فصل 7

Chapter 7

SEAS WITHOUT A SHORE

Before Julian or Emma could speak, the front door of the Institute slammed open. Diana was there, with Mark just behind her, still in his training clothes. Diana, in a white suit, looked as beautiful and formidable as always.

Gwyn’s towering brindled horse reared as Mark approached the top of the steps. Catching sight of Emma and Jules as they strode toward him, Mark looked more than a little surprised. Emma’s cheeks felt as if they must be burning, though when she looked at Julian, he seemed unruffled, cool as always.

They joined Mark just as Diana swept to the top of the steps. The four Shadowhunters stared down at the Hunter—his horse’s eyes were blood-red, and so was the armor that Gwyn wore: tough crimson leather, torn here and there by claw marks and the rips made by weapons.

“Because of the Cold Peace, I cannot bid you welcome,” Diana said. “Why are you here, Gwyn Hunter?” Gwyn’s ancient gaze glided up and down Diana; there was no malice in it or arrogance, only the faerie appreciation for something beautiful. “Lovely lady,” he said, “I do not think we have met.” Diana looked momentarily nonplussed. “Diana Wrayburn. I’m the tutor here.”

“Those who teach are honored in the Land Under the Hill,” said Gwyn. Under his arm he carried a massive helmet decorated with a stag’s antlers. His hunting horn lay across the pommel of his saddle.

Emma boggled. Was Gwyn hitting on Diana? She didn’t know faeries did that, exactly. She heard Mark make an exasperated noise.

“Gwyn,” he said, “I give you fair greetings. My heart is gladdened to see you.”

Emma couldn’t help wondering if any of that was true. She knew Mark had complicated feelings for Gwyn. He’d spoken of them sometimes, during the nights in her room, head on his hand. She had a clearer picture of the Wild Hunt now than she’d ever had before, of its delights and horrors, of the strange path Mark had been forced to make for himself between the stars.

“I would that I could say the same,” said Gwyn. “I bring dark news from the Unseelie Court. Kieran of your heart—” “He is not of my heart any longer,” interrupted Mark. It was a faerie expression, “of my heart,” the closest they might come to saying “girlfriend” or “boyfriend.” “Kieran Hunter has been found guilty of the murder of Iarlath,” said Gwyn. “He stood trial at the Court of the Unseelie, though it was a short affair.” Mark flushed, tensing all over. “And the sentence?”

“Death,” said Gwyn. “He will die at the moon’s rise, tomorrow night, if there is no intervention.” Mark didn’t move. Emma wondered if she should do something—move closer to Mark, offer comfort, a gentling hand? But the expression on his face was unreadable—if it was grief, she didn’t recognize it. If it was anger, then it was unlike any anger he had shown before.

“That is sad news,” Mark said finally.

It was Julian who moved then, stepping to his brother’s side. Julian put a hand on Mark’s shoulder; Emma felt relief flood through her.

“Is that all?” Gwyn said. “Have you nothing else to say?”

Mark shook his head. He looked fragile, Emma thought worriedly. As if you could see through his skin to the bones underneath. “Kieran betrayed me,” he said. “He is nothing to me now.” Gwyn looked at Mark in disbelief. “He loved you and he lost you and he tried to get you back,” he said. “He wanted you to ride with the Hunt again. So did I. You were one of our best. Is that so terrible?” “You saw what happened.” Mark did sound angry now, and Emma herself could not help but remember: the twisted quickbeam tree she had leaned against while Iarlath whipped Julian and then her, and Kieran and Mark and Gwyn watched. The pain and the blood, the lashes like fire against her skin, though nothing had hurt as much as watching Julian be hurt. “Iarlath whipped my family, my friend. Because of Kieran. He whipped Emma and Julian.” “And now you have given up the Hunt for them,” said Gwyn, his two-colored eyes flicking toward Emma, “and so, there is your vengeance, if you wanted it. But where is your compassion?” “What do you want of my brother?” Julian demanded, his hand still on Mark’s shoulder. “Do you want him to grieve visibly for your amusement? Is that why you came?” “Mortals,” Gwyn said. “You think you know so much, yet you know so little.” His large hand tightened on his helmet. “I do not want you to grieve for Kieran. I want you to rescue him, Mark Hunter.” * * *

Thunder rumbled in the distance, but in front of the Institute, there was only silence, profound as a shout.

