She listened for several moments to reassure herself that no one had followed her. The scrape of bare branches against the slate walls of the shed jangled her nerves, but she pressed on and approached the door, which stood slightly ajar. She caught a bitter scent in the air—incense, perhaps, that Grace had been burning as part of some attempt to revive her brother.

Lucie slipped inside, and once her eyes adjusted, she saw Jesse’s body, just as she’d last seen it, laid out peacefully in the glass coffin. His eyes closed, his hands folded on his chest.

Still, she had to make sure. With trembling hands she did something she had never done before, and raised the hinged lid to the glass coffin.

The body before her was not Jesse, she told herself. Jesse was her ghost, a spirit, and not this physical remnant. It still felt like a strange kind of violation as she pulled back the lapels of Jesse’s white funeral jacket.

The broadcloth shirt beneath was spattered with blood.

Half holding her breath, Lucie began to unbutton the top of the shirt, peeling the cold fabric away, the gesture bizarrely intimate.

There, across the pale skin of his chest, was a Strength rune. On his left shoulder, Swiftness and Precision. Voyance on his left hand, though she knew it was not his dominant one. At the inner turn of his arm was the enkeli rune.

Lucie let the fabric slip from her fingers and stared at the black markings on Jesse’s pale, waxy skin. It was as she had feared.

The anchor.

The runes. Jesse had never had any runes. Now he had five. One for each murdered Shadowhunter: Amos Gladstone, Basil Pounceby, Filomena di Angelo, Lilian Highsmith, Elias Carstairs.

Numbly, she went to the far wall and took down the Blackthorn sword. Her steps slowed as she returned to the coffin. The lid was still open, and inside, Jesse lay still—peaceful, and utterly unaware. It was unfair. Horribly unfair. Jesse was innocent.

But those who had been murdered—they had been innocent too.

Lucie had to do it now, before she lost her nerve. She gritted her teeth and raised the sword, gripping the hilt with both hands, ready to swing it down straight and true, as her father had taught her.

“Jesse,” she whispered. “Jesse, I’m so sorry.”

Light flashed off the blade of the sword, just as something slammed into the back of Lucie’s head. The Blackthorn sword fell from her hands. As it glanced off the edge of the glass case and clanged to the hard earth, shadows crept in around the edges of Lucie’s vision, washing her into the dark.

24

HE SHALL RISE

There hath he lain for ages, and will lie

Battening upon huge sea worms in his sleep,

Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;

Then once by man and angels to be seen,

In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.

—Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “The Kraken”

James was in the shadows and they were around him; he was dreaming, though he had not been asleep.

He could hear his own breath, ragged in his ears. He was imprisoned in the shadows, unable to move—unable to see save out of two holes torn in the darkness, like the eyes of a mask.

It was past dawn, the sky the color of cold blue glass. Arching above him as he lurched forward were plane trees, their branches outstretched to catch the attenuated sunlight. His body ached and burned. Dark hair fell across his vision; he reached to push it away. Glancing down, he saw his hands—narrow, pale white hands, clutching a silvery runed box.

His hand, which was not his hand, closed over the box. He was in a familiar space—gardens of some sort. There were hedges, and paths winding among wintry trees. Before him, a church’s gothic spires rose against the clear sky; winding out from its door were footpaths that circled the bronze fountain in the center.

James could hear whistling. His vision was beginning to fade around the edges, but he could see someone—someone in a gear jacket—walking a path, among the laurels and holly bushes, their leaves seared with ice that glittered in the sun….

Somewhere a hand closed itself around the hilt of a blade. Somewhere there was hatred, that bleak, pitiless hatred James had felt before, and contempt—contempt for the man in the jacket, the Shadowhunter, who he had waited for in the square, had followed from his house, driving him, unawares, toward this place, this confrontation….

Stop, James whispered. Don’t do this.

Sneering scorn. Begone, child.

And he was hurled free of the vision, crying out, his hands reaching for purchase, something to hold him to the world.

“James!”

It was Cordelia’s voice. She was kneeling over him, and so was Matthew: he lay on the floor of the study, half-stunned, as if he’d been dropped from a great height. He jerked into a sitting position like a puppet yanked upright on too-tight strings. “It’s happening,” he said. “Another murder—”

“Here.” Matthew reached out; James caught hold of his parabatai’s hand and hauled himself upright. He still felt dizzy, and somehow different—lighter, though he could not begin to explain why. He leaned back against the marble fireplace, catching his breath, Matthew’s worried gaze fixed on him. “Steady on, Jamie bach.”

James realized three things simultaneously. One was that he’d been kissing Cordelia what felt like moments ago, but no evidence of their embrace remained: Cordelia wore a gear jacket buttoned over her dress, and a watchful expression. He himself was wearing a clean shirt, which seemed an even greater mystery.

The second was that Matthew must have just arrived: he hadn’t yet taken off his bright green brocade-and-velvet overcoat, and one end of his long ivory scarf trailed on the floor.

The third was that it was as if someone had unlatched a cage inside him, letting his mind run free. He very urgently needed several things at once: an answer, a map, and a book. “Math,” he said. “The pithos—did Christopher lose it?”

Matthew’s eyes widened. “It was stolen—by someone who looked like me. How did you know it was gone?”

“Because he has it,” James said. “Belial. He must have sent an Eidolon demon to Christopher, to trick him.” He took a deep breath. “I think—I think I may know what’s happening.”

Cordelia rose to her feet, Cortana gleaming where it was strapped to her back. She blushed a little as she looked at him. “What do you mean, you know? You know who’s responsible for the murders?” she demanded. “I mean, Belial, of course—”

“I don’t know all of it,” said James, racing to the center table, where books on dreams and magic still lay scattered haphazardly. “But some of it. Why he’s doing what he’s doing. Maybe even how. Here—” He yanked the dark purple volume free. “The map,” he said. “That map of London—where is it?”

“Here.” Matthew slid the book toward him, open to the map in the center. Hurriedly James glanced at the Monarchia, then back at the map. He picked up a pen and made one last mark.

“Mount Street Gardens?” said Matthew, squinting at the new scrawl. “We’ve been there before. It’s quite near here.”

“But that still doesn’t make Belial’s sigil, does it?” said Cordelia, glancing over Matthew’s shoulder. “It looks rather like Poseidon’s trident. A sort of spear with three prongs.”