Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy

by Cassandra Clare

  “I guess we’re finally even on something we don’t remember.”

  The carriage was simply appointed in black silk, black curtains, black everything, really. But it was well sprung and comfortable, as far as speeding horse carriages go. Brother Shadrach had no fear of speed, and soon the Academy was in the distance and Simon and Clary were looking at each other from across the carriage as they bounced along. Simon tried to talk a few times, but his voice juddered from the impact, the constant thud thud thud of the carriage making its way across Brocelind Plain. The roads in Idris were not the smooth highways Simon was used to. They were paved in stone, and there were no rest stops with bathrooms and Starbucks. There was no heat, but each had been provided with a heavy fur blanket. As a vegetarian, Simon didn’t really want to use it. As a person without much choice who was freezing, he did.

  Simon also had no watch, no phone, nothing to tell the passing time except the rising of the late-autumn sun. He estimated that they rode an hour, maybe more. They entered the calming shade of the Brocelind Forest. The smell of the trees and leaves was almost intoxicating, and the sun came through in slashes and ribbons, illuminating Clary’s face and hair, her smile.

  His parabatai.

  They stopped not too far into the forest. The door opened, and Brother Shadrach was there.

  We have arrived.

  Somehow, it was worse when it stopped. Simon’s head and body still felt like they were shaking. Simon looked up and saw that they were near the base of a mountain. It stretched above the trees.

  This way.

  They followed Brother Shadrach down a barely marked track—a light trail where several feet had passed, leaving just the tiniest scar on the ground, a few inches wide. Through a thicket of trees against the mountainside, there was a doorway, about fifteen feet in height. It was wide at the base and narrower at the top. There was a bas-relief carving of an angel just above the lintel. Brother Shadrach took one of the rings on the door and knocked it hard, just once. The door opened, seemingly of its own accord.

  They walked down a narrow passage with smooth marble walls, and descended a staircase made of stone. There were no rails, so he and Clary put their hands on either wall to keep from falling. Brother Shadrach, in his long robe, had no such fear of falling. He seemed to glide down. From there, they were in a larger space, which Simon at first thought was made of stones. After a moment he saw that the walls were mosaicked with bones—some chalky white, some gray, some ashy, and some a disturbing brownish color. Long bones formed arches and columns, and skulls, top side out, formed most of the walls. They were finally left in a room where the bone art was really ambitious—great circling patterns of skulls and bones gave the room shape. Above, smaller bones formed more delicate structures, such as chandeliers, which glowed with witchlights. It was like being shown the end of the world’s worst home-decorating show.

  You will wait here.

  Brother Shadrach exited the chamber, and Simon and Clary were left alone. One thing about the Silent City: It really lived up to its name. Simon had never been anywhere so utterly devoid of sound. Simon worried that if he spoke, the walls of bones would come down on his head and bury them both. They probably wouldn’t—that would be a major design flaw—but the sensation was strong.

  After several moments the door opened again and Julian appeared alone. Julian Blackthorn may only have been fourteen, but he seemed older, even older than Simon. He had grown quite a bit, and now Simon could look him eye to eye. He had his family’s characteristic thick, curling dark-brown hair, and his face had a look of quiet seriousness. It was a seriousness that reminded Simon of the way his mother had looked when his father died, and she’d spent nights awake worrying about how to pay the mortgage and feed her children, how to raise them all by herself. No one wore this kind of expression by choice. The only sign that Julian wasn’t an adult was the way his dress gear fit a bit loose, and the way he was just a bit gangly.

  “Julian!” Clary said, looking as if she was considering hugging him and then discarding the idea. He seemed too dignified to be squeezed. “Where’s Emma?”

  “Talking to Brother Zachariah,” Julian said. “I mean Jem. She’s talking to Jem.”

  Julian seemed deeply puzzled about this, but also didn’t look to be in the mood to be questioned further.

  “So,” Clary said, “how do you feel?”

  Julian simply nodded and looked around.

  He hesitated. “I just want to . . . do it. I want to get it done.”

