Lady Midnight (The Dark Artifices 1)

"But it is the truth," he said. "Cristina, why did you run away like that? Why didn't you answer any of my messages or calls?"

She held up a hand. "You first," she said. "What are you doing in Los Angeles?"

He rested his chin on his folded arms. "After you left, I couldn't stay. Everything reminded me of you. I was on leave from the Scholomance. We were going to spend the summer together. Then you were gone. One minute you were in my life, and then you were ripped out of it. I was lost. I went back to study but I thought only of you."

"You had Jaime," she said in a hard voice.

"No one has Jaime," he said. "You think he didn't panic when you left? The two of you were supposed to be parabatai."

"I think he'll live." Cristina could hear her own voice, cold and small; it seemed to have frozen down to a tiny sliver of ice.

He was silent for a moment. "Reports were coming through to the Scholomance from L.A.," he said. "Flares of necromantic magic. Your friend Emma's efforts to investigate the deaths of her parents. The Clave thought she was making a fuss about nothing, that it was clear Sebastian had killed her parents but she wouldn't accept it. I thought she might be right, though. I came out here to look into it, and my first day, I went to the Shadow Market. Look, it's a long story--I found my way to Wells's house--"

"Where you decided it was a good idea to shoot a fellow Nephilim with a crossbow?"

"I didn't know they were Shadowhunters! I thought they were murderers-- I wasn't shooting to kill--"

"No manches," Cristina said bluntly. "You should have stayed and told them you were Nephilim. Those arrows were poisoned. Julian nearly died."

"I gathered that." Diego looked rueful. "The arrows weren't poisoned by me. If I'd had any idea, I would have stayed. The weapons I bought at the Shadow Market must have been tainted without my knowing."

"Well, what were you doing buying weapons there anyway? Why didn't you come to the Institute?" Cristina demanded.

"I did," Diego said, flattening her with surprise. "I came looking for Arthur Blackthorn. I found him in the Sanctuary. I tried to tell him who I was, why I was here. He told me the damnation of the Blackthorns was their own private business, that they didn't want any interference, and that if I knew what was good for me I'd get out of town before everything burned."

"He said that?" Cristina sat up in astonishment.

"I realized I wasn't welcome here. I thought, even, that the Blackthorns might be involved in the necromancy somehow."

"They would never--!"

"Well, you can say that. You know them. I didn't know them. All I knew was that the head of the Institute had told me to go away, but I couldn't because you were here. Maybe in danger, maybe even in danger from the Blackthorns. I had to get weapons at the Market because I was afraid that if I went to any of the usual weapons caches it would be found out that I was still here. Look, Cristina, I am not a liar--"

"You don't lie?" Cristina demanded. "You want to know why I left home, Diego? In May we were in San Miguel de Allende. I'd gone to the Jardin, and when I came back, you and Jaime were sitting up on the terrace. I was coming through the courtyard; I could hear your voices very clearly. You didn't know I was there."

Diego looked puzzled. "I don't . . ."

"I heard him talking to you about how the wrong branch of the Rosales family was in power. It should have been you. He was talking about the plan he had. Surely you remember. The one where you would marry me, and he would become my parabatai, and together you would use your influence over me and my mother to eject her from her position as head of the D.F. Institute, and then you would take over. He said you had the easy job, marrying me, because you could leave me someday. Becoming parabatai means you're stuck with them forever. I remember him saying that."

"Cristina . . ." Diego had gone pale. "That's why you left that night. It wasn't because your mother was sick and needed you at the Institute in the city."

"I was the one who was sick," Cristina spat. "You broke my heart, Diego, you and your brother. I don't know what's worse, losing your best friend or losing the boy you're in love with, but I can tell you that it was like you both died for me that day. That's why I don't pick up your calls or messages. You don't take calls from a dead boy."

"And what about Jaime?" Something flared in his eyes. "What about his calls?"

"He never has called," said Cristina, and almost took pleasure in the look of shock on his face. "Maybe he has better sense than you."

"Jaime? Jaime?" Diego was on his feet now. A vein in his temple throbbed. "I remember that day, Cristina. Jaime was drunk and he was babbling. Did you hear me say anything or did you only hear him?"

Cristina forced herself to think back. In memory it seemed like a cacophony of voices. But . . . "I only heard Jaime," she said. "I didn't hear you say a word. Not to defend me. Not to say anything."

"There was no point talking to Jaime when he was like that," Diego said bitterly. "I let him talk. I shouldn't have. I had no interest in his plan. I loved you. I wanted to go far away with you. He is my brother, but he is-- He was born with something missing, I think, some piece of his heart where compassion lives."

