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garfinkelstingle · 2 years

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matthew's letter to james

hi, i was bored and decided to transcribe the additional letter from matthew to james from the waterstone edition of chain of thorns!

thanks to the peeps out there posting pictures of it, you're the true heroes!

Dear James,

When we talked about my trip, and the places I wished to see, you may recall that--while I wished to be beholden to no agenda or itinerary--I did say there were three cities in Europe I would die rather than miss: Vienna. Berlin. And of course, Venice. Your eyes lit up when I mentioned the latter, and I promised to send you word of the City of Masks when I arrived.

Well, I have been here for three days and I wish to share with you my impressions of the city. As one wanders, one discovers quickly that there are two modes of line in Venice: wet and quiet, or wet and loud. I have, as you would imagine, kept myself to its loudest parts.

It is a city beloved of mermaids, obviously, and in general Downworld is dominated by the fishier side of Faerie. You may ask, do I mean the aquatic parts, or do I mean the dodgy parts? And to that I say, sir, I mean both. Never have I seen so many mermaids, and never have I seen more complex scheming. Within moments of arriving at one of their fames half-sunk tavernas, I was drawn into three assassination plots, two blackmails, and a plot to steal a large sapphire owned by someone named "Il Granchio," who turned out to not just be named after but to actually be himself a giant talking crab. What marvels I have missed by remaining in sodden old London. I have never been threatened with having my head pinched off before, and I daresay it has fortified my character.

As with every other city I visit, I have had to spend half my time dodging local Shadowhunters. The local Institute is always very welcoming, and by "welcoming" I mean they wish to put me on patrol. But this is not my travel year and I am not visiting the world's most interesting places in order to patrol them, or to fight their demons at all, really.

(Obviously if a demon crosses my path, I will dispatch it posthaste. I am still a Nephilim born and bred, and thus feel a certain amount of demon-focused violence is good for the blood. Nevertheless, I have found that one does not need to wander the streets of a city to encounter its dangers. Instead I have followed the strategy of going directly to a city's most unsavory places, where trouble will regularly appear without much fuss on my part.)

The only thing worse than Shadowhunters who want to hunt demons with me, are Shadowhunters who want to Put a Word in My Ear because I have "access" to the Consul. As though when I speak to my mother she wishes me to convey the minor grievances of a bureaucrat from Turin. No, she wants to know if I am eating enough (I am) and whether I am wearing the scarf she knitted for me (I am not). If the Continental Shadowhunters wish to politic they will have to wait for Charles to come through. That's their punishment for taking life too seriously.

On a slightly more sober note--as it were--it is difficult to debauch through the world without the social lubrication of drink. I suppose I knew that before I set out, but the reality can be hard to bear. Everywhere I go I am plied with drink, which I must decline, explaining that I have come not for the alcohol but only for the gambling and the perversion. Even on the rare occasion when I have been unable to avoid visiting an Institute they inevitably drag out the dustiest bottle in their cellar and I must rush to stop them before they open it for a guest who cannot appreciate it.

The problem is that nobody seems to understand why one might not wish to drink. It is very frustrating. Everyone recognizes that one can drink to excess and need to stop for the sake of one's health, but to encounter such a person in reality bewilders them. And I can hardly order water in the sorts of places I am visiting. As a result, I have become a great consumer of black coffee, which I down by the ucketful so as to be seen imbibing something. Unfortunately, this means I now require several large cups of the stuff a day just to keep myself upright. I suppose a dependency on coffee is much less debilitating than a dependency on drink. At the very least it is less dangerous to one's health, by which I mean I have never yet drunk a pot of coffee and awoken on the cold stone steps of a baptistry wrapped in the Union Jack, which I cannot say is true of my time as a drinker of liquor. It nevertheless makes me a bit of a figure of scrutiny, the Englishman who turns down drink. I have begun to tell the especially insistent that I am under a faerie curse and if ever liquor should touch my mouth I shall transform into a badger. I tell you, I look forward to later in the year when I shall be in countries where the mundanes' religion prohibits alcohol. Although I imagine the coffee consumption will only rise.

But I was speaking of Venice, somewhere on an earlier page. You shall have to tell Pickles at the Devil that here there is no need to bring a tub with you to soak in, for the Downworld bars are mostly half-sunk into the lagoon and one sits with one's lower half in water and one's upper half at a table. This is an excellent arrangement for the mermaids and a terrible arrangement for anyone else. The werewolves go around looking like drowned rats half the time.

