Emma was prevented from answering by Clary's enveloping hug.
"Great," said Mark. "Really great. They're so full of liquid, squids."
He actually seemed pleased about it.
Clary let Emma go and frowned down at the ichor, seawater, and unidentifiable slime that had transferred themselves to her shirt. "I see what you mean."
"I'm just going to welcome you all from over here," said Jace, waving. "There's a disturbing smell of calamari wafting from your general direction."
There was a giggle, quickly stifled. Emma glanced up and saw legs dangling between the railings of the upstairs gallery. With amusement, she recognized Ty's long limbs and Livvy's patterned stockings. There were nooks up on the gallery level that were perfect for eavesdropping--she couldn't count how many of Andrew Blackthorn's meetings she and Julian had spied on as kids, drinking up the knowledge and sense of importance that being present at a Conclave meeting brought.
She glanced sideways at Julian, seeing him note Ty and Livvy's presence, knowing the moment he decided, as she had, not to say anything about it. His whole thought process was visible to her in the quirk of his smile--odd how transparent he was to her in his unguarded moments, and how little she could tell what he was thinking when he chose to hide it.
Cristina went over to Diego, bumping her hand gently against his shoulder. He kissed her wrist. Emma saw Mark glance at them, his expression unreadable. Mark had talked to her about many things in the past two weeks, but not Cristina. Not ever Cristina.
"So how many sea demons does that make it?" asked Diana. "In total?" She gestured for everyone to take seats around the table. They sat down, squelching slightly, Emma next to Mark but across from Julian. He answered Diana as calmly as if he wasn't dripping ichor onto the polished floor.
"A few smaller ones this past week," said Julian, "but that's normal when it storms. They wash up on the beach. We ran some patrols; the Ashdowns ran some farther south. I think we got them all."
"This was the first really big one," said Emma. "I mean, I've only seen a few that big before. They don't usually come up out of the ocean."
Jace and Clary exchanged a look.
"Is there something we should know about?" Emma said. "Are you collecting really big sea demons to decorate the Institute or something?"
Jace leaned forward, his elbows on the table. He had a calm, catlike face and unreadable amber eyes. Clary had once said that the first time she'd ever seen him, she'd thought he looked like a lion. Emma could see it: Lions seemed so calm and almost lazy until they exploded into action. "Maybe we should talk about why we're here," he said.
"I thought you were here about Kit," Julian said. "What with him being a Herondale and all."
There was a rustle from upstairs and a faint muttering. Ty had been sleeping in front of Kit's door for the past nights, an odd behavior no one had remarked on. Emma assumed Ty found Kit unusual and interesting in the manner that he sometimes found bees and lizards unusual and interesting.
"Partly," said Jace. "We just returned from a Council meeting in Idris. That's why it took us so long to get here, though I wanted to come as fast as possible when I heard about Kit." He sat back and threw an arm over the back of his chair. "You won't be surprised to know there was a great deal of discussion about the Malcolm situation."
"You mean the situation where the High Warlock of Los Angeles turned out to be a spree killer and a necromancer?" Julian said. There were layers of implication clear in his voice: The Clave hadn't suspected Malcolm, had approved of his appointment to the post of High Warlock, had done nothing to stop the murders he committed. It had been the Blackthorns who had done that.
There was another giggle from above. Diana coughed to hide a smile. "Sorry," she said to Jace and Clary. "I think we have mice."
"I didn't hear anything," Jace said.
"We're just surprised the Council meeting ended so quickly," Emma said. "We thought we might have to give testimony. About Malcolm, and everything that happened."
Emma and the Blackthorns had given testimony in front of the Council before. Years before, after the Dark War. It wasn't an experience Emma was excited to repeat, but it would have been a chance to tell their side of what had happened. To explain why they had worked in cooperation with faeries, in direct contradiction of the Laws of the Cold Peace. Why they had investigated the High Warlock of Los Angeles, Malcolm Fade, without telling the Clave they were doing it; what they had done when they had found him guilty of heinous crimes.
