Chapter 6: Through Blood

6THROUGH BLOOD

Whose hearts must I break? What lie must I maintain?

Through whose blood am I to wade?

—Arthur Rimbaud, “A Season in Hell”

Cordelia’s blood turned to ice. But no one knows, she thought. No one knows. It was a secret, that she was bound to Lilith. She and Matthew had spoken of Cortana here, last night, but they had not mentioned the Mother of Demons, nor the word “paladin.” She said, “You must be mistaken. I—”

“Non. Je sais ce que je sais. Vous n’avez pas le droit d’entrer,”the guard snapped. I know what I know. You cannot come inside.

“What’s going on?” Matthew asked in French, approaching the door. “You are refusing us entrance?”

The guard retorted; they raced ahead so quickly in French that Cordelia had trouble keeping up. The guard was still refusing; Matthew was telling him there had been a mistake, a misidentification. Cordelia was a Shadowhunter in good standing. The guard shook his head stubbornly. I know what I know, was all he would say.

Cordelia pressed her palms together, trying to still the trembling in her hands. “I wish only to speak to Madame Dorothea,” she said, her voice cutting through the men’s argument. “Perhaps you could bring a message to her—”

“She is not here tonight.” A young man entering the club indicated the program affixed to the door; indeed, Madame Dorothea’s name was not on it. Instead, a snake charmer was advertised as the amusement for the evening. “I am sorry to disappoint such a beautiful mademoiselle.”

He tipped his hat before entering the club, and Cordelia saw the moonlight gleam gold off his eyes. Werewolf.

“Look here,” Matthew said, about to start in on the guard again—he was waving his walking stick about, in a dramatic manner he probably enjoyed at least a little bit—but Cordelia put her hand on his arm.

“There is no point,” she said. “Not if she is not here. Matthew, let’s go.”

Paladin.The word echoed in Cordelia’s ears, long after Matthew and she had climbed into a fiacre. Even as they rattled quickly away from Montmartre, she still felt as if she were standing in front of the cabaret, hearing the guard refuse her entrance. I know what I know. You cannot come inside.

Because you are corrupted within,said a small voice inside her. Because you belong to Lilith, Mother of Demons. Because of your own foolishness, you are cursed. No one should be around you.

She thought of Alastair. We become what we are afraid we will be, Layla.

“Cordelia?” Matthew’s worried voice seemed to come from far away. “Cordelia, please. Talk to me.”

She tried to look up, to look at him, but the darkness seemed to swirl around her, visions of accusing faces and disappointed voices echoing in her head. It was as if she had been flung back to that night in London, that night her heart had broken into a thousand pieces, driving her out into the night and the snow. The terrible feeling of loss, of crushing disappointment in herself, rose like a wave. She raised her hands as if she could ward it off. “The carriage—stop the carriage,” she heard herself say. “I can hardly breathe. Matthew—”

The window opened, letting in cold air. She heard Matthew rap on the driver’s window, bark out instructions in French. The horses came to a hasty stop, setting the fiacre to swaying. Cordelia threw the door open and almost leaped out, nearly tripping over the heavy hem of her gown. She heard Matthew scramble down after her, hastily paying the driver. “Ne vous inquiétez pas. Tout va bien.” It’s all right, everything is fine. He hurried to catch up with her as she took a few steps before fetching up blindly against a lamppost.

“Cordelia.” He laid his hand on her back as she struggled to catch her breath. His touch was light. “It’s all right. You’ve done nothing wrong, darling—”

He broke off, as if he hadn’t meant the endearment to come out of his mouth. Cordelia was past caring. She said, “I have. I chose to become her paladin. They’ll all find out—if that guard knows, everyone will know soon enough—”

“Not at all.” Matthew spoke firmly. “Even if there is a rumor in Downworld, that doesn’t mean it will spread to Shadowhunters. You’ve seen how little interest Nephilim take in Downworlder gossip. Cordelia, breathe.”

Cordelia took a deep breath. Then another, forcing the air into her lungs. The spots that had dotted her vision began to fade. “I can’t keep it from them for all time, Matthew. It’s lovely to be here with you, but we can’t stay forever—”

“We can’t,” he said, sounding suddenly weary, “and just because I don’t want to think about the future doesn’t mean I don’t know there is a future. It will come to us soon enough. Why run to embrace it?”

