Now this is the Law of the Jungle,
as old and as true as the sky,
And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper,
but the Wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree trunk,
the Law runneth forward and back;
For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf,
and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
Jordan stared blindly at the poem tacked to the wall of his bedroom. It was an old print that he’d found in a used-book store, the words surrounded by an elaborate border of leaves. The poem was by Rudyard Kipling, and it so neatly encapsulated the rules by which werewolves lived, the Law that bound their actions, that he wondered if Kipling hadn’t been a Downworlder himself, or at least known about the Accords. Jordan had felt compelled to buy the print and stick it up on his wall, though he’d never been one for poetry.
He’d been pacing his apartment for the last hour, sometimes taking his phone out to see if Maia had texted, in between bouts of opening the refrigerator and staring into it to see if anything worth eating had appeared. It hadn’t, but he didn’t want to go out to get food in case she came to the apartment while he was out. He also took a shower, cleaned up the kitchen, tried to watch TV and failed, and started the process of organizing all his DVDs by color.
He was restless. Restless in the way he sometimes got before the full moon, knowing the Change was coming, feeling the pull of the tides in his blood. But the moon was waning, not waxing, and it wasn’t the Change making him feel like crawling out of his skin. It was Maia. It was being without her, after almost two solid days in her company, never more than a few feet away from her.
She’d gone without him to the police station, saying that now wasn’t the time to upset the pack with a nonmember, even though Luke was healing. There was no need for Jordan to come, she’d argued, since all she had to do was ask Luke if it was all right for Simon and Magnus to visit the farm tomorrow, and then she’d call up to the farm and warn any of the pack who might be staying up there to clear off the property. She was right, Jordan knew. There was no reason for him to go with her, but the moment she was gone, the restlessness kicked up inside him. Was she leaving because she was sick of being with him? Had she rethought and decided she’d been right about him before? And what was going on between them? Were they dating? Maybe you should have asked her before you slept together, genius, he told himself, and realized he was standing in front of the refrigerator again. Its contents hadn’t changed-bottles of blood, a defrosting pound of ground beef, and a dented apple.
The key turned in the front door lock, and he jumped away from the refrigerator, spinning around. He looked down at himself. He was barefoot, in jeans and an old T-shirt. Why hadn’t he taken the time while she’d been away to shave, look better, put on some cologne or something? He ran his hands quickly through his hair as Maia came into the living room, dropping his spare set of keys onto the coffee table. She had changed clothes, into a soft pink sweater and jeans. Her cheeks were pink from the cold, her lips red and her eyes bright. He wanted to kiss her so badly it hurt.
Instead he swallowed. “So-how did it go?”
“Fine. Magnus can use the farm. I already texted him.” She strolled over to him and leaned her elbows on the counter. “I also told Luke what Raphael said about Maureen. I hope that’s okay.”
Jordan was puzzled. “Why’d you think he needed to know?”
She seemed to deflate. “Oh, God. Don’t tell me I was supposed to keep it a secret.”
“No-I was just wondering-“
“Well, if there really is a rogue vampire cutting her way through Lower Manhattan, the pack should know. It’s their territory. Besides, I wanted his advice about whether we should tell Simon or not.”
“What about my advice?” He was playing at sounding hurt, but there was a little part of him that meant it. They’d discussed it before, whether Jordan should tell his assignment that Maureen was out there and killing, or whether it would just be another burden to add to everything Simon was dealing with now. Jordan had come down on the side of not telling him-what could he do about it, anyway?-but Maia hadn’t been so sure.
She jumped up on top of the counter and swung around to face him. Even sitting down, she was taller than him this way, her brown eyes sparkling down into his. “I wanted grown-up advice.”
He grabbed hold of her swinging legs and ran his hands up the seams of her jeans. “I’m eighteen-not grown-up enough for you?”
