Queen of Air and Darkness
Page 172
All his energy had gone into Ty, all his devotion and hopes for the future. He liked the other Blackthorns, but he hardly knew them well. He probably knew Dru the best, and he liked her as a friend, but that was a small thing compared to the burning hurt and humiliation he felt when he thought about Ty.
He didn’t blame Ty for what had happened. He blamed himself: He’d been too fixated on not losing Ty to tell him what he needed to hear. Everyone needed to be stopped from making bad choices sometimes, but he hadn’t stopped Ty. And he’d gotten what he deserved, really. Now that he knew he meant nothing much to Ty, how could he live in the Institute again? See him every day? Feel like an idiot constantly, feel the pity of his family, listen to them tell him he should try to make other friends, survive in the same house with Ty while Ty avoided him? There was no real question about it. I can’t face going back there and living with them. This is my chance to start again and learn what it means to be who I am.
“I’ll go with you. I’d like to live with you,” Kit said.
“Oh.” Tessa blinked. “Oh!” She grabbed his hand and squeezed it, smiling all over her kind face. “That’s lovely, Kit, that’s wonderful. Jem will be so happy too. And it will be wonderful for the baby to have company. I mean, hopefully you’ll like the baby as well.” She blushed. Kit thought it would actually be kind of nice to have a small sibling-type person in his life, but he said nothing. “I’m babbling,” Tessa said. “I’m just so excited. We’ll go tonight—get you safe and settled as fast as possible. We’ll arrange for you to have a tutor—for all the necessary protection spells to be done by the Silent Brothers—”
“That sounds good,” Kit said, a little exhausted already by the thought of everything that needed to be done. “I only have this bag—no other luggage.” It was true, and there was nothing he cared about much in the bag either, besides the Herondale dagger and the witchlight Ty had given him.
“I imagine you’d like to say good-bye to the Blackthorns before we go—”
“No,” Kit said. “I don’t want to see them.”
Tessa blinked.
“It’s better if they don’t know about all this First Heir stuff,” Kit said. “It’s safer for them. Jem can tell them I just decided L.A. wasn’t for me. They’re all so far ahead of me in training, and I should learn from the beginning if I want to be a Shadowhunter.”
Tessa nodded. Kit knew she didn’t entirely buy his excuse, but she also knew enough not to pry. It was very reassuring.
“I do have one question before we go,” Kit said, and Tessa looked at him curiously. “Will I be growing pointy ears? Maybe a tail? I’ve seen some weird-looking faeries in the Shadow Market.”
Tessa grinned. “I guess we’ll find out.”
* * *
Everyone wanted to come by the canal house and say hello to Emma and Julian now that they had left the Basilias. People Dru was familiar with as well as people she wasn’t flooded into the ground floor, bringing flowers and small gifts: new gauntlets for Emma, a gear jacket for Julian.
Some were overly bright and cheery and greeted Emma and Julian as if nothing odd had happened to them at all. Some complimented them as if they thought the whole “becoming enormous and almost dying” was part of a predetermined plan that had paid off nicely. Others were awkward—those who had been a little too close to the Cohort, Dru suspected—as if they wondered if Emma and Julian might grow huge at any moment and squash them right there in the kitchen. One kindly older lady complimented Julian on being tall and a terrible silence fell; Tavvy said, “What’s going on?” and Dru had to drag him into the sitting room.
A few others seemed to have had major life experiences. “It just came to me on the field that I should spend more time with my family,” said Trini Castel. “Moments of peace are precious moments. We’ll never get them back.”
“So true,” said Julian.
He looked as if he was trying not to laugh. Everyone else nodded thoughtfully. It was very strange—for days, Dru had been worried that Emma and Julian would be punished in some way when they woke up: either officially, by the Clave, or by the ignorant judgment of other Shadowhunters. But it didn’t seem to be happening.
She edged close to Magnus, who was sitting by the fire eating the chocolates out of a box someone had brought for Emma. He’d come over with Maryse, Max, and Rafe so they could play with Tavvy. Alec, Jace, and Clary were coming later, apparently with some sort of surprise. Isabelle and Simon had already returned to the New York Institute to keep an eye on things.
“Why aren’t people mad?” she whispered. “At Emma and Julian?”
Magnus wiggled his eyebrows at her. Magnus had very amusing eyebrows; Dru had always found him an amusing person generally, with his immense tallness and refusal to take anything seriously. “Well,” Magnus said, “without Julian’s war council and his strategy for dealing with Dearborn, it’s likely that the Cohort would have prevailed. The road the Cohort was traveling led to civil war and bloodshed. Everyone is glad it was avoided.”
“True,” said Drusilla, “but that was before they became giant angel monsters.”