  This seemed like a slightly odd response. Now that Simon was thinking about his own ceremony with Clary, the prospect seemed amazing. Something to be looked forward to. But Julian had been through a lot. He’d lost his parents, his older brother and sister. It was probably hard to go through something this major without them there.

  It was hard to look at Julian and not remember that he had seen Julian’s brother Mark not that long ago—Mark, imprisoned and half-mad. That he had decided not to share this fact with Julian, because it would have been unbelievably cruel to do so. Simon still believed his decision had been the right one, but that didn’t mean it didn’t weigh like a stone in his soul.

  “How’s L.A.?” he said, and immediately regretted it. How’s L.A.? How’s that place you live in where you saw your father murdered and your brother taken hostage forever by faeries? How’s that?

  Julian’s mouth curled up at the corner. As if he sensed that Simon was feeling uncomfortable, and he felt sympathetic, but also thought it was funny.

  Simon was used to that.

  “Hot,” Julian said.

  Which was fair enough.

  “How’s your family?” Clary asked.

  Julian’s face lit up, his eyes glowing like the surface of water. “Everyone is good. Ty’s really into detective stuff, Dru’s into horror—watching all sorts of mundane movies she’s not supposed to. But then she scares herself and has to sleep with the witchlight on. Livvy’s gotten really good with the sabre, and Tavvy—”

  He broke off as Jem and Emma came down the stairs. Emma’s step seemed lighter. There was something about Emma that made Simon think of eternal summers on a beach—her sunbleached hair, her graceful way of moving, her winter tan. Along the inside of one of her arms was a vicious long scar.

  She looked at once to Julian, who nodded before starting to pace around the room. Emma immediately wrapped Simon in a hug. Her arms, though smaller than his, wound around him like steel cables. She smelled like sea spray.

  “Thank you for being here,” she said. “I wanted to write to you but they . . .” She looked at Jem for a moment. “They said they would tell you. Thank you, both of you.”

  Julian ran his hand along the smooth marble wall. He seemed to have trouble looking over at Emma. Emma went to him, and Jem followed, speaking to them both for a moment. Clary and Simon stood back and watched them. Something about the way Emma and Julian were acting wasn’t quite what Simon expected. Sure, they would be nervous but . . .

  No, it was something else.

  Clary tugged on Simon’s sleeve, indicating that he should lean down so she could whisper to him.

  “They look so”—Clary broke off her sentence and cocked her head slightly to the side—“young.”

  There was a hint in her voice that this was not a completely satisfactory statement. Something about this was off. But Simon had no time to figure out what. Jem, Emma, and Julian joined them again.

  “I will accompany you into the chamber,” Jem said. “Clary will walk with Emma. Simon will walk with Julian. Do you feel ready to continue?”

  Both Emma and Julian visibly swallowed hard and got very wide-eyed, but both managed to say yes.

  “Then we will proceed. Please follow me.”

  More corridors, but the bone gave way to more white marble, and then marble that had the appearance of gold. They arrived at a great set of doors, which were opened by Brother Shadrach. The room they led to was the largest yet, with a towering
, domed ceiling. There were marbles of all colors—white, black, pink, gold, silver. Every surface was utterly smooth. The room was occupied by a ring of Silent Brothers, maybe twenty in all, who parted to allow them in. The light in the room was dim and came from golden sconces and flickering candlelight. The air was thick with incense.

  “Simon Lewis and Julian Blackthorn.” Jem’s voice resonated—for a moment Simon almost thought he heard it inside his mind, the way he had once heard Brother Zachariah’s. It still held a depth to it that seemed richer than human. “Cross to the other side of the circle, where they have made a space for you. When you get there, remain there. You will be told what to do.”

  Simon looked to Julian, who had turned the color of copier paper. Despite looking like he might faint, Julian walked firmly across the room, and Simon followed. Clary and Emma took their places on the opposite side. Jem joined the circle of Silent Brothers, who all stepped back as one, widening the circle. Now the four of them were at the center.

