AN- have i murdered any of you yet? 

♕

They found their way to the library. The world was swaying around Dahlia like the rolling deck of a ship. She should have stayed at the party.

An other person who died because she couldn't save them.

More blood on her hands.

She nearly started crying remembering her face as she died. Her last request. Her last words before she left the world of the living.

James wasn't looking any better than she felt, his knuckles were nearly white. Matthew was next to him, she couldn't expect him to steady her either. One's parabatai duties were above everything, she knew.

"Math," said James, rigid with strain. "Tell—Anna. Explain to her." 

Voices swirled around Dahlia, Anna's calm and measured, Matthew's urgent and musical. Thomas and Cordelia chiming in. I have to get hold of myself, Dahlia thought. 

"Daisy," said James. "Constantinople."

Dahlia's vision started darkening on the edges, her felt sick like she would faint any second now.

"Math." she whispered before the she fell down, unable to balance herself. Matthew was by her side in an instant.

"Dahlia, look at me darling. Yes like that, with your beautiful blue eyes. Thank you. How are you feeling?"

"Like I'm going to die." she muttered.

Matthew shook his head, "No your not." he said, helping her stand.

"You dreamed of Filomena's death?" Anna was saying, perching on the arm of a chair. "And this has nothing to do with your visions of the shadow realm?" 

"I did dream of her death. Pounceby's, too. But they're not dreams of a different world," James said, drawing out his stele. "I dream of London. The details are real. The only death I didn't see was Amos Gladstone's, and I still had a nightmare that night, a sort of vision of blood."

"The Enclave is fairly certain that he was also murdered," said Thomas. "His throat was slashed roughly—they had assumed by a demon talon, but it could have been someone with a serrated blade."

"Perhaps the murderer was still working out his technique," said Matthew. "I suppose even killers have to practice." 

Dahlia shook her head, "Fairchild, killers already have practice." 

"He certainly seemed to be taking more pleasure from killing Filomena," said James. "It was sickening."

Lucie appeared in the doorway, giving them a start. She was very pale. "I'm sorry," she began. "I stayed behind—"

"Lucie!" Cordelia exclaimed, hurrying over to her friend. "Are you all right?"

Lucie rubbed at her eyes, the same gesture she'd once made as a tired little girl. "I saw a ghost," she said, without preamble. 

"Doesn't that happen rather often?" said Matthew. Dahlia shot him aquelling look. "Sorry—I just didn't think it was too out of the ordinary." 

"This one was," said Lucie. "He told me that—that Filomena's ghost is already risen, and where she might be found. He seemed to think she might know who killed her."

"Odd that I didn't see him," said James. 

"Well, you were staggering, rather, and Matthew was holding you like a sack of oats," pointed out Anna. "So where is Filomena's ghost, Lucie?"

"Limehouse. An old factory," said Lucie. "I wrote down the address."

"I'm all for conversing with the dead and gathering clues," Thomas said, "but what if this is a trap?"

"It's true that when mysterious spectral figures appear in novels telling the hero to visit a certain place, it's always a trap," Lucie admitted. A little of the color was coming back into her cheeks. "But it could also be true. We can't afford not to go—Filomena might be able to point us directly at the murderer."

"Still a trap," said Matthew. He had left her sitting on the table and stood next to James.

 "A trap is a surprise attack," said James. "We won't be surprised, will we?" He winked at Lucie.

"Exactly," she said. "This ghost—and he didn't seem a bad sort, he was rather stylish, even—approached me alone. He has no reason to think that if I went to the place, I'd bring all my friends along."

"We should go," James said, "If we assume this ghostly advice is a trap, and ignore it, then we have no clues. If we assume it means something, and follow it up, we might discover something useful. Do you see what I mean?" 

"You mean that we have a choice," said Dahlia. "Go to the Limehouse docks, and perhaps learn something, or do nothing, and certainly learn nothing."

 "If there's really a chance we could speak to Filomena's ghost, we have to try." Cordelia spoke firmly.

"And if it's an ambush, there will be more than enough of us to handle it," Anna said. "We can't just roll up to the docks in the Consul's carriage, though. We'll have to glamour ourselves and keep a low profile."

"Delightful!" said Matthew. "We'll take the train. I love the train. The little tickets are so amusing."

Dahlia laughed softly, "Of course you do, Matthew." 

He winked at her.

