CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

REBECCA

Seamlessly, they worked together, almost like they had been training for this situation their entire lives. Most of them actually had. Isabelle lashed out with her whip as Alec began firing arrows at the speed of light, taking down demons left and right. Simon, however, needed nothing more than his bare hands.

Clary, meanwhile, was undertaking the most important part of the plan - creating a Portal. As she traced her stele on the granite, rune after rune appeared. Small fissures spiderwebbed outwards from the runes, spreading across the granite.

"Clary, for the love of the angel, HURRY!" Isabelle screamed, as she dispatched a demon with her whip. Clary began to work more feverishly, but a tentacled demon grabbed her ankle and yanked her backwards. She went down with a cry, her stele falling to the ground as she tumbled.

"Clary, get out of the way!" Rebecca yelled, grabbing one of her concealed daggers. Clary looked up, saw the dagger in Rebecca's hand, and immediately understood. She rolled out of the way as Rebecca let the dagger fly. The demon that had been holding Clary roared; the tentacle loosened its grasp, and Clary staggered up and to her feet. She hadn't been able to draw a rectangular doorway, so the entrance scrawled on the wall was blazing in a ragged circle, like the opening to a tunnel. Within the blaze, Rebecca could see the shimmer of the Portal - it rippled like silver water.

Jace hurtled by her and threw himself into it. She caught a brief glimpse of what was beyond - the blasted Accords Hall, with the statue still in the center of the room - before an Elapid demon took up all her attention. She could hear Sebastian somewhere behind her, yelling out something in a demonic language. She could make sense of a few words here and there, but nothing coherent.

As Rebecca sliced neatly, severing the Elapid in front of her in half, the Portal swelled with a sudden, incredible light and Jace hurtled back through it. Never before had he looked so much like an avenging angel; his bright hair seemed to glow as he landed lightly and raised the weapon he was holding in his hand. It was Jonathan Shadowhunter's skeptron.

As Jace raised the skeptron, the demons around them began to scuttle backward. Sebastian was leaning over the balustrade, his hands clenched on it, dead white. He was staring at Jace. "Jonathan," he said, and his voice rose and carried. "Jonathan, I forbid-"

Jace thrust the skeptron skyward, and the orb at the center burst into flame - a brilliant, contained, icy flame, more light than heat. Every demon in the room was annihilated instantly; all that was left of them were piles of ashes.

The light intensified, burning so brightly that Rebecca had to shut her eyes. When she felt it was safe to open her eyes, she did, only to find that the entryway was devoid of demons, and Sebastian was seething with rage. "No," he ground out through clenched teeth.

Jace was still standing with the skeptron in his hand; the orb had turned black and dead, like a lightbulb that had burned out. He looked up at Sebastian, his chest rising and falling fast. "You thought we didn't know you were expecting us," he said. "But we were counting on it." He took a step forward. "I know you," he said, still breathlessly. "You took me over, took control of me, forced me to do whatever you wanted, but I learned from you. You were in my head, and I remember. I remember how you think, how you plan. I remember all of it. I knew you'd underestimate us, think we didn't guess it was a trap, think we wouldn't have planned for that. You forget I know you; down to the last corner of your arrogant little mind I know you-"

"Shut up," Sebastian hissed. He pointed at them with a shaking hand. "You will pay in blood for this," he said, and then he turned and ran up the steps, vanishing so quickly that even Alec's arrow, winging after him, couldn't catch him up. It hit the curve of the staircase instead and snapped on impact with the stone, then fell to the ground in two neat pieces.

Rebecca was already stepping onto the first stair, hand on the railing, when Alec caught hold of her arm. "Wait," he said. "We need a plan."

"There's no time," she said impatiently. "You do realize that when he said 'pay in blood', he doesn't mean our blood."

Alec paled visibly, but he didn't let go. "That still doesn't mean you should go after him alone."

She sighed. She had to admit that he was right, like he usually was.

"Each staircase leads to a different level," Alec said. "We're going to have to split up. Jace, Clary and Rebecca - you take the east staircase; the rest of us will take the other."

No one protested. This was the best way to do it; Rebecca knew that Jace would never have agreed to split off from Clary, and Isabelle and Simon wouldn't leave each other's side.

"Jace," Alec said, again, and this time the word seemed to snap Jace out of his fugue state. He tossed the dead skeptron aside, let it clatter to the ground, and looked up with a nod.

The doors behind them burst open and Dark Shadowhunters in red gear began to pour into the room. Without a word, the six of them raced towards the staircase, breaking apart once they reached it.

At the top, Rebecca, Clary and Jace came to a stop, chests heaving, legs feeling like they were on fire.

"They won't be far behind us," Rebecca said. "We need to keep going."

She led the way confidently; the Dark Gard was no different to the one in Alicante, and she knew her way around it like she knew the back of her hand.

They turned into a long corridor. Halfway down it, they stopped in front of a set of metal doors. "Here's the Council Room," Rebecca whispered to the others, not sure why she was doing so. "You guys ready?"

Jace and Clary glanced at each other, then at her, and nodded.

"Well, here goes nothing." Rebecca swung open the doors and stepped inside with Clary and Jace on her heels.

The room beyond was as large as the Council room in Alicante's Gard, if not larger. However, instead of the usual row of seats, a wide bare marble floor stretched toward a dais at the end of the room. Behind the dais were two massive, separate windows. Sunset light poured through each of them, though one sunset was the color of gold, and the other was the color of blood.