"He was going to be my parabatai," said Cristina. "I was going to be tied to him forever. And you weren't going to say anything to me? Do anything to stop it?"

"I was," Diego protested. "Jaime had planned to go to Idris. I was waiting for him to leave. I needed to speak to you when he wasn't there."

She shook her head. "You shouldn't have waited."

"Cristina." He came toward her, his hands outstretched. "Please, if you don't believe anything else, believe me that I have always loved you. Do you really think I have lied to you since we were children? Since the first time I ever kissed you and you ran away laughing? I was ten years old--do you really think that was some kind of plan?"

She didn't reach for his hands. "But Jaime," she said. "I've known him just as long. He was always my friend. But he wasn't, was he? He said things no friend would say, and you knew he was using me, and you said not a word."

"I was going to tell you--"

"Intentions are nothing," Cristina said. She had thought she would feel some relief, finally telling Diego why she hated him, finally unburdening the knowledge of what she had heard. Finally severing the thread. But it didn't feel severed. She could feel the bond connecting them, as she had when she'd blacked out in the crashing car outside the Institute and woken up with Diego holding her. He'd been whispering in her ear that she would be all right, that she was his Cristina, she was strong. And it had felt for a moment as if the past months had been a dream, and she was home.

"I must stay here," Diego said. "These killings, the Followers, they are too important. I am a Centurion; I cannot abandon a mission. But I do not need to remain at the Institute. If you want me to go away, I will."

Cristina opened her mouth. But before she could speak, her phone buzzed. It was a message from Emma. STOP MAKING OUT WITH PERFECT DIEGO AND GET TO THE COMPUTER ROOM, WE NEED YOU.

Cristina rolled her eyes and shoved the phone back in her pocket. "We'd better go."

The sky outside the Institute had turned the color of what was very late night or very early morning, depending on your point of view. It had always reminded Julian of blue cellophane or watercolor: the intense blue of evening turned translucent by the imminent arrival of the sun.

The inhabitants of the Institute--all but Arthur, who slept on soundly in his attic--had gathered in the computer room. Ty had brought papers and books from the library, and the others were going through them. Tavvy was curled up asleep in the corner. Piles of empty pizza boxes from Nightshade's were stacked on the table. Emma didn't even remember them being delivered, but most of them had been eaten. Mark was busy glaring at Cristina and Diego, though Diego didn't seem to notice. He didn't seem to notice Drusilla staring at him with saucer eyes either. He didn't notice much, Julian thought uncharitably. Maybe being ridiculously good-looking was more time-

consuming than it seemed.

Emma had finished telling the story of the way she and Cristina had tracked down Sterling and the things he had told them on the car ride home. Ty had been taking notes with a pencil, a second pencil stuck behind his ear. His black hair was ruffled up like a cat's fur. Julian remembered when Ty had been young enough that he could reach out and smooth down his younger brother's hair when it got too messy. Something in him ached at the recollection.

"So," Ty said now, turning to Diego and Cristina, who was sitting beside Diego. She was barefoot, one of her pant legs rolled up and her calf bound with bandages. Every once in a while she would shoot Diego a look out of the corner of her eye that was half suspicion, half relief--that he'd helped her? That he was there at all? Julian wasn't sure. "You're a Centurion?"

"I studied at the Scholomance," said Diego. "I was the youngest aspirant ever to become a Centurion."

Everyone looked impressed except Mark. Even Ty. "That's like being a detective, isn't it?" he said. "You investigate for the Clave?"

"That is one of the things we do," said Diego. "We stand outside the Law that precludes Shadowhunters from involving themselves in issues that relate to faeries."

"The Clave can make that exception for any Shadowhunter, though, in exigent cases," said Julian. "Why was Diana told we couldn't investigate? Why did they send you?"

"It was judged that your family, with your connection to the Fair Folk, would not be able to objectively investigate a series of murders where some of the victims were faeries."

"That is entirely unreasonable," Mark said, his eyes flashing.

"Is it?" Diego glanced around. "From all I have heard and seen, you appear to have mounted a secret investigation into this issue, telling the Clave nothing about it. You have compiled evidence that you have not shared. You have discovered a murderous cult operating in secret. . . ."

"You make it sound so shady," Emma said. "So far all you've done is show up in L.A. and shoot another Shadowhunter."

Diego glanced over at Julian. "It's mostly healed," Julian said. "Mostly."