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p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 8pt; line-height: 15.693333625793457px; font-size: 11pt; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto;"It was nighttime, and Lucie Herondale could not sleep. Her thoughts kicked up a whirlwind in her head, spinning out of control. She tried thinking about one thing at a time. Lucie was going to bring Jesse back. That much she was sure of. She didn't like Grace Blackthorn too much, though. James was smitten by her, she could tell, and she was almost sure Cordelia genuinely loved James. Everyone else thought it was fake, because the marriage was a sham, but Lucie knew no one could fake love like that. It was the love her mother Tessa, showed her father. It was the kind of love Lucie had trouble writing about, because it was so pure and beautiful. Lucie wouldn't bring it up with Cordelia, as Cordelia didn't seem like she wanted anyone to know, but it warmed Lucie's heart and broke her heart at the same time. James didn't love Cordelia, Lucie knew. She could tell, from the curtain of sadness that fell over Cordelia whenever she saw James, that James was hurting her. She hated to see her future emparabatai/em in any kind of pain, mental or physical. But perhaps what hurt more was that Cordelia wouldn't tell her. Sometimes, Cordelia felt so far away, Lucie couldn't reach her. It felt like they were growing apart as they got older. Perhaps it was the time spent away from each other. But, some part of Lucie wondered, emIs it my fault? Maybe we're just not meant to be /emparabataiem./emAnd another part of Lucie blamed Cordelia's distance on Grace Blackthorn. It was Grace's fault James was in love with her. Maybe not directly, but still! Maybe if James were in love with Cordelia, Cordelia would confide in Lucie more. It made no sense, yet she needed someone to blame her problems on. She tried to think about something different, but then she thought about the Manticore, and she couldn't. She thought about Jesse, and her power to call ghosts. When Lucie was younger, she wanted a power like James. When Lucie got older and saw how much effort he needed to control his power, she was thankful she didn't have one, but now…Well, now, Lucie wasn't sure how she felt. She was surprised, and a little shocked as well, but there were so many emotions that rolled through her when she thought about her power that she couldn't dissect them all. It was probably better if she didn't. There was one thing Lucie could think about with only a fierce determination accompanying her thoughts: bringing Jesse back. It was necromancy, and if the Clave found out, which it probably would at some point, she could be stripped of her Marks and become a mundane, but it would be worth it. emOr would it? /emLucie had never really had time to think of the consequences of her decision to bring back Jesse, but now they hit her with full force. She thought of not being Nephilim, not having the pump of adrenaline when she fought demons, not being able to see the Merry Thieves or Cordelia ever again, and finally, not being able to see her parents ever again. emWas it really worth it?/em Jesse had asked her not to bring him back. But, when she thought of Jesse at the cemetery, it made her think of what she had done. She had forced Jesse to bring her to the entrance to the Silent City against his wishes as well. That made him give his last breath to James, and now she couldn't see him or be able to touch him. It was her fault he was, well, somewhere she couldn't follow him. She had to bring him back. If he were here, she would have someone to confide in. She wouldn't have to keep secrets from him if she could see him and feel him like before, she wouldn't have to do necromancy to bring him back. He emwas /emher secret. He was also her good friend; she was beginning to think. Except now she had lost him. She could get in touch with spirits, she supposed, to see if they knew where he was. But what were the chances they could see him? Lucie thought back to when Jessamine introduced her to ghosts when she was little. Jessamine hadn't known about a fourth kind of ghost, a emJesse /emkind of ghost. So why would the other spirits know where he was? They wouldn't, she reasoned. Then she would be disappointed, and disappointment was not what she needed. She needed hope. Hope that she could bring Jesse back, hope that Cordelia could start confiding in her, hope that she would learn how to effectively use her power, hope that James would fall in love with Cordelia. No matter how small a chance all this would happen, there was a chance, and Lucie clung to that. "There is a chance," Lucie whispered to herself, and with that, she let herself fall into the soft arms of sleep./p
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