Chain of Gold

by Cassandra Clare

  Love’s soul-encircling chains for me.

  —Nizami Ganjavi, Layla and Majnun

  James lay on the bed in his room, atop the covers, his arm flung behind his head. He was gazing at a familiar crack in the ceiling that was shaped a bit like a duck. His father would be horrified.

  Matthew sat beside him, wearing a velvet jacket and matching trousers. James had wavered in and out of consciousness for the first two days after his visit to Belial’s realm. Sometimes he dreamed of the demon world and woke up yelling, reaching for a weapon that wasn’t there. His knives might not have been beside him, but Matthew always was.

  If there was anyone in the world who understood about parabatai, it was James’s parents. On the first night of their return from Highgate, Matthew had dragged a pile of bedding into James’s room, rolled himself up in it, and gone to sleep. No one tried to make him leave—when Tessa brought soup and tea to James, she brought some for Matthew, too. When Will came and brought card games to while away the time, Matthew played as well, and usually lost.

  Not that others weren’t kind as well. When Anna brought James a stylish new necktie to cheer him, she brought one for Matthew. When Lucie smuggled in midnight tarts from the kitchen, there were extras for Matthew. It was possible, as a result, that Matthew was never going home. James could hardly blame him: Charles had certainly been a pill lately. Everyone was hailing Christopher as a hero for having created the antidote to the Mandikhor poison—a tale made even more romantic by the fact that Christopher had been stricken down and healed himself. Few knew Charles almost hadn’t let Thomas use the lab to make it. The words “If it hadn’t been for Alastair Carstairs, everything would have been ruined,” had actually passed Thomas’s lips, causing James to wonder if he’d wandered back into the demon realm.

  Thomas and Christopher visited every day, carrying stories of the aftermath of the sickness. None of those who had been ill remembered chanting James’s name, nor did Ariadne recall her brief possession. The quarantine had been lifted and Charlotte and Henry were returning shortly; Christopher and James were currently both heroes, which angered James greatly as, he pointed out, Cordelia had been with him in the demon realm and had it not been for her, he would have died. Lucie had also saved the day, as had Matthew. Thomas had helped retrieve the malos root from Chiswick House and had made the antidote with his own hands. Anna had taken them to the Hell Ruelle. They were all heroes, in his opinion.

  It was Matthew who asked him, when they were alone, if he thought he might be missing Cordelia. She alone hadn’t come to visit him: the break in her leg was a bad one, it turned out, and would take several days to heal. Lucie had been to see her and reported her in good spirits. “I read to her from The Beautiful Cordelia and she went right to sleep,” Lucie said with delight, “so she must have been very tired.”

  Thomas and Christopher had gone to see her as well, and brought her chocolates. They asked James if he had anything he wanted them to bring to her with his compliments. He shook his head without speaking, afraid what might pour out if he opened his mouth. He didn’t want to discuss Cordelia with anyone. He just wanted to see her. If he saw her, he would know.

  “So,” Matthew said, folding his own arms behind his head. “With your new status as hero of the Clave, do you plan to make any demands?” He regarded the crack in the ceiling plaster. “I would ask for my own personal valet, and Oscar Wilde to be brought to me for conversation.”

  “Isn’t he dead?” said James.

  “Nothing wrong with the undead.” Matthew chuckled. “Wait until our next visit to the Hell Ruelle.”

  James was silent for a moment. He preferred to avoid the Clave, in truth; there was too much they didn’t know. All they had been told—by Lucie, Matthew, and Cordelia—was that he had found and slain the Mandikhor in Highgate Cemetery with the help of his friends. He saw no reason for them to know more.

  The situation had been different with his parents, however. When he had finally been coherent enough to tell the story, he had explained it to them, and to Lucie. He had told them the truth about his encounter with Belial, and the way Belial, having been wounded by Cortana, had crumbled to dust. Lastly, he told them of the blood relationship that existed between the Herondales and the Prince of Hell.

