The Evil We Love (Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy, #5)

Or return from following after thee—


For whither thou goest, I will go,

And where thou lodgest, I will lodge.

Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.

Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried.

The Angel do so to me, and more also,

If aught but death part thee and me.”

Robert recited the words, but they were unnecessary. Their bond had been cemented the day he turned fourteen, when he finally got up the nerve to Mark himself again. Michael was the only one he told, and as he held the stele over his skin, it was Michael’s steady gaze that gave him the courage to bear down.

Unthinkable that they had only one last year together before they’d be expected to part. Their parabatai bond would remain after the Academy, of course. They’d always be best friends; they’d always charge into battle side by side. But it wouldn’t be the same. They’d each marry, move into houses of their own, refocus their attention and their love. They would always have a claim on each other’s souls. But after next year, they would no longer be the most important person in each other’s lives. This, Robert knew, was simply how life worked. This was growing up. He just couldn’t imagine it, and he didn’t want to.

As if listening in on Robert’s thoughts, Michael echoed the question he’d dodged earlier. “What really is going on with you and Maryse?” he asked. “Do you think it’s for real? Like, for good?”

There was no need to put on a show for Michael. “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “I don’t even know what that would feel like. She’s perfect for me. I love spending time with her, I love . . . you know, with her. But does that mean I love her? It should, but . . .”

“Something’s missing?”

“Not between us, though,” Robert said. “It’s like there’s something missing in me. I see how Stephen looks at Amatis, how Valentine looks at Jocelyn—”

“How Lucian looks at Jocelyn,” Michael added with a wry grin. They both liked Lucian, despite his irritating tendency to act like Valentine’s favor had given him insight beyond his years. But after all these years of watching him pine away for Jocelyn, it was hard to take him entirely seriously. The same went for Jocelyn, who somehow managed to remain oblivious. Robert didn’t understand how you could be the center of someone’s world without even realizing it.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, wondering if any girl would ever be the center of his world. “Sometimes I worry there’s something wrong with me.”

Michael clapped a hand to his shoulder and fixed him with an intense gaze. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Robert. I wish you could finally see that.”

Robert shook off the hand, along with the weight of the moment. “How about you?” he said with forced gaiety. “It’s been, what, three dates with Eliza Rosewain?”

“Four,” Michael admitted.

He’d sworn Robert to secrecy about her, saying he didn’t want the other guys to know until he was sure it was real. Robert suspected he didn’t want Valentine to know, as Eliza was a particular thorn in Valentine’s side. She asked nearly as many disrespectful questions as he did, and harbored a similar disdain for the current policies of the Clave, but she wanted nothing to do with the Circle or its goals. Eliza thought that a new, united front with mundanes and Downworlders was the key to the future. She argued—loudly, and to the disgust of most of the faculty and students—that the Shadowhunters should be addressing the problems of the mundane world. She could often be found in the quad, shoving unwanted leaflets in students’ faces, ranting about nuclear testing, Middle East oil tyrants, some trouble no one understood in South Africa, some disease no one wanted to acknowledge in America . . . Robert had heard every lecture in full, because Michael always insisted on staying to listen.