In the silence that followed the unmasking of the Unseelie champion, Julian could hear his own heart slamming against his chest. He felt the burning of his parabatai rune, a clear searing pain. Emma's pain.
He wanted to go to her. She stood like a knight in a painting, her head bowed and her sword at her side, blood splattering her gear, her hair half-torn out of its bindings, floating down around her. He saw her lips move: He knew what she was saying, even if he couldn't hear her. It cut through him with memories of the Emma he had known what seemed like a thousand years ago, a little girl reaching out her arms for her father to lift her up.
Daddy?
The King laughed. "Cut his throat, girl," he said. "Or can't you kill your own father?"
"Father?" Cristina echoed. "What does he mean?"
"That's John Carstairs," said Mark. "Emma's father."
"But how--"
"I don't know," Julian said. "It's impossible."
Emma dropped to her knees, sliding Cortana back into its scabbard. In the moonlight she and her father were shadows as she bent over him.
The King began to laugh, his eerie face split by a wide grin, and the Court laughed with him, howls of mirth exploding around them.
No one was paying attention to the three Shadowhunters in the center of the clearing.
Julian wanted to go to Emma. He wanted it desperately. But he was someone who was used to not doing, or getting, what he wanted. He spun toward Mark and Cristina. "Go to her," he said to Cristina. Her dark eyes widened. "Go to him," he said to Mark, and Mark nodded and slipped into the crowd, a shadow into shadows.
Cristina disappeared after him, plunging the opposite way into the crowd. The courtiers were still laughing, the sound of their ridicule rising up, painting the night. Human emotions are so foolish to them, and human minds and hearts so fragile.
Julian slid a dagger from his belt. Not a seraph blade, or even a runed one, but it was cold iron, and fit comfortably into his palm. The princes among the knights were looking toward the pavilion, laughing. It took Julian only a few steps to reach them, to throw his arms around Prince Erec from the back and press the edge of his dagger to his throat.
*
Kit's first, distracted thought was, So that's why they haven't been able to find Malcolm's body.
His second was a memory. The High Warlock had been a fixture of the Shadow Market, and friendly with Kit's father--though he had only learned later that they had been more than acquaintances, but partners in crime. Still, the lively, purple-eyed warlock had been popular at the Market, and had sometimes produced interesting candy for Kit that he claimed came from faraway places he had traveled to.
It had been strange for Kit to realize that the friendly warlock he knew was a murderer. It was even stranger now to see what Malcolm had become. The warlock moved forward, stripped of all his previous grace, lurching over the grass. The Shadowhunters snapped into formation, like a Roman legion: They faced Malcolm in a line, shoulder to shoulder, their weapons out. Only Arthur stood alone. He stared at Malcolm, his mouth working.
The grass in front of them all was seared black and gray by demon blood.
Malcolm smirked, as well as he could with his ruined face. "Arthur," he said, gazing at the shrinking man in his bloodstained bathrobe. "You must miss me. You don't look as if you're doing well without your medication. Not at all."
Arthur flattened himself against the Institute wall. There was a murmur among the Centurions, cut off when Diana spoke. "Malcolm," she said. She sounded remarkably calm, considering. "What do you want?"
He came to a stop, close to the Centurions, though not close enough for them to strike. "Have you been enjoying looking for my body, Centurions? It's been a real treat to watch you. Splashing around in your invisible boat, no idea what you're looking for or how to find it. But then you never have been much use without warlocks, have you?"
"Silence, filth," said Zara, vibrating like an electrical wire. "You--"
Divya elbowed her. "Don't," she whispered. "Let Diana talk."
"Malcolm," said Diana, in the same cold tone. "Things aren't like they were before. We have the might of the Clave on our side. We know who you are, and we will find out where you are. You are a fool to have come here and shown your hand."
"My hand," he mused. "Where is my hand again? Oh, right. It's inside this bag . . . ." He plunged his hand into the sack he'd been carrying. When he drew it out, he was carrying a severed human head.
There was a horrified silence.
"Jon!" Diego said hoarsely.
Gen Aldertree seemed about to collapse. "Oh God, poor Marisol. Oh--"
Zara was staring with openmouthed horror, though she made no move to go forward. Diego took a step, but Rayan caught his arm as Diana snapped, "Centurions! Remain in formation!"
There was a gagging sound as Malcolm threw Jon Cartwright's severed head onto the bare grass. Kit realized he'd made the noise himself. He was staring at Jon's exposed spinal column. It was very white against the dark ground.
"I suppose you're right," Malcolm said to Diana. "It's rather time to give up our pretenses, isn't it? You know my weaknesses--and I know yours. Killing this one"--he gestured at Jon's remains--"took seconds, and taking down your wards took less. Do you think it will take much longer for me to get something I actually want?"
"And what is that?" said Diana. "What is it you want, Malcolm?"
"I want what I've always wanted. I want Annabel and what it will take to get her back." Malcolm laughed. It was a gurgling sort of sound. "I want my Blackthorn blood."
*
Emma couldn't remember dropping to her knees, but she was kneeling.
Churned ground and dead leaves were all around her. The faerie knight--her father--was on his back in a pool of spreading blood. It soaked into the alre
ady dark earth and turned it nearly black.
"Daddy," she whispered. "Daddy, please look at me."
She hadn't said the word "daddy" in years. Probably since she was seven years old.
Blue eyes opened in his scarred face. He looked just as Emma remembered him--blond whiskers where he'd forgotten to shave, lines of kindness around his eyes. Dried blood spattered his cheek. He stared at her, wide-eyed.
The King laughed. "Cut his throat," he said. "Or can't you kill your own father, girl?"
John Carstairs's lips moved, but no sound came out.
You will see again the face of someone you loved, who is dead, the phouka had said. But Emma had never dreamed this, not this.
She caught hold of her father's arm, covered in leathery faerie armor. "I concede," she said raggedly, "I concede, I concede, just help him--"
"She has conceded," said the King.
The Court began to laugh. Laughter rose up around Emma, though she barely heard it. A voice in the back of her head was telling her that this wasn't right, there was a fundamental wrongness here, but the sight of her father was roaring in her head like the sound of a crashing wave. She reached for a stele--he was still a Shadowhunter after all--but dropped her hand; no iratze would work here.
"I won't leave you," she said. Her head was buzzing. "I won't leave you here." She gripped his arm tighter, crouching at the foot of the pavilion, aware of the King's gaze on her, the laughter all around. "I'll stay."
*
It was Arthur who moved. He burst away from the wall, careening toward Livvy and Ty. He seized each of them by an arm and propelled them toward the Institute door.
They both struggled, but Arthur seemed shockingly strong. Livvy half-turned, calling Kit's name. Arthur kicked the front door open and shoved his niece and nephew through. Kit could hear Livvy shouting, and the door slammed behind them.
Diana arched an eyebrow at Malcolm. "Blackthorn blood, you said?"
Malcolm sighed. "Mad dogs and Englishmen," he said. "And sometimes you encounter someone who's both. He can't think that would work."
"Are you saying you can get into the Institute?" Diego demanded.
"I'm saying it doesn't matter," said Malcolm. "I set this all up before Emma killed me. My death--and I am dead, though not for long, isn't the Black Volume wonderful?--released the sea demons along this coast. What you see with me tonight is a tiny fraction of the numbers I control. Either you bring me a Blackthorn, or I send them up on land to murder and destroy mundanes."