“We would report the exact details of her letter to her modiste, but we fear you would be overcome. Suffice to say, the money outlaid upon hats rivals the annual income of a large estate or small country; We fail to see why one small woman needs so many hats. She is unlikely to be concealing additional heads upon her person.”

“Staring at him theway she might stare at a beloved place shewas not sure she would ever see again, tryingto commit the details to memory, to paintthem on the backs of her eyelids that shemight see it when she shut her eyes to sleep.”

“For so many years she had wondered what her first kiss would be like - if he would be handsome, if he would love her, if he would be kind. She had never imagined that the kiss would be so brief and desperate and wild. Or that it would taste of holy water. Holy water and blood.”

“Everything we need to know is locked up in your head, under those pretty red curls."Clary reached up to touch her hair protectively. "I dont think-""So what are you going to do?" Simon asked sharply. "Cut her head open to get at it?”

“Will!”He turned at the familiar voice and saw Tessa. There was a small path cut along the side of the hill, lined with unfamiliar white flowers, and she was walking up it, toward him. Her long brown hair blew in the wind — she had taken off her straw bonnet, and held it in one hand, waving it at him and smiling as if she were glad to see him. His own heart leaped up at the sight of her. “Tess,” he called. But she was still such a distance away — she seemed both very near and very far suddenly and at the same time. He could see every detail of her pretty, upturned face, but could not touch her, and so he stood, waiting and desiring, and his heart beat like the wings of seagulls in his chest. At last she was there, close enough that he could see where the grass and flowers bent beneath the tread of her shoes. He reached out for her —”

“Our hearts, they need a mirror, Tessa. We see our better selves in the eyes of those who love us. And there is a beauty that brevity alone provides.” He dropped his gaze, then raised it to hers. “I would give you everything of myself,” he said. “I would give you more in two weeks than most men would give you in a lifetime.”

“To marry a girl just to make her a widow,” said Gabriel Lightwood. “Many would say that was not a kindness.”