The Lost Book of the White (The Eldest Curses #2) - Cassandra Clare Page 0,15

uncertainty. Each time, she noticed his eyes, luminous and slit-pupiled—each time, he expected her to be frightened, but she was only ever curious. When she got old enough, she would ask him, “Why do you have cat eyes?” He got to try out plenty of responses.

“I traded them with my cat. Now he has human eyes.”

“The better to see you with, my dear.”

“Why do you not have cat eyes?”

It was strange to know that Clary didn’t share those memories. To have watched someone grow up without them remembering it. Until, of course, the day he saw her at Chairman Meow’s birthday party, surrounded by New York’s Shadowhunters, and without warning, transformed into the warrior she had been born to be, already the spitting image of Jocelyn at her age.

Now she looked uneasy, as though she was thinking about how to deliver bad news. A few years ago she would just have blurted it out, but now she was his friend and she was concerned about his feelings. It was nice, but strange.

She said, “I had a dream about you, this morning. Just before Alec’s call woke us up.”

“A funny dream?” Magnus said hopefully. “And not an ominous, prophetic dream, right?”

“I stopped having those after the Dark War, so I hope not. You seemed to be having a good time, actually,” said Clary. “You were on a big golden throne.”

“I had that dream too,” said Magnus. “At the top of lots of stairs? I was being attended by gray creatures with beaks?”

“No,” said Clary, looking concerned. “But you had become a hundred-foot-tall monster.”

Magnus nodded thoughtfully. “Are we talking a Godzilla-type situation?”

“More like a… demon situation. You had huge sharp teeth, and long claws coming out of your fingers. There was something wrong with your eyes. And there was—” She paused. “There was a red fire, in the shape of an X, burning from within your chest.”

“Well,” said Magnus heavily. “I have some good news. There is only one line of fire burning on my chest right now, not an X. Prophetic dream understood. Avoid getting another cut in the shape of an X. Excellent advice.”

“There’s more,” said Clary. “The confusing part.”

“So far, this has been very straightforward,” agreed Magnus.

“You were in chains. Like, in lots of chains. Your legs were chained to the ground, your arms and your shoulders and your waist all chained to the wall. Huge chains, with huge iron links. You were weighed down by them. It was amazing you weren’t literally crushed to death under their weight.”

Magnus had to admit that did seem bad.

“But here’s the thing,” Clary said. “You didn’t look like you were in pain. Or even bothered. You looked happy. More than happy. You looked ecstatic. You looked… triumphant.”

She fixed her gaze on Magnus. “I don’t know what it means. Like I said—I don’t have prophetic dreams anymore. Usually. But I thought I should tell you anyway.”

“Better safe than sorry,” said Magnus. “I hope it’s totally abstract, like, I will be sad, but happy about being sad. Something like that. Rather than involving actual iron chains or having bigger teeth.”

“Well, here’s hoping,” said Clary.

“Run along to the Institute,” Magnus said. “I should go check on my family.”

Clary departed, and Magnus, uneasy for the first time since the morning, went to find Alec and their son and hold them close for a moment. Just to warm himself up.

CHAPTER THREE A Brief Farewell

ALEC WAS GETTING A LITTLE frustrated. He’d called Catarina and asked if she could look after Max for a couple of days, only to find out that she was working double shifts at the hospital and would barely be home (though she did agree to stop in and feed Chairman Meow in the evenings). He’d called Maia, who turned out to be hosting friends of Bat’s. He’d considered, but rejected, calling Lily. Lily often spoke of how Max was “so delicious” that she just wanted “to eat him up,” and while Alec trusted Lily, he was not completely sure she was speaking figuratively.

“What about your mother?” Magnus said. He had put Max into an iridescent magical bubble and was rolling him around the bedroom while Alec fetched suitcases from the back of their closet.

“What? No,” Alec said. He watched Max for a moment. “Is he in a magical hamster ball?”

“No! Well, kind of, yes,” said Magnus. “He likes it. Why not your mother?”

“This kid floats up to the ceiling sometimes,” said Alec. “He sets a blanket on fire in his sleep every three weeks