“Very well,” Magnus said. “Let us pause for a moment and consider— Oh, you have already run off. Splendid.”
He found himself addressing Edmund’s coat, wrenched off and left in a heap upon the cobblestones, and his hat, spinning gently beside it.
Edmund jumped and somersaulted in midair, vaulting neatly onto the roof of the carriage. As he did so, he drew weapons from the concealing folds of his garments: the two whips he had spoken of before, arcs of sizzling light against the night sky. He wielded them with cutting precision, their light waking golden fire in his tousled hair and casting a glow on his carved features, and by that light Magnus saw his face change from a laughing boy’s to the stern countenance of an angel.
One whip curled around the demon’s waist like a gentleman’s hand around a lady’s waist during a waltz. The other wrapped as tight as wire about his throat. Edmund twisted one hand, and the demon spun, crashing to the ground.
“You heard the lady,” said Edmund. “Unhand her.”
The demon, his teeth suddenly much more numerous than before, snarled and lunged for the carriage. Magnus raised his hand and made the carriage door fly shut and the carriage jolt forward a few paces, despite the fact that the carriage driver was missing—presumed eaten—and despite the Shadowhunter who was still standing atop it.
Edmund did not lose his balance. As surefooted as a cat, he simply leaped down to the ground and struck the Eidolon demon a blow across the face with his whip, sending him flying backward again. Edmund landed a foot upon the demon’s throat, and Magnus saw the creature begin to writhe, its outlines blurring into a changing shape.
He heard the creak of a carriage door being opened and saw the lady who had punched the demon essaying to emerge from relative safety to the demon-haunted street.
“Ma’am,” Magnus said, advancing. “I must counsel you not to exit the carriage while a demon-slaying is in progress.”
She looked him full in the face. She had large dark blue eyes, the color of the sky immediately before night turned it black, and the hair slipping from her elaborate coiffure was black, as if night had come with no stars. Though her beautiful eyes were very wide, she did not look frightened, and the hand that had struck the demon was still clenched in a fist.
Magnus made a silent vow to come to London far more often in the future. He was meeting the most delightful people.
“We must render assistance to that young man,” said the lady, in a lilting musical accent.
Magnus glanced over to Edmund, who was at present being thrown against a wall and who was bleeding rather profusely, but grinning and sliding a dagger from his boot with one hand as he choked the demon with the other.
“Do not be alarmed, dear lady. He has the matter well in hand,” he said as Edmund slid the dagger home. “So to speak.”
The demon gurgled and thrashed in its death throes. Magnus made the decision to ignore the furor behind him, and made the two women a superb bow. It did not seem to console the maidservant, who shrank into the shadowed recesses of the carriage and attempted to crawl into a pocket handkerchief, face foremost.
The lady of the shining ebony hair and pansy eyes let go her hold on the carriage door and gave Magnus her hand instead. Her hand was small, soft, and warm; she was not even trembling.
“I am Magnus Bane,” said Magnus. “Call on me for aid at any time of mortal danger, or if in urgent need of an escort to a flower show.”
“Linette Owens,” said the lady, and dimpled. She had delicious dimples. “I heard the capital held many dangers, but this seems excessive.”
“I am aware that all this must seem very strange and frightening to you.”
“Is that man an evil faerie?” Miss Owens inquired. She met Magnus’s startled look with her own steady gaze. “I am from Wales,” she said. “We still believe in the old ways and the fey folk there.”
She tipped her head back to scrutinize Magnus. Her crown of midnight-colored plaits seemed like it had to be too massive for such a small head, on such a slender neck.
“Your eyes . . . ,” she said slowly. “I believe you must be a good faerie, sir. What your companion is, I cannot tell.”
Magnus glanced over his shoulder at his companion, who he had almost forgotten was there. The demon was darkness and dust at Edmund’s feet, and with his foe well and truly vanquished, Edmund had turned his attention to the carriage. Magnus observed the spark of Edmund’s golden charm kindle at the sight of Linette, blooming from candle to sun in an instant.
“What am I?” he asked. “I am Edmund Herondale, and, my lady, I am always and forever at your service. If you will have me.”
He smiled, and the smile was slow and devastating. In the dark narrow street long past midnight, his eyes were high summer.
“I do not mean to seem indelicate or ungrateful,” said Linette Owens, “but are you a dangerous lunatic?”