Lady Midnight (The Dark Artifices #1)(15)

She leaned forward, hands on her bent knees, trying to catch her breath. The beach was nearly deserted except for a few mundane couples finishing their romantic sunset walks, heading back up to the cars they’d left parked along the highway.

She wondered how many miles she’d run up and down this stretch of beach in the years she’d lived in the Institute. Five miles a day, every day. And that was after three hours at least in the training room. Half the scars Emma had on her body she’d put there herself, teaching herself to fall from the highest rafters, training herself to fight through pain by practicing barefoot—on broken glass.

The most brutal scar she had was on her forearm, and she’d given herself that, too, in a sense. It had come from Cortana, the day her parents had died. Julian had placed the blade in her arms, and she’d cradled it through the blood and the pain, weeping as it cut her skin. It had left a long white line along her arm, one that sometimes made her feel shy about wearing sleeveless dresses or tank tops. She wondered if even other Shadowhunters would stare at the scar, wonder where it came from.

Though Julian never stared.

She straightened up. From the waterline, she could see the Institute, all glass and stone, up on the hill above the beach. She could see the bump of Arthur’s attic, even the dark window of her own bedroom. She’d slept restlessly there today, dreaming about the dead mundane man, the marks on his body, the marks on her parents. She’d tried to conjure up a vision of what she’d do when she found out who’d killed them. How any amount of physical pain she could inflict could ever even begin to make up for what she’d lost.

Julian had been in the dream too. She didn’t know what exactly she’d dreamed, but she’d woken up with a clear picture of him in her mind—tall, slender Jules, with his dark brown curls and startling blue-green eyes. His dark lashes and pale skin, the way he bit his nails when he was under stress, his confident handling of weapons and even more confident handling of brushes and paints.

Julian, who would be home tomorrow. Julian would understand exactly what she was feeling—how long she’d waited for a clue about her parents. How now that she’d found one, the world suddenly seemed full of a terrifyingly imminent possibility. She remembered what Jem, the ex–Silent Brother who’d helped preside over her parabatai ceremony, had said about what Julian was to her, that there was an expression for it in his native Chinese, zhi yin. “The one who understands your music.”

Emma couldn’t play a note on any instrument, but Julian understood her music. Even the music of revenge.

Dark clouds were rolling in from the ocean. It was about to rain. Trying to put Jules out of her mind, Emma started to run again, darting up the dirt road toward the Institute. Nearing the building, she slowed, staring. There was a man coming down the steps. He was tall and narrow, dressed in a long coat the color of crow feathers. His hair was short and graying. He usually dressed in black; she suspected that was where his last name came from. He wasn’t a warlock, Johnny Rook, even if he had a name like one. He was something else.

He saw her and his eyes widened. She broke into a sprint, cutting him off before he could dart around the side of the house, away from her.

She skidded to a stop in front of him, blocking his way. “What are you doing here?”

His odd eyes darted around, seeking an escape route. “Nothing. Stopping by.”

“Did you say anything about me coming to the Shadow Market to Diana? Because if you did—”

He drew himself up. There was something odd about his face, as well as his eyes; it had an almost ravaged look, as if something awful had happened to him when he was young, something that had cut lines like knife scars into his skin. “You’re not the head of the Institute, Emma Carstairs,” he said. “The information I gave you was good.”

“You said you’d stay quiet!”

“Emma.” Emma’s name, spoken firmly and with precision. Emma turned with slow dread to see Diana watching her from the top of the steps, the evening wind blowing her curly hair. She was wearing another long, elegant dress that made her look tall and imposing. She also looked absolutely furious.

“I guess you got my texts,” Emma said. Diana didn’t react.

“Leave Mr. Rook alone. We need to talk. I want to see you in my office in precisely ten minutes,” she said.

Diana turned and went back into the Institute. Emma shot Rook a venomous glare. “Deals with you are supposed to be secret,” she said, stabbing her index finger into his chest. “Maybe you didn’t promise you’d keep your mouth shut, but we both know that’s what people want from you. What they expect.”

A small smile played around his mouth. “You don’t scare me, Emma.”

“Maybe I should.”

“That’s what’s funny about you Nephilim,” said Rook. “You know about Downworld, but you don’t live in it.” He put his lips to her ear, uncomfortably close. His breath raised the hairs on her neck when he spoke. “There are far more frightening things than you in this world, Emma Carstairs.”

Emma wrenched herself away from him, turned, and ran up the Institute steps.

Ten minutes later Emma was standing in front of Diana’s desk, her hair, still wet from her shower, dripping onto the polished tile floor.

Though Diana didn’t live at the Institute, she had an office there, a comfortable corner room overlooking the highway and the sea. Emma could see the grass stretching out in front of the Institute in the twilight, blue-shadowed at the edges with coastal sage scrub. Rain had begun to patter down, streaking the windows.