CITY OF GLASS

The front door shut, leaving Alec sitting in the half-lit garden, alone. He closed his eyes for a moment, the image of a face hovering behind his lids. Not Jace’s face, for a change. The eyes set in the face were green, slit-pupiled. Cat eyes.

Opening his eyes, he reached into his satchel and drew out a pen and a piece of paper, torn from the spiral-bound notebook he used as a journal. He wrote a few words on it and then, with his stele, traced the rune for fire at the bottom of the page. It went up faster than he’d thought it would; he let go of the paper as it burned, floating in midair like a firefly. Soon all that was left was a fine drift of ash, sifting like white powder across the rosebushes.





5

A PROBLEM WITH MEMORY


AFTERNOON LIGHT WOKE CLARY, A BEAM OF PALE BRIGHTNESS that laid itself directly over her face, lighting the insides of her eyelids to hot pink. She stirred restlessly and warily opened her eyes.

The fever was gone, and so was the sense that her bones were melting and breaking inside her. She sat up and glanced around with curious eyes. She was in what had to be Amatis’s spare room—it was small, white-painted, the bed covered with a brightly woven rag blanket. Lace curtains were drawn back over round windows, letting in circles of light. She sat up slowly, waiting for dizziness to wash over her. Nothing happened. She felt entirely healthy, even well rested. Getting out of bed, she looked down at herself. Someone had put her in a pair of starched white pajamas, though they were wrinkled now and too big for her; the sleeves hung down comically past her fingers.

She went to one of the circular windows and peered out. Stacked houses of old-gold stone rose up the side of a hill, and the roofs looked as if they had been shingled in bronze. This side of the house faced away from the canal, onto a narrow side garden turning brown and gold with autumn. A trellis crawled up the side of the house; a single last rose hung on it, drooping browning petals.

The doorknob rattled, and Clary climbed hastily back into bed just before Amatis entered, holding a tray in her hands. She raised her eyebrows when she saw Clary was awake, but said nothing.

“Where’s Luke?” Clary demanded, drawing the blanket close around herself for comfort.

Amatis set the tray down on the table beside the bed. There was a mug of something hot on it, and some slices of buttered bread. “You should eat something. You’ll feel better.”

“I feel fine,” Clary said. “Where’s Luke?”

There was a high-backed chair beside the table; Amatis sat in it, folded her hands in her lap, and regarded Clary calmly. In the daylight Clary could see more clearly the lines in her face—she looked older than Clary’s mother by many years, though they couldn’t be that far apart in age. Her brown hair was stippled with gray, her eyes rimmed with dark pink, as if she had been crying. “He’s not here.”

“Not here like he just popped around the corner to the bodega for a six-pack of Diet Coke and a box of Krispy Kremes, or not here like …”

“He left this morning, around dawn, after sitting up with you all night. As to his destination, he wasn’t specific.” Amatis’s tone was dry, and if Clary hadn’t felt so wretched, she might have been amused to note that it made her sound much more like Luke. “When he lived here, before he left Idris, after he was … Changed … he led a wolf pack that made its home in Brocelind Forest. He said he was going back to them, but he wouldn’t say why or for how long—only that he’d be back in a few days.”

“He just … left me here? Am I supposed to sit around and wait for him?”

“Well, he couldn’t very well take you with him, could he?” Amatis asked. “And it won’t be easy for you to get home. You broke the Law in coming here like you did, and the Clave won’t overlook that, or be generous about letting you leave.”

“I don’t want to go home.” Clary tried to collect herself. “I came here to … to meet someone. I have something to do.”

“Luke told me,” said Amatis. “Let me give you a piece of advice—you’ll only find Ragnor Fell if he wants to be found.”

“But—”

“Clarissa.” Amatis looked at her speculatively. “We’re expecting an attack by Valentine at any moment. Almost every Shadowhunter in Idris is here in the city, inside the wards. Staying in Alicante is the safest thing for you.”

Clary sat frozen. Rationally, Amatis’s words made sense, but it didn’t do much to quiet the voice inside her screaming that she couldn’t wait. She had to find Ragnor Fell now; she had to save her mother now; she had to go now. She bit down on her panic and tried to speak casually. “Luke never told me he had a sister.”

“No,” Amatis said. “He wouldn’t have. We weren’t—close.”

“Luke said your last name was Herondale,” Clary said. “But that’s the Inquisitor’s last name. Isn’t it?”

“It was,” said Amatis, and her face tightened as if the words pained her. “She was my mother-in-law.”