Dusk Till Dawn [ will herondale ]

3 - a drop of trust

" All of us lost something. Some of us lost everything. "

Cassandra Clare, The Lost Herondale (Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy, #2)

---

Arabella awoke with a start, sweat lining her dirty mangled hair. Gasps left her open mouth as she struggled to comprehend where she was. It all felt very unfamiliar and almost wrong to her. Where once her finger would've grazed chipped wood, they now slid across delicate white satin sheets - a texture she had not felt since she was eleven years old. Arabella couldn't help but pull her hand away from the soft texture, refusing to acknowledge that this was actually real. Her hands curled against her chest as she swiveled her head around. Her brown eyes were wild, her vision swaying with black dots as she swerved her head to acknowledge what was around her. She could only see the faint outline of an individual, their mouth seeming to open and close with words that weren't processing with Arabella's shocked nervous system.

Before she could even register what she was thinking or feeling, she grabbed the nearest figures clothing, a nice fitting black jacket, before breathing out the words. "Jem!" She exhaled softly, terror gripping her. Her eyes tried to adjust before looking into the startlingly captivating blue eyes of a man. Swaying slightly Arabella sighed and fell back onto the bed. Her hair fanning across the pillow as she floated back into unconsciousness.

Charlotte Branwell, the head of the London Institute, let out a strangled breathe at her words. Keeping a hand on a nearby chair to steady herself. Will Herondale, the man who had rescued the girl - Tessa - and Arabella, looked down at the girl laying on the bed. Taking a few steps back, he adjusted the jacket Arabella had gripped onto, before bolting out of the room. Charlotte calling after him in a daze, not wanting to scare Jem with a false alarm.

Will ignored all sense as his determined footsteps could be heard in the hallways as he made his way to Jem's doorway. Having memorized this exact path for the last five years they had been together. After all, they were parabatai and best friends. "Jem." Will slammed his hands on the door before erupting into the room. The door smacked viciously against the wall, a loud bang reverberating.

Jem, who had been playing his violin, looked up startled. His silver hair skimming against his forehead as he looked to see Will at his doorway, gulping up all the available air he needed dramatically. Will gulped again before a grin plastered its way onto his handsome face. Blue eyes meeting silver ones as he spoke almost indefinitely.

"I think it's her. It's her."

---

Jem had wasted no time in putting his violin down. The wooden instrument making a harsh squeal of protest. The violin was always something Jem valued. Will saw it in the way he held it the day he had showed up at the Institute. He had seen it the days Jem had mourned his sister and parents. It was a piece of him that would forever embody who he was.

And Will watched as Jem threw it onto the bed before hurrying out the door.

Will barely had time to move out of Jem's way before the silver haired boy was tearing through the hallways. Will leaned against the doorway and watched his parabatai disappear around the corner. The flaps of his tailcoat could be heard as he sprinted.

Will sighed and pushed himself off the doorway and began to follow his parabatai back to Arabella's room. Over the years Will had been told a lot about the once confident and snarky Arabella Carstairs that Jem had known and loved. The girl Will had saved in that slaughterhouse did not look like the girl Jem had described to him.