Parabatai were strange. So close, and yet it wasn’t a marriage, yet it was more than a best friendship. There was no real analogue in the mundane world. And it drew him, the idea of it, of being connected to someone like that, the way all the dangerous and beautiful things of the Shadowhunter world drew him.
Maybe Ty . . .
Julian stood up, setting Tavvy down in an armchair. He stretched out his arms, cracking the sinews in his wrists. “The thing is, we need Kieran,” he said.
Evelyn snorted. “Imagine needing a faerie lord,” she said. “For anything.”
Julian whispered something in Tavvy’s ear. A moment later he was on his feet. “Miss Highsmith,” he said. “My little brother is exhausted, but he says he doesn’t know where his bedroom is. Can you show him?”
Evelyn looked irritably from Julian to Tavvy, who smiled angelically at her, showing off his dimples. “Can’t you escort the child?”
“I’ve only just arrived,” said Julian. “I don’t know where the room is.” He added his own smile to Tavvy’s. Julian could radiate charm when he wanted to; Kit had nearly forgotten.
Evelyn looked around to see if there were any volunteers to take over for her; no one moved. Finally, with a disgusted snort, she snapped her fingers at Tavvy, said, “Well, come on then, child,” and stalked from the room with him in tow.
Julian’s smile turned crooked. Kit couldn’t help the feeling that Julian had used Evelyn to get rid of Kieran, and Tavvy to get rid of Evelyn, and done it so handily no one could ever prove it.
If Julian had ever wanted to turn his hand to cons and crime, Kit thought, he would have excelled at it.
“We need Kieran to bargain with the Clave,” said Julian, as if nothing had happened. “When we found him in Faerie, his father was about to have him killed. He escaped, but he’ll never be safe as long as the Unseelie King sits on the throne.” He ran his hands through his hair restlessly; Kit wondered how Julian kept it all in his head: plans, plots, concealments, truths.
“And the Queen wants the King off the throne,” said Emma. “She’s willing to help us replace him with Kieran’s brother, but Kieran had to promise to convince him.”
“Kieran’s brother would be better than the King they have right now?” asked Dru.
“He would be better,” Emma confirmed. “Believe it or not.”
“Kieran will also testify in front of the Council,” said Julian. “He will bring the Queen’s message that she’s willing to ally with us to defeat the King. He can confirm for the Council what the King is doing in the Unseelie Lands—”
“But you could tell them that,” said Kit.
“If we wanted to risk the wrath of the Clave for having ventured into Faerie,” Julian said. “Not to mention that while we might get out of that, there will be no forgiveness for our having entered into a bargain with the Seelie Queen.”
Kit had to admit Julian was right. He knew how much trouble the Blackthorns had nearly gotten in for bargaining with the faerie convoy who had returned Mark to them. The Seelie Queen was a whole other level of forbidden. It was like getting a slap on the wrist for running a red light and then coming back the next day and blowing up the whole street.
“Kieran’s your get-out-of-jail-free card,” he said.
“It’s not just about us,” said Emma. “If the Council will listen to him, it could end the Cold Peace. In fact, it would have to. They’ll have to believe him—he can’t lie—and if the Queen is willing to fight the Unseelie King with the Clave, I don’t think they’ll be able to turn that down.”
“Which means we have to keep Kieran safe,” said Julian. “We also have to do what we can not to antagonize him.”
“Because he’s doing this for Mark?” said Dru.
“But Mark broke up with him,” said Livvy, and then looked around, alarmed. Her ponytail brushed Kit’s shoulder. “Is that something I wasn’t supposed to say?”
“No,” Mark said. “It’s the truth. But—Kieran doesn’t remember. When the Unseelie Court tortured him, he lost some of his memories. He doesn’t recall bringing the envoy to the Institute, or Emma and Julian being whipped, or what danger he put us all in with his haste and anger.” He looked down at his intertwined hands. “And he must not be told.”
“But—Emma,” said Livvy. “Are we supposed to pretend that she and Mark aren’t . . . ?”
Kit leaned close to Ty. Ty smelled like ink and wool. “I don’t understand any of this.”
“Neither do I,” Ty whispered back. “It’s very complicated.”
“Mark and I,” Emma, said, looking very steadily at Mark. “We broke up.”
Kit wondered if Mark had known that. He wasn’t able to hide the look of astonishment on his face. “It just didn’t work out,” Emma went on. “So it’s all right, whatever Mark needs to do.”
“They’re broken up?” Livvy whispered. Ty shrugged, baffled. Livvy had gone tense and was glancing from Emma to Mark, clearly worried.
“We have to let Kieran think he and Mark are still dating?” said Ty, looking bewildered. Kit felt the whole thing was beyond him as well, but then Henry VIII had beheaded several of his wives for apparently governmental reasons. The personal, the political, and the romantic were often oddly entwined.
“Concealing these things from Kieran isn’t ideal,” said Julian, hands in his pockets. “And I hate to ask you guys to lie. Probably it’s best to avoid the subject. But there’s literally no other way to make sure he actually shows up in front of the Clave.”
Mark sat, running his fingers through his blond hair in a distracted manner. Kit could hear him saying, “I’m all right, it’s fine,” to Cristina. He felt a surge of odd sympathy—not for Mark, but for Kieran. Kieran, who didn’t know that his boyfriend wasn’t really his boyfriend, that he was sleeping in a house full of people who, however friendly they might seem, would lie to him to get something they needed.
He thought of the coldness he’d seen in Julian back at the Shadow Market. Julian, who would sacrifice Kieran, and perhaps his own brother in a way, to get what he wanted.
Even if it was a good thing to want. Even if it was the end of the Cold Peace. Kit looked at Julian, gazing at the parlor fire with fathomless eyes, and suspected that there was more to it.
That where Julian Blackthorn was concerned, there would always be more to it.
16
P
ASS THE
W
ANDERER
Mark made his way toward Kieran’s room, steeling himself to lie.
Uneasiness and exhaustion had driven Mark from the parlor. The others, equally tired, were scattering to their own bedrooms. Cristina had slipped away without Mark noticing—though he had felt her absence, as a sort of pang in his chest, after she was gone. Diana had decided to leave as soon as she could for Idris, and Julian and Emma had gone to see her off.
Mark had been a little shocked by Emma’s announcement that the pretense of their relationship was over; he knew what he’d said to her, back in Faerie, and that she’d only done as he asked. Still he felt slightly unmoored, alone, with no idea how to look in Kieran’s eyes and tell him untruths.
He didn’t like lying; he hadn’t done it in the Hunt, and he felt uncomfortable with the rhythms of it. He wanted to talk about it with Cristina, but he couldn’t imagine she’d want to hear about his complicated feelings for Kieran. Julian would be focused entirely on what was necessary and had to be done, no matter how painful. And now he could no longer talk to Emma. He hadn’t realized how close their relationship, however false, had brought them in actual friendship; he wondered, now, if he would lose that, too.