It was getting on toward twilight, the shade thickening under the trees on Cromwell Road. Only a few horse-drawn carriages clipped by in the blue light. It felt almost as if they had the city to themselves; they weren’t glamoured, but still no one cast them more than glances of idle curiosity as they passed by the great brick pile of the Natural History Museum. They were probably looking at James, Cordelia thought: like his father, he drew glances without trying. In the darkening light, his eyes reminded her of the eyes of tigers she had seen in Rajasthan, golden and watchful.

“It was clever of you to think of Anna,” said James. Cordelia looked at him in some surprise; they had been chatting rather desultorily about their educations: Cordelia had been taught by Sona and an ever-changing group of tutors. James had gone to Shadowhunter Academy for only a few months; he’d met Thomas, Matthew, and Christopher there, and they’d promptly blown up a wing of the school. They’d all been expelled, save Thomas, who hadn’t wanted to stay at the Academy without his friends and returned to London willingly at the end of the school year. For the past three years the Merry Thieves had been taught by Henry Fairchild and Sophie Lightwood. “I was grateful to have you with us today.”

“The calming presence of a feminine hand?” Cordelia teased. “Lucie could do that.”

James laughed. There was a graceful lightness to his walk that she had not noticed when she had first come to London. As if he had laid down something heavy he had been carrying, though that made little sense in the circumstances. “Lucie wouldn’t want to bother. Familiarity breeds contempt, I fear, and to us we are her ridiculous brother and his ridiculous friends. I worry sometimes—”

He broke off. The wind caught the edges of his black morning coat. They flew like wings at his sides.

“You worry about Lucie?” asked Cordelia, a little puzzled.

“It’s not that,” James said. “I suppose I worry we all tumble into our roles too easily—Christopher the scientist, Thomas the kind one, Matthew the libertine. And I—I don’t know what I am, exactly.”

“You are the leader,” said Cordelia.

He looked amused. “Am I?”

“The four of you are tightly knit,” said Cordelia. “Anyone could see that. And none of you is so simple. Thomas is more than just kind, and Christopher more than beakers and test tubes, Matthew more than wit and waistcoats. Each of you follows his own star—but you are the thread that binds all four together. You are the one who sees what everyone needs, if anyone requires extra care from their friends, or even to be left alone. Some groups of friends drift apart, but you would never let that happen.”