Author's Note: Welcome, and thank you for reading. Chapter 29 turned out to be massive, so I split it in half, giving you two chapters instead of one. Enjoy! Remeber, I still own none of these characters.


Chapter 29

They walked for some time in complete silence, side by side. Gabriel was kicking the water as he went. The back of his shirt was completely burned away and the bits of armor that survived the attack were soaked and clung to his skin. Two leather straps, each holding a seraph blade, crossed his back. Will kept looking at Gabriel, and then at the rune on his wrist. It was faded to a grey smudge on his skin, showing that Jem was closer to death than ever. Gabriel grabbed Will's shirt cuff and pulled it down.

"He's still alive, and you look as though you need distracted," Gabriel said. Will looked up, at the long, dark tunnel ahead of them, and said nothing. "Do you have any sort of plans for what you are going to do with Ambriel?"

"Usually I would have a witty response to that but being that I have already done my best to her-" Will said. Gabriel snorted. "I'm terrible with people, Gabriel. I'm terrible with girls. I just don't know how to talk to them without getting all nervous and tongue tied and then I drink a lot."

Gabriel nodded. "Go on," he said.

"Ambriel drinks as well, and I guess the night of Michael and Evelyn's party, we must have just found common ground. I find her attractive, don't get me wrong. Even…now that she is with child. But I didn't even know she was pregnant with my child until she told me because she asked that I not speak to her. Now, I don't know what to do with her."

"Well, what do you want to do?" Gabriel asked.

"The right thing to do would be to marry her," Will replied.

"Yes, but what do you want to do?" Gabriel asked. "You can't force yourself into a marriage you don't want. The baby will be fine; my mother is more than capable of raising it. Ambriel will be fine as well. My family takes care of their own."

"Just as long as no one betrays the family," Will said, and Gabriel gave him a hurt look. "I'm sorry."

"Of course you are," Gabriel said.

"I think that perhaps having a child might be wonderful. It would keep me out of trouble, that's for sure, and perhaps give me another reason for living," Will said. "And frankly, the idea of my child being brought up by your family is horrifying. If you're sheltered at 18 I shudder to think about what your parents do to infants. They probably smother them."

"I understand that family and love are scary concepts for you," Gabriel said, "but you owe it to yourself to give it a try. You might even like it."

Will put a hand up and Gabriel stopped beside him. In the distance, Will could hear the low undertones of a man's voice. Will took a step forward, prepared to run, but Gabriel held him back.

"As soon as we get close he'll hear us," Gabriel said. "We need to have a plan. You'll handle Jem, I'll handle Nate. One of us needs to get The Green Book if he has it. I have no intentions of letting Nate Gray live."

"I had no idea you had a thirst for blood, Gabriel," Will said. "Stop talking, your beautiful mouth is distracting me." Gabriel shoved Will forward. They left the water and walked along the side of the pipe, desperately trying to keep their shoes from squeaking against the sewer bricks.

In time, they reached another intersection of sewer pipes. Nate's voice was at its loudest and it was clear he was stationed just around the corner in a pipe that had no water running from it. Occasionally, Will heard Jem moaning, but mainly he just heard Nate's mad ramblings. There was an orange light coming from the pipe, and from the smell, Will could determine that candles were burning inside.

"Let's go," Gabriel said, and pulled out a battle ax, then stepped in front of the entrance to the pipe, and Will followed. Nate was standing in front of an alter of bricks covered with papers, the Pyxis, and one book. Nate turned around, opened his palm, and yelled out a curse. Gabriel slammed backwards into the wall and crumbled to the floor into the water His hand was over his heart and he was gasping for breath.

Will looked at Nate, then at body lying on the floor, curled up, with hands and feet bound with ropes.

Jem.

His hair was wet and hung in matted strands around his face, and on the floor in front of him, Will had never seen that much blood. Jem's face was covered in it and his white pajamas were soaked red.

Will looked back at Nate, and waited for Nate's curse to hit him as well. It would all be over then. He would be down in the water, next to Gabriel, about to be washed out to the Thames. Jem was going to die. Will reserved himself to the thought that he had made it this far, but would fail regardless.

I have nothing left to live for.

A primal howl sent chills up Will's spine as it echoed down the sewer. Will tore his eyes from Nate and looked to his left. Gabriel rose slowly from the water and he screamed again, so loudly, Will jumped aside. Gabriel's hair was plastered to his face and water was pouring off of his body. He held a battle ax in each hand and every muscle in his arms and chest were flexed to the breaking point. Gabriel lifted his right hand behind his head and then sent an ax spinning through the air. The ax buried itself into Nate's chest, opening up a gaping chasm of blood and bone, and Nate grinned sadistically.

"Why is it you Nephilim always go after the most obvious fight!" Nate yelled. "The real war is yet to come! You cannot stop us once we have begun, and we have begun. We'll bring the world to its knees…"

"You shut your fucking mouth!" Gabriel screeched. He sent another ax into Nate's head. Nate fell to the floor, splashing into a pool of his own blood, and followed Gabriel's command quite perfectly.

