Clockwork Princess (The Infernal Devices 3)

She closed her eyes and willed that the end be quick.

Will stood at the top of a high green hill and looked out over the sea. The sky and sea were both so intensely blue that they seemed to merge one into the other, so that there was no fixed point upon the horizon. Gulls and terns wheeled and shrieked above him, and the salt wind blew through his hair. It was as warm as summer, and his jacket lay discarded on the grass; he was in shirtsleeves and braces, and his hands were brown and tanned by the sun.

"Will!" He turned at the familiar voice and saw Tessa coming up the hill toward him. There was a small path cut along the side of the hill, lined with unfamiliar white flowers, and Tessa looked like a flower herself, in a white dress like the one she had worn to the ball the night he had kissed her on Benedict Lightwood's balcony. Her long brown hair blew in the wind. She had taken off her bonnet and held it in one hand, waving it at him and smiling as if she were glad to see him. More than glad. As if seeing him were all the joy of her heart.

His own heart leaped up at the sight of her. "Tess," he called, and reached out a hand as if he could pull her toward him. But she was still such a distance away--she seemed both very near and very far suddenly and at the same time. He could see every detail of her pretty upturned face but could not touch her, and so he stood, waiting and desiring, and his heart beat like wings in his chest.

At last she was there, close enough that he could see where the grass and flowers bent beneath the tread of her shoes. He reached out for her, and she for him. Their hands closed on each other's, and for a moment they stood smiling, and her fingers were warm in his.

"I've been waiting for you," Will said, and she looked up at him with a smile that vanished from her face as her feet slipped and she tilted toward the edge of the cliff. Her hands tore out of his, and suddenly he was reaching for air as she fell away from him, silently fell, a white blur against the blue horizon.

Will sat bolt upright in bed, his heart slamming against his ribs. His room at the White Horse was half-full of moonlight, which clearly outlined the unfamiliar shapes of the furniture: the washstand and side table with its unread copy of Fordyce's Sermons to Young Women, the overstuffed chair by the fireplace, in which the flames had burned down to embers. The sheets of his bed were cold, but he was sweating; he swung his legs over the side and walked to the window.

There was a stiff bunch of arranged dried flowers in a vase on the sill. He pushed them out of the way and unlatched the pane with aching fingers. His whole body hurt. He had never ridden so far or so hard in his life before, and he was weary and saddle-sore. He would need iratzes before he started out on the road again tomorrow.

The window opened outward, and cold air blew against his face and hair, cooling his skin. There was an ache inside him, under his ribs, that had nothing to do with riding. Whether it was the separation from Jem or his anxiety over Tessa, he could not say. He kept seeing her falling away from him, their hands unclasping. He had never been one to believe in the prophetic meaning of dreams, and yet he could not undo the tight, cold knot inside his stomach, or regulate his harsh breathing.

In the dark pane of the window he could see the reflection of his face. He touched the window lightly, his fingertips leaving marks in the condensation on the glass. He wondered what he would say to Tessa when he found her, how he could tell her why it was that he was the one who had come after her, and not Jem. If there was grace in the world, perhaps at least they could grieve together. If she never truly believed he loved her, if she never returned his affection, at least mercy might grant that they be able to share their sadness. Nearly unable to bear the thought of how much he needed her quiet strength, he closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against the cold glass.

As they made their way through the East End's winding lanes from Limehouse Station toward Gill Street, Gabriel could not help but be aware of Cecily by his side. They were glamoured, which was useful, as their appearance in this poorer part of London would otherwise doubtless have excited comment, and perhaps resulted in their being hauled into a broker's shop willy-nilly to look at the goods on offer. As it was, Cecily was intensely curious, and paused often to gaze into shop-windows--not just milliners' and bonnet-makers', but shops selling everything from boot polish and books to toys and tin soldiers. Gabriel had to remind himself that she came from the countryside and had probably never seen a thriving market town, much less anything like London. He wished he could take her somewhere befitting a lady of her station--the shops of Burlington Arcade or Piccadilly, not these dark, close streets.

He did not know what he had expected from Will Herondale's sister. That she would be just as unpleasant as Will? That she would not look so disconcertingly like him, and yet at the same time be extraordinarily pretty? He had rarely looked at Will's face without wanting to hit it, but Cecily's face was endlessly fascinating. He found himself wanting to write poetry about how her blue eyes were like starlight and her hair like night, because "night" and "starlight" rhymed, but he had a feeling the poem wouldn't turn out that well, and Tatiana had rather frightened him off poetry as it was. Besides, there were things you couldn't put in poetry anyway, like the way that when a certain girl curved her mouth in a certain way, you wanted very much to lean forward and--

"Mr. Lightwood," Cecily said in an impatient tone that indicated that this was not the first time she had tried to get Gabriel's attention. "I do believe we have passed the shop already."

