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did—a little openmouthed, as if she couldn’t quite believe the vision that had materialized in front of her. Tessa wanted to tell her that Will looked better when less bedraggled, and that being fascinated by his beauty was like being fascinated by a razor-sharp piece of steel—dangerous and unwise. But what was the point? She’d learn it herself soon enough. “I am a fine cook, sir,” she said in a lilting Irish accent. “My previous employers had no complaints.”
    “Lord, you’re Irish,” said Will. “Can you make things that don’t have potatoes in them? We had an Irish cook once when I was a boy. Potato pie, potato custard, potatoes with potato sauce . . .”
    Bridget looked baffled. Meanwhile, somehow Jem had crossed the room and seized Will’s arm. “Charlotte wants to see Cyril and Bridget in the drawing room. Shall we show them where it is?”
    Will wavered. He was looking at Tessa now. She swallowed against her dry throat. He looked as if there were something he wanted to say to her. Gabriel, glancing between them, smirked. Will’s eyes darkened, and he turned, Jem’s hand guiding him toward the stairway, and stalked out. After a startled moment Bridget and Cyril followed.
    When Tessa turned back to the center of the room, she saw that Gabriel had taken one of the blades and handed it to his brother. “Now,” he said. “It’s about time to start training, wouldn’t you say, ladies?”
    Gideon took the blade. “Esta es la idea más estúpida que nuestro padre ha tenido,” he said. “Nunca.”
    Sophie and Tessa exchanged a look. Tessa wasn’t sure exactly what Gideon had said, but “ estúpida ” sounded familiar enough. It was going to be a long remainder of the day.
    They spent the next few hours performing balancing and blocking exercises. Gabriel took it upon himself to oversee Tessa’s instruction, while Gideon was assigned to Sophie. Tessa couldn’t help but feel that Gabriel had chosen her to annoy Will in some obscure way, whether Will knew about it or not. He wasn’t a bad teacher, actually—fairly patient, willing to pick up weapons again and again as she dropped them, until he could show her how to get the grip correct, even praising when she did something right. She was concentrating too fiercely to notice whether Gideon was as adept at training Sophie, though Tessa heard him muttering in Spanish from time to time.
    By the time the training was over and Tessa had bathed and dressed for dinner, she was starving in a most unladylike manner. Fortunately, despite Will’s fears, Bridget could cook, and very well. She served a hot roast with vegetables, and a jam tart with custard, to Henry, Will, Tessa, and Jem for dinner. Jessamine was still in her room with a headache, and Charlotte had gone to the Bone City to look directly through the Reparations archives herself.
    It was odd, having Sophie and Cyril coming in and out of the dining room with platters of food, Cyril carving the roast just as Thomas would have, Sophie helping him silently. Tessa could hardly help but think how difficult it had to be for Sophie, whose closest companions in the Institute had been Agatha and Thomas, but every time Tessa tried to catch the other girl’s eye, Sophie looked away.
    Tessa remembered the look on Sophie’s face the last time Jem had been ill, the way she’d twisted her cap in her hands, begging for news of him. Tessa had ached to talk to Sophie about it afterward, but knew she never could. Romances between mundanes and Shadowhunters were forbidden; Will’s mother was a mundane, and his father had been forced to leave the Shadowhunters to be with her. He must have been terribly in love to be willing to do it—and Tessa had never had the sense that Jem was fond of Sophie in that way at all. And then there was the matter of his illness. . . .
    “Tessa,” Jem said in a low voice, “are you all right? You look a million miles away.”
    She smiled at him. “Just tired. The