She put her hands on his shoulders and flexed them, as if testing his muscles. “Well, you’ve definitely grown…”
He pulled her down from the counter, catching her around the waist and kissing her. Fire sizzled up and down his veins as she kissed him back, her body melting against his. He slid his hands up into her hair, knocking her knitted cap off and letting her curls spring free. He kissed her neck as she pulled his shirt up over his head and ran her hands all over him-shoulders, back, arms, purring in her throat like a cat. He felt like a helium balloon-high from kissing her, and light with relief. So she wasn’t done with him after all.
“Jordy,” she said. “Wait.”
She almost never called him that, unless it was serious. His heartbeat, already wild, speeded up further. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s just-if every time we see each other, we fall into bed-and I know I started it, I’m not blaming you or anything-It’s just that maybe we should talk.”
He stared at her, at her big dark eyes, the fluttery pulse in her throat, the flush on her cheeks. With an effort he spoke evenly. “Okay. What do you want to talk about?”
She just looked at him. After a moment she shook her head and said, “Nothing.” She locked her hands behind his head and pulled him close, kissing him hard, fitting her body against his. “Nothing at all.”
Clary didn’t know how long it was before Jace came out of the bathroom, toweling off his wet hair. She looked up at him from where she was still sitting on the edge of the bed. He was sliding a blue cotton T-shirt on over smooth golden skin marked with white scars.
She darted her eyes away as he came across the room and sat down next to her on the bed, smelling strongly of soap.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Now she did look at him, in surprise. She had wondered if he were capable of being sorry, in his current state. His expression was grave, a little curious, but not insincere.
“Wow,” she said. “That cold shower must have been brutal.”
His lips quirked up at the side, but his expression grew serious again almost immediately. He put his hand under her chin. “I shouldn’t have pushed you. It’s just-ten weeks ago, just holding each other would have been unthinkable.”
“I know.”
He cupped her face in his hands, his long fingers cool against her cheeks, tilting her face up. He was looking down at her, and everything about him was so familiar-the pale gold irises of his eyes, the scar on his cheek, the full lower lip, the slight chip in his tooth that saved his looks from being so perfect that they were annoying-and yet somehow it was like coming back to a house she had lived in as a child, and knowing that though the exterior might look the same, a different family lived there now. “I never cared,” he said. “I wanted you anyway. I always wanted you. Nothing mattered to me but you. Not ever.”
Clary swallowed. Her stomach fluttered, not just with the usual butterflies she felt around Jace but with real uneasiness.
“But Jace. That’s not true. You cared about your family. And-I always thought you were proud of being Nephilim. One of the angels.”
“Proud?” he said. “To be half angel, half human-you’re always conscious of your own inadequacy. You’re not an angel. You’re not beloved of Heaven. Raziel doesn’t care about us. We can’t even pray to him. We pray to nothing. We pray for nothing. Remember when I told you I thought I had demon blood, because it explained why I felt the way I did about you? It was a relief in a way, thinking that. I’ve never been an angel, never even close. Well,” he added. “Maybe the fallen kind.”
“Fallen angels are demons.”
“I don’t want to be Nephilim,” said Jace. “I want to be something else. Stronger, faster, better than human. But different. Not subservient to the Laws of an angel who couldn’t care less about us. Free.” He ran his hand through a curl of her hair. “I’m happy now, Clary. Doesn’t that make a difference?”
“I thought we were happy together,” Clary said.
“I’ve always been happy with you,” he said. “But I never thought I deserved it.”
“And now you do?”
“And now that feeling’s gone,” he said. “All I know is that I love you. And for the first time, that’s good enough.”
She closed her eyes. A moment later he was kissing her again, very softly this time, his mouth tracing the shape of hers. She felt herself go pliant under his hands. She sensed it as his breathing quickened and her own pulse jumped. His hands stroked down through her hair, over her back, to her waist. His touch was comforting-the feel of his heartbeat against hers like familiar music-and if the key was slightly different, with her eyes closed, she couldn’t tell. Their blood was the same, under the skin, she thought, as the Seelie Queen had said; her heart raced when his did, had nearly stopped when his had. If she had to do it all again, she thought, under the pitiless gaze of Raziel, she would have done the same thing.