In the bloody golden light Sebastian knelt in the center of the room. He was etching runes into the floor, a circle of dark connected sigils. Realizing what he was doing, Rebecca stepped forward, then lurched back as a massive demon loomed up in front of her. It looked like an enormous maggot, with a slit-like mouth that was full of jagged grey teeth. A Behemoth demon.

Before it could strike, she thrust her blade upwards, right into its center. The demon wailed - a loud, ululating sound that sent chills down her spine. Ichor gushed from the wound, covering her hand, but it didn't hurt. Not a bit. A sense of elation stole through her at this realization, and she drove the sword into its body again and again, until, finally, it collapsed to the ground with a gurgling scream.

Sebastian, meanwhile, had gotten to his feet and was standing in the center of his completed circle of runes. He began to clap slowly. "Lovely work," he said. "Really excellent demon-dispatching. Isn't she wonderful?" he added with glee.

Nobody said anything.

"You do recognize where we are, don't you?" he continued. He waved a hand at the dais behind him, and Rebecca noticed something that she hadn't noticed before - two thrones of ivory and gold, with golden steps leading up to them. Each had a curved back embossed with a single key.

"'I am he that liveth, and was dead,' " said Sebastian, " 'and behold, I am alive forevermore, and have the keys of hell and of death.' " He walked slowly over to Rebecca, enclosing her left hand in both of his. "These are the keys, made over in the shapes of thrones and given to me by the demons who rule this world, Lilith and Asmodeus." His dark eyes gazed into hers, and she could feel his gaze like cold fingers walking up her spine.

She forced herself to look away and wrenched her hand out of his grip. "Why are you showing us this?"

Sebastian chuckled slightly. He turned and began to walk towards the dais.

"I don't care if you threaten me!" she yelled after him. Her voice shook. "You've taken everything you possibly could from me! My family, my name - even my own blood!" The blood in her veins was hot and alive with fury. "So come after me again, Jonathan Morgenstern, I dare you."

Sebastian turned around to face them. His smile was cold. "Tempting. But to be honest, there are others I can go after." Seemingly on cue, a Dark Shadowhunter entered the room. There was no mistaking her - it was Amatis Herondale.

"Amatis, bring Jocelyn here."

Amatis smiled. "With pleasure," she said, and stalked out of the room, the hem of her long red coat sweeping behind her.

Jace stepped forward with an inarticulate growl - and stopped in his tracks, several feet from Sebastian. He put his hands out, but they seemed to collide with something translucent, an invisible wall.

Sebastian snorted. "As if I'd let you get near me - you, with that fire burning in you. Once was enough, thank you."

"So you know I can kill you," Jace said. "You can't hide in there forever. You'll starve."

Sebastian made a quick gesture with his fingers, and Jace flew up and back, and slammed into the wall behind them. Rebecca's breath hitched in her throat as she spun around to see him crumple to the ground, a bloody gash across the side of his head. Clary cried out and immediately ran to his side.

Sebastian hummed in delight and lowered his hand. "Don't worry," he said conversationally, and turned his gaze back to Clary. "He'll be fine. Eventually. If I don't change my mind about what to do with him. I'm sure you understand, now that you've seen what I can do."

Rebecca forced her expression to remain blank. She couldn't let him see how worried she was. For their plan to work, her acting skills would have to be put to the test. She looked up and met Clary's eyes. The red-haired girl nodded reassuringly. Taking a deep breath, Rebecca turned back to face Sebastian.

"I've always known you had power," she said slowly.

"Power," he echoed, as if it were an insult. "Is that what you call it?" He flicked his hand again, and Rebecca whirled around to see Clary crumple to the ground beside Jace.

"Here I have more than power, Rebecca. Here in this keep I can shape what is real." He had begun to pace inside the circle he had drawn, his hands looped casually behind his back, like a professor delivering a lecture. "This world is connected only by the thinnest threads to the one where we were born. The road through Faerie is one such thread. These windows are another. Step through that one"- he pointed to the window on the right - "and you will return to Idris. But it's not that simple." He regarded the stars through the window. "I came to this world because it was a place to hide. And then I began to realize. I am sure our father quoted these words to you many times" - he spoke to Jace, as if Jace could hear him - "but it is better to rule in Hell than serve in Heaven. And here I rule. I have my Dark Ones and my demons. I have my keep and citadel. And when the borders of this world are sealed, everything here will be my weapon. Rocks, dead trees, the ground itself will come to my hand and wield its power for me. And the Great Ones, the old demons, will look down on my work, and they will reward me. They will raise me up in glory, and I will rule the abysses between worlds and the spaces between all the stars."

"'And he shall rule them with a rod of iron,' " Rebecca said, remembering Jace's words, "'and I will give him the Morning Star.'"

Sebastian whirled around to face her, his eyes bright. "Yes!" he said, striding forward to stand in front of her. He gripped her arms. "You understand, don't you my darling? I thought I wanted our world, to bring it down in blood, but I want more than that. I want the legacy of the Morgenstern name."

"So... you want to be the devil? You want to rule Hell?" she said, half-bewildered and half-terrified. "Then why are you doing all this? Just let us go - you can have Hell."

"Alas," said Sebastian. "I have discovered one other thing that perhaps sets me apart from Lucifer. I do not want to rule alone." He extended his arm, an elegant gesture, and indicated the two great thrones on the dais. "One of those is for me. And the other - the other is for you."