The Land I Lost by Cassandra Clare

Author:Cassandra Clare
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Shadow Market Enterprises
Published: 2018-09-07T17:58:31+00:00

Alec didn’t rest well. His mind was churning with thoughts of Lily’s story, the Buenos Aires Institute’s corruption, lost Herondales and werewolves, and Jem and Tessa’s quest.

He was used to waking up in dark silk sheets and strong arms. He missed home.

Rafael slept in, not stirring until afternoon. Alec suspected that the orphans of the Shadow Market had all developed nocturnal tendencies. When Rafael woke, Alec took him out to the courtyard, where he sat on the stone bench moodily eating an energy bar. Alec thought he was sulking because Alec had taken back his phone.

“Has anyone ever given you a nickname?” he asked Rafael. “Do people ever call you Rafe?”

Rafael gave him a blank look. Alec worried he hadn’t conveyed his meaning.

“Rafa,” Rafael said finally.

He finished one energy bar and held his hand out for another. Alec gave it to him.

“Rafa?” Alec tried. “Do you want me to call you that? Are you getting any of this? I’m sorry I can’t speak Spanish.”

Rafael made a face, as if to say what he thought of being called Rafa.

“Okay,” said Alec. “I won’t call you that. Just Rafael, then?”

The boy gave Alec a massively unimpressed look. Here this fool goes again, his air suggested, talking to me when I cannot understand him.

Jem and Tessa joined them in the courtyard, ready for Rafael to lead them to the house he’d seen.

“I’ll stay and guard Lily,” said Tessa, reading Alec’s mind. “Don’t worry about her. I have wards up, and even if somebody came, I’ve got it covered.”

She made a tiny gesture. Gray glowing magic, like the shine of light on river water or the sheen of pearls in shadow, twined about her fingers. Alec smiled his gratitude at Tessa. Until he was sure about what was happening with this warlock and these Shadowhunters, he didn’t want anybody undefended.

“Don’t you worry about me either,” Tessa told Jem, settling her magic-bright fingers into his black-and-silver hair, drawing him down for a goodbye kiss.

“I won’t,” Jem told her. “I know my wife can take care of herself.”

My wife, Jem said, his voice sounding casual and delighted in that mutual possession: the bargain made between them in the sight of everyone they loved.

Alec had heard a poem read at weddings: My true love has my heart, and I have his. Never was a fairer bargain made. Love that was permanent in the eyes of all the world, demanding respect, blazoning the certain knowledge Alec had when he woke every morning. Nobody else for me, until the day I die: having everyone else know that. Jem and Tessa had that, as Helen and Aline had it. But a Shadowhunter couldn’t marry a Downworlder in gold. A Shadowhunter was forbidden to wear the wedding rune for a Downworlder, and he wouldn’t insult Magnus with a ceremony the Nephilim saw as lesser. He and Magnus had agreed to wait, until the Law was changed.

Alec couldn’t help the tiny sting of jealousy.

His phone buzzed in his pocket, and Rafael perked up.

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