“You and Thomas can take my carriage,” said Matthew. “It is downstairs.”

“And the rest of us can take a hansom cab,” said Cordelia. “Where is the nearest entrance to the Silent City?”

“In Highgate Cemetery,” said James, reaching for his weapons belt as the others caught up gear jackets, belts, and blades. “It’s a good distance. We’ll have to hurry—there’s no time to waste.”

* * *

There was little to slow Cordelia and the others down until they reached Highgate, where the narrow streets were snarled up with evening traffic. The driver of the hansom cab, refusing to brave the bottleneck, deposited them in front of a pub on Salisbury Road.

James asked Cordelia and Matthew to wait while he went to search for the entrance to the Silent City. It often moved about within the cemetery, he had told Cordelia in the carriage, and could be found in various locations depending on the day.

Matthew gave the pub a longing look, but was soon distracted by a large stone tablet at the junction of Highgate Hill and Salisbury Road. It was caged by iron rails and carved with the words THRICE LORD MAYOR OF LONDON.

“ ‘Turn again, Whittington, thrice Lord Mayor of London Town,’  ” said Matthew, with a dramatic gesture. “This is where it’s meant to have happened—him hearing the Bow Bells, I mean.”

Cordelia nodded; she had been told the story often enough when she was a child. Richard Whittington had been a mundane boy who set out from London with his cat, determined to make his fortune elsewhere, only to hear the bells of St. Mary-le-Bow calling him back to a promised glory if he returned. And so he had, and become mayor of London, three times.

Cordelia wasn’t sure what had happened to the cat. All the stories might be true, she thought, but it would be awfully nice if such obvious signals were on offer for her own destiny.

Matthew slipped his silver flask from his waistcoat and began to unscrew it. Though he was in gear, he had not sacrificed his blue spats to duty. Cordelia only looked at him as he tipped back his head and swallowed, then screwed the cap back on. “Dutch courage,” he said.

“Are the Dutch particularly brave, or just particularly drunk?” she asked, her voice sharper than she’d intended.

“A little of both, I imagine.” His tone was light, but he put away the flask. “Did you know Dick Whittington’s cat might never have existed? Scandalous fiction, apparently.”

“Does it matter if he had a cat or not?”

“The truth always matters,” Matthew said.

“Not when it comes to stories,” Cordelia said. “The point of stories is not that they are objectively true, but that the soul of the story is truer than reality. Those who mock fiction do so because they fear the truth.”

She felt, rather than saw, Matthew turn to look at her in the dimming light. His voice was hoarse. “James is my parabatai,” he said. “And I love him. The only thing that I have never understood about him is his feelings for Grace Blackthorn. I have wished for a long time for him to place his affections somewhere else, and yet, when I saw him with you in the Whispering Room, I was not happy.”

Cordelia had not expected such frankness. “What do you mean?”

“I suppose I question if he knows what he feels,” said Matthew. “I suppose I worry that he will hurt you.”

“He is your parabatai,” said Cordelia. “Why should you care if he hurts me?”

Matthew tipped his head back to look at the darkening evening sky. His lashes were several shades darker than his blond hair. “I don’t know,” he said. “But I find that I do care.”

Cordelia wished they were discussing anything else. “Don’t worry. Alastair gave me the same warning about James just yesterday. I have been well told.”

Matthew’s jaw tightened. “I always said that the day I would be in charity with Alastair Carstairs would be the day I burn in Hell.”

“Was he really so horrible to James at school?” said Cordelia.

Matthew turned to her, and the look on his face startled her. It was the purest fury. “It was more than that—”

James appeared out of the shadows, his black hair disarrayed, and beckoned to them. “I’ve found the entrance. We ought to go quickly.”

They proceeded to the cemetery and passed through the tall gates. Dark cypress trees soared overhead, their overlapping leaves blocking out the last of the evening light. In their shadow rose elaborate monuments to the dead. Great mausoleums and Egyptian obelisks towered beside broken granite columns, symbolizing life cut short. Headstones were carved into hourglasses with wings, Greek urns, and beautiful women with streaming hair. And everywhere, of course, there were stone angels: chubby and sentimental-looking, sweet-faced as children. How little mundanes understood about angels, Cordelia thought, picking her way along the twig-strewn path after James. How much they did not understand what was terrifying about their power.

