Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices 2)

"I killed your brother with this sword," she said. "You want revenge? Let the girl go, and I'll fight you. Threaten her a moment longer and I'll go back inside the Institute." Her eyes flicked from one of them to the other. She thought of her parents, of their bodies, stripped and left on the beach for gulls to pick at. "We despoiled Fal's corpse," she lied. "Tore his armor from him, broke his weapon, left him for the rats and crows--"

Ethna gave a high screech and shoved the small girl away from her. The girl toppled to the ground--Emma gasped--but she found her feet and ran, sobbing, for the road. She looked back over her shoulder only once, mouth wide in her tearstained face as she sprinted through the gate and disappeared.

Relief shot through Emma. The girl was safe.

And then Ethna charged, her horse's hooves silent on the courtyard stone. She was like a thrown spear hurtling through the air, noiseless and deadly; Emma bent her knees and sprang, using the height of the steps and the force of her fall to give the swing of her sword power.

Their blades clanged together in midair. The shock rattled Emma's bones. Ethna's arm flew wide; Emma landed in a crouch and drove her sword upward, but the faerie woman had already flung herself from the back of her horse. She was on her feet, laughing; the other Riders had dismounted as well. Their horses vanished, as if absorbed into the air as the children of Mannan surged toward Emma, blades raised.

She lifted herself out of her crouch, Cortana describing a wide arc above her head, striking each sword aside--Emma was reminded of a hand sliding across piano keys, hitting each note in turn.

But it was close. The last sword, Delan's, caught Emma's shoulder. She felt her gear rip, her skin sting. Another scar to add to the map of them.

She whirled, and Ethna was behind her. She held two shortswords, gleaming bronze, and slashed at Emma with first one and then the other. Emma leaped back, barely in time. If she hadn't been wearing gear, she knew, she'd be dead, her guts spilled out on the flagstones. She felt her jacket tear, and even in the cold of battle, a hot spike of fear went down her spine.

This was impossible. No one person could fight six Riders. She'd been mad to try, but she thought of the little girl's feet in their pink sneakers and couldn't be sorry. Not even when she turned to find three Riders blocking the way back into the Institute.

The door of the Institute had stopped shaking. Good, Emma thought. The others should stay safely inside; it was the wise thing to do, the smart thing.

"Your friends have abandoned you," sneered one of the Riders blocking her way. His bronze hair was short and curling, giving him the look of a Greek kouros. He was lovely. Emma hated his guts. "Give yourself up now and we will make your death quick."

"I could give myself a quick death, if that was what I wanted," Emma said, her sword outstretched to hold off the other three faeries. "As it happens."

Ethna was glaring at her. The other Riders--she recognized Airmed, if not the others--were whispering; she caught the last few words of a sentence. "--is the sword, as I told you."

"But runed work cannot harm us," said Airmed. "Nor seraph blades."

Emma dove for Ethna. The faerie woman spun, bringing her blades across in a whip-fast slashing gesture.

Emma leaped. It was a move she had practiced over and over with Julian in the training room, using a bar that they raised just a little bit every day. The blades whipped by beneath her feet, and in her mind's eye she saw Julian, his arms raised to catch her.

Julian. She landed on the other side of Ethna, whirled, and drove her blade into the faerie woman's back.

Or tried, at least. Ethna spun at the last moment, and the blade sliced open her bronze armor, opening a gash in her side. She shrieked and staggered back and Emma jerked Cortana free, blood spattering from the blade onto the flagstones.

Emma raised the sword. "This is Cortana," she gasped, her chest heaving. "Of the same steel and temper as Joyeuse and Durendal. There is nothing Cortana cannot cut."

"A blade of Wayland the Smith," cried the Rider with the bronze curls, and to Emma's amazement, there was fear in his voice.

"Silence, Karn," snapped one of the others. "It is yet only one blade. Kill her."

Karn's beautiful face contracted. He lifted his weapon--a massive battle-ax--and started for Emma; she raised Cortana--

And the front door of the Institute burst open, disgorging Shadowhunters.

Julian. Emma saw him first, a blur of gear and sword and dark hair. Then Mark, Cristina. Kieran, Ty, Livvy. And Kit, who must have come from the infirmary, since he seemed to have thrown gear on over his pajamas. At least he was wearing boots.

