All my thoughts: Lord of Shadows by Cassandra Clare (Part 1)

Analyzing book No. 2 in The Dark Artifices trilogy

By the Angel.

How am I supposed to start this post after taking that 700-page, one-way feels trip to the Great Big Sad?

Lord of Shadows is the second book in Cassandra Clare’s trilogy The Dark Artifices. It picks up shortly after the events of Lady Midnight, with the Blackthorn family dealing with the aftermath of their battle with warlock Malcolm Fade.

There’s an influx of sea demons, a Centurion-led Clave investigation to find Fade’s body, an unplanned rescue mission into Faerie, a race to find the Black Volume, an opportunity to end the Cold Peace, a power grab for the L.A. Institute, testimonies that turn to tragedies, lies told freely and promises made with the intent to be broken, and so much love along with even more pain.

A lot happened, so this will definitely be a multi-part post. First up, I’ll break down the plot and major happenings of LoS, including my new favorite book moment of all time. It’s probably obvious, but go ahead and make a guess down in the comments before you continue reading and see if it’s right! I’ll also be screaming into the abyss about Emma and Julian’s character development both as individuals and a couple.

In part two, I’m going to discuss my love of Ty, Livvy and Kit as a mystery-solving trio, the hot faerie threesome that’s brewing, and relive the pain of the final chapter. I’ll also be crying about how our Mortal Instruments gang are full-blown adults now, and how I’m not OK.

Here’s part one of all my thoughts on Lord of Shadows by Cassandra Clare.

I really love the cover art on *The Dark A*rtifices paperbacks. They’re gorgeous.

There’s a lot going on here

Honestly, I usually cover the plot late in my analyses. However, so much happens in Lord of Shadows that I simply can’t think of a way to talk about everything else without first laying out the framework of exactly how everything plays out.

The Dark Artifices continues to have one of the best plots of a Clare series, but it did falter in this second installment in a way that made me roll my eyes. I’ll get to that later.

OK, so let’s break everything down.

The Centurions, the Cohort & the Cold Peace

LoS starts with the Clave sending Centurions to the L.A. Institute to locate Fade’s body and the Black Volume, which they believe is the key to stopping the surgence of sea demon activity since the warlock’s death.

Lady Midnight already informed readers about how the Centurions are a big deal in the Clave. They’re graduates of the Scholomance, meaning they’re some of the best Shadowhunters the Nephilim have to offer. However, they’re shady as hell. Immediately they push the Blackthorns aside as if this family didn’t do all the legwork to stop Fade in the first place.

Many of the Centurions despise Downworlders — not just the usual hatred that most of the Shadowhunters hold for faeries these days — and they align with the Cohort, a group that formed after the introduction of the Cold Peace and wishes to register, detain and control all Downworlders. It’s pretty much the Shadow World’s version of the Westboro Baptist Church.

Zara Dearborn, a Centurion and Not-So-Perfect Diego’s fiancé that he failed to mention to anybody, is a major proponent of the Cohort and the registry. Zara is looking to find the Blackthorns unfit to run the Institute so that her father can take over and have the power to pass the Registry into Law.

I found it interesting that Clare decided to present yet another group of Nephilim with an intense hatred for Downworlders. At first, I rolled my eyes. We already faced Valentine Morgenstern and his Circle. It was a huge ‘been there, done that’ moment for me.

However, I understand what Clare was going for with the Cohort storyline. The Nephilim often see themselves as a superior race because they’ve been blessed by the Angel. You would think they were smart enough to learn from their past mistakes. If there’s one thing I’ve learned throughout The Shadowhunter Chronicles, it’s that the Nephilim don’t like to admit they were wrong and they like to cover up anything that paints a different picture.

The Cold Peace created a tension between Shadowhunters and the Downworld, and that tension allowed for the seeds of dislike to blossom into hatred and cruelty.

Clare is obviously trying to represent the political climate of the real world in her fantasy one, which I’m OK with. She created a fairly low fantasy world that resides in the shadows of reality, so it makes sense that her characters would face issues that affect our world as well as their own and that they would often intermingle. If it’s possible for white supremacists to march down the streets of Charlottesville over 70 years after the horrors of the Holocaust, it’s possible for Shadowhunters to forget the brutality of the Circle and allow for a repeat of history.

It’s ironic though, because Shadowhunters often believe that they are superior to the mundanes they were created to protect. Based on their own theory, they should be stronger-willed than mundanes and not fall to the same vices, but here we are.

Some of the biggest criticism I’ve seen for TDA is that the politics of the Shadow World too closely reflect those of our own. I understand where those readers are coming from. Sometimes we want to read to forget the faults of the world around us and slip into a setting where the protagonist’s problems are not ours to solve. However, I didn’t mind it and even enjoyed it.

I personally loved the politics that forced these characters to scheme and lie and question the limits of their own morality to defend what they thought was right. Our protagonists and antagonists don’t only meet in hand-to-hand combat, it’s also a battle of mind games that proves the weight of one’s words and promises can cut just as deep as any sword.

