Clockwork Princess

stable, growing ever wetter with the rain, when the growling voice came out of the darkness. He lifted his head, too late to ward off the hand reaching for him. A moment later it had grabbed his collar and hauled him to his feet.
    He stared through eyes dimmed by rain and agony at a group of werewolves standing in a half circle around him. There were perhaps five of them, including the one who had him slammed up against the stable wall, a hand fisted in his bloody shirt. They were all dressed similarly, in black garb so wet with rain, it shone like oilskin. All were hatless, their hair—worn long as werewolves did—plastered to their heads.
    “Get your hands off me,” Will said. “The Accords forbid touching a Nephilim unprovoked—”
    “Unprovoked?” The werewolf in front of him yanked him forward and slammed him back against the wall again. In ordinary circumstances it most likely would have hurt, but these were not ordinary circumstances. The physical pain of Will’s
parabatai
rune had faded, but his whole body felt dry and hollow, all the meaning sucked out of the center of him. “I’d say it’s provoked. If it wasn’t for you Nephilim, the Magister never would have come after our lot with his dirty drugs and his filthy lies—”
    Will looked at the werewolves with an emotion bordering on hilarity. Did they really think they could hurt him, after what he had lost? For five years it had been his absolute truth. Jem and Will. Will and Jem. Will Herondale lives, therefore Jem Carstairs lives also.
Quod erat demonstrandum
. To lose an arm or a leg would be painful, he imagined, but to lose the central truth of your life felt—fatal.
    “Dirty drugs
and
filthy lies,” Will drawled. “That
does
sound unsanitary. Though, tell me, is it true that instead of bathing, werewolves just lick themselves once a year? Or do you all lick one another? Because that’s what I’ve heard.”
    The hand in his shirt tightened. “You want to be a little more respectful, Shadowhunter.”
    “No,” Will said. “No, I really don’t.”
    “We’ve heard all about you, Will Herondale,” said one of the other werewolves. “Always crawling to Downworlders for help. We’d like to see you crawl now.”
    “You’ll have to cut me off at the knees, then.”
    “That,” said the werewolf holding Will, “can be arranged.”
    Will exploded into action. He slammed his head into the face of the werewolf in front of him. He both heard and felt the sick crunch of the werewolf’s nose breaking, hot blood spurting over the man’s face as he staggered back across the courtyard and crumpled onto his knees on the cobblestones. His hands were pressed to his face, trying to stem the flow of blood.
    A hand grasped Will’s shoulder, claws piercing the fabric of Will’s wet shirt. He whirled around to face the wolves and saw in this second werewolf’s hand, silvery in the moonlight, the sharp gleam of a knife. His assailant’s eyes shone through the rain, gold-green and menacing.
    They did not come out here to taunt or hurt me
, Will realized.
They came out here to
kill
me
.
    For one black moment Will was tempted to let them. The thought of it seemed like an enormous relief—all pain gone, all responsibility gone, a simple submersion in death and forgetting. He stood without moving as the knife swung toward him. Everything seemed to be happening very slowly—the iron edge of the knife swinging toward him, the sneering face of the werewolf blurred by the rain.
    The image he had dreamed the night before flashed before his eyes: Tessa, running up a green path toward him. Tessa. His hand came up automatically and grasped the werewolf’s wrist in one hand as he ducked the blow, swinging under the wolf’s arm. He brought the arm down hard, breaking the bone with a savage splintering. The lycanthrope screamed, and a dark bolt of glee shot through Will. The dagger fell to the cobblestones as Will kicked his opponent’s legs out from under him, then slammed his elbow into the man’s temple. The wolf went down in a heap and didn’t move again.
    Will snatched up the dagger and turned to face the others. There were only three of them standing now, and they looked decidedly less sure of themselves than they had before. He grinned, cold and terrible, and tasted the metal of rain and blood in his mouth. “Come and kill me,” he said. “Come and kill me if you think you can.” He kicked the unconscious werewolf at his feet.