Even Diana seemed struck speechless. In the quiet, Emma could hear the sounds of Livvy and the others up in the training room, their voices and laughter.

Jules’s expression was flat. Calculating. His hand on Mark’s shoulder was a tight grip now. I want you to rescue him, Mark Hunter.

Anger swelled quickly inside Emma; unlike Jules, she didn’t bite it back. “Mark is not of the Wild Hunt any longer,” she said hotly. “Don’t call him ‘Hunter.’ He isn’t one.” “He is a Shadowhunter, isn’t he?” asked Gwyn. Now that he had made his bizarre request, he seemed more relaxed. “Once a hunter, always a hunter of some sort.” “And now you wish me to hunt for Kieran?” Mark spoke in a strange, halting tone, as if he were having difficulty getting the words out past his anger. “Why me, Gwyn? Why not you? Why not any of you?” “Did you not hear me?” said Gwyn. “He is held captive by his father. The Unseelie King himself, in the depths of the Court.” “And is Mark indestructible, then? You think he can take on the Unseelie Court where the Wild Hunt can’t?” It was Diana; she had moved down a step, and her dark hair blew in the desert wind. “Yours is a famous name, Gwyn ap Nudd. You have ridden with the Wild Hunt for hundreds of mortal years. There are many stories about you. Yet never had I heard that the leader of the Wild Hunt had succumbed to madness.” “The Wild Hunt is not subject to the rule of the Courts,” said Gwyn. “But we fear them. It would be madness not to. When they came to take Kieran, I, and all my Hunters, were forced to swear a life oath that we would not challenge the trial or its outcome. To attempt to rescue Kieran now would mean death for us.” “That’s why you’ve come to me. Because I didn’t swear. Because even if I did, I can lie. A lying thief, that’s what you want,” Mark said.

“What I wanted was one I could trust,” said Gwyn. “One who has not sworn, one who would dare the Court.” “We want no trouble with you.” It was Julian, keeping his voice level with an effort that Emma suspected only she could sense. “But you must see that Mark cannot do what you’re asking. It is too dangerous.” “We of the Folk of the Air do not fear danger, nor death,” said Gwyn.

“If you don’t fear death,” said Julian, “then let Kieran meet it.”

Gwyn recoiled at the coldness in Julian’s voice. “Kieran is not yet twenty.”

“Neither is Mark,” said Julian. “If you think we’re afraid of you, you’re right. We’d be fools not to be. I know who you are, Gwyn—I know you once made a man eat his own father’s heart. I know you took the Hunt from Herne in a battle over Cadair Idris. I know things that would surprise you. But I am Mark’s brother. And I will not let him risk himself in Faerie again.” “The Wild Hunt is a brotherhood as well,” Gwyn said. “If you cannot bring yourself to help Kieran out of love, Mark, do it out of friendship.” “Enough,” Diana snapped. “We respect you here, Gwyn the Hunter, but this discussion is at an end. Mark will not be taken from us.” Gwyn’s voice was a bass rumble. “What if he chooses to go?”

They all looked at Mark. Even Julian turned, dropping his hand slowly from Mark’s shoulder. Emma saw the fear in his eyes. She imagined it was echoed in her own. If Mark still loved Kieran—even a little bit— “I do not choose it,” said Mark. “I do not choose it, Gwyn.”

Gwyn’s face tightened. “You have no honor.”

Light speared through gaps in the clouds overhead. The storm was moving toward the mountains. The gray illumination cast a film across Mark’s eyes, rendering them unreadable. “I thought you were my friend,” he said, and then he turned and stumbled back into the Institute, the door slamming shut behind him.

Gwyn began to dismount, but Diana raised her hand, palm out. “You know you cannot enter the Institute,” she said.

Gwyn subsided. For a moment, as he gazed at Diana, his face looked lined and old, though Emma knew he was ageless. “Kieran is not yet twenty,” he said again. “Only a boy.” Diana’s face softened, but before she could speak, Gwyn’s horse reared up. Something flew from Gwyn’s hand and landed on the step below Diana’s feet. Gwyn leaned forward, and his horse exploded into motion, its mane and tail blurring into a single white flame. The flame shot toward the sky and vanished, disappearing into the night’s fretwork of clouds.

Julian shouldered the door of the Institute open. “Mark? Mark!”

