CHAPTER FOUR

Inversneyde

He hovered over her with bated breath.

"Gwilym, my love, you must stay in your room!" said their mother, coming in with a new bowl of lukewarm water and a washcloth in hand.

"I can't leave her, Mother. I cannot stay in my room, knowing she's ill and alone in here."

Linette set down the water and cloth at the small table beside Cecily's bed, right next to where Will was. The girl was breathing heavily, beads of sweat trickling from her forehead. She was sleeping; her eyes shut and squeezed together, though battling both a nightmare and the illness within her. Her head tossed from side to side, her hair around her face. Will held her hand in his, brushing her knuckles with his thumb, as he tried to shush her calm.

"You might-"

"I want to be here," he said, turning to face his mother then back to his sister. "I don't want her to be alone."

"You're too young, dear."

"The thought of staying in my room while she's here by herself and ill at that? Mother, please. I want to be here."

Will turned back to his little sister, his eyes trained on her face. Her eyes were closed and scrunched up in obvious discomfort. He took the cloth and dipped it in the lukewarm water, brushing Cecily's forehead with it. Linette put two fingers to her lips and smiled, despite it all. She put a hand at his shoulder – he didn't even look – then at his hair and ruffled it. He looked up at his mother then, though his arm still extended to his little sister's forehead, and gave her a weak smile. His mother bent down and kissed him on the forehead, looked at her ill daughter, and patted her son on the back.

"Oh, my darling boy," she said, squeezing his shoulder one last time before she left the room. "I'll just go make supper, then. If you need assistance, just ring."

Linette walked to leave the room but just before she reached the doorframe, she looked back at her children; her son still brushing away at her youngest daughter's forehead.

"Sing lullabies to her," she said. "She likes those."

"Mother, she's already ill. I don't want to give her night terrors."

Linette breathed a small laugh to which her son replied with a smirk – so much like his father's. "Well read her a story or poetry. That might help her."

Their mother left the room, her heels clacking away. Will held on to Cecily's hand with his, and with the other, he dabbed at her forehead with the damp cloth.

"What hand but would a garland call," he started slowly, trying to remember the words. With every poem he had read, he tried tremendously to recall them to quote to his mother and sisters. And oh, how they glowed at the cleverness of him, he believed. His mother was right – Cecily would like that. He knew. "For thee who art so beautiful?/O happy pleasure! here to dwell/beside thee in some healthy dell…"

X X X

"What joy to hear thee, and to see!/Thy elder brother I would be,/ thy father, - anything to thee!" Will said groggily, head tossing to the side. Cecily laughed as she dipped the cloth into the cooling lukewarm water. She squeezed out the excess into the bowl and then dabbed at her older brother's forehead.

She sat at his bed, just beside him, two silver bowls at his bedside table – one filled with the clean water she had been using to clean his face of the alcohol. Where Will managed to acquire such an alarming amount of alcohol at so little time baffled them all, but she was constant at his side, caring for her brother in a way she never had the chance to before. Though it was nothing she was new to – even her father succumbed to drink with no one else but her to clean up after him.

Will tossed his head again, groaning. She took his hand in hers and tried to soothe him with the cooling damp cloth. His white button down was rolled to his elbows, the Marks still scrawled on him. Was there such a thing as a sobering rune? Even if there was one that existed, she neither possessed a stele nor did she know how to draw runes.

His eyes flickered open, still moaning as he did so. The dim morning light was too bright from the covered infirmary windows and the cloth he felt wiping him clean was much too cold. A vile feeling burned inside of him, with him feeling all of the drink he'd had the night before washing fire through his insides. He rose from his position and as did the feeling – it grew and grew until he rolled to the side and became sick. Cecily was at the ready with the empty silver bowl at his bedside table, her patting him on the back.

When he was through, he tiredly slumped back on his pillows. Cecily set back the bowl filled with sick at the table and wiped his mouth clean with the cloth she was still using.

"Serves you right, you drunken sod," she whispered, dabbing at the corners of his mouth.

"Language," he murmured. She laughed.