Gabriel cursed under his breath and turned back. They had indeed passed the number Magnus had given them; they retraced their steps until they found themselves standing before a dark, ill-favored shop with clouded windows. Through the murky glass he was able to see shelves on which sat a variety of peculiar items--jars in which dead serpents floated, their eyes white and open; dolls whose heads had been removed and replaced with small gold birdcages; and stacked bracelets made of human teeth.

"Oh, dear," said Cecily. "How decidedly unpleasant."

"Do you not wish to enter?" Gabriel turned to her. "I could go instead--"

"And leave me standing about on the cold pavement? How ungentlemanly. Certainly not." She reached for the knob and pushed the door open, setting a small bell somewhere in the shop tinkling. "After me, please, Mr. Lightwood."

Gabriel went blinking after her into the dim light of the shop. The inside was no more welcoming than the exterior. Long rows of dusty shelves led back toward a shadowy counter. The windows seemed to have been smeared with some dark unguent, blocking out much of the sunlight. The shelves themselves were a cluttered mass--brass bells with handles shaped like bones, fat candles whose wax was stuffed with insects and flowers, a lovely golden crown of such peculiar shape and diameter than it could never have fit a human head. There were shelves of knives, and copper and stone bowls whose basins were marked with peculiar brownish stains. There were stacks of gloves of all sizes, some with more than five fingers on each hand. An entire de-fleshed human skeleton hung from a thin cord toward the front of the shop, twisting in the air, though there was no breeze.

Gabriel looked quickly toward Cecily to see if she had quailed, but she had not. She looked irritated if anything. "Someone really ought to dust in here," she announced, and swept toward the back of the shop, the small flowers on her hat bouncing. Gabriel shook his head.

He caught up to Cecily just as she brought her gloved hand down on the brass bell on the counter, setting it to an impatient ringing. "Hello?" she called. "Is anyone here?"

"Directly in front of you, miss," said an irritable voice, downward and to the left. Both Cecily and Gabriel leaned over the counter. Just below the edge of it was the top of the head of a small man. No, not quite a man, thought Gabriel as the glamour peeled away--a satyr. He wore a waistcoat and trousers, though no shirt, and had the cloven feet and neatly curling horns of a goat. He also had a trimmed beard, a pointed jaw, and the rectangular-pupilled yellow eyes of a goat, half-hidden behind spectacles.

"Gracious," said Cecil

y. "You must be Mr. Sallows."

"Nephilim," observed the shop owner gloomily. "I detest Nephilim."

"Hmph," said Cecily. "Charmed, I'm sure."

Gabriel felt it was about time to intervene. "How did you know we were Shadowhunters?" he snapped.

Sallows raised his eyebrows. "Your Marks, sir, are clearly visible on your hands and throat," he said, as if talking to a child, "and as for the girl, she looks just like her brother."

"How would you know my brother?" Cecily demanded, her voice rising.

"We don't get many of your kind in here," said Sallows. "It's notable when we do. Your brother Will was in and out quite a bit about two months ago, running errands for that warlock Magnus Bane. He was down the Cross Bones too, bothering Old Mol. Will Herondale's well-known in Downworld, though he mostly keeps himself out of trouble."

"That is astonishing news," said Gabriel.

Cecily gave Gabriel a dark look. "We are here on the authority of Charlotte Branwell," she said. "Head of the London Institute."

The satyr waved a hand. "I don't care much for your Shadowhunter hierarchies, you know; none of the Fair Folk do. Just tell me what you want, and I'll give you a fair price for it."

Gabriel unrolled the paper Magnus had given him. "Thieves' vinegar, bat's head root, belladonna, angelica, damiana leaf, powdered mermaid scales, and six nails from a virgin's coffin."

"Well," said Sallows. "We don't get much call for that sort of thing around here. I'll have to look in the back."

"Well, if you don't get much call for this sort of thing, what do you get call for?" asked Gabriel, losing his patience. "You're hardly a florist's shop."

"Mr. Lightwood," chided Cecily under her breath--but not quite enough under her breath, for Sallows heard her, and his spectacles bounced on his nose.

"Mr. Lightwood?" he said. "Benedict Lightwood's son?"