فصل 06

6

There were holes punched into the darkness, glimmering dots of light against shadow. Jace closed his eyes, trying to calm his own breathing. There was a coppery taste in his mouth, like blood, and he could tell that he was lying on a cold metal surface and that the chill was seeping through his clothes and into his skin. He counted backward from one hundred inside his head until his breathing slowed. Then he opened his eyes again. The darkness was still there, but it had resolved itself into familiar night sky punctuated by stars. He was on the deck of the ship, flat on his back in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge, which loomed at the ship’s bow like a gray mountain of metal and stone. He groaned and lifted himself onto his elbows—then froze as he became aware of another shadow, this one recognizably human, leaning over him. “That was a nasty knock to the head you got,” said the voice that haunted his nightmares. “How do you feel?”

Jace sat up and immediately regretted it as his stomach lurched. If he’d eaten anything in the past ten hours, he was fairly sure he would have thrown it up. As it was, the sour taste of bile flooded his mouth. “I feel like hell.”

Valentine smiled. He was sitting on a stack of empty, flattened boxes, wearing a neat gray suit and tie, as if he were seated behind the elegant mahogany desk at the Wayland manor house in Idris. “I have another obvious question for you. How did you find me?”

“I tortured it out of your Raum demon,” said Jace. “You’re the one who taught me where they keep their hearts. I threatened it and it told me—well, they’re not very bright, but it managed to tell me it had come from a ship on the river. I looked up and saw the shadow of your boat on the water. It told me you’d summoned it too, but I already knew that.”

“I see.” Valentine seemed to be hiding a smile. “Next time you should at least tell me you’re coming before you drop by. It would save you a nasty run-in with my guards.”

“Guards?” Jace propped himself against the cold metal railing and took in deep breaths of clean, cold air. “You mean demons, don’t you? You used the Sword to summon them.”

“I don’t deny that,” Valentine said. “Lucian’s beasts shattered my army of Forsaken, and I had neither time nor inclination to create more. Now that I have the Mortal Sword, I no longer need them. I have others.”

Jace thought of Clary, bloody and dying in his arms. He put a hand to his forehead. It was cool where the metal railing had touched it. “That thing in the stairwell,” he said. “It wasn’t Clary, was it?”

“Clary?” Valentine sounded mildly surprised. “Is that what you saw?”

“Why wouldn’t it be what I saw?” Jace struggled to keep his voice flat, nonchalant. He wasn’t unfamiliar or uncomfortable with secrets—either his own or other people’s—but his feelings for Clary were something he had told himself he could bear only if he did not look at them too closely.

But this was Valentine. He looked at everything closely, studying it, analyzing in what way it could be turned to his advantage. In that way he reminded Jace of the Queen of the Seelie Court: cool, menacing, calculating.

“What you encountered in the stairwell,” Valentine said, “was Agramon—the Demon of Fear. Agramon takes the form of whatever most terrifies you. When it is done feeding on your terror, it kills you, presuming you are still alive at that point. Most men—and women—die of fear before that. You are to be congratulated for holding out as long as you did.”

“Agramon?” Jace was astonished. “That’s a Greater Demon. Where did you get hold of that?”

“I paid a young and hubristic warlock to summon it for me. He thought that if the demon remained inside his pentagram, he could control it. Unfortunately for him, his greatest fear was that a demon he summoned would break the wards of the pentagram and attack him, and that’s exactly what happened when Agramon came through.”

“So that’s how he died,” Jace said.

“How who died?”

“The warlock,” Jace said. “His name was Elias. He was sixteen. But you knew that, didn’t you? The Ritual of Infernal Conversion—”

Valentine laughed. “You have been busy, haven’t you? So you know why I sent those demons to Lucian’s house, don’t you?”

“You wanted Maia,” said Jace. “Because she’s a werewolf child. You need her blood.”

“I sent the Drevak demons to spy out what there was to see at Lucian’s and report back to me,” Valentine said. “Lucian killed one of them, but when the other reported the presence of a young lycanthrope—”

“You sent the Raum demons to take her.” Jace felt suddenly very tired. “Because Luke is fond of her and you wanted to hurt him if you could.” He paused, and then said, in a measured tone: “Which is pretty low, even for you.”

For a moment a spark of anger lit Valentine’s eyes; then he threw his head back and roared with mirth. “I admire your stubbornness. It’s so much like mine.” He got to his feet then and held a hand out for Jace to take. “Come. Walk around the deck with me. There’s something I want to show you.”

Jace wanted to spurn the offered hand, but wasn’t sure, considering the pain in his head, that he could make it to his feet unaided. Besides, it was probably better not to anger his father so soon; whatever Valentine might say about prizing Jace’s rebelliousness, he had never had much patience with disobedient behavior.

Valentine’s hand was cool and dry, his grip oddly reassuring. When Jace was on his feet, Valentine released his hold and drew a stele out of his pocket. “Let me take those injuries away,” he said, reaching out for his son.

Jace drew away—after a second’s hesitation that Valentine would surely have noticed. “I don’t want your help.”

Valentine put the stele away. “As you like.” He began to walk, and Jace, after a moment, followed him, jogging to catch up. He knew his father well enough to know he would never turn around to see if Jace had pursued him, but would just expect that he had and begin talking accordingly.

He was right. By the time Jace reached his father’s side, Valentine had already started speaking. He had his hands loosely clasped behind his back and moved with an easy, careless grace, unusual in a big, broad-shouldered man. He leaned forward as he walked, almost as if he were striding into a heavy wind.

“… if I recall correctly,” Valentine was saying, “you are in fact familiar with Milton’s Paradise Lost?”

“You only made me read it ten or fifteen times,” said Jace. “It’s better to reign in hell than serve in heaven, etcetera, and so on.”

“Non serviam,”

said Valentine. ‘“I will not serve.’ It’s what Lucifer had inscribed upon his banner when he rode with his host of rebel angels against a corrupt authority.”

“What’s your point? That you’re on the devil’s side?”

“Some say Milton was on the devil’s side himself. His Satan is certainly a more interesting figure than his God.” They had nearly reached the front of the ship. He stopped and leaned against the guardrail.

Jace joined him there. They had passed the bridges of the East River and were heading out into the open water between Staten Island and Manhattan. The lights of the downtown financial district shimmered like witchlight on the water. The sky was powdered with diamond dust and the river hid its secrets under a slick black sheet, broken here and there with a silvery flash that could have been a fish’s tail—or a mermaid’s. My city, Jace thought, experimentally, but the words still brought to mind Alicante and its crystal towers, not the skyscrapers of Manhattan.