The empty foyer swung around him as he turned. Fear for his brother was like pressure on his skin, tightening his veins, slowing his blood. It wasn’t a fear he could put a name to—Gwyn was gone; Mark was safe. It had been a request, not a kidnapping.

“Jules?” Mark appeared from the closet beneath the staircase, clearly having just hung up his jacket. His blond hair was tousled, his expression puzzled. “Did he leave?” “He’s gone.” It was Emma, who had come in behind Julian. Diana, a step after her, was closing the front door. Mark went straight across the room to Emma without a pause and put his arms around her.

The jealousy that flared through Julian took his breath away.

He thought he had gotten used to seeing Emma and Mark like this. They weren’t a particularly demonstrative couple. They didn’t kiss or cuddle in front of other people. Emma wouldn’t, Julian thought. She wasn’t like that. She was determined, and she was matter-of-fact, and she would do what needed to be done. But she wasn’t cruel.

It was Mark who reached for her, usually—for the small, quiet things, the hand on the shoulder, the brushing away of a stray eyelash, a quick embrace. There was an exquisite pain in watching that, more than there would have been in seeing them passionately embracing. After all, when you were dying of thirst, it was the sip of water you dreamed about, not the whole reservoir.

But now—the feel of holding Emma was so close, the taste of her still on his mouth, her rose-water scent on his clothes. He would play back the scene of their kiss over and over in his head, he knew, until it faded and fragmented and came apart like a photograph folded and unfolded too many times.

But it was too close now, like a just-delivered wound. And seeing Emma in Mark’s arms was a sharp splash of acid on raw skin, a brutal reminder: He couldn’t afford to be sentimental, or to think of her as possibly his, even in an imaginary someday. To consider possibilities was to open yourself up to pain. Reality had to be his focus—reality and his responsibilities to his family. Otherwise he would go insane.

“Do you think he’ll come back?” Emma drew back from Mark. Julian thought she cast him an anxious sideways glance, but he wasn’t sure. And there was no point wondering. He crushed his curiosity down, brutally.

“Gwyn?” said Mark. “No. I refused him. He won’t beg and he won’t return.”

“Are you sure?” Julian said.

Mark gave him a wry look. “Do not let Gwyn fool you,” he said. “If I do not help him, he will find someone else to do it, or he will do it himself. Kieran will come to no harm.” Emma made a relieved noise. Julian said nothing—he was wondering about Kieran himself. He remembered how the faerie boy had gotten Emma whipped bloody, and broken Mark’s heart. He remembered also how Kieran had helped them defeat Malcolm. Without him they would have had no chance.

And he remembered what Kieran had said to him before the battle with Malcolm. You are not gentle. You have a ruthless heart.

If he could have saved Kieran by risking his own safety, he would have. But he would not risk his brother. If that made him ruthless, so be it. If Mark was right, Kieran would be fine anyway.

“Diana,” said Emma. Their tutor was leaning against the closed front door, looking down at her palm. “What did Gwyn throw at you?” Diana held out her hand; glimmering on her brown skin was a small golden acorn.

Mark looked surprised. “That is a fair gift,” he said. “Should you crack open that acorn, Gwyn would be summoned to aid you.” “Why would he give Diana something like that?” asked Emma.

The ghost of a smile touched Mark’s mouth as he began to mount the stairs. “He admired her,” he said. “It is rare I have seen Gwyn admire a woman before. I had thought perhaps his heart was closed to that sort of thing.” “Gwyn has a crush on Diana?” Emma inquired, her dark eyes brightening. “I mean, not that you’re not very attractive, Diana, it just seems sudden.” “Faeries are like that,” said Julian. He almost felt for Diana—he had never seen her look so rattled. She was worrying at her lower lip with her teeth, and Julian remembered that Diana really wasn’t very old—only twenty-eight or so. Not that much older than Jace and Clary.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” she said. “And besides, we have more important things to think about!” She dropped the acorn into Mark’s hand just as the front door flew open and the Centurions poured in. They looked wind-tossed and soaking wet, every one of them drenched. Diana, seeming relieved to no longer be talking about her love life, went off to find blankets and towels (drying runes notoriously worked well to dry your skin, but didn’t do much for your clothes).

“Did you find anything?” Emma asked.

