City of Lost Souls (31 page)

She touched the gold ring on her finger for luck before heading into Jace’s bedroom. He was sitting on the bed, shirtless in black pajama bottoms, reading a book in the small pool
of yellow light from the bedside lamp. She stood for a moment, watching him. She could see the delicate play of muscles under his skin as he turned the pages—and could see Lilith’s Mark, just over his heart. It didn’t look like the black lacework of the rest of his Marks; it was silvery-red, like blood-tinged mercury. It seemed not to belong on him.

The door slipped closed behind her with a click, and Jace looked up. Clary saw his face change. She might not have been such a big fan of the nightgown, but he definitely was. The look on his face made a shiver run over her skin.

“Are you cold?” He threw the covers back; she crawled in with him as he tossed the book onto the nightstand, and they slid together under the blanket, until they were facing each other. They had lain in the boat for what had seemed like hours, kissing, but this was different. That had been out in public, under the gaze of the city and the stars. This was a sudden intimacy, just the two of them under the blanket, their breath and the heat of their bodies mingling. There was no one to watch them, no one to stop them, no
reason
to stop. When he reached out and laid his hand against her cheek, she thought the thunder of her own blood in her ears might deafen her.

Their eyes were so close together, she could see the pattern of gold and darker gold in his irises, like a mosaic opal. She had been cold for so long, and now she felt as if she were burning and melting at the same time, dissolving into him—and they were barely touching. She found her gaze drawn to the places he was most vulnerable—his temples, his eyes, the pulse at the base of his throat, wanting to kiss him there, to feel his heartbeat against her lips.

His scarred right hand moved down her cheek, across her shoulder and side, stroking her in a single long caress that ended at her hip. She could see why men liked silk nightclothes so much. There was no friction; it was like sliding your hands across glass. “Tell me what you want,” he said in a whisper that couldn’t quite disguise the hoarseness in his voice.

“I just want you to hold me,” she said. “While I sleep. That’s all I want right now.”

His fingers, which had been stroking slow circles on her hip, stilled. “That’s all?”

It wasn’t what she wanted. What she wanted was to kiss him until she lost track of space and time and location, as she had in the boat—to kiss him until she forgot who she was and why she was here. She wanted to use him like a drug.

But that was a very bad idea.

He watched her, restless, and she remembered the first time she had seen him and how she had thought he seemed deadly as well as beautiful, like a lion.
This is a test,
she thought. And maybe a dangerous one. “That’s all.”

His chest rose and fell. Lilith’s Mark seemed to pulse against the skin just over his heart. His hand tightened on her hip. She could hear her own breathing, as shallow as low tide.

He pulled her toward him, rolling her over until they lay tucked together like spoons, her back to him. She swallowed a gasp. His skin was hot against hers, as if he were slightly feverish. But his arms as they went around her were familiar. The two of them fit together, as always, her head under his chin, her spine against the hard muscles of his chest and stomach, her legs bent around his. “All right,” he whispered, and the feel
of his breath against the back of her neck raised goose bumps over her body. “So we’ll sleep.”

And that was all. Slowly her body relaxed, the thudding of her heart slowing. Jace’s arms around her felt the way they always had. Comfortable. She closed her hands around his and shut her eyes, imagining their bed cut free of this strange prison, floating through space or on the surface of the ocean, just the two of them alone.

She slept like that, her head tucked under Jace’s chin, her spine fitted to his body, their legs entwined. It was the best sleep she had had in weeks.

Simon sat on the edge of the bed in Magnus’s spare room, staring down at the duffel bag in his lap.

He could hear voices from the living room. Magnus was explaining to Maia and Jordan what had happened that night, with Izzy occasionally interjecting a detail. Jordan was saying something about how they should order Chinese food so they wouldn’t starve; Maia laughed and said as long as it wasn’t from the Jade Wolf, that would be fine.

Starving,
Simon thought. He was getting hungry—hungry enough to have begun to feel it, like a pull on all his veins. It was a different kind of hunger than human hunger. He felt scraped out, a hollow emptiness inside. If you struck him, he thought, he would ring like a bell.

“Simon.” His door opened, and Isabelle slid inside. Her black hair was down and loose, almost reaching her waist. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

She saw the duffel bag on his lap, and her shoulders tensed. “Are you leaving?”

“Well, I wasn’t planning to stay forever,” Simon said. “I mean, last night was—different. You asked…”

“Right,” she said in an unnaturally bright voice. “Well, you can get a ride back with Jordan at least. Did you notice him and Maia, by the way?”

“Notice what about them?”

She lowered her voice. “Something
definitely
happened between them on their little road trip. They’re all couply now.”

“Well, that’s good.”

“Are you jealous?”

“Jealous?” he echoed, confused.

“Well, you and Maia…” She waved a hand, looking up at him through her lashes. “You were…”

“Oh. No. No, not at all. I’m glad for Jordan. This will make him really happy.” He meant it too.

“Good.” Isabelle looked up then, and he saw that her cheeks were rosy red, and not just from the cold. “Would you stay here tonight, Simon?”

“With you?”

She nodded, not looking at him. “Alec’s going out to get some more of his clothes from the Institute. He asked if I wanted to go back with him, but I—I’d rather stay here with you.” She raised her chin, looking at him directly. “I don’t want to sleep by myself. If I stay here, will you stay with me?” He could tell how much she hated to ask.

“Of course,” he said, as lightly as he possibly could, pushing the thought of his hunger out of his head, or trying to.
The last time he had tried to forget to drink, it had ended with Jordan pulling him off a semiconscious Maureen.

But that was when he hadn’t eaten for days. This was different. He knew his limits. He was sure of it.

“Of course,” he said again. “That would be great.”

