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“We use the family-finding rune to track down Dru,” Ty said promptly, as if he’d been thinking about it. He probably had been; he was clearly hyperfocused on his plan to find Dru. “I’m sure Clary will be with her.”

That’s a lot of assumptions. “Well, that seems like a plan that couldn’t possibly go wrong,” Kit said.

Tessa shot him a dark look. “What Kit means is that there’s a lot that isn’t known. Why would the Fair Folk have shut their doors to us? Why would they kidnap Shadowhunters with such little subtlety that they almost got caught? These locked doorways could be a trick or a trap. They could even want us to try to get through.”

Ty closed his fist around his fidget toy. “But we can’t just do nothing—”

“We’re not going to do nothing,” Jem said, returning to the library. Kit struggled to read the look on his face. He looked more grave than usual, a shadow in his eyes making Kit even more nervous than he already was. “In a few hours we’ll leave for New York, all of us. We’ll join the Conclave and do everything we can to help them find Clary and Dru.”

“Maybe they don’t need our help in New York,” said Ty, and Kit could tell that what Jem was suggesting was, for some reason, the last thing Ty wanted. “Maybe they need us to be doing something else.”

Jem looked at Ty, not without sympathy. “I didn’t tell them you were with us, Ty. I thought you’d want to discuss all this with them yourself. Your whole family will be gathering with the Conclave and you should be with them.”

“That’s right,” Tessa said, rising to her feet. “Let’s get you some dry clothes, you can sleep for a few hours, and you’ll feel worlds better.”

Kit looked at Ty. Jem and Tessa might not have seen it, but he knew Ty well enough to recognize that dry clothes and rest were not going to blunt his determination. Not even a little bit.

Magnus

“I’ll go,” said Jace. “I should be the one.”

Magnus looked around at his companions. They had gathered in the library, all of them who had so recently been at Pandemonium, enjoying the music and a night out with friends. Simon, pacing back and forth as if he meant to wear a path in the floor. Isabelle, her eyes red. Thais, Dru’s best friend, who appeared to be in shock. Alec, who had come into the room while Jace was speaking, standing patient and weary with a sheaf of papers in his hand.

And Jace. It was almost as if he had reverted to the boy Magnus had met so long ago—before Magnus had become part of the Lightwood family, before Jace had fallen in love with Clary. Clipped, quick, clever, and almost emotionless. But Magnus knew better now, knew to look below the surface. Jace wasn’t acting the way he was because he felt nothing—he was acting that way because he felt too much.

“To Faerie? I should go too,” Simon said. “I’m her parabatai. I can sense where she is.” He tapped the place where his parabatai rune lay. “No reason only one of us should go, anyway.”

“I should go as well,” Thais said unexpectedly. “Dru is my best friend. The rest of you would be looking for Clary, but I would be looking for her.”

“Stop,” said Alec. He sounded tired but firm. “I’m not sure any of us will be going to Faerie. Not right now.”

Magnus glanced at his husband in surprise. Surely Alec wouldn’t forbid this group of people from going to look for Clary. Magnus knew the responsibilities of being Consul weighed heavily on Alec, but Alec hadn’t been the Consul when they’d all reached the roof to find Clary gone. He had been a friend, stunned and horrified that Clary had been whisked away from them without a warning or explanation. Magnus had been one of the last to reach the roof. It had been Jace, white-faced but steady, who had told him what the rest of them had seen—a faerie knight carrying Clary away into the darkness. Magnus had gone to Alec’s side and taken his hand, but it was only later—after they had called Maryse and asked her to remain with their sons, Max and Rafe, the whole night—that Magnus had seen a flash of the Consul.

“If this was an act sanctioned by Faerie,” said Alec, “then this is a massive betrayal. And it will be met with the force required.”

Magnus hadn’t said anything. Alec was angry, and he didn’t blame him. But the kidnapping of Clary and Dru didn’t seem like the opening sally of a war to him: It was stranger, perhaps more sinister, than that. Courts and governments worked in certain predictable ways, but individual people, with their uncontrolled feelings, their actions taken on the spur of the moment, could be much more destructive.

“I’ve been getting messages from the heads of Institutes all night,” Alec said now. His eyes were on Jace as he spoke, full of worry for his parabatai. “No one’s been able to make meaningful contact with anyone in Faerie—or get into Faerie. It’s like all the entrances vanished or shut down in a matter of minutes. The Silent Brothers are investigating, but we don’t yet know who is even responsible—”

“Has anyone tried to reach Mark and Cristina? They were in Faerie,” said Jace. “What about Diana and Gwyn? Or Nene?”

“Nene is with the wild fey,” Magnus said. “She might not be reachable at the best of times. Diana says that Gwyn was with the Hunt in Faerie and she can’t reach him. And no messages are going through for Mark and Cristina.”

“And we can’t get into Faerie to look for Clary and Dru?” Isabelle asked. “Not at all?”

“Not at all.” Alec shook his head. “We have to think,” he said. “Why Clary? Why Drusilla?”

“Dru was following Clary because someone told her to,” Thais said. “I didn’t see who it was, but I think Dru must have gone after Clary because she knew she was in danger.”

I have an idea who it might have been, Magnus thought, but his suspicions were irrelevant to the issue at hand. “You think Dru was taken not because of who she is, but just because she was with Clary? That Clary was the main target?”

“It makes sense,” said Isabelle. “Clary’s the head of an Institute, and she has powers none of the rest of us do. Dru is just a kid.”

So she may well be in much more danger, Magnus thought, but he didn’t say it, and a moment later he was very glad he hadn’t. The library door opened and Emma and Julian came in, looking as if they’d been roused from bed in the middle of the night. Julian’s shirt was buttoned wrong, and Emma was carrying Cortana’s scabbard—a beautiful object decorated with leaves and runes, and one quite familiar to Magnus—in her hand. Under other circumstances it would have been funny.

“What’s going on?” Julian demanded. “Helen just told me it was an emergency and to get to the Portal. Is it the Cohort? Did something happen…?”

His voice trailed off as his gaze landed on Thais, who returned his gaze, her eyes full of a bitter sadness.