“I think we’ve located the likely spot where the body sank,” said Manuel. “But the sea was too rough for us to dive for it. We’ll have to try again tomorrow.” “Manuel,” Zara said warningly, as if he’d revealed the secret passcode that would open the gates to Hell under their feet.

Manuel and Rayan rolled their eyes. “It’s not like they don’t know what we’re looking for, Zara.” “The Scholomance’s methods are secret.” Zara thrust her damp jacket into Diego’s arms and turned back to Emma and Julian. “Right,” she said. “What’s for dinner?” * * *

“I can’t tell any of them apart,” said Kit. “It’s the uniforms. It makes them all look the same to me. Like ants.” “Ants don’t all look the same,” said Ty.

They were sitting at the edge of the second-floor gallery overlooking the main Institute entryway below. Wet Centurions scurried to and fro; Kit saw Julian and Emma, along with Diana, trying to make conversation with the ones who hadn’t wandered off to the dining room, and the fireplace there, to get warm.

“Who is everyone again?” said Kit. “And where are they from?’

“Dane and Samantha Larkspear,” said Livvy, indicating two dark-haired Centurions. “Atlanta.” “Twins,” said Ty.

“How dare they,” said Livvy, with a grin. Kit had been worried she wouldn’t be thrilled with Ty’s plan to absorb Kit into his detecting plans, but she’d just given a wry smile when they’d come over to her in the training room and said, “Welcome to the club.” Livvy pointed. “Manuel Casales Villalobos. From Madrid. Rayan Maduabuchi, Lagos Institute. Divya Joshi, Mumbai Institute. Not everyone’s connected with an Institute, though. Diego’s not, Zara isn’t, or her friend Jessica, who’s French, I think. And there’s Jon Cartwright and Gen Whitelaw, and Thomas Aldertree, all Academy graduates.” She tilted her head. “And not one of them has the sense to come in out of the rain.” “Tell me again why you think they’re up to something?” said Kit.

“All right,” said Ty. Kit had noticed already that Ty responded directly to what you said to him, and much less so to tone or intonation. Not that he couldn’t use a refresher on why they were halfway up a building, staring at a bunch of jerks. “I was sitting in front of your room this morning when I saw Zara go into Diana’s office. When I followed her, I saw that she was going through papers there.” “She could have had a reason,” said Kit.

“To be sneaking through Diana’s papers? What reason?” said Livvy, so firmly that Kit had to admit that if it looked scurrilous, it probably was scurrilous.

“I texted Simon Lewis about Cartwright, Whitelaw, and Aldertree,” said Livvy, resting her chin on the lower crossbar of the railing. “He says Gen and Thomas are solid, and Cartwright is kind of a lunk, but basically harmless.” “They might not all be involved,” said Ty. “We have to figure out which of them are, and what they want.” “What’s a lunk?” said Kit.

“Sort of a combination of hunk and lump, I think. As in, large but not that smart.” Livvy grinned her quick grin as a shadow rose up over them—Cristina, her hands on her hips, her eyebrows quirked.

“What are you three doing?” she asked. Kit had a healthy respect for Cristina Rosales. Sweet as she looked, he’d seen her throw a balisong fifty feet and hit her target exactly.

“Nothing,” said Kit.

“Making rude comments about the Centurions,” said Livvy.

For a moment, Kit thought Cristina was going to scold them. Instead she sat down next to Livvy, her mouth curling up into a smile. “Count me in,” she said.

Ty was resting his forearms on the crossbar. He flicked his storm-cloud-gray eyes in Kit’s direction. “Tomorrow,” he said quietly, “we follow them to see where they go.” Kit was surprised to find he was looking forward to it.

It was an uncomfortable evening—the Centurions, even after drying off, were exhausted and reluctant to talk about what they’d done that day. Instead they descended on the dining room and the food laid out there like ravenous wolves.

Kit, Ty, and Livvy were nowhere to be seen. Emma didn’t blame them. Meals with the Centurions were an increasingly uncomfortable affair. Though Divya, Rayan, and Jon Cartwright tried their best to hold up a friendly conversation about where everyone planned to spend their travel year, Zara soon interrupted them with a long description of what she’d been doing in Hungary before she’d arrived at the Institute.