In particular, I really enjoyed seeing how everything that has happened has been a result of the Dark War. Sebastian Morgenstern nearly obliterated the ranks of the Nephilim, leaving them scared and desperate — though the Clave won’t admit it. The Clave made the Fair Folk a scapegoat for the war, instead of admitting their own role in allowing Valentine’s anger to fester for so long and not doing their own due diligence after the Uprising to ensure he and his Circle were no longer a threat.

When you think about it, the Seelie Queen aligned with Sebastian because she felt she had no other option to keep her people alive. She knew the Shadowhunters wouldn’t protect the Seelies against Sebastian, so she did what she had to do for the betterment of her people, unfortunately for her it blew up in her face.

“Hate like that can tear down the world.” Kieran knows a thing or two about hate. His people are hated for the actions of a few and now it has led to disaster for everyone involved.

The Dark War allowed for the Nephilim’s usual order to be weakened. The chaos left behind allowed for Julian and Emma to slip through the parabatai process despite their obvious feelings for each other. It allowed Fade to sneak into the L.A. Institute and steal the Black Volume. It separated a family and allowed for 12-year-old Julian to run an Institute in secrecy and not have the Clave bat an eye. It allowed for a Civil War to brew between the Seelie Courts. It allowed for Diana Wayburn to return to Alicante after transitioning via mundane medicine without anybody noticing.

Side note! Learning that Diana’s secret is that she is transgender was quite the relief. I was determined that she would somehow betray the Blackthorn children who have already been betrayed far too much by far too many people they thought they could trust. Her story also really touched my heart. Her parents didn’t know how to support her or how they could help, and they knew the Clave wouldn’t understand or allow it. When Diana’s sister died, her parents told the Clave that their son was the one who perished and told Diana that she had to stay in the mundane world due to her seeing mundane doctors.

Shout out to Catarina Loss for once again proving that when the Shadowhunters abandon their own children for being who they are, it’s Downworlders who pick them up and show them their worth.

What the Wrayburns did was cruel; however, it gave Diana the opportunity to come back to Alicante during the Dark War and not have to lie. She simply stated the truth that she was the daughter of the late-Aaron and Lissa Wrayburn. Nobody questioned it.

I think Gwynn, leader of the Wild Hunt, actually said it best. “I saw the fire in your eyes, I knew you were the bravest woman ever to set foot on this earth. I regret only that such a fearless soul was ever hurt by the ignorance and fear of others.”

In this house, we stan Diana Wrayburn.

Now the Shadowhunters are faced with the consequences of the chaos, and it’s so interesting to watch everything play out. One of my favorite things an author with such an expansive world can do is have the actions of one book or series affect the events of another. Everything that happens should have a reason and all actions should have consequences, and Clare is certainly serving that to readers on a silver platter.

The one thing I absolutely hated though in Lord of Shadows was the Cohort bringing anti-Downworlder and pro-Registry signs to the Council meeting in Alicante. It seemed corny. Yes, that is what protesters do in the real world, but it seemed out of place and forced in the Shadow World. In my opinion, the Nephilim don’t exactly feel like the type to sit down and paint signs. They’re more of sword and scheme people. This is where Clare took her parallels too far. It just doesn’t fit into the world she created, and it turned what should’ve been a dynamic moment into one that made me roll my eyes. If Clare reworked that scene to completely cut out the signs and focused purely on the Cohort’s disgusting words and careless bigotry that were spoken, it would’ve flowed smoother and felt more impactful.

There was such powerful tension and discourse between the Blackthorn family (including Emma and Cristina who I consider honorary Blackthorns at this point) and the Cohort during the beautiful reunion of Helen and Mark. Clare ruined it.

Just a quick trip into Faerie, nbd:

Gwynn shows up to tell Mark Blackthorn that Kieran, his lover in the Wild Hunt, has been sentenced to death by the hands of his father, the Unseelie King, because he murdered Iarlath for working with Malcolm Fade and betraying Mark. The leader of the Hunt wants Mark to save the prince, because he knows the love they shared. Mark tells Iarlath that Kieran means nothing to him, but then immediately goes after his ex-lover.

Of course, Julian wants to follow his brother alone, but that boy doesn’t stand a chance of getting his way against the dynamic duo that is Emma Carstairs and Cristina Rosales. The trio find Mark, save Kieran after a dramatic scene at the Unseelie Court — which I’ll discuss in much detail later —, get saved themselves by Mark’s faerie aunt, and strike a deal with the Seelie Queen to find the Black Volume of the Dead to her in exchange for her agreeing to align her Court with the Shadowhunters to take down the Unseelie King and end the Cold Peace.

In the grand scheme of things, this foursome’s trip into Faerie isn’t all that long or prominent. However, I believe that it lays a lot of groundwork for our characters.

First, we learn that Mark isn’t entirely over Kieran. A part of his heart still belongs to the prince. Mark’s heart seems split, though. In faerie, Cristina is drawn into a revel and Mark follows her to keep her safe. They kiss, and Cristina says it’s because of the faerie drink she sipped … but Mark tasted the drink and it was normal juice. Awkward. That moment allows Clare to set up Mark’s feelings for Cristina while also giving him seeds of doubt.

