City of Heavenly Fire

“Oh, dear,” said Jace, his voice dripping sarcasm. “I just might have sent a fire-message to the Clave when I saw the body of the guard you killed and shoved under that bridge. Foolish of you not to dispose of it more carefully, Sebastian.”


Sebastian’s expression tightened, so momentarily that Clary imagined most people would never have noticed it. He reached for Clary, his lips shaping words—a spell to free her from whatever force held her clamped to the wall. She pushed, shoved at him, and then Jace leaped at them, his blade driving down—

Sebastian spun away, but the blade had caught him: It drew a line of blood down his arm. He cried out, staggering back—and paused. He grinned as Jace stared at him, white-faced.

“The heavenly fire,” Sebastian said. “You don’t know how to control it yet. Works sometimes and not other times, eh, little brother?”

Jace’s eyes blazed up in gold. “We’ll see about that,” he said, and lunged for Sebastian, sword slicing through the darkness with light.

But Sebastian was too quick for it to matter. He strode forward and plucked the sword out of Jace’s hand. Clary struggled, but Sebastian’s magic kept her pinned in place; before Jace could move, Sebastian swung Jace’s sword around and plunged it into his own chest.

The tip sank in, parting his shirt, then his skin. He bled red, human blood, as dark as rubies. He was clearly in pain: His teeth bared in a rictus grin, his breath coming unevenly, but the sword kept moving, his hand steady. The back of his shirt bulged and tore as the tip of the sword broke through it, on a gout of blood.

Time seemed to stretch out like a rubber band. The hilt slammed up against Sebastian’s chest, the blade protruding from his back, dripping scarlet. Jace stood, shocked and frozen, as Sebastian reached for him with bloody hands and pulled him close. Over the sound of feet pounding up the stairs, Sebastian spoke:

“I can feel the fire of Heaven in your veins, angel boy, burning under the skin,” he said. “The pure force of the destruction of ultimate goodness. I can still hear your screams on the air when Clary plunged the blade into you. Did you burn and burn?” His breathless voice was dark with poisonous intensity. “You think you have a weapon you can use against me, now, don’t you? And perhaps with fifty years, a hundred, to learn to master the fire, you could, but time is exactly what you don’t have. The fire rages, uncontrolled, inside you, far more likely to destroy you than it is to ever destroy me.”

Sebastian raised a hand and cupped the back of Jace’s neck, pulling him closer, so close their foreheads almost touched.

“Clary and I are alike,” he said. “And you—you are my mirror. One day she will choose me over you, I promise you that. And you will be there to see it.” With a swift darting motion, he kissed Jace on the cheek, fast and hard; when he drew back, there was a smear of blood there. “Ave, Master Herondale,” Sebastian said, and twisted the silver ring on his finger—there was a shimmer, and he vanished.

Jace stared for a wordless moment at the place where Sebastian had been, then started toward Clary; suddenly freed by Sebastian’s disappearance, her legs had collapsed under her. She hit the ground on her knees and threw herself forward immediately, scrabbling for the blade of Heosphoros. Her hand closed around it and she drew it close, curling her body around it as if it were a child that needed protecting.

“Clary—Clary—” Jace was there, sinking to his knees beside her, and his arms were around her; she rocked into them, pressing her forehead to his shoulder. She realized his shirt, and now her skin, was wet with her brother’s blood, as the door burst open, and the guards of the Clave poured into the room.



“Here you go,” said Leila Haryana, one of the newest of the pack’s wolves, as she handed over a stack of clothes to Maia.

Maia took them gratefully. “Thanks—you have no idea what it means to have clean clothes to wear,” she said, glancing through the pile: a tank top, jeans, a wool jacket. She and Leila were about the same size, and even if the clothes didn’t quite fit, it was better than going back to Jordan’s apartment. It had been a while since Maia had lived at pack headquarters, and all her things were at Jordan and Simon’s, but the thought of the apartment without either of the boys in it was a dreary one. At least here she was surrounded by other werewolves, surrounded by the constant hum of voices, the smell of take-out Chinese and Malaysian food, the sound of people cooking in the kitchen. And Bat was there—not getting in her space, but always around if she wanted someone to talk to or just sit silently with, watching the traffic go by on Baxter Street.