“Haven’t eaten,” Anna had said gruffly. “It’s making me light-headed.”

Ari had just nodded. Lovely Ari, who understood Anna had nearly fainted with relief, but would never press her to admit it.

Her dazed state continued even as the Shadowhunters reached them, which was probably how, while Ari walked alongside her mother, Anna had allowed herself to be seized by Eugenia. Dressed in gear and looking thrilled by all the excitement, she chattered continuously for the entire trip back through the Silent City. Anna liked Eugenia and normally enjoyed her gossiping, but she was trying to concentrate on navigating them all back to London successfully. Anna suspected she was only hearing every other sentence, which was giving her a rather patchwork sense of Eugenia’s report on the situation in Idris.

There was a great deal about how angry the Council had been when they’d realized Anna and the others had remained behind in London, which did not bother Anna, and that both Aunt Tessa and Uncle Will had cried when they realized that James and Lucie were trapped in London, which did. Apparently Sona had comforted them, and told them her children were also still in London, but it was because only they could defeat Belial; it was their hour to be warriors, and the hour for their parents to be strong for them. Oh, and Sona had had her baby, it seemed—“Right during the speech about warriors?” Anna was puzzled, but Eugenia, exasperated, said no, it had been the next day, and unrelated to the speech.

Anna missed a great deal of detail after that, because they were emerging from the Path of the Dead, along the narrow corridor between CROSSKILL and RAVENSCROFT. As they passed the Pavilion of Truth, Eugenia was telling her about how Uncle Will and Aunt Tessa had been tested by the Mortal Sword and found innocent of complicity with Belial, but that Jesse’s true identity had been revealed, which had added intensity to the Inquisitor’s insistence that the Herondales believed they were a law unto themselves and must be punished. Anna gathered that there had been a great deal of shouting after that among the Council in Idris, but she’d returned to focusing on finding the way out.

They were almost to the Wood Street exit when Eugenia said, “… and you wouldn’t believe what Charles did! Right in the middle of the Council meeting! Poor Mrs. Bridgestock,” Eugenia added, shaking her head. “Everyone is certain the Inquisitor won’t keep his job, not after Charles’s confession.”

“Confession?” Anna said sharply, startling Eugenia. “What did he say?”

“It was so terribly awkward,” said Eugenia. “No one wanted to look at the Inquisitor—”

“Eugenia. Please attempt to locate the point. What did Charles say?”

“He stood up at the council meeting,” Eugenia said. “I think someone else was still talking but he just spoke over them. He said very loudly that the Inquisitor had engaged in blackmail. Of him! Of Charles! It was part of an attempt to take control of the London Institute.”

Anna gave Eugenia a sidelong glance. “Did it happen to be revealed… what it was Charles was being blackmailed about?”

“Oh, yes,” Eugenia said. “He fancies men. As if that ought to matter, but I suppose it does to some people.” She sighed. “Poor Charles. Matthew always was the braver of the two of them, though no one could see it.”

Anna was stunned. She glanced back over her shoulder at Ari, who had clearly overheard; she looked just as surprised as Anna felt. She supposed they had both given up on the idea that Charles might at some point do the right thing. And yet—didn’t Anna believe that she herself had become a better person in the last months? Wasn’t it possible to change?

Up ahead of them Anna saw a flagstone floor, a familiar set of stone stairs leading up. She began to quicken her steps, hurrying toward the exit—somehow they’d all have to crawl out of the narrow hole in the tree trunk—when a soft plouf sound startled her. A sheet of parchment paper had appeared in the air; it drifted down into her hands.

A fire-message.

The paper felt warm to the touch as she unfolded it with a sense of amazement—it was one thing to hear that the fire-messages had worked, and another to see it happen for herself. She didn’t recognize the spiky handwriting but suspected it was Grace’s. She had written only a few lines:

Anna. The moment you return to London, come immediately to Westminster Abbey. Belial is here, and the Watchers have gathered. The battle has begun.

But it was far more ordinary; she was caught and carried through a brief darkness, as if on a current of air, before being deposited onto the familiar pavement of her beloved London. Of course, she thought, straightening up and looking around for Lucie and Matthew. This was how Belial himself traveled. It was a reminder how much more power he had in Edom than Lilith, now.

She saw Lucie first, gazing around at their surroundings. They had arrived in the deserted street, looking across at St. James’s Park. Shadows clustered thick under the trees, and the frozen hedgerows moved with something that was not wind. Cordelia shuddered and turned to look for Matthew: he was staring at his surroundings in horror.

