Queen of Air and Darkness

by Cassandra Clare

  “Do you feel any better, Kieran?” he said softly.

  “Yes—Cristina is a very good nurse.”

  Cristina rolled her eyes. “I put on a bandage. Don’t exaggerate my talents.”

  Kieran gazed sadly down at his bandaged arm. “I do feel a bit odd with my sleeve missing.”

  Mark couldn’t help smiling. “It’s very stylish. Big with mundanes, the one-sleeve look.”

  Kieran’s eyes widened. “Is it?”

  Both Mark and Cristina giggled. Kieran frowned. “You should not mock me.”

  “Everyone gets mocked,” Cristina said teasingly. “That’s what friends do.”

  Kieran’s face lit up at that, so much so that Mark felt the painful urge to hug him. Princes of Faerie didn’t have friends, he guessed; he and Kieran had never really talked about it. There was a time that the two of them had been friends, but love and pain had transmuted that in a way Mark now knew wasn’t inevitable. There were people who fell in love but stayed friends—Magnus and Alec, or Clary and Jace, or Helen and Aline.

  Kieran’s smile had vanished. He moved restlessly under the covers. “There is something I need to tell you both. To explain.”

  Cristina looked worried. “Not if you don’t want to—”

  “It is about the Scholomance,” Kieran said, and they both fell silent. They listened while Kieran told them of the Hollow Place. Mark tended to lose himself in other people’s stories. He had always been like that, since he was a child, and he remembered how much he had loved Kieran telling him stories when they were in the Hunt—how he had gone to sleep with Kieran’s fingers in his hair and Kieran’s voice in his ears, telling him tales of Bloduwedd, the princess made of flowers, and of the black cauldron that raised the dead, and of the battle between Gwyn ap Nudd and Herne the Hunter, that had shaken down the trees.

  Cristina never lost herself in retellings in the same way, Mark thought; she was entirely present, her expression darkening and her eyes widening with horror as Kieran told them of the Cohort, the fight by the pool, the way Diego had saved him, and how he had escaped from the library.

  “They are horrible,” Cristina said, almost before Kieran had finished speaking. “Horrible. That they would go that far—!”

  “We must check in on Diego and the others,” said Mark, though Diego Rocio Rosales was one of his least favorite people. “See if they’re all right.”

  “I will write to Diego,” Cristina said. “Kieran, I am so sorry. I thought you would be safe at the Scholomance.”

  “You could not have known,” said Kieran. “While I was at the Scholomance, I chided Diego for not planning for the future, but this is not a future anyone could imagine.”

  “Kieran’s right. It’s not your fault,” said Mark. “The Cohort is out of control. I’d guess it was one of them who followed Emma and Julian into Faerie.”

  Kieran shoved his blankets off with a harsh, sudden gesture. “I owe it to Emma and Julian to go after them. I understand that now. I regretted what I had done even before the water of the pool touched me. But I was never able to testify. I was never able to earn their forgiveness or make up for what I did.”

  “Emma has forgiven you,” Cristina said.

  Kieran did not look convinced. When he spoke, it was haltingly. “I want to show you something.”

  When neither Mark nor Cristina moved, he turned around, kneeling on the bed, and pulled up his shirt, baring his back. Mark heard Cristina suck in her breath as Kieran’s skin was revealed.

  It was covered in whip marks. They looked newly healed, as if a few weeks old, no longer bleeding but still scarlet. Mark dry-swallowed. He knew every mark and scar on Kieran’s skin. These were new.

  “The Cohort whipped you?” he whispered.

  “No,” said Kieran. He let his shirt fall, though he didn’t move from where he was, facing the wall behind the bed. “These marks appeared on my back when the water of the pool touched me. They are Emma’s. I bear them now as a reminder of the agony she would not have been caused if not for me. When the pool water touched me, I felt her fear and pain. How can she forgive me for that?”

  Cristina rose to her feet. Her brown eyes glimmered with distress; she touched her hand lightly to Kieran’s back. “Kieran,” she said. “As we all have an infinite capacity to make mistakes, we all have an infinite capacity for forgiveness. Emma bears these scars cheerfully because to her, they are a mark of valor. Let them be the same to you. You are a prince of Faerie. I have seen you be as brave as anyone I have known. Sometimes the bravest thing we can do is confront our own failings.”

