Lord of Shadows (The Dark Artifices, #2)

“Then we’re going to need Energy runes.” Emma held out her arm to Cristina. It wasn’t meant as a deliberate snub to Jules—runes your parabatai put on you were always more powerful—but she could still feel where his body had crashed against hers when they’d fallen. She could still feel the visceral twist inside her when his breath had ghosted against her cheek. She needed him not to be close to her right now, not to see what was in her eyes. The way Mark had looked at the sky of Faerie: that was how she imagined she looked at Julian.

Cristina’s touch was warm and comforting, her stele swift and skilled, its tip tracing the shape of an Energy rune onto Emma’s forearm. Finished, she let Emma’s wrist go. Emma waited for the usual alert, searing heat, like a double jolt of caffeine.

Nothing happened.

“It’s not working,” she said, with a frown.

“Let me see—” Cristina stepped forward. She glanced down at Emma’s skin, and her eyes widened. “Look.”

The Mark, black as ink when Cristina had placed it on Emma’s forearm, was turning pale and silvery. Fading, like melting frost. In seconds it had blended back into Emma’s skin and was gone.

“What on earth . . . ?” Emma began. But Julian had already whirled on Mark. “Runes,” he said. “Do they work? In Faerie?”

Mark looked astonished. “It never occurred to me that they wouldn’t,” he said. “No one’s ever mentioned it.”

“I’ve studied Faerie for years,” Cristina said. “I’ve never seen it said anywhere that runes do not work in the Lands.”

“When was the last time you tried to use one here?” Emma asked Mark.

He shook his head, blond curls falling into his eyes. He shoved them back with narrow fingers. “I can’t remember,” he said. “I didn’t have a stele—they broke it—but my witchlight always worked—” He dug into his pocket and drew out a round, polished rune-stone. They all watched, breathless, as he held it up, waiting for the light to come, to shine brilliantly from his palm.

Nothing happened.

With a soft curse, Julian drew one of his seraph blades from his belt. The adamas gleamed dully in the moonlight. He turned it so that the blade lay flat, reflecting the multicolored brilliance of the stars. “Michael,” he said.

Something sparked inside the blade—a brief, dull gleam. Then it was gone. Julian stared at it. A seraph blade that could not be brought to life was barely more use than a plastic knife: dull-bladed, heavy, and short.

With a violent jerk of his arm, Julian cast the blade aside. It skidded across the grass. He raised his eyes. Emma could sense how tightly he was holding back. She felt it like a pressure in her own body that made it hard to breathe.

“So,” he said. “We’re going to have to journey across Faerie, a place where Shadowhunters aren’t welcome, using only the stars to navigate, and we can’t use runes, seraph blades, or witchlight. Is that the situation, roughly?”

“I would say it’s the situation exactly,” said Mark.

“Also, we’re heading for the Unseelie Court,” Emma added. “Which is supposed to be like one of those horror movies Dru likes, but less, you know, fun.”

“Then we will travel at night,” Cristina said. She pointed into the distance. “There are landmarks that I’ve seen on maps. Do you see those ridges in the distance, against the sky? I think that those are the Thorn Mountains. The Unseelie Lands lie in their shadow. It is not so far away.”

Emma could see Mark relax at the sound of Cristina’s sensible voice. It didn’t seem to be working on Julian, though. His jaw was clenched, his hands rigid fists at his sides.

It wasn’t that Julian didn’t get angry. It was that he didn’t let himself show it. People thought he was quiet, calm, but that was deceptive. Emma recalled something she had read once: that volcanoes had the lushest green slopes, the loveliest and quietest aspect, because the fire that pulsed through them kept their earth from ever freezing.

But when they erupted, they could rain down devastation for miles.

“Jules,” she said. He glanced over at her; fury gleamed behind his eyes. “We might not have witchlight, or runes, but we are still Shadowhunters. With everything that means. We can do this. We can.”

It felt like a clumsy speech to her, but she saw the fire die in his eyes. “You’re right,” he said. “Sorry.”

“And I’m sorry for bringing you all here,” said Mark. “If I had known—about the runes—but it must be something recent, very much so . . . .”

“You didn’t bring us here,” said Cristina. “We followed you. And we all came through not just for you but because of what the phouka told each of us; isn’t that true?”

One you have loved and lost. “It’s true for me,” said Emma. She glanced at the sky. “We should get going, though. Morning is probably in just a few hours. And if we don’t have Energy runes, we’ll have to get our energy the old-fashioned way.”

Mark looked puzzled. “Drugs?”

“Chocolate,” Emma said. “I brought chocolate. Mark, where do you even come up with these things?”

Mark smiled crookedly, shrugging one shoulder. “Faerie humor?”

“I thought faeries mostly made jokes at other people’s expense and played pranks on mundanes,” said Julian.

“Sometimes they tell very long, rhyming stories they think are hilarious,” said Mark. “But I have to admit I never really understood why.”

Julian sighed. “That actually sounds worse than anything else I’ve heard about the Unseelie Court.”

Mark shot Julian a grateful look, as if to say that he understood that his brother had mastered his temper in part for him, for all of them, so that they would be all right. So that they could continue on their way, and find Kieran, with Julian leading them as he always did. “Come,” Mark said, turning. “It is this way—we should begin walking; it may not be very many more hours until dawn.”

Mark headed into the shadows between the trees. Mist clung to the branches, like ropes of white and silver. Leaves rustled softly in the wind above their heads. Julian moved to walk up ahead next to his brother; Emma could hear him asking, “Puns? At least promise me there won’t be puns.”

“The way that boys tell each other they love each other is so very odd,” said Cristina as she and Emma ducked beneath a branch. “Why can’t they just say it? Is it so difficult?”

Emma grinned at her friend. “I love you, Cristina,” she said. “And I’m glad you’re getting to visit Faerie, even if it’s under weird circumstances. Maybe you can find a hot faerie guy and forget about Imperfect Diego.”

Cristina smiled. “I love you, too, Emma,” she said. “And maybe I will.”

*

Kit’s list of grievances against the Shadowhunters had now gotten long enough that he’d started writing it down. Stupid hot people, he’d written, won’t let me go home and get my stuff.

They won’t tell me anything about what it would mean to actually become a Shadowhunter. Would I have to go somewhere and train?

They won’t tell me how long I can stay here, except “as long as you need to.” Don’t I have to go to school eventually? Some kind of school?

They won’t talk about the Cold Peace or how it sucks.

They won’t let me eat cookies.

He thought for a while, and then crossed that one out. They did let him eat cookies; he just suspected they were judging him for it.

They don’t seem to understand what autism is, or mental illness, or therapy, or medical treatment. Do they believe in things like chemotherapy? What if I get cancer? I probably won’t get cancer. But if I did . . .

They won’t tell me how Tessa and Jem found my dad. Or why my dad hated Shadowhunters so much.

That one was the hardest to write. Kit had always thought of his father as a small-time con man, a lovable rogue, a sort of Han Solo type, swindling his way across the galaxy. But lovable rogues didn’t get torn apart by demons the moment their elaborate protection spells fell apart. And though mostly Kit was confused by what had happened at the Shadow Market, he had learned one thing: His dad had not been like Han Solo.

Sometimes, in the dark watches of the night, Kit wondered who he was like himself.