Lady Midnight by Cassandra Clare
Emma had known there was trouble the moment she'd arrived at Johnny Rook's. Though the house looked the same, though the door was closed and the windows shuttered and quiet, she'd felt a lack of the magical energy that had been apparent when they'd been there before. She'd glanced back down at the text message on her phone and drawn Cortana.
The inside of the house looked as if a bomb had gone off. It was clear the Mantids had come from the ground under the house--demons often traveled beneath the earth to avoid daylight. They had burst up through the floorboards; ichor and blood and sawdust were everywhere.
And Mantids. They looked far more grotesque in Johnny Rook's living room than they had on the cliff tops of the Santa Monica Mountains. More insectile, more monstrous. Their razored arms sheered through wood walls, slashed apart furniture and books.
Emma swung Cortana. She sliced one Mantid apart; it disappeared with a screech, leaving her view of the room unobstructed. Several of the other Mantids were splashed with red, human blood. They circled the remains of what had been Johnny Rook, in pieces on the floor.
Kit. Emma looked around wildly, saw the boy crouching by the stairs. He was unharmed. She started toward him--just as he seized up a chair and smashed it down over a Mantid demon's head.
Only training kept Emma from stopping in her tracks. Human children didn't do that. They didn't know how to fend off demons. They didn't have the instinct--
The door behind her blew open, and again only her training kept her from halting in surprise. She managed to sever the head of another Mantid demon, slicking Cortana's blade with ichor, even as Jem Carstairs raced into the room, followed by Tessa.
They had plunged into the battle without a word to each other or to Emma, but Emma had exchanged a glance with Jem as they fought, and knew that he wasn't surprised to see her. He looked older than he had in Idris--now closer to twenty-six, more a man than a boy, though Tessa looked just the same.
She had the same sweet expression Emma remembered, and the same kind voice. She had looked at Kit with love and sadness when she had gone over to him and held out her hand.
Christopher Herondale.
"But Kit is short for Christopher, is it not?" Tessa asked now, still gently. Kit said nothing. "Christopher Jonathan Herondale is your true name. And your father was Jonathan, too, right?"
Johnny. Jonathan.
There were a thousand Shadowhunters named Jonathan. Jonathan Shadowhunter had founded the whole race of Nephilim. It was Jace's name as well.
Emma had heard Tessa back at the house, of course, but she still couldn't quite believe it. Not just a Shadowhunter in hiding, but a Herondale. Clary and Jace would need to be told. They would likely come running. "He's a Herondale? Like Jace?"
"Jace Herondale," Kit muttered. "My father said he was one of the worst."
"One of the worst what?" Jem asked.
"Shadowhunters." Kit spat the word. "And I'm not one, by the way. I'd know."
"Would you?" Jem's voice was mild. "How?"
"None of your business," Kit said. "I know what you're doing. My dad told me you'd kidnap anyone under nineteen with the Sight. Anyone you thought you could make into a Shadowhunter. There's barely any of you left after the Dark War."
Emma opened her mouth to mount an indignant protest, but Tessa was already speaking. "Your father said many things that weren't true," she said. "Not to speak ill of the dead, Christopher, but I doubt I am telling you anything you don't already know. And it is one thing to have the Sight. It is another thing to fight off a Mantid demon with no training."
"You said you've been looking for him?" Emma asked, as the run-down Topanga Canyon Motel flashed by, its smeared windows dull brown in the sunshine. "Why?"
"Because he is a Herondale," said Jem. "And the Carstairs owe the Herondales."
A faint shudder went through Emma. Her father had spoken the same words to her, many times.
"Years ago, Tobias Herondale was convicted of desertion," said Jem. "He was sentenced to death, but he could not be found, so the sentence was carried out on his wife instead. She was pregnant. A warlock, Catarina Loss, smuggled the baby to safety in the New World."
"The sentence was carried out on his pregnant wife?" Kit said. "What is wrong with you people?"
"That is screwed up," Emma said, for once in agreement with Kit. "So Kit here is descended from Tobias Herondale?"
Tessa nodded. "There is no defense for the Clave's actions. As you know, I was Tessa Herondale once--I knew of Tobias; his story was a legend of horror. But only a few years ago was I told by Catarina of the survival of the child. Jem and I decided to find what had become of the Herondale line. Much searching led us to your father, Kit."
