“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 traitorous behavior 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 dispassionately. “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.”
Brother Enoch laid the blade of the Mortal Sword flat across Jessamine’s palms. He did it without either force or gentleness, as if he were hardly aware of her as a person at all. He let the blade go and stepped back; even Jessamine’s eyes rounded in surprise; the blade seemed to balance perfectly across her hands, utterly immobile.
“It is not a torture device, Jessamine,” said Charlotte, her hands folded in front of her. “We must employ it only because you cannot be trusted to tell the truth otherwise.” She held up the invitation. “This is yours, is it not?”
Jessamine did not answer. She was looking at Brother Enoch, her eyes wide and black with terror, her chest rising and falling fast. “I cannot think, not with that monster in the room—” Her voice trembled.
Charlotte’s mouth thinned, but she turned to Enoch and spoke a few words. He nodded, then glided silently from the room. As the door shut behind him, Charlotte said, “There. He is waiting in the corridor. Do not think he will not catch you should you try to run, Jessamine.”
Jessamine nodded. She seemed to droop, broken like a toy doll.
Charlotte fluttered the invitation in her hand. “This is yours, yes? And it was sent to you by Nathaniel Gray. This writing is his.”
“Y-yes.” The word seemed pulled from Jessamine against her will.
“How long have you been meeting him in secret?”
Jessamine set her mouth, but her lips were trembling. A moment later a torrent of words burst from her mouth. Her eyes darted round in shock as if she could not believe she was speaking. “He sent me a message only a few days after Mortmain invaded the Institute. He apologized for his behavior toward me. He said he was grateful for my nursing of him and that he had not been able to forget my graciousness or my beauty. I—I wanted to ignore him. But a second letter came, and a third.. . . I agreed to meet him. I left the Institute in the middle of the night and we met in Hyde Park. He kissed me—”