Gray ↠ Gabriel Lightwood [1]

FOUR

❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀

W E A R E S H A D O W S

❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀ ~ ○ ❀

The moment Tessa turned back to her own shape, she was bombarded with questions that Elise couldn't even help her to answer. For people who lived in a supposed shadow world of magic, the assembled Nephilim seemed surprisingly awed by Tessa's ability, which only supported Elsie's thoughts—that her sister's shape-changing talent was extremely unusual. Even Charlotte, who had known about it before Tessa's demonstration, seemed fascinated.

"So you must be holding something that belongs to the person you're transforming into?" Charlotte asked for the second time. Sophie and the older woman that Elise suspected was the cook had already taken away the dinner plates and had served fancy cake and tea, but none of the diners had touched it yet. "You can't simply look at someone and—"

"She explained that already," Elise muttered with a tad bit of annoyance in her voice for she knew how hard it just be for her sister to be pressured with so many repeating questions. "As she said, Tessa must be holding something that belongs to them, or a bit of hair or an eyelash. Something that's theirs. Otherwise nothing happens. I do wish you would ask more interesting questions instead of repeating the same ones over and over. It gets to be quite boring after a while."

"Do you think a vial of blood would do the trick?" Will asked, in a tone of academic interest.

Elise smiled slightly at that and pointed towards the boy. "Now that is a good question," she said. "I can't believe I am actually saying this, but thank you, Mr. Herondale."

"Probably—I don't know. I've never tried it," Tessa muttered before taking a sip of her tea which made Elise cringe for she knew the tea had to be cold by now.

"And you're saying that the Dark Sisters knew this was your talent? They knew you had this ability before you did?" Charlotte asked.

"Yes. It's why they wanted me in the first place," Tessa explained.

Henry shook his head, "But how did they know? I don't quite understand that part."

"I don't know," Tessa told them. "They never explained it to me nor to Elise. All I know is what I told you—that they seemed to know exactly what it was I could do, and how to train me to do it. They spent hours with me, every day. . ." Tessa swallowed thickly and Elise had to look away, memories of the Dark Sisters screaming at Tessa about how Nate would die while whipping the blonde bloody until she Changed flashing through her head.