The Lost Book of the White

“Sure,” said Jace, exchanging a look with him. “Come on, guys. Let’s give him some room.” They went down the hallway a bit; Magnus went with them. Alec leaned into the front door and spoke with the faerie. After a minute or so, he emerged back in the hallway, his expression neutral. “I’m going to go inside and speak with Mr. Rumnus for a minute. Magnus, could you come with me?”

Somehow Alec had calmed the faerie down enough to let him inside. Magnus had to remind himself that Alec knew something about talking to untrusting Downworlders. Some of those untrusting Downworlders had become Alec’s close friends.

Simon called, “Does he know his name is—”

“He knows,” said Alec.

Simon nodded, satisfied.

Magnus followed Alec inside. It was a shabbily kept little apartment, quite normal. Perhaps too normal for a goat-legged faerie to be living in, Magnus thought. He began extending his magic outward into the room, trying to keep his expression and his hand motions as neutral as possible.

“Mr. Rumnus says there’s been some bad warlock business in Shanghai of late,” Alec said.

“What kind of bad warlock business?” said Magnus. “Like turf wars?” He was distracted. He had expected some magical signature, some residue at least; the Tracking rune had led them here, so Ragnor had been here, the Tracking rune said he was here. But there was no place for him to be. The apartment was one room, the whole place visible at once; the bathroom door was open and revealed nobody. There was definitely no other magical being in the room other than himself and this faerie. How could this be a dead end?

“What are you doing with all these Shadowhunters?” said Mr. Rumnus abruptly to Magnus.

“He’s my boyfriend,” Alec said. “He’s also a High Warlock.”

“Punch above your weight a little, huh?” said the faerie to Alec, leering.

“Ugh,” said Magnus.

“This isn’t your apartment, is it, Rumnus?” Alec said sharply.

“What?” the faerie said.

“You don’t live here. Look at that.” He gestured at a large sculpture, more than six feet tall. It looked like a school of abstract fish colliding with a flock of abstract birds. It was marvelously hideous. “That’s wrought iron. You have a giant wrought-iron sculpture in your living room?”

“Also,” said Magnus, “that big plastic chair shaped like a hand is very non-faerie.” And then he doubled over in pain.

His head suddenly hurt as though he had been hit hard. A high-pitched scream, quiet but growing louder, began to throb in the back of his head.

He felt hands grasp him, and Alec’s voice yelled, “Magnus!” as though from a long way away. With an effort, he lifted his head, in time to see the ceiling tear open and the whirling clouds of a demon world appear behind a shining Portal.

* * *

AS SOON AS THE PORTAL opened and the wind began to whistle, Alec knew demons were coming. He drew his bow and yelled, “It’s a trap!” at the open front door.

Isabelle was first to arrive, her whip at the ready. “Of course it’s a trap,” she said.

“Of course we didn’t put on combat runes,” Jace said, joining her.

Demons began to fall into the room through the Portal. These were demons Alec hadn’t seen before, massive snakes with shiny black scales and silent screaming human faces. As soon as they appeared, he began to shoot. Simon entered, an arrow nocked in his bow, looking more alarmed than Alec would have expected. Clary came in laying about her with glowing seraph blades.

It was a strange fight. Rumnus had crawled under a table and was scrunched up with his eyes closed as though he wished it all would just go away. Magnus had one hand extended, and sparks were haphazardly flying from it, sometimes hitting demons and sometimes leaving little scorch marks on the walls and the furniture. His other hand was at his temple and his eyes were squinted closed; he looked like he was fighting through a migraine, though Magnus was not known to get migraines. Alec wanted to go to him, but the room had become an overcrowded mess of snake demons and sharp objects.

Whatever was causing the snakes to appear, it wasn’t pursuing any kind of battlefield strategy. They continued to fall into the room as if dropped haphazardly by a giant unseen hand. Some landed upright, but others sprawled into a tangled mess or came down on their own heads, leaving them open for easy kills. Clary went around the room delivering those kills gleefully.

Alec spun to avoid a demon’s bite and found Jace, arms pinned by two of the snakes. He quickly put arrows in both of them, and the second Jace was free, he leaped forward and buried a seraph blade in the face of the demon that Alec had spun away from, which had been coming up behind him.

They exchanged a quick look, each confirming the other was all right, and turned back to the battle.