"You're one to talk, Willy," she said, fluffing the pillows he laid on. "You just lie still and rest. We can talk later."

"How long have you been here?" he whispered through nearly closed lips. His eyes were drooping to a close.

"Not long." She brushed her fingers across his hair. She had been there since Jem and Gideon had carried him to the infirmary, when both them had been found at the floor of the library. He had been surrounded by broken bits of glass; some of them stuck to his skin, which Sophie dutifully removed. "Just sleep, Gwilym. You've been through much."

She brushed the hair on his head slowly until his breathing slowed and became steady and she knew he was asleep. Still, she ran her fingers through her brother's head and sang their mother's lullaby.

À la claire fontaine,

M'en allant promener

J'ai trouvé l'eau si belle

Que je m'y suis baigné

Il y a longtemps que je t'aime

Jamais je ne t'oublierai

A small knock came from the entrance door to the infirmary and in came Tessa and Jem, hand in hand.

"How is he?" Tessa asked quietly, her other hand atop her heart.

"He's unaccustomed to the drink and will have hell to pay when he really wakes up," she replied. "But he'll be right as rain soon enough. Have you told Mrs. Branwell?"

"No," said Jem. "All she knows is that Will had had a little too much to drink in the library. Nothing too awful, thank the Angel. Nothing that she wishes to happen again."

"It shan't," said Cecily. "I'll make sure of it."

"Our Memory, feel that she hath eyes:/Then why should I be loath to stir?/I feel this place was made for her;/To give new pleasure like the past,/Continued long as life shall last," murmured Will, his eyebrows scrunching together. Cecily took his hand to her lips and kissed it, brushing his knuckles with her thumb. She shushed him to silence, to stillness, to sleep.

"That's Wordsworth," whispered Tessa.

"He read poetry to me when I was ill as a child," Cecily started. "When I would wake, he would start singing to try and make me laugh. And he did, only because he was absolutely horrid at it."

Cecily stifled a yawn, covering her mouth with the back of her hand.

"How long have you been in here?" asked Jem.

"Haven't left his side once," she replied.

"You ought to sleep," said Jem. "Or at least eat."

"I can take it."

Tessa stepped towards her, reaching out to the girl. "You really ought to rest and-"

"No," said Cecily curtly. "I don't want him to be alone."

Tessa sat next to the girl, placing a hand on the girl's shoulder, on Will's bed as he laid there in peaceful slumber. Jem set his cane near the bedside table and sat at the chair in front of it.

"He won't be," said Jem after a while. "We'll take care of him for a while. You ought to rest or clean up and eat, at least."

"I want to be here," she said.

"You won't be of much help to him if you let yourself get ill," replied Jem, his tone still kind. He saw so much of her brother in the way she spoke, the way she hovered over him. They finally looked like the Herondale siblings he had always imagined they would be: Will, more peaceful than he had ever seen him – even in his sleep; and finally, Cecily – his one last piece of home.

Cecily stood and took the dirty bowl in her hands. "I'll just be a moment. I need to clean this. And maybe lie down for a minute or two," she said to no one in particular.

"Let us take you to the kitchens and have Bridget fix you up a cup of tea and some biscuits," said Jem, also rising from his seat, cane already at hand. Tessa followed suit.

"I don't want to leave him alone," said the girl, sitting back down, holding her brother's hand, the bowl on her lap.

"I'll stay," said Tessa. "I won't leave him."

Jem smiled at his beloved as she sat back down on the bed. He kissed the top of her head. "You're an angel, darling."

"What if he wakes and calls for me?"

"I'll tell him you're resting and should he call for you, I will personally run to where you are and tell you that he is," said Tessa.

Cecily nodded, took the bowl from her lap, and stood. She allowed herself to be escorted from the room by Jem, his cane making gentle brushes against the floor.

The two of them left the infirmary and the door closed with a screech. The beds were empty, clean, and white. Will still lay asleep as Tessa sat still on his bed, watching his closed eyes see while he was dreaming.

