"There was a very ordinary tavern there once," said Jem. "As it grew more and more infested with Downworlders, the Nephilim became concerned about the intertwining of the Shadow World with the mundane world. They barred mundanes from the place by the simple expedient of using a glamour to convince them that the tavern had been knocked down and a bank erected in its place. The Devil is a nearly exclusively Downworlder haunt now." Jem glanced up at the moon, a frown crossing his face. "It's growing late. We'd better move on."
After a single glance back at the Devil, Tessa moved after Jem, who continued to chat easily as they went, pointing out things of interest—the Temple Church, where the law courts were now, and where once the Knights Templar had sustained pilgrims on their route to the Holy Land. "They were friends of the Nephilim, the knights. Mundanes, but not without their own knowledge of the Shadow World. And of course," he added, as they came out from the network of streets and onto Blackfriars Bridge itself, "many think that the Silent Brothers are the original Black Friars, though no one can prove it. This is it," he added, gesturing before him. "My favorite place in London."
Looking out over the bridge, Tessa couldn't help but wonder what Jem liked so much about the place. It stretched from one bank of the Thames to the other, a low granite bridge with multiple arches, the parapets painted dark red and gilded with gold and scarlet paint that gleamed in the moonlight. It would have been pretty if it hadn't been for the railway bridge that ran along the east side of it, silent in the shadows but still an ugly latticework of iron railings stretching away to the river's opposite bank.
"I know what you're thinking," Jem said again, just as he had outside the Institute. "The railway bridge, it's hideous. But it means people rarely come here to admire the view. I enjoy the solitude, and just the look of the river, silent under the moon."
They walked to the center of the bridge, where Tessa leaned against a granite parapet and looked down. The Thames was black in the moonlight. The expanse of London stretched away on either bank, the great dome of St. Paul's looming up behind them like a white ghost, and everything shrouded in the softening fog that laid a gently blurring veil over the harsh lines of the city.
Tessa glanced down at the river. The smell of salt and dirt and rot came off the water, mixing with the fog. Still there was something portentous about London's river, as if it carried the weight of the past in its currents. A bit of old poetry came into her head. "'Sweet Thames, run softly till I end my song,'" she said, half under her breath. Normally she would never have quoted poetry aloud in front of anyone, but there was something about Jem that made her feel that whatever she did, he wouldn't pass judgment on her.
"I've heard that bit of rhyme before," was all he said. "Will's quoted it at me. What is it?"
"Spenser. 'Prothalamion.'" Tessa frowned. "Will does seem to have an odd affinity for poetry for someone so ... so ..."
"Will reads constantly, and has an excellent memory," said Jem. "There is very little he does not remember." There was something in his voice that lent weight to his assertion beyond the mere statement of fact.
"You like Will, don't you?" said Tessa. "I mean, you're fond of him."
"I love him as if he were my brother," said Jem matter-of-factly.
"You can say that," Tessa said. "However horrid he is to everyone else, he loves you. He's kind to you. What did you ever do, to make him treat you so differently from all the rest?"
Jem leaned sideways against the parapet, his gaze on her but still faraway. He tapped his fingers thoughtfully against the jade top of his cane. Taking advantage of his clear distraction, Tessa let herself stare at him, marveling a little at his strange beauty in the moonlight. He was all silver and ashes, not like Will's strong colors of blue and black and gold.
Finally he said, "I don't know, really. I used to think it was because we were both without parents, and therefore he felt we were the same—"
"I'm an orphan," Tessa pointed out. "So is Jessamine. He doesn't think he is like us."
"No. He doesn't." Jem's eyes were guarded, as if there were something he wasn't saying.
"I don't understand him," Tessa said. "He can be kind one moment and absolutely awful the next. I cannot decide if he is kind or cruel, loving or hateful—"
"Does it matter?" Jem said. "Is it required that you make such a decision?"