She gave a dry little laugh. “Is it so terrible? Our future?”

“No,” he said, “but it isn’t Paris, with you. Here, come with me.”

He held out his hand and she took it. He led her to the center of the Pont Alexandre—it was past midnight, and the bridge was deserted. On the left bank of the Seine, she could see Les Invalides, with its gold dome, rising against the night sky. On the right bank, the Grand and Petit Palais glowed richly with electric light. Moonlight poured over the city like milk, making the bridge shimmer, a bar of white gold laid across the river. Gilt-bronze statues of winged horses, supported on tall stone pillars, watched over those who crossed. Below the span of the bridge, the river water sparkled like a carpet of diamonds, touched by starlight along its wind-whipped currents.

She and Matthew stood, hand in hand, watching the river flow beneath the bridge. The Seine rolled on from here, she knew, piercing the heart of Paris like a silver arrow just as the Thames did London. “We are not here just to forget,” Matthew said, “but also to remember that there are good and beautiful things in this world, always. And mistakes do not take them from us; nothing takes them from us. They are eternal.”

She squeezed his gloved hand with her own. “Matthew. Do you listen to yourself? If you believe what you say, remember that it is true for you, too. Nothing can take the good things of the world from you. And that includes how much your friends and family love you, and always will.”

He looked down at her. They stood close; Cordelia knew any passersby would assume they were lovers, seeking a romantic spot to embrace. She didn’t care. She could see the pain in Matthew’s face, in his dark green eyes. He said, “Do you think James—”

He broke off. Neither of them had mentioned James’s name since they had come to Paris. Quickly, he went on, “Would you care to walk back to the hotel? I think the air would clear our heads.”

A set of stone steps led from the bridge down to the quai, the riverfront walkway that followed the Seine. During the day, Parisians fished off the edges; now, boats were tied up along the side, bobbing gently in the current. Mice darted back and forth across the pavement, looking for scraps; Cordelia wished she had some bread to scatter for them. She said as much to Matthew, who opined that French mice were probably terrible snobs who only ate French cheeses.

Cordelia smiled. Matthew’s jokes, the views of Paris, her own good sense—she wished any of it could lighten the weight on her heart. She could not stop imagining what it would be like when her mother found out the truth about her compact with Lilith. When the Enclave found out. When Will and Tessa found out. She knew they were not destined to be her in-laws for much longer, but she found that she cared terribly what they thought of her.

And Lucie. Lucie would be the most affected. They had always planned to be parabatai; she was abandoning Lucie now, without a warrior partner, a sister in battle. She could not help but feel it would be better if Lucie had never known her—what a different life she might have had, a different parabatai, different chances.

“Daisy.” Matthew spoke in a low voice, his hand tightening on hers. “I know you are lost in thought. But—listen.”

There was urgency in his voice. Cordelia closed off thoughts of Lilith, of the Herondales, of the Enclave. She turned to look behind them, down the long tunnel of the quai—the river on one side, the stone retaining wall rising on the other, the city above them as if they had retreated underground.

Shhhh.Not the wind in the bare boughs, but a hiss and a slither. A bitter smell, carried on the wind.

Demons.

Matthew stepped back, placing himself in front of her. There was the sound of a weapon being drawn, the spark of moonlight on metal. It seemed Matthew’s walking stick had a blade cleverly hidden within the hollowed-out wood. He kicked the empty stick aside just as the creatures emerged from the shadows, sliding and slithering over the pavement.

“Naga demons,” Cordelia whispered. They were long and low, bodies whiplike, covered in black, oily scales, like giant water snakes. But when they opened their mouths to hiss, she could see that their heads were more like a crocodile’s, mouths long and triangular and lined with jagged teeth that glowed yellow in the streetlight.

A gray tide surged past her, a skitter of tiny, racing feet. The mice she had seen earlier, fleeing as the Naga demons advanced on the Shadowhunters.