We also find out that Kieran doesn’t remember betraying Mark, having Emma and Julian whipped or the fight that ensued after, which allows for the gang to lie about everything to make Kieran more likely to help them. Yikes. I understand why they all felt the need to lie, but it genuinely hurt to watch them repeatedly disrespect Kieran and him not even understand why or know that he’s being lied to.

The return of Malcolm Fade & Annabel Blackthorn as the keeper of the Black Volume:

Simon Lovelace once said, “Never believe the bad guy is dead until you see a body.”

He’s proven right once again.

Yep, Malcolm wasn’t dead after all. He arrived at the doorstep of the Institute while Julian, Mark, Emma and Cristina were in Faerie rescuing Kieran, with an army of sea demons and a demand for Blackthorn blood.

It’s an overplayed trope to have a villain previously thought of as dead to turn out to be alive, and, to be honest, I might have hated it if I didn’t immediately remember Simon’s quote. It made me laugh, because it almost feels like an inside joke between Clare and her readers. She knows it’s overplayed and obvious, but she’s going to do it anyway.

It’s also necessary for the plot. Lady Midnight’s epilogue told us that Annabel’s eyes opened, but turns out she wasn’t fully resurrected. Malcolm is the one who wants Annabel alive, so he has to be alive to do that.

I was surprised that Arthur sacrificed himself to protect the children he so rarely acknowledged. Julian isn’t there to protect the younger Blackthorn kids, so Arthur does. He shoves Ty and Livvy into the Institute and away from Malcolm and the demons, he helps Diana get the kids portaled to the London Institute to safety, and he sacrifices himself to Malcolm in exchange for a promise that the warlock will not harm his family.

Good on Clare for making me care about Arthur when it’s so easy to despise him for not being the caregiver the Blackthorn children were promised. He cannot help that his mental health deteriorated from years of abuse and that his own people could not help him. His death, while not a devastating blow to the heart, impacts the story in that the Institute is now without a head and the Blackthorn children are without a guardian. Pretty much everything Julian has worked so hard for bleeds out with Arthur.

When Annabel is awakened, the first thing she does is kill Malcolm. The warlock doesn’t even raise his hands to defend himself against the woman he fought so desperately to bring back. It’s karma. Annabel becomes our new villain, and I adore her.

The history of Malcolm and Annabel is devastatingly heartbreaking, and I loved that Clare allowed readers to uncover their tragic love story through Emma and Julian in the cottage that Malcolm had built to hide himself and Annabel from the Clave. As Emma and Julian read through Malcolm’s diaries that date all the way back to when the warlock was just 8 years old and had no idea of what he was, it becomes painfully obvious that these two couples are painfully similar.

The Blackthorns took in Malcolm as a child because they thought a warlock they could control would be useful to them. He fell in love with Annabel because she showed him kindness, protected him and defended him as the pair grew up together. First, they were best friends, then they fell in love … a love that Clave wouldn’t allow. Sounds familiar. Emma and Julian grew up as best friends, they became parabatai out of desperation to remain together, and, because of that decision, their love is forbidden.

“Sometimes, Malcolm had written, someone you have known all your life becomes no longer familiar to you, but strange in a marvelous way, as if you have discovered a beach you have been visiting all your life is made not of sand but of diamonds, and they blind you with their beauty.” (Page 395)

This. This. This.

“That is love, son of thorns. We welcome it’s cruelest blows and when we bleed from them, we whisper our thanks.” The Seelie Queen is hitting Jules where it hurts.

By paralleling the story of Annabel and Malcolm to Julian and Emma, Clare masterfully makes readers sympathize for the supposed villains. How can you criticize Malcolm for raising his love from the dead when Julian would most likely do the same if Emma suffered a similar fate?

ALSO, the Blackthorns don’t really care that Malcolm was performing necromancy. They cared that he wanted one of them dead to do it.

I adore Annabel as an individual, as well. She’s not exactly a villain. Until the last chapter of Lord of Shadows, the worst thing she’s done is kill Malcolm. We can’t hold that against her for two main reasons: First, Malcolm deserved it. Second, Emma was also believed to have killed Malcolm, and she was never considered a villain for it.

Just like our present-day Blackthorns, Annabel has consistently been wronged by those she trusted most. She helped Malcolm steal the Black Volume the first time around, then he vanished from the Guard overnight and left Annabel to face their punishment alone. She’s tortured to insanity by the Inquisitor, and then her own family kills her. She couldn’t even find solace in death, as Malcolm distrubed her grave and awakened her mind but not her body with the deaths of Emma’s parents, leaving her to suffer in silence for five years underground.

“He betrayed me while I lived, and again when I was dead. Death is a gift, you understand. The passing beyond pain and sorrow. He denied me that.” (Annabel to Julian, Page 405)

Julian is yet another name to add to the long list of people who betrayed Annabel. He makes her promises he simply can’t keep to convince her to testify in front of the Clave that she killed Malcolm not Zara and to give him the Black Volume to protect his family. Emma even warns him not to do exactly that, yet he ignored the advice and it ended with blood soaking the Hall of the Accords again.

