“Why didn’t you want to do it?” Tessa asked a little hesitantly. “When he first asked you.”
Jem ran a hand through his silvery hair. “The ceremony binds you,” he said. “It makes you stronger. You have each other’s strength to draw on. It makes you more aware of where the other one is, so you can work seamlessly together in a fight. There are runes you can use if you are part of a pair of parabatai that you can’t use otherwise. But . . . you can choose only one parabatai in your life. You can’t have a second, even if the first one dies. I didn’t think I was a very good bet, considering.”
“That seems a harsh rule.”
Jem said something then, in a language she didn’t understand. It sounded like “khalepa ta kala.”
She frowned at him. “That isn’t Latin?”
“Greek,” he said. “It has two meanings. It means that that which is worth having—the good, fine, honorable, and noble things—are difficult to attain.” He leaned forward, closer to her. She could smell the sweet scent of the drug on him, and the tang of his skin underneath. “It means something else as well.”
Tessa swallowed. “What’s that?”
“It means ‘beauty is harsh.’”
She glanced down at his hands. Slim, fine, capable hands, with blunt-cut nails, and scars across the knuckles. Were any of the Nephilim unscarred? “These words, they have a special appeal to you, don’t they?” she asked softly. “These dead languages. Why is that?”
He was leaning close enough to her that she felt his warm breath on her cheek when he exhaled. “I cannot be sure,” he said, “though I think it has something to do with the clarity of them. Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, they contain pure truths, before we cluttered our languages with so many useless words.”
“But what of your language?” she said softly. “The one you grew up speaking?”
His lips twitched. “I grew up speaking English and Mandarin Chinese,” he said. “My father spoke English, and Chinese badly. After we moved to Shanghai, it was even worse. The dialect there is barely intelligible by someone who speaks Mandarin.”
“Say something in Mandarin,” said Tessa with a smile.
Jem said something rapidly, that sounded like a lot of breathy vowels and consonants run together, his voice rising and falling melodically: “Ni hen piao liang.”
“What did you say?”
“I said your hair is coming undone. Here,” he said, and reached out and tucked an escaping curl back behind her ear. Tessa felt the blood spill hot up into her cheeks, and was glad for the dimness of the carriage. “You have to be careful with it,” he said, taking his hand back slowly, his fingers lingering against her cheek. “You don’t want to give the enemy anything to grab hold of.”
“Oh—yes—of course.” Tessa looked quickly toward the window—and stared. The yellow fog hung heavy over the streets, but she could see well enough. They were in a narrow thoroughfare—though broad, perhaps, by London’s standards. The air seemed thick and greasy with coal dust and fog, and the streets were lined with people. Filthy, dressed in rags, they slumped against the walls of tipsy-looking buildings, their eyes watching the carriage go by like hungry dogs following the progress of a bone. Tessa saw a woman wrapped in a shawl, a basket of flowers drooping from one hand, a baby folded into a corner of the shawl propped against her shoulder. Its eyes were closed, its skin as pale as curd; it looked sick, or dead. Barefoot children, as dirty as homeless cats, played together in the streets; women sat leaning against one another on the stoops of buildings, obviously drunk. The men were worst of all, slumped against the sides of houses, dressed in dirty, patched topcoats and hats, the looks of hopelessness on their faces like etchings on gravestones.
“Rich Londoners from Mayfair and Chelsea like to take midnight tours of districts like these,” said Jem, his voice uncharacteristically bitter. “They call it slumming.”
“Do they stop and—and help in some way?”
“Most of them, no. They just want to stare so they can go home and talk at their next tea party about how they saw real ‘mug-hunters’ or ‘dollymops’ or ‘Shivering Jemmys.’ Most of them never get out of their carriages or omnibuses.”
“What’s a Shivering Jemmy?”
Jem looked at her with flat silver eyes. “A freezing, ragged beggar,” he said. “Someone likely to die of the cold.”
Tessa thought of the thick paper pasted over the cracks in the windowpanes in her New York apartment. But at least she had had a bedroom, a place to lie down, and Aunt Harriet to make her hot soup or tea over the small range. She had been lucky.
