Lady Midnight (The Dark Artifices #1)(3)

“Shh.” She hurried away, her colorful hair bouncing.

“Weird,” Kit muttered, and headed back toward his dad’s booth. He approached from the side, head down, hands in his pockets. He was pretty sure his dad would yell at him if he presented himself in front of the Shadowhunters—especially considering the rumors that they were press-ganging every mundane with the Sight under nineteen—but he couldn’t help but want to eavesdrop.

The blond girl was leaning forward, elbows on the wooden counter. “Good to see you, Rook,” she said with a winning smile.

She was pretty, Kit thought. Older than he was, and the boy she was with towered over him. And she was a Shadowhunter. So she was undateably pretty, but pretty nonetheless. Her arms were bare, and a long, pale scar ran from one elbow to her wrist. Black tattoos in the shapes of strange symbols twined up and down them, patterning her skin. One peeked from the V of her shirt. They were runes, the sorcerous Marks that gave the Shadowhunters their power. Only Shadowhunters could wear them. If you drew them on a normal person’s skin, or a Downworlder’s, they would go insane.

“And who’s this?” Johnny Rook asked, jerking his chin toward the Shadowhunter boy. “The famous parabatai?”

Kit looked at the pair with renewed interest. Everyone who knew about Nephilim knew what parabatai were. Two Shadowhunters who swore to be platonically loyal to each other forever, always to fight by each other’s sides. To live and die for each other. Jace Herondale and Clary Fairchild, the most famous Shadowhunters in the world, each had a parabatai. Even Kit knew that much.

“No,” the girl drawled, picking up a jar of greenish liquid from a stack by the cash register. It was meant to be a love potion, though Kit knew that several of the jars held water that had been dyed with food coloring. “This isn’t really Julian’s kind of place.” Her gaze flicked around the Market.

“I’m Cameron Ashdown.” The redheaded Shadowhunter stuck out a hand and Johnny, looking bemused, shook it. Kit took the opportunity to edge behind the counter. “I’m Emma’s boyfriend.”

The blond girl—Emma—winced, barely perceptibly. Cameron Ashdown might be her boyfriend now, Kit thought, but he wouldn’t lay bets on him staying that way.

“Huh,” said Johnny, taking the jar out of Emma’s hand. “So I assume you’re here to pick up what you left.” He fished what looked like a scrap of red cloth out of his pocket. Kit stared. What could possibly be interesting about a square of cotton?

Emma straightened up. She looked eager now. “Did you find out anything?”

“If you dropped it in a washing machine with a load of whites, it would definitely turn your socks pink.”

Emma took the cloth back with a frown. “I’m serious. You don’t know how many people I had to bribe to get this. It was in the Spiral Labyrinth. It’s a piece of the shirt my mom was wearing when she was killed.”

Johnny held up a hand. “I know. I was just—”

“Don’t be sarcastic. My job is being sarcastic and quippy. Your job is getting shaken down for information.”

“Or paid,” said Cameron Ashdown. “Being paid for information is also fine.”

“Look, I can’t help you,” said Kit’s father. “There’s no magic here. It’s just some cotton. Shredded up and full of seawater, but—cotton.”

The look of disappointment that passed over the girl’s face was vivid and unmistakable. She made no attempt to hide it, just tucked the cloth into her pocket. Kit couldn’t help feeling a jolt of sympathy, which surprised him—he never thought he’d be sympathetic to a Shadowhunter.

Emma looked over at him, almost as if he’d spoken. “So,” she said, and suddenly there was a glint in her eyes. “You’ve got the Sight, huh, like your dad? How old are you?”

Kit froze. His dad moved in front of him quickly, blocking him from Emma’s view. “Now here I thought you were going to ask me about the murders that have been happening. Behind on your information, Carstairs?”

Apparently Wren had been right, Kit thought—everyone did know about these murders. He could tell by the warning note in his father’s voice that he should make himself scarce, but he was trapped behind the counter with no escape route.

“I heard some rumors about dead mundanes,” Emma said. Most Shadowhunters used the term for normal human beings with intense contempt. Emma just sounded tired. “We don’t investigate mundanes killing each other. That’s for the police.”

“There were dead faeries,” said Johnny. “Several of the bodies were fey.”

“We can’t investigate those,” said Cameron. “You know that. The Cold Peace forbids it.”

Kit heard a faint murmur from nearby booths: a noise that let him know he wasn’t the only one eavesdropping.

The Cold Peace was Shadowhunter Law. It had come into being almost five years ago. He barely remembered a time before it. They called it a Law, at least. What it really was, was a punishment.

When Kit was ten years old, a war had rocked the universe of Downworlders and Shadowhunters. A Shadowhunter, Sebastian Morgenstern, had turned against his own kind: He had gone from Institute to Institute, destroying their occupants, controlling their bodies, and forcing them to fight for him as an unspeakable army of mind-controlled slaves. Most of the Shadowhunters in the Los Angeles Institute had been taken or killed.