Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices 2)

She wasn't sure whether it was Mark or Kieran who caught her as she fell.

*

Rain clouds had replaced blue sky over London. Ty, Kit, and Livvy had decided to walk back from Hypatia's after picking up Magnus's ingredients, rather than wait in the fussy, damp line for the riverboat.

Kit was enjoying himself kicking his way through puddles on the Thames Path, which wound like a granite snake along the side of the river. They'd passed the Tower of London again, and Ty had pointed out Traitor's Gate, where condemned criminals had once entered the tower to have their heads chopped off.

Livvy had sighed. "I wish Dru was with us. She would have liked that. She's hardly come out of her room lately."

"I think she's afraid someone will make her babysit if she does," said Kit. He wasn't sure he had a clear impression of Dru yet--more a blurred sense of a round face, flushed cheeks, and a lot of black clothes. She had the Blackthorn eyes, but they were usually focused on something else.

"I think she's keeping a secret," Livvy said. They'd passed Millennium Bridge, a long iron line stretching across the river, and were nearing an older-looking bridge, painted a dented red and gray.

Ty was humming to himself, lost in thought. The river was the same color as his eyes today, a sort of steely-gray, touched with bits of silver. The white band of his headphones was around his neck, trapping his unruly black hair under it. He looked puzzled. "Why would she do that?"

"It's just a feeling I have," said Livvy. "I can't prove it . . . ." Her voice trailed off. She was squinting into the distance, her hand up to shield her face from the gray afternoon light. "What's that?"

Kit followed her glance and felt a coldness pass through him. Shapes were moving through the sky, a line of racing figures, silhouetted against the clouds. Three horses, clear as paper outlines, with three riders on their backs.

He looked around wildly. Mundanes were all around, paying little to no attention to the three teenagers in jeans and hooded raincoats hurrying along with their bags full of magic powders.

"The Wild Hunt?" Kit said. "But why--?"

"I don't think it's the Wild Hunt," said Livvy. "They ride at night. It's broad daylight." She put her hand to her side, where her seraph blades hung.

"I don't like this." Ty sounded breathless. The figures were incredibly close now, skimming the top of the bridge, angling downward. "They're coming toward us."

They turned, but it was too late. Kit felt a breeze ruffle his hair as the horses and their riders passed overhead. A moment later there was a clatter as the three landed in a neat pattern around Kit, Livvy, and Ty, cutting off their retreat.

The horses were a glimmering bronze in color, and their riders were bronze-skinned and bronze-haired, wearing half masks of gleaming metal. They were beautiful, bizarre and unearthly, entirely out of place in the shadows of the bridge as the water taxis skated by and the road above hummed with traffic.

They were clearly faeries, but nothing like the ones Kit had seen before in the Shadow Market. They were taller and bigger, and they were armed, despite the edicts of the Cold Peace. Each wore a massive sword at his waist.

"Nephilim," said one, in a voice that sounded like glaciers breaking apart. "I am Eochaid of the Seven Riders, and these are my brothers Etarlam and Karn. Where is the Black Volume?"

"The Black Volume?" Livvy echoed. The three of them had squeezed tighter against the wall of the path. Kit noticed people giving them odd glances as they passed by, and he knew they looked as if they were staring at nothing.

"Yes," said Etarlam. "Our King seeks it. You will give it up."

"We don't have it," said Ty. "And we don't know where it is."

Karn laughed. "You are but children, so we are inclined to be lenient," he said. "But understand this. The Riders of Mannan have done the bidding of the Unseelie King for a thousand years. In that time many have fallen to our blades, and we have spared none for any reason, not for age or weakness or infirmity of body. We will not spare you now." He leaned over the mane of his horse, and Kit saw for the first time that the horse had a shark's eyes, inky and flat and deadly. "Either you know where the Black Volume is, or you will make useful prisoners to tempt those who do. Which will it be, Shadowhunters?"

23

SKIES OF FIRE

"I win again." Jaime threw down his cards: all hearts. He grinned triumphantly at Dru. "Don't feel bad. Cristina used to say I had the devil's luck."

"Wouldn't the devil have bad luck?" Dru didn't mind losing to Jaime. He always seemed pleased, and she didn't care one way or the other.

He'd slept on the floor at the side of her bed the night before, and when she'd woken up, she'd rolled over and looked down at him, her chest full of happiness. Asleep, Jaime looked vulnerable, and more like his brother, though she thought now that he was better-looking than Diego.

Jaime was a secret, her secret. Something important she was doing, whether the others knew it or not. She knew he was on an important mission, something he couldn't talk much about; it was like having a spy in her room, or a superhero.

"I will miss you," he said frankly, linking his fingers together and stretching out his arms like a cat stretching in the sun. "This is the most fun, and the most rest, I have had in a long time."

"We can stay friends after this, right?" she said. "I mean, when you're done with your mission."

"I don't know when I'll be done." A shadow crossed his face. Jaime was much quicker of mood than his brother: He could be happy, then sad, then thoughtful, then laughing in a five-minute period. "It could be a long time." He looked at her sideways. "You may come to resent me. I've made you keep secrets from your family."

"They keep secrets from me," she said. "They think I'm too young to know anything."

Jaime frowned. Dru felt a little pinch of worry--they'd never discussed how old she was; why would they have? Usually, though, people thought she was at least seventeen. Her curves were bigger than other girls' her age, and Dru was used to boys staring at them.

So far Jaime hadn't stared, at least not the way other boys did, as if they had a right to her body. As if she ought to be grateful for the attention. And she'd discovered she desperately didn't want him to know she was only thirteen.

"Well, Julian does," she went on. "And Julian's pretty much in charge of everything. The thing is, when we were all younger, we were all just 'the kids.' But after my parents died, and Julian basically brought us all up, we split into groups. I got labeled 'younger' and Julian was suddenly older, like a parent."

"I know what that is like," he said. "Diego and I used to play like puppies when we were children. Then he grew up and decided he had to save the world and started ordering me around."

"Exactly," she said. "That's exactly right."

He reached down to pull his duffel bag onto the bed. "I can't stay much longer," he said. "But before I go--I have something for you."

He pulled a laptop computer out of the bag. Dru stared at him--he wasn't going to give her a laptop, was he? He flipped it open, a grin spreading across his face. It was a Peter Pan sort of grin, one that said that he would never be done with mischief. "I downloaded The House That Dripped Blood," he said. "I thought we could watch it together."

Dru clapped her hands together and scrambled up onto the mattress beside him. He scooted over, giving her plenty of room. She watched him as he tilted the screen toward them so they could both see. She could read the words that curled up his arm, though she didn't know what they meant. La sangre sin fuego hierve.

"And yes," he said, as the first images began to unroll across the screen. "I hope we will in the future be friends."

*

"Jules," Emma said, leaning against the wall of the church. "Are you sure this is a good idea? Doesn't there seem something kind of sacrilegious about burning down a church?"

"It's abandoned. Unhallowed." Julian pushed his jacket sleeves up. He was marking himself with a Strength rune, neatly and precisely, on the insid

e of his forearm. Behind him Emma could see the curve of the bay, the water dashing itself in blue curls against the shore.

"Still--we respect all religions. Every religion tithes to Shadowhunters. That's how we live. This seems--"

"Disrespectful?" Julian smiled with little humor. "Emma, you didn't see what I saw. What Malcolm did. He ripped apart the fabric of what made this church a hallowed place. He spilled blood, and then his blood was spilled. And when a church becomes a slaughterhouse like that, it's worse than if it was some other kind of building." He raked a hand through his hair. "Remember what Valentine did with the Mortal Sword? When he took it from the Silent City?"