Queen of Air and Darkness (The Dark Artifices #3)

by Cassandra Clare

  “Don’t compliment Julian Blackthorn,” said Zara, scowling. “He’s a traitor.”

  “Oh, clearly,” said Manuel. “But now we get to punish them, which I’m going to enjoy.”

  “I’m sure you are.” Zara gave him a superior look, but Manuel knew she was going to enjoy the punishment of the Blackthorns just as much as he was. They both hated Emma. Of course, Manuel had good reason—she’d shown him disrespect at the last Council Hall meeting—while Zara was merely jealous.

  “We will make an example of them,” said Horace. “After the parley. Not the younger Blackthorns—no one likes to see a child die, even if the seeds of evil are in them. But Julian certainly, and that half-breed brother and sister of his. The Carstairs girl, of course. Aline Penhallow is a tricky question—”

  The door opened. Manuel looked around curiously; there was only one other visitor to Horace’s office who, like Zara, never bothered knocking.

  A tall, blond Shadowhunter stepped into the room. Manuel had seen him earlier, coming through the Great Gates. Oskar Lindquist, having separated himself from the rest of his equally blond family.

  Horace glanced up. His eyes glittered. “Shut the door behind you.”

  Oskar made a sound between a growl and a laugh, closing and locking the office door. There was a slight shimmer in the air as he turned and began to change. It was like watching water spill over a painting, distorting and altering the lines of it.

  Zara made a low noise of disgust as Oskar’s head fell back and his body spasmed, his hair turning a dark brownish-black and falling to spill over his shoulders, his spine compacting as he shrank down into a smaller frame, the lines of his jaw softening into a new, familiar outline.

  Annabel Blackthorn looked at them out of steady blue-green eyes.

  “So, how was the meeting?” Horace said. “We surmised it hadn’t gone well, considering the number of Shadowhunters returning to Idris.”

  “I believe it went as intended.” Horace wrinkled his brow as Annabel sat stiffly in a chair opposite his desk. Zara watched her warily; Horace kept referring to Annabel as the Unseelie King’s gift to him, but perhaps Zara didn’t consider it a gift. “Except for the fact that I was there.”

  “No one guessed you weren’t Oskar?” said Zara.

  “Obviously not.” Annabel was studying her hands as if they were unfamiliar to her. “Their plan is simple to the point of rudimentary. Which could be seen as an advantage—less to go wrong.”

  Horace leaned forward, arms resting on his desk. “Are you saying we should be worried?”

  “No,” Annabel said, touching the etched glass vial at her throat thoughtfully. Red liquid swirled within it. “The element of surprise was their only advantage. Foolish of them to assume they would not be betrayed.” She sat back in her chair. “Let us begin with the basics. Jace Herondale and Clary Fairchild are still alive. . . .”

  * * *

  Emma stood at the doorway of the Institute. The last of the Downworlders had gone, and they would all be leaving for Brocelind soon. Brother Shadrach had assured Julian and the others that all the guards in Idris had been recalled to the city for the parley. The forest would be deserted.

  The afternoon sun glimmered on the sea, and distantly she wondered if, after today, she would ever see the Pacific Ocean again. Long ago her father had told her that the lights that danced on the surface of seawater came from glowing jewels beneath, and that if you reached under the surface, you could catch a jewel in your hand.

  She held her hand out in front of her now, palm up, and thought of Jem’s words, and then of Diana’s.

  Their runes began to burn like fire, as if they had fire in their veins instead of blood. Black lines spread over their bodies and they became monstrous—physically monstrous.

  Across the inside of her forearm, where the skin had been pale and smooth, was a dark webbing of black lines, like cracks in marble, nearly the size of the palm of her hand.

  PART THREE

  Lady Vengeance

  Her strong enchantments failing,

  Her towers of fear in wreck,

  Her limbecks dried of poisons

  And the knife at her neck,

  The Queen of air and darkness

  Begins to shrill and cry,

  “O young man, O my slayer,

  Tomorrow you shall die.”

  O Queen of air and darkness,

  I think ’tis truth you say,

  And I shall die tomorrow;

  But you will die today.

