Until Bridget’s voice broken in on her happiness, drifting lugubriously from the kitchen.
“On a Tuesday they were wed
And by Friday they were dead
And they buried them in the churchyard side by side,
Oh, my love,
And they buried them in the churchyard side by side.”
Breaking away from Gideon with some reluctance, Sophie rose to her feet and dusted off her dress. “Please forgive me, my dear Mr. Lightwood—I mean Gideon—but I must go and murder the cook. I shall be directly back.”
“Ohhh,” Cecily breathed. “That was so romantic!”
Gabriel took his hand away from the door and smiled down at her. His face quite changed when he smiled: all the sharp lines were softened, and his eyes went from the color of ice to the green of leaves in spring sunshine. “Are you crying, Miss Herondale?”
She blinked damp eyelashes, suddenly aware that her hand was still in his—she could still feel the soft pulse beat in his wrist against hers. He leaned toward her, and she caught the early-morning scent of him: tea and shaving soap—
She pulled away hastily, freeing her hand. “Thank you for allowing me to listen,” she said. “I must—I need to go to the library. There is something I must do before tomorrow.”
His face crinkled in confusion. “Cecily—”
But she was already hurrying away down the corridor, without looking back.
To: Edmund and Linette Herondale
Ravenscar Manor
West Riding, Yorkshire
Dear Mam and Dad,
I have started this letter to you so many times and never sent it. At first it was guilt. I knew I had been a willful, disobedient girl in leaving you, and I could not face the evidence of my wrongdoing in stark black letters on a page.
After that it was homesickness. I missed you both so much. I missed the rich green hills sweeping up from the manor, and the heather all purple in the summer, and Mam singing in the garden. It was cold here, all black and brown and gray, pea-soup fogs and choking air. I thought I might die of loneliness, but how could I tell you that? After all, it was what I had chosen.
And then it was sorrow. I had planned to come here and bring Will back with me, to make him see where his duty lay, and bring him home. But Will has his own ideas about duty, and honor, and the promises he has made. And I came to see that I could not bring someone home when they were already there. And I did not know how to tell you that.
And then it was happiness. That may seem so very strange to you, as it did to me, that I would not be able to return home because I had found contentment. As I trained to become a Shadowhunter, I felt the stirring in my blood, the same stirring Mam always spoke of feeling every time we came from Welshpool into sight of the Dyfi Valley. With a seraph blade in my hand, I am more than just Cecily Herondale, youngest of three, daughter of good parents, someday to make an advantageous marriage and give the world children. I am Cecily Herondale, Shadowhunter, and mine is a high and glorious position.
Glory. Such an odd word, something women are not supposed to want, but is not our queen triumphant? Was not Queen Bess called Gloriana?
But how could I tell you I had chosen glory over peace? The hard-bought peace you left the Clave to provide for me? How could I say I was happy as a Shadowhunter without it causing you the gravest unhappiness? This is the life you turned away from, the life from whose dangers you sought to shelter Will and me and Ella. What could I tell you that would not break your hearts?
Now—now it is understanding. I have come to realize what it means to love someone more than you love yourself. I realize now that all you ever wanted was, not for me to be like you but to be happy. And you gave me—you gave us—a choice. I see those who have grown up in the Clave, and who never had a choice about what they wished to be, and I am grateful for what you did. To have chosen this life is a very different thing from having been born into it. The life of Jessamine Lovelace has taught me that.
And as for Will, and bringing him home: I know, Mam, you feared that the Shadowhunters would take all the love out of your gentle boy. But he is loved and loving. He has not changed. And he loves you, as do I. Remember me, for I will always remember you.
Your loving daughter,
Cecily
To: Members of the Clave of the Nephilim
From: Charlotte Branwell
My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Arms,
It is my sad duty to relate to you all that despite the fact that I have presented Consul Wayland with incontrovertible proof provided by one of my Shadowhunters that Mortmain, the gravest threat the Nephilim has faced in our times, is resident at Cadair Idris in Wales—our esteemed Consul has mysteriously decided to ignore this information. I myself regard knowledge of the location of our enemy and the opportunity to defeat his plans for our destruction as of the deepest importance.
By means provided to me by my husband, the renowned inventor Henry Branwell, the Shadowhunters at my disposal in the London Institute will be proceeding with utmost dispatch to Cadair Idris, there to lay down our lives in an attempt to stop Mortmain. I am most grieved to leave the Institute undefended, but if Consul Wayland can be roused to any action at all, he is most welcome to send guards to defend a deserted building. There are but nine of our number, three of them not even Shadowhunters but brave mundanes trained by us at the Institute who have volunteered to fight beside us. I cannot say that our hopes at this time are high, but I believe the attempt must be made.
Obviously I cannot compel any of you. As Consul Wayland has reminded me, I am not in a position to command the forces of the Shadowhunters, but I would be most obliged if any of you who agree with me that Mortmain must be fought and fought now will come to the London Institute tomorrow at midday and render us your assistance.
Yours truly,
Charlotte Branwell, head of the London Institute
18
FOR THIS ALONE
For this alone on Death I wreak
The wrath that garners in my heart:
He put our lives so far apart
We cannot hear each other speak.
—Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “In Memoriam A.H.H.”
Tessa stood at the edge of a precipice in a country she did not know. The hills about her were green, dropping off sharply into cliffs that sheered down toward a blue sea. Seabirds wheeled and cawed above her. A gray path wound like a snake along the edge of the cliff top. Just ahead of her, on the path, stood Will.
He wore black gear, and over it a long black riding coat, spattered with mud at the hem as if he had been walking a long way. He was without hat or gloves, and his dark hair was tousled by the wind off the sea. The wind lifted Tessa’s hair as well, bringing the scent of salt and brine, of the wet things that grow at the edge of the sea, a smell that reminded her of her sea voyage on the Main.
“Will!” she called out. There was something so lonely about the figure he cut, like Tristan watching across the Irish Sea for the ship that would bear Isolde back to him. Will did not turn at the sound of her voice, only raised his arms, his coat lifting in the wind, sweeping out behind him like wings.
Fear rose up in her heart. Isolde had come for Tristan, but it had been too late. He had died of grief. “Will!” she called again.
He stepped forward, off the cliff. She raced to the edge and looked down, but there was nothing there, only plunging gray-blue water and white surf. The tide seemed to carry his voice to her with each surge of water. “Awake, Tessa. Awake.”