Chain of Gold

He stopped pacing. The look he bent on her was agonized, as if he were being pierced by a thousand small daggers. “Is this because I saved your life?” he whispered.

“You mean last night? At the manor?”

He nodded.

“Oh, James.” She felt suddenly very weary. “No. It was not that. Do you think I could sit by and watch myself acclaimed a hero while you were made a villain? I don’t care what they think of my honor. I know you, and your friends, and what you would do for each other. I am also your friend, and I know what I think honor is. Let me do this.”

“Daisy,” he said, and she realized with a sort of shock that the Mask was off—his expression was starkly vulnerable. “I can’t bear it. To have your life ruined by this? Let’s go back now and tell them I did it—I burned down the house—and you were lying to shield me.”

Cordelia set her hand against a chair, upholstered in pale blue and the back carved with crossed swords, to hold herself steady.

“Nobody will believe it,” she said, dropping each word into the silence between them like stones into a pond. She saw him flinch. “When it comes to a woman’s reputation, if she is suspected, she is guilty. That is the way the world works. I knew they would believe I was guilty, and now, no matter what we say, they’ll never believe I was innocent. It’s done, James. It doesn’t matter so very much. I needn’t stay in London. I can go back to the country.”

As she spoke, she knew that was how it must be. She was not Anna, able to live a wild bohemian lifestyle with her family’s support. She must go back to Cirenworth, where she talked to mirrors for companionship. She would drown slowly in loneliness, and there would be no dream of London to live on: no Devil Tavern, no battling demons alongside Lucie, no laughing late into the night with the Thieves.

James’s eyes blazed. “Absolutely not,” he said. “And let Lucie’s heart be broken because she’s lost her parabatai? Let you live a secluded life of disgrace? I will not accept that.”

“I cannot regret my choice,” Cordelia said softly. “I would do the same again. And there is nothing either of us can do about it now, James.”

He could not make the world fair, any more than she could. It was only in stories that heroes were rewarded; in real life, acts of heroism went unrewarded, or were punished, and the world turned on as it always had.

He might be angry, but he was safe. She wasn’t sorry.

“I can ask one last thing of you,” he said. “One last sacrifice for me.”

Since it might be the last time she ever saw him, Cordelia let her eyes linger on James’s face. The curve of his mouth, the arch of his high cheekbones, the long lashes that shadowed his pale gold eyes. That faint mark of the white star on his neck, just where his dark hair nearly touched his collar. “What?” Cordelia said. “If it is in my power, I will do it.”

He took a step toward her. She could see that his hands were shaking slightly. A moment later he was kneeling on the rug in front of her, his head tipped back, his eyes fixed on her face. She realized what he was about to do and lifted her hands to protest, but it was already too late.

“Daisy,” he said. “Will you marry me?”

The world seemed to stop. She thought of the clocks in Blackthorn Manor, all frozen at twenty to nine. She thought of the thousand times she had imagined James saying these words, but never under these circumstances. Never like this.

“James,” she said. “You don’t love me.”

He rose to his feet. He was no longer kneeling, and she was glad for it, but he was still close to her—so close to her she could have reached out and set her palm against his chest.

“No,” he said. “I don’t.”

She knew that. Hearing him say it still felt like a blow, unexpected and shocking, like the moment when you were stabbed. The surprise was how much it hurt.

Distantly, she could still hear him talking.

“Not in that way, and you don’t love me that way either,” James continued.

Oh, James. So brilliantly clever and so blind.

“But we are friends, aren’t we?” he said. “You are one of the best friends I’ve ever had. I will not leave you in trouble alone.”

“You love Grace,” Cordelia whispered. “Don’t you?”

She saw him flinch then. It was her turn to hurt him. They were only talking, but it was as if their words were blades.

“Grace is marrying someone else,” James said. “I am perfectly free to marry you.” He caught her hand, and she let him: she felt dizzy, as if she were clinging to the mast of a storm-tossed ship.

“I also do not want a situation in which my husband is unfaithful to me,” Cordelia said. “I will not marry you and turn some blind eye to whatever you do, James. I would rather be alone and scorned, and you would rather be free—”

“Daisy,” James said. “I would never, ever do that to you. When I make a promise, I keep it.”