Why Emma had killed him.
"You already told Robert--the Inquisitor," said Clary. "He believed you. He testified on your behalf."
Julian raised an eyebrow. Robert Lightwood, the Inquisitor of the Clave, was not a warm and friendly sort of man. They'd told him what had happened because they'd been forced to, but he wasn't the kind of person you could imagine doing you favors.
"Robert's not so bad," Jace said. "Really. He's mellowed since becoming a grandfather. And the fact is, the Clave was actually less interested in you than they were in the Black Volume."
"Apparently nobody realized it was ever in the library here," said Clary. "The Cornwall Institute is famous for having a considerably large selection of books on dark magic--the original Malleus Maleficarum, the Daemonatia. Everyone thought it was there, properly locked up."
"The Blackthorns used to run the Cornwall Institute," said Julian. "Maybe my father brought it with him when he got the appointment to run the Institute here." He looked troubled. "Though I don't know why he would have wanted it."
"Maybe Arthur brought it," suggested Cristina. "He's always been fascinated with ancient books."
Emma shook her head. "Can't have. The book had to have been here when Sebastian attacked the Institute--before Arthur came."
"How much of the fact that they didn't want us there to testify had to do with them discussing whether I ought to be allowed to stay?" said Mark.
"Some," Clary said, meeting his gaze levelly. "But, Mark, we never would have let them make you return to the Hunt. Everyone would have risen up."
Diego nodded. "The Clave has deliberated, and they're fine with Mark remaining here with his family. The original order only forbid Shadowhunters from looking for him, but he came to you, so the order hasn't been contravened."
Mark nodded stiffly. He had never seemed to like Perfect Diego.
"And believe me," Clary added, "they were very happy to use that loophole. I think even the most faerie-hating of them feel for what Mark went through."
"But not for what Helen has gone through?" said Julian. "Any word on her return?"
"Nothing," said Jace. "I'm sorry. They wouldn't hear of it."
Mark's expression tensed. In that moment, Emma could see the warrior in him, the dark shadow of the battlefields the Wild Hunt stalked, the walker among the bodies of the dead.
"We'll keep at them," said Diana. "Having you back is a victory, Mark, and we'll press that victory. But right now--"
"What's happening right now?" Mark demanded. "Isn't the crisis over?"
"We're Shadowhunters," Jace said. "You'll find that the crisis is never over."
"Right now," Diana went on, "the Council just finished discussing the fact that large sea demons have been spotted all up and down the coast of California. In record numbers. There have been more seen in the past week than in the past decade. That Teuthida you fought wasn't an outlier."
"We think it's because Malcolm's body and the Black Volume are still out there in the ocean," said Clary. "And we think it may be because of the spells Malcolm cast during his life."
"But a warlock's spells disappear when they die," protested Emma. She thought of Kit. The wards Malcolm had placed around the Rooks' house had vanished when he died. Demons had attacked within hours. "We went up to his house after he died, to look for evidence of what he'd been doing. The whole thing had disintegrated into a slag heap."
Jace had disappeared under the table. He appeared a momen
t later, holding Church, the Institute's part-time cat. Church had his paws stuck straight out and a look of satisfaction on his face. "We thought the same thing," said Jace, settling the cat on his lap. "But apparently, according to Magnus, there are spells that can be constructed to be activated by a warlock's death."
Emma glared at Church. She knew the cat had once lived in the New York Institute, but it seemed rude to show preference so blatantly. The cat was lying on his back on Jace's lap, purring and ignoring her.
"Like an alarm," Julian said, "that goes off when you open a door?"
"Yes, but in this case, death is the open door," said Diana.
"So what's the solution?" asked Emma.
"We probably need his body to turn the spell off, so to speak," said Jace. "And a clue as to how he did it would be nice."
"The ruins of the convergence have been picked over pretty thoroughly," Clary said. "But we'll check out Malcolm's house tomorrow, just to be sure."
"It's rubble," Julian warned.
