AN: In this chapter the author finally remembers that there is actually a violent villain in this story and so this chapter is much less fluffy than its predecessor. Sorry about that.
New York on a summer afternoon smelled of metal and garbage and acrid things Will couldn't quite identify. It was bright and busy but closed in by the tall buildings. Everything was draped in colour and light. It was all advertising. Will tried to tell himself it wasn't so different from the advertisements of London but the size and ubiquity of it all made it overwhelming. Tessa tuned it out. She ignored it. She could look across a street where every bright yellow taxicab had a sign on top and only point out the landmark on the other side. She didn't even see it. Will on the other hand read every sign and flashing lights pulled his attention because the only things he'd ever known to flash - not flicker or glow but flash - usually also had claws or dangerous magic involved.
The solution was easy. The solution was watch Tessa instead of watching the mass of humans and cars and ads. That every time she caught his attention on her she smiled and got a little closer made it all the better. He dropped his arm around her shoulder and she wrapped hers around his waist so her hand sat at his hip. Even a married couple would not walk down the street like this at home but the rules were different here. As long as those rules and this strange perfect detente held, he was going to take advantage.
Tessa's pink dress had little cap sleeves but if he let his fingers drag they could brush the skin of her arm below the line of fabric. She smelled like soap and lilac and somehow like the kitchen in her home. It wasn't a scent he could put his finger on but it made he smile and pull her in close enough that he could press a kiss to her temple. She laughed and squeezed him in a half hug. The walk had been a blur of these impossible little moments.
"So you are telling me that the proper way to eat this food is to do the exact opposite of any an all rules of etiquette?" Will asked her when they stopped about halfway to their destination and got pizza.
"Yes, New York pizza counteracts all table manners but New Yorkers get very defensive if you do it wrong," she said. They stood with their paper plates and oversized slices on the side of the street and ate with their hands. It was too hot and greasy and made a mess but she was there laughing and talking and wiping pizza sauce off the side of his face and he wasn't sure he'd even enjoyed a meal more.
When Will sat alone he worried about changing the past and changing the future. He worried about Jem and Tessa and Cecily as they were at home. If he couldn't get back, would they be alright? Would they mourn him as dead or search for him? Would losing the parabatai bond weaken Jem? There were people there who needed him.
He wanted to go back to them and he wanted to stay. Selfish and impossible though it was, he wanted to stay and every time Tessa smiled at him or Jem laughed he wanted to stay more. He wanted to wrap himself up in the fantasy of a life that that morning had hinted at. He wanted to wake up to the solid warmth of Jem beside him and Tessa's soft smiles. Jokes over coffee and always being able to reach out and find someone there to touch and hold. How could he go home and know that this world existed where he couldn't have it?
It was easier to blot all those worries out when they stood in front of him. Happy and healthy and as they were always meant to be. He could lose himself in loving them.
Tessa had gotten ahead of him and found a bin of battered books outside a little shop and was looking through it. He came up behind her and set his chin on her shoulder to look down at the volume in her hands. He liked the way she leaned back and let him close his arms around her when he did it. It was hot and holding on wasn't as comfortable as he wanted it to be but he stayed.
A voice interrupted his questions about the series Tessa was passing over to him while his hand lingered on her waist and he was still close enough to smell her hair.
"It isn't fair, you know?" an American voice said and Will pulled back just a little bit to look at the speaker. A warlock with green skin and dark bright eyes stood beside them looking hurt like someone had just broken her heart and stolen her candy. Her blonde hair was pulled back in a tight high ponytail that swayed when she moved in a little closer. She bobbed more than walked, like she was part bird though she seemed quite human beyond her colouring.
"Pardon me?" Tessa asked.
"It isn't fair, that you get him, it isn't fair," she said again. "I didn't mean for it. It isn't fair. I've been trying so hard and you get him."
"Is this because I am stunningly attractive?" Will asked.
"Who are you?" Tessa asked ignoring the comment which made Will smile. He didn't take his eyes off of the warlock woman. She unsettling but she didn't seem threatening.
"I'm going to have to kill him and that isn't fair either. I know what it's like to lose someone important to you but it doesn't mean anything if he doesn't die. It doesn't work," she said and Will felt Tessa's body language change against his. All the softness drained out of her as she stood straighter and slowly put the book she was holding back in the box so her hands were free.
"Not my handsome face then, people don't usually want to kill you for being handsome though it has happened. I got a death threat in a bar once for being handsome," Will said.
"I could kill you too," the warlock said kindly. Her stare was intense and she leaned in as she spoke only to Tessa as though Will wasn't there, "I could kill you both and then it wouldn't be like losing him, you'd be going together and that isn't as bad. Is it? I wanted to tell you I'm sorry. You're not some mundane and you stood up to Dmitri which is pretty impressive so I thought you deserved to understand. It's important. It won't mean anything if I don't finish it. They all have to die. Do you see?"
"No, I don't understand. What will it mean?" Tessa's voice was soft and even like she was talking to an upset child. Will had a blade in his pocket and another in his boot. He was not nearly well armed enough for a battle. He stopped making comments and started scanning the area for escape routes or people sneaking up on them or anything in the vicinity that might be a better weapon than his pair of daggers.
"The spell is worthless while they're alive. Worthless. Dmitri was supposed to hold onto them so that it could be done systematically because order matters but then you got in the way. You and the little angel babies. They're cute. Really. They're cute. But it has caused problems and set back the schedule and it is going to be harder to kill everyone with them in the way," she said. She rambled in an earnest way like every word was essential as she leaned in.
