Clockwork Princess (The Infernal Devices, #3)(142)

“Charles Buford Fairchild,” Henry had corrected.

Charlotte had made a face. Tessa, laughing, had asked, “Fairchild? Not Branwell?”

Charlotte had given a shy smile. “I am the Consul. It has been decided that in this case the child will take my name. Henry doesn’t mind, do you, Henry?”

“Not at all,” Henry had said. “Especially as Charles Buford Branwell would have sounded rather silly, but Charles Buford Fairchild has an excellent ring to it.”

“Henry …”

Tessa smiled now at the memory. She was standing near the Christmas tree, watching the members of the Enclave in all their finery—women in the deep jewel tones of winter, dresses of red satin and sapphire silk and gold taffeta, men in elegant evening dress—as they milled and laughed. Sophie stood with Gideon, glowing and relaxed in an elegant green velvet gown; there was Cecily in blue, dashing here and there, delighted to be looking at everything, and Gabriel following her, all long limbs and tousled hair and adoring amusement. A massive Yule log, wound round with wreaths of ivy and holly, burned in the enormous stone fireplace, and hanging above the fireplace were nets containing golden apples, walnuts, colored popcorn, and candies. There was music, too, soft and haunting, and Charlotte seemed finally to have found a use for Bridget’s singing, for it rose above the sound of the instruments, lilting and sweet.

“Alas, my love, ye do me wrong

To cast me off discourteously.

And I have loved you so long,

Delighting in your company.

Greensleeves was all my joy;

Greensleeves was my delight;

Greensleeves was my heart of gold,

And who but Lady Greensleeves?”

“‘Let the sky rain potatoes,’” said a musing voice. “‘Let it thunder to the tune of Greensleeves.’”

Tessa started and turned. Will had appeared somehow at her elbow, which was vexing, as she had been looking for him since she had come into the room and had seen no sign of him. As always, the sight of him in evening dress—all blue and black and white—took her breath away, but she hid the hitch in her chest with a smile. “Shakespeare,” she said. “The Merry Wives of Windsor.”

“Not one of the better plays,” Will said, narrowing his blue eyes as he took her in. Tessa had chosen to wear rose-colored silk that night, and no jewelry save a velvet ribbon, wrapped twice about her throat and hanging down her back. Sophie had done her hair—as a favor, now, not as a lady’s maid—and woven small white berries in among the upswept curls. Tessa felt very fancy, and conspicuous. “Though it has its moments.”

“Always a literary critic,” Tessa sighed, gazing away from him, across the room, to where Charlotte was in conversation with a tall, fair-haired man Tessa did not recognize.

Will leaned in toward her. He smelled faintly of something green and wintry, fir or lime or cypress. “Those are mistletoe berries in your hair,” he said, his breath ghosting across her cheek. “Technically, I believe that means anyone can kiss you at any time.”

She widened her eyes at him. “Do you think they’re likely to try?”

He touched her cheek lightly; he was wearing white chamois gloves, but she felt it as if it were his skin on hers. “I’d kill anyone who did.”

“Well,” Tessa said. “It wouldn’t be the first time you did something scandalous at Christmas.”

Will paused for a moment and then grinned, that rare grin of his that lit up his face and changed the whole nature of it. It was a smile Tessa had worried once was gone forever, gone with Jem down into the darkness of the Silent City. Jem was not dead, but some bit of Will had gone with him when he’d left, some bit chiseled out of Will’s heart and buried down there among the whispering bones. And Tessa had worried, for that first week just after, that Will would not recover, that he would always be a sort of ghost, wandering about the Institute, not eating, always turning to speak to someone who was not there, the light in his face dying as he remembered and fell silent.

But she had been determined. Her own heart had been broken, but to mend Will’s, she was sure, would mean to mend her own somehow. As soon as she’d been strong enough, she had set herself to bring him tea he did not want, and books that he did, and harried him, in and out of the library, and demanded his help with training. She told Charlotte to stop treating him like glass that would break and to send him out into the city to fight, as he had been sent before, with Gabriel or Gideon instead of Jem. And Charlotte had done it, uneasily, but Will had come back from them bloody and bruised, but with his eyes alive and alight.

“That was clever,” Cecily had said to her later, as they’d stood by the window, watching Will and Gabriel talking in the courtyard. “Being Nephilim gives my brother a purpose. Shadowhunting will mend the cracks in him. Shadowhunting, and you.”

Tessa had let the curtain fall closed, thoughtfully. She and Will had not spoken of what had happened in Cadair Idris, the night they had spent together. Indeed, it seemed as distant as a dream. It was like something that had happened to another person, not her, not Tessa. She did not know if Will felt the same way. She knew Jem had known, or guessed, and forgave them both, but Will had not approached her again, not said he loved her, not asked if she loved him since the day Jem had left.

It seemed that endless ages went by, though it was only about a fortnight, before Will came and found her alone in the library, and asked her—rather abruptly—if she would go for a carriage ride with him the next day. Puzzled, Tessa had agreed, privately wondering if there was some other reason he wanted her company. A mystery to investigate? A confession to make?