Chain of Gold

“In fact, not even so much as a theory as a hypothesis,” said Christopher. “We have not proved it yet, or even tested it. And I am not sure how it would change their plans or behavior. It may be one demon, but it acts as many demons, and that is what they are seeking to combat.”

In the library, Will frowned. “Maurice, we’ve been over this. Not only will such an action panic all the magicians and Downworlders in London, we have no assurance that whoever raised these demons is even still in the city. It would be a waste of manpower that we need elsewhere.”

“But someone is at fault for this and must pay for it!” snapped Bridgestock.

Will began to say, surprisingly gently, “And that will happen, but we must find this demon first—”

“My daughter is dying!” Bridgestock shouted, suddenly enough to jolt the room. “Ariadne is dying, and I demand to know who is responsible!”

“Well, my niece is already dead.” It was Uncle Gabriel, having risen to his feet. He looked furious, his green eyes nearly black. Lucy rather wished her aunt Cecily was there, for she would surely have been cheering him on. “And yet rather than wasting my energy on imagining revenge, I will be patrolling London’s streets, hoping to prevent what happened to her from happening to another innocent—”

“Well and good, Lightwood,” said Bridgestock, his eyes glittering, “but I am the Inquisitor, and you are not. It is my task to root out evil at its source—”

The view went dark and the library below vanished. Lucie glanced up in surprise to see that Thomas had drawn a line through her rune, closing their window to the library below. His eyes, like his uncle Gabriel’s, were glittering with fury.

Christopher put his hand on Thomas’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Tom. About Oliver, and—”

“There’s no need to apologize.” Thomas spoke in a tight voice. “It is best we know the situation. As soon as we have hold of the Pyxis, we will handle this ourselves, for if we wait for the Enclave to come to a consensus, I expect more will die.”

* * *

James watched as Cordelia ascended the steps to the raised cherrywood stage in the middle of the room. He was aware of Matthew standing beside him, swearing under his breath. He didn’t blame him—he knew how his parabatai felt: that somehow they had thrown Cordelia to the wolves of the Hell Ruelle.

Kellington, standing beside her, clapped his hands, and the crowd began to quiet. Not fast enough, James thought. He began to applaud loudly, and beside him, following his lead, Matthew did the same. Anna, snuggled next to Hypatia on the settee, also clapped, causing Kellington to glance toward her and frown. Hypatia looked back at him with wide, starry eyes and shrugged.

Kellington cleared his throat. “Honored guests,” he said. “Tonight we have something unusual. A Shadowhunter has offered to entertain us.”

A murmur ran through the room. James and Matthew kept clapping, and a dark-haired vampire girl with bright combs in her hair joined in the applause. Anna leaned over and whispered in Hypatia’s ear.

“Please enjoy the performance of the lovely Cordelia Carstairs,” Kellington said, hastily turning to descend the stairs.

Cordelia laid a hand on his arm. “I will require you to accompany me,” she said. “On the violin.”

Matthew chuckled, almost reluctantly. “She is clever,” he said, as Kellington, looking annoyed, strode off to retrieve his instrument. As he moved through the crowd, Cordelia, looking far calmer than James suspected she was, reached up and unpinned her hair.

James caught his breath as it fell down around her shoulders, spilled down her back, the deep red of rose petals. It stroked her bare brown skin like silk. Her glowing bronze dress clung to her as she reached back and unsheathed Cortana, drawing it forward. Every glittering light in the Hell Ruelle caught fire along the blade.

“I have always loved stories,” she said, and her clear voice carried through the room. “One of my favorite tales is that of the servant girl Tawaddud. After the death of a rich merchant, his son wasted all the inheritance he got until he had nothing left but one servant, a girl known through all the caliphate for her brilliance and her beauty. Her name was Tawaddud. She begged the son to take her to the court of the caliph Harun al-Rashid, and there to sell her for a vast sum of money. The son insisted he could not get such a princely sum for the sale of one servant. Tawaddud insisted she would convince the caliph that there was no wiser or more eloquent or learned woman in all the land but she. Eventually the son was worn down. He brought her to the court, and she came before the caliph, and she told him this.”

Cordelia nodded at Kellington, who had come to stand beside the stage. He began to play a haunting tune on the violin, and Cordelia began to move.

It was a dance, but not a dance. She moved fluidly with Cortana. It was gold and she followed that gold in fire. She spoke, and her low, husky voice matched the dance and the music of the violin.