"No," Tessa said.
"No?" the warlock cocked her head to the side like a startled bird and pulled back to stand straight.
"You pulled these people out of time and space, away from their families and their lives so you could murder them in a particular order?" Tessa said and there was anger in her voice though she was fighting to maintain the calm tone and not provoke an attack. Her composure cracked just a little when she said, "What the hell is important enough to do that for?"
"Love," the warlock said. "Love, can't you see that, you should be able to see that. You look at him like you love him. I've watched you. You love him. You understand that. You understand why it is important."
"You're talking about murdering people," Tessa said.
"Only because it needs to happen," she said.
"What's your name?" Tessa asked.
"Zoya," she said.
"Zakarov," Tessa added.
"Yes!" Zoya seemed pleased to be known.
During the fire, Tessa had managed to borrow power from him in some way and he felt her reaching for that connection again. It was tentative, a silent request. He still stood close to her and he leaned in just a little farther so she would feel it when he nodded. The connection caught and held. He kept one hand on her because last time she had needed touch to do make it work. His other hand was in his pocket closed over the hilt of the knife hidden there.
"You need to let us leave," Tessa said and Will was suddenly aware of why Zoya had chosen this moment to stop them. She seemed childish with her bobbing and leaning in and her fast talking earnestness but this was very carefully done. They were far from home and far from the Institute. Tessa had told him they were about halfway there when they'd stopped for pizza. There was no help that could get there fast enough to be useful. That Zoya was outnumbered obviously didn't bother her which didn't ease Will's worries.
"No, no, darling, no," Zoya seemed truly said when she shook her head, "You can go if you want. I don't mind. This isn't personal. It is simply necessary."
"I won't go anywhere without him," Tessa said then to Will's surprise she pulled her phone out of her pocket. Realization rolled through him a moment later.
Zoya looked at it with her bird like head cock, "Mundies all have those. Should I get one?"
"How many friends do you have?" Tessa asked ticking away on the screen without stopping her conversation. She looked down but Zoya didn't seem to care that she was being ignored.
"Not many," Zoya said.
"So surprised," Will put in and he was once again ignored by Zoya though he caught Tessa's lip twitch in a tiny smile. She might be looking down but he was watching.
"Then it may not be useful to you," Tessa said. Will could see the little messages as they went. She had contacted a number of different people, flipping through the brightly coloured screens with ease, tapping out messages and then moving on.
"Do you have friends?" Zoya asked.
"Yes," Tessa said lifting the phone, "Smile."
She took a picture of Zoya looking puzzled and then sent that out as a message to a series of numbers. Will's eyes flicked up and down from Zoya to the phone and then back. The magic connection hung there between them but Tessa wasn't pulling energy from it, she just kept it open. It was the magical equivalent of his hand on the dagger. She might look relaxed as she tapped away but she was just as prepared for the fight to begin as he was.
"What are you doing with the little thing?" Zoya asked.
"Sending messages to my friends," Tessa said, "I forget about this sometimes but it's really very useful." She tucked the phone back into her pocket and then looked Zoya in the eye, "What happens next?"
What happened next was all magic and it was all invisible. Tessa grabbed his hand and tried to counter whatever force knocked them both backwards. Will caught her and kept her from falling. It left Tessa reeling and when Zoya moved in, he slashed out with the first of his weapons. A part of him was trying not to kill her because there were still so many answers. Magic crackled in the air like lightening before the storm. Will backed away, pulling Tessa with him and threw the first knife hard enough to lodge it in the warlock's shoulder.
Between answers to his own questions and Tessa's safety, he would happily take a lifetime of not knowing.
Will was distantly aware of running feet somewhere nearby which meant either whatever glamours were in place were failing or Tessa's little messages had gotten through. He prayed for the latter as he got his hand on the other blade.
Zoya came in before he could look up and find out and she wasn't slinging magic, she'd pulled the knife out of her shoulder and was using that.
Angry. Fast. Very fast. Slash and dance. In and away. Eyes flashing and the bloodied blade catching sunlight.
Knife fights were bloody and Will hadn't been in many. One or two with mundanes in bars who were easily disarmed. She was bleeding but so was he. His arm was slashed and the wound burned but it was the type of pain that wouldn't mean anything until the battle was over. He was aware of it but it didn't slow him down.
Tessa pulled him sideways before the blade could catch him high in the shoulder and when Zoya wheeled on them, fire in her eyes and blood pouring from the wound in her shoulder.
He wasn't ready to stop the next attack. He was faster but his attention was on Tessa. Tessa who got in the way by grabbing his free hand and snapping that magical connection back open. She opened it and pulled hard on Will's energy even as Zoya got too close and that blade was still swinging. He wanted to scream at her but then she cracked the energy and the magic in the air was no longer the charge before the storm, it was lightening.
Zoya was flung backwards and Tessa fell to her knees. Head down, hair like a curtain. The traffic still moved on the street where she had landed. The mundanes still ate pizza and browsed inside the bookshop. The glamours were holding. Will started to get up to go and see if she had survived but then Tessa slipped sideways.
"Will?" she said and her voice wasn't steady. Panic flared. There was too much blood. There was far far too much blood. His arm was still bleeding but it wasn't nearly enough to account for the pool spreading around them..