CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

CLARY

There were six Endarkened dressed in red standing in front of the Dark Gard, and they were only just turning around in shock and surprise when Rebecca sliced with lightning speed, taking down one of them. Another fell to his knees, an arrow protruding from his neck.

A third man, dark-haired and paunchy, staggered back with a yell, an arrow in his leg; Isabelle was on him in an instant, her whip slicing across his throat. As the man went down, Jace leaped and rode his body to the ground, using the force of the fall to hurl his own body forward. His blades flashed with a scissoring motion, slicing the head off a bald man whose red gear was splotched with patches of dried blood.

The fifth one, however, was behind Jace, her blade lifted and ready to strike. Clary whipped her dagger forward and let it fly. It buried itself in the woman's forehead and she folded silently to the ground without another cry.

The last of the Endarkened began to run, stumbling uphill. Simon flashed past Clary, a movement too swift to see, and sprang like a cat. The Endarkened man went down with a gasp of terror, and Clary saw Simon rear up over him and strike like a snake. There was a sound like tearing paper.

They all looked away. After a few long moments, Simon rose from the still body and came down the hill toward them. There was blood on his shirt, and blood on his hands and face. He turned his face to the side, coughed, and spat, looking sick. "Bitter," he said. "The blood. It tastes like Sebastian's."

Rebecca was staring at the dead Endarkened with an odd expression on her face, almost something like regret. When Alec went up behind her and put his hand on her shoulder, she jumped, and turned to face him. Once again, her eyes were pitch black, devoid of anything that made them seem human. But as she turned to look at Alec, her eyes cleared, and her breaths, which were short and heavy, slowed down.

"It's getting worse, she said flatly. "We'd better hurry up - the sun's setting." Without another word, she began tugging at the robes of the dead man at her feet.

They stripped the gear from the bodies, silently and quickly. There was something sickening about the work, something that hadn't seemed quite so horrible when Simon had described the strategy but that now seemed very horrible. After a few minor adjustments to the sleeves and pants, they all managed to make the clothes fit, though Alec's were a bit too short.

After stashing the bodies out of sight behind the rocky cairn, they started their way back up the hill. Rebecca had been right, the sun was going down, bathing the realm in the colors of fire and blood. She was walking ahead of the rest of the group, with an almost hungry expression on her face.

A crowd of Endarkened milled around the Dark Gard, which was bathed in blood-red light from the setting sun. Rebecca held up her hand, bringing them to a stop.

"You'd better put your hoods up," she said to Clary and Jace. "You're too recognizable. Actually-" her eyes met everyone else's. "we'd all better put your hoods up." She turned back to look at the Gard. "Hopefully, we can just stroll in." With a funny little shrug, she set off, not checking to see if they were following.

REBECCA

Rebecca felt cold all over - battle coldness, keeping her spine straight, her breath even. They marched past one red-clad warrior - a brown-skinned man, tall and muscular. He paid no attention as they marched past, carefully keeping their faces hidden.

The massive gates were looming upon them now. It was clear that they had been subjected to years of desecration. Their surfaces were chipped and scarred, splashed here and there with ichor and what looked disturbingly like dried human blood.

Rebecca placed her hand on them and they swung open easily, causing her to step back in surprise. "He doesn't know we're coming..." she muttered, more to herself than the others. She cast a wary glance behind her and then marched in.

Past the gates was a bridge over a narrow ravine. "Don't look down, whatever you do," Rebecca said in a fierce whisper, already halfway across the bridge. Alec took up the rear, facing behind them with his bow and arrow.

The sun had almost completely dipped below the horizon when they reached the front doors. Rebecca undid the latch, and the doors opened into darkness. She could sense the others looking at her, maybe hoping for words of reassurance, but she couldn't find any. So she simply stepped forward into the darkness.

A rush of cold air blew over them as the doors slammed shut behind them. As their eyes adjusted to the darkness, they realized they were standing in an enormous entryway, the size of the inside of the Accords Hall. A massive double spiral stone staircase led upward, twisting and winding, two sets of stairs that interwove with each other but never met. Each was lined on either side by a stone balustrade, and Sebastian was leaning against one of the balustrades, smiling down at them. He wore spotless scarlet gear, and his hair shone like iron. At the sight of him, Rebecca's skin seemed to buzz, like she'd swallowed adrenaline.