James turned off one of the gray avenues then, and they found themselves in an open space that seemed deep in the woods, leaves clustered so thickly above them that the waning light was tinged with green. In the center of the clearing was a statue of an angel, but this was no cherub. It was the marble figure of a beautiful man of great height. Scaled armor had been carved on his body. He held a sword in one outstretched hand, etched with the words QUIS UT DEUS, and his head was thrown back as if he were crying out to heaven.

James stepped forward, raising one hand—the one that bore the Herondale ring with its pattern of birds. “Quis ut Deus?” he said. “ ‘Who is like God?’ the Angel asks. The answer is ‘No one. No one is like God.’ ”

The stone angel’s eyes opened, absolutely black, apertures into a great and silent dark. Then, with a grinding of stone, the angel slid aside, revealing a great empty pit in the earth and stairs leading downward.

James lit his witchlight as they proceeded down the stairs into a shadowed darkness. The Silent Brothers, living as they did with eyes sewn shut, did not see as ordinary Shadowhunters did, and did not require light.

The shimmering white witchlight rayed out between James’s fingers, painting the walls with bars of light. As they reached the bottom of the stairs, James caught Cordelia’s arm and swung her around into an archway below the steps. Matthew followed a moment later. James closed his hand over the witchlight, dousing its illumination; the three of them watched in silence as a group of Silent Brothers, their parchment robes brushing the ground, swept by and vanished through another archway.

“Jem said not to reveal ourselves to the other Brothers,” James whispered. “The infirmary is on the far side of the Speaking Stars. We must move quickly and quietly.”

Cordelia and Matthew nodded. A moment later they were passing through an enormous room full of keyhole-shaped stone archways rising overhead. Semiprecious stones alternated with marble: tiger’s-eye, jade, malachite. Beneath the arches huddled mausoleums, many with family names etched into them: RAVENSCAR, CROSSKILL, LOVELACE.

They reached a great square whose floor was inlaid with tiles printed in a pattern of shimmering stars. On a wall, high above reach, hung a massive dull-silver sword whose crosspiece was carved in the shape of angel wings.

The Mortal Sword. Cordelia’s heart skipped a beat. The sword that her father had held, though it had not been able to make him speak a truth he could not remember.

They passed through the square and into a large space lined with rough flagstones. A pair of wooden doors led one way; a great square arch led another. The doors sported runes of death and peace and silence.

“Get back!” Matthew whispered suddenly; he threw an arm out, pressing James and Cordelia back into the shadows. Cordelia remained motionless as a Silent Brother passed by them and went up a set of nearby stairs. With a nod, James slipped from the shadows, followed by Matthew and Cordelia. They ducked under the square archway and into another massive room with a vaulted stone ceiling, crisscrossed with beams of stone and wood. The walls were bare, and up and down the room marched rows of beds, each with a still figure lying in it: Cordelia guessed there might have been thirty or so sick people there. Young and old, male and female, they lay as soundless and unmoving as if they had already died.

The room was utterly silent. Silent—and empty. Cordelia bit her lip. “Where is Jem?”

But Matthew’s eyes had lighted on a familiar figure. “Christopher,” he said, and darted over, followed by James. Cordelia came after them more slowly, reluctant to intrude. Matthew was crouching down beside a narrow iron bed; James stood at the head, leaning over Christopher.

Christopher had been stripped of his shirt. Dozens of white bandages encircled his narrow chest; blood had already soaked through some of them, forming a scarlet patch over his heart. His glasses were gone, and his eyes seemed sunk deep into his skull, the shadows below them dark purple. Black veins unfurled like coral beneath his skin. “Matthew,” he said with hoarse disbelief. “Jamie.”

James reached to touch his friend’s shoulder, and Christopher caught at his wrist. His fingers were twitching; he picked restlessly at the cuff of James’s jacket. “Tell Thomas,” he whispered. “He can finish the antidote without me. He only needs the root. Tell him.”

Matthew was silent; he seemed sick with pain. James said, “Thomas knows. He is with Lucie now, collecting the root. He’ll finish it, Kit.”

Cordelia cleared her throat, knowing her voice would come out as a whisper regardless. It did. “Jem,” she whispered. “Has Jem been in here, Christopher?”

He smiled at her sweetly. “James Carstairs,” he said. “Jem.”

Cordelia looked nervously at James, who gave her an encouraging nod. “Yes,” she said. “James Carstairs. My cousin.”

“James,” Christopher whispered, and then the figure in the bed next to his echoed the word.

“James,” whispered Piers Wentworth. “James.”