"The other night," she went on, "in your room, when Will came in. He said he had been drinking all night, but then, later, when you—later he seemed to become instantly sober. I've seen my brother drunk. I know it doesn't vanish like that in an instant; even my aunt throwing a pail of cold water in Nate's face wouldn't have roused him from stupor, not if he were truly intoxicated. And Will didn't smell of alcohol, or seem ill the next morning. But why would he lie and say he was drunk if he wasn't?"
Jem looked resigned. "And there you have the essential mystery of Will Herondale. I used to wonder the same thing myself. How anyone could drink as much as he claimed and survive, much less fight as well as he does. So one night I followed him."
"You followed him?"
Jem grinned crookedly. "Yes. He went out, claiming an assignation or some such, and I followed him. If I'd known what to expect, I would have worn sturdier shoes. All night he walked through the city, from St. Paul's to Spitalfields Market to Whitechapel High Street. He went down to the river and wandered about the docks. Never did he stop to speak to a single soul. It was like following a ghost. The next morning he was ready with some ribald tale of false adventures, and I never demanded the truth. If he wishes to lie to me, then he must have a reason."
"He lies to you, and yet you trust him?"
"Yes," Jem said. "I trust him."
"But—"
"He lies consistently. He always invents the story that will make him look the worst."
"Then, has he told you what happened to his parents? Either the truth or lies?"
"Not entirely. Bits and pieces," Jem said after a long pause. "I know that his father left the Nephilim. Before Will was ever born. He fell in love with a mundane girl, and when the Council refused to make her a Shadowhunter, he left the Clave and moved with her to a very remote part of Wales, where they thought they wouldn't be interfered with. The Clave was furious."
"Will's mother was a mundane? You mean he is only half a Shadowhunter?"
"Nephilim blood is dominant," said Jem. "That's why there are three rules for those who leave the Clave. First, you must sever contact with any and all Shadowhunters you have ever known, even your own family. They can never speak to you again, nor can you speak to them. Second, you cannot call upon the Clave for help, no matter what your danger. And the third ..."
"What's the third?"
"Even should you leave the Clave," said Jem, "they can still lay claim to your children."
A little shiver went through Tessa. Jem was still staring out at the river, as if he could see Will in its silvered surface. "Every six years," he said, "until the child is eighteen, a representative of the Clave comes to your family and asks the child if they would like to leave their family and join the Nephilim."
"I can't imagine anyone would," Tessa said, appalled. "I mean, you'd never be able to speak to your family again, would you?"
Jem shook his head.
"And Will agreed to that? He joined the Shadowhunters regardless?"
"He refused. Twice, he refused. Then, one day—Will was twelve or so—there was a knock on the Institute door and Charlotte answered it. She would have been eighteen then, I think. Will was standing there on the steps. She told me he was covered in road dust and dirt as if he'd been sleeping in hedgerows. He said, 'I am a Shadowhunter. One of you. You have to let me in. I have nowhere else to go.'"
"He said that? Will? 'I have nowhere else to go'?"
He hesitated. "You understand, all this is information I heard from Charlotte. Will's never mentioned a word of any of it to me. But that's what she claims he said."
"I don't understand. His parents—th
ey're dead, aren't they? Or they would have come looking for him."
"They did," Jem said quietly. "A few weeks after Will arrived, Charlotte told me, his parents followed. They came to the front door of the Institute and banged on it, calling for him. Charlotte went into Will's room to ask him if he wanted to see them. He had crawled under the bed and had his hands over his ears. He wouldn't come out, no matter what she did, and he wouldn't see them. I think Charlotte finally went down and sent them away, or they left of their own accord, I'm not sure—"
"Sent them away? But their child was inside the Institute. They had a right—"
"They had no right." Jem spoke gently enough, Tessa thought, but there was something in his tone that put him as far away from her as the moon. "Will chose to join the Shadowhunters. Once he made that choice, they had no more claim on him. It was the right and responsibility of the Clave to turn them away."
"And you've never asked him why?"