Anna raised an eyebrow at the two.

Dahlia pointedly avoided her gaze.

♕

As they made their way into the chilly, bustling interior of Fenchurch Street Station, Dahlia was awestruck. This station was filled with people: flower sellers, newsstands, telegraph offices, passengers rushing to and fro in the fog of steam from the engines, the smell of burning coal strong on the air. Dim light seeped through grimy panes in the arched ceiling high above, illuminating a large sign reading CHARRINGTON ALES. Below it hung the big station clock.

They were all in gear and heavily glamoured, save Matthew. He had thrown on a long coat to cover his Marks, but he insisted that they pay for their train tickets, regardless of the fact that James, Dahlia, Thomas, Anna, Cordelia, and Lucie were entirely invisible to the mundane eye. Luckily, the queue at the ticket office was a short one. Dahlia rolled her eyes at him as he carefully fished out seven threepenny bits from a pocket and handed them over. Their train was departing in just a few minutes, and as they followed Matthew to the platform, an engine heaved into place, disgorging smoke and steam. It was a small train, with just three carriages, and not many passengers in the middle of the day. They found themselves a conveniently empty third-class compartment and piled in. 

They spread themselves over the brown plush seats—all except Anna, who remained standing. Matthew had slumped into a seat by the window. James eyed him; there was always love in the way he looked at Matthew, but it was mixed now with worry. "Did you completely move out of your parents' house, Math?" 

Matthew looked up, flushing slightly. "Leave it to you to guess, I suppose—or did someone tell you?"

"Your father rather hinted at it to Thomas," said James. "That and according to Thomas, you had taken Oscar, so I take you completely moved in to your new house?" 

Dahlia looked down at her hand, biting her lip.

"Well, yes." Matthew sighed. "I've been eyeing this automobile for weeks, I even put a deposit on it, but I couldn't if I was still partially with my parents. Yesterday afternoon I decided it was time." He met James's gaze with his own.

The whistle blew loudly. The carriage doors slammed and the train chuffed away from the station in a cloud of black smoke.

Dahlia sighed, Matthew hadn't told her that he had deposited an automobile. Why did that hurt? He was allowed to have his secrets. Of course he was, they had only professed their love for each other, nothing to big.

 Thomas was looking thoughtful. "I wonder why that ghost approached Lucie, rather than one of the older Shadowhunters of the Enclave? Most Nephilim can see ghosts if the ghosts wish to be seen."

Lucie shrugged. "Maybe because I was the last one into the Institute this morning."

"It could be," said James. "Or it could be that there are certainly many Enclave members who wouldn't be all that keen on receiving information from a ghost." 

The compartment was stuffy and smelled of damp woolen overcoats. Outside the sun had vanished behind clouds. A drizzling rain hazed the outlines of rows of grimy little terraced houses backing directly onto the tracks, with the vague outlines of factory chimneys in the distance. The train stopped briefly at Shadwell. It was raining harder now and the long, wet platform with its dripping wooden canopy was completely deserted. As the train pulled away, live sparks from the coal shot past the window like fireflies, oddly beautiful in the mist. 

"Shadowhunters are being killed," Anna said grimly. "We should be glad that anyone cares enough to pass along a clue, ghost or no. I believe the popular attitude among most of Downworld is that we can take care of our own problems, since we meddle in everyone else's." 

Now the train was running alongside a looming row of tall black warehouses, the spaces between them briefly giving fog-blurred glimpses of an expanse of water on the right, crowded with the tall, ghostly masts of Thames barges, bringing in cargoes from the river

 "That's Regent's Canal Dock," said Dahlia. "We're almost there." 

Everyone got up as the train pulled into Limehouse station. A guard in a peaked cap and dripping overcoat eyed Matthew curiously as he held out his ticket for punching. The others slipped by invisibly and started down the wooden stairs behind him. Dahlia held back for a second waiting for him and then followed after Thomas.

It was still raining as they emerged from the station under the railway bridge onto a narrow, cobbled street. Dahlia was drenched in a matter of minutes, she blew a bit of her hair out of her face, annoyed.

 In front of them, looming through the mist, was the dim bulk of a huge church with a tall square tower. They started for the address given by the ghost, following the churchyard wall along the street until they reached a quiet little lane crowded with small houses. At the end of the alley was a low wall, from beyond which came the faint sound of something large slicing through water: a barge on a canal. 

