Clary, I’m about to do something stupid and dangerous and maybe suicidal. Is it so bad I want to talk to you one last time? I’m doing this to keep you safe, and I don’t even know if you’re alive for me to help you. But if you were dead, I’d know, wouldn’t I? I’d feel it.
“All right. Let’s go,” Magnus said, appearing at the foot of the steps. He eyed the ring on Simon’s hand, but made no comment.
Simon stood up and brushed off his jeans, then led the way down the wandering path through the orchard. The lake sparkled up ahead like a cold blue coin. As they neared it, Simon could see the old dock sticking out into the water, where once they had tied up kayaks before a big piece of the dock had broken off and drifted away. He thought he could almost hear the lazy hum of bees and feel the weight of summer on his shoulders. As they reached the lake’s edge, he twisted around and looked up at the farmhouse, white-painted clapboard with green shutters and an old covered sunporch with tired white wicker furniture on it.
“You really liked it here, huh?” Isabelle said. Her black hair snapped like a banner in the breeze off the lake.
“How can you tell?”
“Your expression,” she said. “Like you’re remembering something good.”
“It was good,” Simon said. He reached up to push his glasses up his nose, remembered he no longer wore them, and lowered his hand. “I was lucky.”
She looked down at the lake. She was wearing small gold hoop earrings; one was tangled in a bit of her hair, and Simon wanted to reach over and free it, to touch the side of her face with his fingers. “And now you’re not?”
He shrugged. He was watching Magnus, who was holding what looked like a long, flexible rod and drawing in the wet sand at the lake’s edge. He had the spell book open and was chanting as he drew. Alec was watching him, with the expression of someone watching a stranger.
“Are you scared?” Isabelle asked, moving slightly closer to Simon. He could feel the warmth of her arm against his.
“I don’t know. So much of being scared is the physical feeling of it. Your heart speeding up, sweating, your pulse racing. I don’t get any of that.”
“That’s too bad,” Isabelle murmured, looking at the water. “Guys getting all sweaty is hot.”
He shot her a half smile; it was harder than he thought it would be. Maybe he was scared. “That’s enough of your sass and back talk, missy.”
Isabelle’s lip quivered as if she were about to smile. Then she sighed. “You know what it never even crossed my mind I wanted?” she said. “A guy who could make me laugh.”
Simon turned toward her, reaching for her hand, not caring for the moment that her brother was watching. “Izzy . . .”
“All right,” Magnus called out. “I’m done. Simon, over here.”
They turned. Magnus was standing inside the circle, which was glowing with a faint white light. It was really two circles, a slightly smaller one inside a larger one, and in the space between the circles, dozens of symbols had been scrawled. They, too, glowed, a steely blue-white like the reflection off the lake.
Simon heard Isabelle’s soft intake of breath, and he stepped away before he could look at her. It would just make it all harder. He moved forward, over the border of the circle, into its center, beside Magnus. Looking out from the center of the circle was like looking through water. The rest of the world seemed wavering and indistinct.
“Here.” Magnus shoved the book into his hands. The paper was thin, covered in scrawled runes, but Magnus had taped a printout of the words, spelled out phonetically, over the incantation itself. “Just sound these out,” he muttered. “It should work.”
Holding the book against his chest, Simon slipped off the gold ring that connected him to Clary, and handed it to Magnus. “If it doesn’t,” he said, wondering where his strange calm was coming from, “someone should take this. It’s our only link to Clary, and what she knows.”
Magnus nodded and slid the ring onto his finger. “Ready, Simon?”
“Hey,” said Simon. “You remembered my name.”
Magnus shot him an unreadable glance from his green-gold eyes, and stepped outside the circle. Immediately he was blurry and indistinct too. Alec joined him on one side, Isabelle on the other; Isabelle was hugging her elbows, and even through the wavering air Simon could tell how unhappy she looked.
Simon cleared his throat. “I guess you guys had better go.”
But they didn’t move. They seemed to be waiting for him to say something else.