  —A. E. Housman, “Her Strong Enchantments Failing”

  28

  AND SHADOWS THERE

  It was cool in Brocelind Forest; encroaching autumn added a cold metal bite to the air that Emma could taste on her tongue.

  Quiet had come suddenly after the rush of Portal travel, the setting up of tents in a cleared space among the ancient trees and green earth. They were far from the blighted areas, Diana promised them—in the distance, over the tops of the trees, Emma could see the glimmer of the demon towers of Alicante.

  She stood on a rise overlooking where they’d made camp. There were about a dozen tents, set up in rows, each with two torches burning in front of its flap door. They were cozy inside, with thick rugs on the floor and even blankets. Alec had given Magnus a sharp sideways look when they’d appeared out of nowhere.

  “I did not steal them,” Magnus had said, looking studiously at his fingernails. “I borrowed them.”

  “So you’ll be returning them to the camping store?” said Alec, hands on his hips.

  “I actually got them from a warehouse that provides props for movies,” said Magnus. “It’ll be ages before anyone notices they’re gone. Not,” he added hastily, “that I won’t be returning them, of course. Everyone, try not to set your tents on fire! They’re not our property!”

  “Does one normally set them on fire?” said Kieran, who had his own tent—Mark and Julian were sharing one, and Emma was sharing another with Cristina. “Is that a tradition?”

  Mark and Cristina both smiled at him. The oddness going on with the three of them was growing more intense, Emma thought, and resolved to ask Cristina about it.

  The opportunity came sooner than she’d thought it would. She’d been restless inside the tent alone—Cristina was helping Aline and Julian, who’d put themselves in charge of cooking dinner. Everyone was muttering around maps and plans, except Jace, who’d fallen conspicuously asleep with his head in Clary’s lap.

  Emma couldn’t concentrate. Her body and mind hummed with energy. All she wanted was to talk to Julian. She knew she couldn’t, but the need to tell him everything was painful. She’d never made such a life-altering decision without telling him before.

  She’d ended up throwing on a sweater and taking a walk around the perimeter of the camp. The air smelled so different here than it did at home—pine, green woods, campfire smoke. Inland, no scent of salt or sea. She climbed the small rocky rise over the camp and gazed down.

  Tomorrow they would ride out to challenge Horace Dearborn and his Cohort. Very likely there would be a confrontation. And her parabatai, the one who always fought by her side, would be lost to her. One way or another.

  The sun was setting, sparking off the distant shimmer of the demon towers. Emma could hear the night birds chirping in the woods nearby and tried not to think about what else was in the forest. She felt herself shivering—no, she was shaking. She felt disoriented, almost dizzy, and her cognitive process felt strangely diffuse, as if her mind were racing too fast for her to concentrate.

  “Emma!” Cristina was walking up the rise toward her, her dark eyes full of concern. “I looked for you in the tent but you weren’t there. Are you all right? Or are you on watch?”

  Pull yourself together, Emma. “I just thought someone should try to keep an eye on things, you know, in case a party of Cohort members decides to take a closer look at Brocelind.”

  “So you’re on watch,” said Cristina.

&
nbsp; “Maybe,” Emma said. “What’s going on with you and Kieran and Mark?”

  “Ay ay!” Cristina sat down on a rock, knocking her forehead gently against her hand. “Really? Now?”

  Emma sat down next to her friend. “We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.” She pointed her index finger at Cristina. “If we both die in battle tomorrow, though, we’ll never get to talk about it ever, and you’ll never get the benefit of my enormous wisdom.”

  “Look at this crazy girl,” Cristina said, gesturing to an invisible audience. “All right, all right. What makes you think anything new is happening, anyway?”

  “I see the way you all look at each other. I’ve never seen anything like it,” Emma said.

  Cristina sobered immediately, her hand going to the angel medallion at her throat as it often did when she was nervous. “I don’t know what to do,” she said. “I love both of them. I love Mark and I love Kieran. I love them both in different ways, but with no less intensity.”

  Emma spoke carefully. “Are they asking you to choose between them?”

