City of Lost Souls

“Of course it’s not okay with me. I’m a teenage boy. As far as I’m concerned, this is the worst thing that’s happened since I found out why Magnus was banned from Peru.” His eyes softened. “But it doesn’t change what we are to each other. It’s like there’s always been a piece of my soul missing, and it’s inside you, Clary. I know I told you once that whether God exists or not, we’re on our own. But when I’m with you, I’m not.”


She closed her eyes so he wouldn’t see her tears—happy tears, for the first time in a long time now. Despite everything, despite the fact that Jace’s hands remained carefully together in his lap, Clary felt a sense of relief so overwhelming that it drowned out everything else—the worry about where Sebastian was, the fear of an unknown future—everything receded into the background. None of it mattered. They were together, and Jace was himself again. She felt him turn his head and lightly kiss her hair.

“I really wish you hadn’t worn that sweater,” he muttered into her ear.

“It’s good practice for you,” she replied, her lips moving against his skin. “Tomorrow, fishnets.”

Against her side, warm and familiar, she felt him laugh.

“Brother Enoch,” said Maryse, rising from behind her desk. “Thank you for joining me and Brother Zachariah here on such short notice.”

Is this in regards to Jace? Zachariah inquired, and if Maryse had not known better, she would have imagined a tinge of anxiety in his mental voice. I have checked in on him several times today. His condition has not changed.

Enoch shifted within his robes. And I have been looking through the archives and the ancient documentation on the topic of Heaven’s fire. There is some information about the manner in which it may be released, but you must be patient. There is no need to call on us. Should we have news, we will call on you.

“This is not about Jace,” said Maryse, and she moved around the desk, her heels clicking on the stone floor of the library. “This is about something else entirely.” She glanced down. A rug had been carelessly tossed across the floor, where no rug usually rested. It did not lie flat but was draped over an irregular humped shape. It obscured the delicate pattern of tiles that outlined the shape of the Cup, the Sword, and the Angel. She reached down, took hold of a corner of the rug, and yanked it aside.

The Silent Brothers did not gasp, of course; they could make no sound. But a cacophony filled Maryse’s mind, the psychic echo of their shock and horror. Brother Enoch took a step back, while Brother Zachariah raised one long-fingered hand to cover his face, as if he could block his ruined eyes from the sight before him.

“It was not here this morning,” said Maryse. “But when I returned this afternoon, it awaited me.”

At the very first glimpse she had thought that some kind of large bird had found its way into the library and died, perhaps breaking its neck against one of the tall windows. But as she had moved closer, the truth of what she was looking at had dawned on her. She said nothing of the visceral shock of despair that had gone through her like an arrow, or the way she had staggered to the window and been sick out of it the moment she’d realized what she was looking at.

A pair of white wings—not quite white, really, but an amalgamation of colors that shifted and flickered as she looked at it: pale silver, streaks of violet, dark blue, each feather outlined in gold. And then, there at the root, an ugly gash of sheared-off bone and sinew. Angel’s wings—angel’s wings that had been sliced from the body of a living angel. Angelic ichor, the color of liquid gold, smeared the floor.

Atop the wings was a folded piece of paper, addressed to the New York Institute. After splashing water on her face, Maryse had taken the letter and read it. It was short—one sentence—and was signed with a name in a handwriting oddly familiar to her, for in it there was the echo of Valentine’s cursive, the flourishes of his letters, the strong, steady hand. But it was not Valentine’s name. It was his son’s.

Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern.

She held it out now to Brother Zachariah. He took it from her fingers and opened it, reading, as she had, the single word of Ancient Greek scrawled in elaborate script across the top of the page.

Erchomai, it said.

I am coming.





NOTES


Magnus’s Latin invocation on page 237 that raises Azazel, beginning “Quod tumeraris: per Jehovam, Gehennam,” is taken from The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus by Christopher Marlowe.

The snippets of the ballad Magnus listens to in the car on pages 391–393 are taken with permission from “Alack, for I Can Get No Play” by Elka Cloke. elkacloke.com

The T-shirt CLEARLY I HAVE MADE SOME BAD DECISIONS is inspired by my friend Jeph Jacques’s comic at questionable content.net. The T-shirts can be purchased at topatoco.com. The idea of Magical Love Gentleman also belongs to him.





Acknowledgments