“This,” he said in a strangled voice, “is what Belial’s done to London?”

Cordelia had nearly forgotten. Neither James nor Matthew had seen this dark version of London before. Neither had seen the abandoned carriages in the street, the dense, murky clouds that churned the air like foul water, the dead-looking sky ripped through with scarlet wounds of lightning.

“It’s been like this since you left,” said Cordelia. “The mundanes and Downworlders are all under some kind of enchantment. The streets have been mostly empty—except for the Watchers.”

Lucie was frowning. “Listen—do you hear that?”

Cordelia listened. Her hearing felt sharper, better than it had, and she realized with relief: her runes were working again. She could hear the surge of incipient thunder overhead, the sough of the wind, and over them, the unmistakable sound of battle—of human cries and the crash of metal striking metal.

She ran toward the noise, Matthew and Lucie beside her. They raced down Great George Street and turned onto Parliament Square. Before them rose the great cathedral of Westminster. Though Cordelia had never been inside, she knew its outlines from a thousand history books, photographs, and drawings: there was no mistaking the honeycombed front window, framed by thin Gothic towers and spires connected by soaring stone arches.

In front of the cathedral’s Great West Door, sprawling across the empty courtyard north of the Dean’s Yard Gatehouse, a battle was taking place. White-robed Watchers with their vicious black staffs battled back and forth with at least three dozen Shadowhunters. As they raced across the empty street, Cordelia searched the roiling crowd, her heart leaping as she saw the friends she and Lucie had left behind—Anna and Ari cutting through a knot of Watchers near the abbey entrance, Thomas and Alastair flanking a single Watcher by the fence—and there were Grace and Jesse near the gatehouse. Jesse was holding off a Watcher with the Blackthorn sword; as Cordelia watched, Grace reached into a large bag and threw something that exploded at the Watcher’s feet. Smoke and sparks occluded her view after that, but she heard Lucie mutter, “Oh, good work,” and thought, with some amazement—

They were all still alive. They were all still fighting. And not just them, but others—Eugenia, Piers, Rosamund, even Flora Bridgestock and Martin Wentworth. Whatever else had happened, their friends had made contact with the Clave. They had successfully led Shadowhunters to London to fight. It was nothing short of a miracle.

It would all be for nothing, of course, if Belial could wield the power he had claimed he would have in James’s body. If James could not be saved.

“But what are they doing?” Lucie wondered aloud as they drew closer to the battle. Cordelia understood her confusion. The Shadowhunters were clearly more precise fighters than the Watchers, but they were moving oddly, dancing around the Watchers rather than attacking head-on. Thomas swung a broadsword—not the blade edge, but the flat of it, knocking a Watcher to the ground. She craned her head to see what happened next, but the battle surged like a wave, blocking off her view.

“Let me see,” Matthew said, and began to clamber up the side of a tall granite pillar in the courtyard’s center—a war memorial. He peered out, shading his eyes with one hand, and shouted down to Lucie and Cordelia, but the wind had come up again and all Cordelia heard was the word “Chimeras.”

“Cordelia!” It was Alastair, who turned to start toward them then swung around as a Watcher made a beeline for Rosamund. She plunged a seraph blade into its chest, sending it staggering back; Alastair, behind it, whipped his shamshir in a cutting blow across the back of its neck, slicing away its hood.

The Watcher fell to its knees. Cordelia reached for Cortana, then stopped herself; it would do no good to summon Lilith now. She had to find Belial first. She was forced to do no more than stare as the Watcher shuddered, its body twisting as something with long, arachnoid legs began to emerge from the back of its neck.

A Chimera demon. It burst free of the Silent Brother’s body, hissing as it scuttled past Alastair—and was impaled immediately by Thomas’s sword. As it spasmed, Rosamund hopped over its dying body, her eyes shining.

“There you are!” she cried, as if wondering where Lucie, Cordelia, and Matthew were had been taking up all her spare time. “I was so surprised when none of you came through the York Gate! Have you really been hiding out in London this whole time? How frightfully exciting!”

Matthew sprang down from the memorial, landing lightly on the balls of his feet. “We’re looking for James.” She looked surprised. Matthew said, more slowly, “Have you seen James?”

“Well,” Rosamund said cautiously, “Piers said he’s gone into Westminster Abbey and apparently he’s trying to crown himself king of England. I really don’t know what’s gotten into him.”