"This is the Limehouse Cut," said Matthew. "It ought to be just up here."

It was a working day; the canal was busy with watermen shouting to each other, their voices echoing oddly across the water as they maneuvered heavily laden barges in both directions, barely visible through the fog, which seemed even thicker down here. The Shadowhunters slipped down the narrow towpath silently, passing the high walls of warehouses until Dahlia came to a stop beside a doorway set into a high fence. 

The corners of the door were coated heavily in spiderwebs; it had clearly not been used in years. A rusty padlock hung ineffectively from an even rustier hasp. Across the warped and rotten boards, peeling paint spelled out the ghosts of faded letters, unreadable except for the last row: ILMAKERS.

James raised an eyebrow. "Thomas?" he said.

Thomas turned sideways and slammed his shoulder into the door. It promptly collapsed. The Shadowhunters piled through and found themselves standing in a tiny yard filled with a tangle of weeds and rubble, looking at the back of a building. It might have been painted white, once. Now its bricks were green with mildew, its windows cracked and blind with dust. A set of rotting wooden steps led up to a gaping doorway into darkness. 

"If I were writing a novel in which someone set up a headquarters for their criminal enterprises," Lucie said, "I would describe a place just like this." 

"Wishing you had your notebook?" said Cordelia. Lucie winked. "You know me too well."

Dahlia sighed inwardly, her worry for Christopher and guilt over Filomena had consumed her, she wasn't ale to focus that well on what was going on around her. She clenched her fingers in the skirts of her dress, quietly praying that she didn't need to change. 

The steps, surprisingly, held their weight as they climbed carefully and lightly up one by one. James led the way, laying a finger to his lips, and the other five followed through the doorway and down a low-ceilinged, pitch black, spidery corridor. Webs brushed unpleasantly against Dahlia's face as they moved silently along, and she could hear the scrabbling of rats inside the walls. She made a face as she pushed past the cobwebs.

Suddenly they were in a wide-open space, no doubt the main factory floor, with iron pillars all around it like a cloister in a cathedral. A peaked glass roof with iron ribs arched high above, and a gallery circled the room halfway up. Large metal hooks dangled from iron chains attached to gantries overhead. ILMAKERS, the sign outside had said. It must have been a sailmaker's factory, where swaths of canvas would have been hung up to dry. Now, the empty hooks spun lazily in the dusty air; beneath them, dimly lit by the roof-light, lay the ruins of an enormous, splintered loom.

Lucie looked around, her face tight. "She's here," she said. 

James shot her a curious, sideways look. "Filomena? Where?"

Lucie didn't answer. She was already scrambling past a number of rusting iron machines whose purpose was unclear, picking her way over the cluttered floorboards. "Filomena?" she called. She kicked aside a chunk of rotting plaster. "Filomena!"

 The others exchanged glances. Anna took out a witchlight rune-stone, sending up a flare of light; the others fell into step, following Lucie. She seemed to be making her way toward the center of the room, where debris lay in dark heaps. 

Dahlia made a strangled sound as Lucie called out, "Come here!"

She leaped over a piece of broken floorboard, finding Lucie standing white-faced and ill-looking over a pile of what looked like discarded rags. The floor was stained with a dark sludge. "Luce?"

The others had arrived, bringing with them the comfort of witchlight. Anna prodded the rags with her boot, then knelt to look more closely, using the tip of her finger to lift a corner of the fabric. Her face tightened. "This is the shawl Filomena was wearing when she left my flat."

Thomas speared another dark piece of clothing with a dagger, holding it a loft. "And this is someone's cloak. Stained with blood—" 

Lucie held her hand out. "Could I see the shawl—please?"

Anna handed it to her. The shawl was of a pale cashmere, torn an dragged now. James stood back as Lucie bunched the fabric up in her hand, her lips moving, though she was making no sound. 

Something glimmered in the air. Lucie looked up, and in her eyes Dahlia could see a reflection of the growing light, as if two lamps glowed within her pupils. "Filomena?" Lucie said. "Filomena, is that you?" 

The shimmer resolved itself, like a sketch being filled in around the edges, taking form and shape. A long yellow dress, a blood-splattered white shoe on a slender foot. Long dark hair, catching the faint breeze, swaying like black sailcloth. The ghost of a girl, hovering above them, wrapped in the translucent ghost of a shawl.