After a moment Valentine said, “Why are you here, Jonathan? I wondered after I saw you in the Bone City if your hatred for me was implacable. I had nearly given up on you.”

His tone was level, as it almost always was, but there was something in it—not vulnerability but at least a sort of genuine curiosity, as if he had realized that Jace was capable of surprising him.

Jace looked out at the water. “The Queen of the Seelie Court wanted me to ask you a question,” he said. “She told me to ask you what blood runs in my veins.”

Surprise passed over Valentine’s face like a hand smoothing away all expression. “You spoke with the Queen?”

Jace said nothing.

“It is the way of the Folk. Everything they say has more than one meaning. Tell her, if she asks again, that the blood of the Angel runs in your veins.”

“And in every Shadowhunter’s veins,” said Jace, disappointed. He’d hoped for a better answer. “You wouldn’t lie to the Queen of the Seelie Court, would you?”

Valentine’s tone was short. “No. And you wouldn’t come here just to ask me that ridiculous question. Why are you really here, Jonathan?”

“I had to talk to someone.” He wasn’t as good at controlling his voice as his father was; he could hear the pain in it, like a bleeding wound just under the surface. “The Lightwoods—I’m nothing but trouble for them. Luke must hate me by now. The Inquisitor wants me dead. I did something to hurt Alec and I’m not even sure what.”

“And your sister?” Valentine said. “What about Clarissa ?”

Why do you have to ruin everything?

“She’s not too pleased with me either.” He hesitated. “I remembered what you said at the Bone City. That you never got a chance to tell me the truth. I don’t trust you,” he added. “I want you to know that. But I thought I’d give you the chance to tell me why.”

“You have to ask me more than why, Jonathan.” There was a note in his father’s voice that startled Jace—a fierce humility that seemed to temper Valentine’s pride, as steel might be tempered by fire. “There are so many whys.”

“Why did you kill the Silent Brothers? Why did you take the Mortal Sword? What are you planning? Why wasn’t the Mortal Cup enough for you?” Jace caught himself before he could ask any more questions. Why did you leave me a second time? Why did you tell me I wasn’t your son anymore, then come back for me anyway ?

“You know what I want. The Clave is hopelessly corrupt and must be destroyed and built again. Idris must be freed from the influence of the degenerate races, and Earth made proof against the demonic threat.”

“Yeah, about that demonic threat.” Jace glanced around, as if he half-expected to see the black shadow of Agramon hulking toward him. “I thought you hated demons. Now you use them like servants. The Ravener, the Drevak demons, Agramon—they’re your employees. Guards, butler—personal chef, for all I know.”

Valentine tapped his fingers on the railing. “I’m no friend to demons,” he said. “I am Nephilim, no matter how much I might think the Covenant is useless and the Law fraudulent. A man doesn’t have to agree with his government to be a patriot, does he? It takes a true patriot to dissent, to say he loves his country more than he cares for his own place in the social order. I’ve been vilified for my choice, forced into hiding, banished from Idris. But I am—I will always be—Nephilim. I can’t change the blood in my veins if I wished to—and I don’t.”

I do. Jace thought of Clary. He glanced down at the dark water again, knowing it wasn’t true. To give up the hunt, the kill, the knowledge of one’s own soaring speed and sure abilities: It was impossible. He was a warrior. He could be nothing else.

“Do you?” Valentine asked. Jace looked away quickly, wondering if his father could read his face. It had been just the two of them alone for so many years. He’d known his father’s face better than his own, once. Valentine was the one person from whom he felt he could never hide what he was feeling. Or the first person, at least. Sometimes he felt as if Clary could look right through him as if he were glass.

“No,” he said. “I don’t.”

“You’re a Shadowhunter forever?”

“I am,” Jace said, “in the end, what you made me.”

“Good,” said Valentine. “That’s what I wanted to hear.” He leaned back against the railing, looking up at the night sky. There was gray in his silvery white hair; Jace had never noticed it before. “This is a war,” Valentine said. “The only question is, what side will you fight on?”

“I thought we were all on the same side. I thought it was us against the demon worlds.”

“If only it could be. Don’t you understand that if I felt that the Clave had the best interests of this world at heart, if I thought they were doing the best job they possibly could—by the Angel, why would I fight them? What reason would I have?”

Power,

Jace thought, but he said nothing. He was no longer sure what to say, much less what to believe.

“If the Clave goes on as they are,” Valentine said, “the demons will see their weakness and attack, and the Clave, distracted by their endless courting of the degenerate races, will be in no condition to fight them off. The demons will attack and they will destroy and there will be nothing left.”

The degenerate races.

The words carried an uncomfortable familiarity; they recalled Jace’s childhood to him, in a way that was not entirely unpleasant. When he thought of his father and of Idris, it was always the same blurred memory of hot sunshine burning down on the green lawns in front of their country house, and of a big, dark, broad-shouldered figure leaning down to lift him off the grass and carry him inside. He must have been very young then, and he had never forgotten it, not the way the grass had smelled—green and bright and newly cut—or the way the sun had turned his father’s hair to a white halo, nor the feeling of being carried. Of being safe.

“Luke,” Jace said, with some difficulty. “Luke isn’t a degenerate—”

“Lucian is different. He was a Shadowhunter once.” Valentine’s tone was flat and final. “This isn’t about specific Downworlders, Jonathan. This is about the survival of every living creature in this world. The Angel chose the Nephilim for a reason. We are the best of this world, and we are meant to save it. We are the closest thing that exists in this world to gods— and we must use that power to save this world from destruction, whatever the cost to us.”

Jace leaned his elbows on the railing. It was cold here: The icy wind cut through his clothes, and the tips of his fingers were numb. But in his mind, he saw green hills and blue water and the honey-colored stones of the Wayland manor house.

“In the old tale,” he said, “Satan said to Adam and Eve ‘You shall be as gods’ when he tempted them into sin. And they were cast out of the garden because of it.”

There was a pause before Valentine laughed. He said, “See, that’s what I need you for, Jonathan. You keep me from the sin of pride.”

“There are all sorts of sins.” Jace straightened up and turned to face his father. “You didn’t answer my question about the demons, Father. How can you justify summoning them, associating with them? Do you plan to send them against the Clave?”

