Queen of Air and Darkness
Page 8

“Sure,” said Julian, amazed he sounded so coherent. “Thanks for letting me know.”
Mark gave him a long look. “You were very young when we lost Eleanor, your mother,” he said. “She told me once there is a clock in the hearts of parents. Most of the time it is silent, but you can hear it ticking when your child is not with you and you do not know where they are, or when they are awake in the night and wanting you. It will tick until you are with them again.”
“Tavvy isn’t my child,” said Julian. “I’m not a parent.”
Mark touched his brother’s cheek. It was almost more a faerie touch than a human one, though Mark’s hand felt warm and calloused and real. Actually, it didn’t feel like a touch at all, Julian thought. It felt like a blessing. “You know you are,” Mark said. “I must ask your forgiveness, Julian. I told Helen of your sacrifice.”
“My—sacrifice?” Julian’s mind was a blank.
“The years you ran the Institute in secret,” said Mark. “How you have taken care of the children. The way they look to you, and how you have loved them. I know it was a secret, but I thought she should know it.”
“That’s fine,” Julian said. It didn’t matter. Nothing did. “Was she angry?”
Mark looked surprised. “She said she felt such pride in you that it broke her heart.”
It was like a tiny point of light, breaking through the darkness. “She—did?”
Mark seemed about to reply when a second hot dart of pain went through Julian’s shoulder. He knew exactly the location of that twinge. His heartbeat sped up; he said something to Mark about seeing him later, or at least he thought he did, before going into his bedroom and bolting the door. He was in the bathroom in seconds, turning up the witchlight’s brilliance as he gazed into the mirror.
He drew aside the collar of his shirt to get a better look—and stared.
There was his parabatai rune. It was stark against his skin—but no longer black. Within the thickly drawn lines he saw what looked like red and glowing flecks, as if the rune had begun to burn from the inside out.
He grabbed the rim of the sink as a wave of dizziness passed over him. He’d been forcing himself not to think about what Robert’s death meant, about their broken plans for exile. About the curse that would come on any parabatai who fell in love. A curse of power and destruction. He had been thinking only of how much he desperately needed Emma, and not at all of the reasons that he couldn’t have her, which remained unchanged.
They had forgotten, reaching for each other in the abyss of grief, as they had always reached for each other all their lives. But it couldn’t happen, Julian told himself, biting down hard on his lip, tasting his own blood. There could be no more destruction.
It had begun to rain outside. He could hear the soft patter on the roof of the house. He bent down and tore a strip of material from the shirt he’d worn at the Council meeting. It was stiff and dark with his sister’s dried blood.
He tied it around his right wrist. It would stay there until he had vengeance. Until there was justice for Livvy. Until all this bloody mess was cleared up. Until everyone he loved was safe.
He went back out into the bedroom and began to hunt for clean clothes and shoes. He knew exactly where he needed to go.
* * *
Julian ran through the empty streets of Idris. Warm summer rain plastered his hair to his forehead and soaked his shirt and jacket.
His heart was pounding: He missed Emma already, regretted leaving her. And yet he couldn’t stop running, as if he could outrun the pain of Livvy’s death. It was almost a surprise that he could grieve his sister and love Emma at the same time and feel both, neither diminishing the other: Livvy had loved Emma too.
He could imagine how thrilled Livvy would have been to know he and Emma were together; if it were possible for them to get married, Livvy would have been wild with delight at the idea of helping plan a wedding. The thought was like a stabbing blow to the midsection, the twist of a blade in his guts.
Rain was splashing down into the canals, turning the world to mist and water. The Inquisitor’s house loomed up out of the fog like a shadow, and Julian ran up the front steps with such force that he nearly crashed into the front door. He knocked and Magnus opened it, looking pinched and unusually pale. He wore a black T-shirt and jeans with a blue silk robe thrown over them. His hands were bare of their usual rings.
When he saw Julian, he sagged a little against the doorframe. He didn’t move or speak, just stared, as if he were looking not at Julian but at something or someone else.
“Magnus,” Julian said, a little alarmed. He recalled that Magnus wasn’t well. He’d nearly forgotten it. Magnus had always seemed the same: eternal, immutable, invulnerable. “I—”
“I’m here on my own account,” Magnus said, in a low and distant voice. “I need your help. There is absolutely no one else that I can ask.”
“That’s not what I . . .” Julian pushed sopping-wet hair out of his eyes, his voice trailing off in realization. “You’re remembering someone.”
Magnus seemed to shake himself a little, like a dog emerging from the sea. “Another night, a different boy with blue eyes. Wet weather in London, but when was it anything else?”
Julian didn’t press it. “Well, you’re right. I do need your help. And there isn’t anyone else I can ask.”
Magnus sighed. “Come in, then. But be quiet. Everyone’s asleep, and that’s an achievement, considering.”
Of course, Julian thought, following Magnus into a central drawing room. This was also a house of grief.
The interior of the house was grand in its scope, with high ceilings and furniture that looked heavy and expensive. Robert seemed to have added little in terms of personality and decoration. There were no family pictures, and little art on the wall besides generic landscapes.
“I haven’t seen Alec cry in a long time,” Magnus said, sinking onto the sofa and staring into the middle distance. Julian stood where he was, dripping onto the carpet. “Or Isabelle. I understand what it’s like to have a father who’s a bastard. He’s still your bastard. And he did love them, and tried to make amends. Which is more than you can say for mine.” He flicked a glance at Julian. “I hope you don’t mind if I don’t use a drying spell on you. I’m trying to conserve energy. There’s a blanket on that chair.”
Julian ignored the blanket and the chair. “I shouldn’t be here,” he said.
Magnus’s gaze dropped to the bloody cloth tied around Julian’s wrist. His expression softened. “It’s all right,” he said. “For the first time in a long time, I’m feeling despair. It makes me lash out. My Alec lost his father, and the Clave has lost a decent Inquisitor. But you, you lost your hope of salvation. Don’t think I don’t understand that.”
“My rune started to burn,” Julian said. “Tonight. As if it had been drawn on my skin with fire.”
Magnus hunched forward and rubbed wearily at his face. Lines of pain and tiredness were etched beside his mouth. His eyes looked sunken. “I wish I knew more about it,” he said. “What destruction this will bring to you, to Emma. To others.” He paused. “I should be kinder to you. You’ve lost a child.”
“I thought it would wipe everything else out,” Julian said, his voice scraped raw. “I thought there wouldn’t be anything else in my heart but agony, but there’s room in there for me to be terrified for Ty, and panicked about Dru, and there’s room for more hate than I ever thought anyone could feel.” The pain in his parabatai rune flared, and he felt his legs give out.
He staggered and went down on his knees in front of Magnus. Magnus didn’t seem surprised that he was kneeling. He only looked down at Julian with a quiet, rarefied patience, like a priest hearing a confession.
“What hurts more,” Magnus asked, “the love or the hate?”
“I don’t know,” Julian said. He dug wet fingers into the carpet on either side of his knees. He felt as if he were having a hard time catching his breath. “I still love Emma more than I ever thought was possible. I love her more every day, and more every time I try to stop. I love her like I’m being ripped in half. And I want to cut the throats of everyone in the Cohort.”