“Bunch of Shadowhunters complaining that their steles and seraph blades stopped working during a fight with some faeries,” she said, rolling her eyes. “We told them it was just an illusion—faeries fight dirty, and they should be teaching that at the Academy.” “Faeries don’t fight dirty, actually,” said Mark. “They fight remarkably cleanly. They have a strict code of honor.” “Honor?” Samantha and Dane laughed at the same time. “I doubt you know what that means, ha—” They paused. It had been Dane who was speaking, but it was Samantha who flushed. The word unspoken hung in the air. Half-breed.

Mark shoved his chair back and walked out of the room.

“Sorry,” Zara said into the silence that followed his departure. “But he shouldn’t be sensitive. He’s going to hear a lot worse if he goes to Alicante, especially at a Council meeting.” Emma stared at her incredulously. “That doesn’t make it all right,” she said. “Just because he’s going to hear something ugly from the bigots on the Council doesn’t mean he should hear it first at home.” “Or ever at home,” said Cristina, whose cheeks had turned dark red.

“Stop trying to make us feel guilty,” Samantha snapped. “We’re the ones who’ve been out all day trying to clean up the mess you made, trusting Malcolm Fade, like you could trust a Downworlder. Didn’t you people learn anything from the Dark War? The faeries stabbed us in the back. That’s what Downworlders do, and Mark and Helen will do it to you, too, if you’re not careful.” “You don’t know anything about my brother or my sister,” said Julian. “Please refrain from saying their names.” Diego had been sitting beside Zara in stony silence. He spoke finally, his lips barely moving. “Such blind hatred does no credit to the office or the uniform of Centurions,” he said.

Zara lifted her glass, her fingers curled tightly around the slender stem. “I don’t hate Downworlders,” she said, and there was cool conviction in her voice. It was more chilling, somehow, than passion would have been. “The Accords haven’t worked. The Cold Peace doesn’t work. Downworlders don’t follow our rules, or any rules that aren’t in their interest to follow. They break the Cold Peace when they feel like it. We are warriors. Demons should fear us. And Downworlders should fear us. Once we were great: We were feared, and we ruled. We’re a shadow now of what we were then. All I’m saying is that when the systems aren’t working, when they’ve brought us down to the level we’re at now, then we need a new system. A better one.” Zara smiled, tucked a stray bit of hair back into her immaculate bun, and took a sip of water. They finished dinner in silence.

“She lies. She just sits there and lies like her opinions are facts,” said Emma furiously. After dinner, she’d retreated with Cristina to the other girl’s room; they were both sitting on the bed, Cristina worrying her dark hair between her fingers.

“I think they are, to her and those like her,” said Cristina. “But we should not waste time on Zara. You said on the way upstairs that you had something to tell me?” As concisely as she could, Emma caught Cristina up on the visit from Gwyn. As Emma talked, Cristina’s face grew more and more pinched with worry. “Is Mark all right?” “I think so—he can be really hard to read, sometimes.”

“He’s one of those people with a lot going on in his head,” said Cristina. “Has he ever asked—about you and Julian?” Emma shook her head violently. “I don’t think it would ever cross his mind we had anything but parabatai feelings for each other. Jules and I have known each other so long.” She rubbed at her temples. “Mark assumes Julian feels the same way about me that he does—brotherly.” “It’s strange, the things that blind us,” said Cristina. She drew her knees up, her hands looped around them.

“Have you tried to reach Jaime?” Emma asked.

Cristina leaned her cheek on the tops of her knees. “I sent a fire-message, but I haven’t heard anything.” “He was your best friend,” Emma said. “He’ll respond.” She twisted a piece of Cristina’s woven blanket between her fingers. “You know what I miss most? About Jules? Just—being parabatai. Being Emma and Julian. I miss my best friend. I miss the person I told everything to, all the time. The person who knew everything about me. The good things and the bad things.” She could see Julian in her mind’s eye as she spoke, the way he had looked during the Dark War, all thin shoulders and determined eyes.

The sound of a knock on the door echoed through the room. Emma glanced at Cristina—was she expecting someone?—but the other girl looked as surprised as she did.

“Pasa,” Cristina called.

It was Julian. Emma looked at him in surprise, the younger Julian of her memory blurring back into the Julian standing in front of her: a nearly grown-up Julian, tall and muscular, his curls unruly, a hint of stubble prickling along his jawline.

“Do you know where Mark is?” he asked, without preamble.

