The Midnight Heir Read online

  James seemed amused by the question. He smiled, and as he smiled, his waving black locks blended with the night, and the glow of his skin and his eyes grew as distant as the light of the stars until they became so pale, they diffused. He was nothing but a shadow among shadows again. He was an infuriating Cheshire cat of a boy, nothing left of him but the impression of his smile.

  “My father was cursed,” James said from the darkness. “Whereas I? I’m damned.”

  The London Institute was exactly as Magnus remembered it, tall and white and imposing, its tower cutting a white line against the dark sky. Shadowhunter Institutes were built as monuments to withstand the ravages of demons and time. When the doors opened, Magnus beheld again the massive stone entryway and the two flights of stairs.

  A woman with wildly curling red hair, whom Magnus was sure he should remember but didn’t, answered the door, her face creased with sleep and crossness. “What d’you want, warlock?” she demanded.

  Magnus shifted the burden in his arms. The boy was tall, and Magnus had had a long night besides. Annoyance made his tone rather sharp as he answered:

  “I want you to go tell Will Herondale that I have brought his whelp home.”

  The woman’s eyes widened. She gave an impressed sort of whistle and vanished abruptly. A handful of moments later Magnus saw a white figure come softly down one of the staircases.

  Tessa was like the Institute: hardly changed at all. She had the same smooth youthful face that she had worn twenty-five years before. Magnus thought she must have stopped aging no more than three or four years after he had last seen her. Her hair was in a long brown plait, hanging over one shoulder, and she was holding a witchlight in one hand and had a small sphere of light shining in her palm in the other.

  “Been taking magic lessons, have we, Tessa?” Magnus asked.

  “Magnus!” Tessa exclaimed, and her grave face lit with a welcoming smile that sent a pang of sweetness through Magnus. “But they said— Oh, no. Oh, where did you find Jamie?”

  She reached the bottom of the steps, went over to Magnus, and cradled the boy’s damp head in her hand in an almost absentminded gesture of affection. In that gesture Magnus saw how she had changed, saw the ingrained habit of motherhood, love for someone she had created and whom she cherished.

  No other warlock would ever have a child of their own blood. Only Tessa could have that experience.

  Magnus turned his head away from Tessa at the sound of a new footfall on the stairs.

  The memory of Will the boy was so fresh that it was something of a shock to see Will himself now, older, broader of shoulder, but still with the same tousled black hair and laughing blue eyes. He looked just as handsome as he had ever been—more so perhaps, since he seemed so much happier. Magnus saw more marks of laughter than of time on his face, and found himself smiling. It was true what Will had said, he realized. They were friends.

  Recognition crossed Will’s face, and with it pleasure, but almost instantly he saw the burden Magnus carried, and worry erased all else.

  “Magnus,” he said. “What on earth happened to James?”

  “What happened?” Magnus asked musingly. “Well, let me see. He stole a bicycle and rode it, not using his hands at any point, through Trafalgar Square. He attempted to climb Nelson’s Column and fight with Nelson. Then I lost him for a brief period of time, and by the time I caught up with him, he had wandered into Hyde Park, waded into the Serpentine, spread his arms wide, and was shouting, ‘Ducks, embrace me as your king!’”

  “Dear God,” said Will. “He must have been vilely drunk. Tessa, I can bear it no longer. He is taking awful risks with his life and rejecting all the principles I hold most dear. If he continues making an exhibition of himself throughout London, he will be called to Idris and kept there away from the mundanes. Does he not realize that?”

  Magnus shrugged. “He also made inappropriate amorous advances to a startled grandmotherly sort selling flowers, an Irish wolfhound, an innocent hat stand in a dwelling he broke into, and myself. I will add that I do not believe his admiration of my person, dazzling though I am, to be sincere. He told me I was a beautiful, sparkling lady. Then he abruptly collapsed, naturally in the path of an oncoming train from Dover, and I decided it was well past time to take him home and place him in the bosom of his family. If you had rather I put him in an orphanage, I fully understand.”