  Suddenly, two rings of white and gold fire appeared out of the floor, the flames rising just a few inches, but burning bright and hot.

  Emma Carstairs. Step forward.

  The voices rang in Simon’s head—it was all of the Brothers speaking as one. Emma looked to Clary, then took a single step into one of the rings. She fixed her eyes on Julian and smiled widely.

  Julian Blackthorn. Step forward.

  Julian stepped into the other ring. His step was quicker, but he kept his head down.

  Witnesses, you will stand on the wings of the angel.

  This took Simon a moment to work out. He finally saw that at the top of the circle, carved roughly into the floor, was another figure of an angel with outstretched wings. He took his place on one, and Clary the other. This brought him a little closer to the ring of fire. He felt the heat of it creep pleasantly over his cold feet. From this vantage point, he could see Emma’s and Julian’s expressions.

  What was he seeing? It was something he knew.

  We begin the Fiery Trial. Emma Carstairs, Julian Blackthorn, enter the center ring. In this ring, you will be bound.

  A central ring appeared, joining the two. A Venn diagram of fire. As soon as Emma and Julian were in it, the center ring burned higher, reaching waist height.

  Something flickered between Julian and Emma at that moment. It was so quick that Simon couldn’t tell which direction it had come from, but he’d seen it out of the corner of one of his eyes. Some look, something about the way one of them stood, something—but it was a look or a stance or something that he had seen before.

  The fire flashed higher. It was up to their shoulders now.

  You will now recite the oath.

  Emma and Julian began speaking as one, their voices both with a small tremble as they recited the ancient Biblical words.

  “Whither thou goest, I will go . . .”

  Simon was hit with a bolt of anxiety. What had he just seen? Why was it so familiar? Why did it put him on edge? He studied Emma and Julian again, as best as he could over the fire. They looked like two nervous kids about to do something very serious, while standing in a flaming circle.

  There it was again. So quick. The direction was obscured by the flickering at the top of the ring. What the hell was it? Maybe this was precisely what witnesses were supposed to do. Maybe they were supposed to watch for this kind of thing. No. Jem said it was a formality. A formality. Maybe he should have asked this question before standing next to the giant ring of fire.

  “Where thou diest, I will die, and there will I be buried . . .”

  Shadowhunter rituals, always cheery.

  “The Angel do so to me, and more also . . .”

  Julian tripped on the words “do so to me.” He cleared his throat and finished the statement a second after Emma.

  Something clicked in Simon’s mind. He remembered Jace, suddenly, in his hallucination, saying something about the first time they’d met. And then the memory flashed across his mind like one of those banners trailing off the back of the little planes that flew above the beach off Long Island. . . .

  He was sitting with Clary in Java Jones. They were watching Eric read poetry. Simon had decided this was the moment—he was going to tell her. He had to tell her. He had gotten them both coffees and the cups were hot. His fingers were burned. He had to blow on them, which was not a smooth move.

  He could feel the burning. The feeling that he had to speak.

  Eric was reading some poem that contained the words “nefarious loins.” Nefarious loins, nefarious loins . . . the words danced in his head. He had to speak.

  “There’s something I want to talk to you about,” he said.

  Clary made some remark about his band name, and he had to get her back on point.

  “It’s about what we were talking about before. About me not having a girlfriend.”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Ask Jaida Jones out. She’s nice, and she likes you.”

  “I don’t want to ask Jaida Jones out.”

  “Why not? You don’t like smart girls? Still seeking a rockin’ bod?”

  Was she blind? How could she not see? What exactly did he have to do? He had to keep it together. Also, “seeking a rockin’ bod”?

  But the more he tried, the more oblivious she seemed. And then she became fixated on a green sofa. It was like that sofa contained everything in the world. Here he was, trying to declare his lifelong love, and Clary had fallen for the furniture. But it was more than that. Something was wrong.

  “What is it?” he asked. “What’s wrong? Clary, what’s wrong?”

  “I’ll be right back,” she said. And with that, she put down the coffee and ran away. He watched her through the window, and somehow he knew that this moment was over, forever. And then he saw . . .

