Clockwork Angel (The Infernal Devices #1)(94)
Author: Cassandra Clare

“What are you going to do?” Tessa asked the moment the carriage was out of sight. “About the Dark Sisters?”

“Go after them, of course.” Will’s color was high, his eyes glittering. “Your brother said de Quincey had dozens of those creatures at his disposal; Mortmain says there are hundreds. If Mortmain’s correct, we must get to the Dark Sisters before they work their spell, or the Enclave may well be walking into a slaughter.”

“But—perhaps it would be better to warn Henry and Charlotte and the others—”

“How?” Will managed to make the one word sound cutting. “I suppose we could send Thomas to warn the Enclave, but there is no guarantee he will get there in time, and if the Dark Sisters manage to raise the army, he could simply be killed with the rest. No, we must manage the Dark Sisters on our own. I killed one of them before; Jem and I ought to be able to manage two.”

“But perhaps Mortmain is wrong,” Tessa said. “You have only his word; he might have faulty information.”

“He might,” Jem acknowledged, “but can you imagine if he doesn’t? And we ignored him? The consequence to the Enclave could be utter destruction.”

Tessa, knowing he was right, felt her heart sink. “Maybe I could help. I fought the Dark Sisters with you once before. If I could accompany you—”

“No,” Will said. “It’s out of the question. We have so little time to prepare that we must rely on our fighting experience. And you have none.”

“I fought off de Quincey at the party—”

“I said no.” Will’s tone was final. Tessa looked at Jem, but he gave only an apologetic shrug as if to say that he was sorry but Will was right.

She turned her gaze back to Will. “But what about Boadicea?”

For a moment she thought he’d forgotten what he’d said to her in the library. Then the glimmer of a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, as if he’d tried to fight it and couldn’t. “You will be Boadicea someday, Tessa,” he said, “but not tonight.” He turned to Jem. “We ought to get Thomas and tell him to ready the carriage. Highgate’s not close; we’d best get started.”

Full night had descended on the city by the time Will and Jem stood out by the carriage, preparing to depart. Thomas was checking the fastenings on the horses while Will, his stele a white flash in the dimness, scrawled a Mark on Jem’s bare forearm. Tessa, having registered her disapproval, stood on the steps and watched them, a hollow feeling in her stomach.

After satisfying himself that the harnesses were secure, Thomas turned and ran lightly up the steps, stopping when Tessa raised a hand to halt him. “Are they going now?” she asked. “Is that all?”

He nodded. “All ready to go, miss.” He had tried to get Jem and Will to take him along, but Will was concerned that Charlotte would be angry at Thomas for participating in their exploit and had told him not to come.

“Besides,” Will had said, “we ought to have a man in the house—someone to protect the Institute while we’re gone. Nathaniel doesn’t count,” he’d added, with a sideways glance at Tessa, who had ignored him.

Will slid Jem’s sleeve down, covering the Marks he had made. As he returned his stele to his pocket, Jem stood looking up at him; their faces were pale smudges in the torchlight. Tessa raised her hand, then lowered it slowly. What was it he had said? Shadowhunters don’t say good-bye, not before a battle. Or good luck. You must behave as if return is certain, not a matter of chance.

The boys, as if alerted by her gesture, looked up toward her. She thought she could see the blue of Will’s eyes, even from where she stood. He wore a strange look as their eyes locked, the look of someone who has just woken up and wonders if what they are looking at is real or a dream.

It was Jem who broke away and ran up the stairs to her. As he reached her, she saw that he had high color in his face, and his eyes were bright and hot. She wondered how much of the drug Will had let him take, so that he would be ready to fight.

“Tessa—,” he said.

“I didn’t mean to say good-bye,” she said quickly. “But—it seems odd to let you leave without saying anything at all.”

He looked at her curiously. He did something that surprised her then, and took her hand, turning it over. She looked down at it, at her bitten fingernails, the still-healing scratches along the backs of her fingers.

He kissed the back of it, just a light touch of his mouth, and his hair—as soft and light as silk—brushed her wrist as he lowered his head. She felt a shock go through her, strong enough to startle her, and she stood speechless as he straightened, his mouth curving into a smile.

“Mizpah,” he said.

She blinked at him, a little dazed. “What?”

“A sort of good-bye without saying good-bye,” he said. “It is a reference to a passage in the Bible. ‘And Mizpah, for he said, the Lord watch between me and thee when we are absent one from another.’”

There was no chance for Tessa to say anything in response, for he had turned and run down the steps to join Will, who was as motionless as a statue, his face upturned, at the foot of the steps. His hands, sheathed in black gloves, were in fists at his sides, Tessa thought. But perhaps it was a trick of the light, for when Jem reached him and touched him on the shoulder, he turned with a laugh, and without another look at Tessa, he swung himself up into the driver’s seat, Jem following him. He cracked the whip, and the carriage rattled through the gate, which slammed shut behind it as if pushed by invisible hands. Tessa heard the lock catch, a hard click in the silence, and then the sound of church bells ringing somewhere in the city.

Sophie and Agatha were waiting in the entryway for Tessa when she came back inside; Agatha was saying something to Sophie, but Sophie didn’t appear to be listening. She looked over at Tessa as she came in, and something about the way she looked, for a moment, reminded Tessa of the way Will had looked at her in the courtyard. But that was ridiculous; there were no two people in the world more unalike than Sophie and Will.

Tessa stepped aside as Agatha went to close the great, heavy double doors. She had just pushed them shut, panting slightly, when the knob of the leftmost door, untouched, began to turn.

Sophie frowned. “They can’t be back so soon, can they?”

Agatha gazed down, perplexed, at the turning knob, her hands still braced against the door—then stood back as the doors swung wide before her.