This time he drew back, letting his fingers linger on her cheek, her lips. “I want what you want,” he said. “Whenever you want it.”
Clary felt a shudder go down her spine. The words were simple, but there was a dangerous and seductive invitation to the fall of his voice: Whatever you want, whenever you want it. His hand smoothed down her hair, to her back, lingering at her waist. She swallowed. There was only so much that she was going to be able to hold back.
“Read to me,” she said suddenly.
He blinked down at her. “What?”
She was looking past him, at the books on his nightstand. “It’s a lot to process,” she said. “What Sebastian said, what happened last night, everything. I need to sleep, but I’m too keyed up. When I was young and I couldn’t sleep, my mother used to read to me to relax me.”
“And I remind you of your mother now? I have got to look into a manlier cologne.”
“No, it’s just-I thought it would be nice.”
He scooted back against the pillows, reaching for the stack of books by the bed. “Anything particular you want to hear?” With a flourish he picked up the book on top of the stack. It looked old, leather-bound, the title stamped in gold on the front. A Tale of Two Cities. “Dickens is always promising…”
“I’ve read that before. For school,” Clary recalled. She scooted up on the pillows beside Jace. “But I don’t remember any of it, so I wouldn’t mind hearing it again.”
“Excellent. I’ve been told I have a lovely, melodic reading voice.” He flipped the book open to the front page, where the title was printed in ornate script. Across from it was a long dedication, the ink faded now and barely legible, though Clary could make out the signature: With hope at last, William Herondale.
“Some ancestor of yours,” Clary said, brushing her finger against the page.
“Yes. Odd that Valentine had it. My father must have given it to him.” Jace opened to a random page and began to read:
“He unshaded his face after a little while, and spoke steadily. ‘Don’t be afraid to hear me. Don’t shrink from anything I say. I am like one who died young. All my life might have been.’
“‘No, Mr. Carton. I am sure that the best part of it might still be; I am sure that you might be much, much worthier of yourself.'”
“Oh, I do remember this story now,” Clary said. “Love triangle. She picks the boring guy.”
Jace chuckled softly. “Boring to you. Who can say what got Victorian ladies hot beneath the petticoats?”
“It’s true, you know.”
“What, about the petticoats?”
“No. That you have a lovely reading voice.” Clary turned her face against his shoulder. It was times like this, more than when he was kissing her, that hurt-times when he could have been her Jace. As long as she kept her eyes closed.
“All that, and abs of steel,” Jace said, turning another page. “What more could you ask for?”
Chapter 17: Valediction
As I strolled down along the quay
All in the lateness of the day
I heard a lovely maiden say:
“Alack, for I can get no play.”
A minstrel boy heard what she said
And straight he rushed to her aid…
“Do we have to keep listening to this wail-ey music?” Isabelle demanded, her booted foot tapping against the dashboard of Jordan’s truck.
“I happen to like this wail-ey music, my girl, and since I’m driving, I get to choose,” Magnus said loftily. He was indeed driving. Simon had been surprised that he knew how, though he wasn’t sure why. Magnus had been alive for ages. Surely he had found time to squeeze in a few weeks of driver’s ed. Although Simon couldn’t help wondering what birth date was on his license.
Isabelle rolled her eyes, probably because there wasn’t enough room to do much else in the cab of the truck, with all four of them crammed together on the bench seat. Simon honestly hadn’t expected her to come. He hadn’t expected anyone to come to the farm with him but Magnus, though Alec had insisted on coming as well (much to Magnus’s annoyance, as he considered the whole enterprise “too dangerous”), and then, just as Magnus had revved up the engine on the truck, Isabelle had come banging down the stairs of his apartment building and thrown herself through the front door, panting and out of breath. “I’m coming too,” she’d announced.
And that was that. No one could budge or dissuade her. She wouldn’t look at Simon as she insisted, or explain why she wanted to come, but she did, and here she was. She was wearing jeans and a purple suede jacket she must have stolen out of Magnus’s closet. Her weapons belt was slung around her slim hips. She was mashed up against Simon, whose other side was crushed against the car door. A strand of her hair was flying free and tickling his face.