They drove back the Riders on the steps, Julian and Mark first, their swords flashing in their hands. Neither of them carried seraph blades, Emma saw--they had taken only plain-bladed weapons, unruned, meant for slaying Downworlders. Even Kieran carried one, a sword whose pommel and grip gleamed with gold and silver instead of steel.

One of the Riders let out a roar of rage when he saw Kieran. "Traitor!" he snarled.

Kieran dropped a courtly little bow. "Eochaid," he said, by way of greeting. "And Etarlam." He winked at the sixth Rider, who made a sour face. "Well met."

Eochaid lunged for him. Kieran dropped into a half crouch, swinging his sword with a lightness and skill that surprised Emma.

The clash of their blades seemed to signal the beginning of a much larger battle. Julian and Mark had forced the Riders from the steps in the first surprise of their appearance. Now the others poured after them, hounding and worrying at them with blades. Mark, carrying a double-edged straight sword, went for Delan; the twins harried Airmed while Cristina, looking beyond furious, engaged Etarlam.

Julian began to move through the blur of battle, slashing to either side of him, cutting his way toward Emma. His eyes suddenly widened. Behind you!

She spun. It was Ethna, her face twisted into a mask of hatred. Her blades made a scissoring motion--Emma raised Cortana just in time, and Ethna's double blades closed on it with savage force.

And shattered.

The faerie woman gasped in surprise. A second later she was scrambling back, her hands moving in the air. Julian changed course and leaped after her, but another weapon was taking shape in her grasp, this one with a curved blade like a Persian shamshir.

Julian's sword slammed against Ethna's. Emma felt the collision between their weapons. It forked through her like lightning. Suddenly everything was happening very fast: Julian twisted gracefully away from the blade, but the edge of it caught him across the top of the arm. Emma felt the pain of it, her parabatai's pain, just as she had felt his blade strike Ethna's. She launched herself at the two of them, but Eochaid rose up in front of her and the point of a sword hurtled toward her face, a silver blur cutting the air.

It fell away to the side. Eochaid howled, a brutal, angry sound, and whirled from her to strike savagely at the figure who had come up behind him, whose blade had pierced his shoulder. Blood stained Eochaid's bronze armor.

It was Kieran. His hair was a mass of black and white strands, sticky with blood over his temple. His clothes were stained with red, his lip split. He stared at Emma, breathing hard.

Eochaid leaped for him and they began to fight savagely. The world seemed a din of clashing blades: Emma heard a cry and saw Cristina fighting to get to Kit, who had been knocked to the ground by Delan. The Riders had swarmed up to the steps to block the Institute doors. Julian was holding off Ethna; the twins were fighting back-to-back, trying to hack their way up the steps alongside Mark.

Emma began to shove blindly toward Kit, a coldness at her heart. The Riders were too fierce, too strong. They wouldn't tire.

Delan was standing over Kit, his blade high in the air. Kit was scrambling back on his elbows. A sword flashed in front of Emma; she knocked it away with Cortana, heard someone swear. Delan was staring at Kit intently, as if his face held a mystery. "Who are you, boy?" the Rider demanded, his blade stilled.

Kit wiped blood

from his face. There was a dagger near him on the flagstones, just out of reach of his hand. "Christopher Herondale," he said, his eyes flashing arrogantly. He was a Shadowhunter, Emma thought, through and through; he would never beg for his life.

Delan snorted. "Qui omnia nomini debes," he said, and began to swing his sword down, just as Emma ducked and rolled under the blade, Cortana flashing up, shearing through Delan's wrist.

The faerie warrior screamed, an echoing howl of rage and pain. The air was full of a mist of blood. Delan's hand thumped to the ground, still gripping his sword; a second later Kit was on his feet, snatching up the weapon, his eyes blazing. Emma was beside him; together they began to back Delan up, his blood painting the flagstones beneath them as he retreated.

But Delan was laughing. "Slay me if you think you can," he sneered. "But look around you. You have already lost."

Kit had his blade up, pointed directly at Delan's throat. "You look," he said steadily. "I'll stab."

Emma's head snapped around. Airmed had backed Ty and Livvy against a wall. Ethna had her weapon at Julian's throat. Cristina had been driven to her knees by Etarlam. Mark was looking at her in horror but couldn't move--Eochaid had his sword against Mark's back, just where he could sever his spine.

Karn stood at the top of the steps, his blade out, grinning across his cruel and lovely face.

Emma swallowed. Kit swore softly under his breath. Karn spoke, his teeth flashing white with his smile. "Give us the Black Volume," he said. "We will let you go."