“Thanks for coming here with me,” he said finally, having racked his brain for something meaningful to say; they seemed to be expecting it. He wasn’t the sort who made big farewell speeches or bid people dramatic good-byes. He looked at Alec first. “Um, Alec. I always liked you better than I liked Jace.” He turned to Magnus. “Magnus, I wish I had the nerve to wear the kind of pants you do.”
And last, Izzy. He could see her watching him through the haze, her eyes as black as obsidian.
“Isabelle,” Simon said. He looked at her. He saw the question in her eyes, but there seemed nothing he could say in front of Alec and Magnus, nothing that would encompass what he felt. He moved back, toward the center of the circle, bowing his head. “Good-bye, I guess.”
He thought they spoke back to him, but the wavering haze between them blurred their words. He watched as they turned, retreating up the path through the orchard, back toward the house, until they had become dark specks. Until he could no longer see them at all.
He couldn’t quite fathom not talking to Clary one last time before he died—he couldn’t even remember the last words they’d exchanged. And yet if he closed his eyes, he could hear her laughter drifting over the orchard; he could remember what it had been like, before they had grown up and everything had changed. If he died here, perhaps it would be appropriate. Some of his best memories were here, after all. If the Angel struck him down with fire, his ashes could sift through the apple orchard and over the lake. Something about the idea seemed peaceful.
He thought of Isabelle. Then of his family—his mother, his father, and Becky. Clary, he thought lastly. Wherever you are, you’re my best friend. You’ll always be my best friend.
He raised the spell book and began to chant.
“No!” Clary stood up, dropping the wet towel. “Jace, you can’t. They’ll kill you.”
He reached for a fresh shirt and shrugged it on, not looking at her as he did up the buttons. “They’ll try to separate me from Sebastian first,” he said, though he didn’t sound as if he quite believed it. “If that doesn’t work, then they’ll kill me.”
“Not good enough.” She reached for him, but he turned away from her, jamming his feet into boots. When he turned back, his expression was grim.
“I don’t have a choice, Clary. This is the right thing to do.”
“It’s insane. You’re safe here. You can’t throw away your life—”
“Saving myself is treason. It’s putting a weapon into the hands of the enemy.”
“Who cares about treason? Or the Law?” she demanded. “I care about you. We’ll figure this out together—”
“We can’t figure this out.” Jace pocketed the stele on the nightstand, then caught up the Mortal Cup. “Because I’m only going to be me for a little while longer. I love you, Clary.” He tilted her face up and kissed her, lingeringly. “Do this for me,” he whispered.
“I absolutely will not,” she said. “I will not try to help you get yourself killed.”
But he was already striding toward the door. He drew her with him, and they stumbled down the corridor, speaking in whispers.
“This is crazy,” Clary hissed. “Putting yourself in the path of danger—”
He blew out an exasperated breath. “As if you don’t.”
“Right, and it makes you furious,” she whispered as she raced after him down the staircase. “Remember what you said to me in Alicante—”
They had reached the kitchen. He put
the Cup down on the counter, reaching for his stele. “I had no right to say that,” he told her. “Clary, this is what we are. We’re Shadowhunters. This is what we do. There are risks we take that aren’t just the risks you find in battle.”
Clary shook her head, clutching both his wrists. “I won’t let you.”
A look of pain crossed his face. “Clarissa—”
She drew a deep breath, barely able to believe what she was about to do. But in her mind was the image of the morgue in the Silent City, of Shadowhunter bodies stretched out on marble slabs, and she could not bear for Jace to be one of them. Everything she had done—coming here, enduring everything she had endured, had been to save his life, and not just for herself. She thought of Alec and Isabelle, who had helped her, and Maryse, who loved him, and almost without knowing she was about to do it, she raised her voice and called out:
“Jonathan!” she screamed. “Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern!”
Jace’s eyes widened into circles. “Clary—” he began, but it was too late already. She had let go of him and was backing away. Sebastian might already be coming; there was no way to tell Jace that it wasn’t that she trusted Sebastian but that Sebastian was the only weapon she had at her disposal that could possibly make him stay.