“What is this, anyway?” Alec said, frowning at the CD player, which was playing music, although without a CD in it. Magnus had simply tapped the sound system with a blue-flashing finger, and it had started playing. “Some faerie band?”
Magnus didn’t answer, but the music swelled louder.
To mirror went she straightaway
And did her ebon hair array
And for her gown she much did pay.
Then down she walked along the street,
A handsome lad she chanced to meet,
And sore by dawn were her dainty feet,
But all the boys were gay.
Isabelle snorted. “All the boys are gay. In this truck, anyway. Well, not you, Simon.”
“You noticed,” said Simon.
“I think of myself as a freewheeling bisexual,” added Magnus.
“Please never say those words in front of my parents,” said Alec. “Especially my father.”
“I thought your parents were okay with you, you know, coming out,” Simon said, leaning around Isabelle to look at Alec, who was-as he often was-scowling, and pushing his floppy dark hair out of his eyes. Aside from the occasional exchange, Simon had never talked to Alec much. He wasn’t an easy person to get to know. But, Simon admitted to himself, his own recent estrangement from his mother made him more curious about Alec’s answer than he would have been otherwise.
“My mother seems to have accepted it,” Alec said. “But my father-no, not really. Once he asked me what I thought had turned me gay.”
Simon felt Isabelle tense next to him. “Turned you gay?” She sounded incredulous. “Alec, you didn’t tell me that.”
“I hope you told him you were bitten by a gay spider,” said Simon.
Magnus snorted; Isabelle looked confused. “I’ve read Magnus’s stash of comics,” said Alec, “so I actually know what you’re talking about.” A small smile played around his mouth. “So would that give me the proportional gayness of a spider?”
“Only if it was a really gay spider,” said Magnus, and he yelled as Alec punched him in the arm. “Ow, okay, never mind.”
“Well, whatever,” said Isabelle, obviously annoyed not to get the joke. “It’s not like Dad’s ever coming back from Idris, anyway.”
Alec sighed. “Sorry to wreck your vision of our happy family. I know you want to think Dad’s fine with me being gay, but he’s not.”
“But if you don’t tell me when people say things like that to you, or do things to hurt you, then how can I help you?” Simon could feel Isabelle’s agitation vibrating through her body. “How can I-“
“Iz,” Alec said tiredly. “It’s not like it’s one big bad thing. It’s a lot of little invisible things. When Magnus and I were traveling, and I’d call from the road, Dad never asked how he was. When I get up to talk in Clave meetings, no one listens, and I don’t know if that’s because I’m young or if it’s because of something else. I saw Mom talking to a friend about her grandchildren and the second I walked into the room they shut up. Irina Cartwright told me it was a pity no one would ever inherit my blue eyes now.” He shrugged and looked toward Magnus, who took a hand off the wheel for a moment to place it on Alec’s. “It’s not like a stab wound you can protect me from. It’s a million little paper cuts every day.”
“Alec,” Isabelle began, but before she could say anything more, the sign for the turnoff loomed up ahead: a wooden placard in the shape of an arrow with the words THREE ARROWS FARM painted on it in block lettering. Simon remembered Luke kneeling on the farmhouse floor, painstakingly spelling out the words in black paint, while Clary added the-now weather-faded and almost invisible-pattern of flowers along the bottom.
“Turn left,” he said, flinging his arm out and nearly hitting Alec. “Magnus, we’re here.”
It had taken several chapters of Dickens before Clary had finally succumbed to exhaustion and fallen asleep against Jace’s shoulder. Half in dream and half in reality, she recalled him carrying her downstairs and laying her down in the bedroom she’d woken up in her first day in the apartment. He had drawn the curtains and closed the door after him as he left, shutting the room into darkness, and she had fallen asleep to the sound of his voice in the hallway, calling for Sebastian.