  Will was shaking his head, shadows in his blue eyes now. “Bridget,” he shouted, and Magnus thought, Oh, yes, that was the maid’s name. “Call for the Silent Brothers,” Will finished.

  “You mean call for Jem,” Tessa said, dropping her voice, and she and Will shared a look—what Magnus could describe only as a married look, the look of two people who understood each other completely and yet found each other adorable all the same.

  It was quite sickening.

  He cleared his throat. “Still a Silent Brother, then, is he?”

  Will gave Magnus a withering look. “It does tend to be a permanent state. Here, give me my son.”

  Magnus let Will take James from his arms, which were left lighter if more damp, and Magnus followed Will’s and Tessa’s lead up the stairs. Inside the Institute it was clear they had been redecorating. Charlotte’s dark drawing room now held several comfortable-looking sofas, and the walls were covered in light damask. Tall shelves were lined with books, volumes with the gilt rubbed off their spines and, Magnus was sure, the pages much thumbed. It appeared both Tessa and Will remained great readers.

  Will deposited James onto one of the sofas. Tessa rushed to find a blanket as Magnus turned toward the door, only to find his hand caught in Will’s grasp.

  “It was very good of you to bring Jamie home,” Will said. “But you were always so good to me and mine. I was little more than a boy then, and not as grateful or as gracious as I should have been.”

  “You were well enough, Will,” said Magnus. “And I see you have grown to be better. Also, you are not bald, and neither have you grown fat. All that dashing about and fighting evil you people do is at least useful for keeping a trim figure in middle age.”

  Will laughed. “It’s very good to see you, too.” He hesitated. “About Jamie . . .”

  Magnus tensed. He had not wanted to distress Will and Tessa too much. He had not told them that James had fallen when he was in the Serpentine, and made very little effort to rescue himself from drowning. He had not seemed to want to be taken from the cold depths of the water: had fought Magnus as he dragged him out, then laid his pale cheek against the dank earth of the riverbank and hid his face in his arms.

  For a moment Magnus had thought he was crying, but as he stooped down to check on the boy, he found he was barely conscious. With his cruel golden eyes closed, he once again reminded Magnus of the lost boy Will had been. Magnus touched his damp hair gently and said “James,” in as kind a voice as he could.

  The boy’s pale hands were splayed against the dark earth. The glimmer of the Herondale ring shone against his skin, and the edge of something metallic shone under his sleeve as well. His eyes were shut, the black lashes ink-dark crescents against the lines of his cheekbones. Sparkling drops of water were caught in the curling ends of those lashes, which made him look unhappy in a way he did not when awake.

  “Grace,” James had whispered in his sleep, and was silent.

  Magnus had not been angry: he had found himself wishing for a benevolent grace many times himself. He bent and gathered the boy up in his arms. His head lolled against Magnus’ shoulder. In sleep James had looked peaceful and innocent, and wholly human.

  “This just isn’t like him,” Will was saying now as Tessa drew a blanket up over the boy, tucking him in firmly.

  Magnus raised an eyebrow. “He’s your son.”

  “What are you trying to imply?” Will demanded, and for a moment Magnus saw his eyes flash, and saw the boy with messy black hair and glaring blue eyes standing in his drawing room, furious at the whole world and at no part of it
more than himself.

  “It isn’t like him,” Tessa agreed. “He’s always been so quiet, so studious. Lucie was the impetuous one, but they are both kind, good-hearted children. At parties Jamie could most often be found curled up in a corner with his Latin, or laughing at a private joke with his parabatai. He always kept Matthew out of trouble as well as himself. He was the only one who could make that indolent boy attend to his studies,” she remarked, with a slight smile that betokened she was fond of her son’s parabatai, no matter what his faults. “Now he is out at all hours, doing the most disgraceful things, and he will not listen to reason. He will not listen to anybody. I understand what you mean about Will, but Will was lonely and wretched in the days when he behaved badly. James has been wrapped in love all his life.”

  “Betrayed!” Will muttered. “Cruelly maligned by my friend and now by my own cherished wife, scorned, my name blackened—”

  “I see you are still fond of histrionics, Will,” said Magnus. “As well as still handsome.”

