Alastair blinked. “Cortana? We are talking about your sword?”

“The last time I tried to use it in battle—and don’t ask for the details, I can’t tell you—suddenly the hilt went burning hot, as if it had been lying in coals. There was no way to hold on to it. I dropped it, and if James hadn’t been there, I would have been killed.”

“When was this?” Alastair looked shaken. “If this is true—”

“It is true, and it wasn’t long ago, but—I know why it happened,” Cordelia continued, not looking at him. “It’s because I’m not worthy of it anymore.”

“Not worthy? Why on earth would that be?”

Because I am living a lie. Because my marriage is a sham. Because every time I speak to James and pretend I do not love him, I am lying to his face.

She said, “I need you to take Cortana, Alastair. It no longer chooses me.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Alastair said, almost angrily. “If something’s wrong, it’s the sword, not you.”

“But—”

“Take the sword to the Silent Brothers. Have them look at it. Cordelia, I will not take Cortana. You are the rightful owner of the sword.” He stood up. “Now get some sleep. You must be exhausted.”

GRACE: 1899

“I’m going to ask the Herondale boy to come cut our briars,” Tatiana said casually one day after breakfast.

Grace said nothing. It had been two years, but she sometimes missed the approval her mother had once shown her in Paris. When they had returned, Tatiana had forbidden Grace to tell Jesse the details of their activities, and Grace had not needed persuasion. She didn’t want Jesse to know what she had done. He might have thought she was a terrible person, and Grace couldn’t bear that. She knew Jesse would never compel someone’s will, even if Tatiana bade him to. But there was no comparison to be made. Tatiana would never have lifted a hand against her boy, and she would never have willingly infused him with sorcery, either. Tatiana had different rules for her son and her daughter. There was no point in questioning them.

Tatiana looked out the window at the manor walls. “The thorns have overgrown the gates. We can barely open and close them without cutting ourselves to ribbons. It’s badly needed.”

Grace was taken aback. Her mother did not normally act familiar with the idea that a house needed to be maintained, or even repaired when broken. Grace knew that the hated Herondales had come to stay at their own family manor, not too distant, for the summer, and that there were a boy and a girl, both near her age. They’d come in summers before, and Tatiana had always forbidden her to meet them. “I thought you didn’t want us to have anything to do with them,” she said carefully.