“Of course I do,” said Valentine, without hesitation, without a moment’s pause to consider whether it might be wise to reveal his plans to someone who might share them with his enemies. Nothing could have shaken Jace more than to realize how sure his father was of success. “The Clave won’t yield to reason, only to force. I tried to build an army of Forsaken; with the Cup, I could create an army of new Shadowhunters, but that will take years. I don’t have years. We, the human race, don’t have years. With the Sword I can call to me an obedient army of demons. They will serve me as tools, do whatever I demand. They will have no choice. And when I am done with them, I will command them to destroy themselves, and they will do it.” His voice was emotionless.

Jace was gripping the railing so hard that his fingers had begun to ache. “You can’t slaughter every Shadowhunter who opposes you. That’s murder.”

“I won’t have to. When the Clave sees the power arrayed against them, they’ll surrender. They’re not suicidal. And there are those among them who support me.” There was no arrogance in Valentine’s voice, only a calm certainty. “They will step forward when the time comes.”

“I think you’re underestimating the Clave.” Jace tried to make his voice steady. “I don’t think you understand how much they hate you.”

“Hate is nothing when weighed against survival.” Valentine’s hand went to his belt, where the hilt of the Sword gleamed dully. “But don’t take my word for it. I told you there was something I wanted to show you. Here it is.”

He drew the Sword from its sheath and held it out to Jace. Jace had seen Maellartach before in the Bone City, hanging on the wall in the pavilion of the Speaking Stars. And he had seen the hilt of it protruding from Valentine’s shoulder sheath, but he’d never really examined it up close. The Angel’s Sword. It was a dark, heavy silver, glimmering with a dull sheen. Light seemed to move over and through it, as if it were made of water. In its hilt bloomed a fiery rose of light.

Jace spoke through his dry mouth. “Very nice.”

“I want you to hold it.” Valentine presented the Sword to his son, the way he’d always taught him, hilt first. The Sword seemed to shimmer blackly in the starlight.

Jace hesitated. “I don’t…”

“Take it.” Valentine pressed it into his hand.

The moment Jace’s fingers closed around the grip, a spear of light shot up the hilt of the Sword and down the core of it into the blade. He looked quickly to his father, but Valentine was expressionless.

A dark pain spread up Jace’s arm and through his chest. It wasn’t that the Sword was heavy; it wasn’t. It was that it seemed to want to pull him downward, to drag him through the ship, through the green ocean water, through the fragile crust of the earth itself. Jace felt as if the breath were being torn out of his lungs. He flung his head up and looked around—

And saw that the night had changed. A glimmering net of thin gold wires had been flung across the sky, and the stars shone down through it, bright as nail heads hammered into the darkness. Jace saw the curve of the world as it slipped away from him, and for a moment was struck by the beauty of it all. Then the night sky seemed to crack open like a glass and pouring through the shards came a horde of dark shapes, humped and twisted, gnarled and faceless, howling out a soundless scream that seared the inside of his mind. Icy wind burned him as six-legged horses hurtled past, their hooves striking bloody sparks from the deck of the ship. The things that rode them were indescribable. Overhead eyeless, leathery-winged creatures circled, screeching and dripping a venomous green slime.

Jace bent over the railing, retching uncontrollably, the Sword still gripped in his hand. Below him the water churned with demons like a poisonous stew. He saw spiny creatures with bloody saucer-like eyes struggling as they were dragged under by boiling masses of slippery black tentacles. A mermaid caught in the grip of a ten-legged water spider screamed hopelessly as it sank its fangs into her thrashing tail, its red eyes glittering like beads of blood.

The Sword fell from Jace’s hand and clattered to the deck. Abruptly the sound and spectacle were gone and the night was silent. He hung tightly to the railing, staring down at the sea below in disbelief. It was empty, its surface ruffled only by wind.

“What was that?” Jace whispered. His throat felt rough, as if it had been scraped with sandpaper. He looked wildly at his father, who had bent to retrieve the Soul-Sword from the deck where Jace had dropped it. “Are those the demons you’ve already called?”

“No.” Valentine slid Maellartach into its sheath. “Those are the demons that have been drawn to the edges of this world by the Sword. I brought my ship to this place because the wards are thin here. What you saw is my army, waiting on the other side of the wards—waiting for me to call them to my side.” His eyes were grave. “Do you still think the Clave won’t capitulate?”

Jace closed his eyes and said, “Not all of them—not the Lightwoods—”

“You could convince them. If you stand with me, I swear no harm will come to them.”

The darkness behind Jace’s eyes began to turn red. He had been imagining the ashes of Valentine’s old house, the blackened bones of the grandparents he’d never met. Now he saw other faces. Alec’s. Isabelle’s. Max’s. Clary’s.

“I’ve done so much to hurt them already,” he whispered. “Nothing else must happen to any of them. Nothing.”

“Of course. I understand.” And Jace realized, to his astonishment, that Valentine did understand, that somehow he saw what no one else seemed to be able to understand. “You think it is your fault, all the harm that has befallen your friends, your family.”

“It is my fault.”

“You’re right. It is.” At that, Jace looked up in absolute astonishment. Surprise at being agreed with battled with horror and relief in equal measures.

“Is it?”

“The harm is not deliberate, of course. But you are like me. We poison and destroy everything we love. There is a reason for that.”

“What reason?”

Valentine glanced up at the sky. “We are meant for a higher purpose, you and I. The distractions of the world are just that, distractions. If we allow ourselves to be turned aside from our course by them, we are duly punished.”

“And our punishment is visited on everyone we care about? That seems a little hard on them.”

“Fate is never fair. You are caught in a current much stronger than you are, Jonathan; struggle against it and you’ll drown not just yourself but those who try to save you. Swim with it, and you’ll survive.”

“Clary—”

“No harm will come to your sister if you join with me. I will go to the ends of the earth to protect her. I will bring her to Idris, where nothing can happen to her. I promise you that.”

“Alec. Isabelle. Max—”

“The Lightwood children, also, will have my protection.”

Jace said softly, “Luke—”

Valentine hesitated, then said, “All your friends will be protected. Why can’t you believe me, Jonathan? This is the only way that you can save them. I swear it.”

Jace couldn’t speak. Inside him the cold of fall battled with the memory of summer.

“Have you made your decision?” Valentine said; Jace couldn’t see him, but he could hear the finality in the question. He even sounded eager.

Jace opened his eyes. The starlight was a white burst against his irises; for a moment he could see nothing else. He said, “Yes, Father. I’ve made my decision.”

Part Three

Day of Wrath

Day of wrath, that day of burning,

Seer and Sibyl speak concerning,

All the world to ashes turning.

