Cassandra Clare - Clockwork Prince

“Tessa.”

Tessa nearly leaped out of her seat. The voice was almost a whisper. It was Jessamine. Her eyes were half-open, the reflected firelight flickering in their brown depths.

Tessa sat up straight. “Jessamine. Are you . . .”

“What happened?” Jessamine’s head rolled fretfully from side to side. “I don’t remember.” She tried to sit up and gasped, finding her hands bound. “Tessa! Why on earth—”

“It’s for your own good, Jessamine.” Tessa’s voice shook. “Charlotte—she has questions she has to ask you. It would be so much better if you were willing to answer them—”

“The party.” Jessamine’s eyes flicked back and forth, as if she were watching something Tessa couldn’t see. “Sophie, that little monkey, was going through my things. I found her with the invitation in her hands—”

“Yes, the party,” said Tessa. “At Benedict Lightwood’s. Where you were meeting Nate.”

“You read his note?” Jessamine’s head whipped to the side. “Don’t you know how rude and improper it is to read another person’s private correspondence?” She tried to sit up again, and fell back once more against the pillows. “Anyway, he didn’t sign it. You can’t prove—”

“Jessamine, there is little advantage in falsehood now. I can prove it, for I went to the party, and I spoke with my brother there.”

Jessamine’s mouth opened in a pink O. For the first time she seemed to note what Tessa was wearing. “My dress,” she breathed. “You disguised yourself as me?”

Tessa nodded.

Jessamine’s eyes darkened. “Unnatural,” she breathed. “Disgusting creature! What did you do to Nate? What did you say to him?”

“He made it very clear you have been spying for Mortmain,” said Tessa, wishing that Sophie and Charlotte would return. What on earth was taking them so long? “That you have betrayed us, reporting on all our activities, carrying out Mortmain’s commands—”

“Us?” Jessamine screamed, struggling upright as much as the ropes would allow her. “You are not a Shadowhunter! You owe them no loyalty! They do not care about you, any more than they care about me. Only Nate cares for me—”

“My brother,” Tessa said in a barely controlled voice, “is a lying murderer, incapable of feeling. He may have married you, Jessamine, but he does not love you. The Shadowhunters have helped and protected me, as they have done for you. And yet you turn on them like a dog the moment my brother snaps his fingers. He will abandon you, if he does not kill you first.”

“Liar!” Jessamine screamed. “You don’t understand him. You never did! His soul is pure and fine—”

“Pure as ditch water,” Tessa said. “I understand him better than you do; you are blinded by his charm. He cares nothing for you.”

“Liar—”

“I saw it in his eyes. I saw the way he looks at you .”

Jessamine gasped. “How can you be so cruel?”

Tessa shook her head. “You can’t see it, can you?” she said wonderingly. “For you it is all play, like those dolls in your dollhouse—moving them about, making them kiss and marry. You wanted a mundane husband, and Nate was good enough. You cannot see what your traitorousness has cost those who have always cared for you.”

Jessamine bared her teeth; in that moment she looked enough like a trapped, cornered animal that Tessa almost shrank back. “I love Nate,” she said. “And he loves me. You are the one who does not understand love. ‘Oh, I cannot decide between Will and Jem. Whatever shall I do?’” she said in a high-pitched voice, and Tessa flushed hotly. “So what if Mortmain wants to destroy the Shadowhunters of Britain. I say let them burn.”

Tessa gaped at her, just as the door behind her was flung open, and Charlotte marched in. She looked drawn and hollow with exhaustion, in a gray dress that matched the shadows beneath her eyes, but her carriage was erect, her eyes clear. Behind her came Sophie, scuttling as if frightened—and a moment later Tessa saw why, for bringing up the rear of the party was an apparition in parchment-colored robes, his face hidden beneath the shadow of his hood, and a deadly bright blade in his hand. It was Brother Enoch, of the Silent Brothers, carrying the Mortal Sword.

“Let us burn? Is that what you said, Jessamine?” said Charlotte in a bright, hard voice so unlike her that Tessa stared.

Jessamine gasped. Her eyes were fixed on the blade in Brother Enoch’s hand. Its great hilt was carved in the shape of an angel with outspread wings.

Brother Enoch flicked the Sword toward Jessamine, who flinched back, and the ropes binding her wrists to the bedposts unraveled. Her hands fell limply into her lap. She stared at them, and then at Charlotte. “Charlotte, Tessa’s a liar. She’s a lying Downworlder—”

Charlotte paused at the side of the bed and looked down at Jessamine with dispassion. “That has not been my experience of her, Jessamine. And what of Sophie? She has always been a most honest servant.”

“She struck me! With a mirror!” Jessamine’s face was red.

“Because she found this.” Charlotte drew the invitation, which Tessa had given over to Sophie, from her pocket. “Can you explain this, Jessamine?”

“There’s nothing against the Law about going to a party.” Jessamine sounded equal parts sulky and frightened. “Benedict Lightwood is a Shadowhunter—”

“This is Nathaniel Gray’s writing.” Charlotte’s voice never seemed to lose its even edge, Tessa thought. There was something about that fact that made it seem even more inexorable. “He is a spy, wanted by the Clave, and you have been meeting with him in secret. Why is that?”

Jessamine’s mouth opened slightly. Tessa waited for excuses— It’s all lies, Sophie invented the invitation, I was only meeting Nate to gain his confidence —but instead tears came. “I love him,” she said. “And he loves me.”

“So you betrayed us to him,” said Charlotte.

“I didn’t!” Jessamine’s voice rose. “Whatever Tessa says, it isn’t true! She’s lying. She’s always been jealous of me, and she’s lying!”

Charlotte gave Tessa a measured look. “Is she, now. And Sophie?”

“Sophie hates me,” Jessamine sobbed. This at least was true. “She ought to be put out on the street—without references—”

“Do cease turning on the taps, Jessamine. It accomplishes nothing.” Charlotte’s voice cut through Jessamine’s sobs like a blade. She turned to Enoch. “The true story will be easy enough to get. The Mortal Sword, please, Brother Enoch.”

The Silent Brother stepped forward, the Mortal Sword leveled at Jessamine. Tessa stared in horror. Was he going to torture Jessamine in her own bed, in front of them all?

Jessamine cried out. “No! No! Get him away from me! Charlotte! ” Her voice rose to a terrible wailing scream that seemed to go on and on, splitting Tessa’s ears, her head.

“Put out your hands, Jessamine,” said Charlotte coldly.

Jessamine shook her head wildly, her fair hair flying.

“Charlotte, no,” Tessa said. “Don’t hurt her.”

“Don’t interfere in what you don’t understand, Tessa,” said Charlotte in a clipped voice. “Put your hands out, Jessamine, or it will go very badly for you.”

With tears running down her face, Jessamine thrust her hands forward, palms up. Tessa tensed all over. She felt suddenly sick and sorry she had had anything to do with this plan. If Jessamine had been fooled by Nate, then so had she. Jessie did not deserve this—

“It’s all right,” said a soft voice at her shoulder. It was Sophie. “He won’t hurt her with it. The Mortal Sword makes Nephilim tell the truth.”