  “You are a prince of Faerie.” Kieran smiled a little, though it was crooked. “Someone else said that to me tonight.”

  “To realize that you have made mistakes and hope to correct them is all anyone can hope to do,” said Mark. “Sometimes we may have the best intentions—you were trying to save my life when you went to Gwyn and Iarlath—and the results are terrible. We all had the best intentions when we went to the Council meeting, and now Livvy is dead and Alicante is in the hands of the Cohort.”

  Wincing, Kieran turned to face them both. “I swear to you,” he said. “I will fight to my last breath to help you save the ones you love.”

  Cristina smiled, clearly touched. “Let’s just focus on Emma and Julian right now,” she said. “We will be grateful to have you with us in Faerie tomorrow.”

  Mark reached behind his neck and untied his elf-bolt necklace. “I want you to wear this, Kieran. You must never be defenseless again.”

  Kieran didn’t reach for the elf-bolt. “I gave it to you because I wished you to have it.”

  “And now I want you to have it,” said Mark. “There are many who seek to harm you, here and in Faerie. I want to be certain you will always have a weapon close to hand.”

  Kieran slowly reached out and caught the necklace from Mark’s hand. “I will wear it then, if it pleases you.”

  Cristina gave Mark an unreadable look as Kieran looped the necklace over his head. There was something approving in her expression, as though she were glad of Mark’s generosity.

  Kieran ran his hands through his hair. It slipped through his fingers in ink-blue locks. “Exhaustion claims me,” he said. “I am sorry.”

  In the Hunt, Mark would have wrapped his arms around Kieran and held him. They would have been cushions for each other’s bodies against the hard ground. “Would you like us to make you a bed of blankets on the floor?” Mark offered.

  Kieran looked up, his eyes like shining polished mirrors: one black, one silver. “I think I could sleep in the bed if you stayed with me.”

  Cristina turned bright red. “All right,” she said. “I’ll say good night then—”

  “No,” Kieran said quickly. “I mean both of you. I want both of you to stay with me.”

  Mark and Cristina exchanged a look. It was the first time, Mark thought, that he had really looked at Cristina since they’d come back from the Vasquez Rocks: He’d felt too awkward, too ashamed of his own confusion. Now he realized she looked just as flushed and puzzled as he did.

  Kieran’s shoulders sagged slightly. “If you do not want to, I will understand.”

  It was Cristina who kicked off her shoes and climbed into the bed beside Kieran. She was still wearing her jeans and tank top, one strap torn by a Harpyia demon. Mark got into the bed on the other side of Kieran, pillowing his head on his hand.

  They lay there for long moments in silence. The warmth from Kieran’s body was familiar—so familiar it was hard not to curl up against him. To pull the blankets up over them, to forget everything in the darkness.

  But Cristina was there, and her presence seemed to change the makeup of the atoms in the air, the chemical balance between Kieran and Mark. It was no longer possible to fall into forgetting. This moment was now, and Mark was sharply aware of Kieran’s nearness in a way he had not been since they first met, as if the clock had been rewound on their relationship.

  And he wa
s aware of Cristina as well, no less sharply. Awkward, shy wanting anchored him in place. He glanced over at her; he could see the gleam of her dark hair against the pillow, one bare brown shoulder. Heat muddled Mark’s head, his thoughts.

  “I shall dream of the Borderlands,” said Kieran. “Adaon had a cottage there, in lands neither Seelie nor Unseelie. A little stone place, with roses climbing the walls. In the Hunt, when I was hungry and cold, I would say to myself, none of this is real, and try to make the cottage real in my mind. I would pretend I was there, looking out the windows, and not where I truly was. It became more real to me than reality was.”

  Cristina touched his cheek lightly. “Ya duérmete,” she murmured. “Go to sleep, you silly person.”

  Mark couldn’t help smiling. “Has anyone else ever called you a silly person before, Prince Kieran?” he whispered as Cristina closed her eyes to sleep.

  But Kieran was looking over at Cristina, his dark hair tangled, his eyes soft with weariness and something else.

