Mark had turned the color of ashes. “I didn’t—”
“There is no point lying,” said Iarlath. “Kieran is a prince of Faerie and cannot speak untruths. If he says he overheard this, then he did.”
Mark shifted his gaze to Kieran. The sunlight no longer seemed beautiful to Emma, but merciless, beating down on Mark’s gold hair and skin. Hurt spread across his face like the stain of red from a slap. “It would never mean anything to Cristina. She would never tell anyone. She would never hurt me or the Hunt.”
Kieran turned his face away, his beautiful mouth twisting at the corner. “Enough.”
Mark took a step forward. “Kieran,” he said. “How can you do this? To me?”
Kieran’s face was bleak with pain. “Mine is not the betrayal,” he said. “Speak to your Shadowhunter princess of promises broken.”
“Gwyn.” Mark turned to plead with the Hunt’s leader. “What is between myself and Kieran is not a matter for the law of the Courts or the Hunt. Since when did they interfere in matters of the heart?”
Matters of the heart. Emma could see it on both their faces, Mark’s and Kieran’s, in the way they looked at each other and the way they didn’t. She wondered how she had missed it before, in the Sanctuary, that these were two people who loved each other. Two people who had hurt each other the way only two people in love could.
Kieran looked at Mark as if Mark had taken something irreplaceably precious from him. And Mark looked—
Mark looked crushed. Emma thought of herself on the beach, in the morning, with Julian, and the lonely screech of the gulls circling overhead.
“Child,” said Gwyn, and to Emma’s surprise, there was gentleness in his voice. “I regret the necessity of this visit more than I can say. And believe me, the Hunt does not interfere, as you say, in matters of the heart. But you broke one of the oldest laws of the Hunt, and put every member of it into danger.”
“Exactly,” said Kieran. “Mark has broken the law of Faerie, and for that, he must return to Faerie with us and tarry no longer in the human world.”
“No,” said Iarlath. “That is not the punishment.”
“What?” Kieran turned to him, puzzled. His hair flared at the edges with blue and white like hoarfrost. “But you said—”
“I said nothing to you of punishments, princeling,” said Iarlath, stepping forward. “You told me of Mark Blackthorn’s actions and I said they would be duly dealt with. If you believed that meant he would be dragged back to Faerie to be your companion, then perhaps you should remember that the security of the gentry of Faerie is more paramount than the fancies of a son of the Unseelie King.” He looked hard at Mark, his eyes eerie in the bright sunlight. “The King has given me leave to choose your punishment,” he said. “It will be twenty whip-lashes across the back, and count yourself lucky it is not more.”
“NO!” The word was like an explosion. To Emma’s surprise it was Julian—Julian, who never raised his voice. Julian, who never shouted. He started down the steps; Emma followed him, Cortana ready in her hand.
Kieran and Mark were silent, looking at each other. The rest of the blood had left Kieran’s face and he looked sick. He didn’t move as Julian stepped forward, blocking Kieran’s view of Mark.
“If any of you touch my brother to harm him,” Julian said, “I will kill you.”
Gwyn shook his head. “Do not think I do not admire your spirit, Blackthorn,” he said. “But I would think twice before moving to harm a convoy of Faerie.”
“Move to prevent this, and our agreement will be at an end,” said Iarlath. “The investigation will stop, and we will take Mark back with us to Faerie. And he will be whipped there, and worse than any whipping he could receive here. You will win nothing and lose much.”
Julian’s hands tightened into fists. “You think you alone understand honor? You who cannot understand what we might lose by standing here and letting you humiliate and torture Mark? This is why faeries are despised—this senseless cruelty.”
“Careful, boy,” rumbled Gwyn. “You have your Laws and we have ours. The difference is only that we do not pretend ours are not cruel.”
“The Law is hard,” said Iarlath with amusement, “but it is the Law.”
Mark spoke for the first time since Iarlath had pronounced his sentence. “A bad law is no law,” he said. He looked dazed. Emma thought of the boy who had collapsed in the Sanctuary, who had screamed when he was touched and spoken of beatings that still clearly terrified him. She felt as if her heart was being ripped out—to whip Mark, of all people? Mark, whose body might heal but whose soul would never recover?