A/N: I feel like this chapter is...off. I don't know. It's just something I'm feeling about the writing style of this chapter. But, it's late, which leaves me with two options: this chapter's writing style is off and weird or it's late and I'm just tired, so I've got weird feelings. I'm hoping that it's the latter, but if it IS the writing style, you'll tell me, won't you? Anyway, as usual, R&R. :D
When he handed the receptionist his credit card to pay for the suite he'd booked for three nights, the thought of actually using his hotel room hadn't once crossed his mind. But, God help him, he felt wretched, and when he saw the inviting, pristine white duvet, he said to himself, "I'll lie down for a minute or two, get some rest before returning to Alicante." He rationalized that he would need all the energy he could possibly muster for when he ventured into the Portal. He knew that he would focus particularly on the Circle's safe house, but Portals were unreliable sometimes and could develop a mind of their own. There was no telling which part of Alicante he could end up deposited in.
So, having satisfied himself with enough logical reasoning, Valentine removed his shoes and pulled his shirt off, slipping under the covers and stretching his person out on the mattress, resting his head on the pillow. It required mere minutes for him to succumb to slumber and following that, the world was dead to Valentine Morgenstern—and he continued sleeping until eight minutes past nine in the morning the next day.
What he should've done when he saw the numbers displayed on the clock's face was leap out of bed and hastily throw on his clothes, knowing only too well that classes had begun a little over two hours ago. But he couldn't bring himself to do so. When he dug his elbows into the mattress and propped himself up, his head felt so heavy and groggy, and his arms felt like they couldn't support the rest of him, he instantly gave up and fell back flat onto the bed. His body was cold, and yet warm at the same time. The covers he had over him made him want to throw them off—he felt like he was a lasagna dish baking in the oven!—but felt like the heavy duvet was completely and utterly inadequate to ward off the onslaught of cold brought on by the air conditioner.
He felt almost guilty at the thought of missing school again. He'd missed school for two whole weeks during his recovery, and on Monday, he'd been excused early from class. He felt like he was one of those underachieving, lazy students his teachers were constantly exasperated over.
But, the Angel help him, he didn't ever want to leave that bed. He felt so miserable, and so ready to die, he contemplated the idea of holding a pillow over his face and suffocating himself.
In the next ten hours, his condition had worsened, and in twenty-nine, he officially diagnosed himself with stomach flu. His headache had long since escalated into a migraine, his temperature had risen considerably, his arms and legs felt like jelly, the urge to throw up never left and, he was now beyond certain that he knew the menstrual pains women were always complaining about, and he could understand why they would do so. He felt like his stomach had been ripped open and his intestines were being viciously yanked out over and over again, and then sliced through with a hot blade. Then, as if all that torture wasn't enough, someone had shoved them back into his abdominal cavity where they took to being alive and refused to stay put, choosing instead to bounce in and around his lower abdominal region.
He was genuinely expecting himself to begin bleeding soon.
Despite the recurring suicidal thoughts, Valentine somehow managed to summon enough willpower to drag himself out of bed and step into the shower. He was sure that he was on fire, and remembered how much better he'd felt after Rose had helped give him a bath the last time he'd had a raging fever, which was the main reason he was now allowing ice cold water to fall upon him, rivulets of water running down his back.
The sheer completion, satisfaction that he felt while in the shower was unexplainable in words and he found himself reluctant to leave the sanctity of the bathroom. Eventually, though, he did and, for a lack of clothing, he shrugged on a white bathrobe, cold to the touch, and climbed back into bed.
That feeling of elation, of rebounding from his fever, didn't last long, however. When he woke back up the next evening, at some time after five, his temperature had returned—although, thankfully, hadn't worsened—and the sheer misery of everything he'd experienced the day before had returned as well. To add to that was the dismal realization that tonight was his last night at the Ritz-Carlton.
I could always add an extra night, he thought, and, truly, he was more than capable of doing so. But, he wanted his own bed and his dormitory. It didn't come close to providing him the comfort that the Ritz-Carlton had afforded him, but he wanted to go home. With that thought in mind, he twisted his upper torso so his chest was facing the mattress, and pressed his hands against it, pushing himself up.
Well, pushing himself up was an exaggeration. He couldn't even get past putting the pressure of all his body onto his hands. He collapsed once more onto the bed, and grudgingly conceded to the thought that he needed help. It took a sizeable amount of effort, and a stream of choice expletives left his lips, but he finally had the phone on his bed and had dialed the number one, phoning the front desk. He was greeted by an annoyingly cheerful sounding female, and, resisting the need to growl at her joyous disposition, Valentine asked her if she could call someone for him.
