“Emma?” Cristina said anxiously. “Are you all right? You look a little as if you might throw up.”
Click went the lock on the box. In her mind, Emma set it aside; back in the world, she smiled at Cristina. “Ice cream and bad movies sounds great,” she said. “Let’s go.”
The sky above the ocean was streaked with the pink and rose of sunset. Emma slowed from a run to a jog, gasping, her heart pounding in her chest.
Usually Emma trained in the afternoon and evening and ran in the early morning, but she’d woken up late after staying up nearly all night with Cristina. She’d spent the day feverishly rearranging her evidence, calling Johnny Rook to cajole further details about the murders out of him, writing up notes for her wall, and waiting impatiently for Diana to turn up.
Unlike most tutors, Diana didn’t live in the Institute with the Blackthorns—she had her own house in Santa Monica. Technically, Diana didn’t need to be at the Institute at all today, but Emma’d sent her at least six texts. Maybe seven. Cristina had stopped her from sending eight, and suggested she go for a run to get rid of her anxiety.
She leaned forward, hands on her bent knees, trying to catch her breath. The beach was nearly deserted except for a few mundane couples finishing their romantic sunset walks, heading back up to the cars they’d left parked along the highway.
She wondered how many miles she’d run up and down this stretch of beach in the years she’d lived in the Institute. Five miles a day, every day. And that was after three hours at least in the training room. Half the scars Emma had on her body she’d put there herself, teaching herself to fall from the highest rafters, training herself to fight through pain by practicing barefoot—on broken glass.
The most brutal scar she had was on her forearm, and she’d given herself that, too, in a sense. It had come from Cortana, the day her parents had died. Julian had placed the blade in her arms, and she’d cradled it through the blood and the pain, weeping as it cut her skin. It had left a long white line along her arm, one that sometimes made her feel shy about wearing sleeveless dresses or tank tops. She wondered if even other Shadowhunters would stare at the scar, wonder where it came from.
Though Julian never stared.
She straightened up. From the waterline, she could see the Institute, all glass and stone, up on the hill above the beach. She could see the bump of Arthur’s attic, even the dark window of her own bedroom. She’d slept restlessly there today, dreaming about the dead mundane man, the marks on his body, the marks on her parents. She’d tried to conjure up a vision of what she’d do when she found out who’d killed them. How any amount of physical pain she could inflict could ever even begin to make up for what she’d lost.
Julian had been in the dream too. She didn’t know what exactly she’d dreamed, but she’d woken up with a clear picture of him in her mind—tall, slender Jules, with his dark brown curls and startling blue-green eyes. His dark lashes and pale skin, the way he bit his nails when he was under stress, his confident handling of weapons and even more confident handling of brushes and paints.
Julian, who would be home tomorrow. Julian would understand exactly what she was feeling—how long she’d waited for a clue about her parents. How now that she’d found one, the world suddenly seemed full of a terrifyingly imminent possibility. She remembered what Jem, the ex–Silent Brother who’d helped preside over her parabatai ceremony, had said about what Julian was to her, that there was an expression for it in his native Chinese, zhi yin. “The one who understands your music.”
Emma couldn’t play a note on any instrument, but Julian understood her music. Even the music of revenge.
Dark clouds were rolling in from the ocean. It was about to rain. Trying to put Jules out of her mind, Emma started to run again, darting up the dirt road toward the Institute. Nearing the building, she slowed, staring. There was a man coming down the steps. He was tall and narrow, dressed in a long coat the color of crow feathers. His hair was short and graying. He usually dressed in black; she suspected that was where his last name came from. He wasn’t a warlock, Johnny Rook, even if he had a name like one. He was something else.
He saw her and his eyes widened. She broke into a sprint, cutting him off before he could dart around the side of the house, away from her.
She skidded to a stop in front of him, blocking his way. “What are you doing here?”
His odd eyes darted around, seeking an escape route. “Nothing. Stopping by.”
“Did you say anything about me coming to the Shadow Market to Diana? Because if you did—”