“Rosamund!” It was Thomas. He was in gear, his sandy hair disheveled, a bruise rising on his cheek. “We need you by the door. The Watchers are clustering around Eugenia.” Rosamund gave a tiny shriek and, without another word, ran off. “Eugenia is fine,” Thomas said the moment Rosamund was out of earshot. “She won’t mind the help, I’m sure, but—you’re back!” He gazed back and forth between the three of them as though he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “You’re all back! And you’re safe.” He grasped Matthew by the arm. “I thought we’d lost you, Math. We all thought we’d lost you.”

“What’s going on?” Lucie said, staring after Rosamund. “How did you get everyone here? I mean, not everyone, it’s rather an odd group, but still—”

“Grace and Jesse managed to make the fire-messages work,” Thomas said, looking anxiously back over his shoulder at the fighting. “They sent them to Idris—I gather this was the group in the Council Room at the time, so they got the messages first. They came in through the Iron Tombs, the same way the Watchers did. More are on the way. Shadowhunters, I mean, not Watchers.”

“What are they doing?” Matthew said. “It’s a strange manner of fighting they’ve chosen.”

“There’s only one way we’ve found to defeat the Watchers. There’s a symbol on the backs of their necks that binds the Chimera demon to them. You can’t see it with the hoods of their robes up. If you destroy it, the Chimera is forced out. So you have to try to get behind them—which isn’t easy.” Thomas thrust his hand out. “Here’s the symbol. I wanted to be able to show people what it looked like.”

Cordelia looked at the scrawl on his open palm. It resembled the sigil of Belial that she had come to know well, but with a kind of hook protruding from it.

To Cordelia’s surprise, Lucie’s eyes went wide. “I have to get to Jesse,” she said. “There’s something I must tell him.” She began to back away, drawing the axe from the belt at her waist.

“Lucie—” Cordelia began.

“I have to,” Lucie said, shaking her head almost blindly. “The rest of you, get to James—as fast as you possibly can—”

And she took off running, zigzagging through the edge of the crowded battle, heading for the gatehouse that stood at an angle to the cathedral entrance. Cordelia itched to go after her—but Lucie was right. The most pressing concern here was James. James, and Belial.

She turned back to Thomas. “Is James really inside the abbey?”

“Yes,” said Thomas. He hesitated. “You know it’s not James, though, right? I—encountered him.” He shuddered. “It’s Belial, using James’s body. To what end, right now, I cannot say.”

“We know it’s Belial,” said Matthew. “We have to get to him. All these Watchers, here—” He gestured at the battle. “They’re trying to keep us away from him, from the inside of the abbey. And specifically, they’re trying to keep Cordelia and Cortana away.”

“We’ve been trying to get inside,” Thomas said. “The Watchers won’t let us anywhere near the door.”

“There has to be another way in,” said Cordelia. “The cathedral is huge.”

Matthew nodded. “There are other ways. I know a few.” He straightened up. “We need to gather everyone—”

Thomas seemed to know exactly what Matthew meant by “everyone.” “First, we should get Cordelia away before one of the Watchers notices her,” he said.

“Cordelia and I will go,” said Matthew. “Tom, get the group together and meet us around the corner at Great College Street.”

Thomas looked at Matthew with a slightly curious expression. Then he nodded. “And then we’ll get to James?”

Cordelia put her hand on the hilt of Cortana. “And then we’ll get to James.”

Ari didn’t ask questions. If Thomas looked this desperate, he had a reason for pulling her out of the battle. As they shoved their way through the thrashing, fighting crowd, he let her know—shouting in between ducking through skirmishes—that Cordelia and Matthew and Lucie had returned, and that there was a plan for getting into the cathedral. He didn’t explain further, but the relief that their friends were back—and that there was any sort of plan—was enough to keep Ari pushing forward.

More Shadowhunters arrived, pouring into the triangular courtyard just as Ari and Thomas were leaving, but she had no time to stop and see if there were any familiar faces. She and Thomas were already running down the street, headed around the side of the cathedral. There they found the others waiting: Alastair, Cordelia, Matthew, and Anna. Thomas immediately went up to Alastair—who was sporting quite a few bruises and cuts; there had been no time to stop for healing runes—and kissed him. Ari wanted to do the same to Anna, but decided to wait, given the ferocious light of battle in Anna’s eyes.

