CITY OF GLASS

“I’m not cold,” Clary said patiently, “and I don’t need a bath, either. I’m fine. I just want Luke to come up here and tell me what’s going on.”


Jocelyn waved toward Luke to get his attention, silently mouthing something Clary couldn’t quite decipher. “Mom,” she spat, “don’t,” but it was already too late. Luke glanced up—and so did quite a few of the other Shadowhunters. Most of them looked away just as quickly, but Clary sensed the fascination in their stares. It was weird thinking that her mother was something of a legendary figure here. Just about everyone in the room had heard her name and had some kind of opinion about her, good or bad. Clary wondered how her mother kept it from bothering her. She didn’t look bothered—she looked cool and collected and dangerous.

A moment later Luke had joined them on the dais, Amatis at his side. He still looked tired, but also alert and even a little excited. He said, “Just hang on a second. Everyone’s coming.”

“Malachi,” said Jocelyn, not quite looking directly at Luke while she spoke, “was he giving you trouble?”

Luke made a dismissive gesture. “He thinks we should send a message to Valentine, refusing his terms. I say we shouldn’t tip our hand. Let Valentine show up with his army on Brocelind Plain expecting a surrender. Malachi seemed to think that wouldn’t be sporting, and when I told him war wasn’t an English schoolboy cricket game, he said that if any of the Downworlders here got out of hand, he’d step in and end the whole business. I don’t know what he thinks is going to happen—as if Downworlders can’t stop fighting even for five minutes.”

“That’s exactly what he thinks,” said Amatis. “It’s Malachi. He’s probably worried you’ll start eating each other.”

“Amatis,” Luke said. “Someone might hear you.” He turned, then, as two men mounted the steps behind him. One was a tall, slender faerie knight with long dark hair that fell in sheets on either side of his narrow face. He wore a tunic of white armor: pale, hard metal made of tiny overlapping circles, like the scales of a fish. His eyes were leaf green.

The other man was Magnus Bane. He didn’t smile at Clary as he came to stand beside Luke. He wore a long, dark coat buttoned up to the throat, and his black hair was pulled back from his face.

“You look so plain,” Clary said, staring.

Magnus smiled faintly. “I heard you had a rune to show us,” was all he said.

Clary looked at Luke, who nodded. “Oh, yes,” she said. “I just need something to write on—some paper.”

“I asked you if you needed anything,” Jocelyn said under her breath, sounding very much like the mother Clary remembered.

“I’ve got paper,” said Simon, fishing something out of his jeans pocket. He handed it to her. It was a crumpled flyer for his band’s performance at the Knitting Factory in July. She shrugged and flipped it over, raising her borrowed stele. It sparked slightly when she touched the tip to the paper, and she worried for a moment that the flyer might burn, but the tiny flame subsided. She set to drawing, doing her best to shut everything else out: the noise of the crowd, the feeling that everyone was staring at her.

The rune came out as it had before—a pattern of lines that curved strongly into one another, then stretched across the page as if expecting a completion that wasn’t there. She brushed dust from the page and held it up, feeling absurdly as if she were in school and showing off some sort of presentation to her class. “This is the rune,” she said. “It requires a second rune to complete it, to work properly. A—partner rune.”

“One Downworlder, one Shadowhunter. Each half of the partnership has to be Marked,” Luke said. He scribbled a copy of the rune on the bottom of the page, tore the paper in half, and handed one illustration to Amatis. “Start circulating the rune,” he said. “Show the Nephilim how it works.”

With a nod Amatis vanished down the steps and into the crowd. The faerie knight, glancing after her, shook his head. “I have always been told that only the Nephilim can bear the Angel’s Marks,” he said, with a measure of distrust. “That others of us will run mad, or die, should we wear them.”

“This isn’t one of the Angel’s Marks,” said Clary. “It’s not from the Gray Book. It’s safe, I promise.”

The faerie knight looked unimpressed.

With a sigh Magnus flipped his sleeve back and reached a hand out to Clary. “Go ahead.”

“I can’t,” she said. “The Shadowhunter who Marks you will be your partner, and I’m not fighting in the battle.”

“I should hope not,” said Magnus. He glanced over at Luke and Jocelyn, who were standing close together. “You two,” he said. “Go on, then. Show the faerie how it works.”

Jocelyn blinked in surprise. “What?”

“I assumed,” Magnus said, “that you two would be partners, since you’re practically married anyway.”

Color flooded up into Jocelyn’s face, and she carefully avoided looking at Luke. “I don’t have a stele—”