City of Lost Souls

“But not dead? They haven’t found a body?” She collapsed onto the couch next to Simon. “No—he’s not dead. I’d know.”


She remembered Simon holding her hand while Luke told her what they did know: that Jace was still gone, and so was Sebastian. The bad news was that the blood on the pedestal had been identified as Jace’s. The good news was that there was less of it than they had thought; it had mixed with the water from the coffin to give the impression of a greater volume of blood than there had really been. They now thought it was quite possible he had survived whatever had happened.

“But what happened?” she demanded.

Luke shook his head, blue eyes somber. “Nobody knows, Clary.”

Her veins felt as if her blood had been replaced with ice water. “I want to help. I want to do something. I don’t want to just sit here while Jace is missing.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,” Jocelyn said grimly. “The Clave wants to see you.”

Invisible ice cracked in Clary’s joints and tendons as she stood up. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll tell them anything they want if they’ll find Jace.”

“You’ll tell them anything they want because they have the Mortal Sword.” There was despair in Jocelyn’s voice. “Oh, baby. I’m so sorry.”

And now, after two weeks of repetitive testimony, after scores of witnesses had been called, after she had held the Mortal Sword a dozen times, Clary sat in Isabelle’s bedroom and waited for the Council to rule on her fate. She couldn’t help but remember what it had felt like to hold the Mortal Sword. It was like tiny fishhooks embedded in your skin, pulling the truth out of you. She had knelt, holding it, in the circle of the Speaking Stars and had heard her own voice telling the Council everything: how Valentine had raised the Angel Raziel, and how she had taken the power of controlling the Angel from him by erasing his name in the sand and writing hers over it. She had told them how the Angel had offered her one wish, and she had used it to raise Jace from the dead; she told them how Lilith had possessed Jace and Lilith had planned to use Simon’s blood to resurrect Sebastian, Clary’s brother, whom Lilith regarded as a son. How Simon’s Mark of Cain had ended Lilith, and they had thought Sebastian had been ended too, no longer a threat.

Clary sighed and flipped her phone open to check the time. “They’ve been in there for an hour,” she said. “Is that normal? Is it a bad sign?”

Isabelle dropped Church, who let out a yowl. She came over to the bed and sat down beside Clary. Isabelle looked even more slender than usual—like Clary, she’d lost weight in the past two weeks—but elegant as always, in black cigarette pants and a fitted gray velvet top. Mascara was smudged all around Izzy’s eyes, which should have made her look like a racoon but just made her look like a French film star instead. She stretched her arms out, and her electrum bracelets with their rune charms jingled musically. “No, it’s not a bad sign,” she said. “It just means they have a lot to talk over.” She twisted the Lightwood ring on her finger. “You’ll be fine. You didn’t break the Law. That’s the important thing.”

Clary sighed. Even the warmth of Isabelle’s shoulder next to hers couldn’t melt the ice in her veins. She knew that technically she had broken no Laws, but she also knew the Clave was furious at her. It was illegal for a Shadowhunter to raise the dead, but not for the Angel to do it; nevertheless it was such an enormous thing she had done in asking for Jace’s life back that she and Jace had agreed to tell no one about it.

Now it was out, and it had rocked the Clave. Clary knew they wanted to punish her, if only because her choice had had such disastrous consequences. In some way she wished they would punish her. Break her bones, pull her fingernails out, let the Silent Brothers root through her brain with their bladed thoughts. A sort of devil’s bargain—her own pain for Jace’s safe return. It would have helped her guilt over having left Jace behind on that rooftop, even though Isabelle and the others had told her a hundred times she was being ridiculous—that they had all thought he was perfectly safe there, and that if Clary had stayed, she would probably now be missing too.

“Quit it,” Isabelle said. For a moment Clary wasn’t sure if Isabelle was talking to her or to the cat. Church was doing what he often did when dropped—lying on his back with all four legs in the air, pretending to be dead in order to induce guilt in his owners. But then Isabelle swept her black hair aside, glaring, and Clary realized she was the one being told off, not the cat.