  They had grown up. Neither of them looked startled at all. Tessa raised her eyebrows, and Magnus saw something of her son in her then. They both had the same expressive, arched brows, giving their faces a look of both inquiry and amusement, though in James’s face the amusement was bitter.

  “Do stop flirting with my husband,” said Tessa.

  “I shall not,” Magnus declared, “but I will pause briefly so that I may catch up on your news. I have not heard from you since you sent word the baby had arrived and both he and his lovely mother were thriving.”

  Will looked surprised. “But we sent you several letters in care of the Morgensterns, who were going to visit the Whitelaws at the New York Institute. It was you who proved to be a shocking correspondent.”

  “Ah,” said Magnus. He himself was not even slightly surprised. This was typical behavior from Shadowhunters. “The Morgensterns must have forgotten to deliver them. How careless.”

  Tessa, he saw, did not look too surprised either. She was both warlock and Shadowhunter, and yet not quite either. The Shadowhunters believed that Shadowhunter blood trumped all else, but Magnus could well believe that many of the Nephilim might be unkind to a woman who could do magic and whom the years did not touch.

  He doubted any of them dared be unkind in front of Will, though.

  “We will be more careful about whom we entrust with our letters in future,” Tessa said decisively. “We have been out of touch for far too long. How fortunate that you are here in London, both for us and for Jamie. What brings you here, business or pleasure?”

  “I wish it were the business of pleasure,” Magnus told her. “But no, it is very dull. A Shadowhunter I believe you know sent for me—Tatiana Blackthorn? The lady used to be a Lightwood, did she not?” Magnus turned to Will. “And your sister Cecily married her brother. Gilbert. Gaston. I have a shocking memory for Lightwoods.”

  “I begged Cecily not to throw herself away on a Lightworm,” Will muttered.

  “Will!” said Tessa. “Cecily and Gabriel are very happy together.”

  Will threw himself dramatically into an armchair, touching his son’s wrist as he passed by, with a light, careful caress that spoke volumes.

  “At least you must admit, Tess, that Tatiana is as mad as a mouse trapped in a teapot. She refuses to speak to any of us, and that includes her brothers, because she says we had a hand in her father’s death. Actually, she says we pitilessly slew him. Everybody tries to point out that at the time of the pitiless slaying her father was a giant worm who had eaten her husband and followed up his meal with a palate-cleansing servant sorbet, but she insists on lurking about the manor house and sulking with all the curtains drawn.”

  “She has lost a great deal. She lost her child,” Tessa said. She stroked back her son’s hair, her face troubled. Will looked to James and fell silent.

  “Mrs. Blackthorn has come from Idris to her family manor in England specifically so I might visit her, and she sent me a message through the usual Downworlder channels promising me a princely sum if I would come and cast a few spells to increase the attractions of her young ward,” Magnus said, attempting to strike a lighter note. “I gather she wishes to marry her off.”

  Tatiana would not be the first Shadowhunter to seek a warlock’s spells to make her life easier and more pleasant. She was, however, the Shadowhunter offering the best price.

  “Did she?” Will asked. “The poor girl must look like a toad in a bonnet.”

  Tessa laughed and stifled the laugh against her hand, and Will grinned, looking pleased with himself, as he always had when he’d managed to amuse Tessa.

  “I suppose I should not be casting aspersions on anybody else’s children, since my son is all about in his wits. He shoots things, you know. He made quite a scene at the Ascot Derby Day when he spotted an unfortunate woman wearing a hat he thought had too much wax fruit on it.”

  “I did know that he shoots things,” Magnus said tactfully. “Yes.”

  Will sighed. “The Angel grant me patience so I do not strangle him, and wisdom so I can talk some sense into his great fat head.”

  “I do wonder where he gets it from,” said Magnus pointedly.

  “It is not the same,” said Tessa. “When Will was Jamie’s age, he tried to drive everyone he loved away. Jamie is as loving as ever to us, to Lucie, to his parabatai. It is himself he wishes to destroy.”

