Chain of Thorns (The Last Hours, #3)

“Lucie,” Thomas said roughly, and Lucie looked up in surprise. “Isn’t there something you can do? You raised Jesse—you brought him back—”

Lucie whitened. “Oh, Tom,” she said. “It’s not like that. I—I did reach out for Kit, just after it happened. But there wasn’t anything there. He’s dead. Not like Jesse. He’s truly dead.”

Thomas sat down. Very suddenly, on the floor, as if his legs had given out. And Cordelia thought of all the times she had seen Christopher and Thomas together, talking or laughing or just reading in companionable silence. It was the natural outcome of James and Matthew being parabatai and always together, but it was more than that: they had not fallen together by chance, but because their temperaments aligned.

And because they had known each other all their lives. Now, Thomas had lost a sister and a friend as close as a brother, all in one year.

Matthew stood up. He went over to Thomas and knelt down beside him. He took Thomas’s hands, and Thomas, who was so much taller and bigger than Matthew, gripped onto Matthew as if he were anchoring him to the ground. “I shouldn’t have left,” Thomas said, a hitch in his voice. “I should have stayed—I could have protected him—”

Alastair looked stricken. Cordelia knew that if Thomas blamed himself for Kit’s death because he had been with Alastair, it would crush her brother. He already blamed himself for so much.

“No,” Matthew said sharply. “Never say that. It was only chance that Kit was killed. It could have been any of us. We were outnumbered, outmatched. There was nothing you could have done.”

“But,” Thomas said, dazed, “if I’d been there—”

“You might be dead too.” Matthew stood up. “And then I would have to live with not just a quarter of my heart cut out, but half of it gone. We were glad you were somewhere else, Thomas. You were out of danger.” He turned to Alastair, his green eyes bright with unshed tears. “Don’t just stand there, Carstairs,” he said. “It isn’t me Thomas needs now. It’s you.”

Alastair looked stunned, and Cordelia knew immediately what he was thinking: That can’t be true, it can’t be me Thomas needs, or wants.

“Go,” she said, giving him a little shove, and Alastair put his shoulders back, as if he were readying for a battle. He marched across the room, past Matthew, and got down on his knees beside Thomas.

Thomas raised his head. “Alastair,” he whispered, as if Alastair’s name were a talisman against pain and grief, and Alastair put his arms around Thomas, with a gentleness Cordelia did not think she had ever seen her brother express before. He pulled Thomas close to him and kissed his eyes, and then his forehead, and if anyone had wondered what their relationship might be before, Cordelia thought, they would not wonder now. And she was glad. It was past time for the end of secrets.

She caught Matthew’s eye and tried to smile at him. She did not think she actually managed anything like a smile, but she hoped he read the message in her eyes, regardless: Good work, Matthew.

She turned to look at James. He was frowning, but not at Thomas or Alastair. It was as if he heard something—and a moment later, Cordelia heard it too. The sound of hoofbeats in the courtyard.

“That’s Balios,” James said. “And others. Charles must be back with the patrol.”

Matthew nodded. “We’d better go see what they’ve found,” he said, sounding weary unto death. “By the Angel, how is this night not ended yet?”



* * *



They made their way out of the Sanctuary, all of them save Anna—who had only shaken her head mutely when James had asked if she wished to come outside—and Ari, who would not leave Anna’s side, and Grace, who was in no fit state to go anywhere.

Charles had ridden out alone, but he had returned with about ten members of the First Patrol, all in gear, all on horseback. They crowded the courtyard, steam rising from the horses’ flanks, and as the patrol dismounted one by one, Cordelia could not help but stare.

They looked as if they, too, had been in a battle. They were tattered and bloodstained, their gear ripped and torn. A white bandage circled Rosamund’s head, soaked through with blood on one side. A large patch along the side of Charles’s jacket was blackened with burn marks. Several of the others bore healing runes; Augustus, one of his eyes swelling blue and black, wore a dazed expression, nothing like his usual cocky demeanor.

Charles threw his reins over his horse’s neck and stalked over toward James, Cordelia, and the others. There was a grim expression on his scratched face; he looked like a Shadowhunter, for once, rather than a mundane businessman.

“Grace was telling the truth,” he said, without preamble. “We went straight to Highgate, but the entrance to the Silent City was surrounded by demons. A swarm of them. We could barely fight our way through—finally Piers broke through the line, but…” He shook his head. “It didn’t matter. The doors to the City were sealed shut. We couldn’t find any way through, and demons just kept coming.…”

Piers Wentworth joined them. He had his stele out, his gloves off. He was drawing a healing rune onto the back of his left hand. Cordelia couldn’t blame him—he had a nasty cut along the side of his neck, and one of his fingers appeared broken. “That wasn’t the worst of it, though,” he said, looking over at James. “Have any of you been out in the city?”

“Only a little ways,” said Cordelia. “It was hard to see anything in the fog.”

Piers barked a hollow laugh. “It’s much worse than just fog. Something has gone horribly wrong in London.”

James glanced back at the others. Matthew, Thomas, Lucie. Alastair. Jesse. They all looked pale and stunned; Cordelia could tell that James was worrying that they could take very little more.

He also hadn’t mentioned Christopher. Not yet. Or the Watcher attack. Clearly he wanted Charles and the patrol to speak first. “What do you mean, Piers?” he said.

But it was Rosamund who answered. “It was like riding through Hell as soon as we left Highgate,” she said, and winced. She put a hand to her head, and Piers reached over with his stele to mark her with an iratze. “We couldn’t fight the demons in the cemetery—some of us thought there were too many of them, anyway.” She eyed Augustus coldly. “The minute we left, a thick fog came up. We could barely see through it. Lightning was striking everywhere—we had to dodge it, it was hitting the ground all around us—”

“It split a lamp in Bloomsbury in half,” put in Esme Hardcastle, “like the blasted tree in Jane Eyre.”

“Not the time for literary references, Esme,” snapped Rosamund. “It nearly set Charles on fire. Whatever it was, it wasn’t ordinary lightning. And the storm—it stank of demonic magic.”