I’m going to go into detail on that last chapter which sees Annabel snap in part two, so be on the lookout for that. What I’ll say now is that Annabel as a villain is perfection. Wow, it feels like “perfection” is the word of the day. I told you I loved this book.

Even when she did the absolute most horrible thing possible in the final pages, I found myself feeling sorry for her. She caused so much death and despair, but, in my head, I kept thinking about how scared and hurt she must feel to lash out as she had. She trusted Julian, and, while he didn’t entirely mean to betray her, he put the protection of his siblings over protecting Annabel.

Clare does it again by presenting another antagonist that really isn’t a true antagonist. Annabel gives me major Sebastian Morgenstern vibes in that she pulls sympathy despite doing awful things. She’s not as terrifying as Sebastian, but her fear makes her unpredictable. I am so ready to see what happens to Annabel after the events of Lord of Shadows. We saw what she did to Malcolm, is Julian next?

*“The world can burn if my family lives.*” That one line could probably be the summary for the entire series.

Julian and Emma genuinely scare me, but I like it

Clare is a warlock in her own right, because the way she can write such unique and dynamic characters that are both flawed and perfect, that are multidimensional, that are realistic, and that make readers question their own values is downright magic.

Julian Blackthorn

Man, the duality of Julian Blackthorn is magnificent.

He wears an apron while making pancakes, he cuddles Tavvy when he has nightmares, he calls Dru “baby girl” and ruffles Ty’s hair, Livvy gives him forehead kisses, and he dreams of a domestic life with Emma where they raise a family of their own.

He also holds a dagger to the throat of the Unseelie King’s son, he nearly kills the piskies that tricked him and Emma into falling for Annabel’s trap, he has sex with Emma up against the wall of Malcolm’s cottage, he’s willing to threaten the Inquisitor with his knowledge on how to break parabatai bond, and he repeatedly lies and has an uncanny ability to strike deals with powerful people.

“Julian was the kind of person who could descend into Hell and come out with the devil himself owing him a favor.” (Kit, Page 304)

Julian is a caretaker, an artist and a protector, but he’s also a strategist with a ruthless heart and a willingness to risk his own conscience to get what he wants.

I said in my Lady Midnight review that I wanted to see Julian tip the scale and do something incredibly heinous for the sake of protecting his family. He hasn’t gotten there, yet, but we’re getting closer.

LoS shows Julian testing the limits of what he’s willing to do for his family. His character develops in a surprising way for a protagonist … Julian wields his ruthless heart like Emma wields Cortana, acting first and thinking of his actions later.

A major tipping point comes in the Unseelie Court, when Julian slips into the role of a villainous protagonist.

“I came of age in the Dark War. I was baptized in blood and fire. … I killed my own father. You think I won’t kill your son?” (Julian, Page 235)

This is … wow. It’s magic in words on a page. It’s a book moment where the words left goosebumps on my arms and fire in my veins. I screeched at 2 a.m. I’m not afraid to admit it. That’s what I wanted out of Julian, a moment where he unbalances the scale between good and evil.

It’s been said multiple times throughout TDA that Julian does what needs to be done because no one else will. That means learning to cook and clean to care for his siblings, it means running an Institute at 12 years old to keep his family together, and it means putting a dagger to the throat of the Unseelie King’s favorite son in his own court.

What readers know of the gentry is that they’re tricksters and manipulators. They can’t lie, but they twist words and use magic to warp reality to get what they want. They’re cruel and ruthless.

Julian has mastered the art of manipulation himself. He has become what the Shadowhunters fear from the Fair Folk. He stands in the court of the Unseelie King and lies through his teeth to protect his brother, his friend and his parabatai.

When his Endarkened father reached out to Ty during the Dark War, Julian let his dagger fly at just 12 years old. Baptized in blood and fire.

“You think angels are gentle. They are anything but. They bring justice in blood and heavenly fire. They take vengeance with fists and iron.” Chills.

But Emma also came of age in the Dark War. She wielded Cortana in the Accords Hall to protect the Blackthorns. She shed faerie blood as she watched children get slaughtered around her. She let revenge fuel her for five years. If you need a warrior to stand in a trial by combat, she’s the one you want on your side.

However, she tilts the faerie knight’s helmet back to end the trial and claim her victory, revealing the face of her dead father, and she crumples to her knees. Julian told her not to have mercy, yet all she could muster was compassion.

Emma does not have Julian’s ruthless edge. She never needed it. Julian has always been merciless enough for both of him. He had lost his innocence the second the dagger left his hand in the Accords Hall, and Emma, despite her hard exterior and fighting soul, held onto her compassionate and merciful side. Cortana is the sword of mercy, after all.

Julian saw this and knew she couldn’t end the fight, even if her father was a trick of the fae. She couldn’t kill her own father like he had, so he put a dagger to Prince Erec’s throat and made demands. He had to be ruthless for both of them.

Emma fighting in the trial by combat and Julian threatening an Unseelie Prince? Perfection.