  Cristina looked off toward the sunset, stripes of gold and red above the trees. “No. No, they’re not asking me to choose.”

  “I see,” said Emma, who was not sure she did see. “Then . . .”

  “We decided it was impossible,” Cristina said. “Kieran, Mark, and I—we are all afraid. If we were together, the way we want to be, we would bring misery on those we love.”

  “Misery? Why?” Emma’s hands were shaking again; she shoved them between her knees so Cristina wouldn’t see.

  “Kieran fears for Faerie,” Cristina said. “After so many terrible Kings, after so much cruelty, he wishes to go back and take up a place in the Court and see to the welfare of his people. He cannot turn away from that, and neither Mark nor I would want him to. But for us—we cannot know the future. Even if the Cohort is gone, it does not mean the end of the Cold Peace. Mark is afraid for Helen, for all the Blackthorns, that if he were involved with a prince of Faerie and everyone knew it, his family would be punished. I fear the same for my family. So it would never work. Do you understand?”

  Emma twirled a piece of grass between her fingers. “I would never judge you,” she said. “First because it’s you, and second because I hardly have the right to judge anyone. But I think you’re letting your fear get in the way of what you really want because what you really want is what you’re afraid of.”

  Cristina blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “From the outside, here’s what I see,” said Emma. “When Mark and Kieran are alone together, they get pulled into their difficult past. It consumes them. When Mark and you are together, he worries that he isn’t good enough for you, no matter what you say. And when Kieran and you are together, sometimes you can’t bridge the gulf between Shadowhunter understanding and faerie understanding. Mark helps you bridge that gulf.” The sun was nearly down, the sky a deep blue, Cristina’s expression lost in shadow. “Does that seem wrong?”

  “No,” Cristina said after a long pause. “But it doesn’t—”

  “You’re afraid of what everyone is afraid of,” said Emma. “Having your hearts broken, being made miserable by love. But what you’re saying, that’s what the Cohort wants. They want to make people afraid, to make them stay apart because they have created an environment of fear and suspicion where you could be punished for being with someone you love. If they got their way, they’d punish Alec for being with Magnus, but that doesn’t mean Magnus and Alec should split up. Am I making sense?”

  “A little too much sense,” Cristina said, pulling at a loose thread on her sleeve.

  “I know one thing for sure,” Emma said. “Cristina, of all the people I know, you’re the most generous, and you spend the most time thinking about what makes other people happy. I think you should do whatever makes you happy. You deserve it.”

  “Thanks.” Cristina gave her a shaky smile. “What about you and Julian? How are you doing?”

  Emma’s stomach lurched, surprising her. It was as if hearing the words “you and Julian” had set something off inside her. She pushed down on the feeling, trying to control it. “It’s really hard,” she whispered. “Julian and I can’t even talk to each other. And the best we can hope for after all this is over is some kind of exile.”

  “I know.” Cristina took Emma’s hand in hers; Emma tried to still her own shaking. Cristina’s reassuring touch helped. For the millionth time, Emma wished she’d met Cristina earlier—that Cristina could have been her parabatai. “After the exile, if it happens, come and stay with me, wherever I am. Mexico, anywhere. I’ll take care of you.”

  Emma made a sound halfway between a laugh and a sniffle. “That’s what I mean. You’re always doing things for other people, Tina.”

  “Okay, well, then I’m going to ask you to do something for me.”

  “What? I’ll do anything. Unless it makes your mom mad. Your mom scares me.”

  “You want to kill Zara in the battle, if there’s a fight, don’t you?” Cristina said.

  “The thought had crossed my mind. Okay. Yes. If anyone else takes her out, I’m going to be really angry.” Emma mock scowled.

  Cristina sighed. “We don’t even know if there’s going to be a fight, Emma. If Zara is spared or imprisoned or escapes, or if someone else kills her, I don’t want you to dwell on it. Focus on what you want your life to be after tomorrow.”

  After tomorrow I’ll be exiled, Emma thought. Will I see you again, Cristina? Will I always miss you?

  Cristina narrowed her eyes in concern. “Emma? Promise me?”

  But before Emma could promise, before she could say anything at all, Aline’s and Helen’s voices cut through the evening air, calling them down to dinner.