—Abraham Coles

14

Fearless

When Clary awoke, light was streaming in through the

windows and there was a sharp pain in her left cheek. Rolling over, she saw that she’d fallen asleep on her sketchpad and the corner of it had been digging into her face. She’d also dropped her pen onto the duvet, and there was a black stain spreading across the cloth. With a groan she sat up, rubbed her cheek ruefully, and went in search of a shower.

The bathroom showed telltale signs of the activities of the night before; there were bloody cloths shoved into the trash and a smear of dried blood across the sink. With a shudder Clary ducked into the shower with a bottle of grapefruit body wash, determined to scrub away her lingering feelings of unease.

Afterward, wrapped in one of Luke’s robes and with a towel around her damp hair, she pushed the bathroom door open to discover Magnus lurking on the other side, clutching a towel in one hand and his glittery hair in the other. He must have slept on it, she thought, because one side of the glittered spikes looked dented in. “Why does it take girls so long to shower?” he demanded. “Mortal girls, Shadowhunters, female warlocks, you’re all the same. I’m not getting any younger waiting out here.”

Clary stepped aside to let him pass. “How old are you, anyway?” she asked curiously.

Magnus winked at her. “I was alive when the Dead Sea was just a lake that was feeling a little poorly.”

Clary rolled her eyes.

Magnus made a shooing motion. “Now move your petite behind. I need to get in there; my hair is a wreck.”

“Don’t use up all my body wash, it’s expensive,” Clary told him, and headed into the kitchen, where she rooted around for some filters and plugged in the Mr. Coffee machine. The familiar burble of the percolator and the smell of coffee damped down her feeling of unease. As long as there was coffee in the world, how bad could things be?

She headed back to the bedroom to get dressed. Ten minutes later, in jeans and a blue-and-green striped sweater, she was in the living room shaking Luke awake. He sat up with a groan, his hair rumpled and his face creased with sleep.

“How are you feeling?” Clary asked, handing him a chipped mug full of steaming coffee.

“Better now.” Luke glanced down at the torn fabric of his shirt; the edges of the tear were stained with blood. “Where’s Maia?”

“She’s asleep in your room, remember? You said she could have it.” Clary perched on the arm of the sofa.

Luke rubbed at his shadowed eyes. “I don’t remember last night all that well,” he admitted. “I remember going out to the truck and not much after that.”

“There were more demons hiding outside. They attacked you. Jace and I took care of them.”

“More Drevak demons?”

“No.” Clary spoke with reluctance. “Jace called them Raum demons.”

“Raum demons?” Luke sat up straight. “That’s serious stuff. Drevak demons are dangerous pests, but the Raum—”

“It’s all right,” Clary told him. “We got rid of them.”

“You got rid of them? Or Jace did? Clary, I don’t want you—”

“It wasn’t like that.” She shook her head. “It was like…”

“Wasn’t Magnus around? Why didn’t he go with you?” Luke interrupted, clearly upset.

“I was healing you, that’s why,” Magnus said, coming into the living room smelling strongly of grapefruit. His hair was wrapped in a towel and he was dressed in a blue satin tracksuit with silver stripes down the side. “Where is the gratitude?”

“I am grateful.” Luke looked as if he were both angry and trying not to laugh at the same time. “It’s just that if anything had happened to Clary—”

“You would have died if I’d gone out there with them,” Magnus said, flopping down into a chair. “And then Clary would have been a lot worse off. She and Jace handled the demons just fine on their own, didn’t you?” He turned to Clary.

She squirmed. “You see, that’s just it—”

“What’s just it?” It was Maia, still in the clothes she’d worn the night before, with one of Luke’s big flannel shirts thrown over her T-shirt. She moved stiffly across the room and sat down gingerly in a chair. “Is that coffee I smell?” she asked hopefully, wrinkling her nose.

Honestly, Clary thought, it was hardly fair for a werewolf to be curvy and pretty; she ought to be big and hirsute, possibly with hair coming out of her ears. And this, Clary added silently, is exactly why I don’t have any female friends and spend all my time with Simon. I’ve got to get a grip. She rose to her feet. “You want me to get you some?”

“Sure.” Maia nodded. “Milk and sugar!” she called as Clary left the room, but by the time she was back from the kitchen, steaming mug in hand, the werewolf girl was frowning. “I don’t really remember what happened last night,” she said, “but there’s something about Simon, something that’s bothering me…”

“Well, you did try to kill him,” Clary said, settling back onto the arm of the sofa. “Maybe that’s it.”

Maia paled, staring down into her coffee. “I’d forgotten. He’s a vampire now.” She looked up at Clary. “I didn’t mean to hurt him. I was just…”

“Yes?” Clary raised her eyebrows. “Just what?”

Maia’s face went a slow, dark red. She set her coffee down on the table beside her.

“You might want to lie down,” Magnus advised. “I find that helps when the crushing sense of horrible realization sets in.”

Maia’s eyes filled suddenly with tears. Clary looked toward Magnus in horror—he looked equally shocked, she noticed—and then to Luke. “Do something,” she hissed at him under her breath. Magnus might be a warlock who could heal fatal injuries with a flash of blue fire, but Luke was hands down the top choice between the two for dealing with crying teenage girls.

Luke began to kick back his blanket in preparation for rising, but before he could get to his feet, the front door banged open and Jace came in, followed by Alec, who was carrying a white box. Magnus hastily pulled the towel off his head and dropped it behind the armchair. Without the gel and glitter, his hair was dark and straight, halfway to his shoulders.

Clary’s eyes went immediately to Jace, as they always did; she couldn’t help it, but at least no one else seemed to notice. Jace looked strung up, wired and tense, but also exhausted, his eyes ringed with gray. His eyes slid over her without expression and landed on Maia, who was still weeping soundlessly and didn’t seem to have heard them come in. “Everyone in a good mood, I see,” he observed. “Keeping up morale?”

Maia rubbed at her eyes. “Crap,” she muttered. “I hate crying in front of Shadowhunters.”

“So go cry in another room,” Jace said, his voice devoid of warmth. “We certainly don’t need you sniveling in here while we’re talking, do we?”

“Jace,” Luke began warningly, but Maia had already gotten to her feet and stalked out of the room through the kitchen door.

Clary turned on Jace. “Talking? We weren’t talking.”

“But we will be,” Jace said, flopping down onto the piano bench and stretching out his long legs. “Magnus wants to shout at me, don’t you, Magnus?”