  “And yet there is no reason for it,” Will said, striking the arm of his chair with his clenched fist. “I know my son, and he would not behave this way unless he felt he had no other choice. Unless he was trying to achieve a goal, or punish himself in some way, because he felt he had done some wrong—”

  You called for me? I am here.

  Magnus looked up to see Brother Zachariah standing in the doorway. He was a slender outline, the hood of his robe down, baring his face. The Silent Brothers rarely bared their faces, knowing how most Shadowhunters reacted to the scars and disfigurement of their skin. It was a sign of trust that Jem showed himself to Will and Tessa in this way.

  Jem was still Jem—like Tessa, he had not aged. The Silent Brothers were not immortal but aged incredibly slowly. The powerful runes that gave them knowledge and allowed them to speak with their minds also slowed their bodies’ aging, turning the Brothers to living statues. Jem’s hands were pale and slender under the cuffs of his robe, still musician’s hands after all this time. His face seemed carved out of marble, his eyes shuttered crescents, the dark runes of the Brothers standing out on his high cheekbones. His hair waved around his temples, darkness shot with silver.

  A great sadness welled up in Magnus at the sight of him. It was human to age and die, and Jem stood outside that humanity now, outside the light that burned so brightly and so briefly. It was cold outside that light and fire. No one had greater cause to know that cold than Magnus did.

  On seeing Magnus, Jem inclined his head. Magnus Bane. I did not know you would be here.

  “I—” Magnus began, but Will was already on his feet, striding across the room to Jem. He had lit up at the sight of him, and Magnus could feel Jem’s attention move from himself to Will, and catch there. Those two boys had been so different, yet at times they had seemed so wholly one that it was strange for Magnus to see Will changed as all humans changed, while Jem was set apart, to see that both had gone somewhere the other could not follow. He imagined it must be even stranger for them.

  And yet. There was still about them what had always reminded Magnus of an old legend he’d heard of the red thread of fate: that an invisible scarlet thread bound certain people, and however tangled it became, it could not and would not break.

  The Silent Brothers moved the way one imagined a statue would move if it could. Jem had moved the same way coming in, but as Will neared him, Jem took a step toward his former parabatai, and the step was swift, eager, and human, as if being close to the people whom he loved made him feel made of flesh and racing blood once more.

  “Y
ou’re here,” said Will, and implicit in the words was the sense that Will’s contentment was complete. Now Jem was there, all was right with the world.

  “I knew you would come,” said Tessa, rising from her son’s side to go after her husband, toward Jem. Magnus saw Brother Zachariah’s face glow at the sound of her voice, runes and pallor no longer mattering. He was a boy again for an instant, his life just beginning, his heart full of hope and love.

  How they loved each another, these three, how they had suffered for each another, and yet how much joy they clearly took from simply being in the same room. Magnus had loved before, many times, but he did not ever recall feeling the peace that radiated out from these three only from being in the others’ presence. He had craved peace sometimes, like a man wandering for centuries in the desert never seeing water and having to live with the want of it.

  Tessa, Will, and their lost Jem stood together in a tight knot. Magnus knew that for a few moments nothing existed in the world but the three of them.

  He looked at the sofa where James Herondale lay, and saw that he was awake, his gold eyes like watchful flames teaching the candles to burn brightly. James was the young one, the boy with his whole life ahead of him, but there was no hope or joy in his face. Tessa, Will, and Jem looked natural being together, but even in this room with those who loved him better than life, James looked utterly alone. There was something desperate and desolate about his face. He tried to lean up on one elbow, and collapsed back against the cushions of the sofa, his black head tipped back as if it were too heavy for him to bear.

  Tessa, Will, and Jem were murmuring together, Will’s hand on Jem’s arm. Magnus had never seen anyone touch a Silent Brother like that, in simple friendship. It made him ache inside, and he saw that hollow ache reflected on the face of the boy on the sofa.

  Obeying an impetuous impulse, Magnus crossed the room and knelt down by the couch, close to Will’s son, who looked at him with tired golden eyes. “You see them,” James said. “The way they all love one another. I used to think everyone loved that way. The way it is in fairy tales. I used to think that love was giving and generous and good.”