Lady Midnight (The Dark Artifices 1)

He dropped to his knees. His expression was dazed, though he was clearly fighting it. "We need to get out of here," he said hoarsely. "The shooter might come back, alone or with more--"

His voice choked off and he fell backward, sprawling in the grass. Emma moved faster than she ever had in her life, leaping across the pool, but she still wasn't there in time to catch him before he hit the ground.

Clouds were gathering out over the ocean. The wind up on the roof was cool, the ocean acting like a giant air conditioner. Cristina could hear the roar and crash of the surf in the distance as she moved gingerly across the shingles. What was it about the Blackthorns and Emma that meant that ever since she'd come to Los Angeles she'd spent half her time on top of buildings?

Mark was sitting near one of the copper gutters, his legs dangling over the side. The wind blew his fair hair around his face. His hands were long and white and bare, bracing him against the roof tiles behind him.

He was holding one of the Institute's spare cell phones in his hand. It seemed incongruous--it was incongruous, the faerie boy with the long, tangled hair, the tapestry of stars behind him, and the phone in his hand. "I am so sorry, Helen," she heard him say, and the word echoed with such a depth of love and loneliness that she nearly turned away.

Leaving silently didn't seem to be an option, though. Mark had heard her approach: He turned slightly, and gestured for Cristina to remain.

She hovered uncertainly. It was Dru who had told her that she would find Mark on the roof, and the others had urged her to go up and see if he was all right. She had wondered if it was really her place, but Ty and Livvy had been absorbed in their translation job, and she'd sensed Dru was afraid of Mark's harsh words. And it wasn't as if Tavvy could be sent to fetch his brother down. So with some reluctance, Cristina had climbed the ladder to the roof.

Now that she was here, though, she felt an aching sympathy for the boy perched at the roof's edge. The look on his face as he spoke to Helen--she couldn't imagine what it must be like for him, to know there was only one other person in his family quite like him, who shared his blood and heritage, and to know she was separated from him by a cruel and unbreakable Law.

"And I, you, my sister," Mark said, and let the phone fall from his hand. It was an old-fashioned one, with a screen that flickered and went dark as the call disconnected.

He slid it into a pocket and looked over at Cristina, the clouds casting shadows on his face.

"If you have come to tell me I behaved ill, I already know it," he said.

"That's not why I came," she said, moving closer to him but not sitting down.

"But you agree," he said. "I behaved ill. I should not have spoken as I did to Julian, especially in front of the little ones."

Cristina spoke carefully. "I don't know Julian well. But I do believe he was worried about you, and that's why he didn't want you to go with them."

"I know that," Mark said, surprising her. "But do you know what it's like, to have your little brother worry about you as if you were the child?" He raked his fingers through his hair. "I thought, while I was gone, that Helen would be raising them. I never thought it would fall so much upon Julian's shoulders. I cannot tell if that is why he seems unknowable to me."

Cristina thought of Julian, of his quiet competence and careful smiles. She remembered saying to Emma in a joking way that perhaps she would fall in love with Julian when she met him. And he had been much more beautiful than she'd thought, than Emma's blurry photos or vague descriptions had led her to believe. But though she liked him, she doubted she could love him. Too much of him was hidden for that.

"A great deal of him is, I think, locked away," she said. "Have you seen the mural on the wall of his room? The one of the fairy tale? He is like that castle, I think, surrounded by thorns that he has grown to protect himself. But with time, you can cut those thorns away. I believe you will know your brother again."

"I don't know how much time I have," he said. "If we do not solve their puzzle, the Wild Hunt will reclaim me."

"Do you want them to?" Cristina asked softly.

He said nothing, only glanced up at the sky.

"Is that why you come up to the roof? Because from here you can see the Hunt if they go by?"

Mark was silent for a long time. Then he said, "I imagine sometimes I can hear them. That I can hear the sound of their hooves against the clouds."

She smiled. "I like the way you talk," she said. "It always sounds like poetry."

"I speak the way I was taught by the Folk. So many years under their tutelage." He turned his hands over and placed them on his knees. The insides of his wrists were marked by odd, long scars.

"How many years? Do you know?"

He shrugged. "Time is not measured there as it is measured here. I could not say."

