Lord of Shadows

Kit blinked away the glamour as he reached the bottom of the steps. The image tore like spiderwebs and the Shadow Market burst into life. They were still using many of the ordinary market’s stalls—clever, he thought, to hide in plain sight like that—but they were brightly colored now, a rainbow of paint and shimmer. Tents billowed in between the stalls as well, made of silks and draperies, signs floating beside their openings, advertising everything from fortune-telling to luck charms to love spells.

They slipped into the bustling crowd. Stalls sold enchanted masks, bottles of vintage blood for vampires—Livvy looked like she was going to gag over the RED HOT CHERRY FLAVOUR variety—and apothecaries did a brisk trade in magical powders and tinctures. A werewolf with thin, pale white hair sold bottles of a silvery powder, while across from him a witch whose skin had been tattooed with multicolored scales was hawking spell books. Several stands were taken up with selling Shadowhunter-repelling charms, which made Livvy giggle.

Kit was less amused.

“Push your sleeves down,” he said. “And pull your hoods up. Cover your Marks as much as you can.”

Livvy and Ty did as they were told. Ty reached for his headphones, too, but paused. Slowly he looped them back around his neck. “I should keep them off,” he said. “I might need to hear something.”

Livvy squeezed his shoulder and said something to him in a low voice that Kit couldn’t hear. Ty shook his head, waving her away, and they pushed farther into the Market. A group of pale-skinned Night’s Children had gathered at a stall advertising WILLING VICTIMS HERE. A crowd of humans sat around a deal table, chatting; occasionally another vampire would come up, money would change hands, and one of the humans would be drawn into the shadows to be bitten.

Livvy made a smothered noise. “They’re very careful,” Kit assured her. “There’s a place like this in the L.A. Market. The vamps never drink enough to hurt anyone.”

He wondered if he should say something else reassuring to Ty. The dark-haired boy was pale, with a fine sheen of sweat along his cheekbones. His hands were opening and closing at his sides.

Farther along was a stall advertising a RAW BAR. Werewolves surrounded a dozen fresh carcasses of animals, selling bloody hunks torn off in fistfuls by passing customers. Livvy frowned; Ty said nothing. Kit had noticed before that puns and language jokes didn’t interest Ty much. And right now, Ty looked as if he were struggling between trying to take in the details of the Market, and throwing up.

“Put your headphones on,” Livvy murmured to him. “It’s all right.”

Ty shook his head again. His black hair was sticking to his forehead. Kit frowned. He wanted to grab Ty and drag him out of the Market to somewhere it would be calm and quiet. He remembered Ty saying that he hated crowds, that the sheer noise and confusion was “like broken glass in my head.”

There was something else, too, something odd and off about this Market.

“I think we’ve wandered into the food area,” said Livvy, making a face. “I wish we hadn’t.”

“This way.” Kit turned more toward the cathedral. Usually there was a section of the Market where warlocks grouped together; so far he’d only seen vampires, werewolves, witches, and . . .

He slowed almost to a stop. “No faeries,” he said.

“What?” Livvy asked, nearly bumping into him.

“The Market is usually full of faeries,” he said. “They sell everything from invisibility clothes to sacks of food that are never empty. But I haven’t seen a single one here.”

“I have,” said Ty. He pointed.

Nearby was a large stall manned by a tall male witch with long braided gray hair. In front of the stall was a green baize table. Displayed on the table were antique birdcages made of white-painted wrought iron. Each one was quite pretty in its own right, and for a moment Kit thought that they were what was for sale.

Then he looked closer. Inside each cage was a small, trapped creature. An assortment of pixies, nixies, brownies, and even a goblin, whose wide eyes were nearly swollen shut—probably from so much proximity to cold iron. The other faeries were chattering mournfully and softly, their hands seizing at the bars and then falling away with low cries of pain.

Ty was white with distress. His hands trembled against his sides. Kit thought of Ty in the desert, stroking the small lizards, putting mice in his pockets, capturing weasels for company. Ty, whose heart went out to small and helpless living things. “We can’t leave them like that.”

“They’re probably selling them for blood and bones,” said Livvy, her voice shaking. “We have to do something.”

“You have no authority here, Shadowhunter.” A cool, clipped voice spun them around. A woman stood before them. Her skin was dark as mahogany, her hair like bronze and dressed high on her head. The pupils of her eyes were shaped like golden stars. She was dressed in a glacier-white pantsuit with high, sparkling heels. She could have been any age from eighteen to thirty.

She smiled when they looked at her. “Yes, I can recognize a Shadowhunter, even those clumsily hiding their Marks,” she said. “I suggest you leave the Market before someone less friendly than I am notices you.”

Both the twins had made subtle gestures toward their weapons belts, their hands hovering near the hilts of their seraph blades. Kit knew this was his moment: his moment to show how well he could handle a Market and its denizens.

Not to mention preventing a bloodbath.

“I am an emissary of Barnabas Hale,” he said. “Of the Los Angeles Market. These Shadowhunters are under my protection. Who are you?”

“Hypatia Vex,” she said. “I co-run this Market.” She narrowed her starry eyes at Kit. “A representative of Barnabas, you say? Why should I believe you?”

“The only people who know about Barnabas Hale,” said Kit, “are people he wants to know.”

She nodded slightly. “And the Shadowhunters? Barnabas sent them, too?”

“He needs me to consult a warlock regarding a peculiar magical object,” said Kit. He was flying high now, high on the lies and the trickery and the con. “They have it in their possession.”

“Very well, then. If Barnabas sent you to consult a warlock, which warlock was it?”

“It was me.” A deep voice spoke from the shadows.

Kit turned to see a figure standing in front of a large dark green tent. It had been a male voice, but otherwise the figure was too covered—massive robe, cloak, hood, and gloves—to discern gender. “I’ll take this, Hypatia.”

Hypatia blinked slowly. It was like the stars vanishing and then reappearing from behind a cloud. “If you insist.”

She made as if to turn and stalk away, then paused, looking back over her shoulder at Livvy and Ty. “If you pity those creatures, those faeries, dying inside their cages,” she said, “think of this: If it were not for the Cold Peace your people insisted on, they would not be here. Look to the blood on your own hands, Shadowhunters.”

She disappeared between two tents. Ty’s expression was full of distress. “But my hands—”

“It’s an expression.” Livvy put her arm around her twin, hugging him tightly to her side. “It’s not your fault, Ty, she’s just being cruel.”

“We should go,” Kit said to the robed and hooded warlock, who nodded.

“Come with me,” he said, and slipped into his tent. The rest of them followed.

*

The inside of the tent was remarkably clean and plain, with a wooden floor, a simple cot bed, and several shelves filled with books, maps, bottles of powder, candles in different colors, and jars of alarming-colored liquids. Ty exhaled, leaning back against one of the tent poles. Relief was printed clearly on his face as he basked in the relative calm and quiet. Kit wanted to go over to Ty and ask him if he was all right after the cacophony of the Market, but Livvy was already there, brushing the sweat-damp hair off her brother’s forehead. Ty nodded, said something to her Kit couldn’t hear.

“Come,” said the warlock. “Sit down with me.”

He gestured. In the center of the room was a small table surrounded by chairs. The Shadowhunters sat down, and the hooded warlock settled opposite them. In the flickering light inside the tent, Kit could glimpse the edge of a mask beneath the hood, obscuring the warlock’s face.

“You may call me Shade,” he said. “It’s not my last name, but it will do.”