“Isn’t he in his room?” Emma said. “He left during dinner, so I thought—”

Julian shook his head. “He’s not there. Could he be in your room?”

It cost him visible effort to ask, Emma thought. She saw Cristina bite her lip and prayed Julian wouldn’t notice. He could never find out how much Cristina knew.

“No,” Emma said. “I locked my door.” She shrugged. “I don’t completely trust the Centurions.” Julian ran a hand distractedly through his hair. “Look—I’m worried about Mark. Come with me and I’ll show you what I mean.” Cristina and Emma followed Julian to Mark’s room; the door was propped wide open. Julian went in first, and then Emma and Cristina, both of them glancing around carefully as if Mark might be found hiding in a closet somewhere.

Mark’s room had changed a great deal since he’d first come back from Faerie. Then it had been dusty, a clearly unused space kept empty for the sake of memory. All his things had been cleared out and put into storage, and the curtains, filmed with dust, had been always drawn.

It was very different now. Mark had folded his clothes in neat stacks at the foot of his bed; he’d told Emma once that he didn’t see the point of a wardrobe or a dresser, since all they did was hide your clothes from you.

The windowsills were covered with small items from nature—flowers in various stages of drying, leaves and cactus needles, shells from the beach. The bed was made neatly; clearly he hadn’t slept in it once.

Julian looked away from the too-orderly bed. “His boots are gone,” he said. “He only had the one pair. They were supposed to ship more from Idris, but they haven’t yet.” “His jacket, too,” Emma said. It had been his only heavy one, denim lined with shearling. “His bag . . . he had a duffel bag, didn’t he?” Cristina gave a gasp. Emma and Julian both swung to look at her as she reached up for a piece of paper that had just appeared, floating at shoulder height. Glowing runes sealed it shut; they faded as she caught the fire-message out of the air. “Addressed to me,” she said, tearing it open. “From Mark.” Her eyes scanned the page; her cheeks paled, and she handed over the paper without a word.

Julian took the message, and Emma read over his shoulder as he studied it.

My dear Cristina,

I know you will show this to the right people at the right time. I can always trust you to do what is necessary when it needs to be done.

By now you know what has happened with Kieran’s arrest. Though things ended badly between us, he was my protector for many Faerie years. I owe him and cannot leave him to die in the grim Court of his father. I take the moon’s road for Faerie tonight. Tell my brothers and sisters I will return to them as soon as I can. Tell Emma I will be back. I returned to them from the Land Under the Hill once before. I will do it again.

Mark Blackthorn

Julian crumpled the paper viciously between unsteady fingers. “I’m going after him.”

Emma started to reach for his arm before remembering, and dropping her hand to her side. “I’m going with you.” “No,” Julian said. “Do you understand what Mark’s trying to do? He can’t invade the Unseelie Court by himself. The King of Shadows will have him killed before you can blink.” “Of course I understand,” said Emma. “That’s why we need to get to Mark before he makes it to an entrance to Faerie. Once he enters the Fair Folk’s Lands, it’ll be practically impossible to intercept him.” “There is also the issue of time,” said Cristina. “Once he crosses the border, time will be different for him. He could come back in three days, or three weeks—” “Or three years,” said Emma grimly.

“”Which is why I should go after him now,” said Julian. “Before he makes it into Faerie and time starts being our enemy—” “I can help with that,” Cristina said.

Faeries had been Cristina’s special field of study when she was growing up. She’d once confessed to Emma that this had been partly because of Mark, and what she’d learned about him as a child. He’d fascinated her, the Shadowhunter boy taken by faeries during the Dark War.

Cristina touched the pendant at her throat, the golden pendant that bore an image of Raziel. “This is a faerie-blessed charm. My family has . . .” She hesitated. “Many of them. Years ago, they were close with the Fair Folk. We still have many tokens of their regard. We speak of it little, though, as the Clave’s attitude toward those who befriend Fair Folk is . . .” She glanced around Mark’s room. “As you know it to be.” “What does the charm do?” said Emma.

“It keeps time from passing too quickly for mortals in the Fair Folk’s realm.” Cristina held the pendant between her fingers, gazing at Jules with quiet inquiry as if to say she had many more surprises up her neat sleeves, if he cared to hear them.

“It’s only one pendant,” said Julian. “How can it protect us all?”

