City of Lost Souls

But he’d been telling the truth. I’m giving you a chance, he’d said. Can you give me a chance?

Could she? This was Sebastian they were talking about. She mulled it over feverishly while she showered and dressed carefully. The clothes in the wardrobe, having been selected for Jocelyn, were so far from her usual style that it was hard to choose what to wear. She found a pair of jeans—designer, from the price tag still attached—and a dotted silk shirt with a bow at the neck that had a vintage feel she liked. She threw her own velvet jacket on over it and headed back to Jace’s room, but he was gone, and it wasn’t hard to guess where. The rattle of dishes, the sound of laughter, and the smell of cooking floated up from downstairs.

She took the glass stairs two at a time, but paused on the bottom step, looking into the kitchen. Sebastian was leaning against the refrigerator, arms crossed, and Jace was making something in a pan that involved onions and eggs. He was barefoot, his hair messy, his shirt buttoned haphazardly, and the sight of him made her heart turn over. She had never seen him like this, first thing in the morning, still with that warm golden aura of sleep clinging to him, and she felt a piercing sadness that all these firsts were happening with a Jace who wasn’t really her Jace.

Even if he did look happy, eyes shadow-free, laughing as he flipped the eggs in the pan and slid an omelet onto a plate. Sebastian said something to him, and Jace looked over at Clary and smiled. “Scrambled or fried?”

“Scrambled. I didn’t know you could make eggs.” She came down from the steps and over to the kitchen counter. Sun was streaming through the windows—despite the lack of clocks in the house, she guessed it was late morning—and the kitchen glittered in glass and chrome.

“Who can’t make eggs?” Jace wondered aloud.

Clary raised her hand—and at the same time so did Sebastian. She couldn’t help a little jerk of surprise, and put her arm down hastily, but not before Sebastian had seen and grinned. He was always grinning. She wished she could slap it off his face.

She looked away from him and busied herself putting together a breakfast plate from what was on the table—bread, fresh butter, jam, and sliced bacon—the chewy, round kind. There was juice, too, and tea. They ate pretty well here, she thought. Although, if Simon was anything to go by, teenage boys were always hungry. She glanced toward the window—and did a double take. The view was no longer of a canal but of a hill rising in the distance, topped by a castle.

“Where are we now?” she asked.

“Prague,” said Sebastian. “Jace and I have an errand to do here.” He glanced out the window. “We should probably get going soon, in fact.”

She smiled sweetly at him. “Can I come with you?”

Sebastian shook his head. “No.”

“Why not?” Clary crossed her arms over her chest. “Is this some manly bonding thing I can’t be a part of? Are you getting matching haircuts?”

Jace handed her a plate with scrambled eggs on it, but he was looking at Sebastian. “Maybe she could come,” he said. “I mean, this particular errand—it’s not dangerous.”

Sebastian’s eyes were like the woods in the Frost poem, dark and deep. They gave nothing away. “Anything can turn dangerous.”

“Well, it’s your decision.” Jace shrugged, reached for a strawberry, popped it into his mouth, and sucked the juice off his fingers. Now that, Clary thought, was a clear and absolute difference between this Jace and hers. Her Jace had a ferocious and all-consuming curiosity about everything. He would never shrug and go along with someone else’s plan. He was like the ocean ceaselessly throwing itself against a rocky shore, and this Jace was… a calm river, shining in the sun.

Because he’s happy?

Clary’s hand tensed on her fork, her knuckles whitening. She hated that little voice in her head. Like the Seelie Queen, it planted doubts where there shouldn’t be doubts, asked questions that had no answer.

“I’m going to get my stuff.” After grabbing another berry off the plate, Jace popped it into his mouth and shot upstairs. Clary craned her head up. The clear glass steps seemed invisible, making it look like he was flying upward, not running.

“You’re not eating your eggs.” It was Sebastian. He had come around the counter—still noiselessly, dammit—and was looking at her, his eyebrows raised. He had the faintest accent, a mixture of the accent of the people who lived in Idris and something more British. She wondered if he’d been hiding it before or if she just hadn’t noticed.

“I don’t actually like eggs,” she confessed.

“But you didn’t want to tell Jace that, because he seemed so pleased to be making you breakfast.”

Since this was accurate, Clary said nothing.