The Other World (A Shadowhunters Fanfiction)

Chapter 8: Anthem Of The Angels

Cordelia, James and Lucie were quick—repack, retrace their steps, sneak through the building toward an inconspicuous back exit—but they were not quick enough.

James was offering Cordelia a hand, and she was perched on the windowsill, just about to jump, when she felt an ice-cold grip clamp down on her shoulder. She gave a yelp as the automaton pulled her back into the room, and she stumbled back until she hit its eerily fleshy body. Then she felt its arms fasten around her, with a series of mechanical clicks and whirs; felt the give of its cold skin against her own.

She acted on instinct, reaching for a knife at her belt. She aimed behind her, for the automaton's abdomen, but the blade only hit a metal rib with a dull thud, and the metal creature growled, whipping the blade from her grasp and flinging it across the room. It buried itself up to the hilt in the stucco, landing right between two faded wallpaper flowers.

Everything else happened at once.

"No!" James shouted. James and Lucie each vaulted back into the room, through the window, but the automatons were faster. Lucie ducked and struck out, and then an automaton's hand hit her in the face, knocking her away. Lucie flew into the wall, her head cracking with a distinctly wet sound.

"Lucie, Lucie!" Cordelia cried, struggling against the clammy metal arms, but they constricted her until she could barely breathe, much less escape. Across the room, James lunged for his sister, crying her name—but the automatons had overwhelmed him, too. Two had him pinned, their metal arms constricting him on either side.

And then...

Then she stepped into the room.

Tessa.

Not Tessa, Cordelia quickly realized. Belial.

Belial was dressed in simple gear, and had bound all of Tessa's thick hair in an unforgiving knot at the nape of the neck; a belt round Tessa's waist bore almost a dozen different weapons, each more intimidating than the last. He gazed around with an eerie smile, eyes brushing over Lucie's inert body, meeting James' furious gaze. When he spoke with Tessa's voice, Cordelia felt a wave of cold wash through her.

"Finally," Belial said, walking toward Cordelia. He reached out and caught Cordelia's face in his inhumanly strong grip. "I am three days behind, but nonetheless, you are in my grasp now."

James jerked against the automatons. "Not for long," he spat.

Belial only turned to look at James, his gaze so cold it was almost robotic.

"What do you think, Cordelia?" he said, gesturing to James. "I feared that threatening James by threatening you—albeit the James of another world—would not be enough. I meant to procure Matthew for the occasion, but unfortunately, he slipped through my fingers." He tilted his head, considering. "Do you think you will make an effective alternative?"

That, at least, was where Belial was wrong. "He doesn't love me," Cordelia said, shaking her head. "Not—like that."

Belial considered her for a moment before seeming to decide she was telling the truth. Then, with a strange new ice in his face, Belial stepped toward Cordelia and jerked her face up again; chipped, grimy nails dug into Cordelia's cheeks.

"In that case," Belial hissed, "your purpose is simple: you will pay for the crimes you perpetrated against me, and then you will die."

Belial released Cordelia, and she jerked her head back defiantly. "No," James said, his eyes on Cordelia. "No, you bastard, you let her alone! What the fuck do you need from two realms, anyway? What the fuck—"

All at once, Belial was across the room, and the robes that adorned Tessa's form swept behind him. "You wouldn't understand," he said. "You're a mere human, James Herondale; you imagine that dominating one realm should be enough for me. But you have no idea the scope of my power, and you certainly cannot understand my wrath. The insignificance of all this, of this one planet, is beyond your comprehension. You snivelling human beings, snivelling Shadowhunters and Downworlders and all—you all think your agonies and struggles are so all-consuming. But when you have lived as long as I have, you grow to see how small it all really is. You are small, and you are worthless to me."

Belial gave the automaton a small nod, and just like that, the automaton snapped James's neck.

She heard the scream, eventually, and knew it was her own, but couldn't feel it coming up her throat. She wasn't here; this wasn't happening; this could not be real. James' body was slumped omn the ground, his eyes still open, his expression slackened and empty. The automatons were filing out of the room on Belial's command, all but the two who stayed inside to guard the window and the door, respectively.

At last, the automatons holding Cordelia released her, and she crumpled to the floor.

Belial gazed down at her from the doorway. "Say your goodbyes, little girl. Send off your Shadowhunter kin into oblivion. Then be ready to leave. You have a long night ahead of you."

Then Belial was gone.

Strange, Cordelia thought—he had so little regard for human life; she wondered why he even bothered to allow her this one little ritual. Cordelia had no strength left; her limbs felt weak. The floor was made of wood, but caved in at some spots, coated with a layer of dust so thick that it had become sticky. It stuck to her hands and knees as she crawled toward James.

She took his face in her trembling hands and kissed his lips, still warm. Hands shaking, she raised them and gently shut his eyelids with two fingers. "Ave atque vale," she whispered.

She crawled to Lucie next. Blood seeped through the dust in a sticky red pool behind Lucie's head; Cordelia closed Lucie's eyes, whispered those words again. "Ave atque vale."

The room felt empty. James and Lucie had been with her, only moments before, but now they were dead. And Cordelia had been stupid. She'd put Jem's necklace into James' pack—which lay in the brush on the other side of the window, now. The window, which was guarded on both sides by an automaton, so that Cordelia had no way of getting to it—no way of summoning help. And even if the James of her world came for her, how would he help her? He could not hand his body over to Belial, not for Cordelia's sake—he did not love her that way, would not give up so many things to save his mere friend. Nor would she want him to, even if he had loved her that way in return.

Cordelia was alone, weaponless, helpless—and she'd never been scared like this in her life.