  They had all reacted characteristically. Tessa had been practical and said that she’d been trying to find out who her father was for years, and at least now they knew. Lucie had looked shaken but said she would turn the story into a novel. Will had been angry at the world, and then gone to see Jem.

  Jem, who had promised to keep the secret of Tessa’s parentage, had told Will that while a Prince of Hell could not be killed, such a serious wound would keep Belial weak and disembodied for at least a century.

  James had told Christopher and Thomas as well, but everyone had agreed that it was best to keep the details regarding Belial a secret for now, especially as the Prince of Hell was not a current threat. His realm had crumbled away, Jem had explained, signifying a true loss of power for the Lord of Thieves. It was unlikely that James would ever feel the pull to the demon realm again, or ever see it at all.

  “James?” His door cracked open and his mother stood on the threshold. She smiled when she saw him and Matthew, but there was a line of concern between her brows. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and said, “Someone is here to see you. A young lady.”

  James sat upright. “Cordelia?”

  He saw Matthew give him a sideways look, but Tessa was already shaking her head.

  “Not Cordelia,” she said. “It is Grace Blackthorn.”

  It was Matthew’s turn to bolt into a sitting position. “Oh no,” he said. “No, no. Send her away. Tell her there’s a rat infestation. Tell her that vague, insidious behavior has been made illegal in the Institute and she’s not allowed in.”

  Tessa merely raised her eyebrows. “She said it was regarding an important matter.”

  Matthew turned to James imploringly. “Jamie. Don’t. After what she did…”

  James glared at his parabatai. Even now, Tessa and Will knew little of the understanding he had once shared with Grace, and he preferred to keep it that way.

  “Is it about her mother?” he said. “Isn’t Tatiana well again?”

  “She is quite well,” said Tessa. The antidote had been incredibly effective; as far as James knew, not a single poisoned Shadowhunter had not recovered. “James, if you don’t want to see her—”

  “I’ll see her,” James said, rising to his feet. “Send her in.”

  As Tessa went to fetch Grace, Matthew rolled off the bed and toed on his shoes. He turned at the door to give James a sharp look. “Be careful,” he said, and departed, leaving the door open.

  A moment later, as if she had been waiting for Matthew to leave, Grace came into the room.

  She looked beautiful, as always. Her white-blond hair was pulled smoothly back from her oval face. Her cheeks were flushed with pale pink color, like the inside of a seashell. She wore a green dress, its hem wet and a bit draggled—it had been raining on and off for most of the day, and it was now late afternoon.

  Once her beauty had shaken him like a storm. Now, seeing her, he felt only a great weariness—a bleary exhaustion, as if he had drunk too much the night before. He wished she were not here. Not because it hurt him to look at her, but because it didn’t.

  He had thought of himself as someone who loved more deeply than that. “You wanted to talk to me alone,” he said. “Are you sure that’s a good idea? Your mother—”

  “Would go mad if she knew I was here,” Grace said. “Yes. But I had to talk to you.”

  “You had better close the door, then,” he said. He had never been so short with Grace. It felt odd and awkward, but then, it felt odd and awkward for her to be here at all.

  Grace’s hands shook as she closed the door. She turned back and, to James’s immense surprise, knelt down on the floor in front of him.

  He took a step bac
k. “Grace. Don’t.”

  “I must,” she said. Her hands were in fists. “I understand why you don’t want to listen to me. You have every reason. But I must beg you to do just that.” She exhaled a shuddering breath. “I engaged myself to Charles because I believed that by the time my mother recovered, she would be unable to hurt me. She would find me protected by the Consul’s family.”

  “Yes,” said James. “I know. They will indeed protect you. The Fairchilds are good people.” He exhaled. “Grace, get up, please.”

  She got to her feet, her chin raised. “I returned to Chiswick House with Charles yesterday, to fetch some of my belongings,” she said. “I intend to remain away from home until my marriage. I saw my mother there, and at first I thought I had been successful. She seemed pleased I had made a powerful match. Then I realized she had lost interest in what I had done because she had larger plans.”

