She’d kept her jewelry simple—very simple.
She put her hand up and touched the Morgenstern ring on its chain around her throat. She had put it on again, for the first time in days, that morning. She felt as if it were a silent gesture of confidence in Jace, a way of signaling her loyalty, whether he knew about it or not. She had decided she would wear it until she saw him again.
“Clarissa Morgenstern?” said a soft voice at her shoulder.
Clary turned in surprise. The voice wasn’t familiar. Standing there was a slim tall girl who looked about twenty. Her skin was milk-pale, threaded with veins the clear green of sap, and her blond hair had the same greenish tint. Her eyes were solid blue, like marbles, and she wore a slip of a blue dress, so thin that Clary thought she had to be freezing. Memory swam up slowly from the depths.
“Kaelie,” Clary said slowly, recognizing the faerie waitress from Taki’s who had served her and the Lightwoods more than once. A flicker reminded her that there had been some intimation that Kaelie and Jace had once had a fling, but the fact seemed so minor in the face of everything else that she couldn’t bring herself to mind it. “I didn’t realize—do you know Luke?”
“Do not mistake me for a guest at this occasion,” said Kaelie, her thin hand tracing a casually indifferent gesture on the air. “My lady sent me here to find you—not to attend the festivities.” She glanced curiously over her shoulder, her all-blue eyes shining. “Though I had not realized that your mother was marrying a werewolf.”
Clary raised her eyebrows. “And?”
Kaelie looked her up and down with some amusement. “My lady said you were quite flinty, despite your small size. In the Court you would be looked down on for having such short stature.”
“We’re not in the Court,” said Clary. “And we’re not in Taki’s, which means you came to me, which means you have five seconds to tell me what the Seelie Queen wants. I don’t like her much, and I’m not in the mood for her games.”
Kaelie pointed a thin green-nailed finger at Clary’s throat. “My lady said to ask you,” she said, “why you wear the Morgenstern ring. Is it to acknowledge your father?”
Clary’s hand stole to her throat. “It’s for Jace—because Jace gave it to me,” she said before she could help herself, and then cursed herself quietly. It wasn’t smart to tell the Seelie Queen more than you had to.
“But he is not a Morgenstern,” said Kaelie, “but a Herondale, and they have their own ring. A pattern of herons, rather than morning stars. And does that not suit him better, a soul that soars like a bird in flight, rather than falling like Lucifer?”
“Kaelie,” Clary ground out between her teeth. “What does the Seelie Queen want?”
The faerie girl laughed. “Why,” she said, “only to give you this.” She held out something in her hand, a tiny silver bell pendant, with a loop at the end of the handle so that it could be strung on a chain. As Kaelie moved her hand forward, the bell chimed, light and as sweet as rain.
Clary shrank back. “I do not want the gifts of your lady,” she said, “for they come freighted with lies and expectations. I will not owe the Queen anything.”
“It is not a gift,” Kaelie said impatiently. “It is a means of summoning. The Queen forgives you for your earlier stubbornness. She expects there is a time soon in which you will want her help. She is willing to offer it to you, should you choose to ask. Simply ring that bell, and a servant of the Court will come and bring you to her.”
Clary shook her head. “I will not ring it.”
Kaelie shrugged. “Then it should cost you nothing to take it.”
As if in a dream Clary saw her own hand reach out, her fingers hover over the bell.
“You would do anything to save him,” said Kaelie, her voice thin and as sweet as the bell’s ring, “whatever it cost you, whatever you might owe to Hell or Heaven, would you not?”
Remembered voices chimed in Clary’s head. Did you ever stop to wonder what untruths might have been in the tale your mother told you, that served her purpose in telling it? Do you truly think you know each and every secret of your past?
Madame Dorothea told Jace he would fall in love with the wrong person.
He is not beyond saving. But it will be difficult.
The bell clanged as Clary took it, folding it into her palm. Kaelie smiled, her blue eyes shining like glass beads. “A wise choice.”
Clary hesitated. But before she could thrust the bell back at the faerie girl, she heard someone call her name, and turned to see her mother making her way through the crowd toward her. She turned back hastily, but was not surprised to see that Kaelie was gone, having melted away into the crowd like mist burning away in the morning sun.
City of Fallen Angels
CASSANDRA CLARE's books
- City of Ruins
- Invincible (A Centennial City Novel)
- City of Fae
- City of Lost Souls
- City of Heavenly Fire
- CITY OF GLASS
- CITY OF BONES
- CITY OF ASHES
- City of Lost Souls
- Velocity
- Ascendancy of the Last
- Blood of Aenarion
- Broods Of Fenrir
- Burden of the Soul
- Caradoc of the North Wind
- Cause of Death: Unnatural
- Dark of the Moon
- Demons of Bourbon Street
- Edge of Dawn
- Eye of the Oracle
- Freak of Nature
- Heart of the Demon
- Lady of Devices
- Lance of Earth and Sky
- Last of the Wilds
- Legacy of Blood
- Legend of Witchtrot Road
- Lord of the Wolfyn
- Of Gods and Elves
- Of Wings and Wolves
- Prince of Spies
- Professor Gargoyle
- Promise of Blood
- Secrets of the Fire Sea
- Shadows of the Redwood
- Sin of Fury
- Sins of the Father
- Smugglers of Gor
- Sword of Caledor
- Sword of Darkness
- Talisman of El
- Threads of Desire (Spellcraft)
- Tricks of the Trade
- Visions of Magic
- Visions of Skyfire
- Well of the Damned
- Wings of Tavea
- Wings of the Wicked
- A Bridge of Years
- Chronicles of Raan
- Dawn of Swords(The Breaking World)
- A Draw of Kings
- Hunt the Darkness (Guardians of Eternity)
- Lord of the Hunt
- Master of War
- Mistfall(Book One of the Mistfall Series)
- The Gates of Byzantium
- The House of Yeel
- The Oath of the Vayuputras: Shiva Trilogy 3
- The Republic of Thieves #1
- The Republic of Thieves #2
- Edge of Dawn
- A Quest of Heroes
- Mistress of the Empire
- Servant of the Empire
- Gates of Rapture
- Reaper (End of Days)
- This Side of the Grave
- Magician's Gambit (Book Three of The Belgariad)
- Skin Game: A Novel of the Dresden Files
- Murder of Crows
- The Queen of the Tearling
- A Tale of Two Castles
- Mark of the Demon
- Sins of the Demon
- Blood of the Demon
- The Other Side of Midnight
- Vengeance of the Demon: Demon Novels, Book Seven (Kara Gillian 7)
- Cold Burn of Magic
- Of Noble Family
- Wrath of a Mad God ( The Darkwar, Book 3)
- King of Foxes
- Daughter of the Empire
- Mistress of the Empire
- Krondor : Tear of the Gods (Riftwar Legacy Book 3)
- Shards of a Broken Crown (Serpentwar Book 4)
- Rise of a Merchant Prince
- End of Days (Penryn and the End of Day #3)
- Servant of the Empire
- Talon of the Silver Hawk
- Shadow of a Dark Queen
- The Cost of All Things
- The Wicked (A Novella of the Elder Races)
- Night's Honor (A Novel of the Elder Races Book 7)
- Born of Silence
- Born of Shadows
- Sins of the Night
- Kiss of the Night (Dark Hunter Series – Book 7)
- Born Of The Night (The League Series Book 1)