City of Heavenly Fire

“Wrecked,” Clary said. “What happened after I left the meeting?”


“The interrogation was mostly over,” said Jace. “Sebastian’s obviously behind the attacks, and he has a sizeable force of Endarkened warriors backing him up. Nobody knows exactly how many, but we have to assume all of the missing have been Turned.”

“Still, we have greater numbers by far,” said Alec. “He has his original forces, and the six Conclaves he Turned; we have everyone else.”

There was something in Jace’s eyes that turned them darker than gold. “Sebastian knows that,” he murmured. “He’ll know his forces, down to the last warrior. He’ll know exactly what he can match and what he can’t.”

“We have the Downworlders on our side,” said Alec. “That’s the whole point of tomorrow’s meeting, isn’t it? Talk to the representatives, strengthen our alliances. Now that we know what Sebastian’s doing, we can strategize around it, hit him with the Night’s Children, the Courts, the warlocks. . . .”

Clary’s eyes met Jace’s in silent communication. Now that we know what Sebastian’s doing, he’ll do something else. Something we don’t expect yet.

“And then everyone talked about Jace,” said Isabelle. “So, you know, the usual.”

“About Jace?” Clary leaned against the footboard of Jace’s bed. “What about him?”

“There was a lot of back-and-forth about whether Sebastian’s basically invulnerable now, and if there are ways to wound and kill him. Glorious could have done it because of the heavenly fire, but currently the only source of heavenly fire is . . .”

“Jace,” Clary said grimly. “But the Silent Brothers have tried everything to separate Jace from the heavenly fire, and they can’t do it. It’s in his soul. So what’s their plan, hitting Sebastian over the head with Jace until he passes out?”

“Brother Zachariah said pretty much the same thing,” Jace said. “Maybe with less sarcasm.”

“Anyway, they wound up talking about ways to capture Sebastian without killing him—if they can destroy all the Endarkened, if he can be trapped somewhere or somehow, it might not matter as much if he can’t be killed,” Alec said.

“Put him in an adamas coffin and drop it into the sea,” Isabelle said. “That’s my suggestion.”

“Anyway, when they were done talking about me, which was of course the best part,” Jace said, “they went back pretty quickly to talking about ways to cure the Endarkened. They’re paying the Spiral Labyrinth a fortune to try to unravel the spell Sebastian used to create the Infernal Cup and enact the ritual.”

“They need to stop obsessing about curing the Endarkened and start thinking about how to defeat them,” Isabelle said in a hard voice.

“A lot of them know people who were Turned, Isabelle,” said Alec. “Of course they want them back.”

“Well, I want my little brother back,” said Isabelle, her voice rising. “Don’t they understand what Sebastian did? He killed them. He killed what was human about them, and he left demons walking around in skin-suits that look like people we used to know, that’s all—”

“Keep it down,” Alec said, in his determined-older-brother tone. “You know Mom and Dad are in the house, right? They’ll come up.”

“Oh, they’re here,” said Isabelle. “About as far away from each other, bedroom-wise, as you could possibly be, but they’re here.”

“It’s not our business where they sleep, Isabelle.”

“They’re our parents.”

“But they have their own lives,” said Alec. “And we have to respect that and stay out of it.” His expression darkened. “A lot of people split up when they have a child who dies.”

Isabelle gave a little gasp.

“Izzy?” Alec seemed to realize he’d gone too far. Mentions of Max seemed to devastate Isabelle more than they did any of the other Lightwoods, even Maryse.

Isabelle turned and ran out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

Alec shoved his fingers into his hair, causing it to stick up like duck fluff. “Goddammit,” he swore, and then flushed—Alec hardly ever swore, and usually when he did, he muttered. He shot Jace an almost apologetic look and went after his sister.

Jace sighed, swung his long legs off the bed, and stood up. He stretched like a cat, cracking his shoulders. “Guess that’s my cue to walk you home.”

“I can find my way back—”

He shook his head, grabbing his jacket off the bedpost. There was something impatient about his movements, something prowling and watchful that made Clary’s own skin prickle. “I want to get out of here anyway. Come on. Let’s go.”