"My father's last name was Rook," Kit muttered.
"Legally, your family has had several names," said Tessa. "It made it quite hard to find you. I assume your father knew of his Shadowhunter blood and was hiding you from us. Certainly posing out in the open as a mundane with the Sight was clever. He was able to make connections, ward his house, bury his identity. Bury you."
Kit spoke in a dull voice. "He used to say I was his biggest secret."
Emma turned onto the road to the Institute.
"Christopher," said Tessa. "We are not Shadowhunters, Jem and I. We are not the Clave, bent on making you something you do not want to be. But your father had many enemies. Now that he is dead and cannot protect you, they will come after you. You will be safest in the Institute."
Kit grunted. He looked neither impressed nor trusting.
It was odd, Emma thought, as they pulled up at the end of the road. The only things Kit had in common with his father, looks-wise, were his height and slenderness. As he stepped out of the car, hunching over his bloody shirt, his eyes were a clear blue. His hair, pale gold waves--that was pure Herondale. And his face, too, the fine bones of it, the gracefulness. He was too bloody and scratched and miserable-looking to tell now, but he'd be devastating someday.
Kit looked at the Institute, all glass and wood and shining in the afternoon light, with loathing. "Aren't Institutes like jails?"
Emma snorted. "They're like big houses. Shadowhunters from all over the world can stay there. They have a million bedrooms. I live in this one."
"Whatever." Kit sounded sullen. "I don't want to go in."
"You could run away," Tessa said, and for the first time Emma heard the hardness under the gentle tone of her voice. It was a reminder that she and Jace shared some of the same blood. "But you would most likely be eaten by a Mantid demon as soon as the sun set."
"I'm not a Shadowhunter," Kit said, getting out of the car. "Stop acting like I am."
"Well, there's a quick test for it," said Jem. "Only a Shadowhunter can open the door of the Institute."
"The door?" Kit stared at it. He was holding one arm close against his body. Emma's gaze sharpened. With Julian as a parabatai, she had become familiar with the way boys handled themselves when they were trying to conceal an injury. Maybe some of that blood was his.
"Kit--" she began.
"Let me get this straight," he interrupted. "If I try to open that door and I can't, you'll let me go?"
Tessa nodded. Before Emma could say anything else, Kit limped up the stairs. She dashed after him, Tessa and Jem behind her. Kit put his shoulder to the door. He shoved.
The door flew open and he half-fell inside, nearly knocking over Tiberius, who had been crossing the entryway. Ty stumbled back and stared at the boy on the floor.
Kit was kneeling, his hand clearly cradling his left arm. He was breathing hard as he looked around, taking in the entryway--the marble floor, carved with runes. The swords hanging on the walls. The mural of the Angel and the Mortal Instruments. "It's impossible," he said. "I can't be."
Ty's look of astonishment faded. "Are you all right?"
"You," Kit said, staring up at Ty. "You pointed a knife at me."
Ty looked uncomfortable. He reached up to tug on a lock of his dark hair. "It was
Kit started to laugh. Still laughing, he sank back onto the floor. Tessa knelt down next to him, putting her hands on his shoulders. Emma couldn't help seeing herself, during the Dark War, breaking down when she realized her parents were dead.
Kit looked up at her. His expression was blurry. It was the expression of someone who was using every bit of his willpower not to cry. "A million bedrooms," he said.
"What?" Emma said.
"You said there were a million bedrooms here," he said, rising to his feet. "I'm going to find an empty one. And then I'm going to lock myself into it. And if anyone tries to break the door down, I'll kill them."
"Do you think he'll be all right?" Emma asked. "Kit, I mean?"
She was standing on the front steps with Jem, who was cradling Church in his arms. The cat had come running up a few moments after Jem had arrived, and practically launched his small furry body into Jem's arms. Jem was petting him now, rubbing absentmindedly under his chin and around his ears. The cat had gone limp under his ministrations, like a washcloth.
The ocean rose and fell at the horizon. Tessa had stepped away from the Institute to make a phone call. Emma could hear her voice in the distance, though not the individual words.
"You can help him," said Jem. "You lost your own parents. You know what it's like."