In addition to the continued popularity of drink and debauch, Venice is also mad for seances. (In this it resembles most other places I have visitied; the whole continent seems mad for ghosts these days. What a career Jesse could have had had he remained disembodied.) I ran into Madame Dorothea yesterday while in a dimly-lit lounge of poor reputation playing Trappola. (Because what goes better with card-playing than dire warning and demands from one's dead family members?) This is not the first time I have seen her on my travels--like me, she appears to be touring. I encountered her first in a brown café in Rotterdam and then again at a floating cabaret on the Rhine a few weeks ago. Both times I could barely see her through the tobacco smoke, but I did get to witness her admonishing a vampire that his late mother was very disappointed in him because she had expected him to become a lawyer.

By this our fourth encounter, Dorothea and I nodded knowingly to each other as fellow-travelers, and she asked me directly if there was anyone I wished to speak to. I demurred, but she was insistent, and having singled me out the crowd demanded I follow through. I searched my mind for anyone whose messages would not be potentially harmful to my good mood, and finally asked her if I could speak with Oscar Wilde. (The man, not the dog, of course; Oscar Wilde the dog awaited me loyally at the pensione as usual.)

At this point I had no doubt about the genuine power possessed by Dorothea, and so when a gruff but cultured voice emanated from that lady's mouth I knew at one it was him. Of course I immediately went off my head and said the only thing I could think of, which, foolishly, was that I thought he would sound more Irish.

Rather dryly he informed me that he had deliberately put aside his accent while at Oxford, and that he hoped I had not called him back from sailing beyond the sunset in order to complain about his diction. (He got quite enough of that from the ghost of his sister, apparently.) I told him no, but that I wished him to know that his House of Pomegranates had been a formative text for me in my youth. Which was a terrible understatement of the importance of his writing to me, but I could think of nothing else. I felt a fool the moment I said it.

Rather acidly he told me that he no longer concerned himself much with notices or reviews, being dead. At this point Dorothea's body-language showed that the spirit was becoming restless, and the crowd was on his side. More politely than I deserved, he suggested that I might wish to ask him for some advice, or at least wisdom, that he might provide from his side of the veil.

Struck, I blurted out, "In the past I have made so many errors, have caused so much hurt. Can I make up for them? Will I carry them with me forever, or can they ever be left behind in the past?"

At this the crowd became hushed. This was not what they had come to see, but at least it was more interesting than my telling a specter ripped from beyond the void that I liked his work.

Oscar gazed at me--I had no doubt it was him, behind Dorothea's eyes, and I will not soon forget the frisson I felt as he sized me up. Finally, he spoke, and his voice was gentle.

"I see from your cravat," he said, "that you are a man of the world."

I allowed that his observation was accurate.

"And I see from your eyes," he went on, "that you mean to live a grand life. That you have already begun to do so, in fact."

"I do," I told him. "I have."

"To live magnificently," Oscar said, as though carefully choosing his words, "means that your joys will be magnificent, but so too will be your pains. You will celebrate grandly and you will suffer grandly. Such is the covenant of such a life."

"Is it worth it?" said I.

He appeared to shrug. "You can see how it has turned out for me," he said. "Nevertheless, I would not exchange my fate for another. Epictetus said that a man is not made by his circumstances; rather, his circumstances reveal him to himself. I may be paraphrasing," he added, and I thought I head him mutter something to the effect, "Look at me. Dead and still quoting."

Now he took in his surroundings. "Next time you seek me out," he said, "pray do so in a place less chill and damp. I may not feel it, but I still appreciate a decent ambience."

And then he was gone.

I tell you, James, I had little expectation when I asked Dorothea to call upon him, but I left that chill and damp taverna greatly inspired. I share these words with you because, while you are not one to descend into the damp and chill places of the world for the sake of a party, as I am, your life is also grand, and like me you are destined to love grandly, to suffer grandly, and to celebrate grandly. I want you to know that Oscar Wilde says it is worth the trouble. And that I believe him.

The only real sorrow of my travels, of course, is the pangs I feel in being absent from you. Parabatai separated are always missing a bit of themselves, and I carry that lack with me wherever I go. I continue forth to seek more experiences, but I promise to return to you in time, and, I hope, the wiser for it.

Pray give my love to Cordelia, to Lucie, to Thomas and yes, even to Alastair. I miss you all very much, and hope that you are keeping London well for me while I am away. Be well and the Angel protect you.

Love,

Matthew

#chain of thorns #chain of thorns spoilers #chot #chot spoilers #matthew fairchild #james herondale #cordelia carstairs #lucie herondale #alastair carstairs #thomas lightwood #christopher lightwood #grace blackthorn #jesse blackthorn #herondaisy #cassandra clare #cassie clare #will herondale #tessa gray #jem carstairs

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