The thing I love most about Julian’s character is that he’s absolutely frightening. He’s not as physically dominating as Emma is, but he’s constantly strategizing and he acts as if he has nothing to lose. While he always appears to be cool and collected, he’s always taking in his surroundings and holding onto information that can be used at his disposal later.

Even though Emma refuses to even consider the Seelie Queen’s method of breaking all parabatai bonds, Julian — who would 100 percent take the Queen’s help if Emma was on board — keeps the information locked away to use as a threat against the Inquisitor later.

I’m almost positive that the real reason Julian wanted to burn down Porthallow Church with Emma is to prove what they can do together. He needs proof that they’re stronger than the average parabatai pair, so when the occasion arises, he can stand up and ask, “We burned a stone church to the ground, do you want to see what else we’re capable of?” He’s always scheming.

He’s not going to stop being ruthless, because he keeps getting these positive affirmations from those he loves most. Tavvy holds onto him so tightly, Livvy tells him that she wants to be just like him when she grows up, Ty leaves the note for Annabel telling her how wonderful of a brother he is, Dru trusts him enough to tell him she feels left out and gives him a rare hug, and Emma is always by his side no matter what he does.

He can’t stop himself because he’s getting so close to everything he ever wanted. If he can get both Kieran and Annabel to testify to the Clave and give the Black Volume to the Seelie Queen, he can bring Helen home to help raise his siblings, her wife Aline can take over the Institute, his family can stay together, and he and Emma have two different plans to break the parabatai bond so they can love each other freely — though Emma strongly opposes Plan B.

In the end, Julian takes it too far. Before meeting with Annabel, Emma tells Julian not to make any promises that they can’t deliver, to which he responds, “I will do whatever I need to do.” And, he does.

“The universe didn’t just hate him, it was trying to kill him.” I legit cackled at this scene. Poor Julian.

He expertly convinces Annabel that she can trust him because he never told anyone she was hiding in Cornwall, information he kept solely for leverage if it ever came to this moment. He also uses the fact that it was a Dearborn who was the Inquisitor that tortured Annabel to his advantage. A Dearborn wants to hurt the Blackthorns once again, will she allow that?

Julian says that if she testifies to the Council that she killed Malcolm, she will get her justice, the Clave won’t punish her, they’ll give her Blackthorn Manor in Idris, she’ll be hailed a hero, she’ll be reinstated as a Shadowhunter, and Magnus will be there to protect her every step of the way.

Annabel gets none of that. She only gets bloody hands after Julian’s promises to her are repeatedly broken. She uses the Mortal Sword to kill not just Robert Lightwood, but also Livvy, — which we’ll talk about in part two (sorry) — because she wants Julian to feel as betrayed and broken as she does by his deception.

Julian’s ruthlessness and willingness to hurt anyone, do anything in the process of protecting his family, ends with his little sister dead in his arms. His worst nightmare.

Clare’s presentation of Julian Blackthorn is a masterpiece. She skillfully crafted this character into this gentle boy who loves his family so much that he’s willing to do absolutely anything to protect them. Julian’s character development is a wild roller coaster ride of emotions. The boy that holds a dagger to the Unseelie Prince’s throat is far different than the “boy he had been, scared and terrified and twelve years old, looking at his younger brothers and sisters and thinking, They’re mine now.” And the clever boy who deceives Annabel with no regard to her own wellbeing, is not the same boy who cradles Livvy’s lifeless body, begging her to open her eyes.

I’m all about consequences and reflecting consequence is something Clare usually does pretty poorly. Livvy’s death is a massive consequence for everything Julian had done, and it will be a tipping point for his character. In my opinion, he will either jump off the scale and become even more ruthless to keep the rest of his siblings alive, or he will lose that edge because he sees the disaster and pain it caused his family. Or will he blame the parabatai curse for what happened? Either way, I’m super excited about where Clare takes Julian’s character.

Side note! It’s super heartbreaking to realize that the man Julian has become is a far cry from that innocent little boy readers met in City of Lost Souls who had Helen in a frenzy because he was playing in candle wax. At that moment, he asked Clary if the reason she looked sad was because she didn’t have siblings. Even then, he couldn’t even imagine a life without his brothers and sisters. The only thing he knew was that he’d be sad without them.

Emma Carstairs

Emma has quickly become my favorite female character in Clare’s Shadow World. I love everything about her. She’s an absolute warrior, she’s a tad reckless, she’s very sarcastic, she’s … well, she’s the female version of Jace Herondale. However, she doesn’t feel like a carbon copy. She’s unique in her own right.

While Jace was raised to be a weapon by Valentine and was swayed against anything other than destruction, Emma chose to be a warrior on her own accord and was always surrounded by love amongst the Blackthorns, despite the tragic death of her parents.

I also believe that Emma is a bit more chaotic than Jace ever was. Jace looked for the approval of the Lightwoods in everything he did. He wanted to be the perfect warrior and the perfect son for them. Emma doesn’t have an actual guardian since she lost her parents. She acts solely to protect the Blackthorns who have graciously given her a family when hers was taken away.