It was over quickly, considering the number of demons and the Shadowhunters’ lack of preparation for a fight. From Alec’s perspective there were lots of snakes, and then there were no snakes, only his own heavy panting and that of his friends as they caught their breath, no longer in immediate danger.

Abruptly a gigantic version of the screaming human face of the snakes, this one easily ten feet across, appeared in the Portal. It opened its distended mouth and screeched, its eyes searching. It caught sight of Magnus, who was still clutching his head, his teeth gritted, his fingers sparking at the end of his outstretched hand, but not to any noticeable effect.

Simon fired an arrow into the Portal; it passed through the face and vanished into nothing. He looked at Alec with a panicked expression. Alec shrugged.

And just as suddenly as it had appeared, the demon face vanished. The Portal, too, quickly faded away, leaving only the bare, cracked ceiling of the apartment and the sound of Alec’s own heartbeat in his ears.

He went over to Magnus immediately and put his hand on his boyfriend’s shoulder. He leaned in and said, “I’m here. Are you okay?”

Magnus took his hand off his forehead and blinked at Alec. “I’m okay,” he said. He looked oddly unstable, like a reed caught in a wind. “The headache is going away. That was… that was something. I don’t think I’ve ever—”

He stopped himself and a steely look came over his face. “You,” he said past Alec, to the faerie, who was scuttling out from under the table.

“I think we can—” began Rumnus.

“You!” Magnus roared. Alec was surprised—not that Magnus was angry, but at the force in his voice. Magnus kept his cool, in almost all situations. It was one of the great consistencies in Alec’s life. Now, Magnus extended a hand and Rumnus went tumbling over, falling to the ground in a heap.

“This isn’t your apartment,” said Magnus dangerously. “This isn’t Ragnor’s apartment either. In fact,” he went on, “this isn’t anybody’s apartment.” He put his arms above his head, and a great electrical storm came from his hands, crackling as loudly as the demon face had screamed. The bolts of blue energy flew jagged and chaotic around the room, and when they cleared, Alec could see that Magnus had dispelled some powerful illusions, stronger than any glamour Alec had seen before. The apartment was, in fact, empty—abandoned, even. No furniture, no rugs, cracked white walls with unknown dark residue on them, a broken bare lightbulb dangling from the single socket in the ceiling. Magnus turned his gaze on Rumnus, who had gotten to his feet. “What do you have to say for yourself?” he bit out.

Rumnus considered his options, and then, making a decision, yelled, “You’ll never take me alive, narcs!” He ran to the window and threw himself out of it before anyone could stop him.

They watched him plummet toward the ground. Before he hit, huge brown bird’s wings sprang from his back, and he flapped them and flew off into the night.

“How about that,” said Alec mildly into the silence.

Magnus was breathing hard. His hand was gripped tightly on his chest. Just over his wound, Alec noticed. He approached Magnus cautiously.

“Okay,” said Clary, “so what was any of that?”

Magnus went to sit down on the chair, seemed to remember there was no chair, and lowered himself slowly to the floor, exhaling. “I’m not sure.”

“Let’s start with the part that wasn’t snake demons,” said Alec. He folded his arms and looked at Magnus. “What was that? That wasn’t like you. You don’t get angry like that.”

“I often get angry like that,” Magnus retorted, “when encountering lying Downworlders who are collaborating with demons.”

“And we assume he’s collaborating with demons,” said Jace, “due to all of the demons that fell out of the ceiling? And the yelling demon face?”

“Yes,” agreed Magnus. Some of the fight seemed to be draining from him. He looked at Alec. “I’m sorry. I’m just frustrated.”

“No kidding,” said Isabelle. She started ticking things off on her fingers. “Where’s Ragnor? Why did the Tracking rune lead us here instead of where he actually is? How did he know we were Tracking him? Did he send those demons? Did Shinyun Jung? Did someone else they’re working with who we don’t even know about?”

Alec thought. “There were a bunch of the snakes, but there definitely weren’t enough to be a real threat to all of us. Which means this was either a warning—”

“Or,” Jace put in, “they didn’t realize you were bringing four other Shadowhunters with you.”

“So where next?” said Simon. He had his hands tucked under his crossed arms and was looking squirrelly.

They all looked at Magnus, who sighed heavily. “What does the Tracking rune say?”

Alec took the scrap of cloth back out of his pocket and tried the rune again. He shrugged. “It says we’re in the right place.”

Simon said, “We could try the Institute. See what they know about this ‘bad warlock’ stuff the faerie mentioned.”