"But I don't think--" Emma was alarmed. "If he stays, I don't know--" She thought of Julian, of Uncle Arthur, of Diana, of the secrets they were all hiding. "Can't you stay?" she said, and was surprised at the wistfulness in her voice.
Jem smiled at her over Church's head. That smile she remembered from the first time she'd really seen Jem's face, the smile that reminded her, in a way she couldn't have described, of her father. Of the Carstairs blood that they shared. "I would like to stay," he said. "Since we met in Idris, I have missed you, and thought of you often. I would like to visit with you. Spend time with my old violin. But Tessa and I, we must go. We must find Malcolm's body, and the Black Volume, for even leagues underwater a book like that can still cause us trouble."
"Do you remember when we met at my parabatai ceremony? You told me you wished you could be watching over me, but there was something you and Tessa had to find. Was that something Kit?"
"Yes." Jem set Church down, and the cat wobbled off, purring, in search of a shady spot. Smiling, Jem looked so young, it was impossible for Emma to think of him as an ancestor--even an uncle. "We've been searching for him for years. We narrowed the search to this area, and then finally to the Shadow Market. But Johnny Rook was an expert at hiding." He sighed. "I wish he hadn't been. If he'd trusted us, he might be alive now." He pushed a hand distractedly through his dark hair. A lock of it was silver, the color of aluminum. He was looking over at Tessa, and Emma could see the expression in his eyes when he looked at her. The love that had never dimmed over a century.
Love is the weakness of human beings, and the angels despise them for it, and the Clave despises it too, and therefore they punish it. Do you know what happens to parabatai who fall in love? Do you know why it's forbidden?
"Malcolm--" she began.
Jem turned back toward her, the light of sympathy in his dark eyes. "We heard everything from Magnus. He told us that you were the one who killed Malcolm," he said. "That must have been hard. You knew him. It's not like killing demons."
"I knew him," Emma said. "At least, I thought I did."
"We knew him too. Tessa was heartbroken to hear that Malcolm believed that we all lied to him. Concealed from him that Annabel was not an Iron Sister, but was dead, murdered by her family. We believed the story, but he died thinking we all knew the truth. What a betrayal that must have felt like."
"It's strange to think he was your friend. Though I guess he was our friend too."
"People are more than one thing. Warlocks, no less. I would not even hesitate to say that Malcolm once did much good, before he did evil. It is one of the great lessons of growing up, learning that people can do both."
"His story--the one about Annabel--such terrible things happened to both of them, just because they fell in love. Malcolm said something--and I wondered if it was true. It just seemed so strange."
Jem looked puzzled. "What was it?"
"That the Clave despises love because love is something human beings feel. That that's why they make all those Laws, about people not falling in love with Downworlders or with their parabatai. . . . And the Laws don't make sense. . . ." Emma watched Jem out of the corner of her eye. Was she being too obvious?
"The Clave can be awful," he said. "Hidebound and cruel. But some of the things they do are rooted in history. The parabatai Law, for instance."
Emma felt as if her body temperature had dropped several degrees. "What do you mean?"
"I don't know if I should tell you," said Jem, looking off toward the ocean, and his expression was so somber that Emma felt her heart freeze inside her chest. "That's a secret--a secret even from parabatai themselves--only a few know: the Silent Brothers, the Consul . . . I took a vow."
"But you're not a Shadowhunter anymore," Emma said. "The vow doesn't hold." When he said nothing, she pressed on: "You owe me, you know. For not being around."
The corner of his mouth flicked up into a smile. "You drive a hard bargain, Emma Carstairs." He drew in a breath. Emma could hear Tessa's voice, faint on the wind. She was saying Jace's name. "The ritual of parabatai was created so that two Shadowhunters could be stronger together than they were apart. It has always been one of our most powerful weapons. Not everyone has a parabatai, but the fact that they exist is part of what makes Nephilim what they are. Without them, we would be infinitely weaker, in ways it is forbidden for me even to explain. Ideally, the ceremony increases each parabatai's power--runes given to each other are stronger--and the closer the personal bond, the greater the power."
Emma thought of the healing runes she'd drawn on Julian after the arrow poisoning. The way they'd glowed. The Endurance rune he'd given her. How it had behaved like no Endurance rune she'd ever known.
