It was Arthur who moved. He burst away from the wall, careening toward Livvy and Ty. He seized each of them by an arm and propelled them toward the Institute door.

They both struggled, but Arthur seemed shockingly strong. Livvy half-turned, calling Kit’s name. Arthur kicked the front door open and shoved his niece and nephew through. Kit could hear Livvy shouting, and the door slammed behind them.

Diana arched an eyebrow at Malcolm. “Blackthorn blood, you said?”

Malcolm sighed. “Mad dogs and Englishmen,” he said. “And sometimes you encounter someone who’s both. He can’t think that would work.”

“Are you saying you can get into the Institute?” Diego demanded.

“I’m saying it doesn’t matter,” said Malcolm. “I set this all up before Emma killed me. My death—and I am dead, though not for long, isn’t the Black Volume wonderful?—released the sea demons along this coast. What you see with me tonight is a tiny fraction of the numbers I control. Either you bring me a Blackthorn, or I send them up on land to murder and destroy mundanes.”

“We will stop you,” Diana said. “The Clave will stop you. They will send Shadowhunters—”

“There aren’t enough of you,” said Malcolm, with glee. He had begun to pace up and down in front of the wall of sea demons that slavered behind him. “That’s the beauty of the Dark War. You simply can’t hold off every demon in the Pacific, not with your current numbers. Oh, I’m not saying you might not win eventually. You would. But think of the death toll in the meantime. Is one measly Blackthorn really worth it?”

“We’re not going to give you one of our own to murder, Fade,” said Diana. “You know better than that.”

“You don’t speak for the Clave, Diana,” said Malcolm. “And they are not above sacrifices.” He tried to grin. One rotted lip split, and black fluid spilled down his chin. “One for many.”

Diana was breathing hard, her shoulders rising and falling angrily. “And then what? All that death and destruction and what will you gain?”

“You will have also suffered,” said Malcolm. “And that is enough for me, for now. That the Blackthorns suffer.” His eyes raked the group in front of him. “Where are my Julian and Emma? And Mark? Too cowardly to face me?” He chuckled. “Too bad. I would have liked to see Emma’s face when she laid eyes on me. You may tell her I said I hope the curse consumes them both.”

Consumes who? Kit thought, but Malcolm’s gaze had dipped to focus on him, and he saw the warlock’s milky eyes glitter. “Sorry about your father, Herondale,” said Malcolm. “It couldn’t be helped.”

Kit raised Adriel over his head. The seraph blade was hot under his grip, starting to flicker, but it cast a glow all around him, one he hoped illuminated him enough that the warlock could see it when he spat in his direction.

Malcolm’s gaze flattened. He turned back to Diana. “I will give you until tomorrow night to decide. Then I will return. If you do not provide a Blackthorn to me, the coast will be ravaged. In the meantime—” He snapped his fingers, and a dim purple fire flickered in the air. “Enjoy amusing yourselves with my friends here.”

He vanished as the sea demons surged forward toward the Centurions.

12

BY THE MOUNTAINS

Mark shoved his way through the Unseelie Court. He had been among these people before only for revels: the Court was not always in the same place, but moved around the Unseelie Lands. Mark could smell blood on the night air now as he darted among the close-packed gentry. He could smell panic and fear and hate. Their hate of Shadowhunters. The King was calling to the Court to be quiet, but the crowd was shouting for Emma to spill her father’s blood.

No one was guarding Kieran. He slumped on his knees, the weight of his body pulling against the thorned ropes that held him as if they were barbed wire. Blood oozed sluggishly around the lacerations on his wrists, neck, and ankles.

Mark pushed past the last of the courtiers. This close, he could see that Kieran wore something around his neck on a chain. An elf-bolt. Mark’s elf-bolt. Mark’s stomach tightened.

“Kieran.” He put his hand against the other boy’s cheek.

Kieran’s eyes fluttered open. His face was gray with pain and hopelessness, but his smile was gentle. “So many dreams,” he said. “Is this the end? Have you come to bear me to the Shining Lands? You could not have chosen a better face to wear.”

Mark ran his hands along the ropes of thorns. They were tough. A seraph blade could have cut them, but seraph blades did not work here, leaving him only ordinary daggers. An idea sparked in Mark’s mind, and he reached up to gently unfasten the elf-bolt from Kieran’s throat.

“Whatever gods have done this,” Kieran whispered, “they are gracious to bring me the one my soul loves, in my last moments.” His head fell back against the tree, exposing the scarlet gashes around his throat where the thorns had cut in. “My Mark.”

“Hush.” Mark spoke through a tightened throat. The elf-bolt was sharp, and he drew the blade of it against the ropes that bound Kieran’s throat and then his wrists. They fell away, and Kieran gave a gasp of pain relieved.

“It is true, as they say,” said Kieran. “The pain leaves you as you die.”

Mark slashed away the ropes binding Kieran’s ankles, and straightened up. “That is enough,” he said. “I am Mark, not an illusion. You are not dying, Kieran. You are living.” He took Kieran by the wrist and helped him to his feet. “You are escaping.”

Kieran’s gaze seemed dazzled by moonlight. He reached for Mark and laid his hands on Mark’s shoulders. There was a moment where Mark could have drawn away, but he didn’t. He stepped toward Kieran just as Kieran did toward him, and he could smell blood and cut vines on Kieran, and they were kissing.

The curve of Kieran’s lips under his own was as familiar to Mark as the taste of sugar or the feel of sunlight. But there was no sugar or sunlight here, nothing bright or sweet, only the dark pressure of the Court all around them and the scent of blood. And still his body responded to Kieran’s, pressing the other boy up against the bark of the tree, gripping him, hands sliding on his skin, scars and fresh wounds under his fingertips.

Mark felt himself lifted up and out of his body, and he was in the Hunt again, hands gripped in Windspear’s mane, leaning low into the wind that tore his hair and seared his throat and carried away his laughter. Kieran’s arms were around him, the only warm thing in a cold world, and Kieran’s lips against his cheek.

Something sang by his ear. He jerked away from Kieran. Another object whistled by and he instinctively crowded Kieran against the tree.

Arrows. Each arrow tipped with flame, they ripped their way through the Court like deadly fireflies. One of the Unseelie princes was racing toward Mark and Kieran, raising a bow as he came.

They had been noticed after all, it seemed.

*

The grass in front of the Institute seemed to boil, a mass of sea demons and Centurions, whipping tentacles and slashing seraph blades. Kit half-threw himself down the stairs, almost knocking into Samantha, who, alongside her twin, was battling furiously with a grotesque gray creature covered with sucking red mouths.

“Look where you’re going!” she yelled, and then shrieked as a tentacle snaked around her chest. Kit whipped Adriel forward, severing the tentacle just above Samantha’s shoulder. The demon shrieked from all its mouths and vanished.

“Disgusting,” said Samantha, who was now covered in thick grayish demon-blood. She was frowning, which seemed ungrateful to Kit, but he hardly had time to worry about it; he was already turning to raise his sword against a spiny-looking creature with nubbly, stony skin like a starfish.

He thought of Ty on the beach with the starfish in his hand, smiling. It filled him with rage—he hadn’t realized before how much demons seemed like the beautiful things of the world had been warped and sickened and made revolting.