City of Lost Souls

Jace shot him a look. “We were out getting food,” he said to Clary. “Nothing fancy. Bread and cheese. You want lunch?”


Which was how, several minutes later, Clary found herself installed at the big glass and steel table. From the comestibles spread out over the table, she figured that her second guess had been right. They were in Venice. There was bread, Italian cheeses, salami and prosciutto, grapes and fig jam, and bottles of Italian wine. Jace sat across from her, Sebastian at the head of the table. She was eerily reminded of the night she had met Valentine, at Renwick’s in New York, how he had put himself between Jace and Clary at the head of a table, how he had offered them wine and told them they were brother and sister.

She sneaked a glance at her real brother now. She thought of how her mother had looked when she’d seen him. Valentine. But Sebastian wasn’t a carbon copy of their father. She had seen pictures of Valentine when he was their age. Sebastian’s face tempered her father’s hard features with her mother’s prettiness; he was tall but less broad-shouldered, more lithe and catlike. He had Jocelyn’s cheekbones and fine soft mouth, Valentine’s dark eyes and white-blond hair.

He looked up then, as if he had caught her staring at him. “Wine?” He offered the bottle.

She nodded, though she had never much liked the taste of wine, and since Renwick’s she had hated it. She cleared her throat as Sebastian filled the glass. “So,” she said. “This place—is it yours?”

“It was our father’s,” said Sebastian, setting the bottle down. “Valentine’s. It moves, in and out of worlds—ours and others. He used to use it as a retreat as well as a mode of travel. He brought me here a few times, showed me how to get in and out and how to make it travel.”

“There’s no front door.”

“There is if you know how to find it,” said Sebastian. “Dad was very clever about this place.”

Clary looked at Jace, who shook his head. “He never showed it to me. I wouldn’t have guessed it existed either.”

“It’s very… bachelor pad,” Clary said. “I wouldn’t have thought of Valentine as…”

“Owning a flat-screen TV?” Jace grinned at her. “Not that it gets channels, but you can watch DVDs on it. Back at the manor we had an old icebox powered by witchlight. Here he’s got a Sub-Zero fridge.”

“That was for Jocelyn,” said Sebastian.

Clary looked up. “What?”

“All the modern stuff. The appliances. And the clothes. Like that shirt you’re wearing. They were for our mother. In case she decided to come back.” Sebastian’s dark eyes met hers. She felt a little sick. This is my brother, and we’re talking about our parents. She felt dizzy—too much happening too fast to take in, to process. She had never had time to think about Sebastian as her living, breathing brother. By the time she’d found out who he really was, he’d been dead.

“Sorry if it’s weird,” Jace said apologetically, indicating her shirt. “We can buy you some other clothes.”

Clary touched the sleeve lightly. The fabric was silky, fine, expensive. Well, that explained that—everything close to her size, everything in colors that suited her. Because she looked just like her mother.

She took a deep breath. “It’s fine,” she said. “It’s just—What do you do exactly? Just travel around inside this apartment and…”

“See the world?” Jace said lightly. “There’s worse things.”

“But you can’t do that forever.”

Sebastian hadn’t eaten much, but he’d drunk two glasses of wine. He was on his third, and his eyes were glittering. “Why not?”

“Well, because—because the Clave is looking for both of you, and you can’t spend forever running and hiding…” Clary’s voice trailed off as she looked from one of them to the other. They were sharing a look—the look of two people who knew something, together, that no one else did. It was not a look Jace had shared with someone else in front of her in a very long time.

Sebastian spoke softly and slowly. “Are you asking a question or making an observation?”

“She has a right to know our plans,” Jace said. “She came here knowing she couldn’t go back.”

“A leap of faith,” said Sebastian, running his finger around the rim of his glass. It was something Clary had seen Valentine do. “In you. She loves you. That’s why she’s here. Isn’t it?”

“So what if it is?” Clary said. She supposed she could pretend there was another reason, but Sebastian’s eyes were dark and sharp, and she doubted he’d believe her. “I trust Jace.”

“But not me,” Sebastian said.

Clary chose her next words with extreme care. “If Jace trusts you, then I want to trust you,” she said. “And you’re my brother. That counts for something.” The lie tasted bitter in her mouth. “But I don’t really know you.”

“Then, maybe you should spend a little time getting to know me,” Sebastian said. “And then we’ll tell you our plans.”