“Angels are messengers.” Magnus dusted cocoa powder off his hands, looking thoughtful. “They speak in strange ways, even to you, their children. Horace and his Cohort spoke as if they were doing the angels’ will, and because of it, people feared them. On the battlefield, burning with heavenly fire, Julian and Emma proved that wasn’t the case. The angels spoke through them.”
“So basically everyone who didn’t like Horace wanted a big angel to squash the Cohort?” Dru said.
Magnus grinned. “They don’t want to say that, but believe me, it was immensely satisfying to them.”
At that moment Jace and Clary arrived with Alec and an enormous cake they’d iced themselves. Most of the strangers had already departed, and Ty helped them put it on the sideboard, where the cake box was opened to reveal that the lettering said: CONGRATULATIONS ON NOT BEING GIANTS ANYMORE!
Everyone laughed and gathered around to cut pieces of the lemon-chocolate cake. Julian and Emma leaned against each other, their shoulders touching. Since they had returned from the Basilias, it had seemed that a massive weight was off Julian’s shoulders. He seemed lighter and happier than he had since before the Dark War. Dru knew that he and Emma were no longer parabatai: the angel magic had burned it out of them somehow. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that they were probably very pleased about that, considering all the smiling and hand touching they were doing.
Mark and Cristina, on the other hand, seemed sad. They were quiet among all the bright chatter in the room. At one point Dru saw Emma take Cristina into the kitchen and hug her as if something bad had happened.
Dru didn’t know what it was, but she did notice that Kieran wasn’t there.
Ty was also quiet. Every time he passed Julian, Jules would pull him in for a hug and ruffle his hair the way he’d liked when he was little. Ty would smile, but he seemed unusually listless, uninterested even in eavesdropping on the guests’ conversations and making notes for his detective manuals the way he usually did.
Eventually he went up to Magnus, who was sitting in a deep blue chair by the fireplace holding his deep blue son on his lap and tickling him. Dru edged closer to the hearth, wondering what Ty wanted to say to the warlock.
“Where’s Kit, really?” Ty said, and Dru thought: I should have known. Jem had told them that Kit was coming to live with him and Tessa in Devon, but not why, nor why they had to leave in such a hurry. Julian and the others seemed to think Kit would visit them soon, but Dru wasn’t so sure. “I keep asking, but no one will tell me.”
Magnus looked up, his cat’s eyes hooded. “Kit’s all right. He’s with Tessa and Jem. He’s going to be living with them.”
“I know,” Ty said. His voice shook. “I know, but—can I say good-bye to him? If I could just talk to him once—”
“He’s already gone,” Magnus said. “He didn’t want to say good-bye to you. To anyone really, but I suspect it was mostly you.”
He didn’t blame Ty for what had happened. He blamed himself: He’d been too fixated on not losing Ty to tell him what he needed to hear. Everyone needed to be stopped from making bad choices sometimes, but he hadn’t stopped Ty. And he’d gotten what he deserved, really. Now that he knew he meant nothing much to Ty, how could he live in the Institute again? See him every day? Feel like an idiot constantly, feel the pity of his family, listen to them tell him he should try to make other friends, survive in the same house with Ty while Ty avoided him? There was no real question about it. I can’t face going back there and living with them. This is my chance to start again and learn what it means to be who I am.
“I’ll go with you. I’d like to live with you,” Kit said.
“Oh.” Tessa blinked. “Oh!” She grabbed his hand and squeezed it, smiling all over her kind face. “That’s lovely, Kit, that’s wonderful. Jem will be so happy too. And it will be wonderful for the baby to have company. I mean, hopefully you’ll like the baby as well.” She blushed. Kit thought it would actually be kind of nice to have a small sibling-type person in his life, but he said nothing. “I’m babbling,” Tessa said. “I’m just so excited. We’ll go tonight—get you safe and settled as fast as possible. We’ll arrange for you to have a tutor—for all the necessary protection spells to be done by the Silent Brothers—”
“That sounds good,” Kit said, a little exhausted already by the thought of everything that needed to be done. “I only have this bag—no other luggage.” It was true, and there was nothing he cared about much in the bag either, besides the Herondale dagger and the witchlight Ty had given him.
“I imagine you’d like to say good-bye to the Blackthorns before we go—”
“No,” Kit said. “I don’t want to see them.”
Tessa blinked.
“It’s better if they don’t know about all this First Heir stuff,” Kit said. “It’s safer for them. Jem can tell them I just decided L.A. wasn’t for me. They’re all so far ahead of me in training, and I should learn from the beginning if I want to be a Shadowhunter.”
Tessa nodded. Kit knew she didn’t entirely buy his excuse, but she also knew enough not to pry. It was very reassuring.
“I do have one question before we go,” Kit said, and Tessa looked at him curiously. “Will I be growing pointy ears? Maybe a tail? I’ve seen some weird-looking faeries in the Shadow Market.”
Tessa grinned. “I guess we’ll find out.”