  * * *

  “Has anyone ever tried ketchup on a s’more?” Isabelle said.

  “This is why you’re a bad cook,” said Alec. Simon, bundled up in a sweater and leaning back against a log, slunk down as if he hoped to become invisible. “You actually like disgusting food. It’s not, like, an accident.”

  “I like ketchup and s’mores,” said Simon loyally, and mouthed to Clary, I don’t like them.

  “I know,” Clary said. “I can feel through the parabatai bond how much you don’t like them.”

  “Julian is an excellent cook,” said Emma, spearing a marshmallow. Magnus had produced bags of them along with the requisite chocolate and graham crackers. He gave Emma a dark look that seemed to say, Stay away from Julian, and also his cooking.

  “I am also an excellent cook,” said Mark, putting an acorn onto his s’more. Everyone stared.

  “He can’t help it,” said Cristina loyally. “He has lived with the Wild Hunt for so long.”

  “I don’t do that,” said Kieran, eating a s’more in the correct fashion. “Mark has no excuse.”

  “I never pictured Shadowhunters eating s’mores,” said Kit, glancing around the fire. It was like a scene out of dreams of camping he’d had when he was a little kid—the fire, the trees, everyone bundled up in sweaters and sitting around on logs, smoke in their eyes and hair. “On the other hand, this is the first s’more I’ve ever had that didn’t come out of a box.”

  “That’s not a s’more, then,” Ty said. “That’s a cookie. Or some cereal.”

  Kit smiled, and Ty smiled back at him. He leaned against Julian, who was sitting beside him; Julian put an absent arm around his younger brother, his hand ruffling Ty’s hair.

  “Excited for your first battle?” Jace said to Kit. Jace was sitting cross-legged with his arms around Clary, who was creating a massive s’more out of several chocolate bars.

  “He’s not going!” Clary said. “He’s too young, Jace.” She looked at Kit. “Don’t listen to him.”

  “He seems old enough,” said Jace. “I was fighting battles when I was ten.”

  “Stay away from my children,” said Magnus. “I’m watching you, Herondale.”

  Kit felt a
brief jolt before realizing Magnus wasn’t talking to him. Then another when he realized he’d reacted unconsciously to the name Herondale.

  “This is great,” said Helen, yawning. “I haven’t been camping in so long. You can’t go camping on Wrangel Island. Your fingers will turn to icicles and snap right off.”

  Emma frowned. “Where’s Cristina?”

  Kit glanced around: Emma was right. Cristina had slipped away from the group.

  “She shouldn’t be walking around the edge of the forest,” Magnus said, frowning. “There are booby traps there. Quite well hidden, if I do say so myself.” He started to rise. “I’ll get her.”

  Mark and Kieran were already on their feet.

  “We will find her,” Mark said hastily. “In the Hunt, we learned much about traps.”

  “And few know more about the ways of the forest than the fey,” said Kieran.

  Magnus shrugged, but there was a knowing spark in his eye that Kit didn’t quite understand. “All right. Go ahead.”

  As they vanished into the shadows, Emma smiled and placed another marshmallow on a stick.

  “Let’s make a toast.” Aline raised a plastic cup of water. “To never being parted from our families again.” She gazed at the fire. “Once tomorrow comes, we’re never going to let the Clave do that to any of us again.”

  “Not to be parted from family or friends,” said Helen, raising her glass.

  “Or parabatai,” said Simon, winking at Clary.

  Alec and Jace cheered, but Julian and Emma were silent. Emma seemed bleakly sad, staring down into her cup of water. She did not seem to see Julian, who looked at her for a single long moment before wrenching his gaze away.

  “To never being parted,” Kit said, looking across the campfire at Ty.

  Ty’s thin face was limned in light from the red-gold flames. “To never being parted,” he said, with a grave emphasis that made Kit shiver for reasons he did not understand.

  * * *

  Maryse could no longer return to the Inquisitor’s house, as Horace and Zara had moved into it. Instead she took Dru and the others to the Graymark house, the one Clary said she had stayed in when she’d first come to Idris.