  James frowned. Under her eyes he could see the tracks of recent tears. Worry stirred, despite himself. “What kind of plans?”

  “You know she hates you and your father,” Grace said rapidly. “She hates her brothers as well. She has always believed that one day they would kill her to get Chiswick House back.”

  “In the state it’s in, she’d be lucky if anyone wanted it,” said James, but Grace didn’t seem to hear him.

  “When she woke from her sickness, she found out somehow—I do not know how—that you had nearly died, and she believes…” Grace seemed to be struggling for words. “She has always believed that Jesse might be brought back from the dead if she used necromancy. She called upon warlocks, hoping they would do dark magic for her. She begged demons to help her—”

  James was appalled. “But that is madness. To dabble in such things is a near-certain death sentence.”

  “She did not dabble. She dedicated herself to the idea, collecting books of necromancy, scouring Shadow Markets for Hands of Glory—”

  “But the Enclave searched Chiswick House. They found no trace of dark magic.”

  “She keeps it all at the manor in Idris.”

  “And you never told me of any of this?” said James.

  “How could I? And implicate you, too? She is mad where you are concerned. Since she awoke from her poisoned sleep, she has been raging and ranting. She says she knows now there is no chance Jesse will ever return. She says it is as if you stole his last breath by surviving the Mandikhor.”

  “What?” James’s head was spinning. “How would that be possible?”

  “I would tell you if I knew. James, she is dangerous,” said Grace. “She has built herself a palace of dreams and lies, and when those lies are threatened, she lashes out. Do you remember the automaton in the hallway of the manor in Idris?”

  “Yes, though I don’t see what that has to do with anything—”

  “It was enspelled by a warlock years ago,” said Grace. “In the event of her death, it is enchanted to rise up and kill Shadowhunters. Now she has decided that Jesse will never rise and that she has nothing to live for. She plans to end her life tonight, and when she does, it will wreak havoc. It will go to Alicante—”

  James’s heart had begun to pound. “I understand what it will do,” he said. “Grace, we must go to my parents with this information.”

  “No! No one must know, James. If the Clave arrests my mother, if they search Blackthorn Manor, they will see how deeply my mother has sunk into necromancy and black magic, and I will be at fault as well, and Jesse—” She broke off, her hands fluttering like panicked moths. “If she knew I had given away her secrets, Mama would want me to be blamed, James. I could be locked in the Silent City.”

  “That need not happen. This is Tatiana’s sin, not yours. And she is clearly mad—there can be mercy for the mad—”

  She raised her face to his. Her eyes gleamed; tears or determination, he could not tell. “James,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Sorry?” he echoed. “For what?”

  “I never wanted to do this to you,” she said. “But she insisted. And he insisted. It had to be you. My mother made me her blade, to cut every barrier raised against her. But your blood, his blood, is a barrier I cannot cut. I cannot bind you without his chain.”

  Something silver flashed in her hand. She caught at his arm; he tried to pull away, but she held fast. He felt something cold against his skin, and heard a click like a lock turning as the metal circle closed about his wrist. A spark of pain traveled up his arm, like a sudden shock of electricity.

  He tried to step back. Shadowy images rose before his eyes. In the last moment before it all changed, he saw Cordelia—she stood some distance away from him, at the edge of the Institute roof. When he tried to turn, to look at her, she covered her face with her hands and moved back, out of his reach. He saw the moon behind her, or perhaps it was not the moon. It was a silver, spinning thing, a wheel in the night, so bright it blinded him to every other star.

  * * *

  It had been raining in London, but the weather in Idris, even at the edge of sunset, was warm. Lucie had followed Uncle Jem along the path from the spot where they had Portaled in, just outside Alicante. One could not Portal directly into the walled city; it was warded against such things. Lucie didn’t mind. Her destination was not within the city limits.