The Ritz-Carlton had always been synonym with excellent service, and he was glad for it because the woman, when she heard his request, didn't question him, didn't ask why he couldn't call himself, and immediately asked for the number. He gave it to her, the number of a household linked to Morgenstern Manor. As soon as the receptionist asked for Mrs Christine Anna-Marie Morgenstern nee Blevins, there would be a dove sent to his home, addressed to his mother, and when the receptionist told the person on the other side of the line to have Christine Morgenstern pick her son up at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Paris, another dove would be sent and his mother would be at the hotel in less than an hour.
In the mean time, as he waited for the hour to pass, Valentine asked for someone to be sent up to his room to light a fire in the fireplace. Six minutes later and there was a pleasant-looking Frenchman at his door, a fire poker and some logs at the ready. The fire was lit in a matter of minutes and he murmured a very sickly thank you to the Frenchman, nodding once, an indication that the time was nigh for him to leave. Once he heard the door click, he mustered all the willpower he could possibly have in his sick and frail body at that moment, and though his stomach lurched violently inside him and he became dizzy, light-headed, desperate to vomit, he picked up the backpack he'd purchased on the night he met Pierre, the very one that contained the human flesh—which was producing a vile smell, already beginning to decompose—and his bloody sweater, and threw it into the crackling flame.
He then swiped his clothes off the back of an armchair, where the Frenchman had been nice enough to place them, and put them on. He had tunnel vision twice when he looked down at his legs to ascertain that he was pushing his limbs into the right holes, and he had just enough time to yank his shirt off and grab the rubbish bin from the side of the couch and spew his vomit in it instead of all over the expensive Persian carpet. He coughed and gagged a few times after that, his head still over the rubbish bin, but when he was sure that he wouldn't throw up again, he drank from the complimentary bottle of water placed on the coffee table and pulled his shirt back on, this time managing to pull it all the way past his abdomen, covering him up properly.
Valentine half-crawled, half-walked back to the bed and fell heavily onto it, foregoing the covers and falling straight asleep. He didn't hear the doorbell when his mother rang it repeatedly, and the only reason he woke up was because she was shaking him so violently, all the while saying in a stern tone, "Valentine Morgenstern, you wake up right now. I don't have time for your games. Wake up. Now."
His eyelids weighed a tonne, but hearing his mother's voice, they fluttered open easily and he opened his mouth to call to her, but was cut short when she continued with, "Are you sick? No, that was a stupid question. It's so obvious that you are." She was now taking on the role of a mother fraught with distress, and she placed her palm on his forehead, keeping it there for a long time before retracting it. "Come now, darling, I'll take you home. We'll have someone take a look at you when we get back."
His mother ceased bending over and returned to her full height, her back ramrod straight, motioning with a hand for someone to come in and help him up. He smelt the familiar smell of Morgenstern Manor's library—of parchment and wood stains—and leaned heavily onto the member of the staff now supporting him. The walk to the elevator was excruciatingly long to him, and the ride down was equally as excruciating when he saw a reflection of himself in one of the mirrors. His skin had adopted a pasty, pallid complexion and his eyes looked sunken in, proof of the great amount of weight he'd lost. When he left the elevator and headed for the hotel's main entrance, people stared after him, probably thinking of him as a rich, spoilt heroin addict, being carted off by his embarrassed mother.
The drive to the Portal was even tougher on him as every turn the car made provoked his headache and sent him spiraling into twenty minutes of uncontrollable gag reflexes. Once, he actually almost threw up on his mother. Going through the Portal to get to Alicante damn near killed him, and the carriage ride home convinced him that his active imagination truly wasn't playing a part in the symptoms he suffered, after all. The world really was spinning around him and he had to focus very, very hard just to put one foot in front of the other. Had it not been for the man holding him up, he would've tumbled to the ground and never gotten up.
However, climbing up steps proved to be too hard even for the great Valentine Morgenstern, and they had to get the biggest man in their employment, Ben, to carry him all the way to his room. The healthy Valentine would have cursed himself every which way, but in his current state, even thinking would induce vomiting. He was simply too tired. He'd never felt this weak in his life, and all he wanted to do was fall asleep and never awake again.
Like a child, he was placed onto his bed, and his mother came in seconds later to tuck him in. His room, he recognised, was completely shrouded in darkness, with its curtains pulled and the witchlights brought out, the candles extinguished. The only reason his mother could see him perfectly was due to the dim light that snaked in from the corridor through the wide-open door and her Shadowhunter sense of sight. When she bent down to smooth his hair away from his face and plant a kiss on his forehead, Valentine could see the emerald green dress his mother had on underneath her coat, and noticed for the first time, how her hair had been styled into an elaborate up-do. And then he remembered that his mother was hosting a dinner party, and he'd received a formal letter in school on Monday, telling him to come home on the date that the dinner party was to be held—which was today.