“But why?” Cordelia was saying. She looked more grimy than Ari had ever seen her—her boots were dusty, her gear scratched, and there was dust in her dark red hair. “Why on earth would Belial be in the abbey trying to crown himself king?”

“Indeed,” Anna said, “I would not have thought that would be his priority. But Piers managed to get a look inside. James—Belial—has the Coronation Chair up on the High Altar, and at least some of the crown jewels as well.”

“He also,” said Alastair, “appears to have an archbishop of Canterbury.”

“He’s kidnapped the archbishop of Canterbury?” Ari said, horrified. She wasn’t entirely sure what an archbishop did, but it certainly seemed outside the bounds of propriety to kidnap one.

“Worse.” Anna looked grim. “He’s raised one from the dead. The very, very dead. And is attempting to have him do the honors.”

“Will it make some kind of difference to his power?” Thomas asked. “Crowning himself? Does it solidify his hold over London?”

“It must,” Alastair said. “But most significantly, this may be our last chance to get Cordelia near enough to him to—”

“But she can’t mortally wound him,” Anna interrupted before Alastair could say it. “Not without killing James.”

There was an awful silence. “James told Matthew I had to get as close to him as I could,” Cordelia said. “And I trust him. If that’s what he wanted me to do—”

“James would be willing to sacrifice himself,” Thomas said in a low voice. “We all know that. But we can’t—we can’t lose another—”

Anna looked away.

To Ari’s surprise, it was Matthew who spoke. He stood with his back straight, and there was something very different about him. As if Edom had changed him—not just that he was thinner, and exhausted-looking, but as if the light in his eyes, always there, had changed in its quality. “He would not consider this a sacrifice,” he said. “He would not want to live with Belial possessing him. If there was no other way out, he would take death as a gift.”

“Matthew,”Cordelia said softly.

Anna’s eyes flashed. “You’re his parabatai, Math. Surely you can’t be arguing for his death.”

“I don’t want to,” Matthew said. “I know I might not survive it myself. But he asked me to be his voice when he no longer had one. And I cannot betray that promise.”

“Let me ask a question,” Alastair said. “Does anyone have a different solution? One in which Belial doesn’t murder everyone in London, and perhaps everyone in the world, and he stops possessing James, and James is never in danger? Because if so, speak up now.”

There was another awful silence.

“I love James like a brother,” said Thomas, “but Math is right. James would never want to live with Belial controlling his every move. That would be torture.”

“James said to believe in him,” Cordelia said. Her chin was up, her jaw set and determined. “And I do.”

Anna nodded. “Fine. That’s our plan, then. We get Cordelia inside the abbey, as close to Belial as possible.” She drew a seraph blade, unlit, from her belt. “Now come along. There’s an entrance around the back we can use to get in.”

She gestured for the others to follow her down Great College Street, a narrow cobbled lane with tall, old-fashioned houses along one side. On the other side was the abbey, protected by a high stone wall topped with spikes. Halfway down the road, they found an alcove set into the wall, containing a small wooden door with no visible latch or knob.

Anna eyed it for a moment before launching a kick at it; it flew open with a sound like a gunshot. They all piled through the doorway and found themselves in a large monastic garden. It was a manicured lawn lined with flowerbeds, and utterly deserted. The blank windows of what seemed to be a dormitory overlooked it; Ari couldn’t help but wonder what had happened to the students who normally lived in the abbey. Were they wandering the streets of London, blank-faced as all the other mundanes?

Together, the Shadowhunters darted silently across the grass and through an archway into a dimly lit tunnel that led into the abbey proper. There was no movement, not a single sign of anyone living. They passed out of the tunnel into a small walled garden, open to the sky, which was a whirlpool of colliding gray-black thunderheads. A fountain at the garden’s center trickled quietly into a stone bowl. Thomas paused for a moment, blinking in the unnatural light.

“If we do succeed,” he said, “if everything goes back to some sort of normal, will the mundanes remember what happened? What all of this was like?”

No one answered; only Alastair touched Thomas gently on the shoulder before they started moving again. Ari noticed that they had grouped themselves loosely around Cordelia, as if they were the escorts of a warrior knight. It had been completely unconscious, but they had all done it.

They cut down a passageway that led into a larger, square garden, surrounded by arcaded walls. The Great Cloister. The dry grass square was surrounded by corridors paved with ancient, pitted stone slabs and lined with arched doorways.

