"So by this point he had already proposed?"
"He proposed the second time we met. " Jessamine sounded breathy. "He said he knew there would never be another woman for him. And he promised that once he had enough money, I would have just the life I had always wanted, that we would never worry about money, and that there would be ch- children. " She sniffled.
"Oh, Jessamine. " Charlotte sounded almost sad.
Jessamine flushed. "It was true! He loved me! He has more than proved it.
We are married! It was done most properly in a church with a minister-"
"Probably a deconsecrated church and some flunky dressed to look like a minister," said Charlotte. "What do you know of mundane weddings, Jessie? How would you know what a proper wedding was? I give you my word that Nathaniel Gray does not consider you his wife. "
"He does, he does, he does!" Jessamine shrieked, and tried to pul away from the Sword. It stuck to her hands as if it had been nailed there. Her wails went up an octave. "I am Jessamine Gray!"
"You are a traitor to the Clave. What else did you tell Nathaniel?"
"Everything," Jessamine gasped. "Where you were looking for Mortmain, which Downworlders you had contacted in your attempt to find him. That was why he was never anywhere you searched. I warned him about the trip to York. That is why he sent the automatons to Will s familys home. Mortmain wanted to terrify you into ceasing the search. He considers you all pestilential annoyances. But he is not afraid of you. " Her chest was heaving up and down. "He Will win out over you all. He knows it. So do I. "
Charlotte leaned forward, her hands on her hips. "But he did not succeed in terrifying us into ceasing the search," she said. "The automatons he sent tried to snatch Tessa but failed-"
"They werent sent to try to snatch Tessa. Oh, he still plans to take her, but not like that, not yet. His plan is close to realization, and that is when he Will move to take the Institute, to take Tessa-"
"How close is he? Has he managed to open the Pyxis?" Charlotte snapped.
"I-I dont know. I dont think so. "
"So you told Nate everything and he told you nothing. What of Benedict? Why has he agreed to work hand in glove with Mortmain? I always knew he was an unpleasant man, but it seems unlike him to betray the Clave. "
Jessamine shook her head. She was sweating, her fair hair stuck to her temples. "Mortmain is holding something over him, something he wants. I dont know what it is. But he Will do anything to get it. "
"Including handing me over to Mortmain," said Tessa. Charlotte looked at her in surprise when she spoke, and seemed about to interrupt her, but Tessa hurtled on. "What is this about having me falsely accused of possessing articles of dark magic? How was that to be accomplished?"
"The Book of the White," Jessamine gasped. "I-took it from the locked case in the library. Hid it in your room while you were out. "
"Where in my room?"
"Loose floorboard-near the fireplace. " Jessamines pupils were enormous. "Charlotte . . . please . . . "
But Charlotte was relentless. "Where is Mortmain? Has he spoken to Nate of his plans for the Pyxis, for his automatons?"
"I-" Jessamine took a shuddering gasp. Her face was dark red. "I cant-"
"Nate wouldnt have told her," said Tessa. "He would have known she might have been caught, and he would have thought shed crack under torture and spil everything. He would. "
Jessamine gave her a venomous look. "He hates you, you know," she said. "He says that all his life you looked down on him, you and your aunt with your sil y provincial morality, judging him for everything he did. Always tell ing him what to do, never wanting him to get ahead. Do you know what he call s you? He-"
"I dont care," Tessa lied; her voice shook slightly. Despite everything, hearing that her brother hated her hurt more than she had thought it could.
"Did he say what I am? Why I have the power I do?"
"He said that your father was a demon. " Jessamines lips twitched. "And that your mother was a Shadowhunter. "
The door opened softly, so softly that had Magnus not already been drifting in and out of sleep, the noise would not have woken him.
He looked up. He was sitting in an armchair near the fire, as his favorite place on the sofa was taken up by Will. Will, in bloody shirtsleeves, was sleeping the heavy sleep of the drugged and healing. His forearm was bandaged to the elbow, his cheeks flushed, his head pil owed on his unhurt arm. The tooth Will had pulled from his arm sat on the side table beside him, gleaming like ivory.
The door to the drawing room stood open behind him. And there, framed in the archway, was Camil e.
She wore a black velvet traveling cloak open over a bril iant green dress that matched her eyes. Her hair was dressed high on her head with emerald combs, and as he watched, she drew off her white kid gloves, deliberately slowly, one by one, and laid them on the table by the door.
"Magnus," she said, and her voice, as always, sounded like silvery bel s.
"Did you miss me?"
Magnus sat up straight. The firelight played over Camil es shining hair, her poreless white skin. She was extraordinarily beautiful. "I did not realize you would be favoring me with your presence tonight. "
She looked at Will, asleep on the sofa. Her lips curled upward. "Clearly. "
"You sent no message. In fact, you have sent me no messages at all since you left London. "
"Are you reproaching me, Magnus?" Camil e sounded amused. Gliding behind the sofa, she leaned over the back, looking down into Will s face.
"Wil Herondale," she said. "He is lovely, isnt he? Is he your newest amusement?"
Instead of answering, Magnus crossed his long legs in front of him. "Where have you been?"
Camil e leaned forward farther; if she had had breath, it would have stirred the curling dark hair on Will s forehead. "Can I kiss him?"
"No," said Magnus. "Where have you been, Camil e? Every night I lay here on your sofa and I waited to hear your step in the hall, and I wondered where you were. You might at least tell me. "
She straightened, rol ing her eyes. "Oh, very well. I was in Paris, having some new dresses fitted. A much-needed holiday from the dramas of London. "
There was a long silence. Then, "Youre lying," Magnus said.
Her eyes widened. "Why would you say such a thing?"
"Because its the truth. " He took a crumpled letter from his pocket and threw it onto the floor between them. "You cannot track a vampire, but you can track a vampires subjugate. You took Walker with you. It was easy enough for me to track him to Saint Petersburg. I have informants there. They let me know that you were living there with a human lover. "
Camil e watched him, a little smile playing about her mouth. "And that made you jealous?"
"Did you want me to be?"
"Ça mest egal," said Camil e, dropping into the French she used when she truly wanted to annoy him. "Its all the same to me. He had nothing to do with you. He was a diversion while I was in Russia, nothing more. "