"The years do not show on your face," she said quietly. "Sometimes you look as young as Julian and sometimes you look as the fey do--ageless."

Now he looked at her sideways. "You don't think I look like a Shadowhunter?"

"Do you want to?"

"I want to look like my family," he said. "I cannot have the Blackthorn coloring, but I can look as much like Nephilim as possible. Julian was right--if I wish to be part of the investigation, I cannot stand out."

Cristina held back from telling Mark that there was no world in which he didn't stand out. "I can make you look like a Shadowhunter. If you come downstairs with me."

He moved as noiselessly on the shingled roof as if he had the padded feet of a cat or as if he were wearing a Soundless rune. He stepped aside to let her lead the way downstairs. Even that was hushed, and when she brushed by him, his skin was cool as night air.

She led the way to his room; he had left the lights off, so she illuminated her witchlight and set it down by the bed. "That chair," she said, pointing. "Bring it into the middle of the room and sit down. I'll be right back."

He looked after her quizzically as she left the room. When she returned, carrying a damp comb, a towel, and a pair of scissors, he was seated in the chair, still with the same quizzical look. He didn't sit the way other teenage boys did, all sprawl and legs and arms. He sat the way kings did in drawings, upright but deliberate, as if the crown rested uneasily on his head.

"Are you going to cut my throat?" he asked as she came toward him with the towel and the sharp scissors gleaming.

"I'm going to cut your hair." She looped the towel around his neck and moved to stand behind him. His head tipped back to follow her movements as she took hold of his hair, running her fingers through it. It was the kind of hair that should have been curly but was weighed down by its own length and tangles.

"Hold still," she said.

"As my lady requests."

She ran the comb through his hair and began to cut, careful to keep the length even. As she snipped away the weight of his silvery-blond mane, it sprang free in adorable curls like Julian's. They twined up against the back of his neck as if they wanted to be close to him.

She remembered touching Diego's hair; it had been thick under her fingers, dark and textured. Mark's was fine, like corn silk. It fell like gleaming chaff, catching the witchlight.

"Tell me about the faerie Court," she said. "I've always heard stories. My mother told me some, and my uncle."

"We didn't see it much," he said, sounding very ordinary for a moment. "Gwyn and the Hunters aren't part of any Court. He keeps himself to himself. We joined the Courts and the gentry only on nights when there were revels. But those were--"

He was silent for so long she wondered if he had fallen asleep or was perhaps simply deathly bored.

"If you had been to one you would not forget it," he said. "Great sparkling caves or deserted copses in woodlands full of will-o'-the-wisp lights. There are still some parts of this world that are undiscovered by all but the Folk. There was dancing to wear your feet down, and there were beautiful boys and girls, and kisses were cheaper than wine but the wine was sweet and the fr

uit sweeter. And you would wake up in the morning and it would all be gone, but you could still hear the music in your head."

"I think I would find it very frightening." She moved around to stand in front of him. He looked up at her with his curious two-colored eyes and she felt a tremor run through her hand, one she'd never felt when she cut Diego's hair or his brother Jaime's or any of her little cousins'. Of course, they'd been twelve when she'd clipped their hair, showing off what her mother had taught her, so maybe it was different when you were older. "Everything so glamorous and beautiful. How can a human compare?"

He looked surprised. "But you would be lovely in the Court," he said. "They would turn leaves and flowers into jeweled crowns and sandals for you. You would sparkle and be admired. The Folk love nothing more than mortal beauty."

"Because it fades," she said.

"Yes," he admitted. "It is true that eventually you will become gray and bent and withered, and it is possible that hair will sprout from your chin. And there is also the issue of warts." He caught her glare. "But that time is a long time away," he added hastily.

Cristina snorted. "I thought faeries were meant to be charming." She slid a hand under his chin to steady his head as she snipped away the last unruly strands. That was different too; his skin was as smooth as hers, no hint of stubble or roughness. His eyes narrowed, their color thinning to a gleam as she set the scissors aside and cleared her throat. "There," she said. "Would you like to see?"

He straightened up in the chair. Cristina was bending down; their heads were on a level. "Lean closer," he said. "For years I have had no mirror; I have learned to make do. The eyes of another can be a mirror more effective than water. If you will look at me, I can see my reflection in yours."