Filomena di Angelo.

"Mi sono persa. Ho tanto freddo," the ghost whispered, her voice desolate. Oh, I am lost. And so cold.

Dahlia glanced around at the others' puzzled faces; it seemed she was the only one who spoke Italian. "You are among friends, Filomena," she said gently.

"I drifted in shadow," said the ghost-girl, in English. "Now you have called my name. Why?"

"To secure justice," said Lucie. "You should not have died. Who did this to you?"

Filomena gazed down at them. Dahlia felt the hairs along the back of her neck rise. She had never thought closely about how eerie it must be for Lucie, for James, to be able to see the dead. They were not simply insubstantial people. They were very alien indeed. Filomena's eyes, which had been so dark, were entirely white now—no iris at all, only two single black pinpoints of pupils. "He came out of the shadows. There was a blade in his hand. I fought him. I cut him. He bled. Red blood, like a man. But his eyes ..." Filomena's mouth twisted, elongating strangely. "They were filled with hate. Such hate." 

"His blood is here," Filomena whispered. Her gaze had fallen on Thomas. "I spilled it, but not enough. I was not strong enough. He took from me. My strength, my life." Dark hair drifted across Filomena's face. "I could not withstand him."

"It's not your fault, Filomena," Dahlia said. "You fought bravely. But tell us who he was. Was he a Shadowhunter?" 

Filomena's head whipped toward her. Her gaze fixed on Dahlia, her eyes changing shape, widening into impossible circles. "Per quale motivosono stata abbandonata, lasciata sola a farmi massacrare?" she whispered. Why did you leave me alone to be slaughtered? 

Filomena's voice rose to an eerie singsong, the musical Italian words skipping over each other in her haste to say them: "Dahlia, detentrice di Caliburn, la spada sacra, sorella di Excalibur. Sembri il suo prescelto, parlano di te nell'aldilà. Perché mi hai lasciato morire?Hai solo più sangue sulle mani ora, figlia degli Angeli."

Stricken, Dahlia staggered back and could only stammer, "Filomena—I'm so sorry, Filomena—" 

But Filomena had begun to twist and jerk, as if a strong wind were blowing through her. A network of lines appeared on her face, splintering with lightning speed into a web of cracks throughout her whole body. She moaned, a sound of terrible pain. "Lasciami andare ... let me go.... There, I have told you.... I cannot bear it any longer...." 

Dahlia sucked in a breath, biting her lip so hard she could taste blood. 

"Go, if you wish it." Lucie spread her hands out. "Filomena, I will not hold you here."

The Italian girl went still. For a moment, she looked as she had in life—her face full of hope and thought, the tension of her body gone. Then she shuddered and crumbled apart like dust, vanishing into nothing among the particles in the air.

Dahlia curled her hands into tight fists, so tight she could feel blood seeping from her palms. 

Good, she thought. You deserve it.

"By the Angel," said Anna, gazing at Lucie. "Is it always so harrowing, speaking with ghosts?"

Lucie was silent; it was James who replied. "No," he said. "But ghosts remain on Earth to fulfill unfinished business. I think Filomena's was telling us what she knew. Once she'd done that, she was desperate to rest."

"I'm not sure she knew that much, poor girl," Matthew said. 

"What did she say to you, Dahlia?" Thomas asked. "That was a great deal of Italian." 

Before Dahlia could respond, a loud noise echoed from deeper within the factory. The small group of Shadowhunters spun around. Cordelia caught her breath—the dangling chains were whipping back and forth overhead, the hooks suspended from them swinging wildly. 

"We're not alone," Anna hissed suddenly, angling her witchlight toward the gallery above. The ruby necklace at her throat was pulsing with light like a second heart.

Dust and grayness, the humped shapes of broken machines; then Dahlia spotted a shadow moving along the underside of the gallery railing, scuttling on what seemed like countless thick grayish limbs. 

She pulled out her chakaras.

All around her, the others were arming themselves: Anna with her whip, Thomas his Argentinian bolas, James with a throwing knife, Matthew with a seraph blade, Lucie her axe.

Spider, Dahlia thought. The demon was indeed arachnoid: its row of six eyes gleamed as it leaped to a dangling iron hook and swung out into the open space, chittering wildly. Its front four legs ended in claws with long, curved talons. The additional legs protruding from the back each ended in a hook. Mandibles jutted from either side of its fanged mouth. 