“Yes,” Magnus said, tearing his eyes away from Alec long enough to scowl. “Where the hell were you? I thought I was clear with you that you were to stay in the house.”

“I thought he didn’t have a choice,” Clary said. “I thought he had to stay where you are. You know, because of magic.”

“Normally, yes,” Magnus said crossly, “but last night, after everything I did, my magic was—depleted.”

“Depleted?”

“Yes.” Magnus looked angrier than ever. “Even the High Warlock of Brooklyn doesn’t have inexhaustible resources. I’m only human. Well,” he amended, “half-human, anyway.”

“But you must have known your resources were depleted,” Luke said, not unkindly, “didn’t you?”

“Yes, and I made the little bastard swear to stay in the house.” Magnus glared at Jace. “Now I know what your much-vaunted Shadowhunter vows are worth.”

“You need to know how to make me swear properly,” Jace said, unfazed. “Only an oath on the Angel has any meaning.”

“It’s true,” Alec said. It was the first thing he’d said since they’d come into the house.

“Of course it’s true.” Jace picked up Maia’s untouched mug of coffee and took a sip. He made a face. “Sugar.”

“Where were you all night, anyway?” Magnus asked, his voice sour. “With Alec?”

“I couldn’t sleep, so I went for a walk,” Jace said. “When I got back, I bumped into this sad bastard mooning around the porch.” He pointed at Alec.

Magnus brightened. “Were you there all night?” he asked Alec.

“No,” Alec said. “I went home and then came back. I’m wearing different clothes, aren’t I? Look.”

Everyone looked. Alec was wearing a dark sweater and jeans, which was exactly what he’d been wearing the day before. Clary decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. “What’s in the box?” she asked.

“Oh. Ah.” Alec looked at the box as if he’d forgotten it. “Doughnuts, actually.” He opened the box and set it down on the coffee table. “Does anyone want one?”

Everyone, as it turned out, wanted a doughnut. Jace wanted two. After downing the Boston cream that Clary brought him, Luke seemed moderately revitalized; he kicked the blanket the rest of the way off and sat up against the back of the couch. “There’s one thing I don’t get,” he said.

“Just one thing? You’re way ahead of the rest of us,” said Jace.

“The two of you went out after me when I didn’t come back to the house,” Luke said, looking from Clary to Jace.

“Three of us,” Clary said. “Simon came with.”

Luke looked pained. “Fine. The three of you. There were two demons, but Clary says you killed neither of them. So what happened?”

“I would have killed mine, but it ran off,” Jace said. “Otherwise—”

“But why would it do that?” Alec inquired. “Two of them, three of you—maybe it felt outnumbered?”

“No offense to anyone involved, but the only one among you who seems formidable is Jace,” Magnus said. “An untrained Shadowhunter and a scared vampire …”

“I think it might have been me,” Clary said. “I think maybe I scared it off.”

Magnus blinked. “Didn’t I just say—”

“I don’t mean I scared it off because I’m so terrifying,” Clary said. “I think it was this.” She raised her hand, turning it so that they could see the Mark on her inner arm.

There was a sudden quiet. Jace looked at her steadily, then away; Alec blinked, and Luke looked astounded. “I’ve never seen that Mark before,” he said finally. “Has anyone else?”

“No,” Magnus said. “But I don’t like it.”

“I’m not sure what it is, or what it means,” Clary said, lowering her arm. “But it doesn’t come from the Gray Book.”

“All runes come from the Gray Book.” Jace’s voice was firm.

“Not this one,” Clary said. “I saw it in a dream.”

“In a dream?” Jace looked as furious as if she were personally insulting him. “What are you playing at, Clary?”

“I’m not playing at anything. Don’t you remember when we were in the Seelie Court—”

Jace looked as if she had hit him. Clary went on, quickly, before he could say anything:

“—and the Seelie Queen told us we were experiments? That Valentine had done—had done things to us, to make us different, special? She told me that mine was the gift of words that cannot be spoken, and yours was the Angel’s own gift?”

“That was faerie nonsense.”

“Faeries don’t lie, Jace. Words that cannot be spoken—she meant runes. Each has a different meaning, but they’re meant to be drawn, not said aloud.” She went on, ignoring his doubtful look. “Remember when you asked me how I’d gotten into your cell in the Silent City? I told you I just used a regular Opening rune—”

“Was that all you did?” Alec looked surprised. “I got there just after you did and it looked like someone had ripped that door off its hinges.”

“And my rune didn’t just unlock the door,” Clary said. “It unlocked everything inside the cell, too. It broke Jace’s manacles open.” She took a breath. “I think the Queen meant I can draw runes that are more powerful than ordinary runes. And maybe even create new ones.”

Jace shook his head. “No one can create new runes—”

“Maybe she can, Jace.” Alec sounded thoughtful. “It’s true, none of us have ever seen that Mark on her arm before.”

“Alec’s right,” Luke said. “Clary, why don’t you go and get your sketchbook?”

She looked at him in some surprise. His gray-blue eyes were tired, a little sunken, but held the same steadiness they’d held when she was six years old and he’d promised her that if she climbed the jungle gym in the Prospect Park playground, he’d always be standing underneath it to catch her if she fell. And he always had been.

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”

To get to the spare bedroom, Clary had to cross through the kitchen, where she found Maia seated on a stool pulled up to the counter, looking miserable. “Clary,” she said, jumping down from the stool. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

“I’m just going to my room to get something—”

“Look, I’m sorry about what happened with Simon. I was delirious.”

“Oh, yeah? What happened to all that werewolves are destined to hate vampires business?”

Maia blew out an exasperated breath. “We are, but—I guess I don’t have to hurry the process along.”

“Don’t explain it to me; explain it to Simon.”

Maia flushed again, her cheeks turning dark red. “I doubt he’ll want to talk to me.”

“He might. He’s pretty forgiving.”

Maia looked at her more closely. “Not that I want to pry, but are you two going out?”

Clary felt herself start to flush and thanked her freckles for providing at least some cover-up. “Why do you want to know?”

Maia shrugged. “The first time I met him he referred to you as his best friend, but the second time he called you his girlfriend. I wondered if it was an on-off thing.”

“Sort of. We were friends first. It’s a long story.”

“I see.” Maia’s blush had vanished and her tough-girl smirk was back on her face. “Well, you’re lucky, that’s all. Even if he is a vampire now. You must be pretty used to all sorts of weird stuff, being a Shadowhunter, so I bet it doesn’t faze you.”

“It fazes me,” Clary said, more sharply than she’d intended. “I’m not Jace.”