"If he wanted me to know, he'd tell me," Jem said. "You asked why I think he tolerates me better than other people. I'd imagine it's precisely because I've never asked him why." He smiled at her, wryly. The cold air had whipped color into his cheeks, and his eyes were bright. Their hands were close to each other's on the parapet. For a brief, half-confused moment Tessa thought that he might be about to put his hand over hers, but his gaze slid past her and he frowned. "Bit late for a walk, isn't it?"
Following his gaze, she saw the shadowy figures of a man and a woman coming toward them across the bridge. The man wore a workman's felt hat and a dark woolen coat; the woman had her hand on his arm, her face inclined toward his. "They probably think the same thing about us," Tessa said. She looked up into Jem's eyes. "And you, did you come to the Institute because you had nowhere else to go? Why didn't you stay in Shanghai?"
"My parents ran the Institute there," said Jem, "but they were murdered by a demon. He—it—was called Yanluo." His voice was very calm. "After they died, everyone thought that the safest thing for me would be to leave the country, in case the demon or its cohorts came after me as well."
"But why here, why England?"
"My father was British. I spoke English. It seemed reasonable." Jem's tone was as calm as ever, but Tessa sensed there was something he wasn't telling her. "I thought I would feel more at home here than I would in Idris, where neither of my parents had ever been."
Across the bridge from them the strolling couple had paused at a parapet; the man seemed to be pointing out features of the railway bridge, the woman nodding as he spoke. "And did you—feel more at home, that is?"
"Not precisely," Jem said. "Almost the first thing I realized when I came here was that my father never thought of himself as British, not the way an Englishman would. Real Englishmen are British first, and gentlemen second. Whatever else it is they might be—a doctor, a magistrate or landowner—comes third. For Shadowhunters it's different. We are Nephilim, first and foremost, and only after that do we make a nod to whatever country we might have been born and bred in. And as for third, there is no third. We are only ever Shadowhunters. When other Nephilim look at me, they see only a Shadowhunter. Not like mundanes, who look at me and see a boy who is not entirely foreign but not quite like them either."
"Half one thing and half another," Tessa said. "Like me. But you know you're human."
Jem's expression softened. "As are you. In all the ways that matter."
Tessa felt the backs of her eyes sting. She glanced up and saw that the moon had passed behind a cloud, giving it a pearlescent luster. "I suppose we should go back. The others must be worried."
Jem moved to offer her his arm—and paused. The strolling couple Jem had noted before were suddenly in front of them, blocking their way. Though they must have moved very swiftly to reach the far side of the bridge so fast, they stood eerily still now, their arms linked. The woman's face was concealed in the shadow of a plain bonnet, the man's hidden beneath the brim of his felt hat.
Jem's hand tightened on Tessa's arm, but his voice was neutral when he spoke. "Good evening. Is there something we can help you with?"
Neither of them spoke, but they moved a step closer, the woman's skirt rustling in the wind. Tessa looked around, but there was no one else on the bridge, no one visible at either embankment. London seemed utterly deserted under the blurring moon.
"Pardon me," Jem said. "I'd appreciate it if you'd let me and my companion go by." He took a step forward, and Tessa followed. They were close enough now to the silent couple that when the moon came out from behind its cloud, flooding the bridge with silvery light and illuminating the face of the man in the felt hat, Tessa recognized him instantly.
The tangled hair; the wide once-broken nose and scarred chin; and most of all the protruding, popping eyes, the same eyes as the woman who stood beside him, her blank stare fixed on Tessa in a manner terribly reminiscent of Miranda's.
But you're dead. Will killed you. I saw your body. Tessa whispered, "It's him, the coachman. He belongs to the Dark Sisters."
The coachman chuckled. "I belong," he said, "to the Magister. While the Dark Sisters served him, I served them. Now I serve him alone."
The coachman's voice sounded different from how Tessa remembered—less thick, more articulate, with an almost sinister smoothness. Beside Tessa, Jem had gone very still. "Who are you?" he demanded. "Why are you following us?"