Matthew shrugged off his overcoat, let it drop to the pavement, and lunged. Cordelia stood frozen, watching, as he sliced the head off one demon, then another—her hands curled into fists. She hated this. It ran counter to everything in her nature to hang back while a fight was going on. But if she were to pick up a weapon, she would be vulnerable to Lilith—to Lilith working her will through Cordelia.

Matthew plunged his blade down—and missed. A Naga demon lunged, closing its sharp-toothed jaw around his ankle. Matthew yelled, “My spats!” and stabbed downward. Ichor splashed up and over him; he spun, his blade whirling. A demon hit the pavement with a wet smack, bleeding, its tail lashing. With a yell of pain, Matthew staggered back; his cheek was bleeding from a long cut.

Everything about this was wrong. Cordelia should be there, at Matthew’s side, Cortana in her hand, scrawling its blood-and-gold signature across the sky. Without being able to stop herself, she tore off her cloak, seized up the walking stick Matthew had dropped, and leaped into the fray.

She heard Matthew call out to her, even as he backed up—there must have been ten Naga demons left. He couldn’t possibly kill them all, she thought, even as he shouted at her to get back, to protect herself. From Lilith, she thought, but what use would protecting herself be if she let something happen to Matthew?

She slammed the runed cane hard into a Naga demon’s head, heard its skull shatter, the crumpling as its body vanished, sucked back to its home dimension. Matthew, giving up on stopping Cordelia, cut a wide arc with his blade, slicing a Naga demon neatly in two. Cordelia stabbed down with the cane, punching a hole through another demon’s body. It, too, vanished, a tide of ichor spilling across the ground. Cordelia struck out again—and hesitated. The Naga demons had begun skittering backward, away from the two Shadowhunters.

“We did it,” Matthew panted, touching a hand to his bloody cheek. “Got rid of those bastards—”

He froze. Not because of surprise, or even watchfulness. He simply froze, blade in hand, as if he had been turned to stone. Cordelia looked up, her heart beating wildly, as at her feet the Naga demons bent their heads, their chins scraping the ground.

“Mother,”they hissed. “Mother.”

Cordelia’s heart turned over in her chest. Walking toward her along the quai, dressed in a gown of black silk, was Lilith.

Her hair was loose and unbound, the wind catching it, unfurling it like a banner. Her eyes were flat black marbles, with no white visible. She was smiling. Her skin was very white, her neck rising like an ivory column from the collar of her gown. Once she had been beautiful enough to seduce demons and angels. She looked as youthful as ever, though Cordelia could not help but wonder if she had changed through the ages, with bitterness and loss. Her mouth was hard, even as she looked at Cordelia with a deadly pleasure.

“I knew you could not stop yourself, little warrior,” she said. “It is in your blood, the need to fight.”

Cordelia flung the stick she’d been holding. It bounced across the pavement, fetching up at Lilith’s feet. The wood of it was stained with ichor. “I was protecting my friend.”

“The pretty Fairchild boy. Yes.” Lilith flicked a glance at him, then snapped her fingers; the Naga demons slithered away, back into the shadows. Cordelia wasn’t sure whether to be relieved. She was far more afraid of Lilith than of the demons in her command. “You have many friends. It makes you simple to manipulate.” She cocked her head to the side. “But to see you, my paladin, fighting with this—this bit of wood.” She kicked contemptuously at the walking stick. “Where is Cortana?”

Cordelia smiled. “I don’t know.”

She didn’t. She had given Cortana to Alastair and told him to hide it. She trusted that he had. She was glad not to know more.

“I made sure I wouldn’t know,” she added, “so that I couldn’t tell you. No matter what you do to me.”

“How brave,” Lilith said, with some amusement. “That is, after all, why I chose you. That brave little heart that beats inside your chest.” She took a step forward; Cordelia held her ground. Any fear she felt was for Matthew. Would Lilith harm him, just to show Cordelia her power?

She vowed to herself that if Lilith did, she, Cordelia, would dedicate her life to finding some way to hurt Lilith back.

Lilith looked from Matthew to Cordelia, and her smile widened. “I will not hurt him,” she said. “Not yet. He does well in that area himself, don’t you think? You are loyal, faithful to your friends; but sometimes I think you are too clever.”

