“Does it hurt?” she whispered, holding tightly to his shirtfront.
“Nothing hurts,” he assured her, pulling her close for a kiss so yearning, so hot with desire, that she felt it down to her toes.
It was such a relief to feel, to lose herself in sensation, to let the weight of memory drop from her shoulders. She reached to touch his face, a shadow in the darkness, just as the lights went on.
She blinked for a moment, her eyes adjusting to the new illumination. Someone had switched on the Tiffany lamp in the reading corner. Someone who was sitting in the plush velvet armchair beneath the lamp, someone in a black traveling suit, pale face a smudge of white between his shirt and his crow-black hair. Someone with eyes the color of lamplight and fire.
James.
7 BITTER FRUIT
Am I mad, that I should cherish that which bears but bitter fruit?
I will pluck it from my bosom, tho’ my heart be at the root.
—Alfred, Lord Tennyson, “Locksley Hall”
Thomas had never masterminded a secret mission before. Usually it was James who planned the secret missions （at least, the important ones; Matthew often planned secret missions that were entirely frivolous）。 It was a mixed experience, he decided as he and Alastair trotted down the steps outside the Institute doors. On the one hand, he felt guilty that he had misled his kind aunt Tessa as to the reason for their visit. On the other hand, it was satisfying to have a secret, especially a secret shared with Alastair.
Especially, Thomas thought, a secret that was not weighted with emotion, with longing and jealousy and family intrigues. Alastair seemed to feel that as well; while he was not exactly buoyant, he was quiet, without his usual snappishness. That snappishness, Thomas had always thought, came reflexively to Alastair, as though it were necessary to punctuate anything good with some bad temper, to maintain balance.
Alastair stopped at the bottom of the Institute steps and stuffed his hands in his pockets. “It’s a good hiding place, Lightwood,” he said, without the gruff tone that he normally used to disguise being in good spirits. “I would never have thought of it.”
They were both bundled against the cold, Thomas in a tweed overcoat given to him years ago by Barbara, and Alastair in a fitted dark blue paletot that showed off the lines of his shoulders. Knotted around his neck was a dark green scarf. Due to the winter and the vanishing English sun, Alastair’s skin was a few shades lighter than usual, which made his eyelashes look even darker. They framed his black eyes like the petals of a flower.
Petals of a flower? SHUT UP, THOMAS.
Thomas looked away. “So what happens if demons come looking for it now? You tell them you don’t have it and they go away?”
Alastair chuckled. “I think they can sense where it is, sense its presence somehow. If they keep turning up at my house and don’t sense it, they’ll stop. That’s my theory, anyway. Which is good,” he added, “because the last thing my mother needs right now is demons frolicking in her herbaceous borders.”
Thomas could also hear the genuine current of worry in Alastair’s voice, under the easy dismissiveness. Sona Carstairs was pregnant, due to have her child very soon. It had been a difficult pregnancy, not helped by the death of Alastair’s father only a few weeks past.
“If there’s anything else I can do to help,” Thomas said, “do please tell me. I like to be of use.” And at the moment, there’s no one to be of use to besides Christopher, who considers me another lab implement.
Alastair frowned at him. “That coat is huge on you,” he said. “Your neck must be absolutely freezing.”
To Thomas’s surprise, Alastair drew off his own scarf and looped it around Thomas’s neck. “Here,” he said. “Borrow this. You can give it back to me next time I see you.”
Thomas smiled without being able to help it. He knew this was Alastair’s way of saying thank you. The scarf smelled of Alastair, of expensive triple-milled soap. Alastair, who was still holding the ends of the scarf, and looking Thomas directly in the eyes, his gaze unwavering.
A light flurry of snow drifted around them. It caught in Alastair’s hair, his lashes. His eyes were so black that the pupils almost lost themselves in the soft darkness of the irises. He smiled a little, a smile that made desire beat through Thomas’s blood like a pulse. He wanted to pull Alastair against him, right here in front of the Institute, and wind his hands into the clouds of Alastair’s dark hair. He wanted to kiss Alastair’s upturned mouth, wanted to explore the shape of it with his own, those little curls at the corners of Alastair’s lips, like inverted commas.
But there was Charles. Thomas still had no idea what was going on between Alastair and Charles; hadn’t Alastair been visiting Charles just this past day? He hesitated, and Alastair—sensitive as always to the slightest hint of rejection—dropped his hand, catching his lower lip between his teeth.
“Alastair,” Thomas said, feeling hot and cold and vaguely sick all at once, “I have to know, if—”
A cracking noise split the air. Thomas and Alastair leaped apart, reaching for their weapons, just as a Portal began to open in the center of the courtyard—a massive one, much larger than the usual. Thomas glanced in Alastair’s direction and noted that Alastair had dropped into a fighting stance, a short spear held out before him. Thomas knew they were both thinking the same thing: the last time something had appeared suddenly in the Institute courtyard, it had been a tentacled Prince of Hell.
But there was no sudden rush of seawater, no howl of demons. Instead Thomas heard the stamping hooves of horses, a shout of warning, and the Institute carriage came crashing through the Portal, barely remaining on all four of its wheels as it came. Balios and Xanthos looked very pleased with themselves as the carriage spun in midair and landed, with a jarring thud, at the foot of the steps. Magnus Bane was in the driver’s seat, wearing a dramatic white opera scarf and holding the reins in his right hand. He looked even more pleased with himself than the horses.
“I wondered if it was possible to ride a carriage through a Portal,” he said, jumping down from the seat. “As it turns out, it is. Delightful.”
The carriage doors opened, and rather unsteadily, Will, Lucie, and a boy Thomas didn’t know clambered out. Lucie waved at Thomas before leaning against the side of the carriage; she was faintly green about the gills.
Will went around the carriage to unstrap the luggage, while the unfamiliar boy—tall and slender, with straight black hair and a pretty face—put a hand on Lucie’s shoulder. Which was surprising—it was an intimate gesture, one that would be considered impolite unless the boy and girl in question were close friends or relatives, or had an understanding between them. It seemed, however, unlikely that Lucie could have an understanding with someone Thomas had never seen before. He rather bristled at the thought, in an older-brother way—James didn’t seem to be here, so someone had to do the bristling for him.
“I told you it would work!” Will cried in Magnus’s direction. Magnus was busy magicking the unfastened baggage to the top of the steps, blue sparks darting like fireflies from his gloved fingertips. “We should have done that on the way out!”