The carriage came to a stop at an unprepossessing corner. Across the street the lights of an open public house spilled out onto the street, along with a steady stream of drunkards, some with women leaning on their arms, the women’s brightly colored dresses stained and dirty and their cheeks highly rouged. Somewhere someone was singing “Cruel Lizzie Vickers.”
Jem took her hand. “I can’t glamour you against the glances of mundanes,” he said. “So keep your head down and keep close to me.”
Tessa smiled crookedly but didn’t take her hand out of his. “You said that already.”
He leaned close and whispered into her ear. His breath sent a shiver racing through her whole body. “It’s very important.”
He reached past her for the door and swung it open. He leaped down onto the pavement and helped her down after him, pulling her close against his side. Tessa looked up and down the street. There were some incurious stares from the crowds, but the two of them were largely ignored. They headed toward a narrow door painted red. There were steps around it, but unlike all the other steps in the area, they were bare. No one was sitting on them. Jem took them quickly, pulling her up after him, and rapped sharply on the door.
It was opened after a moment by a woman in a long red dress, fitted so tightly to her body that Tessa’s eyes widened. She had black hair piled on her head, kept in place by a pair of gold chopsticks. Her skin was very pale, her eyes rimmed with kohl—but on closer examination Tessa realized she was white, not foreign. Her mouth was a sulky red bow. It turned down at the corners as her gaze came to rest on Jem.
“No,” she said. “No Nephilim.”
She moved to shut the door, but Jem had raised his cane; the blade shot out from the base of it, holding the door open wide. “No trouble,” he said. “We’re not here for the Clave. It’s personal.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“We’re looking for someone,” he said. “A friend. Take us to him, and we won’t bother you further.”
At that, she threw her head back and laughed. “I know who you’re looking for,” she said. “There’s only one of your kind here.” She turned away from the door with a shrug of contempt. Jem’s blade slid back into its casing with a hiss, and he ducked under the low lintel, drawing Tessa after him.
Beyond the door was a narrow corridor. A heavy sweet smell hung on the air, like the smell that hung about Jem’s clothing after he had taken his drug. Her hand tightened involuntarily on his. “This is where Will comes to buy the—to buy what I need,” he whispered, inclining his head so that his lips nearly touched her ear. “Although why he would be here now . . .”
The woman who had opened the door for them glanced back over her shoulder as she set off down the hall. There was a slit up the back of her dress, showing much of her legs—and the end of a long, slender forked tail, marked with black and white markings like the scales of a snake. She’s a warlock, Tessa thought with a dull thud at her heart. Ragnor, the Dark Sisters, this woman—why was it that warlocks always seemed so—sinister? With the exception of Magnus perhaps, but she had the feeling Magnus was an exception to many rules.
The corridor widened out into a large room, its walls painted dark red. Great lamps, their sides carved and painted with delicate traceries that threw patterned light against the walls, hung down from the ceiling. Along the walls were ranged beds, in bunks, like the inside of a ship. A larg
e round table dominated the center of the room. At it sat a number of men, their skin the same blood-red as the walls, their black hair clipped close to their heads. Their hands ended in blue-black talons that had also been clipped, probably to allow them to more easily count and sift and mix the various powders and concoctions they had spread out before them. The powders seemed to glimmer and shine under the lamplight, like pulverized jewels.
“Is this an opium den?” Tessa whispered into Jem’s ear.
His eyes were raking the room anxiously. She could sense the tension in him, a thrum just under the skin, like the fast-beating heart of a hummingbird. “No.” He sounded distracted. “Not really—mostly demon drugs and faerie powders. Those men at the table, they’re ifrits. Warlocks without powers.”
The woman in the red dress was leaning over the shoulder of one of the ifrits. Together they looked up and over at Tessa and Jem, their eyes lingering on Jem. Tessa didn’t like the way they were looking at him. The warlock woman was smiling; the ifrit’s look was calculating. The woman straightened up and swayed over to them, her hips moving like a metronome under the tight satin of her dress.