The smirk widened. “No one is. And I get the feeling he knows it.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, you know. Jace reminds me of an old boyfriend. Some guys look at you like they want sex. Jace looks at you like you’ve already had sex, it was great, and now you’re just friends—even though you want more. Drives girls crazy. You know what I mean?”

Yes,

Clary thought. “No,” she said.

“I guess you wouldn’t, being his sister. You’ll have to take my word on it.”

“I have to go.” Clary was almost out the kitchen door when something occurred to her and she turned around. “What happened to him?”

Maia blinked. “What happened to who?”

“The old boyfriend. The one Jace reminds you of.”

“Oh,” Maia said. “He’s the one who turned me into a werewolf.”

“All right, I got it,” Clary said, coming back into the living room with her sketchpad in one hand and a box of Prismacolor pencils in the other. She pulled a chair out from the little-used dining room table—Luke always ate in the kitchen or in his office, and the table was covered in paper and old bills—and sat down, sketchpad in front of her. She felt as if she were taking a test at art school. Draw this apple. “What do you want me to do?”

“What do you think?” Jace was still sitting on the piano bench, his shoulders slumped forward; he looked as if he hadn’t slept all night. Alec was leaning against the piano behind him, probably because it was as far away from Magnus as he could get.

“Jace, that’s enough.” Luke was sitting up straight but looked as if it were something of an effort. “You said you could draw new runes, Clary?”

“I said I thought so.”

“Well, I’d like you to try.”

“Now?”

Luke smiled faintly. “Unless you’ve got something else in mind?”

Clary flipped the sketchpad to a blank page and stared down at it. Never had a sheet of paper looked quite so empty to her before. She could sense the stillness in the room, everyone watching her: Magnus with his ancient, tempered curiosity; Alec too preoccupied with his own problems to care much for hers; Luke hopefully; and Jace with a cold, frightening blankness. She remembered him saying that he wished he could hate her and wondered if someday he might succeed.

She threw her pencil down. “I can’t just do it on command like that. Not without an idea.”

“What kind of idea?” said Luke.

“I mean, I don’t even know what runes already exist. I need to know a meaning, a word, before I can draw a rune for it.”

“It’s hard enough for us to remember every rune—,” Alec began, but Jace, to Clary’s surprise, cut him off.

“How about,” he said quietly, “Fearless?”

“Fearless?” she echoed.

“There are runes for bravery,” said Jace. “But never anything to take away fear. But if you, as you say, can create new runes…” He glanced around, and saw Alec’s and Luke’s surprised expressions. “Look, I just remembered that there isn’t one, that’s all. And it seems harmless enough.”

Clary looked over at Luke, who shrugged. “Fine,” he said.

Clary took a dark gray pencil from the box and set the tip of it to the paper. She thought of shapes, lines, curlicues; she thought of the signs in the Gray Book, ancient and perfect, embodiments of a language too faultless for speech. A soft voice spoke inside her head: Who are you, to think you can speak the language of heaven?

The pencil moved. She was almost sure she hadn’t moved it, but it slid across the paper, describing a single line. She felt her heart skip. She thought of her mother, sitting dreamily before her canvas, creating her own vision of the world in ink and oil paint. She thought, Who am I? I am Jocelyn Fray’s daughter. The pencil moved again, and this time her breath caught; she found she was whispering the word, under her breath: “Fearless. Fearless.” The pencil looped back up, and now she was guiding it rather than being guided by it. When she was done, she set the pencil down and gazed for a moment, wonderingly, at the result.

The completed Fearless rune was a matrix of strongly swirling lines: a rune as bold and aerodynamic as an eagle. She tore the page free and held it up so the others could see it. “There,” she said, and was rewarded by the startled look on Luke’s face—so he hadn’t believed her—and the fractional widening of Jace’s eyes.

“Cool,” Alec said.

Jace got to his feet and crossed the room, taking the sheet of paper out of her hand. “But does it work?”

Clary wondered if he meant the question or if he was just being nasty. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, how do we know it works? Right now it’s just a drawing—you can’t take fear away from a piece of paper, it doesn’t have any to begin with. We have to try it out on one of us before we can be sure it’s a real rune.”

“I’m not sure that’s such a great idea,” Luke said.

“It’s a fabulous idea.” Jace dropped the paper back onto the table, and began to slide off his jacket. “I’ve got a stele we can use. Who wants to do me?”

“A regrettable choice of words,” muttered Magnus.

Luke stood up. “No,” he said. “Jace, you already behave as if you’ve never heard the word ‘fear.’ I fail to see how we’re going to be able to tell the difference if it does work on you.”

Alec stifled what sounded like a laugh. Jace simply smiled a tight, unfriendly smile. “I’ve heard the word ‘fear,’” he said. “I simply choose to believe it doesn’t apply to me.”

“Exactly the problem,” said Luke.

“Well, why don’t I try it on you, then?” Clary said, but Luke shook his head.

“You can’t Mark Downworlders, Clary, not with any real effect. The demon disease that causes lycanthropy prevents the Marks from taking effect.”

“Then…”

“Try it on me,” Alec said unexpectedly. “I could do with some fearlessness.” He slid his jacket off, tossed it over the piano stool, and crossed the room to stand in front of Jace. “Here. Mark my arm.”

Jace glanced over at Clary. “Unless you think you should do it?”

She shook her head. “No. You’re probably better at actually applying Marks than I am.”

Jace shrugged. “Roll up your sleeve, Alec.”

Obediently, Alec rolled his sleeve up. There was already a permanent Mark on his upper arm, an elegant scroll of lines meant to give him perfect balance. They all leaned forward, even Magnus, as Jace carefully traced the outlines of the Fearless rune on Alec’s arm, just below the existing Mark. Alec winced as the stele traced its burning path across his skin. When Jace was done, he slid his stele back into his pocket and stood a moment admiring his handiwork. “Well, it looks nice at least,” he announced. “Whether it works or not…”

Alec touched the new Mark with his fingertips, then glanced up to find everyone else in the room staring at him.

“So?” Clary said.

“So what?” Alec rolled his sleeve down, covering the Mark.

“So, how do you feel? Any different?”

Alec looked considering. “Not really.”

Jace threw his hands up. “So it doesn’t work.”

“Not necessarily,” Luke said. “There might simply be nothing going on that might activate it. Perhaps there isn’t anything here that Alec is afraid of.”

Magnus glanced at Alec and raised his eyebrows. “Boo,” he said.