  The ring of fire had extinguished. It was over. The oath was made, and Emma and Julian stood before them all. Julian had a rune on his collarbone, and Emma on her upper arm.

  Clary was tugging his arm. He looked over at her and blinked a few times.

  You okay? her expression said.

  His memory had chosen quite a moment to return.

  After the ceremony, they returned to Alicante, where they were taken to the Blackthorn manor to change their clothes. Emma and Julian were taken by the staff to rooms on the main floor. Clary and Simon were led up the grand staircase.

  “I don’t know what I’m supposed to change into,” Simon said. “I didn’t get a lot of advance notice.”

  “I brought you a suit from home,” Clary said. “I borrowed it.”

  “Not from Jace.”

  “From Eric.”

  “Eric has a suit? Do you promise it wasn’t, like, his dead grandfather’s?”

  “I can’t promise anything, but I do think it will fit.”

  Simon was shown to a small, fussy bedroom on the second floor, overstuffed with furniture and crowded in by flocked wallpaper and the penetrating stares of some long-deceased Blackthorns who had taken up residence in the form of severe portraits. The suit bag was on the bed. Eric did have a suit—a plain black one. A shirt had also been provided, along with a silver-blue tie and some dress shoes. The suit was an inch or two too short. The shirt was too tight—Simon’s daily training had made him into one of these people who burst through a dress shirt. The shoes didn’t fit at all, so he wore the soft black shoes that were part of the formal gear. The tie fit fine. Ties were good for this.

  He sat on the bed for a moment and let himself think about all that had happened. He closed his eyes and fought the urge to sleep. He felt himself wobbling and dropping off when there was a soft knock on the door. He snorted as he came back from the microsleep.

  “Sure,” he said, which wasn’t what he meant to say. “Yeah. I mean, come in.”

  Clary entered wearing a green dress that perfectly complemented her hair, her skin, every part of her. And Simon had a revelation. If he still felt romantic attraction toward Clary, seeing her at that moment might h
ave caused him to start sweating and stammering. Now he saw someone he loved, who looked beautiful, and was his friend. And that was all.

  “Listen,” she said, shutting the door, “back at the ceremony, you looked . . . weird. If you don’t want to do it . . . The parabatai thing. It was a shock and I don’t want you to be . . .”

  “What? No. No.”

  Instinctively he reached for her hand. She squeezed it hard.

  “Okay,” she said. “But something happened in there. I saw it.”

  “In the hallucination I had, from the lake water, I saw Jace, and he kept telling me to remember how we met,” he said. “So I was trying to remember. And then right in the middle of the ceremony, I got the memory back. It just kind of . . . downloaded.”

  Clary frowned, her nose wrinkling in confusion. “The memory of how you met Jace? Wasn’t it at the Institute?”

  “Yes and no. The memory was really about us, you and me. We were in the coffee shop, Java Jones. You were naming all of these girls I could date and I was . . . I was trying to tell you that you were the one I liked.”

  “Yeah,” Clary said, looking down.

  “And then you ran out. Just like that.”

  “Jace was there. You couldn’t see him.”

  “That’s what I thought.” Simon studied her face. “You ran out while I was telling you how I felt. Which is okay. We were never meant to be . . . like that. I think that’s what my subconscious, in the annoying form of Jace, wanted me to know. Because I think we are meant to be together. Parabatai can’t like each other like that. That’s why it was important for me to remember. I had to remember that I felt like that. I had to know it was different now. Not in a bad way. In the right way.”

  “Yes,” Clary said. She had gotten a little teary-eyed. “In the right way.”

  Simon nodded once. It was too big to reply to in words. It was everything. It was all the love he saw in Jem’s eyes when he talked about Will, and the love in Alec’s face when he looked at Jace, even when Jace was being annoying, and a clear memory he had of Jace holding Alec while he was wounded and the desperation in Jace’s eyes, that terror that comes only from thinking you might lose someone you can’t live without.