Jem's smile was like the sun, illuminating for the first time a world consumed in total darkness, and the sight caught at Tessa's heart until she herself was smiling, grinning from ear to ear like a love struck fool, and she was perfectly fine with that, content to stare at him all day long with an inexplicable happiness lying between them. His hands, gentle fingers carefully wrapped around Tessa's slender wrists, carried the ghost of a tremble within their strong grip, and the young warlock had to remind herself that Jem was shaking for a whole different reason and not because of the drug that had so long sustained him.
He was nervous, her Jem. The thought made her smile grow even wider.
The ceremony was small, close friends gathered around them with large grins and wide eyes, and the comfort of it pulled Tessa into a memory, the echo of her first wedding vow drifting in the October breeze, and she blinked away the image of Will, a pair of twinkling eyes staring out from a tangle of dark hair, smiling like he's just been given the best thing in the world. Jem stood in his place, then, looking for all the world like a mess of then and now, angled face and dark eyes, violinist fingers and black hair, the young Jem that smiled with his heart on his sleeve and the one standing before her, scarred cheeks and wise words that formed the most meaningful thing Tessa had ever heard, a promise taken from the soul and kept within the heart.
She didn't think the day could get any better, a fresh wedding ring nestled on her finger, twinkling like a newly born star, until she had pressed her lips to his, sealing their lives for as long as they both lived, and Tessa knew, deep down in her heart of hearts, that the bond they shared, the undeniable link between husband and wife, would stretch far beyond two grave markers. Jem's heart leapt as everyone cheered, claps and whistles cutting through the air, and he held her hand in his own as they turned to the crowd around them. He saw Magnus, hair oddly free from glitter, and all of the shadowhunters he'd come to know on a level higher than mere conversation while healing an injured warrior.
He blinked at the fading memory of robes, rubbing across his skin like stiff parchment, blinding white in the hell of darkness, a bright spot of mourning in a world clad in black. The rune on his shoulder, the one put there so long ago by a boy long gone, was warm across his skin, glowing with heat beneath his suit. He looked to his left and found the world moving slowly, the leaves tumbling across the frozen ground twisting at a paused state, and felt his breath hitch at the sight.
Charlotte had a hand on her swelling belly, the other over her mouth as she smiled, her wide eyes sparkling with unshed tears. She leaned against Henry as he sat in his wheelchair, his prone legs resting upon the footrests, his hair waving in the wind like a brightly burning fire. His freckles were wrinkled from how big he was smiling, looking at Jem like a proud father, and the pain in Jem's heart increased that much more.
Jessamine carried her parasol, resting it on her shoulder as she sat in one of the white chairs, her pale blond curls flowing in the wind. Her china doll face was content, her eyes sparkling with an amount of happiness Jem had never witnessed, and she nodded at him. Gideon and Gabriel laughed with one another, giving him two thumbs up as they smiled, light hair tossed about their heads and shielding their eyes.
Sophie turned a scarred cheek to look at him, resting beside Gideon as she sat on the edge of her seat, clapping wildly, her laughter echoing in his head, and Cecily's ruby necklace gleamed in the light as she clutched it in her palm, her smile as bright as Will's had been.
Will. He was there of course, standing far from Cecily's chair, a stark figure in the midst of a crowd, all alone beneath a distant tree.
His presence sent Jem's heart pounding against his ribs, his soul aching to reach out and wrap around his parabatai's, an pain that he'd never known lying heavy within his chest, like an anvil ready to crush him. Will tipped his hat at Jem, a crooked smile gracing his sharp features, and sent a glance at Tessa, who stood frozen, moving but not quite moving, as she clutched Jem's hand.
The boy beneath the tree gave her a loving smile before turning his attention to Jem, his blue eyes shining in the darkness, reminding the groom of a time when that was all that kept him anchored in a sea of coughing and dots of blood, shaking shoulders and bright eyes glowing with concern. His throat felt tight, his stomach dropping, as Will laughed, a miraculous thing that sounded far better than any piece of music Jem could lure from his violin, and nodded, turning from his best friend to fade into the shadows, just as every other ghost from Jem's past dissipated in the wind, laughter and claps and cheers lost to the rush of movement as it returned.
Tessa turned to him with a smile, her eyes falling upon his paling face, and she squeezed his hand. The imprint of Will, the mark he left upon Jem's soul over a century ago, lifted Jem's spirits in a way he never could have thought possible, an all-encompassing rightness falling over him as he smiled at his wife, a victim to his memories as they took him away.
Jem had never found the words, spoken so long ago within such a great time of grief, to be as true as they were in that instant, looking at the spot where Will had been out of the corner of his eye, his parabatai rune burning his skin like an all-consuming fire.
In your eyes I have always found grace.
Please R&R!