Jace was grinning. “Come on, surely you’ve got a phobia or two. What scares you?”

Alec thought for a moment. “Spiders,” he said.

Clary turned to Luke. “Have you got a spider anywhere?”

Luke looked exasperated. “Why would I have a spider? Do I look like someone who would collect them?”

“No offense,” Jace said, “but you kind of do.”

“You know”—Alec’s tone was sour—”maybe this was a stupid experiment.”

“What about the dark?” Clary suggested. “We could lock you in the basement.”

“I’m a demon hunter,” Alec said, with exaggerated patience. “Clearly, I am not afraid of the dark.”

“Well, you might be.”

“But I’m not.”

Clary was spared replying by the buzz of the doorbell. She looked over at Luke, raising her eyebrows. “Simon?”

“Couldn’t be. It’s daylight.”

“Oh, right.” She’d forgotten again. “Do you want me to get it?”

“No.” He stood up with only a short grunt of pain. “I’m fine. It’s probably someone wondering why the bookstore’s shut.”

He crossed the room and threw the door open. His shoulders went stiff with surprise; Clary heard the bark of a familiar, stridently angry female voice, and a moment later Isabelle and Maryse Lightwood pushed past Luke and strode into the room, followed by the gray, menacing figure of the Inquisitor. Behind them was a tall and burly man, dark-haired and olive-skinned, with a thick black beard. Though it had been taken many years ago, Clary recognized him from the old photo Hodge had showed her: This was Robert Lightwood, Alec and Isabelle’s father.

Magnus’s head went up with a snap. Jace paled markedly, but showed no other emotion. And Alec—Alec stared from his sister, to his mother, to his father, and then looked at Magnus, his clear, light blue eyes darkened with a hard resolution. He took a step forward, placing himself between his parents and everyone else in the room.

Maryse, on seeing her eldest son in the middle of Luke’s living room, did a double take. “Alec, what on earth are you doing here? I thought I made it clear that—”

“Mother.” Alec’s voice as he interrupted his mother was firm, implacable, and not unkind. “Father. There’s something I have to tell you.” He smiled at them. “I’m seeing someone.”

Robert Lightwood looked at his son with some exasperation. “Alec,” he said. “This is hardly the time.”

“Yes, it is. This is important. You see, I’m not just seeing anyone.” Words seemed to be pouring out of Alec in a torrent, while his parents looked on in confusion. Isabelle and Magnus were staring at him with expressions of nearly identical astonishment. “I’m seeing a Downworlder. In fact, I’m seeing a war—”

Magnus’s fingers moved, quick as a flash of light, in Alec’s direction. There was a faint shimmer in the air around Alec— his eyes rolled up—and he dropped to the floor, felled like a tree.

“Alec!” Maryse clapped her hand to her mouth. Isabelle, who had been standing closest to her brother, dropped down beside him. But Alec had already begun to stir, his eyelids fluttering open. “Wha—what—why am I on the floor?”

“That’s a good question.” Isabelle glowered down at her brother. “What was that?”

“What was what?” Alec sat up, holding his head. A look of alarm crossed his face. “Wait—did I say anything? Before I passed out, I mean.”

Jace snorted. “You know how we were wondering if that thing Clary did would work or not?” he asked. “It works all right.”

Alec looked supremely horrified. “What did I say?”

“You said you were seeing someone,” his father told him. “Though you weren’t clear as to why that was important.”

“It’s not,” Alec said. “I mean, I’m not seeing anyone. And it’s not important. Or it wouldn’t be if I was seeing someone, which I’m not.”

Magnus looked at him as if he were an idiot. “Alec’s been delirious,” he said. “Side effect of some demon toxins. Most unfortunate, but he’ll be fine soon.”

“Demon toxins?” Maryse’s voice had become shrill. “No one reported a demon attack to the Institute. What is going on here, Lucian? This is your house, isn’t it? You know perfectly well if there’s been a demon attack you’re supposed to report it—”

“Luke was attacked too,” Clary said. “He’s been unconscious.”

“How convenient. Everyone’s either unconscious or apparently delirious,” said the Inquisitor. Her knifelike voice cut through the room, silencing everyone. “Downworlder, you know perfectly well that Jonathan Morgenstern should not be in your house. He should have been locked up in the warlock’s care.”

“I have a name, you know,” Magnus said. “Not,” he added, seeming to think twice about interrupting the Inquisitor, “that that matters, really. In fact, forget all about it.”

“I know your name, Magnus Bane,” said the Inquisitor. “You’ve failed in your duty once; you won’t get another chance.”

“Failed in my duty?” Magnus frowned. “Just by bringing the boy here? There was nothing in the contract I signed that said I couldn’t bring him with me at my own discretion.”

“That wasn’t your failure,” the Inquisitor said. “Letting him see his father last night, that was your failure.”

There was a stunned silence. Alec scrambled up off the floor, his eyes seeking out Jace’s—but Jace wouldn’t look at him. His face was a mask.

“That’s ridiculous,” Luke said. Clary had rarely seen him look so angry. “Jace doesn’t even know where Valentine is. Stop hounding him.”

“Hounding is what I do, Downworlder,” said the Inquisitor. “It’s my job.” She turned to Jace. “Tell the truth, now, boy,” she said, “and it will all be much easier.”

Jace raised his chin. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”

“If you’re innocent, why not exonerate yourself? Tell us where you really were last night. Tell us about Valentine’s little pleasure boat.”

Clary stared at him. I went for a walk, he’d said. But that didn’t mean anything. Maybe he really had gone for a walk. But her heart, her stomach, felt sick. You know what the worst feeling you can have is? Simon had said. Not trusting the person you love more than anything else in the world.

When Jace didn’t speak, Robert Lightwood said, in his deep bass voice: “Imogen? You’re saying Valentine is—was—”

“On a boat in the middle of the East River,” said the Inquisitor. “That’s correct.”

“That’s why I couldn’t find him,” Magnus said, half to himself. “All that water—it disrupted my spell.”

“What’s Valentine doing in the middle of the river?” Luke said, bewildered.

“Ask Jonathan,” said the Inquisitor. “He borrowed a motorcycle from the head of the city’s vampire clan and he flew it to the boat. Isn’t that right, Jonathan?”

Jace said nothing. His face was unreadable. The Inquisitor, though, looked hungry, as if she were feeding off the suspense in the room.

“Reach into the pocket of your jacket,” she said. “Take out the object you’ve been carrying with you since you last left the Institute.”

