More Than Starlight (Lady Midnight Julian + Emma)

Chapter 15 - To Seek Revenge

The next wave of blackness began to fade away as Emma regained consciousness. She was still in the same room, but no longer bound to the ceiling. She struggled up to her knees and waves of pain wracked her body. Fumbling around her waist, she felt that all of her weapons as well as her stele were still missing. She silently cursed herself as her eyes frantically scanned the room. To her dismay, there was nothing except the same bucket of water and the restraints that had held her hands up on the floor. Knowing what she would find, she scrambled ungracefully to the door and tried to open it, finding it bolted on the other side. She was in a plain white tank top and black jeans which were both now in tatters and stained with water and blood. Emma took a deep breath and surged forward, shouldering the door with all her might. The metal door didn't budge, but her shoulder did, sending another shock of pain through her. A hoarse cry escaped her as she staggered backwards. The oxygen felt thinner as she realized she was stuck in this room, weaponless and now injured without her stele. She steeled herself when she heard a small laugh and the sounds of a crank reverberate through the room. Instinctively she readied herself to fight, but still held her shoulder tenderly, but nothing happened and no one came in. The tense set of her body softened until she heard a small splash behind her. Whipping around to look at the bucket of water in the center of the room sent her heart racing. From the ceiling of the stone room, a fissure had formed and was now letting in a steady stream of water. With a spark of panic, she doubled her efforts to find a way out, the water slowly rising out of the bucket and spilling onto the floor. The water rippled over the stone as it spread to the walls of the room, coating the floor in a shallow pool. She ran to the door again and pounded on it.

"So what, you're just going to let me die in here while you sit there like coward?! You won't even try and fight me?" Despite the panic deep in her stomach, her voice was strong and commanding. Despite her attempts, she simply heard a muted laugh once more before a small horizontal slide in the metal door opened to reveal Annabel's blue-green and eerie white eyes. Her voice resonated from the other side of the door.

"Your provoking will do you no good. I have no pride in my fighting ability and do not wish to. I only wish to see you die and what better way to than the way my love did. It is that beautiful irony that I take pride in, and the Blackthorns must pay the price they have owed for decades." And with that, she turned on her heel and walked away from the door, leaving Emma standing enclosed in the room that was filling quickly. Her own watery grave.

***

They had been driving as fast as they could down the road towards where the Convergence was. Clary could not make a portal since she had not been to the Convergence herself and so they had to make due. Clary was driving with Jace in the passenger seat and Mark and Julian seated in the back. They had convinced Cristina that they needed her to stay back at the Institute with the younger ones and be ready for when Jia Penhallow or anyone from the Clave arrived since she was 18. Along the way, Julian would flinch and cringe in pain, but not his own. It was obviously Emma's which was making him more frantic.

"Are we almost there?" Julian's voice was more controlled now than it had been back at the Institute, eerily calm as it often was before battle, but it was still laced with faint traces of panic. He was strapping weapons onto his gear belt, Mark drawing runes on him while he did so as Jace did for Clary while she drove.

"We're here." Clary pulled the car to a screeching halt as they all scrambled out and made their way down around the rock outcropping silently, their soundless runes muting any noise their feet made. In the silence they could hear a steady stream of water, splashing onto the sandy stone in the convergence. They made their way around and saw water streaming slowly across the wet ground beneath them.

"Hello dear descendant," A woman's voice rang out sweetly from up above and Julian and the rest of them whipped around with their weapons ready to see Annabel Blackthorn sitting gingerly up on the rock outcropping. She made no sound as she moved, as if she were a ghost, though it was obvious she was not. She still had an unnerving air about her, her black hair hanging in soft tangles and her eyes piercing. A gasp escaped Clary's lips as she tightened her grip on her seraph blade.

"Annabel Blackthorn," Jace was smirking, looking up at her with a devilish grin, "Death did not treat you well, did it?" Her smile faltered and her eyes darted to him viciously.

"A Herondale, I presume? Always relied on their beauty, that family, never were incredibly bright," Her tone was lazy as she moved to stand on the floor, her movements oddly graceful, "They also have always had a horrible tendency to antagonize. Not that it has ever stopped their demise." With a swift whir of air, she was behind Jace, her finger grazing his neck. With a quick motion, he twisted around and sliced his blade at her. She nearly escaped its reach as she jumped back, the blade only cutting a thin gash across her shoulder. Much to their horror, however, she did not bleed. The cut was simply a flap of pale skin, her face did not even cringe in pain. Splash. Julian instinctively looked over at the far wall where he could make out the door with a horizontal slit, water pouring out of the hole with force. Annabel used his distraction to her advantage and surged toward him, Clary cried out to warn him but it was too late, knocking him off his feet with impressive force. She had him pinned onto the ground with a sinister expression plastered on her face. In a split second, she was ripped off of him by the boy with golden eyes and thrust backwards where Mark caught hold of her and placed a blade to her throat. Clary had always looked to Julian a sweet and composed person, but the look on her face now mirrored Jace's; determined with a bit of enjoyment mixed in.

"Tell us where Emma Carstairs is, or he will slit your throat where you stand," Clary spoke the words with conviction, Mark tightening his grip on the woman in front of him. Despite the vulnerable position she was in, Annabel looked entirely calm and simply smiled in response.

"TELL US WHERE SHE IS!" Julian was standing now, screaming in her face, the rage that was blooming in his chest exploding like a fire out of him. They locked gazes until Julian began to cough up water. Saltwater. He thought, and he knew exactly what was happening. The same thing that happened when Emma was drowning in the ocean weeks before. Annabel's smile stretched across her face as she laughed until Mark dragged the blade hard against the skin of her neck. No blood spilled, but her body crumpled to the floor.

"That door!" Julian yelled as he began racing to the far door where water was spilling from the hole. He whipped out his stele and began to draw the open rune. Jace was yelling something as well, but Julian could not hear it, he was too focused on getting to Emma. The door unlatched and flew open and then he realized what Jace was warning him of. A wave of water surged out, barreling through with the force of a tsunami. Julian was knocked off his feet as well as Jace until the water settled on the ground and over the edge. Mark grabbed hold of Clary's shoulders to steady her as the water pushed its way over Annabel's body and over Mark and Clary's feet calmly. Unconscious on the ground in front of them was Emma. Julian scrambled over and began to draw runes to expel the water from her lungs. Finally her brown eyes shot open and she coughed up saltwater, rolling over onto her side. After her coughing ceased, Julian wrapped her shaking body in his arms, the other three making their way over to their side.

"Jules?" Emma's voice was hoarse as if she had been screaming, although Julian knew she wouldn't have been. She was too strong for that.

"Oh, Em!" He pulled her tighter in his embrace as she wrapped her arms around his neck, his racing heart beginning to slow. He wanted nothing more than to kiss her, kiss her like he would never be able to again but he forced himself not to.

"We may have a problem," Mark's voice drifted into Julian's ears and broke him out of his reverie, and although he didn't want to focus on anything but the fact that he had Emma back now, he peered over at him. He didn't even have to ask what the problem was, no one did, because it was very clear. The place on the stone ground where the body had been lying was empty; Annabel was gone.