Charlotte walked with her back straight, her cheeks red, and her eyes gazing straight ahead as if she couldn’t hear the gossip. Wil seemed about to lunge off toward the whisperers to administer rough justice, but Jem had a firm grip on the back of his parabatai’s coat. Being Jem, Tessa reflected, must be a great deal like being the owner of a thoroughbred dog that liked to bite your guests. You had to have a hand on his col ar constantly. Jessamine merely looked bored again. She wasn’t terribly interested in what the Enclave thought of her, or any of them.
By the time they had reached the doors of the Council chamber, they were nearly running. Charlotte paused a moment to let the rest of their group catch up. Most of the crowd was streaming off to the left, where Tessa, Jem, and Wil had come from, but Charlotte turned right, marched several paces down the hal , spun around a corner, and abruptly stopped.
“Charlotte?” Henry, catching up to her, sounded worried. “Darling—”
Without warning Charlotte drew her foot back and kicked the wal , as hard as she could. As the wal was stone, this did little damage, though Charlotte let out a low shriek.
“Oh, my,” said Jessamine, twirling her parasol.
“If I might make a suggestion,” said Wil . “About twenty paces behind us, in the Council room, is Benedict. If you’d like to go back in there and try kicking him, I recommend aiming upward and a bit to the left—”
“Charlotte.” The deep, gravel y voice was instantly recognizable. Charlotte spun around, her brown eyes widening.
It was the Consul. The runes picked out in silver thread on the hem and sleeves of his cloak glittered as he moved toward the little group from the Institute, his gaze on Charlotte. One hand against the wal , she didn’t move.
“Charlotte,” Consul Wayland said again, “you know what your father always said about losing your temper.”
“He did say that. He also said that he should have had a son,” Charlotte replied bitterly. “If he had—if I were a man—would you have treated me as you just did?”
Henry put his hand on his wife’s shoulder, murmuring something, but she shook it off. Her large, hurt brown eyes were on the Consul.
“And how did I just treat you?” he asked.
“As if I were a child, a little girl who needed scolding.”
“Charlotte, I am the one who named you as head of the Institute and the Enclave.” The Consul sounded exasperated. “I did it not just because I was fond of Granvil e Fairchild and knew he wanted his daughter to succeed him, but because I thought you would accomplish the job wel .”
“You named Henry, too,” she said. “And you even told us when you did it that it was because the Enclave would accept a married couple as their leader, but not a woman alone.”
“Wel , congratulations, Charlotte. I do not think any members of the London Enclave are under the impression that they are in any way being led by Henry.”
“It’s true,” Henry said, looking at his shoes. “They al know I’m rather useless. It’s my fault al this happened, Consul—”
“It isn’t,” said Consul Wayland. “It is a combination of a generalized complacency on the part of the Clave, bad luck and bad timing, and some poor decisions on your part, Charlotte. Yes, I am holding you accountable for them—”
“So you agree with Benedict!” Charlotte cried.
“Benedict Lightwood is a blackguard and a hypocrite,” said the Consul wearily. “Everyone knows that. But he is political y powerful, and it is better to placate him with this show than it would be to antagonize him further by ignoring him.”
“A show? Is that what you cal this?” Charlotte demanded bitterly. “You have set me an impossible task.”
“I have set you the task of locating the Magister,” said Consul Wayland. “The man who broke into the Institute, kil ed your servants, took your Pyxis, and plans to build an army of clockwork monsters to destroy us al —in short, a man who must be stopped. As head of the Enclave, Charlotte, stopping him is your task. If you consider it impossible, then perhaps you should ask yourself why you want the job so badly in the first place.”
REPARATIONS
Then share thy pain, allow that sad relief;
A h, more than share it! give me all thy grief.
—Alexander Pope, “Eloisa to Abelard”
The witchlight that il uminated the Great Library seemed to be flickering low, like a candle guttering down in its holder, though Tessa knew that was just her imagination. Witchlight, unlike fire or gas, never seemed to fade or burn away.