“Christopher,” she said. “I’m sorry for having left you here for so long.”
“It’s all right,” he said, though he wasn’t sure it was. “But don’t call me Christopher. No one does.”
“Kit,” she said. “I’m so sorry that we left you here. We were looking after Julian and Emma, so we couldn’t leave the city. It was touch and go for a while, but they just woke up.” She smiled. “I thought you’d want to know.”
Kit was glad to hear it. And yet—“What about the others, are they okay? What about Ty?”
“Ty and the others are fine. And Emma is all right in part thanks to you. You saved her life.”
Kit slumped back against the metal headboard of the bed, relief coursing through him. “So I’m not in trouble for what I did on the battlefield?”
“No,” Tessa said slowly. “But you need to know what it means. There is a story. One shrouded in mystery and misdirection. One that very few people alive know.”
“Something about faerie blood,” Kit said. “The Rider . . . He said, ‘Kit is the child. The descendant of the First Heir.’ But I don’t see how that would be possible.”
Tessa smoothed her skirt out over her legs. “Long ago, the King of Unseelie and the Seelie Queen formed an alliance to unite the faerie Courts. They brought magicians from all over Faerie to cast spells ensuring that the child they had would be the perfect heir. Not all the magic was good magic. Some of it was dark. The King dreamed of a son who would unite the realms, inspire perfect loyalty and perfect love, who would be braver than any faerie knight that had gone before.”
“Sure sounds like me,” muttered Kit.
Tessa flashed him a sympathetic smile. “But when the child was born, she was a girl, Auraline.”
“Plot twist,” said Kit.
“The King had expected a male heir and was . . . upset. In his eyes, the child was flawed, and eventually he set a faerie knight the task of having her killed, though the King had the tale put around that she had been kidnapped, and that is the story most believe.”
“The King planned to kill his own daughter?”
“Indeed, and he has had every daughter of his killed since, in bitterness over Auraline. For she defied him—she was still the Heir. She called upon the knight’s loyalty to her and he let her go. That is what the King tried to hide. He pretended Auraline’s death was the fault of another, even when Auraline fled to the mortal world. There she met a magician who became her husband—a magician who was descended from a line of Shadowhunters who had left the Clave.”
“The Lost Herondales,” Kit guessed.
“Correct. They were your ancestors; their line led to your mother. Through all the past decades, the Unseelie King has hunted those he thought were descended from his daughter, and so the Herondales have hidden, concealed by false names and powerful magic.”
“Why would the King do that?” said Kit.
“Auraline inherited a great deal of magic. The spells done on her before and after she was born were powerful. She is called the First Heir because she was the first faerie born who was heir to the Seelie and Unseelie Court both. And so are all her descendants. Your blood gives you claim to the High Kingship of Faerie.”
“What?” said Kit. “But—I don’t want it. I don’t want to be High King of Faerie!”
“It doesn’t matter what you want, not to them,” Tessa said sadly. “Even if you never went near the throne of Faerie, there are warring factions who would love to get hold of you and use you as a pawn. An army with you at the head of it could take down the King or Queen or both.”
Goose bumps flooded along Kit’s arms. “But doesn’t everyone know who I am now? Because of what happened with the Riders? Are they hunting me?”
Tessa put her hand on his wrist. It was a gentle, motherly touch. Kit could not remember such a touch in all his life. Only the memory of light blond hair and the sound of a lilting voice singing to him. The story that I love you, it has no end.
“Part of the reason we kept you here these last few days was to reach out into Downworld to see if anyone has been talking about you,” said Tessa. “We have many connections, many ways of following gossip in the Markets. But with the chaos of the battle, all the talk is of the death of the Riders, what happened with Emma and Julian, and Kieran’s ascension. There have been words of a warlock who made the great horses of the Riders vanish, but we have spread the word that it was Ragnor Fell.” She rolled her eyes.
“I thought his name was Ragnor Shade?”
“It is Ragnor Fell,” she said, and smiled in a way that made her look nineteen. “He is a scamp, and has been in hiding for some years. He resurfaced in grand style during the battle, and now everyone knows Ragnor Fell is back—and that he defeated the Riders, to boot.” She chuckled. “He will be insufferable.”
“He didn’t actually do it,” said Kit.
“That will not make a difference to Ragnor,” said Tessa gravely.
“So . . . I’m safe?” Kit said. “I could go back to the Institute in Los Angeles?”
“I don’t know.” A line of worry had appeared between Tessa’s brows. “We felt nervous enough before, leaving you, even with you in the Institute and Ragnor nearby to protect you. He even followed you when you went to the Shadow Market.”
“Did he say why we were going to the Shadow Market?” Kit said, forgetting, in his sudden fear for Ty, not to act suspicious.
“Of course not,” said Tessa. “He wasn’t there to tattle on you, just protect you.” She patted his shoulder absently while Kit mused on the strange loyalty of people you barely knew. “The thing is—before, we didn’t realize you’d manifest any of the powers of the Heir. Few of your ancestors have before, save Auraline. We thought if we kept you away from things that might trigger the powers . . .”
“No faeries,” Kit recalled. “No battles.”
“Exactly. If it happens again, word might spread. Besides, faeries have long memories, and we want to make you as safe as possible.”
“Does that mean leaving me in the Silent City? Because I don’t like it here,” Kit said. “I’m not good at Silent. And I don’t want to talk about the bathroom situation.”
“No,” Tessa said. She took a deep breath, and Kit realized she was actually nervous. “What I’m saying is that you should come and live with me and Jem and the child we’re going to have. After all our wandering, we’ve decided to settle down and build a home. We want you to—to build it with us. To be part of our family.”
Kit was almost too stunned to speak, not the least at the revelation that Tessa was pregnant. “But—why?”
Tessa looked at him forthrightly. “Because a long time ago the Herondales gave both Jem and me a home, and we want to do the same for you.”
“But am I actually a Herondale?” he asked. “I thought my father was a Herondale and my
mother was a mundane, but it looks like they were both Shadowhunters. So I don’t even know what my name should be.”
“Your father’s real last name isn’t known,” Tessa said. “He did have a small amount of Shadowhunter blood. It allowed him to have the Sight.”
“I thought Shadowhunter blood bred true?”
“It does, but over the course of many generations it can become diluted. Still, your father could have trained and Ascended had he wanted. He never did. It was your mother who bore runes. It was your mother who has made you the Lost Herondale we searched for for so long. It is your choice, of course. You can bear any name you wish. We would still welcome you in our family whether you were called Kit Herondale or not.”
Kit thought of Jace and of the mother he had never known, who he remembered now only in the songs she had sung him once. The mother who had given up her own life for his.
“I’ll be a Herondale,” he said. “I like the family ring. It’s classy.”
Tessa smiled at him.
“Anyway,” Kit said. “Where are you planning to live?”
“Jem owns a house in Devon. A big old pile. We’ll be going there. We know you care about the Blackthorns, so we’ll understand if you want to stay with them,” she added quickly. “We would be sad, but we would do whatever we can to protect you. Ragnor would help, and Catarina—we’d have to tell the Blackthorns why you needed the protection, of course—”
She was still talking, but Kit had stopped hearing her. The words spilled around him in a meaningless rush as all the memories he’d been trying to push back flew at him like sharply pecking birds. The Institute, the beach, the Blackthorns, always kind to him; Emma saving his life, Julian driving him to the Market and listening to him talk about Ty—even then, he’d wanted to talk about Ty.