Camille smirked up at Alec from her divan. “So where does Magnus think you are now?”

Alec, who had put a plank of wood across two cinderblocks to form a sort of bench, stretched his long legs out and looked at his boots. “At the Institute, picking up clothes. I was going to go up to Spanish Harlem, but I came here instead.”

Her eyes narrowed. “And why is that?”

“Because I can’t do it. I can’t kill Raphael.”

Camille threw up her hands. “And why not? Have you some sort of personal bond with him?”

“I barely know him,” Alec said. “But killing him is deliberately breaking Covenant Law. Not that I haven’t broken Laws before, but there’s a difference between breaking them for good reasons and breaking them for selfish ones.”

“Oh, dear God.” Camille began to pace. “Spare me from Nephilim with consciences.”

“I’m sorry.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Sorry? I’ll
make
you—” She broke off. “Alexander,” she went on in a more composed voice. “What of Magnus? If you continue as you have been, you will lose him.”

Alec watched her as she moved, catlike and composed, her face blank of anything now but a curious sympathy. “Where was Magnus born?”

Camille laughed. “You don’t even know that? My goodness.
Batavia, if you must know.” She snorted at his look of incomprehension. “Indonesia. Of course, it was the Dutch East Indies then. His mother was a native, I believe; his father was some dull colonial. Well, not his
real
father.” Her lips curved into a smile.

“Who was his real father?”

“Magnus’s father? Why, a demon, of course.”

“Yes, but
which
demon?”

“How could it possibly matter, Alexander?”

“I get the feeling,” Alec went on stubbornly, “that he’s a pretty powerful, high-up demon. But Magnus won’t talk about him.”

Camille collapsed back onto the divan with a sigh. “Well, of course he won’t. One must preserve some mystery in one’s relationship, Alec Lightwood. A book that one has not read yet is always more exciting than a book one has memorized.”

“You mean I tell him too much?” Alec pounced on the morsel of advice. Somewhere here, inside this cold, beautiful shell of a woman, was someone who had shared a unique experience with him—of loving and being loved by Magnus. Surely she must know something, some secret, some key that would keep him from screwing everything up.

“Almost certainly. Although, you’ve been alive for such a short time that I can’t imagine how much there could be to say. Certainly you must be out of anecdotes.”

“Well, it seems clear to me that your policy of not telling him anything didn’t work out either.”

“I was not so invested in keeping him as you are.”

“Well,” Alec asked, knowing it was a bad idea but not being able to help it, “if you
had been
interested in keeping him, what would you have done differently?”

Camille sighed dramatically. “The thing that you are too young to understand is that we all hide things. We hide them from our lovers because we wish to present our best selves, but also because if it is real love, we expect our loved one to simply understand it, without needing to ask. In a true partnership, the kind that lasts through the ages, there is an unspoken communion.”

“B-but,” Alec stammered, “I would have thought he would have wanted me to open up. I mean, I have a hard time being open even with people I’ve known my whole life—like Isabelle, or Jace…”

Camille snorted. “That’s another thing,” she said. “You no longer need other people in your life once you have found your true love. No wonder Magnus feels he cannot open up to you, when you rely so heavily upon these other people. When love is true, you should meet each other’s every desire, every need—Are you listening, young Alexander? For my advice is precious, and not given often…”

The room was filled with translucent dawn light. Clary sat up, watching Jace as he slept. He was on his side, his hair a pale brass color in the bluish air. His cheek was pillowed on his hand, like a child’s. The star-shaped scar on his shoulder was revealed, and so were the patterns of old runes up and down his arms, back, and sides.

She wondered if other people would find the scars as beautiful as she did, or if she only saw them that way because she loved him and they were part of him. Each one told the story of a moment. Some had even saved his life.

He murmured in his sleep and turned over onto his back. His hand, the Voyance rune clear and black on the back of it, was splayed
across his stomach, and above it was the one rune that Clary did not find beautiful: Lilith’s rune, the one that bound him to Sebastian.

It seemed to pulse, like Isabelle’s ruby necklace, like a second heart.

Silent as a cat, she moved up the bed and onto her knees. She reached up and pulled the Herondale dagger from the wall. The photograph of her and Jace together fluttered free, spinning in the air before landing face-down on the floor.

She swallowed and looked back at him. Even now, he was so alive, he seemed to glow from inside, as if lit by inner fire. The scar on his chest pulsed its steady beat.

She lifted the knife.

Clary came awake with a start, her heart slamming against her rib cage. The room swung around her like a carousel: it was still dark, and Jace’s arm was around her, his breath warm on the back of her neck. She could feel his heartbeat against her spine. She closed her eyes, swallowing against the bitter taste in her mouth.

It was a dream. Just a dream.

But there was no way she was getting back to sleep now. She sat up carefully, gently moving Jace’s arm away, and climbed off the bed.

The floor was icy cold, and she winced as her bare feet touched it. She found the knob of the bedroom door in the half-light, and swung it open. And froze.

Though there were no windows in the hallway outside, it was lit by pendant chandeliers. Puddles of something that looked sticky and dark marred the floor. Along one white-painted wall was the clear mark of a bloody handprint. Blood
spattered the wall at intervals leading to the stairs, where there was a single long, dark smear.

Clary looked toward Sebastian’s room. It was quiet, the door shut, no light showing beneath it. She thought of the blond girl in the spangled top, looking up at him. She looked at the bloody handprint again. It was like a message, a hand thrust out, saying
Stop
.

And then Sebastian’s door opened.

He stepped out. He was wearing a thermal shirt over black jeans, and his silver-white hair was rumpled. He was yawning; he did a double take when he saw her, and a look of genuine surprise passed over his face. “What are you doing up?”