The demon sprang from the hook.

"Anna!" Cordelia yelled. Dahlia spun around just before Anna ducked out of the way.

Dahlia felt a flash of relief.

Anna came out of her crouch into a full spin, sending her whip whistling toward the demon. It reared up to avoid being hit, its back four legs clinging to the loom as the whip slashed through the air.

"Ourobas demon!" James called. He flung his knife, but the Ourobas had already scuttled down from the loom and under a piece of broken machinery. The knife buried itself in the opposite wall. 

You know it personally?" Matthew had his blade at the ready. Lucie was beside him, her axe out, clearly waiting for an opportunity to engage the creature at close quarters. 

James leaped atop a nearby pile of rusted metal, flicking his gaze over the factory floor. "Never had the pleasure, but they're meant to be fast and agile. Not too clever, though." 

"Sounds like some people we've met," said Dahlia. 

 James yelled a warning. Lucie lashed out with her axe as the demon hurtled past her, barreling straight for Thomas. He was ready with his bolas: the flexible leather thong shot out and doubled back, emitting a deafening crack as it encircled one of the demon's legs and pulled tight. The leg was wrenched off: with a spray of ichor it fell to the ground, where it twitched like a dying insect.

The demon howled and leaped for a dangling hook, catching it and swinging away fast. James swore, but there was no point chasing it; it had already pushed off one of the gantries and was flying, ichor dripping from its injured leg, directly at Cordelia. She raised Cortana, then suddenly dropped it with a gasp.

Dahlia heard Lucie scream. Cordelia flung herself to the ground and rolled, the Ourobas's claws narrowly missing her.

 The Ourobas yowled, dropping to the debris-strewn floor. Lucie's throwing axe had buried itself deep in the demon's side, but it didn't even slow down. It sprang toward Cordelia. She could smell the stink of ichor as she scrambled backward, fumbling at her belt for a seraph blade—

A blast ricocheted through the room, echoing off the walls. Something punched through the Ourobas, leaving a smoking wound behind. Jittering, twitching, the Ourobas gave an unearthly shriek and vanished.

Lucie's axe fell to the floor, where it stuck, blade-down. 

Cordelia scrambled to her feet. The others all turning to stare at a spot just behind her. There was smoke in the air, and the unmistakable smell of cordite. 

 James had his arm extended, a revolver gleaming in his right hand. A wisp of smoke rose from the barrel.

"By the Angel! It worked! Jamie it worked!" Dahlia cried, smiling despite the circumstances. 

"Dahlia," said Anna, brushing dirt from the sleeves of her gear jacket. "Explain yourself." 

"Christopher made it," Matthew said, breaking the shocked silence. "He wanted to make a runed gun that could fire. But only James can shoot it."

"Are you sure?" Anna said. She approached James, holding out her hand. "Let me try."

James handed the gun over. Anna pointed it at a window and pulled the trigger; everyone winced, but nothing happened. She handed it back to James with a curious look.

"Well," she said. "That is interesting." 

James looked at Lucie. "It might work for you, as well," he said. "I'm not the only one—you know." 

But Lucie held her hands up, shaking her head. "No. I don't want to try, James."

"But you ought, Luce," said Matthew. "What if Christopher could make a second one? Think what we could do against demons with two of them. Two of you." 

Dahlia shook her head in mild amusement, and turned to Cordelia quietly checking over the girl.

"Are you okay?" she asked her quietly. Cordelia only nodded, her eyes not leaving James. Dahlia felt a small smile make it's way to her mouth.

"If you say so."

"Oh, all right," Lucie said crossly, and went toward James, taking the gun from him.

Dahlia walked off, standing next to Matthew.

 "Nothing," Lucie said. "It doesn't appear to be a talent we share, James. Like seeing the shadow realm." She glanced around the factory. "Speaking of which, this place gives me the creeps. I'd rather be elsewhere, gun or not."

No one disagreed. As they headed back out of the factory, into the grim drizzle, Dahlia could not help but hear, over and over, the last words Filomena had spoken to her. She thought she would hear them for the rest of her life. 

Dahlia, holder of Caliburn, the sacred sword, Excalibur's sister. You look like his chosen one, they talk about you in the afterlife. Why did you let me die? You only have more blood on your hands now, daughter of the Angels.

♕