He shook his head. "Rebecca, my darling," he said. "I really thought you were much smarter than this."

"Smarter than what?" she said loudly, and her voice echoed off the bare walls. "We got inside. And unless I'm blind, there's six of us, and one of you."

"So you can count," Sebastian said coolly. The smile had vanished from his face, replaced by an almost feral expression. His eyes were fixed entirely on Rebecca. The rest of them didn't seem to exist. "Fascinating. But exactly how dumb do you think I am? Never mind that obviously I found out from the Queen that you'd come here, but since you've arrived, you've set an enormous fire, taken a ride on a 'flying death centipede', if I recall correctly - I mean, you've done everything other than put up an enormous flashing arrow pointing directly to your location." He sighed delicately. "I've always known most of you were terribly stupid. Even Jace, well, you're pretty but not too bright, are you? Maybe if Valentine had had a few more years with you - but no, probably not even then. The Herondales have always been a family more prized for their jawlines than their intelligence. As for the Lightwoods, the less said the better. Generations of idiots-"

"You forgot me," Simon said.

Sebastian dragged his gaze over to Simon, as if he were distasteful. "You do keep turning up like a bad penny," he said. "Tedious little vampire. I killed the one who made you, did you know that? I thought vampires were supposed to feel that sort of thing, but you seem indifferent. Terribly callous."

Rebecca felt Simon stiffen beside her, remembered him in the cave, doubling over as if he were in pain, saying he felt as if someone had stuck a knife in his chest.

"Raphael," Simon whispered; beside him Alec had paled markedly.

"What about the others?" he demanded in a rough voice. "Magnus - Luke-"

"Our mother," Clary said. "Surely even you wouldn't hurt her."

Sebastian's smirk turned brittle.

"She's not my mother," he said, and then shrugged with a sort of exaggerated exasperation. "But she is alive. As for the warlock and the werewolf, I couldn't say. I haven't checked on them in a while. The warlock wasn't looking so well the last time I saw him," he added. "I don't think this dimension's been good for him. He might be dead by now. But you really can't expect me to have foreseen that."

Alec lifted his bow in a single swift motion. "Foresee this," he said, but before he could let it fly, Rebecca caught his arm, throwing off his aim. The arrow landed some three feet to the left of Sebastian.

Alec lowered his bow, looking incredulously at his sister. "Rebecca, what the hell?"

Rebecca was staring at her hand as if she'd never seen it before. Her eyes were again demon-black, but when she looked up to meet everyone else's gaze, her expression was one of astonishment.

"I don't know... I didn't... why did I do that?"

"It's in your blood now, my beautiful one," Sebastian said, looking at her with unconcealed pride. There was something else in there too - a sort of feral longing. "Your instinct will always be to protect me. We're bound by more than our love. We're bound by blood. And together, we will rule Edom for all eternity!"

At the word eternity, the double doors at both ends of the entryway flew open, and demons poured in. Rebecca had expected it, had braced herself, but there was no real bracing oneself for something like this. She had seen hundreds of demons, killed hordes of them, and yet, as the flood poured in from both sides - spider-creatures with fat, poisonous bodies; skinless humanoid monsters dripping blood; things with talons and teeth and claws, massive praying mantises with jaws that dropped open as if unhinged - her skin felt as if it wanted to crawl away from her body. She forced herself to stay still and looked up at the boy she had thought she loved.

He met her gaze with his own dark one, and she remembered the boy in her vision, the one with bright green eyes and a smile that made her heart sing. She saw a furrow appear between his eyes.

He raised his hand; snapped his fingers. "Stop," he said. The demons froze, midmotion, on either side of Rebecca and the others.

"Rebecca," Sebastian said. "Don't hurt her. Bring her to me here. Kill the others." He narrowed his eyes at Jace. "If you can."

Then the demons surged forward.