Blood of the Hunt

Blood of the Hunt - Chapter 17

Jace watched the second hand tick forward on the ancient Morgenstern heirloom grandfather clock standing in the corner of the main floor parlour.

Tick-tock, tick-tock.

His knee bounced up and down impatiently in triple-time. He steepled his hands and gave his wife a significant look over the tips of his fingers. "Why is this taking so long?"

Clary chewed at her bottom lip. "I don't know." If Alec had not been in the magical equivalent of a coma, she might have ribbed her husband and told him that Magnus had not taken nearly as long to brew the draught that had woken her mother all those years ago, and he must therefore like her better than, you know, the entire world.

But Jace had been near-ashen since the previous day's Council meeting, refusing to eat and chewing his fingernails down to the quick instead. Catarina had arrived within the hour along with many of the Downworlders to whom Alec had extended invitations. The warlock had stayed with the stricken Consul for nearly 24 hours straight, trying to discern the nature of the poison from the would-be assassin's arrow without success. After a brief but heated argument with Seraphine about the danger of using a stasis spell to preserve the Consul against further harm, she had since been forced to conclude that it had likely saved his life. She had never seen such a complicated toxin in all her years.

Tick-tock, tick-tock.

"I do not believe that we will need to wait much longer, one way or another," Cassius offered from where he was laying gingerly on a faded grey divan by the window. He wore clean bandages across the many wounds he had suffered on his journey into Deep Faerie, even if he still could not be persuaded to wear a shirt in the house. "The corruptisia will not survive long in this realm. Magnus Bane will either finish the potion in time, or the bloom will expire and it will all be for naught."

Jace clenched his teeth. "Very comforting."

Later the same evening that Alec had been sent to the infirmary, Mark Blackthorn had returned to the manor with a dead-drunk Zeke and a torn-up Faerie, much to everyone's surprise. The one-time Hunter had revealed that Kieran's steed had been trailing after him since its master's death, that Zeke had encountered the beast in the stables along with Jem's loaner horse from the Silent Brothers, and had put two and two together. The Stripped Shadowhunter had cornered Mark and shanghaied him into ferrying them both into Deep Faerie to rescue Cassius. The alcohol in his system appeared to have blunted the edge of the effects of the strange land, but he was still sleeping off the no-doubt wicked hangover.

Cristina had gone uncomfortably quiet when her husband had explained his absence as something more than a stroll through the surrounding hillside. Too well did she know the toll that the Faerie realm could take on someone, and despite the fact that Zeke had clearly not made the trip optional, she could not quite bring herself to reconcile with her husband. He had slept on the couch last night, and they were seated at opposite ends of the parlour today. There would be time to discuss it in private later.

Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Sera felt the chill coming from the Latina Shadowhunter and leaned back against Rayce's chest gently until she felt his hands slip around her hips in a protective circle, skimming past where Heosphoros rested against her right leg. As it had in her dream, it just felt right to carry it, and these were uncertain times. She knew without looking that Rayce no doubt wore his double-bladed staff slung across his back, even at home. Baelerithon's threat in the dream world was never far from her thoughts.

She had long-since gamely resigned herself to having that home filled with guests in a strange mix of refugee camp and played-out family reunion. Most of the bedrooms were occupied now, and at least a couch or two that she was aware of after bumping into Mark in the kitchen last night.