“Oh my Lord, I am versed in syntax and poetry and jurisprudence and exegesis and philosophy. I am skilled in music and in the knowledge of the divine ordinances, and in arithmetic and geodesy and geometry and the fables of the ancients.”

Cortana wove with her words, underlining each one with steel. She turned as her sword turned, and her body curved and moved like water or fire, like a river under an infinity of stars. It was beautiful—she was beautiful, but it was not a distant beauty. It was a beauty that lived and breathed and reached out with its hands to crush James’s chest and make him breathless.

“I have studied the exact sciences, geometry and philosophy, and medicine and logic and rhetoric and composition.”

Cordelia sank to her knees. Her sword whipped around her, a narrow circlet of fire. The violin sang, and her body sang, and James could see the court of the caliph, and the brave girl kneeling before Harun al-Rashid and telling him of her worth.

“I can play the lute and know its gamut and notes and notation and the crescendo and diminuendo.”

Beside James, Matthew sucked in his breath. James glanced quickly at his parabatai. Matthew—Matthew looked as he did sometimes when he thought no one was watching him. There was a haunted loneliness in that look, a desire almost beyond comprehension for something even Matthew himself did not understand.

His gaze was fixed on Cordelia. But then, everyone in the room was looking at her as her body bent backward and her hair swept from side to side, an arc of fire. Her brown skin glowed; perspiration glimmered on her collarbones. James’s blood was pounding through his body like a river through a broken dam.

“If I sing and dance, I seduce.” Cordelia straightened with a snap. Her eyes met the gaze of her audience, direct and challenging. “And if I dress and scent myself, I slay.”

She slammed Cortana into its sheath. Kellington had stopped playing the violin; he, too, was staring at Cordelia like a lovesick sheep. James had an overwhelming urge to kick him.

Cordelia rose to her feet, her chest rising and falling with her quick breath. “And wise men were brought from around the land to test Tawaddud, but she was wiser than them all. So wise and beautiful was she that in the end, the caliph granted her whatever it was she wanted—all the wishes of her heart.”

Cordelia bowed.

“And that is the end of the story,” she said, and began to descend the steps.

* * *

Cordelia had never been stared at by so many people in her life. Escaping the stage, she slithered into the crowd, though it was a different crowd than it had been—everyone seemed to want to smile at her now, or incline their heads, or wink. Several Downworlders said, “Beautifully done,” as she passed.

She murmured her thanks and was immensely grateful when she reached James and Matthew. James seemed completely composed; Matthew was looking at her with wide eyes. “Bloody hell,” he said admiringly, as soon as she came into range. He looked far more serious than he usually did. “What was that?”

“It was a fairy tale,” James said briefly. “Well done, Cordelia.” He indicated the now-empty jacquard settee. “Anna has disappeared with Hypatia, so I would call your distraction a success.”

Cordelia. He had not called her Daisy. She didn’t know what to think of that. She put a hand to her chest; her heart was pounding, from nerves and from the dancing. “What do we do now?” she said. “How long does seduction usually last?”

“Depends if you do it properly,” said Matthew, with a little of his old grin.

“Well, I hope for Hypatia’s sake that Anna does it properly, yet for our sake I hope she hurries it up,” said James.

Matthew had gone still. “Both of you,” he said. “Listen.”

Cordelia listened, and heard at first only the buzz and murmur of the crowd. Then, beneath it, the whisper of a familiar word, spoken low and urgently.

A Shadowhunter. A Shadowhunter is here.

“Do they mean us?” She looked around in puzzlement and saw Kellington gazing toward the door, his mouth flat with irritation. Someone had just come into the chamber—someone with bright red hair, wearing a heavy tweed coat.

“Charles.” Matthew’s eyes were green slits. “By the Angel. What is he doing here?”

James swore softly. Charles was moving through the crowd, his coat buttoned to the throat, looking around uncomfortably. He looked desperately out of place.

“We should go,” James said. “But we can’t leave Anna.”

“You two run and hide yourselves,” said Matthew. “Charles will go off his head if he sees you here.”

“But what about you?” said Cordelia.

“He’s used to this kind of thing from me,” Matthew said, and his whole face seemed to have tightened. His eyes were glittering like chips of glass. “I’ll deal with Charles.”

James looked at Matthew for a long moment. Cordelia sensed the whisper of unspoken words passing between them, the silent communication of parabatai. Perhaps one day she would have that with Lucie; at the moment, it seemed almost like magic.