Teaser 1:
“What are you doing following me around the back streets of London, you little idiot?” Will demanded, giving her arm a light shake.
Cecily’s eyes narrowed. “This morning it was cariad (note: Welsh endearment, like ‘darling’ or ‘love’), now it’s idiot.”
“Oh, you’re using a Glamour rune. There’s one thing to declare, you are not afraid of anything when you live in the country. But this is London.”
“I’m not afraid of London,” Cecily said defiantly.
Will leaned closer, almost hissing in her ear *and said something very complicated in Welsh*
She laughed. “No, it wouldn’t do you any good to tell me to go home. You are my brother, and I want to go with you.”
Will blinked at her words.
You are my brother, and I want to go with you.
It was the sort of thing he was used to hearing Jem say.
Although Cecily was unlike Jem in every other conceivable possible way, she did share one quality with him. Stubbornness. When Cecily said she wanted something, it did not express an idle desire, but an iron determination.
“Do you even care where I’m going?” he said. “What if I were going to hell?”
“I’ve always wanted to see hell,” Cecily said. “Doesn’t everyone?”
“Most of us spend our time trying to stay out of it, Cecily. I’m going to an ifrit den, if you must know, to purchase drugs from vile, dissolute criminals. They may clap eyes on you, and decide to sell you.”
“Wouldn’t you stop them?”
“I suppose it would depend on whether they cut me a part of the profit.”
She shook her head. “Jem is your parabatai,” she said. “He is your brother, given to you by the Clave, but I am your sister by blood. Why would you do anything for him, but you only want me to go home?”
“How do you know the drugs are for Jem?” Will said.
“I’m not an idiot, Will.”
“No, more’s the pity. Jem- Jem is like the better part of me. I would not expect you to understand. I owe him. I owe him this.”
“So what am I?” Cecily said.
Will exhaled, too desperate to check himself. “You are my weakness.”
“And Tessa is your heart,” she said, not angrily, but thoughtfully. “I am not fooled. As I told you, I’m not an idiot. And more’s the pity for you, although I suppose we all want things we can’t have.”
“Oh,” said Will, “and what do you want?”
“I want you to come home.” A strand of black hair was stuck to her cheek by the dampness, and Will fought the urge to pull her cloak closer about her, to make her safe as he had when she was a child.
“The Institute is my home,” Will sighed, and leaned his head against the stone wall. “I can’t stand out her arguing with you all evening, Cecily. If you’re determined to follow me into hell, I can’t stop you.”
“Finally,” she said provingly. “You’ve seen sense. I knew you would, you’re related to me.”
Will fought the urge to shake her.
“Are you ready?”
She nodded, and he raised his hand to knock on the door.
Teaser 2:
Will’s eyes met Tessa’s as she came closer, almost tripping again over the torn hem of her gown. For a moment, they were in perfect understanding. Jem was what they could still look each other straight in the eye about. On the topic of Jem, they were both fierce and unyielding. Tessa saw Will’s hand tighten on Jem’s sleeve. “She’s here,” he said.
Jem’s eyes opened slowly. Tessa fought to keep the look of shock from her face. His pupils were blown out, his irises a thin ring of silver around the black. “Ni shou shang le ma, quin ai de?” he whispered.
Teaser 3:
“Will!”
He turned at the familiar voice and saw Tessa. There was a small path cut along the side of the hill, lined with unfamiliar white flowers, and she was walking up it, toward him. Her long brown hair blew in the wind — she had taken off her straw bonnet, and held it in one hand, waving it at him and smiling as if she were glad to see him.
His own heart leaped up at the sight of her. “Tess,” he called. 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 the wings of seagulls 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 —
Teaser 4:
“If Jem dies, I cannot be with Tessa,” said Will. “Because it will be as if I were waiting for him to die, or took some joy in his death, if it let me have her. And I will not be that person. I will not profit from his death. So he must live.” He lowered his arm, his sleeve bloody. “It is the only way any of this can ever mean anything. Otherwise it is only —”
“Pointless, needless suffering and pain? I don’t suppose it would help if I told you that was the way life is. The good suffer, the evil flourish, and all that is mortal passes away,” Magnus said.
“I want more than that,” said Will. “You made me want more than that. You showed me I was only ever cursed because I had chosen to believe myself so. You told me there was possibility, meaning. And now you would turn your back on what you created.”
