Lucie sniffed. “Well, you’d all better hope it works. Especially you, James, because if Mam and Papa find out you released a demon in the Sanctuary, they will feed you to it.”

James shot Lucie a dark older-brother glare that almost made Cordelia giggle. She had always been a little jealous of the closeness Lucie and James shared, something she had always wanted with Alastair but never had. It was nice that at some moments they were perfectly ordinary.

They relocated themselves to the Sanctuary, James carrying the Pyxis carefully, as if it were an infernal device that might explode at any moment. Cordelia found herself walking beside James and Lucie. She wondered if she and James would ever discuss what had happened the night before in the Whispering Room or if she would be left to go quietly mad wondering about it.

“Don’t worry,” Lucie said to her brother. “It won’t be like it was with Papa.”

“What do you mean?” Cordelia asked.

James said, “When he was a child, my father opened a Pyxis with tragic consequences. My aunt Ella was killed.”

Cordelia was horrified. “Maybe we shouldn’t—”

“This will be different,” Lucie said, and Cordelia wasn’t sure if Lucie was reassuring herself or James. “We know what we’re getting into. Papa didn’t.”

They had arrived at the Sanctuary, the only room in the Institute where Downworlders could freely enter without being invited in by a Shadowhunter. It was warded all around with spells preventing them from entering the main body of the Institute. Meetings with prominent Downworlders were often held there, and Downworlders could even seek refuge in a Sanctuary under the Accords.

It was certainly clear that the London Institute had once been a cathedral, and a large one. Massive stone pillars stretched up to a vaulted roof. Thomas had produced a box of vestas and was moving around the room, lighting a dozen enormous candelabras, their sconces stuffed with fat white candles that cast a glimmering light. The tapestries and pillars were all traced with the designs of runes, as were the tiles of the floor. Cordelia had to admit that if one was going to release a demon, this seemed one of the better places to do it.

In the middle of the room was a dry stone fountain, in the center of which stood the statue of an angel with folded wings, its stone face streaked with black lines like tears.

James set the box on the floor, directly on top of a rune of angelic power. He knelt down, studying the Pyxis. After a moment, he took an unlit seraph blade from the inside of his coat.

“Arm yourselves, everyone,” he said.

Cordelia unsheathed Cortana; the others drew seraph blades as James had done, save Thomas, who took out his bolas. James reached out and took hold of the handle of the Pyxis.

Cordelia’s hand tightened on the hilt of her sword.