And he remembered how, upon reading the letter, he'd decided to ask Rose to go with him. It was the perfect opportunity to introduce her to his mother.
He groaned. He was thinking too much. But, he couldn't let it go. He had to send a note to Rose and he had to convince his mother to allow him to attend the dinner party. "I forgot about the dinner party tonight," he began. His mother shook her head and waved her hand through the air, a gesture that was meant to tell him to not worry about it. "I want to go, Mother."
Immediately, the nonchalant air that she'd had about her disappeared, as if dispersing into the air. Her answer was a simple and decisive, "No." The beginnings of a protest was about to leave his mouth, and Christine turned her back to him. "No, Valentine. You're sick." And then, as if to make a point, she said again, "You're sick."
"Mother, I am your only son." He stopped talking for a moment, breathing properly to steady the rapid beating of his heart. "This dinner party will be the first event we've held at this house since Father passed on, and people will wonder and question you about my absence. We must put on a strong front, yes?" His head was pounding, but he forced himself to hold his gaze on his mother, trying to discern her rigid posture. "Mother, I have to be there. As his son—his only son, I have to be in attendance."
Christine liked to think that she knew her son better than she knew anyone else, better than anyone else knew him, and she knew for a fact that despite his condition, he wouldn't stop arguing with her until he had gotten what he wanted. There really was no other choice but to say yes to his wish. So that was what she did. She made a show of being hesitant, and then sighed heavily and said, "Alright, you may be present at the dinner party." She grinned then, only just thinking of something that might make attending the dinner party seem daunting to her son. "Everyone has to have a date to the event, and it has to be of the opposite sex. You, Valentine, will not be an exception to the rule. I don't want uneven numbers at my party just because my son doesn't want to spend time with any girl."
Valentine flashed her a grin of his own before replying, "That, I think, won't be a problem, Mother dearest. I know exactly who to bring."
If Christine was shocked at her son's declaration, she was hiding it well. Her face was an unbreakable, impassive mask. And then, just because she was still worried about him and she wanted to make him fuss over something for the duration of the day, she said, "And you have to be in bed by ten."
He should protest. He should really protest, give his mother a hard time, but he couldn't bring himself to do it. His brain was trying to break through his skull. His head was just pounding and pounding and pounding. He nodded his consent, and when his mother started to leave his room, he called after her, asking her to send their fastest rider into his room with a pen and paper. She smiled, nodded, and then said, "The receptionist handed me a package addressed to you when I went to check out just now. It's on your desk."
The words his mother had just spoken made no impression whatsoever on Valentine. He just wanted that rider in his room so he could write a note to Rose, asking her to come over to his house.
Soon, the man he'd asked for knocked on his door and pushed it open. Only when Valentine motioned for him to come closer did he do so. Unable to get up, Valentine told the rider to write down every word he said. The quill poised on the paper, Valentine began to speak. "Dear Rose, I would like the pleasure of your company to a black-tie event being held at my home this evening at eight. And when I say that, I mean that I need you to come, and I hope that you won't refuse me. If you agree to this, please be at the Academy's main archway at seven in the evening. I will send a carriage down to pick you up at that time. All my love, V Morgenstern."
He provided the rider with instructions to find Rose and began to drift off to sleep just as his door started to close, the word 'package' lingering in the back of his mind.
Valentine was standing by the door at eight o'clock in the evening that night, having refused a maid's offer to get him a chair. The pounding in his head had faded to a dull thud that he could ignore were he to put an effort into it, but it had moved to the confinements of his chest, where his heart was now beating wildly. Thoughts were racing through his mind, sending him into a panic when he began to raise questions to himself.
What if she refused? What if she didn't show up and he was left to stand at the door, waiting for her while other guests milled into his home? What if she hated him for disappearing just like that? What if she'd heard something pertaining to Francois? What if that was why she hated him?
He was saved from continuous traitorous, panicked thoughts when he heard the neigh of several horses and the sound of wheels rattling ever closer down the path to the manor. He looked up to see a carriage bearing the Morgenstern emblem moving steadily towards him, and hoped with everything that he was that that carriage contained one Rosalind Wyatt instead of some other guest his mother had sent the footman to fetch.
When the carriage rolled to a stop directly in front of the manor's great oak double doors, he moved from his spot by the door to stand near the stairs. He would be resigned to escorting another guest into the house if the person in the carriage wasn't Rose, and if she did show up, then he would run the risk of not being there to greet her, but that was a chance that he was willing to take. Call it a leap of faith.