“There is nothing clever,” said Cordelia, “in my doing what you want. You wish to have the sword so you can slay Belial—”

“Which you also desire,” Lilith pointed out. “You will be glad to know those two wounds you dealt him pain him still. He is in agony without respite.”

“We may desire the same thing,” Cordelia conceded. “But that does not make it clever to give you what you want—a paladin, a powerful weapon. You are not better than Belial. You simply also hate him. And if I accepted you, became your true paladin, that would be the end of me. The end of my life, or any part of it that is worth living.”

“And otherwise a long and happy life will be yours?” Lilith’s hair rustled. Perhaps the serpents she liked so much, slithering among the dark mass of her locks. “You think danger is behind you? The greatest danger lies ahead. Belial has not stopped his planning. I, too, have heard the whispers on the wind. ‘They wake.’”

Cordelia started. “What—?” she began, but Lilith only laughed, and vanished. The quai was empty again, only the stains of ichor, and her and Matthew’s fallen coats and weapons, to show anything had occurred.

Matthew. She whirled, and saw him on his knees. She darted to his side, but he was already rising, his face white, the cut on his cheek standing out stark and red. “I heard her,” he said. “I couldn’t move, but I could see—I heard all of it. ‘They wake.’” He stared down at her. “Are you all right? Cordelia—”

“I’m so sorry.” She fumbled off her gloves, reached for her stele. She was already starting to shiver, with reaction and with cold. “Let me—you need an iratze.” She pushed up the cuff of his shirt, began to scrawl the healing rune with the tip of her stele. “I’m so sorry you’re hurt. I’m so—”

“Do not say you are sorry again,” Matthew said in a low voice. “Or I will begin shouting. This is not your fault.”

“I let myself be fooled,” she said. The inside of Matthew’s forearm was pale, blue-veined, marked with white, lacelike patterns where old runes had faded. “I wanted to believe that Wayland the Smith had chosen me. I was a fool—”

“Cordelia.” He caught hold of her with such force that her stele clattered to the ground. The cut along his cheek was already healing, his bruises fading. “I am the one who believed a faerie who told me that what I was purchasing was a harmless truth potion. I am the one who nearly murdered my own—” He inhaled, as if the words hurt to speak. “Do you think I don’t understand what it is to have made a wrong decision, believing you were making the right one? Do you think anyone could imagine what that is like better than I could?”

“I should cut my own hands off so that I can never pick up a weapon again,” she whispered. “What have I done?”

“Don’t.” The agony in his voice made her look up. “Don’t talk about hurting yourself. What wounds you wounds me. I love you, Daisy, I—”

He cut himself off abruptly. Cordelia felt as if she were floating in a dream. She knew she had dropped her cloak, that cold air was cutting through the fabric of her dress. She knew she was in a sort of shock, that despite all she knew, she had not truly expected Lilith to appear. She knew despair was there, reaching out long, dark fingers for her like a siren, desperate to draw her under, to drown her in misery, in the whisper of voices that said, You have lost James. Your family. Your name. Your parabatai. The world will turn its back on you, Cordelia.

“Cordelia,” Matthew said. “I’m sorry.”

She put her hands flat against his chest. Took a deep breath, air stuttering in her chest. She said, “Matthew. Hold me.”

Without a word, he pulled her close. The future was cold and dark, but Matthew was warm against her, a shield against shadow. He smelled of night air, of sweat and cologne and blood. You are all I have. Hold the darkness back. Hold the memories back. Hold me.

“Matthew,” she said. “Why have you not tried to kiss me, since we came to Paris?”

His hands, which had been stroking her back, stilled. He said, “You told me you considered me only a friend. You remain a married woman, at that. I may be a drunk and a wastrel, but I do have my limits.”

“Surely we are already a deplorable scandal in London.”

“I don’t care about scandal,” Matthew said, “as should be obvious from every single thing I do. But I have my limits for… myself.” His voice shook. “Do you think I have not wanted to kiss you? I have wanted to kiss you every moment of every day. I have held myself back. I always will, unless…” There was a hunger in his voice. A desperation. “Unless you tell me I need no longer do so.”

She let her fingers fold themselves into the fabric of his shirt. Pulled him closer. Said, “I would like you to kiss me.”