  Jem—she never could think of him as Brother Zachariah, no matter how hard she tried—walked along beside her as they skirted the Imperishable Fields. His hood was down, and the wind ruffled his black hair. Though his face was scarred, she realized for the first time that it was a young face—much more like her mother’s than her father’s. Was it strange for Will, she wondered, to be aging and have Jem remain in appearance still a boy? Or when you loved someone, did you not notice these things, just as her parents saw no difference between themselves?

  It is there. Jem gestured toward what looked like a miniature city of white houses. It was the necropolis of Alicante, where families of Idris were buried. Narrow lanes threaded among the mausoleums, paved with crushed white stone. Lucie had always loved the way the tombs looked like small houses, with doors or gates and sloping roofs. Unlike mundanes, Shadowhunters did not tend to decorate their graves with statues of angels. The names of the families who owned the tombs were carved over the doors, or etched on metal plates: BELLEFLEUR, CARTWRIGHT, CROSSKILL, LOVELACE, even BRIDGESTOCK. Death made unlikely neighbors. She found what she was looking for at last, a large tomb under a shaded tree, bearing the name BLACKTHORN.

  She stopped and looked. It was a tomb like any other, save for the design of thorns that ran around the plinth. The names of those who had died marched up and down the tomb’s left side like orderly soldiers. It was easy to find the newest. JESSE BLACKTHORN, BORN 1879, DIED 1896.

  It had only been 1897 when she had met him in the woods, Lucie realized. He had been a ghost for such a short time. He had seemed so much older than her then; she had never given thought to how frightened he must have been himself.

  Everybody thought Jesse had died long ago. Nobody knew what he had sacrificed since.

  She touched the locket hanging around her throat and turned to Jem. “Can I have a moment alone here, please?”

  Jem glanced down at her, clearly worried. It was hard to read his face, his closed eyes, but he had hesitated when she first asked him to bring her to Idris to pay respects in the graveyard and not to tell her parents. He had only agreed when she’d said that if he didn’t do it, she’d find a warlock who would take her.

  He touched her hair lightly. Do not dwell too much on death. Lucie means light. Look to the day, not the night.

  “I know, Uncle Jem,” she said. “It will only be a moment.”

  He nodded and vanished into the shadows, the way Silent Brothers always did.

  Lucie turned back to the tomb. She knew it did not contain any part of Jesse, yet it comforted her to be there all the same. “I have told no one what I saw at Chiswick House, and I never shall,” she said aloud. “I haven’t kept silence to prote
ct Grace, or your mother. Only to protect you. I did not expect you to be such a true friend as you were, Jesse. I did not expect you to give your life for my brother’s. I knew you had been angry at me only moments before, and more than anything I regret not being able to tell you I was sorry. I should not have used my power like that. It is still hard to imagine I have a power, and even now I do not quite understand it.” She touched his name with her fingertips, letters cut evenly into smooth marble. “Without you, I am not sure I will ever understand it.”

  “You will.”

  She looked up, and there he was. Jesse, leaning against the side of the tomb like a farmer’s boy against a gate. Smiling his odd little smile, straight black hair in his eyes. Lucie dropped the flowers she was holding and reached out, without pausing to think, to grasp his hand.

  Her fingers brushed through emptiness. Aside from a path of colder air, there was no solidity to him, as there had been before.

  She drew her hand back, pressing it against her chest. “Jesse.”

  “I find my strength is fading,” he said. “Perhaps there was more to this last breath business than I thought.”

  “I am so sorry,” Lucie whispered. “This is my fault.”

  “Lucie, no.” Jesse stepped forward; she felt the cold emanating from his body, and stared up at him. He seemed less human, and ironically more oddly beautiful, than he had before: his skin was smooth as glass, his lashes black and startling. “You let me be something I had never been before, even when I was living. A Shadowhunter. You let me be part of what you did. I never thought I would again be given the chance to make a difference.”

  “You made every difference,” Lucie said. “Without your help, we could not have done what we did, even if the others don’t know it. And you saved James’s life. I will always owe you.”

  Jesse’s eyes were nearly black. “You need not owe the dead, Lucie.”

  “I do,” she whispered. “Is your body still at Chiswick House? Is Grace watching over you?”