In the silence, the creak of metal hinges was as loud as a shriek. Ari straightened as, from the darkened hallway they’d come from, the telltale white robes of the Watchers appeared. Apparently they’d been seen; apparently they’d been followed; apparently the Watchers could enter the church unimpeded. From the far corner behind them came half a dozen more, moving fast, swarming across the cloister’s lawn toward them. There was nowhere to hide, nothing to duck behind.

Anna whirled on the others. “All of you, go. We have to get Cordelia to James. I’ll hold these off.”

Ari thought of Anna’s face in the corridor, her fierce desperation, her need to stand against the Watchers—and her apparent desire to do it alone.

Cordelia seemed paralyzed, her hand on Cortana, her face a mask of indecision. “Anna—”

“Anna’s right,” Alastair said. “Cordelia. Let’s go.”

Ari said nothing as the others raced from the cloisters, through an arched doorway that led into the abbey. But she did not follow them—only gestured, when Thomas paused to look back at her, that they should go on ahead.

“I’m staying,” she said, and Anna spun to stare at her. She held a seraph blade in one hand, and her expression was furious, her blue eyes blazing.

“Ari—you idiot—get out of here—”

But it was too late for her to protest; they were already surrounded by Watchers. Anna swore and raised her blade: “Kadmiel!”

The glow of the blade seared Ari’s eyes; she reached over her shoulder and drew her khanda free. Her mind was already passing from the place of conscious thought to the place of battle, where her hands and body seemed connected to a force outside herself. An avenging, ruthless force.

She charged at the nearest Watcher. It raised its staff, but not fast enough. Her khanda punched into it with a sickening thud. But it only twisted away, leaving Ari’s sword bright with blood, and the Watcher’s wound already beginning to close.

Ari looked past it, meeting Anna’s blazing eyes with her own. With her gaze, she told Anna what she needed; she could only hope Anna understood as Ari harried the Watcher back, landing blow after blow, making it retreat, maneuvering it into just the right position—

Behind the Watcher, Kadmiel blazed. Blade in hand, Anna tore away the Watcher’s hood, and sliced her weapon across the back of its neck. It crumpled to the ground, its body spasming as the smaller Chimera demon began to worm its way free of the body that could no longer hold it.

Ari didn’t wait for the other Watchers to react; she immediately leaped forward, catching one that was facing away from her, ripping away its hood, destroying the mark of Belial with a single sweep of her khanda. As it folded in on itself, she looked over at Anna in triumph—only to see that Anna, her bloodstained seraph blade held high, was staring past her with a look of sickening dismay.

Ari turned her head and saw why: more Watchers were pouring into the cloister. Too many for the two of them to possibly handle. What had been a risk before, fighting the Watchers on their own, was now far more. Now, it was suicide.

She caught Anna’s eye. They looked at each other for a long moment before, together, they turned to face the demons.

They had fled from the Great Cloister, leaving Anna and Ari to face the Watchers. The thought of it made Thomas feel sick to his stomach—even though he knew both were excellent warriors. Even though he knew that in reality, they’d had no choice.

They had to get Cordelia to Belial.

It was Matthew who had taken over as their navigator; he led them through a heavy oak door along the south side of the great cathedral, swung them along the lower part of the nave, and then came back up along the north wall. They stayed out of sight of the central part of the church, the High Altar blocked by the choir screen. Which was nerve-racking, Thomas thought, since they all knew that was where Belial was, doing only the Angel knew what.

Whatever Belial was doing, it was quiet. They stopped near the north transept, listening, Thomas leaning silently against the cold stone wall for a moment. There were few things that made him feel small, but he was struck by the sheer vast height of the cathedral; the great rows of impossibly high arches going up and up, like an optical illusion.

He wondered if it was that enormity that had brought Belial here. Or something about the solemnity of it, the ceremonial effigies of soldiers and poets, royalty and statesmen, that lined the walls. He realized he was facing the large statue of a Major General Sir John Malcolm, a balding gentleman leaning on a stone sword. According to the inscribed marble pillar on which he stood, his memory is cherished by grateful millions, his fame lives in the history of nations. This statue has been erected by the friends whom he acquired by his splendid talents, eminent public services and private virtues.

Well, thought Thomas, I’ve never heard of you.

Sir John Malcolm scowled.

Thomas jerked bolt upright. He glanced to the right, at Alastair, and then at Matthew and Cordelia. None of them seemed to have noticed anything amiss. Cordelia and Matthew seemed to be assessing Cordelia’s best route to the High Altar, and Alastair was looking away, frowning.

