Lady Midnight (The Dark Artifices #1)(154)

As Cristina stepped back with alacrity, she bumped into Perfect Diego. He raised his hands as if to steady her, and to Emma’s surprise, she allowed it. She was wincing, clearly in pain. Blood had spattered onto her shoe.

Malcolm lowered his hand, curling his fingers under. Sterling’s body burst into flame. Mage-fire, burning hard and quick and clean. The body seemed to glow intensely for a moment before sifting away to ash. The fire vanished and there was only a charred and bloodstained patch on the ground to show where it had been.

Emma realized she was still holding Cortana. She knelt, mechanically wiped off the blade on the dry grass, and sheathed it. As she rose to her feet, her gaze sought out Julian. He was leaning against one of the pillars by the front doors, the seraph blade, now dark, dangling in his hand. He met her gaze for only a moment; his was bleak.

The front door of the Institute opened and Mark came out. “Is it over?” Mark asked.

“It’s over,” Julian said wearily. “For now, anyway.”

Mark’s gaze scanned over the others—Emma, then Cristina—and lit on Diego. Diego looked puzzled at the intensity of his gaze. “Who’s that?”

“That’s Diego,” said Emma. “Diego Rocio Rosales.”

“Perfect Diego?” said Mark, sounding incredulous.

Diego looked even more puzzled. Before he could say anything, Cristina dropped to the ground, clutching at her leg. “I need,” she said, a little breathlessly, “another iratze—”

Diego lifted her up into his arms and ran up the stairs, ignoring her protests that she could walk. “I must get her inside,” he said, pushing past Julian and then Mark. “You have an infirmary?”

“Of course,” Julian said. “Second floor—”

“Cristina!” Emma called, running up the stairs after them, but they had already disappeared inside.

“She’ll be fine,” Malcolm said. “Better not to chase after them and frighten the kids.”

“How are the kids?” Emma asked anxiously. “Ty, Dru—”

“They’re all fine,” Mark said. “I was looking after them.”

“And Arthur?”

“Didn’t even seem to notice anything was happening,” said Mark with a quizzical look. “It was odd—”

Emma turned to Julian. “It is odd,” she said. “Julian, what did Belinda mean? When she said she knew who really ran the Institute?”

Julian shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Malcolm exhaled an exasperated breath. “Jules,” he said. “Tell her.”

Julian looked exhausted—more than exhausted. Emma had read somewhere that people drowned when they became too tired to keep themselves afloat any longer. They gave up and let the sea take them. Julian looked that tired now. “Malcolm, don’t,” he whispered.

“Can you even remember all the lies you’ve told?” Malcolm asked, and there was none of his usual insouciance in his look. His eyes were hard as amethyst. “You didn’t tell me about your brother’s return—”

“Oh—Mark!” Emma exclaimed, realizing suddenly that of course Malcolm hadn’t known before tonight that he was in the Institute. Quickly, she put her hand over her mouth. Mark raised an eyebrow at her. He seemed remarkably calm.

“You concealed it,” Malcolm went on, “knowing that I would realize it meant faerie involvement in these murders, and that I would know I might be breaking the Cold Peace by helping you.”

“You couldn’t break it if you didn’t know,” Julian said. “I was protecting you, too.”

“Maybe,” said Malcolm. “But I’ve had enough. Tell them the truth. Or that will be the end of my help.”

Julian nodded. “I’ll tell Emma and Mark,” he said. “It’s not fair on the others.”

“Your uncle would probably be able to tell you who said this,” Malcolm said. “‘Do nothing secretly; for Time sees and hears all things, and discloses all.’”

“I can tell you who said it.” Julian’s eyes burned with a low fire. “Sophocles.”

“Clever boy,” said Malcolm. There was affection in his voice, but weariness, too.

He turned and marched down the steps. He paused when he reached the bottom, staring off past Emma, his eyes too dark for her to read. He seemed to be seeing something in the distance she couldn’t, either something too far in the future to imagine or too far in the past to remember.

“You’ll help us, still?” Julian called after him. “Malcolm, you won’t . . .” He trailed off; Malcolm had vanished into the shadows of the night. “Abandon us?” he said, speaking as if he knew no one was listening.

Julian was still leaning against the pillar as if it was the only thing holding him up, and Emma couldn’t keep her mind from flashing to the pillars in the Hall of Accords, to Julian when he was twelve, crumpled against one and sobbing into his hands.

He’d cried since then, but not often. There wasn’t much, she supposed, that measured up to having killed your father.

The seraph blade in his hand had burned out. He flung it aside just as Emma came close to him. She slid her hand into his now-empty one. There was no passion in the gesture, nothing that recalled that night on the beach. Only the absolute solidity of the friendship they had shared for more than a decade.