The last time she had seen him in the infirmary, he had been getting shards of metal and glass taken from his bare back. She could still hear his stifled screams and grunts of pain as Brother Enoch pulled the shards out of him.

Only. No.

The last time they were in the infirmary, she had a bandage wrapped around her head, him bringing her a tisane to help her relax. She remembered the faded vision she had, the scent of lemon in the air. He remembered the concern in his eyes, in his lips, and how he held her – and how it hurt him – and how he didn't care. She remembered how she was curled up in his arms and how he tilted her chin and how he was so close to her.

"Tess," he muttered, his eyes still closed. She felt tears in her eyes and held her breath. The corners of his lips turned and he frowned, still sleeping. "I shall never be better than I am. I shall sink lower, and be worse."

Though she knew he was still sleeping, she put her fingers to her lips. She laid her other hand atop his and held it firm. "I am sure that you might be much, much worthier of yourself," she quoted.

She recalled that moment in the book, that so-terrible moment that she never believed herself to actually live out. How Lucie must have hurt to see him go, to see him waste, to leave him as he was and with no power to change it – no power to make it better for him when he had given her everything.

"For you, and for any dear to you, I would do anything," he murmured, as if he could hear her and her thoughts – feel her presence there, giving her the goodbye she would have had if he had carried through with his intentions.

She bit back a sob, tears falling from her eyes, as she came to know what he had done. The drink, the last kindness he had promised to Jem. How distraught he was when he recounted their conversation in the library to her, and how adamant he was that no one else knew of what he almost did. Will would not want them to change around him, to treat him with the same fatality that they treated Jem with.

Will's eyes soon opened slowly to her silent sobs. She brushed her eyes quickly before his vision cleared up from the drowsiness.

"Tess," he said again. "Where's Cecily?"

X X X

Their walk was a silent one.

Cecily's eyes fought to remain open as she had been up half the night and the whole morning, caring for her brother. She hadn't known that her words would have had so much on him, that she would still affect him so. All the years they had been away and she thought he had left her, there was a pain in him – like something had been ripped from inside.

She had seen it in her father when Will left them. When they returned from London without Will, she had blamed her father. She had lashed out at him for casting Will away, for failing to reclaim him. She then blamed Will for leaving them, for being so selfish so as to cause their parents to lose two out of three children in a span of days. She started blaming herself, for not being enough for him to stay. She wondered if there was something about London, something about the Institute that was more than their family could give to him. While she coped in anger, her father coped through drink. Edmund must have believed the same of himself for his son's sudden departure, not even seeing his mother goodbye when they came to the Institute to beg for him to come home.

She didn't think she could forgive Will for leaving them alone but to hear him say that he would pay his life as penance to her, then she could try. She would have to – to still have some semblance of home.

"When Tessa and I came around to the infirmary," Jem started, breaking her out of her reverie. He looked down to her as he spoke, his hands idly swinging his cane. His eyes were a bright shade of silver, as was the hair on his head. His features intrigued her but when he spoke, he carried the same tone as any Englishman she'd ever known. He looked at her expectantly.

"I'm sorry, what?" she asked, shaking her head from drowsiness.

"Tessa and I heard singing before we came into the infirmary," he said. "Was it you?"

"Oh," she nodded. "Yes. Our mother sang that lullaby to us when we were children and especially when we were ill."

"You have a beautiful voice," he remarked.

"Thank you," she said noncommittally, rubbing her eyes with her free hand. They made it to the kitchens where Sophie, who was setting the table and polishing the silverware, greeted them. The girl took the dirty bowl from Cecily's hands and went off to wash it. Jem called for Bridget to come and get them some tea and biscuits.

"How did you like your tea?" he asked. "Tessa said you were particular about it."

"Oh, yes," she said. "Blueberry tea, if you've got it. Two sugars. And a-"

"Sprig of peppermint, Miss?"

She nodded and Bridget went off to the kitchen. Even from where they waited, they could hear her and her awful ballads of a heartbroken Sally or some sort.

"Do you have a taste for mint?"

"Not really. The mint from the sprig increases the flavour of the blueberry, giving it a bit of an aftertaste."