  “I think she is the most beautiful girl I have ever seen,” he said in a ruminative voice.

  “I have always thought the same,” said Mark.

  “You are different with each other now,” Kieran said. “It is clear to see. You were together while I was away.”

  It was not something Mark would have ever lied about. “That is true.”

  Kieran reached out, touched Mark’s hair. A light touch, sending a shower of sparks down through Mark’s body. Kieran’s mouth was a sleepy, soft curve. “I hoped you would be,” he said. “The thought gave me comfort while I was in the Scholomance.”

  Kieran curled into the blankets and closed his eyes, but Mark remained awake for a long time, staring into the dark.

  12

  BENEATH THE SKY

  Mark, Kieran, and Cristina were in the library, packing for their departure to Faerie. Everyone else was there too; at least, everyone except Dru, who had taken Tavvy down to the beach to keep him distracted. Kit doubted she’d actually want to watch them preparing to leave anyway.

  Kit felt bad for her—her eyes had still been red when she’d set out with Tavvy and a duffel bag full of toys and sand buckets, though she’d kept her voice cheerful when promising Tavvy she’d help him make a sandcastle city.

  But he felt worse for Ty.

  It wasn’t just that Mark was going back to Faerie. That was bad enough. It was why he was going. When Mark and Helen had explained that Emma and Julian were on a mission in the Undying Lands and needed assistance, Kit had tensed all over with panic. Ty didn’t just love Julian, he needed him the way kids needed their parents. On top of what had happened to Livvy, how would he deal with it?

  They had been in the kitchen, in the early morning, the room flooded with sun. The table still scattered with the remains of breakfast, Dru teasing Tavvy by making mini seraph blades out of pieces of toast and dunking them in jelly. Then Aline had gotten up at some unspoken signal from Helen and taken Tavvy out of the room, promising to show him her favorite illustrated book in the library.

  And then Helen had explained what was going on. Mark and Cristina had interjected occasionally, but Kieran had stood quietly by the window while they talked, his dark blue hair threaded through with white.

  When they were done, Drusilla was crying quietly. Ty sat in absolute silence, but Kit could see that his right hand, under the table, was moving like a pianist’s, his fingers stretching and curling. He wondered if Ty had forgotten his hand toys—the Internet called them stim toys or stimming objects. He glanced around for something he could hand to Ty, as Mark leaned forward and lightly touched his younger brother’s face.

  “Tiberius,” he said. “And Drusilla. I know this must be hard for you, but we will bring Julian back and then we will all be together again.”

  Dru smiled faintly at him. Don’t say that, Kit thought. What if you can’t bring him back? What if he dies there in Faerie? Making promises you can’t keep is worse than making no promises at all.

  Ty stood up and walked out of the kitchen without a word. Kit started to push his chair back, and hesitated. Maybe he shouldn’t go after Ty. Maybe Ty wouldn’t want him to. When he glanced up, he saw that Mark and Cristina were both looking at him—in fact, Kieran was too, with his eerie light-and-dark eyes.

  “You should go after him,” Mark said. “You’re the one he wants.”

  Kit blinked and stood up. Cristina gave him an encouraging smile as he headed out of the kitchen.

  Ty hadn’t gone far; he was in the corridor just outside, leaning back against the wall. His eyes were closed, his lips moving silently. He had a retractable pen in his right hand and was clicking the top of it, over and over, snap snap.

  “Are you okay?” Kit said, hovering awkwardly just outside the kitchen door.

  Ty opened his eyes and looked toward Kit. “Yeah.”

  Kit didn’t say anything. It seemed desperately unlikely to him in that moment that Ty was actually okay. It was too much. Losing Livvy, and now the fear of losing Julian and Mark—and Emma and Cristina. He felt as if he were witnessing the burning away of the Blackthorn family. As if the destruction that Malcolm had wished on them was happening now, even after Malcolm was gone, and they would all be lost, one by one.

  But not Ty. Please don’t do this to Ty. He’s good, he deserves better.

  Not that people always got what they deserved, Kit knew. It was one of the first things he’d ever learned about life.

  “I am okay,” Ty said, as if he could hear Kit’s doubts. “I have to be okay for Livvy. And if anything happens to Mark or to Julian or Emma in Faerie, that’s okay too, because we can bring them all back. We have the Black Volume. We can bring them back.”

