Jordan’s furniture matched — was Maia, her wildly curling hair contained in two braids. The last time Simon had seen her, she’d been glamorously dressed for a party. Now she was back in uniform: jeans with frayed cuffs, a long-sleeved T-shirt, and a caramel leather jacket. She looked as uncomfortable as Jordan did, her back straight, her gaze straying to the window. When she saw Simon, she clambered gratefully to her feet and gave him a hug. “Hey,” she said. “I just stopped by to see how you were doing.”
“I’m fine. I mean, as fine as I could be with everything going on.”
“I didn’t mean about the whole Jace thing,” she said. “I meant about
“Me?” Simon was startled. “I’m all right. Worried about Isabelle and Clary. You know the Clave was investigating her—”
“And I heard she got cleared. That’s good.” Maia let him go. “But I was thinking about you. And what happened with your mom.”
“How did you know about that?” Simon shot Jordan a look, but Jordan shook his head, almost imperceptibly. He hadn’t told.
Maia pulled on a braid. “I ran into Eric, of all people. He told me what happened and that you’d backed out of Millenium Lint’s gigs for the past two weeks because of it.”
“Actually, they changed their name,” Jordan said. “They’re Midnight Burrito now.”
Maia shot Jordan an irritated look, and he slid down a little in his seat. Simon wondered what they’d been talking about before he’d gotten home. “Have you talked to anyone else in your family?” Maia asked, her voice soft. Her amber eyes were full of concern. Simon knew it was churlish, but there was something about being looked at like that that he didn’t like. It was as if her concern made the problem real, when otherwise he could pretend it wasn’t happening.
“Yeah,” he said. “Everything’s fine with my family.”
“Really? Because you left your phone here.” Jordan picked it up from the side table. “And your sister’s been calling you about every five minutes all day. And yesterday.”
A cold feeling spread through Simon’s stomach. He took the phone from Jordan and looked at the screen. Seventeen missed calls from Rebecca.
“Crap,” he said. “I was hoping to avoid this.”
“Well, she’s your sister,” said Maia. “She was going to call you eventually.”
“I know, but I’ve been sort of fending her off — leaving messages when I knew she wouldn’t be there, that kind of thing. I just… I guess I was avoiding the inevitable.”
“And now?”
Simon set the phone down on the windowsill. “Keep avoiding it?”
“Don’t.” Jordan took his hands out of his pockets. “You should talk to her.”
“And say what?” The question came out more sharply than Simon had intended.
“Your mother must have told her something,” said Jordan. “She’s probably worried.”
Simon shook his head. “She’ll be coming home for Thanksgiving in a few weeks. I don’t want her to get mixed up in what’s going on with my mom.”
“She’s already mixed up in it. She’s your family,” said Maia. “Besides,
“Then, I guess I want her to stay out of it.” Simon knew he was being unreasonable, but he didn’t seem to be able to help it. Rebecca was — special. Different. From a part of his life that had so far remained untouched by all this weirdness. Maybe the only part.
Maia threw her hands up and turned to Jordan. “Say something to him. You’re his Praetorian guard.”
“Oh, come on,” said Simon before Jordan could open his mouth. “Are either of you in touch with your parents? Your families?”
They exchanged quick looks. “No,” Jordan said slowly, “but neither of us had good relationships with them
“I rest my case,” said Simon. “We’re all orphans. Orphans of the storm.”
“You can’t just ignore your sister,” insisted Maia.
“Watch me.”
“And when Rebecca comes home and your house looks like the set of
“I just don’t think I’m ready to hear her voice,” Simon said, but he knew he’d lost the argument. “I have to head back out, but I promise, I’ll text her.”
“Well,” Jordan said. He was looking at Maia, not Simon, as he said it, as if he hoped she’d notice he’d made progress with Simon and be pleased. Simon wondered if they’d been seeing each other at all during the past two weeks when he’d been largely absent. He would have guessed no from the awkward way they’d been sitting when he’d come in, but with these two it was hard to be sure. “It’s a start.”
The rattling gold elevator stopped at the third floor of the Institute; Clary took a deep breath and stepped out into the hallway. The place was, as Alec and Isabelle had promised her it would be, deserted and quiet. The traffic on York Avenue outside was a soft murmur. She imagined she could hear the brush of dust motes against one another as they danced in the window light. Along the wall were the pegs where the residents of the Institute hung their coats when they came inside. One of Jace’s black jackets still dangled from a hook, the sleeves empty and ghostly.
With a shiver she set off down the hallway. She could remember the first time Jace had taken her through these corridors, his careless light voice telling her about Shadowhunters, about Idris, about the whole secret world she had never known existed. She had watched him as he’d talked — covertly, she’d thought, but she knew now that Jace noticed everything — watching the light glint off his pale hair, the quick movements of his graceful hands, the flex of the muscles in his arms as he’d gestured.
She reached the library without encountering another Shadowhunter and pushed the door open. The room still gave her the same shiver it had the first time she’d seen it. Circular because it was built inside a tower, the library had a second floor gallery, railed, that ran along the midpoint of the walls, just above the rows of bookshelves. The desk Clary still thought of as Hodge’s rested in the center of the room, carved from a single slab of oak, the wide surface rested on the backs of two kneeling angels. Clary half-expected Hodge to stand up behind it, his keen-eyed raven, Hugo, perched on his shoulder.
Shaking off the memory, she headed quickly for the circular staircase at the far end of the room. She was wearing jeans and rubber-soled sneakers, and a soundless rune was carved into her ankle; the silence was almost eerie as she bounded up the steps and onto the gallery. There were books up here too, but they were locked away behind glass cases. Some looked very old, their covers frayed, their bindings reduced to a few strings. Others were clearly books of dark or dangerous magic—
Between the locked bookshelves were glass display cases. Each held something of rare and beautiful workmanship — a delicate glass flacon whose stopper was an enormous emerald; a crown with a diamond in the center that did not look as if it would fit any human head; a pendant in the shape of an angel whose wings were clockwork cogs and gears; and in the last case, just as Isabelle had promised, a pair of gleaming golden rings shaped like curling leaves, the faerie work as delicate as baby’s breath.
The case was locked, of course, but the Opening rune — Clary biting her lip as she drew it, careful not to make it too powerful lest the glass case burst apart and bring people running — unsnapped the lock. Carefully she eased the case open. It was only as she slid her stele back into her pocket that she hesitated.
Was this really her? Stealing from the Clave to pay the Queen of the Fair Folk, whose promises, as Jace had told her once, were like scorpions, with a barbed sting in the tail?
She shook her head as if to clear the doubts away — and froze. The door to the library was opening. She could hear the creak of wood, muffled voices, footsteps. Without another thought she dropped to the ground, flattening herself against the cold wooden floor of the gallery.
“You were right, Jace,” came a voice — coolly amused, and horribly familiar — from below. “The place is deserted.”