She dreamed of the frozen lake again, and of Simon crying out for her, and of a city like Alicante, but the demon towers were made of human bones and the canals ran with blood. She woke twisted in her sheets, her hair a mass of tangles and the light outside the window dimmed to a twilight darkness. At first she thought that the voices outside her door were part of the dream, but as they grew louder, she raised her head to listen, still groggy and half-tangled in the webbing of sleep.
“Hey, little brother.” It was Sebastian’s voice, floating under her door from the living room. “Is it done?”
There was a long silence. Then Jace’s voice, oddly flat and colorless. “It’s done.”
Sebastian’s breath drew in sharply. “And the old lady-she did as we asked? Made the Cup?”
“Yes.”
“Show it to me.”
A rustle. Silence. Jace said, “Look, take it if you want it.”
“No.” There was a curious thoughtfulness in Sebastian’s tone. “You hold on to it for the moment. You did the work of getting it back, after all. Didn’t you?”
“But it was your plan.” There was something in Jace’s voice, something that made Clary lean forward and press her ear to the wall, suddenly desperate to hear more. “And I executed it, just as you wanted. Now, if you don’t mind-“
“I do mind.” There was a rustle. Clary imagined Sebastian standing up, looking down at Jace from the inch or so that divided them in height. “There’s something wrong. I can tell. I can read you, you know.”
“I’m tired. And there was a lot of blood. Look, I just need to clean myself off, and to sleep. And…” Jace’s voice died.
“And to see my sister.”
“I’d like to see her, yes.”
“She’s asleep. Has been for hours.”
“Do I need to ask your permission?” There was a razored edge to Jace’s voice, something that reminded Clary of the way he had once spoken to Valentine. Something she had not heard in the way he spoke to Sebastian in a long time.
“No.” Sebastian sounded surprised, almost caught off guard. “I suppose if you want to barge in there and gaze wistfully at her sleeping face, go right ahead. I’ll never understand why-“
“No,” Jace said. “You never will.”
There was silence. Clary could so clearly picture Sebastian staring after Jace, a quizzical look on his face, that it took her a moment before she realized that Jace must be coming to her room. She had only time to throw herself flat on the bed and shut her eyes before the door opened, letting in a slice of yellow-white light that momentarily blinded her. She made what she hoped was a realistic waking-up noise and rolled over, her hand over her face. “What… ?”
The door shut. The room was in darkness again. She could see Jace only as a shape that moved slowly toward her bed, until he was standing over her, and she couldn’t help remembering another night when he had come to her room while she slept. Jace standing by the head of her bed, still wearing his white mourning clothes, and there was nothing light or sarcastic or distant in the way he was looking down at her. “I’ve been wandering around all night-I couldn’t sleep-and I kept finding myself walking here. To you.”
He was only an outline now, an outline with bright hair that shone in the faint light that filtered from beneath the door. “Clary,” he whispered. There was a thump, and she realized he had fallen to his knees by the side of her bed. She didn’t move, but her body tightened. His voice was a whisper. “Clary, it’s me. It’s me.”
Her eyelids fluttered open, wide, and their gazes met. She was staring at Jace. Kneeling beside her bed, his eyes were level with hers. He wore a long dark woolen coat, buttoned all the way to the throat, where she could see black Marks-Soundless, Agility, Accuracy-like a sort of necklace against his skin. His eyes were very gold and very wide, and as if she could see through them, she saw Jace-her Jace. The Jace who had lifted her in his arms when she was dying of Ravener poison; the Jace who had watched her hold Simon against the rising daylight over the East River; the Jace who had told her about a little boy and the falcon his father had killed. The Jace she loved.
Her heart seemed to stop altogether. She couldn’t even gasp.
His eyes were full of urgency and pain. “Please,” he murmured. “Please believe me.”
She believed him. They carried the same blood, loved the same way; this was her Jace, as much as her hands were her own hands, her heart her own heart. But-“How?”
“Clary, shh-“
She began to struggle into a sitting position, but he reached out and pushed her back against the bed by her shoulders. “We can’t talk now. I have to go.”
She grabbed for his sleeve, felt him wince. “Don’t leave me.”