  Kit stared; his mind felt full of white noise and shock. Ty didn’t mean it, he told himself. He couldn’t mean it. The kitchen door opened behind him and Mark came out; he said something Kit didn’t hear and then he went to Ty and put his arms around him.

  Ty hugged him back, his forehead against Mark’s shoulder. He was still gripping the pen. Kit saw again the bruises on Ty’s hands and wrists, the ones he must have gotten climbing the pyre in Idris. They stood out so starkly against Ty’s pale skin that Kit imagined he could feel the pain of them himself.

  And now he and Kit were sitting on one of the library tables, watching the others pack. Kit couldn’t shake off his feeling of strangeness. The last time Mark and Cristina had disappeared to Faerie, there’d been no warning and no preparation. They’d disappeared overnight with Emma and Julian. This time not only did everyone know about it, they were all pitching in to help as if it were a camping trip.

  Mark, Cristina, and Kieran were dressed in the least Shadowhuntery clothes they’d been able to find. Cristina wore a knee-length white dress, and Mark and Kieran had on shirts and trousers that Aline had attacked with a pair of scissors to make them look ragged and uneven. They wore soft shoes, without metal buckles, and Cristina’s hair was tied back with ribbon.

  Helen had packed them plastic containers of food—granola bars, apples, things that wouldn’t go bad. There were blankets and bandages and even antiseptic spray, since their steles wouldn’t work in Faerie. And of course there were all the weapons: Cristina’s balisong, dozens of daggers and throwing knives wrapped in soft leather, a crossbow for Mark, and even a bronze shortsword for Kieran, who had buckled it on at his waist with the delighted look of someone who missed being armed.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t pack the food now,” Helen said nervously, taking a Tupperware container she’d just packed back out of the bag. “Maybe we should wait until they’re leaving.”

  Aline sighed. She’d been flipping back and forth all day between looking as if she was going to cry and looking as if she was going to yell at Mark, Kieran, and Cristina for making Helen cry. “Most of that food will keep. That’s the point.”

  “We can only wait so long to depart,” Mark said. “This is urgent.” He flicked his eyes toward Kit and Ty; Kit turned an
d realized that Ty had disappeared. No one had left the library, though, so he had to be somewhere in the room.

  “Jaime will come as quickly as he can,” Cristina said. She was deftly knotting up a roll of throwing knives.

  “If he isn’t here by tonight, we may need to take the moon’s road,” said Kieran.

  “And risk being reported to the Courts?” Helen said. “It’s too dangerous. No. You can’t go anywhere until Jaime Rosales shows up.”

  “He’ll come,” Cristina said, shoving the roll of knives into her pack with some force. “I trust him.”

  “If he doesn’t, it’s too risky. Especially considering where you’re going.”

  Kit slid off the table as Kieran protested; no one was paying attention to him anyway. He walked alongside the rows of bookshelves until he saw Ty, between two stacks of books, his head bent over a piece of paper.

  He stopped for a moment and just looked at him. He was aware of Kieran watching him from across the room and wondered why; they’d shared an interesting conversation once, on the roof of the London Institute, where they realized they were both outsiders where the Blackthorn family was concerned.

  Kit wasn’t sure that was true anymore, though. Either for him or for Kieran. And they hadn’t spoken since.

  He slipped between the rows of books. He couldn’t help noticing they were somewhat ironically in the SEA CREATURES AND THINGS AQUATIC section.

  “Ty,” he said. “Ty, what’s going on?”

  Perhaps Ty had finally snapped; perhaps the weight of grief and loss and fear had gotten to him. There was something incredibly vulnerable about the thinness of his fingers, the flush on his cheeks when he glanced up. Maybe—

  Kit realized Ty’s eyes were shining, and not with tears. Ty held up the paper in his hands; it was a letter. “It’s from Hypatia Vex,” he said in a low voice. “She’s agreed to help us with the Shadow Market.”

  * * *

  “What’s going on?” Julian jogged down the curving steps from Fergus’s bower, twisting his shirt around as he went. Emma followed more cautiously, having stopped to throw on clothes and grab her pack.