“Daisy, don’t joke—”

She raised herself up on her toes. Brushed her lips across his. For a moment, memory flashed against the darkness in her mind: the Whispering Room, the fire, James kissing her, the first kiss of her life, kindling an unimaginable blaze. No, she told herself. Forget. Forget.

“Please,” she said.

“Daisy,” Matthew whispered, in a strangled voice, before control seemed to desert him. With a groan, he gathered her up against him, ducking his head to cover her mouth with his own.

---

When Brother Zachariah came to tell her that she had a visitor, Grace felt her heart begin to race. She could not think of anyone who might visit her who would bring good news. It could not be Jesse; if it were public knowledge that Lucie had brought him back, if he were in London, surely Zachariah would have told her so? And if it were Lucie… Well, James would have told Lucie the truth of the bracelet by now. Lucie would have no reason to see her save to berate and blame her. No one would.

Then again… she had lost track of how many days she had been in the City of Bones. She thought it had been about a week, but the lack of sunlight, and the irregularity of the Brothers’ demands on her time, made it hard to know. She slept when she grew tired, and when she was hungry, someone would bring her something to eat. It was a comfortable prison, but a prison nonetheless. A prison where no human voice broke the silence; sometimes Grace wanted to scream, just to hear someone.

By the time she saw the shadow coming down the corridor toward her cell, she was resigned: it would likely be an unpleasant encounter, but it would be a break in the numbing tedium. She sat up on her narrow bed, patting down her hair. Steeling herself for…

“Christopher?”

“Hullo, Grace,” Christopher Lightwood said. He wore his habitual ink- and acid-stained clothes, and his light brown hair was windblown. “I heard you were here. I thought I ought to see how you’ve been.”

Grace swallowed. Didn’t he know? Hadn’t James told him what she’d done? But he was looking at her with his customary mild curiosity. There was no anger on his face.

“How long,” Grace said, in almost a whisper, “have I been here?”

Christopher, to her surprise, flushed. “A week, or thereabouts,” he said. “I would have come earlier, only Jem said I ought to give you some time to adjust.”

He was standing just in front of the barred door. Grace realized with a shock that he thought she was accusing him of some sort of neglect, for not having come earlier. “Oh,” she said, “no, I didn’t mean—I’m glad you’re here, Christopher.”

He smiled, that kind smile that lit up his unusually colored eyes. Christopher was not handsome in an ordinary way, and Grace knew perfectly well that there were plenty of people, her mother included, who would have thought him not attractive at all. But Grace had known handsome men in abundance, and she knew outward beauty did not ensure kindness, or cleverness, or any kind of a good heart.

“I am too,” he said. “I’d been wanting to see how you were. I thought it was awfully brave of you to give yourself up to the Silent Brothers and let them study you. To see if your mother—had done anything awful to you.”

He really doesn’t know.And Grace knew, in that moment, that she was not going to tell him. Not now. She knew it was dishonesty, that it ran counter to her promise to herself to be more truthful. But hadn’t Zachariah said they were planning to keep the information about her power a secret? Wasn’t she doing what the Silent Brothers would have wanted?

Christopher shifted his feet. “All right,” he said. “I did come because I wanted to see if you were well. But not only because of that.”

“Oh?”

“Yes,” said Christopher. Abruptly he dug his hand into his trouser pocket and withdrew a sheaf of pages, carefully folded into quarters. “You see, I’ve been working on this new project—a kind of amalgam of science and Shadowhunter magic. It’s meant for sending messages at a distance, you see, and I’ve made progress, but now there have been some snags, and I’m rather at an impasse, and—oh dear, my metaphors are getting all muddled now.”

Grace’s anxiety had quickly faded as soon as she saw the pages, covered in Christopher’s unreadable scrawl. Now she found she was smiling a bit, even.

“And you’ve got a scientific mind,” Christopher went on, “and so few Shadowhunters do, you know, and Henry’s been too busy to help, and I think my other friends are weary of their things catching on fire. So I was wondering if you would read these over? And give me the honor of your opinion on where I might be going wrong?”

Grace felt a smile spread over her face. Probably the first time she’d really smiled since—well, since the last time she’d seen Christopher. “Christopher Lightwood,” she said, “there is absolutely nothing I would like to do more.”

