, but that vampire is scorned by the others. We carry day and the fire of angels in our veins, everything they hate. They would shun me, and the Nephilim would shun me. I would no longer be Will’s parabatai , no longer be welcome in the Institute. No, Tessa. I would rather die and be reborn and see the sun again, than live to the end of the world without daylight.”

“A Silent Brother, then,” she said. “The Codex says that the runes they put upon themselves are powerful enough to arrest their mortality.”

“Silent Brothers cannot marry, Tessa.” He had lifted his chin. Tessa had known for a long time that beneath Jem’s gentleness lay a stubbornness as strong as Will’s. She could see it now, steel under silk.

“You know I would rather have you alive and not married to me than—” Her throat closed on the word.

His eyes softened slightly. “The path of Silent Brotherhood is not open to me. With the yin fen in my blood, contaminating it, I cannot survive the runes they must put upon themselves. I would have to cease the drug until it was purged from my system, and that would most likely kill me.” He must have seen something in her expression, for he gentled his voice. “And it is not much of a life they have, Silent Brothers, shadows and darkness, silence and—no music.” He swallowed. “And besides, I do not wish to live forever.”

“I may live forever,” Tessa said. The enormity of it was something she could still not quite comprehend. It was as hard to comprehend that your life would never end as it was to comprehend that it would.

“I know,” Jem said. “And I am sorry for it, for I think it is a burden no one should have to bear. You know I believe we live again, Tessa. I will return, if not in this body. Souls that love each other are drawn to each other in their next lives. I will see Will, my parents, my uncles, Charlotte and Henry . . .”

“But you will not see me.” It was not the first time she had thought it, though she often pushed the thought down when it rose. If I am immortal, then I have only this, this one life. I will not turn and change as you do, James. I will not see you in Heaven, or on the banks of the great river, or in whatever life lies beyond this one.

“I see you now.” He reached out and put his hand on her cheek, his clear silver-gray eyes searching hers.

“And I see you,” she whispered, and he smiled tiredly, closing his eyes. She put her hand over his, her cheek resting in the hollow of his palm. She sat, wordless, his fingers cool against her skin, until his breathing slowed and his fingers went boneless in hers; he had fallen asleep. With a rueful smile she lowered his hand gently so that it rested on the coverlet, by his side.

The bedroom door opened; Tessa turned round in her chair and saw Will standing on the threshold, still in his coat and gloves. One look at his stark, distraught face had her rising to her feet and following Will out into the corridor.

Will was already striding down the corridor with the haste of a man with the devil at his heels. Tessa closed the bedroom door carefully behind her and hurried after him. “What is it, Will? What’s happened?”

“I just came back from the East End,” Will said. There was pain in his voice, pain she had not heard the likes of since that day in the drawing room when she had told him she was engaged to Jem. “I had gone to look for more yin fen . But there is no more.”

Tessa nearly stumbled as they reached the steps. “What do you mean, there’s no more? Jem has a supply, does he not?”

Will turned to face her, walking backward down the stairs. “It’s gone,” he said curtly. “He did not want you to know, but there is no way to hide it. It is gone, and I cannot find more. I have always been the one to buy it. I had suppliers—but they have either vanished or come up empty-handed. I went first to that place—that place where you came and found me, you and Jem, together. They had no yin fen .”

“Then another place—”

“I went everywhere ,” Will said, spinning back around. They emerged into the corridor on the second level of the Institute; the library and the drawing room were here. Both their doors were open, spilling yellow light into the hall. “Everywhere. In the last place I went, someone told me that it had all been deliberately bought up in the last few weeks. There is nothing.”

“But Jem,” Tessa said, shock buzzing through her like fire. “Without the yin fen . . .”