Slowly, Jace did as she asked. As he drew his hand out of his pocket, Clary recognized the shimmering blue-gray object he held. The piece of the Portal mirror.

“Give it to me.” The Inquisitor snatched it out of his hand. He winced; the edge of the glass had cut him, and blood welled up along his palm. Maryse made a soft noise, but didn’t move. “I knew you’d return to the Institute for this,” said the Inquisitor, positively gloating now. “I knew your sentimentality wouldn’t allow you to leave it behind.”

“What is it?” Robert Lightwood sounded bewildered.

“A bit of a Portal in mirror form,” said the Inquisitor. “When the Portal was destroyed, the image of its last destination was preserved.” She turned the bit of glass over in her long, spidery fingers. “In this case, the Wayland country house.”

Jace’s eyes followed the movement of the mirror. In the bit of it Clary could see, there seemed to be a trapped piece of blue sky. She wondered if it ever rained in Idris.

With a sudden, violent motion at odds with her calm tone, the Inquisitor dashed the piece of mirror to the ground. It shattered instantly into powdery shards. Clary heard Jace suck his breath in, but he didn’t move.

The Inquisitor drew on a pair of gray gloves and knelt among the bits of mirror, sifting them through her fingers until she found what she was looking for—a single sheet of thin paper. She stood, holding it up for everyone in the room to see the thick rune written on it in black ink. “I marked this paper with a tracking rune and slipped it between the bit of mirror and its backing. Then I replaced it in the boy’s room. Don’t feel bad for not noticing it,” she said to Jace. “Older heads and wiser than yours have been fooled by the Clave.”

“You’ve been spying on me,” Jace said, and now his voice was colored with anger. “Is that what the Clave does, invade the privacy of its fellow Shadowhunters to—”

“Be careful what you say to me. You are not the only one who’s broken the Law.” The Inquisitor’s chilly gaze slid around the room. “In releasing you from the Silent City, in freeing you from the warlock’s control, your friends have done the same.”

“Jace isn’t our friend,” said Isabelle. “He’s our brother.”

“I’d be careful what you say, Isabelle Lightwood,” said the Inquisitor. “You could be considered complicit.”

“Complicit?” To everyone’s surprise, it was Robert Lightwood who had spoken. “The girl was just trying to keep you from shattering our family. For God’s sake, Imogen, these are all just children—”

“Children?” The Inquisitor turned her icicle gaze on Robert. “Just as you were children when the Circle plotted the destruction of the Clave? Just as my son was a child when he—” She caught herself with a sort of gasp, as if gaining control of herself by main force.

“So this is about Stephen after all,” said Luke, with a sort of pity in his voice. “Imogen—”

The Inquisitor’s face contorted. “This is not about Stephen! This is about the Law!”

Maryse’s thin fingers twisted as her hands worked at each other. “And Jace,” she said. “What’s going to happen to him?”

“He will return to Idris with me tomorrow,” said the Inquisitor. “You’ve forfeited your right to know any more than that.”

“How can you take him back to that place?” Clary demanded. “When will he come back?”

“Clary, don’t,” Jace said. The words were a plea, but she battled on.

“Jace isn’t the problem here! Valentine is the problem!”

“Leave it alone, Clary!” Jace yelled. “For your own good, leave it alone!”

Clary couldn’t help herself, she flinched away from him— he’d never shouted at her like that, not even when she’d dragged him to their mother’s hospital room. She saw the look on his face as he registered her flinch and wished she could take it back somehow.

Before she could say anything else, Luke’s hand descended onto her shoulder. He spoke, sounding as grave as he had the night he’d told her the story of his life. “If the boy went to his father,” he said, “knowing the kind of father Valentine was, it is because we failed him, not because he has failed us.”

“Save your sophistry, Lucian,” said the Inquisitor. “You’ve gone as soft as a mundane.”

“She’s right.” Alec was sitting on the edge of the sofa, his arms crossed and his jaw set. “Jace lied to us. There’s no excuse for that.”

Jace’s jaw dropped. He’d been sure of Alec’s loyalty, at least, and Clary didn’t blame him. Even Isabelle was staring at her brother in horror. “Alec, how can you say that?”

“The Law is the Law, Izzy,” said Alec, not looking at his sister. “There’s no way around that.”

At that, Isabelle gave a little gasping cry of rage and astonishment and bolted out the front door, letting it swing open behind her. Maryse made a move as if to follow her, but Robert drew his wife back, saying something in a low voice.

Magnus got to his feet. “I do believe that’s my cue to leave as well,” he said. Clary noticed he was avoiding looking at Alec. “I’d say it’s been nice meeting you all, but, in fact, it hasn’t. It’s been quite awkward, and frankly, the next time I see a single one of you will be far too soon.”

Alec stared at the ground as Magnus stalked out of the living room and through the front door. This time it shut behind him with a bang.

“Two down,” said Jace, with ghastly amusement. “Who’s next?”

“That’s enough from you,” said the Inquisitor. “Give me your hands.”

Jace held his hands out as the Inquisitor produced a stele from some hidden pocket and proceeded to trace a Mark around the circumference of his wrists. When she took her hands away, Jace’s wrists were crossed, one over the other, bound together with what looked like a circlet of burning flames.

Clary cried out. “What are you doing? You’ll hurt him—”

“I’m fine, little sister.” Jace spoke calmly enough, but she noticed that he couldn’t seem to look at her. “The flames won’t burn me unless I try to get my hands free.”

“And as for you,” the Inquisitor added, and turned on Clary, much to Clary’s surprise. Up until now the Inquisitor had barely seemed to notice she was alive. “You were lucky enough to be raised by Jocelyn and escape your father’s taint. Nevertheless, I’ll be keeping an eye on you.”

Luke’s grip tightened on Clary’s shoulder. “Is that a threat?”

“The Clave does not make threats, Lucian Graymark. The Clave makes promises and keeps them.” The Inquisitor sounded almost cheerful. She was the only one in the room who could be described that way; everyone else looked shell-shocked, except for Jace. His teeth were bared in a snarl Clary doubted he was even aware of. He looked like a lion in a trap.

“Come, Jonathan,” the Inquisitor said. “Walk in front of me. If you make a single move to flee, I’ll put a blade between your shoulders.”

Jace had to struggle to turn the front doorknob with his bound hands. Clary set her teeth to keep from screaming, and then the door was open and Jace was gone and so was the Inquisitor. The Lightwoods followed in a line, Alec still staring at the ground. The door shut behind them and Clary and Luke were alone in the living room, silent in shared disbelief.