"Rubble that will have to be cleared away soon, before mundanes notice it," said Diana. "There's a glamour on it, but it's temporary. That means the site will only be undisturbed for another few days."
"And there's no harm taking a last look," said Jace. "Especially as Magnus has given us some idea what to look for." He rubbed Church's ear but didn't elaborate.
"The Black Volume is a powerful necromantic object," said Perfect Diego. "It could be causing disturbances we cannot even imagine. Driving the deepest-dwelling of sea demons to crawl up onto our shores means mundanes are in danger--a few have already disappeared from the Pier."
"So," said Jace. "A team of Centurions is going to arrive here tomorrow--"
"Centurions?" Panic flashed in Julian's eyes, a look of fear and vulnerability that Emma guessed was visible only to her. It was gone almost instantly. "Why?"
Centurions. Elite Shadowhunters, they trained at the Scholomance, a school carved into the rock walls of the Carpathian Mountains, surrounded by an icy lake. They studied esoteric lore and were experts in faeries and the Cold Peace.
And also, apparently, sea demons.
"This is excellent news," said Perfect Diego. He would say that, Emma thought. Smugly, he touched the pin at his shoulder. "They will be able to find the body and the book."
"Hopefully," Clary said.
"But you're already here, Clary," said Julian, his voice deceptively mild. "You and Jace--if you brought in Simon and Isabelle and Alec and Magnus, I bet you could find the body right away."
He doesn't want strangers here, Emma thought. People who would pry into the Institute's business, demand to talk to Uncle Arthur. He had managed to preserve the Institute's secrets even through everything that had happened with Malcolm. And now they were threatened again by random Centurions.
"Clary and I are only stopping by," Jace said. "We can't stay and search, though we'd like to. We're on assignment from the Council."
"What kind of assignment?" Emma said. What mission could be more important than retrieving the Black Volume, clearing up the mess Malcolm had made once and for all?
But she could tell from the look that Jace and Clary exchanged that there was a world of more important things out there, ones she couldn't imagine. Emma couldn't help a small explosion of bitterness inside, the wish that she were just a bit older, that she could be equal to Jace and Clary, know their secrets and the Council's secrets.
"I'm so sorry," Clary said. "We can't say."
"So you're not even going to be here?" Emma demanded. "While all this is going on, and our Institute is invaded--"
"Emma," Jace said. "We know that you're used to being alone and untroubled here. To having only Arthur to answer to."
If only he knew. But that was impossible.
He went on, "But the purpose of an Institute is not just to centralize Clave activity, but to house Shadowhunters who must be accommodated in a city they don't live in. There are fifty rooms here that no one is using. So unless there's a pressing reason they can't come . . ."
The words hung in the air. Diego looked down at his hands. He didn't know the full truth about Arthur, but Emma guessed that he suspected.
"You can tell us," Clary said. "We'll keep it in the strictest confidence."
But it wasn't Emma's secret to tell. She held herself back from looking at Mark or Cristina, Diana or Julian, the only others at the table who knew the truth about who really ran the Institute. A truth that would need to be hidden from the Centurions, who would be duty-bound to report it to the Council.
"Uncle Arthur hasn't been well, as I assume you know," Julian said, gesturing toward the empty chair where the Institute's head would normally have sat. "I was concerned the Centurions might worsen his condition, but considering the importance of their mission, we'll make them as comfortable as possible."
"Since the Dark War, Arthur has been prone to flare-ups of headaches and pain in his old wounds," added Diana. "I'll run interference between him and the Centurions until he's feeling better."
"There's really nothing to worry about," said Diego. "They're Centurions--disciplined, orderly soldiers. They won't be throwing wild parties or making unreasonable demands." He put an arm around Cristina. "I'll be glad to have you meet some of my friends."
Cristina smiled back at him. Emma couldn't help but glance toward Mark to see if he was looking at Cristina and Diego the way he often did--a way that made her wonder how Julian could miss it. One day he would notice, and there would be awkward questions to answer.
But that day wouldn't be today, because sometime in the past few minutes Mark had slipped soundlessly out of the library. He was gone.