The footman hopped down from beside the driver and walked calmly to the door, his hand reaching for it, and all the while, Valentine's heart was beating so hard and so fast, he was certain his rib cage had fractured. The door swung open and the footman removed the steel steps from their position under the door, placing them on the ground and then turned towards Valentine, and said in a formal tone, "Miss Rosalind Sahra Wyatt."
At the sound of her name, he felt his shoulders become less tense, and his fingers softened, a smile etching onto his lips. Completely disregarding the stomach flu he had suffered from for the past three days and was still feeling traces of, Valentine walked down the marble steps as calmly as he could, even when all he wanted to do was bound to that carriage, reach in and carry her out. He came to a halt before the door, just as Rose stepped out of the shadows, and left him feeling like the breath had been knocked out of him.
The colour of her dress was pastel pink, and it had a sweetheart neckline, devoid of any straps, baring her milky shoulders to him. The skirt was tulle and came down in tiers, the hemline stopping just above her knees. Around her waist was a black sash and she had on no jewellery save for a charm bracelet around her right wrist. Her brown hair cascaded in waves past her shoulders, stopping at her midsection, and it was pulled away from her face by a rose-shaped clip adorned with dazzling, dark little jewels that reminded him of his eyes.
He cracked a smile at her, trying to push away the nervousness so evident on her face, and then said, "Sahra?"
The sound she emitted was a cross between a giggle and a laugh, and it made her look more radiant than ever. He held out his hand, and she placed her own in his, stepping out of the carriage. He led her into the foyer where a lot of elegantly dressed people were standing together in groups, deep in conversation. He'd greeted each and every one of them, shaken their hands and chatted with them as they entered his house, and he'd done all this while waiting for her to arrive.
He steered her towards a corner behind the sea of people in the foyer, next to a gilded table whose middle stood a crystal glass filled to the brim with yellow orchids and hibiscuses. He pressed his back against the wall and encircled her in his arms, drawing her closer and closer until she was pressed against him. He trailed kisses down the side of her face, down to the length of her neck, and then back up to her cheek. His hands were restless, though, and he let them move up and down her arms, rubbing sensuously against her skin. She sighed contentedly, but then placed her hands on his own and brought them down to her waist, where they'd originally been.
"Let's not get naughty now, Angel," she said, laughing.
He laughed with her, and planted more kisses along her face, then stopped and kissed behind her ear, making her shiver. He was just about to whisper something into her ear, something about escaping up to his bedroom once they'd eaten, but all his plans were thwarted by his mother when she clinked a spoon against her champagne glass, calling for everyone's attention.
Valentine stopped leaning against the wall, standing up straight instead and moving to his girlfriend's side. His mother was saying something at the head of the room. She was most probably thanking the guests for being here, and expressing her endless gratitude for their support. Valentine had paid avid attention to what his mother was saying—up until she mentioned his father, and started talking about him and how he happy he would've felt were he here that all his friends had gathered in his home for a night of laughter, replacing the sorrow that had taken over the manor since he departed this earth.
He really couldn't listen to that. It had been over nine months since his father died, but it was still too soon for him to hear his father being spoken of in such a way: dead.
Rose had noticed the way Valentine suddenly tensed. She edged closer to him and laced her fingers through his once she was close enough, prompting him to squeeze her hand. She looked up at the man next to her, smiling as reassuringly as she could, and her smile was reciprocated.
He wanted nothing more than to pull her into his embrace then and bury his face into the crook of her neck, but that would seem slightly off in such a formal setting. So he didn't, but God, how he wanted to.
Before he knew it, the speech was over and he was forced to play the role of a host, standing responsibly at the archway leading into the dining room, smiling and nodding at his guests. Rose was still by his side, her arm linked with his, and she smiled and nodded at his guests, too—the perfect hostess. She even uttered a cheerful, "Hi!" at the Starkweather's and Hodge when they passed.
When all the guests had entered the dining room, he led her to her seat beside him, pulling her chair out for her, just the way a gentleman should. He kissed her on the top of her head as he stood behind her chair, causing her to look up at him, beaming. His mother would be at the door at any second, and he wanted her completely at ease before she met her. The lady of the Morgenstern household, he knew, could come off as ferocious, frightening and stand-offish.
He left her side when he could make out the beginnings of her silhouette at the archway and strode over to where she was, offering her his arm. She took it, smiling radiantly at him, and he brought her all the way to the head of the table, and all through that time, she kept smiling. She was genuinely happy. It was authentic, not something that she would fake to impress family friends. They got closer and closer to the head of the table, where he would sit, and his mother would be seated to his right, and he smiled even wider as he said the words he'd thought of saying since the incident at the library with Rose. "Mother, I want you to meet my girlfriend." As soon as that sentence was finished, they were at his mother's seat and he gestured towards the young woman already sitting opposite her. He bit his lower lip for a fraction of a second and then continued, "Mother, this is Rosalind."