"It was not long after the ritual had been in use for some generations," Jem said, lowering his voice, "that it was discovered that if the bond was too close, if it tipped into romantic love--then it would begin to warp and change the kind of power that was generated by the spell. One-sided love, a crush even, all that seems to pass by the rule--but real, requited, romantic love? It had a terrible cost."
"They'd lose their power?" Emma guessed. "As Shadowhunters?"
"Their power would grow," Jem corrected. "The runes they created would be unlike any others. They would begin to wield magic as warlocks do. But Nephilim are not meant to be magicians. Eventually the power would make them mad, until they became as monsters. They would destroy their families, the others they loved. Death would surround them until eventually they died themselves."
Emma felt as if she were choking. "Why don't they tell us that? Why not warn Nephilim, so they know?"
"It's power, Emma," said Jem. "Some would have wisely avoided the bond, but many others would have rushed to take advantage of it for the wrong reasons. Power will always attract the greedy and the weak."
"I wouldn't want it," Emma said softly. "Not that kind of power."
"There is also human nature to take into account," Jem said, and smiled down at Tessa, who was off the phone and coming up the path toward them. "Being told that love is forbidden does not kill love. It strengthens it."
"What are you two talking about?" Tessa smiled up at them from the foot of the steps.
"Love," Jem said. "How to end it, I suppose."
"Oh, if we could end love just by willing it, life would be very different!" Tessa laughed. "It's easier to end someone else's love for you than kill your love for them. Convince them that you don't love them, or that you are someone they cannot respect--ideally both." Her eyes were wide and gray and youthful; it was hard to believe she was older than nineteen. "To change your own heart, that's nearly impossible."
There was a shimmer in the air. A Portal suddenly appeared, glowing like a ghost door, just above the ground. It opened, and Emma could see as if she were looking through a keyhole: Magnus Bane stood on the other side of the Portal, and beside him was Alec Lightwood, tall and dark-haired and holding a little boy in a white shirt, with navy-blue skin. Alec looked messy and happy, and the way he held Max reminded Emma of the way Julian used to hold Tavvy.
In the middle of raising a hand to greet Emma, Alec paused and turned his head, and said something that sounded like "Raphael." Odd, Emma thought. Alec handed Max over to Magnus and disappeared back into the shadows.
"Tessa Gray!" Magnus shouted, leaning out of the Portal as if he were leaning over a balcony. Max cooed and waved. "Jem Carstairs! Time to go!"
Someone was walking up the road from the beach. Emma could see only a silhouette. But she knew it was Julian. Julian, coming back from the beach where he had waited for her. She would always know it was Julian.
With the courtliness of a generation many years past, Jem bent over her hand in a gentle bow.
"If you need me, tell Church," he said, straightening up. "As you've seen, he can always find me. He'll make sure I come to you."
Then he turned and strode away toward the Portal. Tessa took his hand and smiled up at him, and a moment later they had stepped through the glowing door. It disappeared with a flash of pale gold light, and Emma, blinking, looked down to where Julian stood staring up at her from the foot of the steps.
"Emma?" Julian bounded up the stairs, reaching for her. "Emma, what happened? I waited on the beach--"
She drew away from his touch. A flicker of hurt crossed his face, then he glanced around, as if realizing where they were, and nodded.
"Come with me," he said in a low voice. Emma followed him, half in a daze, as they circled the Institute to the parking lot. He ducked out past the statues and the small garden, Emma behind him, until they were screened from the building by rows of scrub trees and cactus.
He turned so that they stood face-to-face. She could see the worry in his eyes. He reached to cup her cheek in his hand, and she felt her heart thrash against her rib cage.
"You can tell me," he said. "Why didn't you come?"
In a leaden voice, Emma told him about the panicked message from Kit, how she'd bolted immediately for the car. How after everything that the Institute had been through the day before, she hadn't been able to bear dragging anyone else along with her to Rook's. How Rook felt like her responsibility. How she'd tried to call Julian to tell him where she'd gone, but he hadn't picked up. About the Mantids at Rook's house, Jem and Tessa's arrival, the truth about Kit. Everything but what Jem had said to her about parabatai.