Tessa woke up with a headache. She needed a few moments to remember where she was, because she saw everything through a blur and she was still dizzy. And it felt like something was missing. An important part of her, but she couldn't tell what it was. As she looked to the side she saw Will, who looked back at her with a frightened look on his face. A look she had never seen on his face before. Then she saw Mortmain walking into her field of view.

"You finally woke up." he said.

"What did you do to me?" she wanted to walk toward him, but she realised that she was bound to the wall by iron chains. She probably didn't notice that before, because of the dizziness.

"Why am I bound to a wall?! WHAT DID YOU DO?" Tessa screamed, while trying to escape the chains holding her, without any success.

"What I had to do" Mortmain answered

"Stop with your answers that give me no information! Just say what you did to me and don't enjoy yourself like that! That's sick!"

"Keep calm, Miss Gray. I will tell you. Don't worry." He said with a little smile.

"Then what are you waiting for?"

"Well, basically I freed you from your ability to shape-shift."

"...What?! You... NO! That's not possible!" Tessa said frightened and confused.

"Actually it is." he responded.

"How? You can't just take it away!"

"I didn't just take it away! The process is complicated, far too complicated for you. But basically I took your ability away from you and into me. You're just a little mundane girl now. And I'm the shape-shifter." Mortmain said, a faint smile on his lips.

"I don't believe you! You couldn't do that. And even if this story is true, you wouldn't know how to use it. You don't know how to shape-shift! You've never been trained for that!" Thinking of the Dark Sisters, she had to oppress a shiver.

"I don't need to be trained. You did that for me." he said.

"But you stole my ability, not my knowledge how to use it!" Tess said.

"With the ability comes the knowledge and also the power to change into everyone you ever changed into."

Tessa shook her head. "It can't be that easy!"

"oh, you want to see me changing? There you go!"

He walked toward Charlotte, grabbed her through the cell bars - which didn't hurt him at all, maybe because it was his work - and closed his eyes.

Then he didn't look like Mortmain anymore, but like Charlotte. The real Charlotte looked at him, frightened.

"Well, a little short, but... oh, what is that?! You're pregnant!" Mortmain says to Charlotte.

"Leave her alone!" Henry said angrily. Tessa almost smiled, because his protectiveness for Charlotte in situations like that just show how much he loved her.

"I just wanted Miss Gray to see I'm not lying." he explained to Henry and changed back into himself.

Tessa looked at him. Speechless, she just couldn't and didn't want to believe that he said the truth. So that's the feeling that I miss something, she thought. Out loud she said

"You wanted to tell me who I am. I'm not a shape-shifter anymore. The only thing I knew for sure about myself was this. My ability. And now I'm a mundane? You have to give me answers!" The longer she spoke the louder was her voice.

"Everything in it's time." Mortmain said again.

"I gave you everything I had! What else could you probably want from me?"

"You love him, don't you?" he pointed at Jem, who was still lying on the floor of his cell. "i just give you a chance to rescue him."

Tessa looked at Jem.

Will must have seen something in the way she looked at him, because he said: "Don't Tess! He does nothing without an advantage for himself!"

She turned her head to look at Will.

"If you would have the chance to safe him, you wouldn't think about the risks, you would do everything to save him. And I would do the same. I WILL do exactly that. Save him."
"Let me do it instead!"

"No!" Mortmain interrupted "She or no one."

"Tess... please don't! You could die!"

"And if I don't do it Jem dies for sure. He's your parabatai, Will. He needs you more than he needs me. You have to be there for him, if I can't."

"But.."

"It's Jem or me. I choose Jem over me, you should do the same. Do it for him. For me. You know in your heart that it's the right choice."

Will gave her a long look, saying everything he didn't want to say aloud, with all the others around them. The he leaned at one of the walls and buried his face in his hands.

Tessa looked at him for a few moments, a sad look on her face. Then she turned to Mortmain, her face hardened and asked "What do I have to do?"