Exit Signs I Missed (A Dark Artifices Fanfiction) ✔️

And I Was Singing

"You were wrong."

Three words. Not at all what Emma had wanted to hear. But they were Julian's, and so they burrowed into her mind, crept under her skin, carried through her bloodstream and pierced her heart. She turned around, arms folded across her chest, not backing down.

"You were wrong, Emma." He stood at the door, clutching the frame so tightly that his knuckles were white as the snow that never fell in LA, as white as ashes. "I know it's not what you want to hear, but you were wrong. If you do this, I'd be putting you in danger. I'd be enabling you, I'd be letting you get hurt. It's not that I don't think our relationship is worth it - Raziel, sometimes it's the only good part of my day - but it goes against everything I am, to let you go and try to kill yourself."

His words were a stele, inking indelible runes into her skin, trying to imprint their message onto her body, imploring her to listen, to understand. And she did, she really did - because they were parabatai, and she felt everything that he did.

"But what's the alternative, Julian? I can't live like this - I can't live, knowing that if we keep going on like this, we'll destroy everything around us. The kids, Julian, think of them. This is our chance to make things right, to have everything we've ever wanted. We have to take the risk. I trust us. I trust you with my life, I trust you to be able to save me no matter what happens."

She had faith in revenge, and Julian. That was enough for her, was all she needed to subsist on - love. And she knew that was how he felt about art, and her, and the children, like they were his whole life.

Emma stepped forwards. "I'm going to do this no matter what, but it would be a lot easier with my parabatai at my side."

Julian swallowed; she could see doubt and hope shining in his ocean-coloured eyes, and knew only one of them would win out. He took a step closer to her, and then spoke. They were words she knew by heart, words she had cherished and despised in equal measure, and she said them in unison with him. "Entreat me not to leave thee, or return from following after thee - for whither thou goest, I will go, and whither thou lodgest, I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. Where thou die, I will die, and there I will be buried. The Angel do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me."

"Thank you." She pressed her forehead into his shoulder, felt tears stain his shirt. "Thank you."

:::

The ocean lay before her, both threat and promise churning in its blue-black waters. Sooner or later, beneath the star-studded night sky, Emma would have to fling herself in.

You're going to be fine, said Julian's voice in her head. Steadying, soothing as always, tempering her anxiety. I'm with you. I'll be with you the whole time.

With his words in her ears, she plunged into the ocean. Freezing water engulfed her, and she resisted the urge to find a stele and draw a warming rune. Sea creatures unseen and unknown drifted past her, brushed her skin, caught in her hair, only made her more determined to press her lips together and not let any air escape. But she didn't - instead, Emma released it, felt oxygen flee her lungs as rapidly as she wanted to escape the sea. She sunk, not catching herself, allowed the tide to pull her deeper into the ocean, where it was colder and darker and more terrifying. Fear was paralyzingly her, and she kept the thought of Julian - his voice, his smile, his hands, any part of him - close to the front of her mind to keep from going insane.

Pretty soon, she would sink deeper. Pressure would force every ounce of air from her lungs. Without oxygen, her brain would stop working, she would take in water, and Emma would drown, as she had in a thousand nightmares, and her body would float to the surface. But that wouldn't happen. Julian would save her. He would find her, save her, and this would end the way it had begun: on the beach, in waterlogged clothing, both of them having almost died for completely different reasons.

She made herself not resist, made herself let go. It was just like falling in the training room, just like jumping from the Institute's roof; she didn't need anyone to catch her. She would fall, and break, and fix herself.

But no matter what, Julian would always be there - not to catch her, but to help her back up. This was just like those times, she told herself as she sunk.

:::

The air was perfectly still.

No salty ocean breeze stirred it; no breath blew through it; not a sound was made. It was just Emma, alone, in an empty room.

She was dry, her clothes plain black Shadowhunter gear, not the jeans and t-shirt that she donned earlier. What had she been doing earlier? She couldn't remember.

Suddenly, behind her, came a voice. "Emma Cordelia Carstairs."

She recognized it suddenly as Jem's, his soothing baritone loud and reverberating in the small space.

"Jem!" She made move to hug him, but something stopped her.

"Do you know what you are doing, Emma?" His voice, his face, his body, was perfectly neutral, composed, blank.

"No," she replied honestly.

"And yet you would do it anyways? Step into the unknown, risk everything that you know, for the sake of your parabatai?"

"It's not a question," she said, and it wasn't. There was no other conceivable choice than this one, the one that had brought her here, to this strange place, with Jem.

"I see." He nodded solemnly. "Remember that, in the end. Remember that it was not a choice, that it was not a question. Hold onto that thought, and you may succeed still."

She opened her mouth, just about to ask him what he meant by that, when water rushed into it, cold and bitter and unforgiving.

She had no strength to force it out. Saltwater filled her lungs. Emma was drowning, but she opened her arms, and embraced it.