“If a Shadowhunter gets up and starts waving knives around, we’re going to have a riot,” said Kellington. “Hypatia wants to entertain her guests, not kill them.” His gaze slid to Cordelia. It was a gaze like being touched, she thought. Not entirely pleasant, but certainly novel. Kellington seemed to be examining her from head to toe and finding himself not displeased. “What about you?”

Matthew and James both stared at her.

“I suppose I could perform,” Cordelia said breathlessly.

She heard her own voice as if from a distance. Was she mad? What was she offering? What would she even do? She heard Kellington agree and felt James’s slender, scarred fingers on her arm. “Cordelia, you don’t need to—” he began.

“I can do it,” she said.

He met her gaze directly, and she saw that there was no doubt in his expression. He was looking at her with exactly the faith he showed when he looked at Matthew, at Lucie, or at Thomas. With a total belief that she could do anything, if it was required of her to do it.

It was as if she could suddenly get enough air into her lungs: Cordelia inhaled, nodded at James, and turned to Kellington.

“I am ready,” she said.

With a bow, the werewolf led her toward the stage.

PART TWO

— —

You have been in every line I have ever read, since I first came here, the rough common boy whose poor heart you wounded even then. You have been in every prospect I have ever seen since—on the river, on the sails of the ships, on the marshes, in the clouds, in the light, in the darkness, in the wind, in the woods, in the sea, in the streets. You have been the embodiment of every graceful fancy that my mind has ever become acquainted with. The stones of which the strongest London buildings are made, are not more real, or more impossible to be displaced by your hands, than your presence and influence have been to me, there and everywhere, and will be. Estella, to the last hours of my life, you cannot choose but remain part of my character, part of the little good in me, part of the evil.

—Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

15 THE WHISPERING ROOM

Where beauty has no ebb, decay no flood,

But joy is wisdom, Time an endless song.

I kiss you and the world begins to fade.

—William Butler Yeats, Land of Heart’s Desire

From her window, Lucie could see the steady stream of carriages arriving through the arched entrance to the Institute. She drew back with a frown. Where were Thomas and Christopher? She didn’t blame either of them for having had difficulty concentrating the day before. Barbara’s death was on all their minds. But it had meant the three of them had failed to make a proper plan for meeting up tonight.