She shook her head. “I don’t understand what you’re proposing—”

“A year,” he said rapidly. “Give me a year to make things right. Let us be married and live together as friends. We are exceptionally compatible, Daisy. It might well be a great deal of fun. I promise I will be better breakfast-table company than Alastair.”

Cordelia blinked. “A mariage blanc?” she said slowly. “White marriages” usually took place when one partner needed to marry to claim an inheritance, or to protect a woman against a dangerous situation in her home. There were other reasons too. Charles was seeking something very like this with Grace, she thought; it was hard to miss the irony.

“Divorce is far more accepted among Shadowhunters than among mundanes,” said James. “In a year, you may divorce me for any reason you like. Claim I cannot give you children. Say anything you want about how we are not compatible and I will go along with it. Then you will be a desirable divorcée with your honor intact. You could marry again.”

The relief and hope in his eyes were agony to see. And yet—

Cordelia could not say she did not want it. If they were married, they would live together. They would have their own house. An untold level of intimacy. They would go to sleep in the same place and wake in the same place. It would be a life lived in the guise of everything she had ever desired.

“But what about our friends?” she whispered. “We cannot hide the truth from them for a year. Besides, they know I was lying. They know you burned down the manor.”

“We will tell them the truth,” said James. “They will keep our secret. They may even find it a great prank on the Clave. And they’ll be delighted to have a whole house to disport themselves in. We shall have to guard our china.”

“Lucie as well,” Cordelia said. “I cannot lie to my parabatai.”

“Of course,” James said, beginning to smile. “Our friends love us and will keep our secrets. Are we agreed? Or shall I go back on my knees?”

“No!” Cordelia said sharply. “Do not go on your knees, James. I will marry you, but don’t go on your knees.”

“Of course,” he said, and the understanding in his eyes cracked what was left of her heart. “You wish to save such things for the true marriage you will find after this. Love will find you, Daisy. It is only a year.”

“Yes,” she said. “Only a year.”

He drew off the Herondale ring, with its pattern of soaring birds. She held out her hand, and James slid it onto her finger without hesitation. Cordelia watched as he did it, watched the fall of his long lashes against his cheek, like black ink against a white page.

Love will find you.

Love had found her years ago, and now, and every day since she had first seen James in London. You don’t love me, he’d said to her. He had no idea. He never would.

The door opened. Cordelia started, and Will came through the door, his face like thunder. Tessa followed him, more sedately, and Sona came after her. All wore expressions of grim fury. Well, perhaps not Tessa—she looked more worried, Cordelia thought, and more resigned.

“Tatiana has been taken into custody by Bridgestock and the Consul,” Will announced, his blue eyes icy. “Under other circumstances, this would be a great relief, considering her false accusations against you, James.”

James held up a hand. “Father, I understand why you are angry, but—”

“James.” Will snapped the word like a whip. There was more than anger in his eyes, though—there was a deep hurt that made Cordelia want to cringe. She could only imagine the pain James was feeling. “I can’t express how disappointed Tessa and I are in you. We have taught you better than this, both in how you treat women, and in how you own up to your mistakes.”

“Oh, Layla,” Sona said. Her gaze was bleak. “Che kar kardi?”

What have you done?

“Enough!” James moved protectively in front of Cordelia, but Cordelia stepped forward to stand next to him. They should face trouble side by side. If their agreement meant nothing else, it should mean that.

“Father,” said James. “Mother. Mrs. Carstairs. I will hear anything you have to say, and apologize for all that I have done wrong, but first let me present to you my promised wife.”

The three adults exchanged surprised glances. “You mean…” Tessa began.

James smiled. He actually looked quite happy, Cordelia thought, but she could sense the Mask going up again, like a sheet of glass. She saw the way Tessa looked at James and wondered if she sensed it too. “Cordelia has done me the honor of agreeing to marry me.”

Cordelia held out her hand, on which the Herondale ring gleamed. “We are both,” she said, “very happy, and we hope you will be happy too.”

She glanced at her mother. To her surprise, Sona’s eyes were troubled. But I did as you wished, Mâmân, she cried out silently. I made a good marriage.