"He may have been saying something relevant," Will said.

"Evil always exists. He was the one stupid enough to want to control it," Gabriel said. "You can't control evil, you can only fight against it and hope for the best outcome."

"If I wasn't so distracted, Gabriel, and I wasn't worried about Jem overhearing… the things I could do to your body…" Will said. They climbed into the pipe and hurried over to Jem.

"That's a lot of blood," Gabriel said softly.

"He's lost more," Will said, "Help me." Gabriel took a dagger from Will's weapons belt and sawed at the ropes binding Jem's arms, and Will pulled Jem's head into his lap.

Jem's body was freezing cold and soaking wet. His runes were faded to white discolorations in his skin. He was dressed in his white silk pajamas, and there was blood all down the front of them, coming from his mouth and nose. His eyes were closed, and his eyelids were blue. His skin was a ghostly shade of pale silver and his lips were white and stained with blood. If not for the pulse beating weakly at Jem's throat, Will might have thought Jem was already dead.

"I'm here, Jem," Will said, and with shaking hands he brought out the bottle of angel blood. He opened it and poured most of it down Jem's throat before he closed Jem's mouth. Will handed the bottle to Gabriel. He nodded and Gabriel had the last sip of the blood before he got The Green Book and Pyxis from Nate's alter. Gabriel leaned against the wall of the pipe and put his head down.

Then there was silence. Will knew that he could have stood up, tossed Jem over his shoulder, and carried him from the sewer as a hero would, but somehow Will knew that Jem would have wanted Will to accept his death with as few people around as possible. Going back meant facing Charlotte, and Will wasn't ready to tell her about Henry.

Will's eyes clouded with tears and he looked up to see the sewer pipe distorted into an orange room with bricks on the walls. Will took a few breathes, let them out slowly, and tried to focus on this moment and not the ones that had led up to it.

"Were you supposed to do anything else?" Gabriel asked.

"Raziel just said that I was to have him drink it," Will said. "Come on, Jem." He put his hands on Jem's arms and began to rub vigorously, trying to do anything to warm Jem's body. Gabriel knelt beside them and began to rub Jem's chest.

"Why isn't it working?" Gabriel asked.

"I don't know," Will replied. He looked at Jem's mouth, pale and closed, and his eyes that hadn't yet opened, and his chest, which was rising and falling with the shallowest of breathes.

"When will you give up?" Gabriel asked, as they paused and Will felt for Jem's pulse. Will could barely feel it.

"Never," Will said, and he went back to rubbing Jem's chest, harder, faster, until he was pushing his knuckles against Jem's ribs, and Jem finally gasped and moved his head.

Jem's eyes opened, and they were neither silver nor white but an impermeable black, so dark, Will couldn't see their pupils. Jem met Will's eyes with his own before they closed again, and every rune on his body flared to a solid black once more.

Except for one.

Will blinked, shook his head, and then looked to see that the binding rune which matched Will's, which should have been on Jem's wrist, was missing. In its place there was only smooth, white skin. Not even a scar of the rune remained.

"No," Will said, and he looked at his own wrist to see that his rune was gone as well. "No. We were bound together. He's my parabatai… where did our runes go?"

"You were one another's parabatai until death," Gabriel said. "You died, Will. Magnus brought you back but that doesn't matter, you died. Death renders the parabatai vow null and void. I'm sorry."

"I didn't know," Will said. "I thought because I didn't stay dead…" Gabriel placed a hand on Will's shoulder.

"Would it have changed things?" he asked, and Will shook his head. He would have rescued Jem and tried to cure him whether or not they were parabatai.

"He can swear to me again, right?" Will asked.

"Of course," Gabriel said. He looked up, out of the pipe they were in. "We need to go. I'll draw a Portal. Michael is already waiting on the other side for us." Gabriel stood up and walked over to the wall.

"You know the Portal rune?" Will asked.

"Of course. Everyone who went to the Academy learned the Portal rune, remember?" Gabriel asked. "We got to Portal around Campus? Oh, never mind. You were hung over and spent most of the day beneath a tree sleeping. That Morgenstern kid drew pointless runes all over you. It was funny." Gabriel smiled at the memory.

"How do you know I was hung over?" Will asked, and Gabriel blushed.

"Because… I was as well," He said. "It was after that one night… we were drinking… never mind, Will. I just need to…" He turned away and drew a portal rune, which melted into the bricks and became a shimmering doorway.

"I remember now," Will said. "That one night…"

"Let's just go home and forget I ever brought it up," Gabriel said. He collected the Pyxis and The Green Book. Will got to his feet and held Jem in his arms. Gabriel blew out all of the candles in the pipe, and Will felt Gabriel grip his arm as, together, they stepped into the Portal.