“Do you want to rush to his aid?” inquired Wayland. “If you try, every one of us will move to strike you down. Do not dare to question our motives or our way of life. You speak of that which is higher and nobler than you can possibly understand.”
Magnus heard another scream, and this one broke off into desperate sobbing. The warlock thought of the bright boy he had spent one night at a club with, his face radiant and untouched by pain. This was the price Shadowhunters set on love.
Magnus started forward, but the Shadowhunters drew together with bared blades and stern faces. An angel with a flaming sword, proclaiming that Magnus should not pass, could not have expressed more conviction of his own righteousness. He heard the echoes of his stepfather’s voice in his mind: devil’s child, Satan’s get, born to be damned, forsaken by God.
The long lonely cry of a suffering boy he could not help chilled Magnus through to the bone, like cold water seeping through to find a grave. Sometimes he thought they were all forsaken, every soul on this earth.
Even the Nephilim.
“There is nothing to be done, Magnus. Come away,” said Camille’s voice in his ear in an undertone. Her hand was small but held Magnus’s arm in a firm grip. She was strong, stronger than Magnus was, perhaps in all ways. “Fairchild raised the boy from a child, I believe, and yet he is throwing him away like refuse into the street. The Nephilim have no pity.”
Magnus allowed her to draw him away, into the street and away from the Institute. He was impressed that she was still so calm. Camille had fortitude, Magnus thought. He wished she could teach him the trick of being less foolish, and less easily hurt.
“I hear you are leaving us, Mr. Bane,” Camille said. “I shall be sorry to see you go. De Quincey hosts the most famous parties, and I hear you are quite the life and soul of any party you attend.”
“I am sorry to go, indeed,” said Magnus.
“If I might ask why?” said Camille, her lovely face upturned, her green eyes glittering. “I had rather thought that London had caught your fancy, and that you might stay.”
Her invitation was almost irresistible. But Magnus was no Shadowhunter. He could have pity on someone who was suffering, and young.
“That young werewolf, Ralf Scott,” Magnus said, abandoning pretense. “He is in love with you. And it seemed to me you looked at him with some interest as well.”
“And if that is true?” Camille asked, laughing. “You do not strike me as the sort of man to step aside and renounce a claim for the benefit of another!”
“Ah, but I am not a man. Am I? I have years, and so do you,” he added, and that was glorious too, the idea of loving someone and not fearing they would soon be lost. “But werewolves are not immortals. They age and die. The Scott boy has but one chance for your love, where I—I might go and return, and find you here again.”
She pouted prettily. “I might forget you.”
He bent to her ear. “If you do, I shall have to recall myself forcibly to your attention.” His hands spanned her waist, the silk of her dress smooth under the pads of his fingertips. He could feel the swell and rise of her under his touch. His lips brushed her skin, and he felt her jump and shudder. He whispered, “Love the boy. Give him his happiness. And when I return, I shall devote an age to admiring you.”
“An entire age?”
“Perhaps,” said Magnus, teasing. “How does Marvell’s poem go?
“An hundred years should go to praise
Thine eyes and on thy forehead gaze;
Two hundred to adore each breast,
But thirty thousand to the rest;
An age at least to every part,
And the last age should show your heart. . . .”
Camille’s eyebrows had lifted at the reference to her bosom, but her eyes were sparkling. “And how do you know that I have a heart?”
Magnus raised his own eyebrows, conceding the point. “I have heard it said that love is faith.”
“Whether your faith is justified,” Camille said, “time will tell.”
“Before time tells us anything more,” Magnus said, “I humbly beg of you to accept a small token of my regard.”
He reached inside his coat, which was made of blue superfine fabric and which he hoped Camille found dashing, and produced the necklace. The ruby glinted in the light of a nearby streetlamp, its heart the rich color of blood.
“It is a pretty thing,” said Magnus.
“Very pretty.” She sounded amused at the understatement.
“Not worthy of your beauty, of course, but what could be? There is one small thing besides prettiness to recommend it. There is a spell on the jewel, to warn you when demons are near.”
Camille’s eyes went very wide. She was an intelligent woman, and Magnus saw she knew the full value of the jewel and of the spell.
Magnus had sold the house in Grosvenor Square, and what else had he to do with the proceeds? He could think of nothing more valuable than purchasing a guarantee that would keep Camille safe, and cause her to remember him kindly.