The Shadowhunter's Codex (34 page)

THE IRON SISTERS

The Iron Sisters are a monastic order, like the Silent Brothers, the members of which have taken Marks upon themselves for a specific purpose that requires them to become more than merely human. In the case of the Sisters, however, they have taken upon themselves the ability to work the angelic stone
adamas,
and craft it and whatever other mundane materials are needed into the arms, armor, and tools that keep the Nephilim alive and protected. The Sisters are the only Nephilim permitted to handle
adamas pur
, unworked
adamas
.

Like the Brothers, the Iron Sisters must join the order by taking Marks upon themselves that act as keys to unlocking normally hidden sections of the Gray Book. These Marks also serve to distance them from the rest of humanity. (The Marks are different between the two orders, and being Marked as a Silent Brother does not give you access to the Iron Sisters’ Marks, nor vice versa.) Also like the Silent Brothers, the Iron Sisters are not fighters, do not marry, and do not normally attend Council meetings or venture outside of their usual domain.

Iron Sisters are rarely encountered by most Nephilim, but when they are, they are significantly less unsettling in appearance than the Silent Brothers. Their eyes and mouths are not magically closed, and they can neither read minds nor speak telepathically. They wear simple clothes, long white gowns bound tightly at the wrists and waist by demon-wire, to protect their clothes from the holy fires in which their materials are worked. Apart from an appearance of agelessness, their only odd physical feature is their eyes, which typically glow with the colors of flames. It is said that the fires of their great forges burn behind their eyes.

Despite their somewhat more familiar mien, the Iron Sisters are even more private and removed from Nephilim society than the Silent Brothers. They live in solitude in their great Adamant Citadel—whose location on the Earth is unknown to any other Nephilim—and rarely venture outside their fortress. They do not like to be bothered and prefer to work in isolation. A Shadowhunter may live many years without seeing even one Iron Sister in the flesh.

The first Iron Sister, Abigail Shadowhunter, was concerned that despite the gender neutrality of the Shadowhunters, the Sisters would need to be protected from unwanted interference from male Shadowhunters, and so the Adamant Citadel was built to be, and has always been, open only to female Shadowhunters. Indeed, only women are permitted to speak to Iron Sisters.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS AND THINGS TO TRY

1. Why do you think the Nephilim live under such a strict code of Law? How does it benefit our overall mission?

Sheer unbridled cussedness. Being the baddest hombres in town.

I wouldn’t have put it that way, but that’s pretty much the answer the Codex is looking for.

Law and order good! Chaos and anarchy bad!

Chaos and anarchy also part of our tools, but the Codex doesn’t like to admit it.

2. Have you been Marked? Describe the experience here. Did you have a bad reaction to it? Did you notice it working immediately? How have any Marks since the first Mark felt different?

The Codex actually sounds kind of creepy here. “Yeeeees, tell me eeeeeverything.” I was Marked by a very cute boy with terrible impulse control. I don’t remember because I was basically unconscious but everyone was mad at him when I woke up. The end, love Clary.

Oh my God, your love is so epic.

IDRIS,

THE NEPHILIM HOMELAND

Idris is our country, our land of sanctuary and safety. If you, soon-to-be Shadowhunter, have not yet traveled there, you will likely do so in order to drink from the Cup and receive your first Marks, and there you will see the beauty and tranquility that have made it the best-loved of all Shadowhunter places. Angelic enchantment appears in each leaf, each river stone, each dwelling. The land stands presided over by the soaring fingers of
adamas
that form the towers protecting its capital, Alicante. These towers surround us with angelic light and shield the city and its people from demonkind. Usually.

WHERE IS IDRIS? WHAT IS IT LIKE?

The country of Idris is small, barely visible on a map of Europe. It is in fact little more than the city of Alicante, the plains that gently unroll beneath its walls, and the surrounding mountain range that protects it. Alicante is the only city—indeed, the only major settled area—in the country. This makes much of Idris difficult to traverse, even for Shadowhunters; its mountains are impassible except in high summer, due to heavy snows, and its woods, especially Brocelind Forest, are dense and unmarked by trails. Idris is, nonetheless, very beautiful country: low Alpine, stacked with sheaves of pine trees, among which meander countless rivulets and brooks. Though the land is different from any of its mundane neighbors—Germany, France, Switzerland—it evokes the same beauty as the landscapes of those countries.

Idris was not, as is commonly believed, made from land “stolen” from its bordering countries. Instead Raziel created an entirely new country, like blowing a bubble, in the middle of Europe. It is land made for no purpose other than to be a home for the Nephilim.

HOW TO GET TO IDRIS

Practice, practice, practice.

In order to reach Idris by air, one must fly to one of the airports in a neighboring country and travel overland across its border. Those who are used to the delights of mundane transportation technology may find this somewhat retrogressive, but we invite you to think of it instead as charmingly quaint. Of course, until the beginning of the twentieth century, the only means of reaching Idris at all was overland travel. The travel problem caused by Idris’s landlocked status was eventually solved by the invention of the Portal, now the most common means of getting there and back.

THE WARDS OF IDRIS

Come visit the wards! You can’t see them!

The wards around Idris are unique, and have proved impossible to comprehend or duplicate despite all our years of study. Humans are able to create wards that divert certain individuals away from a place or an object; they do this sometimes by illusion and sometimes by distraction. This is true of both Gray Book Marks and warlock magic. If a mundane passes through the Idris wards, however, he will be transported instantly to the corresponding location on the opposite border. This happens without any side effects or signs, so a mundane will have no awareness that he has passed instantly through an entire country. From the perspective of mundanes, it is as if Europe exists with no Idris in it at all, and indeed, this is how mundane maps depict things.

The wards of Idris were created by Raziel himself, as part of the initial set of gifts that he presented to Jonathan Shadowhunter. Their magic was not, apparently, magic that Raziel decided to share with his creations the Nephilim, and so we are unable to duplicate elsewhere, or at all modify, the wards of the Idris borders. Over the years Nephilim have argued endlessly about why the Idris wards allow the free passage of Downworlders and even demons themselves into Idris. In other words the wards prevent the discovery of Idris by the mundane world, but all members of the Shadow World may pass in and out freely. Many Shadowhunters have argued that Raziel’s purpose in warding Idris was to prevent the Nephilim from ever becoming involved in land conflicts with its neighbors. Idris is meant as a hidden sanctuary from the mundane, and as a home, not as a political entity among the nations of the world, and as such, its borders can never be altered.

IDRIS AND THE MODERN WORLD

Idris’s unspoiled nature is maintained in part by its wards, but strict Law also prevents the country from becoming modernized. This is partly because such improvements would be unworkable: magic easily disrupts modern technology. The wards that prevent mundanes from being able to enter or even detect Idris cause the whole country to exist in a “magical cage” that prevents machinery from working reliably within its borders. (This is similar to the disruption that prevents Marked firearms from functioning, and indeed, no firearm can be successfully fired within Idris.) As such, Alicante is lit and powered primarily by witchlight, as are those rare roads that have been illuminated.

IDRIS AND DOWNWORLDERS

Idris is home to a number of Downworlder groups—faerie courts, werewolf packs in the forests, vampire clans in caves or in dark rocky valleys. For these Downworlders, Idris provides a space where they can live freely without having to disguise their identities, and where they can have land of their own, under their control. Those who live in Idris tend to be among the wildest of Downworlders, since they are the ones most willing to renounce the human world and live entirely away from mundanes. (This is even true for faeries, who, despite their prickliness, have a real affinity for humans and usually prefer to live among them.)