I remember how formal Jace was when our TMI gang first met with the Seelie Queen, how he was careful with his words and didn’t want to upset her. Now, flash forward to Emma …

“Is that why you have set yourself as the protector of the Blackthorns? Because you could not save your parents, you will save them, your makeshift family?”

“You bet your ass it is.” (Seelie Queen and Emma, Page 293)

“Wishing only brought you small blessings: a sleep without nightmares, your best friend’s safety for another day, birthday sunshine.”

Emma doesn’t give a f*ck about the Seelie Queen’s feelings. She knows the Queen manipulated them to do her bidding by offering a deal they couldn’t refuse. Emma’s not allowing the Queen to walk away from the bargain feeling as if she earned respect from this group of Shadowhunters. That’s why I love Emma.

She’s built up such a hard exterior to hide the pain of losing her parents. She uses her sarcastic wit and fighting skills as a shield and sword against the tragedy of this world in which she was born and baptized … in blood and fire.

A lot of females probably feel similarly, that they need to become a warrior to survive life — I certainly did and still do. The world sometimes feels as if it was created to hurt women — for us to be preyed upon and victimized, to have to fight for everything we deserve, that there’s what is expected of us as women and a fear of doing what is unexpected.

All women are born warriors bred to bear burdens of life no matter what path one takes.

My parents raised me similarly to how Emma raised herself, to be strong and independent and to take shit from no one. It has probably saved my life on more than one occasion, and it has molded me into the person I am today.

When a man whistled and grabbed me by the waist one morning while running in Pittsburgh, I didn’t hesitate to elbow him in the face as hard as I could and not look back. I’m also making a career for myself in sports media, a field historically male-dominated, by never losing confidence that I am just as qualified as the men around me. I have walked through life being told I was intimidating, cold and too callous, but I’ve always known the difference between what the world sees and who I was, who I am, on the inside. I see so much of myself in Emma, and I’m currently crying.

Much like Julian, there’s two sides to Emma, the fierce and relentless warrior that unwaveringly wields Cortana, and the gentle, honest girl who tempers her parabatai’s ruthlessness with her soft and kind heart.

We see a little bit of a shift in Emma in LoS. She’s usually pretty quick to throw her trust into Julian, but we see her confidence in him doing the right thing waver a bit through this book. She asks Clary if Nightshade was genuinely guilty of using demon powders at his restaurant, because she’s worried that Jules threw an innocent Downworlder to the Clave as collateral damage in his efforts to protect his family. Turns out Nightshade was very guilty.

Love is Pain …

“Everything about the fact that this was forbidden was wrong, he thought. Nobody belonged together more than he and Emma did.” (Julian, Page 614)

Emma and Julian’s love story feels like a tragedy. A beautiful tragedy.

I’m a sucker for a good best friends to lovers trope when it’s done well. Thankfully, Clare did it well. Emma and Julian belong together in the way Simon and Clary never did. Their relationship and feelings for each other never felt forced or uncomfortable. I think the children had it right in Lady Midnight, Emma and Julian go together like chocolate and peanut butter, like Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson and definitely like Captain Ahab and the whale.

What makes Emma and Julian different from Clary and Simon is that Clare establishes a romantic connection between these two through flashbacks and the character’s inner-monologues. The love between Julian and Emma is not one-sided like Simon’s unrequited feelings for Clary. They both fell hard for each other, just not at the same time.

“There’s something about a place you’ve been with someone you love. It takes on a meaning your mind. It becomes more than a place. It becomes a distillation of what you felt for each other.”

Example one is the quote below from Emma that left me broke just 17 pages into LoS.

“He was beautiful. He had always been beautiful, but she had noticed it too late. And now she stood with hands at her sides and her body aching because she couldn’t touch him. She could never touch him again.” (Emma, Page 17)

Example two is Julian remembering the exact moment he realized he was in love with his best friend, but it was already too late.

“He remembered it even now, the driving pain as if something deadly had struck him. It had made him understand why the Greeks had believed love was an arrow that tore through your body and left a blazing trail of longing behind. In French, falling suddenly in love was the coupe de foudre. The bolt of lightning. The fire in your veins, the destructive power of a thousand million volts. Julian hadn’t fallen suddenly in love: He always had been in love.” (Julian, Page 615)

The love story between Emma and Julian is gorgeous. They were simply children who played together by the ocean, trained together and created their own form of communication so that they’d always know what the other was thinking. Who knows what would’ve played out if the Dark War didn’t steal their childhoods away. Could you imagine Andrew Blackthorn joking with the Carstairs about how their kids were falling in love? Could you imagine John Carstairs telling Julian to take care of his little girl, even though he would know Emma could take care of herself? My heart can’t take it.

The Dark War stole that from them. Grief and tragedy forced them to desperately seek out becoming parabatai to remain together and not lose yet another person they loved. A decision they made in haste at 12 and again at 14 changed their lives. Now, they face the consequences — their love not only breaks the Law but it also sparks a curse that endangers everyone they love.

