Just a few IMPORTANT notes: This story takes place in between the ending of City of Bones and the beginning of City of Ashes. I may also move the story line into City of Ashes, I'm not sure yet. I do not own any of thecharacters, even though I wish that Jace was my boyfriend. Haha. The only character that I own is Naevia.
Now I'm not sure if Rome has any Shadowhunters but since Jem(Clockwork Angel) was originally a Shadowhunter in Shanghai(I believe…I remember it was in China but the name escapes me right now) I figured that Shadowhunters are present all over the world, even in Rome, one of the holiest cities in the world.
But onward, please enjoy and please review. I can hear everyone groaning at that but please, it helps me become a better writer and it also helps me with what you guys want to see. I don't have a real direction for this story, yet, but you guys could help me write it! If you have any ideas or even if you want a cameo from your own character, I have no problem doing that. Just please make sure that it's not something overly crazy. Nothing from an alternate universe either, I want to keep to the story line that Cassandra Clare has set up. So Vampires, Faeries, Wolves, Warlocks, Humans and of course, Shadowhunters are welcome to make an appearance. Also, I had an idea of making someone's character Naevia's best friend, so if anyone is interested drop me a line or simply leave me a comment in the review box!
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Naevia looked upward at the Institute and sighed a little. She didn't want to leave Idris for this place that looked like a dilapitated church to mundanes, with its cracked walkway, overgrown grass and nearly caved in roof. She moved to the back of the car that had dropped her off and dug her luggage out of the back. Maryse Lightwood joined her at her side and smiled down at her. "I do hope that you find a home here, Naevia."
"As do I ma'am." Her voice was sincere but she wasn't so sure if she truly meant it. She hadn't been back in Idris very long before she was being transferred to New York. Naevia grew up in Rome, close to the Vatican. She carried with her a thick Italian accent that Maryse said would make all the American boys melt. Not only did she have her accent but Naevia also had long, thick italian hair and sun kissed skin. When Maryse first saw her in Idris, she called her an italian supermodel. Naevia had merely laughed at the comment. She was never one to think of herself as gorgeous, no matter how many people told her otherwise.
Unforunately, Naevia's parents were still living in Rome. The only reason Naevia left was to pursue a life somewhere else. She needed a bit more adventure in her life and the demons in Rome just weren't cutting it. Most demons were taken care of by the priests in the numerous churches around Italy. Shadowhunters in their own way, Naevia supposed. She hoped that she would be able to live in Idris, for at least a few years but fate had called her to leave Idris with Maryse and Robert Lightwood.
"…Alec does that too, come to think of it." Maryse let out a small laugh and turned around, seeing Naevia still standing by the car. At this point, Maryse had already scurried up the cracked walkway to the steps of the Institute. Naevia looked like her mind was elsewhere. Maryse frowned a little and called over to her, breaking Naevia from her thoughts. "Are you all right, dear?"
"Oh…yes. I'm fine." Naevia grabbed the one bag that was left behind and ran up to Maryse and smiled the best she could. Naevia could only hope that her smile hid the nervousness that was building up in the pit of her stomach. Maryse was close to entering to Institute when Naevia caught up to her. She could feel the butterflies in her stomach moving around rapidly. In the car, Maryse had already told her about Alec and Isabelle. Of course Naevia had met Max and her husband, Robert, who were still in Idris. Maryse also spoke of a girl named Clarissa, who was usually called Clary. And a boy, Jace, that she had adopted after his father had been killed. Or had been supposedly killed. Mrs. Lightwood went into a tragic and drama-filled story about Clary and Jace and man who she called Valentine. She also mentioned that Jace's true name was Jonathon Morgenstern but he hated being called 'Jonathon.' She quickly made a mental note of that.
Naevia could remember the shiver that was sent down her spine at the mention of Valentine. She had heard stories of him through her parents. He had made up a group called the 'Circle', which was basically an anti-downworlder cult. Well, atleast in Naevia's eyes.
Naevia's nerves didn't cease when she took her first steps into the Institute. She looked around her and took in her surroundings. Thankfully she wouldn't have to memorize the floorplan of the Institute. She was told that most of the institute looked the same. However, Maryse had told her that she added her touch to the place.