"Really?"

"Truly. My mother had spices all around the kitchens. Ella, Will, and I played around with food, while helping mother prepare for supper, as children. I took more than a liking to it."

She wiped her face with her hand and tried to take a step forward but her knees gave way and she stumbled. Jem, who was at her side, caught her in time and curled her to him, his hand on her waist to keep her steady.

"Are you alright?"

"I'm so sorry, I'm a bit lightheaded is all." Jem's hand was still around her, his other hand atop his cane.

"You're tired. Let's get you to your room to rest," he said, helping her walk. Bridget came along with her tea prepared. Jem balanced his cane on his arm while holding the cup. He was still helping Cecily to walk in a steady line.

"Is this what you do for Will?" she asked after a while of walking, her voice slurred from lethargy.

"Heaven knows it goes the other way around," he replied. "It's usually him who makes sure I'm still standing. He's always been so good to me – more than I could ask for in a brother."

"He's always been like that."

"When he left-" he started but she did not let him get a word in edgewise, to explain Will's actions for him. She knew. She's always known, perhaps, but she never truly hated him. She never really could.

"I know," she said. They had reached her room. She pulled the handle and let them inside. Jem set her down her bed and her head rested on the pillows. Thank the Angel she was still in Shadowhunter black and freely breathing, free from her corsets, and could sleep for a while. Steam rose from the still-hot tea that Jem laid at her bedside table. He'd had something else to say but Cecily was already fast asleep.

X X X

"She went off to rest and have something to eat. Jem escorted her to the kitchens. She'll be back soon," she said, forcing a smile.

"Are you alright?" he asked her, seeing her hand holding his – he held hers back. "You're crying."

"Yes, yes, I'm fine," she said, smiling still. "Are you?"

"I'll be alright," he replied, his voice still weak. He pulled away from her hand then and massaged his temple, his head still throbbing. A deep guttural sound came from his stomach and he winced at the pain. "Feels like hell turned water in my insides, though."

"Do you feel sick?"

He hoped not. Becoming sick in front of his sister and having her clean him up was one thing, but to have the woman he loved who was not going to become his wife do the same? He wouldn't dream of subjecting her to that. He willed for his insides to calm, to become well – that he might regain his senses again.

"Just famished, Tess."

Tessa rose from the bed and the doors opened as Jem walked inside the room.

"Will," was all Jem could say.

"Where's Cecily?"

"I had Bridget give her some tea and she fell right to sleep in her bedroom before the biscuits even came," said Jem. He walked to Tessa's side and then sat at the spot where she had been sitting before. "She's just tired."

"I'll ring for- I'll go get you some food." Tessa patted Jem by the shoulder and walked out of the infirmary. Unbeknownst to the boys, the tears that had welled up in her eyes fell freely with every step towards the kitchens.

When Tessa had gone, Will spoke. "James-"

"Never," said Jem, breaking him off. He ran a hand through his hair, then looking at his parabatai already regaining colour back in his cheeks, his blue eyes becoming brighter at every passing second. "Never frighten me like that again, William."

"I am sorry, James. Truly." The boys looked at each other in silence then, taking the other in the bleak almost afternoon light that peered from the windows.

"Cecily called you something," Jem said, breaking the silence.

"Brawd? It's brother in Welsh."

"No, no. It sounded like your name."

Will closed his eyes and nodded. He lifted himself to sit, his weight propped by his elbows. The movement strained him but it was a welcome relief from his cramped muscles that had been lying in bed all day, doing nothing.

"Gwilym, you mean."

"An endearment?"

"No," said Will, half-amused. "It's my name. My Welsh name. Gwilym Owain Herondale. With Cecily, it's Seissylt Gwyneth."

"And your other sister?"

"Ella Maris," he said. His name and his sisters' names rolled off his tongue.

"You never told me that," said Jem, playfully pushing at Will's covered knee.

"I always thought that if you knew, you'd start laughing at me with 'Owain' whenever I upset you and I would never hear the end of it."