---

As they touched, everything fell away for Cordelia—worries, fears, frustrations, despair. Matthew’s mouth was hot against hers; he staggered back against a lamppost. He kissed her feverishly, over and over, lacing his fingers into her hair. Each kiss hotter, harder than the last. He tasted sugar-sweet, like candy.

She let her hands run over him, over his lean body, the arms she had admired before, the planes of his chest through his shirt, his skin burning feverishly at her touch. She sank her fingers into his thick hair, rougher than James’s, cupped his face in her palms.

He had discarded his gloves and was touching her, too, hands against the thick velvet of her dress, a finger tracing her collarbone, the neckline of her dress. She moaned softly and felt his whole body shudder. He buried his face in the side of her neck. His pulse was racing like wildfire.

“We have to get back to the hotel, Daisy,” he whispering, kissing her throat. “We have to get back, my God, before I disgrace myself and you in front of all Paris.”

Cordelia barely remembered the trip. They retrieved their coats, left Matthew’s weapon, and made their way back in a sort of dream state. They paused several times to kiss in shadowed doorways. Matthew held her so hard it hurt, his hands in her hair, winding the strands around his fingers.

It was like a dream, she thought, as they passed the clerk at the hotel’s front desk. He seemed to be trying to flag them down, but they ducked into one of the gilt-and-crystal lifts and let it carry them upward. Cordelia could not stop an almost hysterical giggle as Matthew pressed her back against the mirrored wall, kissing her neck. Fingers in his hair, she looked at herself in the glass opposite. She looked flushed, almost drunk, the sleeve of her red gown torn. In the fight, perhaps, or by Matthew; she wasn’t sure.

The room, when they came into it, was dark. Matthew kicked the door shut, tearing off his coat with shaking hands. He, too, was flushed, his spun-gold hair disarrayed by her fingers. She drew him toward her—they were still in the entryway, but the door was locked; they were alone. Matthew’s eyes were their darkest green, nearly black, as he pushed the cloak from her shoulders. It fell in a soft, whispering heap at her feet.

Matthew’s hands were skilled. Long fingers curled around the back of her neck; she raised her face to be kissed. Let him not think James has never kissed me, she thought, and kissed him back, willing thoughts of James out of her head. She looped her arms around Matthew’s neck; his body was slim and hard against hers, his mouth soft. She flicked her tongue across his lower lip, felt him shiver. His free hand drew down the sleeve of her dress, baring her shoulder. He kissed the uncovered skin, and Cordelia heard herself gasp.

Who was this, she thought, this bold girl kissing a boy in a Parisian hotel? It couldn’t be her, Cordelia. It had to be someone else, someone carefree, someone brave, someone whose passions were not directed at a husband who did not love her back. Someone who was wanted, truly wanted; she could feel it in the way Matthew held her, the way he said her name, the way he trembled when he gathered her closer, as if he could not believe his good fortune.

“Matthew,” she whispered. Her hands were under his jacket; she could feel the heat of him through the thin cotton of his shirt, feel the flutter in his stomach when she brushed it with her palm. “We can’t—not here—your room—”

“It’s a mess. We’ll go to yours,” he said, and kissed her hard, swinging her up in his arms. He carried her through the French doors into the living room, the only light a spill of illumination through the window. A mix of moon and streetlight, turning the shadows a dark gray. Matthew stumbled against a low table, swore, and laughed, setting Cordelia momentarily down.

“Does it hurt?” she whispered, holding tightly to his shirtfront.

“Nothing hurts,” he assured her, pulling her close for a kiss so yearning, so hot with desire, that she felt it down to her toes.

It was such a relief to feel, to lose herself in sensation, to let the weight of memory drop from her shoulders. She reached to touch his face, a shadow in the darkness, just as the lights went on.

She blinked for a moment, her eyes adjusting to the new illumination. Someone had switched on the Tiffany lamp in the reading corner. Someone who was sitting in the plush velvet armchair beneath the lamp, someone in a black traveling suit, pale face a smudge of white between his shirt and his crow-black hair. Someone with eyes the color of lamplight and fire.

James.