“If I wear it into the realm, the protection will extend to you and Emma, and Mark, too, as long as you do not go too far away from me.” Julian leaned against the wall and sighed. “And I suppose you’re not going to consider just giving it to me, so I can wear it into Faerie? By myself?” “Absolutely not,” Cristina said primly. “It’s a family heirloom.”

Emma could have kissed Cristina. She settled for winking at her. The corner of Cristina’s lip curled up slightly.

“Then the three of us will go,” Emma said, and Julian seemed to realize there would be no point in disagreement. He nodded at her, and there was a little of the old parabatai look in his eye, the look that said that he expected the two of them to enter into danger. Together.

“The pendant will also allow us take the moon’s road,” said Cristina. “Usually only those with faerie blood can access it.” She squared her shoulders. “Mark will not imagine that we could follow him; that is why he sent the note.” “The moon’s road?” Julian said. “What is that, exactly?”

At that, Cristina did smile. It was an odd smile—not quite a look of happiness, and Emma expected that she was too worried for that—but there was a little bit of wonder in it, the look of someone who was getting to experience something they never thought they’d get a chance to do.

“I’ll show you,” she said.

They gathered their things swiftly. The house was dark, unusually alive with the untidy breathing of multiple sleepers. As Julian moved down the hallway, sliding the straps of his pack over his shoulders, he saw Ty asleep in front of Kit’s room, half-sitting up, his chin in his hand. A book was open beside him on the floor.

Julian paused at the door to the attic. He hesitated. He could leave a note, walk away. That would be the easier thing to do. There wasn’t much time; they had to get to Mark before he got to Faerie. It wouldn’t be cowardly. Just practical. Just— He shoved the door open and pounded up the stairs. Arthur was where he had left him, at his desk. Moonlight streamed in, angular, through the skylight.

Arthur dropped his pen and turned to look at Julian. Gray hair framed his tired Blackthorn eyes. It was like looking at a blurred picture of Julian’s father, something that had been flawed in the development process, pulling the angles of his face out of familiar alignment.

“I have to leave for a few days,” Julian said. “If you need anything, talk to Diana. Not to anyone else. Just Diana.” Arthur’s eyes seemed glazed. “You are—where are you going, Julian?”

Julian considered lying. He was good at lying, and it came easily to him. But for some reason, he didn’t want to.

“Mark went—back,” he said. “I’m going to get him, hopefully before he crosses over into Faerie.” A shudder went through Arthur’s body. “You’re going after your brother in Faerie?” he said hoarsely, and Julian remembered the shreds of what he knew of his uncle’s story—that he had been trapped with Julian’s father, Andrew, in Faerie for years, that Andrew had fallen in love with a gentry woman and fathered Helen and Mark on her, but Arthur had been separated from him, locked away, tortured with enchantments.

“Yes.” Julian shifted his pack to one shoulder.

Arthur reached his hand out, as if he meant to take Julian’s, and Julian flinched back, startled. His uncle never touched him. Arthur dropped his hand. “In the republic of Rome,” he said, “there was always a servant assigned to every general who won a war. When the general rode through the streets, accepting the thanks of the grateful people, the servant’s task was to whisper in his ear, ‘Respice post te. Hominem te esse memento. Memento mori.’” “Look behind you,” Julian translated. “Remember that you are a man. Remember that you will die.” A faint shiver went up his spine.

“You’re young, but you’re not immortal,” Arthur said. “If you find yourself in Faerie, and I pray that you do not, for it is Hell there if there ever was a Hell—if you find yourself there, listen to nothing the faeries tell you. Listen to none of their promises. Swear to me, Julian.” Julian exhaled. He thought of that long-ago general, being exhorted not to let the glory go to his head. To remember that everything passed. Everything went. Happiness went, and so did loss and pain.

Everything but love.

“I swear,” he said.

“We have to wait for the moment,” said Cristina. “Where the moon on the water seems solid. You can see it if you look—like the green flash.” She smiled at Emma, who stood between Jules and Cristina, the three of them in a line at the edge of the ocean. There was little wind and the ocean stretched out before them thick and black, edged with white where the water met the sand. Surges of sea foam where the waves had broken and spent themselves on the tideline pushed seaweed and bits of shells farther up the beach.

The sky had cleared from the earlier storm. The moon was high, casting a perfect, unbroken line of light across the water, reaching toward the horizon. The waves made a soft noise like whispers as they spilled around Emma’s feet, the surf lapping at her waterproofed boots.