He dropped his head for just a moment; when he looked up again, his eyes were dry but the expression in them silenced her. “Wait a few moments after I go,” he whispered. “Then slip out and up to my room. Sebastian can’t know we’re together. Not tonight.” He dragged himself to his feet, his eyes pleading. “Don’t let him hear you.”
She sat up. “Your stele. Leave me your stele.”
Doubt flickered in his eyes; she held his gaze steadily, then put her hand out. After a moment he reached into his pocket and took out the dully glowing implement; he laid it in her palm. For a moment their skin touched, and she shuddered-just a brush of the hand from this Jace was almost as powerful as all the kissing and tearing at each other they had done in the club the other night. She knew he felt it too, for he jerked his hand away and began to back toward the door. She could hear his breath, ragged and swift. He fumbled behind himself for the knob and let himself out, his eyes on her face until the very last moment, when the door closed between them with a decided click.
Clary sat in the darkness, stunned. Her blood felt as if it had thickened in her veins and her heart was having to work double time to keep beating. Jace. My Jace.
Her hand tightened on the stele. Something about it, its cold hardness, seemed to focus and sharpen her thoughts. She looked down at herself. She was wearing a tank top and pajama shorts; there were goose bumps on her arms, but not because it was cold. She set the tip of the stele to her inner arm and drew it slowly down the skin, watching as a Soundless rune spiraled across her pale, blue-veined skin.
She opened the door just a crack. Sebastian was gone, off to sleep most likely. There was music playing faintly from the television set-something classical, the sort of piano music Jace liked. She wondered if Sebastian appreciated music, or any sort of art. It seemed such a human capacity.
Despite her concern about where he’d gone, her feet were carrying her toward the passage that led to the kitchen-and then she was through the living room and dashing up the glass steps, her feet making no noise as she reached the top and sprinted down the hall to Jace’s room. Then she was jerking open the door and sliding inside, the door clicking shut behind her.
The windows were open, and through them she could see rooftops and a curving slice of moon, a perfect Paris night. Jace’s witchlight rune-stone sat on the nightstand beside his bed. It glowed with a dull energy that cast further illumination through the room. It was enough light for Clary to see Jace, standing between the two long windows. He had shrugged off the long black coat, which lay in a crumpled heap at his feet. She realized immediately why he had not taken it off when he’d come into the house, why he had kept it buttoned all the way to his throat. Because beneath it he wore only a gray button-down shirt, and jeans-and they were sticky and soaked with blood. Parts of the shirt were in ribbons, as if they had been slashed with a very sharp blade. His left sleeve was rolled up, and there was a white bandage wrapped around his forearm-he must have just done it-already darkening at the edges with blood. His feet were bare, his shoes kicked off, and the floor where he stood was splattered with blood, like scarlet tears. She set the stele down on his bedside table with a click.
“Jace,” she said softly.
It suddenly seemed insane that there was this much space between them, that she was standing across the room from Jace, and that they weren’t touching. She started toward him, but he held up a hand to ward her off.
“Don’t.” His voice cracked. Then his fingers went to the buttons on his shirt, undoing them, one by one. He shrugged the bloodstained garment off his shoulders and let it fall to the ground.
Clary stared. Lilith’s rune was still in place, over his heart, but instead of shimmering red-silver it looked as if the hot tip of a poker had been dragged across the skin, charring it. She put her hand up to her own chest involuntarily, her fingers splaying over her heart. She could feel its beating, hard and fast. “Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh,” Jace said flatly. “This won’t last, Clary. Me being myself again, I mean. Only as long as this hasn’t healed.”
“I-I wondered,” Clary stammered. “Before-while you were sleeping-I thought about cutting the rune like I did when we fought Lilith. But I was afraid Sebastian would feel it.”
“He would have.” Jace’s golden eyes were as flat as his voice. “He didn’t feel this because it was made with a pugio-a dagger seethed in angel blood. They’re incredibly rare; I’ve never even seen one in real life before.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “The blade turned to hot ash after it touched me, but it did the damage it needed to do.”