Jem chuckled. Then Will did. They settled into silence once more and then looked at each other, both smiling, and burst into laughter. The sound of Will's laugh had not left him for ages, the brightness of his blue eyes returning to him. Jem appeared fairer and in the light, he was practically glowing.

The door opened while the boys were still laughing and Sophie entered with a tray of food: hot soup, tea, and a few small loaves of bread.

"Where's Tessa?" they both asked at the same time. Jem grinned at Will and he tried to return his amusement, until he could look away and force the redness of colour to leave his cheeks.

"She said she was feeling rather tired and wanted to lie down for a while," Sophie replied.

Jem rose immediately, eyes narrow in worry. He made to walk to her room but then he looked back to Will, who was watching him go.

"Go on and go to her," said Will, trying to keep the smile on his face, the light in his eyes.

"I gave your sister my word that I wouldn't leave you alone."

"Well you call tell her I made you go," said Will, shrugging. "You can't deny an ill man his wishes and look at me – I'm so ill, I've got a blanket!"

Jem nodded and smiled at Will who was straightening his back as Sophie put the tray at his bedside, collecting the bowl that had the cloth and the cooled once-was-lukewarm water.

"Remember your oaths, brother."

"I'm sure you'll always remind me," said Will.

Jem, with cane at hand, almost ran out of the infirmary to Tessa's room. Once Sophie had laid out the food at the table, she stood by his bed expectantly.

"Is that all, Master Will?"

"Yes, Sophie. Thank you kindly."

"Are you feeling much better?" Sophie looked at him not with the same glaring eyes. Her look was softer, like she was staring at a dying man on his deathbed – which, in essence, he was.

"Yes, thank you. I'd like to be alone now though, if you don't mind."

Sophie opened her mouth to retort – expecting his usual rudeness – then shut it tight as Will pleaded with his eyes. She nodded briskly and walked out of the infirmary, the doors again closing with a creaking sound. He looked at the food at his table, when he was so famished but a minute ago, now he could not bare to look at it.

He slumped back to bed and covered his head with the blanket. He forced himself to sleep once more but the light from the afternoon shone through the windows. The infirmary was so quiet without anyone else there. It was for this reason that that day, when his sister was ill, that he refused to leave her alone. The freedom in thinking left shadows to whisper in the silence – the same shadows of his mind that whispered to him the night before. And so he spoke, by his lonesome, the same poem he spoke to her, wishing that it would also grant him dreamless sleep once more.

"Nor am I loath, though pleased at heart,/Sweet Highland girl! from thee to part;/For I methinks, till I grow old,/As fair before me shall behold,/As I do now, the cabin small,/The lake, the bay, the waterfall;/And thee, the spirit of them all!"

A/N: High five if you noticed the BBC Sherlock reference! Quotes from To the Highland Girl of Inversneyde by William Wordsworth and A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens (Part 2, Chapter 13 – AKA the death of my heart and soul because bb Sydney Carton feels). This chapter was not beta-ed as I'm looking for another to help Rachel (highways). You can go to sisypheandreams or snapspotter on Tumblr and send up an ask. Things are getting a little cray, school-wise, for all of us. In line with that, I'm starting undergraduate thesis for my Bachelor's degree in a few weeks and I'm very nervous and I'm going to be very busy in the next three months so updates might be slower than before and for that I must apologise. Are things getting a little too slow for this fic? I promise, the next one's a doozy.

Thank you so much to Amy is Rockin, Hannah R, Kelli, Anonymous reviewer, DramioneFremione4eva, dewikaka, and Fransizka for all your lovely words. Can I just say that reviews, especially constructive ones, mean the world to me and it makes me so glad to know that there are still people like you all left, especially Hannah R and Fransizka. I'm so glad to hear that I'm doing rather well on the description parts of places I've never been to so hah! Yay!

Again, thank you ever so much for your patience and for reading this little fic of mine. Reviews make Will Herondale happy and we all know how much he deserves it!

xx, Jonnah.

P.S.

"Maris" is pronounced "mah-ris".

Facts, again, taken from google. Ehehe.