“Madran says we have what you want, silver boy,” said the warlock woman, raking a blood-red nail across Jem’s cheek. “No need for pretense.”
Jem flinched back from her touch. Tessa had never seen him look so unnerved. “I told you, we’re here for a friend,” he snapped. “A Nephilim. Blue eyes, black hair—” His voice rose. “Ta xian zai zai na li?”
She looked at him for a moment, then shook her head. “You are foolish,” she said. “There is little of the yin fen left, and when it is gone, you will die. We struggle to obtain more, but lately the demand—”
“Spare us your attempts to sell your merchandise,” said Tessa, suddenly angry. She couldn’t bear the look on Jem’s face, as if each word were the cut of a knife. No wonder Will bought his poisons for him. “Where is our friend?”
The warlock woman hissed, shrugged, and pointed toward one of the bunk beds bolted to the wall. “There.”
Jem whitened as Tessa stared. Their occupants were so still that at first she had thought the beds were empty, but she realized now, looking more closely, that each was taken up by a sprawled figure. Some lay on their sides, arms trailing over the edges of the bed, hands splayed; most were on their backs, eyes open, staring at the ceiling or the bunk above them.
Without another word Jem began to stalk across the room, Tessa on his heels. As they drew closer to the beds, she realized that not all the occupants were human. Blue, violet, red, and green skin flashed past; green hair as long and netted as a web of seaweed brushed restlessly against a dirty pillow; taloned fingers gripped the wooden sides of a bunk as someone moaned. Someone else was giggling softly, hopelessly, a sound sadder than weeping; another voice repeated a children’s rhyme over and over and over again:
“Oranges and lemons
Say the bells of St. Clement’s
When will ye pay me?
Ring the bells at Old Bailey
When I grow rich
Say the bells of Shoreditch—”
“Will,” whispered Jem. He had stopped at a bunk halfway down the wall, and leaned against it, as if his legs threatened to give way.
Lying in the bunk was Will, half-tangled in a dark, ragged blanket. He wore nothing but trousers and a shirt; his weapons belt hung on a nail peg inside the bunk. His feet were bare, his eyes half-lidded, their blue only slightly visible beneath the fringe of his dark lashes. His hair was wet with sweat, pasted to his forehead, his cheeks bright red and feverish. His chest rose and fell raggedly, as if he were having trouble drawing breath.
Tessa reached out and put the back of her hand to his forehead. It was burning. “Jem,” she said softly. “Jem, we must get him out of here.”
The man in the bunk beside them was still singing. Not that he was quite a man, exactly. His body was short and twisted, his shoeless feet ending in cloven hooves.
“When will that be?
Say the bells of Stepney
I do not know,
Says the great bell of Bow”
Jem was still staring down at Will, motionless. He seemed frozen. His face had gone a patchy white and red color.
“Jem!” Tessa whispered. “Please. Help me get him on his feet.” When Jem did not move, she reached out, took Will by the shoulder, and shook him. “Will. Will, wake up, please.”
Will only groaned and turned away from her, burying his head against his arm. He was a Shadowhunter, she thought, six feet of bone and muscle, far too heavy for her to lift. Unless—
“If you do not help me,” Tessa said to Jem, “I swear, I will Change into you, and I will lift him myself. And then everyone here will see what you look like in a dress.” She fixed him with a look. “Do you understand?”
Very slowly he raised his eyes to hers. He did not look fazed by the idea of being seen by ifrits in a dress; he did not look as if he saw her at all. It was the first time she could remember seeing those silver eyes without any light behind them. “Do you?” he said, and reached into the bunk, catching Will by the arm and hauling him sideways, taking little care, and bumping Will’s head, hard, against the side rail of the bed.
Will groaned and opened his eyes. “Let me go—”
“Help me with him,” Jem said without looking at Tessa, and together they wrestled Will out of the bunk. He nearly fell, sliding his arm around Tessa to balance himself as Jem retrieved his weapons belt from the nail it was hanging from.
“Tell me this is not a dream,” Will whispered, nuzzling his face into the side of her neck. Tessa jumped. He felt feverishly hot against her skin. His lips grazed her cheekbone; they were as soft as she remembered.