“We chose each other when we were children. We chose each other again when we were fourteen. I chose you, and you chose me. That’s what the parabatai ceremony is, really, isn’t it? It’s a way of sealing that promise. The one that says that I will always choose you.”

“I will always choose you, too.” (Julian and Emma, Page 268)

Oof. Emma starts LoS trying to get Julian to stop loving her by doing two things: fake dating Mark and parabatai-zoning Jules around every corner.

It doesn’t work. All it does is cause both of these teenagers endless pain.

“She might feel like she was dying inside every day, but that was her problem — she’d handle it. No one owed her help, and in a way she welcomed the pain. It meant Julian wasn’t suffering alone, even if he believed he was.” (Emma, 56)

The pain I feel while reading about Julian and Emma is reminiscent of what I felt during The Infernal Devices. It’s not the same pain, it’s a fresh wound creating a whole new type of agony. Just as there seemed to be no happy ending for Jem, Will and Tessa, the end doesn’t seem too promising for Julian and Emma either.

Maybe even more so, because our TID trio had a shot of at least two of them getting a decently happy ending. No matter who Tessa chose, the other would wish nothing but happiness for the both of them. There still would have been pain for the love that could never fully be felt, but there would also be endless joy and happiness. That’s kind of what happened anyway, Jem became a Silent Brother and gave his blessing for Will and Tessa to marry, watching them live a life he could’ve had from the shadows with nothing but tenderness and love.

But there’s no other option for Emma and Julian. Either they find a way to be together or they both spend their lives in agony hoping that a time will come when they will hurt just a little less than they did the day before.

There’s a moment at Malcolm’s cottage where Julian, who is really bad at bottling his emotions up and then just exploding, has a full-blown melt down when Emma realizes that all her efforts to get Julian to stop loving her failed.

“I’m not you, I don’t get to fall in love every week with someone different. I wish it wasn’t you, Emma, but it is, it’ll always be you, so don’t tell me my life isn’t wrecked when you don’t know the first thing about it! … I want you to know what it’s like. To be tortured all the time, night and day, desperately wanting what you know you should never want, what doesn’t even want you back. To know how it feels to understand that a decision you made when you were twelve years old means you can never have the one thing that would make you truly happy.” (Julian, Page 523)

I wanted Emma to strike that boy across the face like Jem did to Will outside the ifrit den in TID. What Julian says to Emma is disgusting. He throws in her face the fact she’s dragged Cameron Ashdown into and out of a relationship — what is Cam even up to through all of this anyway? — and he acts like Emma is ruining the lives of Cam and Mark and Julian simply for not dating them. I know that Julian is hurting and he thinks he’s suffering alone, but it’s no excuse for what he says. Even if Emma didn’t love him anymore and really did break Mark’s heart, she doesn’t deserve to feel guilty for not loving someone in return. Shame on Julian.

“You loved someone I loved too. I’d that likely to happen again?” This passage was actually kind of sweet. Julian was OK being hurt because at least he cared about both of them.

However, I like that Clare includes this fight between our two love birds. Relationships are never smooth sailing all the time. There are waves and there are storms, and you must learn to weather them together. It’s realistic. I’ve definitely said terrible things to my husband when we were young because I was hurt and wanted him to hurt too. You realize that hurting someone else doesn’t make your own pain go away. It only makes you hurt worse. You take these fights and you learn from them — learn to communicate better, learn to handle your emotions in a positive manner, and learn that love is strong and fierce yet delicate and fragile all at the same time.

Because of this fight, Emma strips down her facade to confess that she still loves him and she’s also been in pain trying to convince him otherwise.

Side note! There’s an absolutely breathtaking line after Emma and Julian’s fight that I simply can’t ignore. Emma stood outside the cottage on the crest of Chapel Cliff as a storm brewed around her. She opened her arms and welcomed the wind and rain that soaked her to the bone.

“Maybe the storm could wash her clean, could wash what felt like both their hearts’ blood off her hands.” (525)

Emma feels so much guilt for doing what she feels is right to protect Julian. She bears the burden of both their unhappiness and welcomes the pain. I can’t get over this scene and how beautiful it is.

Of course, no apology and love confession is complete without a little spice. In the heat of the moment, these two crazy kids do the do. The quote below had me in absolute pieces.

“I’ve been broken for weeks. I need to be whole again. Even if it doesn’t last.”

“It can’t last. It’ll break our hearts.”

“Break my heart. Break it in pieces. I give you permission.” (Julian and Emma, Page 541)

How is Julian so desperate and fragile but also terrifyingly ruthless? Why do I like that so much? Oof. This is a great callback to City of Heavenly Fire when Emma sees Julian slide down the pillar in despair after killing his own father.

“And if Julian was broken, then the whole world was broken and nothing would be right again.”

That’s some good stuff right there.

Also, we get the iconic tradition of Magnus walking in on TSC couples in compromising positions. The High Warlock of Brooklyn portals into the cottage complaining like a true dad about how Emma and Julian aren’t answering their phones and finds the parabatai in bed wrapped up in each other. The warlock has probably never felt his age so profusely.