*
Mark associated different rooms in the Institute with different feelings, most of them new since his return. The rowaned library made him tense. The entryway, where he had faced down Sebastian Morgenstern so many years ago, made his skin prickle, his blood heat.
In his own room he felt lonely. In the twins' rooms, and Dru's or Tavvy's, he could lose himself in being their older brother. In Emma's room he felt safe. Cristina's room was barred to him. In Julian's room, he felt guilty. And in the training room, he felt like a Shadowhunter.
He had made unconsciously for the training room the moment he'd left the library. It was still too much for Mark, the way that Shadowhunters hid their emotions. How could they bear a world where Helen was exiled? He could hardly bear it; he yearned for his sister every day. And yet they all would have looked at him in surprise if he had cried out in grief or fallen to his knees. Jules, he knew, didn't want the Centurions there--but his expression had hardly changed. Faeries could riddle and cheat and scheme, but they did not hide their honest pain.
It was enough to send him to the weapons rack, his hands feeling for whatever would let him lose himself in practice. Diana had owned a weapons shop in Idris once, and there was always an impeccable array of beautiful weapons laid out for them to train with: Greek machaera, with their single cutting edges. There were Viking spatha, two-handed claymores and zweihander, and Japanese wooden bokken, used only for training.
He thought of the weapons of faerie. The sword he had carried in the Wild Hunt. The fey used nothing made of iron, for weapons and tools of iron made them sick. The sword he had borne in the Hunt had been made of horn, and it had been light in his hand. Light like the elf-bolts he had shot from his bow. Light like the wind under the feet of his horse, like the air around him when he rode.
He lifted a claymore from the rack and turned it experimentally in his hand. He could feel that it was made of steel--not quite iron, but an iron alloy--though he didn't have the reaction to iron that full-blooded faeries did.
It did feel heavy in his hand. But so much had been feeling heavy since he had returned home. The weight of expectation was heavy. The weight of how much he loved his family was heavy.
Even the weight of what he was involved in with Emma was heavy. He trusted Emma. He didn't question that she was doing th
e right thing; if she believed it, he believed in her.
But lies didn't come to him easily, and he hated lying to his family most of all.
"Mark?" It was Clary, followed by Jace. The meeting in the library must be over. They had both changed into gear; Clary's red hair was very bright, like a splash of blood against her dark clothes.
"I'm here," Mark said, placing the sword he'd been holding back in the rack. The full moon was high, and white light filtered through the windows. The moon traced a path like a road across the sea from where it kissed the horizon to the edge of the beach.
Jace hadn't said anything yet; he was watching Mark with hooded golden eyes, like a hawk's. Mark couldn't help but remember Clary and Jace as they had been when he'd met them just after the Hunt had taken him. He'd been hiding in the tunnels near the Seelie Court when they'd come walking toward him, and his heart had ached and broken to see them. Shadowhunters, striding through the dangers of Faerie, heads held high. They were not lost; they were not running. They were not afraid.
He had wondered if he would have that pride again, that lack of fear. Even as Jace had pressed a witchlight into his hand, even as he had said, Show them what a Shadowhunter is made of, show them that you aren't afraid, Mark had been sick with fear.
Not for himself. For his family. How would they fare in a world at war, without him to protect them?
Surprisingly well, had been the answer. They hadn't needed him after all. They'd had Jules.
Jace seated himself on a windowsill. He was bigger than he had been the first time Mark had met him, of course. Taller, broader shouldered, though still graceful. Rumor had it that even the Seelie Queen had been impressed by his looks and manner, and faerie gentry were rarely impressed by humans. Even Shadowhunters.
Though sometimes they were. Mark supposed his own existence was proof of that. His mother, the Lady Nerissa of the Seelie Court, had loved his Shadowhunter father.
"Julian doesn't want the Centurions here," said Jace. "Does he?"
Mark looked at them both with suspicion. "I wouldn't know."
"Mark won't tell us his brother's secrets, Jace," said Clary. "Would you tell Alec's?"
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