Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices 2)

Darkness spread across the wall like a stain. Cristina sucked in her breath, and Kieran's hand tightened on hers. The darkness moved and shivered, trembled and re-formed. Light danced within it, and Cristina could see the multicolored night sky of Faerie. And within the shadow, a darker shadow. A man, wrapped in a dark cloak. As the darkness lightened, Cristina saw his grin before she saw anything else, and her heart seemed to stop.

It was a grin of bones set within a skeletal half face, beautiful on one side, deathly on the other. The cloak that wrapped him was ink-black and bore the insignia of a broken crown. He stood straight and broad, grinning his lopsided grin down at Kieran.

They had not summoned Adaon at all. It was the Unseelie King.

*

"No. NO!" Tavvy wept, his face buried in Julian's shoulder. He'd taken the news that he was going to Idris with Alec, Max, and Rafe worse than Mark had expected. Did all children cry like this, like everything in the world was ruined and their hearts were broken, even at the news of a short parting?

Not that Mark blamed Tavvy, of course. It was only that he felt as if his own heart was being shredded into pieces inside his chest as he watched Julian walk up and down the room, holding his small brother in his arms as Tavvy sobbed and pounded his back.

"Tavs," Julian said in his gentle voice, the voice Mark could hardly reconcile with the boy who had faced down the Unseelie King in his own Court with a knife to a prince's throat. "It's only going to be a day, two days at most. You'll get to see the canals in Alicante, the Gard . . . ."

"You keep leaving," Tavvy choked against his brother's shirtfront. "You can't leave again."

Julian sighed. He dipped his chin, rubbing his cheek against his brother's unruly curls. Over Tavvy's head, his eyes met Mark's. There was no blame in them, and no self-pity, only a terrible sadness.

Yet Mark felt as if guilt were crushing his rib cage. If only were wasted words, Kieran had once said, when Mark had speculated on whether the two of them would ever have met if they had never joined the Hunt. But he couldn't stop the flood of if onlys now: if only he had been able to stay with his family, if only Julian hadn't needed to be mother and father and brother to all the younger ones, if only Tavvy hadn't grown up in the shadow of death and loss. Perhaps then, every parting would not feel like the last one.

"It's not your fault," said Magnus, who had appeared noiselessly at Mark's side. "You can't help the past. We grow up with losses, all of us except the supremely lucky."

"I cannot help wishing my brother had been one of the supremely lucky," said Mark. "You can understand."

Magnus glanced toward Jules and Tavvy. The little boy had cried himself out and was clinging to his older brother, his face mashed against Julian's shoulder. His small shoulders were slumped in exhaustion. "Which brother?"

"Both of them," said Mark.

Magnus reached out and, with curious fingers, touched the glimmering arrowhead slung around Mark's neck. "I know this material," he said. "This arrowhead once tipped the weapon of a soldier in the King's Guard of the Unseelie Court."

Mark touched it--cool, cold, smooth under his fingers. Unyielding, like Kieran himself. "Kieran gave it to me."

"It is precious," said Magnus. He turned as Alec called him, and let the pendant fall back against Mark's chest.

Alec stood with Max in his arms and Rafe by his side, along with a small duffel bag of their things. It occurred to Mark that Alec was close to the same age Mark would have been if only he had never been kidnapped by the Hunt. He wondered if he would be as mature as Alec seemed, as self-collected, as able to take care of other people as well as himself.

Magnus kissed Alec and ruffled his hair with infinite tenderness. He bent to kiss Max, too, and Rafe, and straightened up to begin to create the Portal. Light sparked from and between his fingers, and the air before him seemed to shimmer.

Tavvy had sagged into a bundle of hopelessness against Julian's chest. Jules held him closer, the muscles in his arms tensing, and murmured soothing words. Mark wanted to go over to them but couldn't seem to make his feet move. They seemed, even in their unhappiness, a perfect unit who needed no one else.

The melancholy thought vanished a moment later as pain shot up Mark's arm. He grabbed at his wrist, his fingers encountering agonizing soreness, the slickness of blood. Something's wrong, he thought, and then, Cristina.

He bolted. The Portal was growing and shimmering in the center of the room; through its half-formed door, Mark could see the outline of the demon towers as he darted by and into the corridor.

Some sense in his blood told him he was getting closer to Cristina as he ran, but to his surprise, the pain in his wrist didn't fade. It pulsed again and again, like the warning beam from a lighthouse.

Her door was closed. He set his shoulder against it and shoved without bothering to try the knob. It flew open and Mark half-fell inside.

