Don't panic, but we've got an audience." Clary turned her head. Perched on a nearby tree branch was Hugo, watching them beadily from bright black eyes. So the sound she'd heard had been wings rather than demented passion. That was disappointing.

Tessa is gone, and every moment she is gone is a knife ripping me apart from the inside. She is gone, and they cannot track her, and I have no idea where to go or what to do next, and the only person I can imagine speaking my agony to is the one person who cannot know.

Other people have shrubbery in their gardens. You have a bottomless pit.

Is that why you didn't call me? Because I'm an idiot?

I was just thinking of bunding up Cecily and feeding her to the ducks in Hyde Park," said Will, pushing his wet hair back and favoring Jem with a rare smile.

under his dripping hair, he was as white as parchment, his hands clenched at his sides so tightly that they were shaking. It seemed clear that some terrible turmoil was ripping him apart from the inside out.

She's alive," Thomas said, not opening his eyes. "What?" Will was caught off guard. "The one you come back for. Her. Tessa. She's with Sophie.