Maryse walked past her and Naevia followed at her heels, leaving her bags by the door. "Don't worry about your bags," Maryse had said as they hurriedly walked into the elevator. Maryse spoke as her slim finger pushed a button, making the elevator jerk to life and started to bring them up."I'll ask one of the kids to help you in a minute. I want you to meet them first."
Upon leaving the elevator, they walked down a long hall and into the kitchen and there stood three of the four kids that Maryse mentioned. A girl with dark hair bounced over to her and extended her hand to her. Maryse was the first to speak. "Kids, this is Naevia Giordano." She motioned the kids over to Naevia, where Isabelle took her hand in hers and gently shook it. The look on her face said that she was happy to meet Naevia but the attitude in her voice hinted otherwise.
"Pleasure…" She had that sort of 'I'm-better-than-you" attitude. Isabelle took a step back and Alec made a move forward. He had a geniune smile on his face, but he didn't speak. He just took Naevia's hand and shook it gently then nodded his head and took a step back. The next boy that moved forward had golden hair and a lean body, like Alec had but Naevia couldn't see Alec's body. Jace had a button down shirt on, letting it hang open. His jeans hung a bit low, just below his navel, hanging out his hips. Naevia took a quick glance down at the 'V' that his tight body made. Jace raised a brow, noticing Naevia checking him out. He let out a laugh and moved a bit closer to her. "See something you like?"
Naevia quickly turned her glance up towards his face. Her face flushed with a deep red. "Uh..um no I just…"
"Don't worry about it. Most women find me irrestible."
"Jace…" It was Maryse. Her stern voice made Jace looked up at her. He smirked, nodded and walked past her.
"I'll be in the library if anyone needs me."
Isabelle rolled her eyes as she walked Jace walked out of the kitchen. She turned her attention back to Naevia. "Here, I'll show you to your room. Alec…grab her bags." Isabelle grabbed Naevia's wrist and practically dragged her to her room. Naevia didn't even have a second to look around and see what was in the institute. Whether it was decorated nicely or decorated by someone with bland taste. The next thing she knew she was standing in a large room, with a four poster bed set in the middle.
"This is nice." Naevia did a 360, seeing a few angelic paintings on the wall, some flowers on the nightstand and an open closet filled with clothes that clearly weren't hers. "Those clothes…"
"Oh I just figured you might want some extra clothes. A few of them are mine old clothes, you know things I don't want anymore and some things were just bought the other day. I was a bit excited to have another girl in the house. To be honest I've never had many girlfriends but one girl happened to change my mind about being friends with girls."
Naevia raised a brow as she looked at Isabelle. Isabelle went into a story about Clary, who Naevia had already heard about on the way to the institute. "Oh by the way, I'm sorry about the little attitude in the kitchen. I was just trying to feel you out, you know."
"Uh…"
"I just wanted to see if you were a stuck up bitch or not."
"Oh." Naevia let out a laugh and walked over to the bed, placing her hand onto the covers. "So have you guys lived here all your lives?"
"Practically. Sometimes my parents go back to Idris but it's usually only for the Accords."
"Ah, I see." Naevia hopped up on the bed and turned her head towards the door as it opened. In walked a smaller girl with fiery red hair. Isabelle turned and smiled a big smile. She ran over to the girl and threw her arms around her. Naevia made a small coughing sound, to tell Isabelle that she was still in the room. Isabelle whipped around, the smile still plastered onto her face.
"I'm so sorry, Naevia. This is Clary. Clary this is Naevia. She's the new girl I've been talking about all week. So far, she's really sweet." Naevia had to laugh at that. Isabelle spoke to Clary like she wasn't even in the room.
"She's not too bad on the eyes either." It was Jace, leaning against the frame of the door and looking over at Naevia. Again, color rushed into her cheeks and she darted her eyes to the other side of the room. By the Angel, she had only known this guy for 5 minutes and he was already making her blush like a sinner in church. Naevia turned her head and looked over at Clary and merely smiled. Clary returned the smile and hopped up on the bed next to her.
"Don't worry about him. He'll never stop annoying you but you'll get used to his antics."
"Well, I must say that's a relief." Naevia looked over at Clary, her brilliant sapphire colored eyes, studying her expressions. Clary looked at her eyes for a moment then smiled again.
"Wow, you have some awesome eyes."
"Oh, thank you. I get that a lot."