He choked, eyes stinging. The room smelled as if something inside it had been burning--something organic, like dead leaves or rotted fruit.

It was dark. His eyes adjusted quickly and he made out Cristina and Kieran, both standing by the foot of the bed. Cristina was clutching her balisong. A massive shadow loomed over them--no, not a shadow, Mark realized, moving closer. A Projection.

A Projection of the King of the Unseelie Court. Both sides of his face seemed to gleam with unnatural humor, both the beautiful, kingly side, and the hideous, defleshed skull.

"You thought to summon your brother?" the King sneered, his gaze on Kieran. "And you thought I would not feel you reaching into Faerie, searching for one of my own? You are a fool, Kieran, and always have been."

"What have you done to Adaon?" Kieran's face was bloodless. "He knew nothing. He had no idea I planned to summon him."

"Worry not about others," said the King. "Worry about your own life, Kieran Kingson."

"I have been Kieran Hunter for a long time," said Kieran.

The King's face darkened. "You should be Kieran Traitor," he said. "Kieran Betrayer. Kieran Kin-Slayer. All are better names for you."

"He acted in self-defense," said Cristina sharply. "If he hadn't killed Erec, he would have been killed himself. And he acted to protect me."

The King gave her a brief look of scorn. "And that in itself is a traitorous act, foolish girl," he said. "Placing the lives of Shadowhunters above the lives of your own people--what could be worse?"

"Selling your son to the Wild Hunt because you worried that people liked him better than they liked you," said Mark. "That's worse."

Cristina and Kieran looked at him in astonishment; it was clear they hadn't heard him come in. The King, though, evinced no surprise. "Mark Blackthorn," he said. "Even in his choice of lovers, my son gravitates to the enemies of his people. What does that say about him?"

"That he knows better than you who his people are?" Mark said. Very deliberately, he turned his back on the King. It would have been a hanging offense in the Court. "We must get rid of him," he said, in a low voice, to Kieran and Cristina. "Should I get Magnus?"

"He is only a Projection," Kieran said. His face was drawn. "He cannot hurt us. Nor can he remain forever. It is an effort for him, I think."

"Do not turn your back on me!" the King roared. "Do you think I do not know your plans, Kieran? Do you think I do not know you plan to stand up and betray me before the Council of Nephilim?"

Kieran turned his face away, as if he couldn't bear to look at his father. "Then cease to do what I know you are doing," he said, in a shaking voice. "Parlay with the Nephilim. Do not make war on them."

"There is no parlay with those who can lie," snarled the King. "And have done, and will do again. They will lie and spill the blood of our people. And once they are done with you, do you think they will let you live? Treat you like one of them?"

"They have treated me better than my own father has." Kieran raised his chin.

"Have they?" The King's eyes were dark and empty. "I took some memories from you, K

ieran, when you came to my Court. Shall I give them back?"

Kieran looked confused. "What use could you possibly have for my memories?"

"Some of us would know our enemies," said the King.

"Kieran," Mark said. The look in the King's eyes made fear roil in the pit of his stomach. "Do not listen. He seeks to hurt you."

"And what do you seek?" the King demanded, turning toward Mark. Only the fact that Mark could see through him, could see the outline of Cristina's bed, her wardrobe, through the transparent frame of his body, kept him from darting toward the fireplace poker and swinging it at the King. If only . . .

If only the King had been any sort of father, if only he hadn't thrown his son to the Hunt like a bone to a pack of hungry wolves, if only he hadn't sat complacently by while Erec tortured Kieran . . .

How different would Kieran be? How much less afraid of losing love, how much less determined to hold on to it at all costs, even if it meant trapping Mark in the Hunt with him?

The King's lip curled, as if he could read Mark's thoughts. "When I looked into my son's memories," he said, "I saw you, Blackthorn. Lady Nerissa's son." His smile was malignant. "Your mother died of sorrow when your father left her. My son's thoughts were half of you, of the loss of you. Mark, Mark, Mark. I wonder what it is in your bloodline that has the power to enchant our people and make fools of them?"

A small line had appeared between Kieran's brows. The loss of you.

Kieran didn't remember losing Mark. The cold fear in Mark's stomach had spread to his veins.

"Those who cannot love do not understand it," said Cristina. She turned toward Kieran. "We will protect you," she said. "We won't let him harm you for testifying at the Council."

"Lies," said the King. "Well-intentioned, perhaps, but still lies. If you testify, Kieran, there will be no place on this earth or in Faerie where you will be safe from me and from my warriors. I will hunt you forever, and when I find you, you will wish you had died for what you did to Iarlath, to Erec. There is no torment you can imagine that I will not visit on you."