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I

DARK DESCENT

I sung of Chaos and eternal Night,

Taught by the heav—nly Muse to venture down

The dark descent, and up to reascend …

—John Milton, Paradise Lost

1

PANDEMONIUM

“YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME,” THE BOUNCER SAID, folding his arms across his massive chest He stared down at the boy in the red zip-up jacket and shook his shaved head “You can’t bring that thing in here”

The fifty or so teenagers in line outside the Pande wait to get into the all-ages club, especially on a Sunday, and not enerally happened in line The bouncers were fierce and would co to start trouble Fifteen-year-old Clary Fray, standing in line with her best friend, Si for some excitement

“Aw, co up over his head It looked like a wooden beam, pointed at one end “It’s part of my costume”

The bouncer raised an eyebrow “Which is what?”

The boy grinned He was norht, for Pandemonium He had electric-blue dyed hair that stuck up around his head like the tendrils of a startled octopus, but no elaborate facial tattoos or big h his ears or lips “I’ It bent as easily as a blade of grass bending sideways “It’s fake Foam rubber See?”

The boy’s wide eyes ay too bright a green, Clary noticed: the color of antifreeze, spring grass Colored contact lenses, probably The bouncer shrugged, abruptly bored “Whatever Go on in”

The boy slid past him, quick as an eel Clary liked the lilt to his shoulders, the way he tossed his hair as he went There was a word for him that her mother would have used—insouciant

“You thought he was cute,” said Sined “Didn’t you?”

Clary dug her elbow into his ribs, but didn’t answer

Inside, the club was full of dry-ice s it into a reens, hot pinks and golds

The boy in the red jacket stroked the long razor-sharp blade in his hands, an idle s over his lips It had been so easy—a little bit of a glalaht at hiotten by without all that trouble, but it was part of the fun—fooling the ht in front of the off on the blank looks on their sheeplike faces

Not that the hureen eyes scanned the dance floor, where slender limbs clad in scraps of silk and black leather appeared and disappeared inside the revolving colu hair, boys swung their leather-clad hips, and bare skin glittered with sweat Vitality just poured off they that filled him with a drunken dizziness His lip curled They didn’t kno lucky they were They didn’t knohat it was like to eke out life in a dead world, where the sun hung lihtly as candle flames—and were as easy to snuff out

His hand tightened on the blade he carried, and he had begun to step out onto the dance floor, when a girl broke away fro toward hi hair nearly the precise color of black ink, charcoaled eyes Floor-length white gown, the kind woer Lace sleeves belled out around her slim ar a dark red pendant the size of a baby’s fist He only had to narrow his eyes to know that it was real—real and precious His y pulsed fro hi the phantom sizzle of her death on his lips

It was always easy He could already feel the power of her evaporating life coursing through his veins like fire Hu so precious, and they barely safeguarded it at all They threay their lives forsh the colored s her skirt up in her hands, lifting it as she grinned at hih boots

He sauntered up to her, his skin prickling with her nearness Up close she wasn’t so perfect: He could see theher hair to her neck He could smell her ht

A cool smile curled her lips She ainst a closed door NO ADMITTANCE—STORAGE was scrawled across it in red paint She reached behind her for the knob, turned it, slid inside He caught a glilanced behind hi So much the better if she wanted privacy

He slipped into the roo followed

“So,” Siood music, eh?”

Clary didn’t reply They were dancing, or what passed for it—a lot of swaying back and forth with occasional lunges toward the floor as if one of theroup of teenage boys inout passionately, their colored hair extensions tangled together like vines A boy with a lip piercing and a teddy bear backpack was handing out free tablets of herbal ecstasy, his parachute pants flapping in the breeze fro s—her eyes were on the blue-haired boy who’d talked his way into the club He was prowling through the crowd as if he were looking for so about the way he…

“I, for one,” Si myself immensely”

This seemed unlikely Simon, as always, stuck out at the club like a sore thumb, in jeans and an old T-shirt that said MADE IN BROOKLYN across the front His freshly scrubbed hair was dark brown instead of green or pink, and his glasses perched crookedly on the end of his nose He looked less as if he were conte the powers of darkness and more as if he were on his way to chess club

“Mmm-hmm” Clary knew perfectly well that he came to Pandeht it was boring She wasn’t even sure why it was that she liked it—the clothes, the music,real life at all But she was always too shy to talk to anyone but Simon

The blue-haired boy washis way off the dance floor He looked a little lost, as if he hadn’t found who for Clary wondered ould happen if she went up and introduced herself, offered to show him around Maybe he’d just stare at her Or rateful and pleased, and try not to show it, the way boys did—but she’d know Maybe—

The blue-haired boy straightened up suddenly, snapping to attention, like a hunting dog on point Clary followed the line of his gaze, and saw the girl in the white dress