Magnus’s arrival meant the end of the dream that Julian and Emma had created for themselves within the four walls of the cottage — a small fragment of time that showed these two a life they could never truly have.

“A place built by and for two people who loved each other yet weren’t allowed to, and that had sheltered two more such people two hundred years later. … ‘All dreams end when you wake.’” (Magnus, Page 558)

Clare does give us some hope for Emma and Julian toward the end of LoS. Julian reminds Magnus of Will Herondale — who we all know is probably Magnus’s favorite Nephilim other than Alec — and he’s willing to help find a way to turn this tragedy into a happy ending. Magnus gives Julian and Emma hope in the form of his word and a plan that involves telling the truth.

Julian and Emma tell the Inquisitor that they’re in love. They’re banking on sympathy from Robert who had a parabatai and knows that exile has the power to weaken the bond. Surprisingly, they get it. Robert seems to have changed for the better (he’ll always be a PoS in my mind). He agrees to exile only Emma to the Mexico Institute with Cristina so that Julian can stay with the children. He gives into Julian’s demand that Emma’s exile won’t leave her defenseless. Julian didn’t even have to threaten him!

Robert Lightwood gives them hope.

What Robert doesn’t know is that during Emma’s exile, Magnus will be working on a way to break the bond completely in the name of love. The exile is solely to slow down the curse that’s looming over their heads.

None of that matters now because Annabel killed Robert. Julian and Emma can’t manipulate another Inquisitor. Robert was a special case because he owes Magnus for saving his son’s life, because he lost his parabatai and didn’t notice due to his own exile, because Michael Wayland loved Robert and Robert broke his heart in a way that could never be forgiven, and because Michael would’ve wanted to help these two young Shadowhunters who made a mistake.

Emma and Julian had hope, and now they’re back at square one. Pain.

The main thing I think Clare did best with Emma and Julian’s relationship is make sure it didn’t overtake the plot. While I loved TID, the love triangle eclipsed everything else that happened. TDA doesn’t fall into that same trap. Yes, the struggles that Emma and Julian face because of their forbidden love, are important and interesting and heartbreaking, but there’s so many other elements in the plot that are just as exciting and vital to the story — like keeping the Blackthorn children together and unharmed … oops.

A part of me thinks that Emma and Julian will sideline their quest to break the parabatai bond in the wake of Livvy’s death. Grieving such a disastrous loss to the family is far more important. Or they’ll say f*ck it, print out all those pictures of the Black Volume Julian took with his phone, and take the Seelie Queen’s deal to snap all parabatai bonds. That would be interesting.

Bonus thoughts! Julian’s Sleeping Beauty mural … At first I thought that Julian’s mural was symbolic of how he felt about Emma, in that she was Sleeping Beauty, locked in her castle of thorns (Blackthorns) and Julian was the knight with the broken sword trying to break in and awaken the princess from her dreams — AKA make her realize they were meant to be together. However, after Lord of Shadows, I think it’s the opposite. Julian believes he is Sleeping Beauty, trapped in one place by the weight of caring for his siblings and lost in dreams of what should’ve been. Emma is the knight, the only one capable of stirring him from his endless slumber. He’s repainting the mural in LoS, so we better get to see what changes he makes.

Before I end this, I want to point out one criticism I have of Julian in relation to Emma. He scares her. That’s not OK, and it made me a bit uncomfortable.

I wanted to sit on this take for a while and really examine if the fact that Julian scared Emma put him in a place of power over her to manipulate her feelings and coerce her into loving him in return.

“The way I love you is fundamental to me, Emma. It’s who I am. No matter how far we are from each other.” Swoon.

Julian doesn’t mean to scare her, and it’s extremely important to note that she’s not scared of him. She’s scared of what he’s capable of, because she’s just now seeing the ruthless man that used to be her gentle boy. She never fears that Julian will hurt her. She never thinks he’ll break the trust she has in him. It’s more of a worry for how these things he does will affect him later. They’ve always been there for each other to keep his nightmares at bay, she doesn’t want something else keeping him up at night.

In fact, Emma only tells Julian once that he scared her. It comes at the end of Lady Midnight when Julian presents their coverup story to the Inquisitor, but her words stuck with him.

Julian.

You scared me a little.

It’s Emma’s words that constantly remind him that sometimes he needs to reel it in. In those moments when his head is telling him to do whatever it takes to protect his family, it’s Emma’s voice that tempers his ruthless heart. He doesn’t want to scare her, and he stops himself. That counts for something and makes me feel more confident in my love for them.

End of Part One

I’m actually exhausted after writing all this. I think I might have gone a little too hard, but I kept finding more and more things I simply couldn’t leave out. There was just so much I loved about this book, especially Emma and Julian’s character developments.

I’m not even done … Part two is coming soon! I think I might not go as in depth on everything else. It might be more of “quick hits” rather than a fluid and flowing analysis. We’ll see.

I just refuse to start another book without finishing my analysis, so I need to get this out into the world and crack open Queen of Air and Darkness. I’m desperate.

Check out part two for a whole lot of pain … and some fun Kit stuff because I love him with my whole heart.

Later, gators.

Life of Bry