Christine's smile that had been present all this time disappeared when her eyes rested on the young woman Valentine had introduced as his girlfriend. A rage built up quickly inside her, and it was reaching breaking point. She wanted to pick up her plate and hurl it across the room. She wanted to pick up a fork and stab the human girl with it.
Oh, yes, she could tell that the young woman was human.
But, instead of doing all those things, she turned sharply around and stalked out of the dining room into the kitchen.
To say that Valentine was shocked was an understatement. He hadn't at all expected his mother to react as such. His mother, who was always the perfect lady, the perfect hostess, had looked at Rose, the woman he loved, with eyes full of hatred and walked away from them both. He looked down the dining table, and after he was assured that no one had witnessed the scene that had just unfolded, he followed his mother into the kitchen.
The first thing he saw of his mother was her back, and that fuelled his rage even more. "Mother! What the hell was that?" He pointed in the direction of the door, but both knew that he was referring to what had happened at the dining table.
Christine turned around, her eyes alight with a fire he hadn't seen since his father died. She was angry, and he wasn't sure what about. That is, until she opened her mouth to speak. "I don't want you to be with her. That girl is not good enough for you. She is not what you want."
"I think," his voice was beginning to rise. He was furious with his mother's behaviour. God, all the things that must be going through Rose's head at that very moment, "that I am a better judge of what it is that I do and don't want. And I'll tell you this, Mother—I want her. I want the girl that you just rudely walked away from. I love her."
"No, you don't!" Christine was yelling now, too. It was a good thing that no one in the dining room could hear them from this side of the kitchen.
"You don't get to tell me how I feel! You don't get to decide whom I love! Just because you are my mother, it doesn't—"
Smack! Her hand collided with his cheek, and the sound that was produced when skin met skin and actually broke skin was loud to both their ears. He couldn't suppress the stunned look, couldn't hide it from his face when he turned back to his mother. He pressed two fingers to his cheek where she'd hit him and then pulled it away and looked at it. There was blood. Not much of it, but there it was.
Valentine's mother was breathing heavily. "You would do well not to forget, Valentine, that I am your mother, and I am telling you right now that you will break off things with that girl and get her out of Idris. Send her back to wherever she came from."
He couldn't say anything. His mother was talking about Rose as if she were one of the demons his kind killed, like she was vermin. He shook his head and began to walk away.
"Valentine!" his mother called. "She is not good for you, son."
"How can you know that when you've never even given her a chance?" He turned back around to face his mother as those words left his lips, and in that moment, there was nothing more he wanted to do than break down into tears. But he would never do that.
His mother sighed heavily, exasperated with her son. "She is dangerous, Valentine."
He closed his eyes, and for the longest moment, there was nothing between them but silence. Then he swiveled on his heel, pushed the door open and, once he was sure that his mother couldn't see him, he tore through the dining room towards Rose, who was already standing, worry making a frown dance on her brow, and grabbed her hand and pulled her along behind him as he ran up to his bedroom.
Valentine all but broke through the door, so strong was the force he used to open it. He led her into his bedroom and left her standing by his bed, walking distractedly to his closet. Tears were beginning to well up in his eyes at the thought of his mother, and what he'd said to her. He knew he must've broken her heart, but he couldn't let her do this to him! He loved Rose. He was in love with her, and she made him so undeniably happy. Why wouldn't his mother let him be happy?
A duffel bag was lying on the floor. He'd pulled it out only a second ago, and as he did so, he started crying. The tears rolled freely down his cheeks, and still his tear ducts were producing more. He grabbed random items of clothing, unable to see anything properly through the blur of his tears. He did, however, have enough presence of mind to get up and retrieve the phonebook he'd ordered from his desk—the package. He dropped it into the duffel bag and bent down to zip it up.
That was when he felt a weight crash into his back and he straightened immediately, allowing her to wrap her arms about his shoulders, clasping her hand in his own. "Valentine—"
She'd wanted to say more, he knew, but he couldn't bear to hear anything right now. Instead he turned around and tried his best to smile brightly at her, even as more tears trickled down his cheeks. She reached out and cupped his face in both her hands. Her mouth opened again. She was going to talk some sense into him. But he didn't want that right now, so he forced his smile to remain on his lips and turned his head to kiss her palm. "Let's go to Amsterdam," he said to her.