Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices 2)

*

"She lies. She just sits there and lies like her opinions are facts," said Emma furiously. After dinner, she'd retreated with Cristina to the other girl's room; they were both sitting on the bed, Cristina worrying her dark hair between her fingers.

"I think they are, to her and those like her," said Cristina. "But we should not waste time on Zara. You said on the way upstairs that you had something to tell me?"

As concisely as she could, Emma caught Cristina up on the visit from Gwyn. As Emma talked, Cristina's face grew more and more pinched with worry. "Is Mark all right?"

"I think so--he can be really hard to read, sometimes."

"He's one of those people with a lot going on in his head," said Cristina. "Has he ever asked--about you and Julian?"

Emma shook her head violently. "I don't think it would ever cross his mind we had anything but parabatai feelings for each other. Jules and I have known each other so long." She rubbed at her temples. "Mark assumes Julian feels the same way about me that he does--brotherly."

"It's strange, the things that blind us," said Cristina. She drew her knees up, her hands looped around them.

"Have you tried to reach Jaime?" Emma asked.

Cristina leaned her cheek on the tops of her knees. "I sent a fire-message, but I haven't heard anything."

"He was your best friend," Emma said. "He'll respond." She twisted a piece of Cristina's woven blanket between her fingers. "You know what I miss most? About Jules? Just--being parabatai. Being Emma and Julian. I miss my best friend. I miss the person I told everything to, all the time. The person who knew everything about me. The good things and the bad things." She could see Julian in her mind's eye as she spoke, the way he had looked during the Dark War, all thin shoulders and determined eyes.

The sound of a knock on the door echoed through the room. Emma glanced at Cristina--was she expecting someone?--but the other girl looked as surprised as she did.

"Pasa," Cristina called.

It was Julian. Emma looked at him in surprise, the younger Julian of her memory blurring back into the Julian standing in front of her: a nearly grown-up Julian, tall and muscular, his curls unruly, a hint of stubble prickling along his jawline.

"Do you know where Mark is?" he asked, without preamble.

"Isn't he in his room?" Emma said. "He left during dinner, so I thought--"

Julian shook his head. "He's not there. Could he be in your room?"

It cost him visible effort to ask, Emma thought. She saw Cristina bite her lip and prayed Julian wouldn't notice. He could never find out how much Cristina knew.

"No," Emma said. "I locked my door." She shrugged. "I don't completely trust the Centurions."

Julian ran a hand distractedly through his hair. "Look--I'm worried about Mark. Come with me and I'll show you what I mean."

Cristina and Emma followed Julian to Mark's room; the door was propped wide open. Julian went in first, and then Emma and Cristina, both of them glancing around carefully as if Mark might be found hiding in a closet somewhere.

Mark's room had changed a great deal since he'd first come back from Faerie. Then it had been dusty, a clearly unused space kept empty for the sake of memory. All his things had been cleared out and put into storage, and the curtains, filmed with dust, had been always drawn.

It was very different now. Mark had folded his clothes in neat stacks at the foot of his bed; he'd told Emma once that he didn't see the point of a wardrobe or a dresser, since all they did was hide your clothes from you.

The windowsills were covered with small items from nature--flowers in various stages of drying, leaves and cactus needles, shells from the beach. The bed was made neatly; clearly he hadn't slept in it once.

Julian looked away from the too-orderly bed. "His boots are gone," he said. "He only had the one pair. They were supposed to ship more from Idris, but they haven't yet."

"His jacket, too," Emma said. It had been his only heavy one, denim lined with shearling. "His bag . . . he had a duffel bag, didn't he?"

Cristina gave a gasp. Emma and Julian both swung to look at her as she reached up for a piece of paper that had just appeared, floating at shoulder height. Glowing runes sealed it shut; they faded as she caught the fire-message out of the air. "Addressed to me," she said, tearing it open. "From Mark." Her eyes scanned the page; her cheeks paled, and she handed over the paper without a word.

Julian took the message, and Emma read over his shoulder as he studied it.

My dear Cristina,

I know you will show this to the right people at the right time. I can always trust you to do what is necessary when it needs to be done.

By now you know what has happened with Kieran's arrest. Though things ended badly between us, he was my protector for many Faerie years. I owe him and cannot leave him to die in the grim Court of his father. I take the moon's road for Faerie tonight. Tell my brothers and sisters I will return to them as soon as I can. Tell Emma I will be back. I returned to them from the Land Under the Hill once before. I will do it again.

Mark Blackthorn

Julian crumpled the paper viciously between unsteady fingers. "I'm going after him."

Emma started to reach for his arm before remembering, and dropping her hand to her side. "I'm going with you."

"No," Julian said. "Do you understand what Mark's trying to do? He can't invade the Unseelie Court by himself. The King of Shadows will have him killed before you can blink."

"Of course I understand," said Emma. "That's why we need to get to Mark before he makes it to an entrance to Faerie. Once he enters the Fair Folk's Lands, it'll be practically impossible to intercept him."

"There is also the issue of time," said Cristina. "Once he crosses the border, time will be different for him. He could come back in three days, or three weeks--"

"Or three years," said Emma grimly.

""Which is why I should go after him now," said Julian. "Before he makes it into Faerie and time starts being our enemy--"

"I can help with that," Cristina said.

Faeries had been Cristina's special field of study when she was growing up. She'd once confessed to Emma that this had been partly because of Mark, and what she'd learned about him as a child. He'd fascinated her, the Shadowhunter boy taken by faeries during the Dark War.

Cristina touched the pendant at her throat, the golden pendant that bore an image of Raziel. "This is a faerie-blessed charm. My family has . . ." She hesitated. "Many of them. Years ago, they were close with the Fair Folk. We still have many tokens of their regard. We speak of it little, though, as the Clave's attitude toward those who befriend Fair Folk is . . ." She glanced around Mark's room. "As you know it to be."

"What does the charm do?" said Emma.

"It keeps time from passing too quickly for mortals in the Fair Folk's realm." Cristina held the pendant between her fingers, gazing at Jules with quiet inquiry as if to say she had many more surprises up her neat sleeves, if he cared to hear them.

"It's only one pendant," said Julian. "How can it protect us all?"

"If I wear it into the realm, the protection will extend to you and Emma, and Mark, too, as long as you do not go too far away from me."

Julian leaned against the wall and sighed. "And I suppose you're not going to consider just giving it to me, so I can wear it into Faerie? By myself?"

"Absolutely not," Cristina said primly. "It's a family heirloom."

Emma could have kissed Cristina. She settled for winking at her. The corner of Cristina's lip curled up slightly.

"Then the three of us will go," Emma said, and Julian seemed to realize there would be no point in disagreement. He nodded at her, and there was a little of the old parabatai look in his eye, the look that said that he expected the two of them to enter into danger. Together.

"The pendant will also allow us take the moon's road," said Cristina. "Usually only those with faerie blood can access it." She squared her shoulders. "Mark will not imagine that

we could follow him; that is why he sent the note."

"The moon's road?" Julian said. "What is that, exactly?"

At that, Cristina did smile. It was an odd smile--not quite a look of happiness, and Emma expected that she was too worried for that--but there was a little bit of wonder in it, the look of someone who was getting to experience something they never thought they'd get a chance to do.

"I'll show you," she said.

*