Cast Long Shadows (Ghosts of the Shadow Market #2)

Cast Long Shadows (Ghosts of the Shadow Market #2)

Cassandra Clare & Sarah Rees Brennan




Old sins cast long shadows — English Proverb





London, 1901



The railway viaduct passed only a hair’s breadth away from the church of St. Savior. There had been discussion among the mundanes about the possibility of demolishing the church to make way for the railroad, but it had met with unexpectedly fierce opposition. Instead the railway took a slightly more circuitous route, and the spire of the church still remained, a silver dagger against the night sky.

Beneath the arches, crosses, and rattling rails, a mundane market was held by day, the largest association of grocers in the city. By night, the market belonged to the Downworld.

Vampires and werewolves, warlocks and the fey, met under the stars and under glamour that human eyes could not pierce. They had their magic stalls set up in the same pattern as the humans’ stalls, under the bridges and through tiny streets, but the Shadow Market stalls did not hold apples or turnips. Under the dark arches the stalls shone, laden with bells and ribbons, gaudy with color: snake green, fever red, and the startling orange of flames. Brother Zachariah smelled incense burning and heard the songs of werewolves for the distant beauty of the moon, and faeries calling for children to come away, come away.

It was the first Shadow Market of the New Year by English standards, though it was still the old year in China. Brother Zachariah had left Shanghai when he was a child, and London when he was seventeen, to go to the Silent City, where there was no acknowledgment of time passing save that the ashes of more warriors were laid down. Still he remembered the celebrations of the New Year in his human life, from egg nog and fortune-telling in London to the setting off of fireworks and nibbling of moon dumplings in Shanghai.

Now, snow was falling on London. The air was crisp and cold as a fresh apple, and felt good against his face. The voices of his brothers were a low hum in his head, affording Brother Zachariah a little distance.

Zachariah was here on a mission, but he took a brief time to be glad he was in London, in the Shadow Market, to breathe air clear of the dust of the departed. It felt something like freedom, like being young again.

He rejoiced, but that did not mean the people of the Shadow Market rejoiced with him. He observed many Downworlders, and even mundanes with the Sight, casting him looks that were the opposite of welcoming. As he moved, a dark murmur threaded through the hum of conversation all around him.

The denizens of the Downworld considered this Market time as space snatched away from angels. They clearly did not relish his presence among them. Brother Zachariah was one of the Silent Brothers, a voiceless fraternity that lived long amid old bones, sworn to seclusion with hearts dedicated to the dust of their city and their dead. Nobody could be expected to embrace a Silent Brother, and these people would not be likely to take pleasure in the appearance of any Shadowhunter at all.

Even as he doubted, he saw a stranger sight than any he had expected in the Market.

There was a Shadowhunter boy dancing a cancan with three faeries. He was Charlotte and Henry Fairchild’s younger son, Matthew Fairchild. His head was thrown back, his fair hair bright by firelight, and he was laughing.

Brother Zachariah had an instant to wonder if Matthew was spellbound before Matthew caught sight of him and bounded forward, leaving the fairies behind him looking discomfited. The Fair Folk were not accustomed to having mortals skip out on their dances.

Matthew did not appear to notice. He ran up to Brother Zachariah, threw an exuberant arm about his neck, and ducked his head under the hood of the Silent Brother to give him a kiss on the cheek.

“Uncle Jem!” Matthew exclaimed joyfully. “What are you doing here?”



Idris, 1899



Matthew Fairchild hardly ever lost his temper. When he did, he tried to make the occasion memorable.

The last time had been two years ago, during Matthew’s short-lived stint at Shadowhunter Academy, a school intended to mass-produce perfect demon-fighting bores. It began with half the school crowded on a tower top, watching the parents arrive after an incident in the woods with a demon.

Matthew’s usual good humor had already been sorely tried. His best friend, James, was being blamed for the incident, simply because James happened to have a tiny, insignificant amount of demon blood and the—Matthew thought prodigiously lucky—ability to transform into a shadow. James was being expelled. The actual people to blame, unmitigated wart Alastair Carstairs and his rotten friends, were not being expelled. Life in general, and the Academy in particular, was a positive parade of injustice.

Matthew had not even had the chance to ask James if he wanted to be parabatai yet. He had been planning to ask him to be sworn warrior partners in a very elaborate and stylish fashion so Jamie would be too impressed to decline.

Mr. Herondale, James’s father, was among the first of the parents to arrive. They saw him stride in the doors with his black hair turbulent from wind and rage. Mr. Herondale undeniably had an air.

The few girls permitted to come to the Academy were casting James speculative glances. James shuffled about the place with his head in a book and had an unfortunate haircut and an unassuming demeanor, but he bore a very marked resemblance to his father.

James, Angel bless his oblivious soul, failed to notice anyone’s attention. He slunk away to be expelled, sunk in despair.