* * *
Everyone wanted to come by the canal house and say hello to Emma and Julian now that they had left the Basilias. People Dru was familiar with as well as people she wasn’t flooded into the ground floor, bringing flowers and small gifts: new gauntlets for Emma, a gear jacket for Julian.
Some were overly bright and cheery and greeted Emma and Julian as if nothing odd had happened to them at all. Some complimented them as if they thought the whole “becoming enormous and almost dying” was part of a predetermined plan that had paid off nicely. Others were awkward—those who had been a little too close to the Cohort, Dru suspected—as if they wondered if Emma and Julian might grow huge at any moment and squash them right there in the kitchen. One kindly older lady complimented Julian on being tall and a terrible silence fell; Tavvy said, “What’s going on?” and Dru had to drag him into the sitting room.
A few others seemed to have had major life experiences. “It just came to me on the field that I should spend more time with my family,” said Trini Castel. “Moments of peace are precious moments. We’ll never get them back.”
“So true,” said Julian.
He looked as if he was trying not to laugh. Everyone else nodded thoughtfully. It was very strange—for days, Dru had been worried that Emma and Julian would be punished in some way when they woke up: either officially, by the Clave, or by the ignorant judgment of other Shadowhunters. But it didn’t seem to be happening.
She edged close to Magnus, who was sitting by the fire eating the chocolates out of a box someone had brought for Emma. He’d come over with Maryse, Max, and Rafe so they could play with Tavvy. Alec, Jace, and Clary were coming later, apparently with some sort of surprise. Isabelle and Simon had already returned to the New York Institute to keep an eye on things.
“Why aren’t people mad?” she whispered. “At Emma and Julian?”
Magnus wiggled his eyebrows at her. Magnus had very amusing eyebrows; Dru had always found him an amusing person generally, with his immense tallness and refusal to take anything seriously. “Well,” Magnus said, “without Julian’s war council and his strategy for dealing with Dearborn, it’s likely that the Cohort would have prevailed. The road the Cohort was traveling led to civil war and bloodshed. Everyone is glad it was avoided.”
“True,” said Drusilla, “but that was before they became giant angel monsters.”
“Angels are messengers.” Magnus dusted cocoa powder off his hands, looking thoughtful. “They speak in strange ways, even to you, their children. Horace and his Cohort spoke as if they were doing the angels’ will, and because of it, people feared them. On the battlefield, burning with heavenly fire, Julian and Emma proved that wasn’t the case. The angels spoke through them.”
“So basically everyone who didn’t like Horace wanted a big angel to squash the Cohort?” Dru said.
Magnus grinned. “They don’t want to say that, but believe me, it was immensely satisfying to them.”
At that moment Jace and Clary arrived with Alec and an enormous cake they’d iced themselves. Most of the strangers had already departed, and Ty helped them put it on the sideboard, where the cake box was opened to reveal that the lettering said: CONGRATULATIONS ON NOT BEING GIANTS ANYMORE!
Everyone laughed and gathered around to cut pieces of the lemon-chocolate cake. Julian and Emma leaned against each other, their shoulders touching. Since they had returned from the Basilias, it had seemed that a massive weight was off Julian’s shoulders. He seemed lighter and happier than he had since before the Dark War. Dru knew that he and Emma were no longer parabatai: the angel magic had burned it out of them somehow. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that they were probably very pleased about that, considering all the smiling and hand touching they were doing.
Mark and Cristina, on the other hand, seemed sad. They were quiet among all the bright chatter in the room. At one point Dru saw Emma take Cristina into the kitchen and hug her as if something bad had happened.
Dru didn’t know what it was, but she did notice that Kieran wasn’t there.
Ty was also quiet. Every time he passed Julian, Jules would pull him in for a hug and ruffle his hair the way he’d liked when he was little. Ty would smile, but he seemed unusually listless, uninterested even in eavesdropping on the guests’ conversations and making notes for his detective manuals the way he usually did.
Eventually he went up to Magnus, who was sitting in a deep blue chair by the fireplace holding his deep blue son on his lap and tickling him. Dru edged closer to the hearth, wondering what Ty wanted to say to the warlock.
“Where’s Kit, really?” Ty said, and Dru thought: I should have known. Jem had told them that Kit was coming to live with him and Tessa in Devon, but not why, nor why they had to leave in such a hurry. Julian and the others seemed to think Kit would visit them soon, but Dru wasn’t so sure. “I keep asking, but no one will tell me.”
Magnus looked up, his cat’s eyes hooded. “Kit’s all right. He’s with Tessa and Jem. He’s going to be living with them.”
“I know,” Ty said. His voice shook. “I know, but—can I say good-bye to him? If I could just talk to him once—”
“He’s already gone,” Magnus said. “He didn’t want to say good-bye to you. To anyone really, but I suspect it was mostly you.”
