“You said your family, the memory of your family, was all you had until something. Until Kieran?”
“Yes,” Mark said.
“Was he the only one who was kind to you?”
“In the Hunt?” said Mark. “There is not kindness in the Hunt. There is respect, and a sort of camaraderie of brothers. They feared Kieran, of course. Kieran is gentry, a Prince of Faerie. His father, the King, gave him to the Hunt as a sign of goodwill to Gwyn, but he also demanded his good treatment. That good treatment was extended to me, but even before Kieran, they came slowly to respect me.” His shoulders hunched. “It was worst when we attended the revels. Faeries from all over would come to those, and they did not appreciate a Shadowhunter’s attendance. They would do their best to draw me aside, to taunt and torment me.”
“Did no one intervene?”
Mark laughed shortly. “The ways of Faerie are brutal,” he said. “Even for the greatest among them. The Queen of the Seelie Court can be deprived of her powers if her crown is stolen. Even Gwyn, who leads the Wild Hunt, must yield authority to any who steals his cloak. You cannot imagine they would show mercy to a half-Shadowhunter boy.” His lip curled. “They even had a rhyme they would mock me with.”
“A rhyme?” Cristina held up a hand. “Never mind, you do not need to tell it to me, not if you don’t wish to.”
“I no longer care,” Mark said. “It was an odd bit of doggerel. First the flame and then the flood, in the end it’s Blackthorn blood.”
Cristina sat up straight. “What?”
“They claimed it meant Blackthorn blood was destructive, like flood or fire. That whoever made up the rhyme was saying Blackthorns were bad luck. Not that it matters. It’s just a bit of nonsense.”
“That isn’t nonsense,” Cristina exclaimed. “It means something. The words written on the bodies . . .” She frowned in concentration. “They are the same.”
“What do you mean?”
“‘Fire to water,’” she said. “It is the same—they are simply different translations. When English is not your first language, you understand the sense of the words differently. Believe me, ‘Fire to water’ and ‘First the flame and then the flood,’ they could be the same thing.”
“But what does that mean?”
“I’m not sure.” Cristina pushed her hands into her hair in frustration. “Please, promise me you’ll mention it to Emma and Jules as soon as you can. I could be wrong, but . . .”
Mark looked baffled. “Yes, of course—”
“Promise.”
“Tomorrow, I promise.” His smile was bemused. “It occurs to me that you know a great deal about me, Cristina, and I know very little about you. I know your name, Mendoza Rosales. I know you left something behind in Mexico. What was it?”
“Not a something,” she said. “Someone.”
“Perfect Diego?”
“And his brother, Jaime.” She waved away Mark’s raised eyebrow. “One of them I was in love with, and the other was my best friend. They both broke my heart.” She was almost astonished to hear the words come out of her mouth.
“For your heart twice broken, I am sorry,” said Mark. “But is it wrong that I am glad that it brought you into my life? If you had not been here when I arrived—I do not know that I could have borne it. When I first saw Julian, I thought he was my father. I did not know my brother so grown. I left them children, and now they are no longer that. When I knew what I had lost, even with Emma, those years of their lives . . . You are the only one I have not lost something with, but rather gained a new friendship.”
“Friendship,” Cristina agreed.
He extended his hand, and she looked at him, bemused.
“It is traditional,” he said, “among the fey, for a declaration of friendship to be accompanied by a clasp of hands.”
She put her hand in his. His fingers closed about her own; they were rough where they were calloused, but lithe and strong. And not cool, as she had imagined they would be, but warm. She tried to hold back the shiver that threatened to spread up her arm, realizing how long it had been since she had held someone’s hand like this.
“Cristina,” he said, and her name sounded like music when he spoke it.
Neither of them noticed the movement at the window, the flash of a pale face looking in, or the sound of an acorn being viciously crushed between narrow fingers.
The large chamber inside the cave hadn’t changed since the last time Emma had been in it. The same bronze walls, the same chalked circle on the floor. The same large glass doors fixed into the walls and wavering darkness behind them.
Energy crackled against her skin as she walked into the circle. The magic of the glamour. From inside the circle, the room looked different—the walls seemed faded and flowing, as if they were in an old photograph. The porthole doors were dark.