Cassandra Clare: The Last Stand of the New York Institute

“Robert!” said Maryse softly, as if she could not believe this was happening.

Robert unsheathed his sword from Rachel’s chest, and Rachel tumbled to the floor.

“Rachel Whitelaw was just killed by a Shadowhunter,” shouted Magnus, and even then he thought Robert might cry out that he had been defending his wife. Magnus thought that the Whitelaws might put away their blades rather than spill more Nephilim blood.

But Rachel had been the baby of the family, everyone’s special pet. The Whitelaws as one roared a challenge and hurled themselves into the fray with redoubled ferocity. Adam Whitelaw, a stolid white-haired old man who had always seemed to simply follow his wife’s lead, charged at Valentine’s Circle, whirling a shining axe over his head, and cut down all those who stood before him.

Magnus edged toward the werewolves, to the woman who was the only one who remained human, even though her teeth and claws were growing apace.

“Why aren’t you fighting?” he demanded.

The werewolf woman glared at him as if he were impossibly stupid.

“Because Valentine’s here,” she snapped. “Because he has my daughter. He took her through there, and they said if we moved to follow her, they would kill her.”

Magnus did not have an instant to reflect on what Valentine might do to a helpless Downworlder child. He lifted a hand and blasted from his feet the stocky Shadowhunter at the single door at the far end of the room, and then Magnus ran toward the door.

He heard the cries behind him, of the Whitelaws demanding, “Bane, where are you—” and a shout, Magnus thought from Stephen, saying, “He’s going after Valentine! Kill him!”

Behind the door Magnus heard a low, awful sound. He pushed the door open.

On the other side of the door was a small ordinary room, the size of a bedroom, though there was no bed, only two people and a single chair. There was a tall man with a fall of white-blond hair, wearing Shadowhunter black. He was stooped over a girl who looked about twelve. She was fastened to the chair with silver cord, and was making a terrible low sound, a cross between a whine and a moan.

Her eyes were shining, Magnus thought for a moment, the moonlight turning them into mirrors.

His mistake lasted for the briefest of instants. Then Valentine moved slightly and the gleam of the girl’s eyes resolved in Magnus’s vision. The gleam was not her eyes. The moonlit shine was silver coins pressed to the girl’s eyes, tiny wisps of smoke escaping from beneath the bright discs as the tiny sounds escaped from between her lips. She was trying to suppress the sound of her pain, because she was so scared of what Valentine would do to her next.

“Where did your brother go?” demanded Valentine, and the girl’s sobbing continued, but she said nothing.

Magnus felt for a moment as if he had become a storm, black curling clouds, the slam of thunder and slash of lightning, and all the storm wanted was to leap at Valentine’s throat. Magnus’s magic lashed out almost of its own volition, leaped from both hands. It looked like lightning, burning so blue that it was almost white. It knocked Valentine off his feet and into a wall. Valentine hit the wall so hard that a crack rang out, and he slid to the floor.

That one act also used up far too much of Magnus’s power, but he could not think of that now. He ran over to the girl’s chair and wrenched the chain off her, then touched her face with painful gentleness.

She was crying now, more freely, shuddering and sobbing beneath his hands.

“Hush, hush. Your brother sent me. I’m a warlock; you’re safe,” he murmured, and clasped the back of her neck.

The coins were hurting her. They had to come off. But would removing them do more damage? Magnus could heal, but it had never been his specialty as it was Catarina’s, and he had not had to heal werewolves often. They were so resilient. He could only hope she would be resilient now.

He lifted the coins as gently as he could, and threw them against the wall.

It was too late. It had been too late before he’d ever entered the room. She was blind.

Her lips parted. She said, “Is my brother safe?”

“As safe as can be, sweetheart,” said Magnus. “I’ll take you to him.”

No sooner had he said the word “him” than he felt the cold blade sink into his back and his mouth fill with hot blood.

“Oh, will you?” asked Valentine’s voice in his ear.

The blade slid free, hurting as much on the way out as it had on the way in. Magnus gritted his teeth and gripped the back of the chair harder, kept himself arched over and protecting the child, and turned his head to face Valentine. The white-haired man looked older than the other leaders, but Magnus was not sure if he was actually older or if cold purpose simply made his face seem carved from marble. Magnus wanted to smash it.

Valentine’s hand moved, and Magnus only just managed to catch Valentine’s wrist before he found Valentine’s blade in his heart.

Magnus concentrated and made the clasp of his hand burn, blue electricity circling his fingers. He made the contact burn as the touch of silver had burned the girl, and he grinned as he heard Valentine’s hiss of pain.

Valentine did not ask his name as the others had, did not treat Magnus as that much of a person. Valentine simply stared at Magnus with cold eyes, the same way anyone might stare at a loathsome animal in their path and impeding their progress. “You are interfering in my business, warlock.”

Magnus spat blood into his face. “You are torturing a child in my city. Shadowhunter.”

Valentine used his free hand to deal Magnus a blow that sent Magnus staggering back. Valentine wheeled and followed him, and Magnus thought, Good . It meant that he was moving away from the girl.

She was blind, but she was a werewolf, smell and sound as important to her as sight. She could run, and find her way back to her family.

“I thought we were playing a game where we said what the other person was and what we were doing,” Magnus told him. “Did I get it wrong? Can I guess again? Are you breaking your own sacred Laws, asshole?”

He glanced at the girl, hoping she would run, but she seemed frozen to the spot with terror. Magnus did not dare call out to her in case it attracted Valentine’s attention.

Magnus lifted a hand, sketching a spell in the air, but Valentine saw the spell coming and dodged it. He leaped into the air and then bounded off the wall, Nephilim-swift, to lunge at Magnus. He scythed Magnus’s legs out from under him, and when Magnus landed, Valentine kicked him brutally hard. He drew a sword and brought it down. Magnus rolled so that it caught him a glancing blow along the ribs, cutting through shirt and skin but not hitting vital organs. Not this time.

Magnus dearly hoped he was not going to die here, in this cold warehouse, far from anyone he loved. He tried to rise from the floor, but it was slippery with his own blood, and the scraps of magic he had were not enough to heal or fight, let alone both.

Marian Whitelaw stood in front of him, her blades drawn and new runes shining on her arms. Her hair shone silver in his blurred vision.

Valentine swung his sword, and cut her almost in half.

Magnus gasped, salvation lost as quickly as it had been found, then turned his head toward the sound of more footsteps on the stone.

He was a fool to have hoped for another rescue. He saw one of Valentine’s Circle, standing in the doorway with his eyes fixed on the werewolf girl.

“Valentine!” Lucian Graymark shouted. He ran for the girl, and Magnus tensed, coiled himself for a leap, and then froze as he saw Lucian pick the girl up and wheel on his master. “How could you do this? She’s a child!”