Cassandra Clare - Clockwork Prince

These were the letters she had written her brother from the Dark House, not expecting Nate to read them—not expecting anyone to read them. They were more of a diary than letters, the only place where she could pour forth her horror, her sadness, and her fear. She knew that they had been found, that Charlotte had read them, but what were they doing here in Will’s room, of all places, hidden between the pages of a book?

“Tessa.” It was Jem. She turned quickly, slipping the letters into the pocket of her coat as she did so. Jem stood by the bureau, holding a silver knife in his hand. “By the Angel, this place is such a tip, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to find it.” He turned it over in his hands. “Will didn’t bring much from home when he came here, but he did bring this. It’s a dagger his father gave him. It has the Herondale bird markings on the blade. It should have a strong enough imprint of him for us to track him with it.”

Despite the encouraging words, he was frowning.

“What’s wrong?” Tessa asked, crossing the room to him.

“I found something else,” he said. “Will has always been the one to buy my—my medicine for me. He knew I despised the whole transaction, finding Downworlders willing to sell it, paying for the stuff . . .” His chest rose and fell quickly, as if merely talking about it sickened him. “I would give him money, and off he would go. I found a bill, though, for the last transaction. It appears the drugs—the medicine—does not cost what I thought it did.”

“You mean Will’s been cheating you out of money?” Tessa was surprised. Will could be awful and cruel, she thought, but somehow she had thought his cruelty of a more refined order than that. Less petty. And to do that to Jem, of all people . . .

“Quite the opposite. The drugs cost much more than he said they did. He must have been making up the difference somehow.” Still frowning, he slid the dagger into his belt. “I know him better than anyone else in the world,” he said matter-of-factly. “And yet still I find that Will has secrets that surprise me.”

Tessa thought of the letters stuffed into the Dickens book, and what she intended to say to Will about it when she saw him again. “Indeed,” she said. “Though it is not so much a mystery, is it? Will would do anything for you—”

“I’m not sure I would take it quite that far.” Jem’s tone was wry.

“Of course he would,” said Tessa. “Anyone would. You’re so kind and so good—”

She broke off, but Jem’s eyes had already widened. He looked surprised, as if he were not used to such praise, but surely he must be, Tessa thought in confusion. Surely everyone who knew him knew how lucky they were. She felt her cheeks begin to warm again, and cursed herself. What was going on?

A faint rattle came from the window; Jem turned after a moment’s pause. “That will be Cyril,” he said, and there was a slight, rough undercurrent to his voice. “I—I asked him to bring the carriage around. We had better go.”

Tessa nodded, wordless, and followed him from the room.

When Jem and Tessa emerged from the Institute, the wind was still gusting into the courtyard, sending dried leaves skittering in circles like faerie dancers. The sky was heavy with a yellow fog, the moon a gold disk behind it. The Latin words over the Institute’s gates seemed to glow, picked out by the moonlight: We are dust and shadows.

Cyril, waiting with the carriage and the two horses, Balios and Xanthos, looked relieved to see them; he helped Tessa up into the carriage, Jem following her, and then swung himself up into the driver’s seat. Tessa, sitting opposite Jem, watched with fascination as he drew both the dagger and the stele from his belt; holding the dagger in his right hand, he drew a rune on the back of that hand with the tip of his stele. It looked to Tessa like all Marks looked, a ripple of unreadable waving lines, circling around to connect with one another in bold black patterns.

He gazed down at his hand for a long moment, then shut his eyes, his face still with intense concentration. Just as Tessa’s nerves began to sing with impatience, his eyes flew open. “Brick Lane, near Whitechapel High Street,” he said, half to himself; returning the dagger and stele to his belt, he leaned out the window, and she heard him repeat the words to Cyril. A moment later Jem was back in the carriage, shutting the window against the cold air, and they were sliding and bumping forward over the cobblestones.

Tessa took a deep breath. She had been eager to look for Will all day, worried about him, wondering where he was—but now that they were rolling into the dark heart of London, all she could feel was dread.

Tessa kept the curtain on her side of the carriage pulled back, her eyes on the glass of the window, as they rolled along Fleet Street toward Ludgate Hill. The yellow fog had thickened, and she could make out little through it—the dark shapes of people hurrying to and fro, the hazy words of advertising signs painted on the sides of buildings. Every once in a while the fog would part and she would get a clear glimpse of something—a little girl carrying bunches of wilting lavender, leaning against a wall, exhausted; a knife grinder rolling his cart wearily homeward; a sign for Bryant and May’s Lucifer Matches looming suddenly out of the gloom.

“Chuckaways,” said Jem. He was leaning back against the seat across from her, his eyes bright in the dimness. She wondered if he had taken some of the drug before they left, and if so, how much.

“Pardon?”

He mimed the act of striking a match, blowing it out, and tossing the remainder over his shoulder. “That’s what they call matches here—chuckaways, because you toss them aside after one use. It’s also what they call the girls who work at the match factories.”

Tessa thought of Sophie, who could easily have become one of those “chuckaways,” if Charlotte hadn’t found her. “That’s cruel.”

“It’s a cruel part of the city we’re going into. The East End. The slums.” He sat forward. “I want you to be careful, and to stay close by me.”

“Do you know what Will’s doing there?” Tessa asked, half-afraid of the answer. They were passing by the great bulk of St. Paul’s now, looming up above them like a giant’s glimmering marble tombstone.

Jem shook his head. “I don’t. I only got a sense—a fleeting image of the street—from the tracking spell. I will say, though, that there are few harmless reasons for a gentleman to go ‘down to Chapel’ after dark.”

“He could be gambling . . .”

“He could be,” Jem agreed, sounding as if he doubted it.

“You said you would sense it. Here.” Tessa touched herself over the heart. “If something had happened to him. Is that because you’re parabatai ?”

“Yes.”

“So there’s more to being parabatai than just swearing to look out for each other. There’s something—mystical about it.”

Jem smiled at her, that smile that was like a light suddenly being turned on in every room of a house. “We’re Nephilim. Every one of our life’s passages has some mystical component—our births, our deaths, our marriages, everything has a ceremony. There is one as well if you wish to become someone’s parabatai . First you must ask them, of course. It’s no small commitment—”

“You asked Will,” Tessa guessed.