There was a flash of movement, and Sebastian was there. He hadn’t bothered with running down the stairs, just flipped himself over the side and landed between them. His hair was sleep-mussed; he wore a dark T-shirt and black pants, and Clary wondered distractedly if he slept in his clothes. He glanced between Clary and Jace, his black eyes taking in the situation. “Lovers’ spat?” he inquired. Something glinted in his hand. A knife?
Clary’s voice shook. “His rune’s damaged. Here.” She put her hand over her heart. “He’s trying to go back, to give himself up to the Clave—”
Sebastian’s hand shot out and grabbed the Cup out of Jace’s hand. He slammed it down on the kitchen counter. Jace, still white with shock, watched him; he didn’t move a muscle as Sebastian stepped close and took Jace by the front of the shirt. The top buttons on the shirt popped open, baring his collar, and Sebastian slashed the point of his stele across it, gashing an iratze into the skin. Jace bit down on his lip, his eyes full of hatred as Sebastian released him and took a step back, stele in hand.
“Honestly, Jace,” he said. “The idea that you thought you could get away with something like this just knocks me out.”
Jace’s hands tightened into fists as the iratze, black as charcoal, began to sink into his skin. His words were eked out, breathless: “Next time . . . you want to be knocked out . . . I’d be happy to help you. Maybe with a brick.”
Sebastian made a tsk noise. “You’ll thank me later. Even you have to admit this death wish of yours is a little extreme.”
Clary expected Jace to snap back at him again. But he didn’t. His gaze traveled slowly across Sebastian’s face. For that moment there was only the two of them in the room, and when Jace spoke, his words came cold and clear. “I won’t remember this later,” he said. “But you will. That person who acts like your friend—” He took a step forward, closing the space between himself and Sebastian. “That person who acts like they like you. That person isn’t real. This is real. This is me. And I hate you. I will always hate you. And there is no magic and no spell in this world or any other that will ever change that.”
For a moment the grin on Sebastian’s face wavered. But Jace didn’t. Instead, he tore his gaze from Sebastian and looked at Clary. “I need you to know,” he said, “the truth—I didn’t tell you all the truth.”
“The truth is dangerous,” said Sebastian, holding the stele before him like a knife. “Be careful what you say.”
Jace winced. His chest was rising and falling rapidly; it was clear that the healing of the rune on his chest was causing him physical pain. “The plan,” he said. “To raise Lilith, to make a new Cup, to create a dark army—that wasn’t Sebastian’s plan. It was mine.”
Clary froze. “What?”
“Sebastian knew what he wanted,” said Jace. “But I figured out how he could do it. A new Mortal Cup—I gave him that idea.” He jerked in pain; she could imagine what was happening under the cloth of his shirt: the skin knitting together, healing, Lilith’s rune whole and shining once again. “Or, should I say, he did. That thing that looks like me but isn’t? He’ll burn down the world if Sebastian wants him to, and laugh while he’s doing it. That’s what you’re saving, Clary. That. Don’t you understand? I’d rather be dead—”
His voice choked off as he doubled over. The muscles in his shoulders tightened as ripples of what looked like pain went through him. Clary remembered holding him in the Silent City as the Brothers rooted through his mind for answers—Now he looked up, his expression bewildered.
His eyes shifted first not to her but to Sebastian. She felt her heart plummet, though she knew this was only her own doing.
“What’s going on?” Jace said.
Sebastian grinned at him. “Welcome back.”
Jace blinked, looking momentarily confused—and then his gaze seemed to slide inward, the way it did whenever Clary tried to bring up something that he couldn’t process—Max’s murder, the war in Alicante, the pain he was causing his family.
“Is it time?” he said.
Sebastian made a show of looking at his watch. “Just about. Why don’t you go on ahead and we’ll follow? You can start getting things ready.”
Jace glanced around. “The Cup—where is it?”
Sebastian took it off the kitchen counter. “Right here. Feeling a little absentminded?”
Jace’s mouth curled at the corner, and he grabbed the Cup back. Good-naturedly. There was no sign of the boy who had stood in front of Sebastian moments ago and told him he hated him. “All right. I’ll meet you there.” He turned to Clary, who was still frozen in shock, and kissed her cheek. “And you.”
