Free The Mortal Instruments - Complete Collection by Cassandra Clare

up—”
    “We’re sent where we’re needed,” said Jace shortly. “And there are a few, like Isabelle and Alec, who grow up away from the home country because that’s where their parents are. With all the resources of the Institute here, with Hodge’s training—” He broke off. “This is the library.”
    They had reached an arch-shaped set of wooden doors. A blue Persian cat with yellow eyes lay curled in front of them. It raised its head as they approached and yowled. “Hey, Church,” Jace said, stroking the cat’s back with a bare foot. The cat slit its eyes in pleasure.
    “Wait,” said Clary. “Alec and Isabelle and Max—they’re the only Shadowhunters your age that you know, that you spend time with?”
    Jace stopped stroking the cat. “Yes.”
    “That must get kind of lonely.”
    “I have everything I need.” He pushed the doors open. After a moment’s hesitation she followed him inside.
    The library was circular, with a ceiling that tapered to a point, as if it had been built inside a tower. The walls were lined with books, the shelves so high that tall ladders set on casters were placed along them at intervals. These were no ordinary books either—these were books bound in leather and velvet, clasped with sturdy-looking locks and hinges made of brass and silver. Their spines were studded with dully glowing jewels and illuminated with gold script. They looked worn in a way that made it clear that these books were not just old but were well used, and had been loved.
    The floor was polished wood, inlaid with chips of glass and marble and bits of semiprecious stone. The inlay formed a pattern that Clary couldn’t quite decipher—it might have been the constellations, or even a map of the world; she suspected she’d have to climb up into the tower and look down in order to see it properly.
    In the center of the room sat a magnificent desk. It was carved from a single slab of wood, a great, heavy piece of oak that gleamed with the dull shine of years. The slab rested upon the backs of two angels, carved from the same wood, their wings gilded and their faces engraved with a look of suffering, as if the weight of the slab were breaking their backs. Behind the desk sat a thin man with gray-streaked hair and a long beaky nose.
    “A book lover, I see,” he said, smiling at Clary. “You didn’t tell me that, Jace.”
    Jace chuckled. Clary could tell that he had come up behind her and was standing there with his hands in his pockets, grinning that infuriating grin of his. “We haven’t done much talking during our short acquaintance,” he said. “I’m afraid our reading habits didn’t come up.”
    Clary turned around and shot him a glare.
    “How can you tell?” she asked the man behind the desk. “That I like books, I mean.”
    “The look on your face when you walked in,” he said, standing up and coming around from behind the desk. “Somehow I doubted you were that impressed by
me.
”
    Clary stifled a gasp as he rose. For a moment it seemed to her that he was strangely misshapen, his left shoulder humped and higher than the other. As he approached, she saw that the hunch was actually a bird, perched neatly on his shoulder—a glossy feathered creature with bright black eyes.
    “This is Hugo,” the man said, touching the bird on his shoulder. “Hugo is a raven, and, as such, he knows many things. I, meanwhile, am Hodge Starkweather, a professor of history, and, as such, I do not know nearly enough.”
    Clary laughed a little, despite herself, and shook his outstretched hand. “Clary Fray.”
    “Honored to make your acquaintance,” he said. “I would be honored to make the acquaintance of anyone who could kill a Ravener with her bare hands.”
    “It wasn’t my bare hands.” It still felt odd to be congratulated for killing something. “It was Jace’s—well, I don’t remember what it was called, but—”
    “She means my Sensor,” Jace said. “She shoved it down the