Clockwork Angel (The Infernal Devices #1)(103)
Author: Cassandra Clare

“I suppose,” Tessa said, “if it had been your decision to make …”

“You’d have been out the door with nothing but the key of the street to your name,” Jessamine said, and sniffed. Seeing the way Sophie was looking at her, she added, “Oh, really! Don’t be such a mush-mouth, Sophie. Agatha and Thomas would still be alive if I’d been in charge, wouldn’t they?”

Sophie went pale, her scar standing out along her cheek like the mark of a slap. “Thomas is dead?”

Jessamine looked as if she knew she’d made a mistake. “I didn’t mean that.”

Tessa looked at her, hard. “What happened, Jessamine? We saw you injured—”

“And precious little any of you did about it either,” Jessamine said, and sat down with a flounce on the fountain wall, apparently forgetting to worry about the state of her dress. “I was unconscious … and when I awoke, I saw that all of you had gone but Thomas. Mortmain was gone too, but those creatures were still there. One of them began to come after me, and I looked for my parasol, but it had been trampled to shreds. Thomas was surrounded by those creatures. I went toward him, but he told me to run, so … I ran.” She tilted her chin up defiantly.

Sophie’s eyes flashed. “You left him there? Alone?”

Jessamine set the knife down on the wall with an angry clatter. “I’m a lady, Sophie. It is expected that a man sacrifice himself for a lady’s safety.”

“That’s rubbish!” Sophie’s hands were tight little fists at her sides. “You’re a Shadowhunter! And Thomas is just a mundane! You could have helped him. You just wouldn’t—because you’re selfish! And—and awful!”

Jessamine gaped at Sophie, her mouth wide open. “How dare you speak to me like—”

She broke off as the door of the Sanctuary resounded with the noise of the heavy knocker falling. It sounded again, and then a familiar voice, raised, called out to them, “Tessa! Sophie! It’s Will.”

“Oh, thank God,” Jessamine said—clearly just as relieved to be free of her conversation with Sophie as she was to be rescued—and hurried toward the door. “Will! It’s Jessamine. I’m in here too!”

“And you’re all three all right?” Will sounded anxious in a way that tightened Tessa’s chest. “What happened? We raced here from Highgate. I saw the door of the Institute open. How in the Angel’s name did Mortmain get in?”

“He evaded the wards somehow,” Jessamine said bitterly, reaching for the door handle. “I’ve no idea how.”

“It hardly matters now. He’s dead. The clockwork creatures are destroyed.”

Will’s tone was reassuring—so why, Tessa thought, did she not feel reassured? She turned to look at Sophie, who was staring at the door, a sharp vertical frown line between her eyes, her lips moving very slightly as if she were whispering something under her breath. Sophie had the Sight, Tessa remembered—Charlotte had said so. Tessa’s sense of unease rose and crested like a wave.

“Jessamine,” she called. “Jessamine, don’t open the door—”

But it was too late. The door had swung wide. And there on the threshold stood Mortmain, flanked by clockwork monsters.

Thank the Angel for glamours, Will thought. The sight of a boy riding bareback on a charging black horse down Farringdon Road would normally be enough to raise eyebrows even in a metropolis as jaded as London. But as Will went by—the horse kicking up great puffs of London dust as it reared and snorted its way through the streets—no one turned a hair or batted the lash of an eye. Yet even as they seemed not to see him, they found reasons to move out of his way—a dropped pair of eyeglasses, a step to the side to avoid a puddle in the road—and avoid being trampled.

It was almost five miles from Highgate to the Institute; it had taken them three-quarters of an hour to cover the distance in the carriage. It took Will and Balios only twenty minutes to make the return trip, though the horse was panting and lathered with sweat by the time Will pounded through the Institute gates and drew up in front of the steps.

His heart sank immediately. The doors were open. Wide open, as if inviting in the night. It was strictly against Covenant Law to leave the doors of an Institute standing ajar. He had been correct; something was terribly wrong.

He slid from the horse’s back, boots clattering loudly against the cobblestones. He looked for a way to secure the animal, but as he’d cut its harness, there was none, and besides, Balios looked inclined to bite him. He shrugged and made for the steps.

Jessamine gasped and leaped back as Mortmain stepped into the room. Sophie screamed and ducked behind a pillar. Tessa was too shocked to move. The four automatons, two on either side of Mortmain, stared straight ahead with their shining faces like metal masks.

Behind Mortmain was Nate. A makeshift bandage, stained with blood, was tied around his head. The bottom of his shirt—Jem’s shirt—had a ragged strip torn from it. His baleful gaze fell on Jessamine.

“You stupid whore,” he snarled, and started forward.

“Nathaniel.” Mortmain’s voice cracked like a whip; Nate froze. “This is not an arena in which to enact your petty revenges. There is one more thing I need from you; you know what it is. Retrieve it for me.”

Nate hesitated. He was looking at Jessamine like a cat with its gaze fixed on a mouse.

“Nathaniel. To the weapons room. Now.”

Nate dragged his gaze from Jessie. For a moment he looked at Tessa, the rage in his expression softening into a sneer. Then he turned on his heel and stalked from the room; two of the clockwork creatures peeled themselves from Mortmain’s side and followed him.

The door closed behind him, and Mortmain smiled pleasantly. “The two of you,” he said, looking from Jessamine to Sophie, “get out.”

“No.” The voice was Sophie’s, small but stubborn, though to Tessa’s surprise, Jessamine showed no inclination to leave either. “Not without Tessa.”

Mortmain shrugged. “Very well.” He turned to the clockwork creatures. “The two girls,” he said. “The Shadowhunter and the servant. Kill them both.”

He snapped his fingers and the clockwork creatures sprang forward. They had the grotesque speed of skittering rats. Jessamine turned to run, but she had gone only a few steps when one of them seized her, lifting her off the ground. Sophie darted among the pillars like Snow White fleeing into the woods, but it did her little good. The second creature caught up to her swiftly and bore her to the ground as she screamed. In contrast Jessamine was utterly silent; the creature holding her had one metal hand clamped across her mouth and the other around her waist, fingers digging in cruelly. Her feet kicked uselessly in the air like the feet of a criminal dangling at the end of a hangman’s rope.