He drew back and winked at her. There was affection in his eyes, but it didn’t matter. This was not her Jace, very clearly not her Jace, and she watched numbly as he crossed the room. His stele flashed, and a door opened in the wall; she caught a glimpse of sky and rocky plain, and then he stepped through it and was gone.
She dug her nails into her palms.
That thing that looks like me but isn’t? He’ll burn down the world if Sebastian wants him to, and laugh while he’s doing it. That’s what you’re saving, Clary. That. Don’t you understand? I’d rather be dead.
Tears burned at the back of her throat, and it was all she could do to hold them off as her brother turned to her, his black eyes very bright. “You called for me,” he said.
“He wanted to give himself up to the Clave,” she whispered, not sure who she was defending herself to. She had done what she’d had to, used the only weapon at hand, even if it was one she despised. “They would have killed him.”
“You called for me,” he said again, and took a step toward her. He reached out and lifted a long lock of her hair away from her face, tucking it back behind her ear. “He told you, then? The plan? All of it?”
She fought back a shiver of revulsion. “Not all of it. I don’t know what’s happening tonight. What did Jace mean ‘It’s time’?”
He leaned down and kissed her forehead; she felt the kiss burn, like a brand between her eyes. “You’ll find out,” he said. “You’ve earned the right to be there, Clarissa. You can watch it all from your place at my side, tonight, at the Seventh Sacred Site. Both of Valentine’s children, together . . . at last.”
Simon kept his eyes on the paper, chanting out the words Magnus had written for him. They had a rhythm to them that was like music, light and sharp and fine. He was reminded of reading aloud his haftarah portion during his bar mitzvah, though he had known what the words meant then, and now he didn’t.
As the chant went on, he felt a tightening around him, as if the air were becoming denser and heavier. It pressed down on his chest and shoulders. The air was growing warmer
as well. If he were human, the heat might have been unbearable. As it was, he could feel the burn of it on his skin, singeing his eyelashes, his shirt. He kept his eyes fixed on the paper in front of him as a bead of blood ran from his hairline to drip onto the paper.
And then he was done. The last of the words—“Raziel”—was spoken, and he lifted his head. He could feel blood running down his face. The haze around him had cleared, and in front of him he saw the water of the lake, blue and sparkling, as untroubled as glass.
And then it exploded.
The center of the lake turned gold, then black. Water rushed away from it, pouring toward the edges of the lake, flying into the air until Simon was staring at a ring of water, like a circle of unbroken waterfalls, all shimmering and pouring upward and downward, the effect bizarre and strangely beautiful. Water droplets shivered down onto him, cooling his burning skin. He tipped his head back, just as the sky went black—all the blue of it gone, eaten up in a sudden shock of darkness and clamoring gray clouds. The water splashed back down into the lake, and from its center, the greatest density of its silver, rose a figure all of gold.
Simon’s mouth went dry. He had seen countless paintings of angels, believed in them, had heard Magnus’s warning. And still he felt as if he had been struck through with a spear as before him a pair of wings unfolded. They seemed to span the sky. They were vast, white and gold and silver, the feathers of them set with burning golden eyes. The eyes regarded him with scorn. Then the wings lifted, scattering clouds before them, and folded back, and a man—or the shape of a man, towering and many stories tall, unfolded itself and rose.
Simon’s teeth had started to chatter. He wasn’t sure why. But waves of power, of something more than power—of the elemental force of the universe—seemed to roll off the Angel as he rose to his full height. Simon’s first and rather bizarre thought was that it looked as if someone had taken Jace and blown him up to the size of a billboard. Only he didn’t quite look like Jace at all. He was gold all over, from his wings to his skin to his eyes, which had no whites at all, only a sheen of gold like a membrane. His hair was gold and looked cut from pieces of metal that curled like wrought ironwork. He was alien and terrifying. Too much of anything could destroy you, Simon thought. Too much darkness could kill, but too much light could blind.
Cassandra Clare: The Mortal Instruments Series Page 199
