City of Fallen Angels

“It’s a bad dream,” Simon said. He moved toward her and put his hand on her shoulder. She didn’t pull away. Her head was drooping, like a tired child’s. “Just a dream. You never found anything in my room. Nothing happened. You’ve just been sleeping, that’s all.”


He took her hand. She let him lead her into the living room, where he settled her into the armchair. She smiled when he pulled a blanket over her, and closed her eyes.

He went back into the kitchen and swiftly, methodically, swept the bottles and containers of blood into a garbage bag. He tied it at the top and brought it to his room, where he changed his bloody jacket for a new one, and threw some things quickly into a duffel bag. He flipped the light off and left, closing the door behind him.

His mother was already asleep as he passed through the living room. He reached out and lightly touched her hand.

“I’ll be gone for a few days,” he whispered. “But you won’t worry. You won’t expect me back. You think I’m on a school field trip. There’s no need to call. Everything is fine.”

He drew his hand back. In the dim light his mother looked both older and younger than he was used to. She was as small as a child, curled under the blanket, but there were new lines on her face he didn’t remember being there before.

“Mom,” he whispered.

He touched her hand, and she stirred. Not wanting her to wake, he jerked his fingers back and moved soundlessly to the door, grabbing his keys from the table as he went.


The Institute was quiet. It was always quiet these days. Jace had taken to leaving his window open at night, so he could hear the noises of traffic going by, the occasional wail of ambulance sirens and the honking of horns on York Avenue. He could hear things mundanes couldn’t, too, and these sounds filtered through the night and into his dreams—the rush of air displaced by a vampire’s airborne motorcycle, the flutter of winged fey, the distant howl of wolves on nights when the moon was full.

It was only half-full now, casting just enough light for him to read by as he sprawled on the bed. He had his father’s silver box open in front of him, and was going through what was inside it. One of his father’s steles was in there, and a silver-handled hunting dagger with the initials SWH on the handle, and—of most interest to Jace—a pile of letters.

Over the past six weeks he had taken to reading a letter or so every night, trying to get a sense for the man who was his biological father. A picture had begun to emerge slowly, of a thoughtful young man with hard-driving parents who had been drawn to Valentine and the Circle because they had seemed to offer him an opportunity to distinguish himself in the world. He had kept writing to Amatis even after their divorce, something she hadn’t mentioned before. In those letters, his disenchantment with Valentine and sickness at the Circle’s activities were clear, though he rarely, if ever, mentioned Jace’s mother, Céline. It made sense—Amatis wouldn’t have wanted to hear about her replacement—and yet Jace could not help hating his father a little for it. If he hadn’t cared about Jace’s mother, why marry her? If he’d hated the Circle so much, why hadn’t he left it? Valentine had been a madman, but at least he’d stood by his principles.

And then, of course, Jace only felt worse for preferring Valentine to his real father. What kind of person did that make him?

A knock on the door drew him out of his self-recriminations; he got to his feet and went to answer it, expecting Isabelle to be there, wanting to either borrow something or complain about something.

But it wasn’t Isabelle. It was Clary.

She wasn’t dressed the way she usually was. She had a low-cut black tank top on, a white blouse tied loose and open over it, and a short skirt, short enough to show the curves of her legs up to midthigh. She wore her bright red hair in braids, loose curls of it clinging against the hollows of her temples, as if it had been raining lightly outside. She smiled when she saw him, arching her eyebrows. They were coppery, like the fine eyelashes that framed her green eyes. “Aren’t you going to let me in?”

He looked up and down the hallway. No one else was there, thank God. Taking Clary by the arm, he pulled her inside and shut the door. Leaning against it, he said, “What are you doing here? Is everything all right?”

“Everything’s fine.” She kicked off her shoes and sat down on the edge of the bed. Her skirt rode up as she leaned back on her hands, showing more thigh. It wasn’t doing wonders for Jace’s concentration. “I missed you. And Mom and Luke are asleep. They won’t notice I’m gone.”

“You shouldn’t be here.” The words came out as a sort of groan. He hated saying them but knew they needed to be said, for reasons she didn’t even know. And he hoped she never would.