Thomas followed his gaze and realized that Alastair was staring at another monument, a huge bas-relief of multicolored marble, featuring Britannia, the emblem of Britain, holding a massive spear. An intense scarlet light had appeared within the stone spear, as if it were being heated from below.

“Alastair,”Thomas whispered—just as, with a horrendous tearing sound, Sir John Malcolm stepped down from his pillar and raised his marble sword; it, too, was burning with an intense scarlet light.

Thomas lunged out of the way just as the sword came down, slamming into the floor of the abbey and sending up a cloud of stone dust. He heard Alastair call his name, and scrambled to his feet.

In seconds, chaos had erupted in the north transept. Britannia was tearing herself free of her imprisoning stone carving, her blank gaze fixed on Cordelia. Several knights in full armor began to rise from their sleeping positions atop their tombs.

Matthew whirled, white-faced. “Run, Cordelia,” he said.

She hesitated—just as a Roman soldier bearing a gladius lurched around the corner. He made straight for her, and without a moment’s thought, Matthew stepped into its way. He raised his seraph blade, and the stone gladius slammed into it, sending him skidding back several feet. Cordelia started toward him, and so did Thomas, but it was as if the statues sensed blood—Britannia bore down on him, raising her spear—

Something lunged into Matthew, knocking him out of the way. The spear jammed into the wall just behind where he’d been standing, sending chips of stone flying as he and Alastair rolled across the abbey floor.

Alastair. Alastair had saved Matthew’s life. Thomas only had a moment to take that in before he spun to hiss at Cordelia, “Run—get to James—”

The knights who had torn free of their tombs were lurching toward them, their footsteps ringing through the cathedral. Thomas thought he heard distant laughter. Belial.

Cordelia stood very still for a moment. Her gaze swept over Thomas, over Matthew—rising now and lifting his sword once more—and finally over Alastair, who was back on his feet. It seemed as if she were trying to memorize all of them, as if she were praying she could hold this image in her head, and never forget it.

“Go,” Alastair rasped, his eyes fixed on his sister. He was bleeding from a cut at his temple. “Layla. Go.”

Cordelia ran.

She had not thought it would take so long to get to the gatehouse. She knew now how one could kill a Watcher, but she had no time to try. She had to reach Jesse. She used her small size as an advantage, slipping through the ranks of Nephilim, ducking low to scuttle across the courtyard. When she could, she slashed with her axe at the Watchers’ feet and legs, making them stumble; she upended one that was in the middle of battling with Eugenia, leaving Eugenia staring around in surprise.

Many of the Nephilim she passed were strangers, and she could not help but feel a pang at not seeing her parents. At the same time, wasn’t it better that they were somewhere else, out of danger? She knew they would hurry here as soon as they could. She hoped the battle would have ended by then. That she could help it end.

But to do that, she needed to reach Jesse.

At last, she burst out from the main clutch of the fighting, and found herself at the gatehouse. At first she saw neither Grace nor Jesse, just a swath of blackened pavement and a glimpse of the green Dean’s Yard through the main archway.

She felt a moment of fear—had something happened to Jesse, to Grace? Had they moved elsewhere in the battle, and now she would have to search for them, when there was so little time?

And then she heard Jesse’s voice. “Lucie, look out!” he called, and as she whirled, she realized he was behind her, and so was a Watcher, black staff in hand. She reached for her axe, but Jesse had his sword out and was harrying the Watcher back. Something tore past the Watcher and exploded behind it, sending up licks of flame that caught the hem of its robe.

Lucie glanced up to see Grace clinging to a cornice along the gatehouse wall. She was still holding her bag, and had something clutched in her other hand—another explosive, no doubt. Her gaze was fixed on Jesse, who had taken advantage of the Watcher’s distraction to slice away its hood; he spun, lashed out with the sword, and caught it across the back of the neck.

The Watcher fell forward like a tree uprooted in a storm, making no attempt to cushion its fall. As its body began to spasm, the Chimera demon wriggled free through an eye socket—Lucie shuddered—and rotated its head swiftly, seeking a hiding place.

Lucie brought her axe down, slicing it in half. It made a sound like bone crunching underfoot, and vanished.