“Jem,” Tessa said desperately, and Jem looked over at them; he had been buckling Will’s belt over his own, and it seemed clear he hadn’t heard a word Will had said. He knelt down to stuff Will’s feet into his boots, then rose to take his parabatai’s arm. Will seemed delighted by this.
“Oh, good,” he said. “Now we’re all three together.”
“Shut up,” said Jem.
Will giggled. “Listen, Carstairs, you haven’t any of the needful on you, have you? I’d stump up, but I’m flat out.”
“What did he say?” Tessa was baffled.
“He wants me to pay for his drugs.” Jem’s voice was stiff. “Come. We’ll get him to the carriage, and I’ll come back with the money.”
As they struggled toward the door, Tessa heard the voice of the cloven-footed man, following them, thin and as high as music piped through reeds, ending in a high-pitched giggle.
“Here comes a candle to light you to bed,
And here comes a chopper to chop off your head!”
Even the dirty Whitechapel air seemed clear and fresh after the cloying incense stench of the faerie drug den. Tessa almost stumbled going down the stairs. The carriage was thankfully still at the curb, and Cyril was swinging himself down out of the seat, heading over to them, concern on his big, open face.
“Is he all right, then?” he said, taking the arm that Will had draped over Tessa’s shoulders and draping it over his own. Tessa slipped aside gratefully; her back had begun to ache.
Will predictably, though, did not like this. “Let me go,” he said with sudden irritation. “Let me go. I can stand.”
Jem and Cyril exchanged glances, then moved apart. Will staggered, but stayed upright. He raised his head, the cold wind lifting the sweaty hair from his neck and forehead, blowing it across his eyes. Tessa thought of him up on the roof of the Institute: And I behold London, a human awful wonder of God.
He looked at Jem. His eyes were bluer than blue, his cheeks flushed, his features angelic. He said, “You did not have to come and fetch me like some child. I was having quite a pleasant time.”
Jem looked back at him. “God damn you,” he said, and hit Will across the face, sending him spinning. Will didn’t lose his footing, but fetched up agai
nst the side of the carriage, his hand to his cheek. His mouth was bleeding. He looked at Jem with total astonishment.
“Get him into the carriage,” Jem said to Cyril, and turned and went back through the red door—to pay for whatever Will had taken, Tessa thought. Will was still staring after him, the blood reddening his mouth.
“James?” he said.
“Come along, then,” said Cyril, not unkindly. He really was awfully like Thomas, Tessa thought as he opened the carriage door and helped Will inside, and then Tessa after him. He gave her a handkerchief from his pocket. It was warm and smelled like cheap eau de cologne. She smiled and thanked him as he shut the door.
Will was slumped in the corner of the carriage, his arms around himself, his eyes half-open. Blood had trickled down his chin. She leaned over and pressed the handkerchief to his mouth; he reached up and put his hand over hers, holding it there. “I’ve made a mess of things,” he said. “Haven’t I?”
“Dreadfully, I’m afraid,” said Tessa, trying not to notice the warmth of his hand over hers. Even in the darkness of the carriage, his eyes were luminously blue. What was it Jem had said, though, about beauty? Beauty is harsh. Would people forgive Will the things he did if he were ugly? And did it help him, in the end, to be forgiven? Though, she could not help but feel he did the things he did not because he loved himself too much but because he hated himself. And she did not know why.
He closed his eyes. “I’m so tired, Tess,” he said. “I only wanted pleasant dreams for once.”
“That is not the way to get them, Will,” she said softly. “You cannot buy or drug or dream your way out of pain.”
His hand tightened over hers.
The carriage door opened. Tessa drew back from Will hastily. It was Jem, his face like thunder; he spared a cursory glance at Will, threw himself into a seat, and reached up to rap on the roof. “Cyril, drive home,” he called, and after a moment the carriage lurched forward into the night. Jem reached out and drew the curtains across the windows. In the dimness Tessa slipped the handkerchief into her sleeve. It was still damp with Will’s blood.
The Infernal Devices Series Page 58