"The Magister has directed us to follow you," the coachman said. "You are Nephilim. You are responsible for the destruction of his home, the destruction of his people, the Children of the Night. We are here to deliver a declaration of war. And we are here for the girl." He turned his eyes to Tessa. "She is the property of the Magister, and he will have her."
"The Magister," said Jem, his eyes very silver in the moonlight. "Do you mean de Quincey?"
"The name you give him does not matter. He is the Magister. He has told us to deliver a message. That message is war."
Jem's hand tightened on the head of his cane. "You serve de Quincey but are not vampires. What are you?"
The woman standing beside the coachman made a strange sighing noise, like the high whistle of a train. "Beware, Nephilim. As you slay others, so shall you be slain. Your angel cannot protect you against that which neither God nor the Devil has made."
Tessa began to turn toward Jem, but he was already in motion. His hand swung up, the jade-headed cane in it. There was a flash. A wickedly sharp and shimmering blade shot from the end of the cane. With a swift turn of his body, Jem plunged the blade forward and slashed it into the coachman's chest. The man staggered back, a high whirring sound of surprise issuing from his throat.
Tessa drew in her breath. A long slash across the coachman's shirt gaped open, and beneath it was visible neither flesh nor blood but shining metal, raggedly scored by Jem's blade.
Jem drew his blade back, letting out a breath, satisfaction mixed with relief. "I knew it—"
The coachman snarled. His hand darted into his coat and withdrew a long serrated knife, the kind butchers used to cut through bone, while the woman, snapping into action, moved toward Tessa, her ungloved hands outstretched. Their movements were jerky, uneven—but very, very fast, much faster than Tessa would have guessed they could move. The coachman's companion advanced on Tessa, her face expressionless, her mouth half-open. Something metallic gleamed inside it—metal, or copper. She has no gullet, and I would guess, no stomach. Her mouth ends in a sheet of metal behind her teeth.
Tessa retreated until her back hit the parapet. She looked for Jem, but the coachman was advancing on him again. Jem slashed away at him with the blade, but it seemed only to slow the man down. The coachman's coat and shirt hung away from his body now in ragged strips, clearly showing the metal carapace beneath.
The woman grabbed for Tessa, who darted aside. The woman lumbered forward and crashed into the parapet. She seemed to feel no more pain than the coachman did; she drew herself stiffly upright and turned to move toward Tessa again. The impact seemed t
o have damaged her left arm, though, for it hung bent at her side. She swung toward Tessa with her right arm, fingers grasping, and seized her by the wrist. Her grip was tight enough to make Tessa scream as the small bones in her wrist flared with pain. She clawed at the hand that held her, her fingers sinking deep into slick, soft skin. It peeled away like the skin of a fruit, Tessa's nails scraping against the metal beneath with a harshness that sent shivers up her spine.
She tried to jerk her hand back, but she only succeeded in pulling the woman toward her; she was making a whirring, clicking noise in her throat that sounded unpleasantly insectile, and up close her eyes were pupil-less and black. Tessa pulled her foot back to kick out—
And there was the sudden clang of metal on metal; Jem's blade flashed down with a clean slice, cutting the woman's arm in half at the elbow. Tessa, released, fell back, the bodiless hand falling from her wrist, striking the ground at her feet; the woman was jerking around toward Jem, whir-click, whir-click. He moved forward, striking at the woman hard with the flat of the cane, knocking her back a step, and then another and another until she hit the railing of the bridge so hard that she overbalanced. Without a cry she fell, plunging toward the water below; Tessa raced to the railing just in time to see her slip beneath the surface. No bubbles rose to show where she had vanished.
Tessa spun back around. Jem was clutching his cane, breathing hard. Blood ran down the side of his face from a cut, but he seemed otherwise unharmed. He held his weapon loosely in one hand as he gazed at a dark humped shape on the ground at his feet, a shape that moved and jerked, flashes of metal showing between the ribbons of its torn clothing. When Tessa moved closer she saw that it was the body of the coachman, writhing and jerking. His head had been sliced cleanly away, and a dark oily substance pumped from the stump of his neck, staining the ground.
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