Page 2 of Better in Black
“A ghastly topic,” Tessa mocked gently.
“Enough, woman. I’m trying to tell you something.” He wrapped a curl of her hair around his finger. “Our wedding was the pinnacle of my life, my darling, as you well know. A decision I shall never regret. As to why you married me, of course, opinions vary. Some say it was a moment of weakness, or the result of a fever—”
“Will.”
He sighed again. “It was only a moment, at the ceremony,” he said. “But I found that I missed, not my mother and father, but—Ella. I wished she had been there.”
Ella. Will’s older sister. Will had cast the blame on himself for her death, for many years; he knew better now, but the grief and guilt had left a wound. Tessa’s heart ached for him.
“Of course you missed her,” Tessa said. “I missed Nate—I hadalways thought he would walk me down the aisle, should I marry. I did not miss him the way he was in the end, of course. I missed the brother I had once, before he was corrupted and changed.”
“I would that I could bring him back for you,” Will said, tracing a finger down her cheek. “As he was before.”
“And I wish the same, that I could bring Ella back for you.” Tessa tilted her head to the side; some of her hair had come out of its fastenings and tumbled rather wildly around her shoulders. “Do you—you’ve never seen her spirit, have you?”
Will had the rare gift of seeing ghosts, even those who did not want to be seen. It was a rather melancholy gift, Tessa had discovered; the dead who lingered on Earth rarely remained for happy reasons.
“No,” Will said, his dark blue eyes somber. “I never have. And I am glad of it, for it means she is at rest. Her death—” He broke off, but Tessa knew what he had begun to say.Her death was dreadful. Eternal peace would be the greatest blessing.
“Will—”
He shook his head, and she saw him shake away his melancholy with a deliberate effort. His eyes cleared, and he was smiling again. “Now is not the time to chatter about sad things,” he said. “It is very unromantic of me. I should be telling you how glorious you look half-clothed. Like the Venus de Milo, but with arms.”
“I am duly complimented,” Tessa said gravely. “And the arms are quite useful, as are the hands. For instance,” she added, reaching for him, “I can dothis.”
After a moment, Will caught at her wrist, his eyes languid. “You are mischievous, Tess,” he said. “There will be consequences.”
“Come and show me what they are, then,” she whispered, and hedid.
—
The next day they ventured out to admire the windows of Sainte-Chapelle. Though the chapel had not been used for religious purposes since the Revolution, it had the hushed-stone feeling Tessa associated with churches and Institutes. Indeed, Will led her to a corner of the chapel, and with the tip of his umbrella (they had wakened to darker skies and the promise of rain) pointed out the near-illegible Enkeli rune carved upon the stone floor. “There would have been a storehouse of weapons here once,” he said, “kept for the use of Shadowhunters—maces, flails, swords, all sorts of things.”
Tessa leaned against his shoulder. “And now?”
“Who knows?” He flashed a smile. “Times change. Nothing remains as it was.”
They went out in the city, where it had not yet rained, which Will attributed to his having brought an umbrella with him. He twirled it as they crossed the Rue de la Paix, where Tessa saw a pretty cameo brooch in the window of a jeweler’s, and Will bought it for her immediately. He also tried to interest her in a dressmaker’s, but Tessa told him she had not come to Paris to buy clothes, and when he looked affronted, she stuck out her tongue. Will always brought out her childish side, Tessa thought, though not in a bad way—there was much to be missed about childhood and its easy sense of wonder, a wonder she often felt when she was with Will.
That night, tired, they dined at the hotel, intending to go to bed early. As they left the grand dining room, walking hand in hand under the lights of the great sparkling chandeliers in the lobby, Tessa caught sight of something that made her pause.
A printed sign was displayed atop a gold stand. All elegant curlicues and flourishes, it read:
THE WORLD BEYOND?
Tonight, for the special pleasure of our guests, the MEURICE is hosting A GREAT SÉANCE, led by the famed Madame Dorothea, Occultist and Seer! Behold with wonder as she speaks with voices from beyond the veil and relays the words of loved ones believed long lost and gone! Shudder with terror as a GHOSTLY PRESENCE makes itself known. Do you dare?
There was a second sign, where the location of this event was printed:THE READING ROOM, 8p.m.Tessa had been in the hotel’s reading room before, of course; it was a pleasant space of frescoed walls, with plush seating, potted palms, and scattered tables.
Tessa checked the clock on the wall: The Great Séance had already begun a quarter of an hour ago. “I don’t like this,” she said. “We were so hoping to avoid anything that smacked of magic, or Downworld—”
“Oh, I doubt there’s any magic here,” Will said. “Just a mundane pretending she can speak with the dead, profiting from the grief of others.” His voice was hard, and Tessa could not help but recall her thought of the previous night, that Will would always battle anything he perceived as injustice. “I say we attend. Make pests of ourselves. Perhaps we can interrupt her scheme.”
“Make pests of ourselves in what way?” Tessa demanded, but Will had already caught her hand in his, and was hurrying to the reading room.
The gas lamps had been turned down low, the room illuminated only by rows of flickering candles. They threw the wavering shadows of those in attendance against the walls, where they seemed to dance an odd, elongated sort of waltz. And there were many hotel guests in attendance, clustered in one corner of the room. Tessa recognized some of them: an old British soldier who had fought in the Crimea, a mother and daughter who had come to fill out their next season’s wardrobes, a pair of elderly sisters who had scrapedto save for this trip to Paris. All were watching, rapt, what was unfolding within a circle of daintily upholstered chairs.
Will and Tessa pushed carefully through the crowd until they had a good view. In the center of the chair circle stood a middle-aged woman, stout and short, with dyed-black hair pulled back into a tightly coiled knot. Her face was pale, and she wore a garish blue velvet robe that matched the velvet gloves on her hands.
