First Matthew had to breeze into the London Institute to collect a parcel known as James Herondale. He had a shrewd idea of where James was likely to be, so he told Oscar to stay and guard a lamppost. Oscar obeyed: he was very well behaved for a puppy, and people said Matthew must have trained him well, but Matthew only loved him. Matthew threw a grappling hook up to the library window, climbed up while being careful of his trousers, and tapped on the glass.
James was in the window seat, his black head bent over—what a surprise!—a book. He looked up at the tap, and smiled.
James had never really needed Matthew. James had been so shy, and Matthew had wanted to take care of him, but now that James was growing into his angular features and accustomed to having the certain company of three good friends, he was far more collected during social gatherings. Even when Jamie was shy, he never seemed to doubt or wish to alter himself. He never looked to Matthew for rescue. There was a quiet, deep certainty to James that Matthew wished he had himself. From the start, there was something between them which was more equal than between him and Thomas, or him and Christopher. Something that made Matthew want to prove himself to James. He was not sure he ever truly had.
James never looked relieved to see Matthew, or expectant. He only looked pleased. He opened the window and Matthew crawled in, upsetting both James and the book from the window seat.
“Hello, Matthew,” said James from the floor, in slightly sardonic tones.
“Hello, Matthew!” chimed Lucie from her writing desk.
She was a picture of dainty disarray, clearly in the throes of composition. Her light brown curls were half pulled out of a blue ribbon, one shoe dangling precariously from her stockinged toes. Uncle Will frequently gave dramatic readings from the book he was writing on the demon pox, which were very droll. Lucie did not show her writing around. Matthew had often considered asking her if she might read him a page, but he could think of no reason why Lucie would make a special exception for him.
“Bless you, my Herondales,” said Matthew grandly, scrambling up from the floor and making Lucie his bow. “I come upon an urgent errand. Tell me—be honest!—what do you think of my waistcoat?”
Lucie dimpled. “Devastating.”
“What Lucie said,” James agreed peacefully.
“Not fantastic?” Matthew asked. “Not positively stunning?”
“I suppose I am stunned,” said James. “But am I positively stunned?”
“Refrain from playing cruel word games with your one and only parabatai,” Matthew requested. “Attend to your own attire, if you please. Heave that beastly book away. The Misters Lightwood await us. We must hook it.”
“Can’t I go as I am?” asked James.
He looked up at Matthew with wide gold eyes from his position on the floor. His pitch-black hair was askew, his linen shirt rumpled, and he was not even wearing a waistcoat. Matthew nobly repressed a convulsive shudder.
“Surely you jest,” said Matthew. “I know you only say these things to hurt me. Off with you. Brush your hair!”
“The hairbrush mutiny is coming,” warned James, making for the door.
“Come back victorious or on the hairbrushes of your soldiers!” Matthew called after him.
When Jamie was flown, Matthew turned to Lucie, who was scribbling intently but who looked up as if sensing his glance and smiled. Matthew wondered how it would be, to be self-sufficient and welcoming with it, like a house with sturdy walls and a beacon light always burning.
“Should I brush my hair?” Lucie teased.
“You are, as always, perfect,” said Matthew.
He wished he could fix the ribbon in her hair, but that would be taking a liberty.
“Do you wish to attend our secret club meeting?” asked Matthew.
“I cannot, I am doing lessons with my mother. Mam and I are teaching ourselves Farsi,” said Lucie. “I should be able to speak the languages my parabatai speaks, shouldn’t I?”
James had recently started calling his mother and father Mam and Da rather than Mama and Papa, since it sounded more grown up. Lucie had instantly copied him in this matter. Matthew rather liked hearing the Welsh lilt in their voices when they called their parents, their voices soft as songs and always loving.
“Of a certainty,” said Matthew, coughing and making a private resolution to return to his Welsh lessons.
There had been no question of Lucie attending Shadowhunter Academy. She had never demonstrated any abilities like James’s, but the world was cruel enough to women who were even suspected of being the least bit different.
“Lucie Herondale is a sweet child, but with her disadvantages, who would marry her?” Lavinia Whitelaw had asked Matthew’s mama once over tea.
“I would be happy if either of my sons wished to,” said Charlotte, in her most Consul-like manner.
Matthew thought James was very lucky to have Lucie. He had always wanted a little sister.
Not that he wanted Lucie to be his sister.
“Are you writing your book, Luce?” Matthew asked tentatively.
“No, a letter to Cordelia,” Lucie answered, shattering Matthew’s fragile plot. “I hope Cordelia will come to visit, very soon,” added Lucie with earnest eagerness. “You will like her so much, Matthew. I know you will.”
“Hmm,” said Matthew.
Matthew had his doubts about Cordelia Carstairs. Lucie was going to be parabatai with Cordelia one day, when the Clave decided they were grown-up ladies who knew their own minds. Lucie and James were acquainted with Cordelia from childhood adventures that Matthew had not been part of, and which Matthew felt a bit jealous about. Cordelia must have some redeeming qualities, or Lucie would not want her for a parabatai, but she was Alastair Loathly Worm Carstairs’s sister, so it would be strange if she was entirely amiable.
“She sent me a picture of herself in her latest. This is Cordelia,” Lucie continued in tones of pride. “Is she not the prettiest girl you ever saw?”
“Oh, well,” said Matthew. “Perhaps.”
He was privately surprised by the picture. He would have thought Alastair’s sister might share Alastair’s unpleasant look, as if he were eating lemons he looked down upon. She did not. Instead Matthew was reminded of a line in a poem James had read to him once, about an unrequited love. “That child of shower and gleam” described the vivid face laughing up at him from the frame exactly.
“All I know is,” Matthew continued, “you have every other girl in London beat to flinders.”
Lucie colored faint pink. “You are always teasing, Matthew.”
“Did Cordelia ask you to be parabatai,” Matthew said casually, “or did you ask her?”
Lucie and Cordelia had wanted to be made parabatai before they were parted, but they were warned that sometimes you regret a bond made young, and sometimes one partner or other would change their mind. Particularly, Laurence Ashdown had remarked, since ladies could be so flighty.
Lucie was not flighty. She and Cordelia wrote to each other faithfully, every day. Lucie had even once told Matthew she was writing a long story to keep Cordelia amused since Cordelia was always so far away. Matthew did not really wonder why someone like Lucie found it difficult to take someone like Matthew seriously.
“I asked her, of course,” Lucie said promptly. “I did not wish to miss my chance.”
Matthew nodded, confirmed in his new belief that Cordelia Carstairs must be something special.
He was sure that if he had not asked James to be parabatai, James would never have thought of asking him.
James returned to the room. “Satisfied?” he asked.