“Lucie.”Jesse caught her with his free arm, swinging her hard against his body. She could feel the hammering beat of his heart. He was breathing hard; he smelled of sweat and blood and leather. Shadowhunter smells. She looked up at him—his face was cut and bruised, his green eyes stunned as he searched her face—

“Get under the gate,” Grace hissed from above. “You can’t just stand around ogling each other during a battle—”

Jesse blinked as if snapped out of a dream. “That’s good advice,” he noted.

Lucie could only agree. She took hold of Jesse’s arm and half dragged him into the shadows of the gateway: it was deep, almost a tunnel leading through to the Dean’s Yard on the other side.

“Lucie.” Jesse slammed his bloody sword into its scabbard and caught hold of her. He pulled her close, his back against the stone wall. She tossed her axe aside, taking hold of his gear jacket, clinging to him tightly. “I thought you were gone forever. I thought I’d lost you.”

It seemed so long ago now, the night she’d left him, placing the folded note under his pillow. “I know,” she whispered, wanting to lay her head against his chest. Wanting to touch his cheek, to tell him she hadn’t spent a moment since without thinking of him, of getting back to him. But there was no time. “I know, and I’m sorry. But Jesse—I need you to hold me.”

“I want to.” He brushed his lips against her hair. “I’m furious at you, and desperately glad to see you, and I want to hold you for hours, but it’s not safe—”

“Remember when I said I’d never seen the ghost of an Iron Sister or Silent Brother?” Lucie breathed. “That wherever they were voyaging, I’d never gone that far? Well, it was true I’ve never seen them. But I’ve heard them. I realize that now.”

“Heard them? What—?”

“Every time I was with you, every time I touched you and I saw that darkness and heard those cries—Malcolm was wrong, I think. I don’t believe being with you makes me closer to Belial, more vulnerable to him. I think because of what happened to you, it brings me closer to the other side. Where souls go, the ones who don’t linger here.”

Outside the archway, an explosive went off, scattering dirt and sending smoke drifting into their hiding space. Lucie’s stomach turned over; Grace could hold off the Watchers for only so long.

“Jesse. The sign I kept seeing—it wasn’t that it was Belial’s symbol; the symbol was holding them back, keeping them imprisoned—”

“Lucie,” he said quietly. “I don’t understand.”

“I know, and there’s no time to explain.” She pushed herself up on her toes, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Trust me, Jesse. Hold me. Please.”

He pulled her close. She gasped in relief, pressing herself against him. “Well,” he whispered against her hair, “if we’re going to do this—”

And then he was kissing her. She hadn’t expected it consciously, but it seemed her body had: she pushed up harder on her toes, her hand stroking the back of his neck, tasting dust and salt on his lips, and something sweet and hot beneath that. Her skin prickled with yearning, and then the surge of longing became a buzzing in her head. She felt the narrowing of her perception, darkness encroaching, tunneling her vision.

She closed her eyes. She was in the great darkness, the shimmer of stars in the distance. She gritted her teeth, even though she could no longer feel them, as she reached out. Reached out to hear them, the voices, the awful cries that had become so familiar. They swelled somewhere beyond her imagining, the cries of the lost, desperate to be found. Of the unknown, desperate to be recognized.

And she recognized them now. She knew exactly who they were. And though her own body was beyond her awareness, she cried out to them with her mind. “Iron Sisters! Silent Brothers!” she called. “My name is Lucie—Lucie Herondale. I want to help you.”

The howling cries continued; Lucie had no way of knowing if she’d been heard or not. No way of knowing if she could reach them, but she had to try; she could only deliver her message and hope.

“I understand now what you’ve been trying to tell me,” she called out. “Your souls are voyaging, but still you remember your bodies, still you might return to them one day. And Belial came and violated them—he stole you from the Iron Tombs and put his demons in your bodies to use as he wishes. He can be stopped. I swear he can be stopped. But you need to help me. Help me, please.”

She paused. She could still hear the wailing in the distance. Had it grown louder? She could not tell.

“Fight back!” she cried. “Reclaim yourselves! If you thrust the demons from your bodies, I swear we know how to destroy them! You will be freed! But you must try!” The cries had died away; there was a great silence now. She floated in it, in the darkness and the silence, utterly untethered. She had gone further than she had ever gone before, reached further than she had ever reached. Whether she could return or not, Lucie did not know. She raised her face to the stars, that were not really stars, and said, “We need you. The Nephilim need you. We have fought so hard.”

Her vision had begun to dim, her consciousness slipping away. Lucie whispered, “Please come back to us, please,” and then her mind was swallowed up by darkness, and she could say no more.