Cordelia and Lucie exchanged looks: Did Duke Carbas know that Lilith was gone, and Belial had taken her place as ruler of Edom? If he never left this spot, perhaps he didn’t; either way, Lucie wasn’t inclined to tell him.
“You collect secrets from passing demons?” Cordelia said.
“I didn’t think demons had secrets,” Lucie mused. “I thought they’d be proud of all the evil they did.”
“Oh, they are,” said Carbas. “Which makes it a very boring job. ‘Oh, I saved a kitten from a Ravener demon, Carbas, and I’m so ashamed.’ ‘Oh, I failed to turn anyone toward the dark side last week, Carbas.’ Whine, whine, complain. But you, Nephilim, with all your morals—you will have juicy secrets.”
He popped another grape into his mouth. This one definitely screamed.
“What happens,” said Lucie, “if we try to pass through without telling you a secret?”
Carbas leered coldly. “Then you will find yourself trapped in this tunnel, and soon enough will become a member of my court.” He gestured at the bones jutting from the ground, which began to vibrate. “We’d all like that, wouldn’t we?” He chuckled. “New blood, as it were.”
Trapped in the tunnel. Lucie tried not to look worried: dying in battle was one thing. Being trapped in this dank, demon-haunted tunnel until they died was something else.
“So please,” Carbas went on, grinning wetly, “whenever you’re ready, a secret from each of you. It must be something you have told no one else, something you wish no one to know. Otherwise, it is worth nothing to me. And I will be able to tell if you are making something up. You must tell a secret from the heart,” he added, somehow making the phrase “from the heart” sound vicious. “One that means something to tell.”
“These rules seem vague,” said Cordelia. “And subjective.”
“That’s magic for you.” Carbas shrugged.
Lucie and Cordelia exchanged a look. They could try to attack Carbas, of course, but that would mean stepping into the pentagram with him, a deeply risky choice. Yet the thought of offering up her most hidden thoughts to Carbas, to snack on as he did the grapes, felt violating and cruel.
It was Cordelia who stepped forward first. “I have a secret,” she said. “It isn’t something nobody knows, but it is something Lucie doesn’t know.” She looked over at Lucie, her eyes pleading. Lucie bit her lip. “And that’s what matters, isn’t it?”
“Mmm. I’m interested,” Carbas said. “Let’s hear it.”
“I’m in love with James Herondale,” Cordelia said. “Lucie’s brother.”
“Well, of course you are,” Lucie said, before clamping her mouth shut.
Carbas rolled his eyes. “Not off to a great start.”
“No,” Cordelia said, a little desperately, “you don’t understand. I didn’t just fall in love with him when I came to London, or when we got married. I’ve been in love with him for… for years,” she went on. “Ever since he had the scalding fever.”
That long ago? The thought jolted Lucie. But…
“I never told you about it, Lucie. Every time you mentioned him, I would lie about how I felt, or make a joke. When you suggested that I might entertain romantic thoughts about James, I would act like it was the most ridiculous idea on earth. When we got engaged, I acted as if I couldn’t wait for it to be over. I didn’t want to be pitied, and I didn’t want to be just another of the silly girls who was in love with your brother while he only cared about Grace. So I lied to you.” She took a deep breath. “It’s like you said at my house that night, Lucie. I was too proud.”
But you could have told me. I would never have pitied you, Lucie thought, bewildered. She didn’t mind that Cordelia had been in love with James—but the lying, the hiding… she wished it didn’t bother her, but it did. She looked away from Cordelia—and saw Carbas on his throne, smacking his lips.
“Not bad,” he murmured. “Not terrible.” His yellowish eyes slid over to Lucie. “Now what about you?”
Lucie stepped forward, taking Cordelia’s place before the throne. She didn’t look at Daisy as she did so; if she hadn’t known this important thing about her best friend, had she ever really known her at all? Had Cordelia ever really trusted her?
She told herself to stop, that this was what Carbas wanted. Their pain. His amber demon’s eyes were already fixed on her with anticipatory delight. “I have a secret,” she said. “One nobody knows.”
“Ooh,” said Carbas.
“When Cordelia and I tried to practice our parabatai ceremony,” she said, “I couldn’t go through with it. I didn’t tell her why. I pretended as if nothing had happened, but that—that wasn’t true at all.” She glanced over her shoulder at Cordelia, who was holding Cortana so tightly her knuckles were white. “When we began to speak the words,” Lucie said, “the room filled with ghosts. Ghosts of Shadowhunters, though none I knew. I could see them everywhere, and they were staring at us. Usually I can understand the dead, but—I didn’t know what they wanted. Did they disapprove of my creating a bond to someone living? Or did they want me to do it? I thought—what if going through with it bonded you, too, to the dead?”
Cordelia had gone a sickly color. “How could you not tell me that?” she whispered. “You were going to go ahead with the ceremony, then, without warning me? What if something had happened to you during it—what if the ghosts meant harm?”
“I was going to tell you,” Lucie protested. “But then the thing with Lilith happened, and you told me that we couldn’t become parabatai—”
“Yes, because I thought I owed you the truth before we bonded ourselves together.”
Carbas moaned in pleasure. “Don’t stop,” he groaned. “This is wonderful! It’s rare I get two people telling secrets about each other. I haven’t enjoyed a revelation this much since I found out Napoleon always hid his hand inside his jacket because he kept a spare sandwich there.”
He leered again.
“Oh, ugh,” said Lucie, thoroughly revolted. “That’s enough. We’ve done what you asked—by your own rules, you have to let us leave.”
Carbas sighed and looked sadly at the flapping skull, as if seeking sympathy. “Well, if you return this way, do stop by and see old Carbas.” As he spoke, a hidden door in the far wall swung open. Through it Lucie could see the familiar bloody orange light of Edom. “But then again,” Carbas added, as Lucie and Cordelia made their way to the door, “this is Edom. Who are we trying to fool? You’ll be lucky to make it to nightfall, Nephilim. You certainly won’t be coming back here.”
31 BRIGHT VOLUMES
At the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears,
Hangs a Thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three years:
Poor Susan has passed by the spot, and has heard
In the silence of morning the song of the Bird.
’Tis a note of enchantment; what ails her? She sees
A mountain ascending, a vision of trees;