Jules had his gaze on his watch—it had been his father’s, a large old-fashioned mechanical watch, gleaming on his wrist. Emma saw with a slight lurch that the sea-glass bracelet she’d fashioned for him once was still on his wrist beside it, shining in the moonlight.

“Almost midnight,” he said. “I wonder how much of a head start Mark has.”

“It depends how long he had to wait for the right moment to step on the path,” said Cristina. “Such moments come and go. Midnight is only one of them.” “So how are we planning on capturing him?” Emma said. “Just your basic chase and tackle, or are we going to try to distract him with the power of dance, and then lasso his ankles?” “Jokes not helping,” said Julian, staring at the water.

“Jokes always help,” said Emma. “Especially when we’re not doing anything else but waiting for water to solidify—” Cristina squeaked. “Go! Now!”

Emma went first, leaping over a small wave crashing at her feet. Half her brain was still telling her that she was throwing herself into water, that she’d splash down into it. The impact when her boots struck a hard surface was jarring.

She took a few running steps and spun around to face the beach. She was standing on a gleaming path that looked as if it were made of hard rock crystal, cut thin as glass. The moonlight on the water had become solid. Julian was already behind her, balanced on the shimmering line, and Cristina was leaping up onto the path behind him.

She heard Cristina gasp as she landed. As Shadowhunters, they had all seen wonders, but there was something distinctly Faerie about this kind of magic: It seemed to take place in the interstices of the normal world, between light and shadow, between one minute and another. As Nephilim they existed in their own space. This was Between.

“Let’s move,” Julian said, and Emma began to walk. The path was wide; it seemed to flex and curl under her feet with the motion and ripple of the tide. It was like walking on a bridge held suspended over a chasm.

Except that when she looked down, she didn’t see empty space; she saw what she feared much more. The deep darkness of the ocean, where her parents’ dead bodies had floated before they washed up on the shore. For years she had imagined them struggling, dying, underwater, miles of sea all around, totally alone. She knew more now about how they’d died, knew they’d been dead when Malcolm Fade had consigned their bodies to the sea. But you couldn’t speak to fear, couldn’t tell it the truth: Fear lived in your bones.

This far out, Emma would have expected the water to be so deep it was opaque. But the moonlight made it glow as if from within. She could gaze down into it as if into an aquarium.

She saw the fronds of seaweed, moving and dancing with the push and pull of the tides. The flutter of schools of fish. Darker shadows, too, bigger ones. Flickers of movement, heavy and enormous—a whale, perhaps, or something bigger and worse—water demons could grow to the size of football fields. She imagined the path breaking up suddenly, giving way, and all of them plunging into the darkness, the enormity all around them, cold and deathly and filled with blind-eyed, shark-toothed monsters, and the Angel knew what else rising up out of the deep . . . .

“Don’t look down.” It was Julian, approaching on the path. Cristina was a little behind them, looking around in wonder. “Look straight ahead at the horizon. Walk toward that.” She raised her chin. She could feel Jules next to her, feel the warmth coming off his skin, raising the hair along her arms. “I’m fine.” “You’re not.” He said it flatly. “I know how you feel about the ocean.”

They were far out from shore now—it was a shining line in the distance, the highway a ribbon of moving lights, the houses and restaurants along the coastline glimmering. “Well, as it turns out, my parents didn’t die in the ocean.” She took a shuddering breath. “They didn’t drown.” “Knowing that doesn’t wipe out years of bad dreams.” Julian glanced toward her. The wind blew soft tendrils of his hair against his cheekbones. She remembered what it felt like to have her hands in that hair, how holding him had anchored her not just to the world, but to herself.

“I hate feeling like this,” she said, and for a moment even she wasn’t sure what she was talking about. “I hate being afraid. It makes me feel weak.” “Emma, everyone’s afraid of something.” Julian moved slightly closer; she felt his shoulder bump hers. “We fear things because we value them. We fear losing people because we love them. We fear dying because we value being alive. Don’t wish you didn’t fear anything. All that would mean is that you didn’t feel anything.” “Jules—” She started to turn toward him in surprise at the intensity in his voice, but paused when she heard Cristina’s footsteps quicken, and then her voice, raised in recognition, calling: “Mark!”