"I'm sure. Not many people have eyes like that. I'm a bit a jealous." Clary cocked her head to the side then looked over at Jace and patted the bed, offering him a seat next to her. "Come over here, stop standing by the door like a freak."
"I think I might make poor Naevia blush again." Naevia rolled her eyes and of course, blushed again. She looked over at Jace, seeing him smirk then slowly move toward the bed. Instead of sitting next to Clary, he stood by Naevia, probably just to make her more nervous than she already was. Isabelle, still over by the door, frowned at Jace.
"Jace, stop that. She's new here. I'm sure she's anxious enough as it is. She doesn't need you making it worse."
Naevia tried to speak but found she couldn't get her voice to work. She wanted to protest, to say that it was alright but she knew that it wasn't. With Jace acting like some sort of arrogant sex god, Naevia was never going to be able to calm down and feel like herself. Right now, she felt like some sort of school girl oogling the hottest and most popular boy in school. Usually Naevia was calm, cool and collected. She could handle herself in almost any situation. She was never one to get overly excited about anything. Right now, she was nervous, her breathing more rapid than normal. Why? Because this gorgeous guy was slowly pushing her over the edge. Naevia had to admit to herself that she never did like arrogant guys, even if they were smoking hot.
"Oh, she's fine. She's knows I'm only playing with her… " His voice trailed off for a moment. He smirked then said, "Or am I?" With that he looked down at Naevia, who finally got the redness in her cheeks to subside. She tried her hardest not to blush again and to pretend that he wasn't even standing there. She looked over at Clary and changed the subject.
"It's nice to meet you by the way. I've heard a lot about you from Mrs. Lightwood. You seem to be very famous."
Clary nodded. "Yeah, that's what I've been told. I'm not sure if that's a good thing though." She laughed nervously, pushing a strand of red hair out of her face. Isabelle moved over to the bed and leaned against one of the posters. At that moment, Alec entered the room with Naevia's bags. Naevia hopped off the bed and scurried over to him, taking a bag from him.
"Thanks for bringing them up, but I would have gotten them later."
"Eh, don't even worry about it. It was the nice thing to do." He gave her a polite smile and placed two of her three bags over by the closet. Clary watched Alec with a raised brow then shook her head. Clary couldn't help but wonder why Alec was being so nice to Naevia when Alec was so mean to Clary when he first met her. She came to the conclusion that it was probably because he thought that Clary was a mere mundane and he knows that Naevia is a shadowhunter.
"Aww look at you, Alec…being such a gentlemen."
Alec narrowed his eyes at Jace. "Fuck you, Jace." He walked over to him and gave him a slight push. Jace laughed.
"Well I'm sure there's a few people in this room that would love to sleep with me." He glanced over at Naevia . He avoided a gaze with Clary and Naevia knew why. She almost shuddered at the thought of brother and sister wanting to lay with eachother, even though they hadn't known they were related. He also avoiding looking at Isabelle, considering she was his adoptive sister and that would be a bit odd too.
"A bit cocky aren't we, Jace?" Naevia looked over at Jace, saying his name with a bit of acid on her tongue. She was starting to feel like her old self again. Jace looked at her, surprised.
"Looking the way I do, I have a right to be cocky." He walked over to the door and turned his head slightly before leaving. "And with the way you look, you have every right to be just as cocky." With that he left. Naevia stared at the door empty in the doorway, along with Alec, Clary and Isabelle. Isabelle was the first to break the silence.
"Well…that was interesting to say the least." She turned to Naevia and laughed. "I think he likes you." She leaned over Clary and ran her fingers up Naevia's arm and winked at her then laughed loudly. Alec shook his head. Clary just sat there and continued to stare at the door.
"Clary…" Naevia watched Clary and cocked her head to the side. "Are you all right?" There was no way that Clary could have been upset by that comment. They were related, she really had no right to be mad at Jace or Naevia or whoever. Clary looked over at Naevia and merely nodded before hopping off the bed and walking out the door. Naevia could tell that Clary wished that her and Jace weren't related. It was written all over the poor girls face.
Naevia bit her lip and looked between Alec and Isabelle, who both shrugged. Isabelle hopped up onto the bed and smiled at Naevia, trying to break the tension that was now lingering in the air. "Hey, why don't we go and get some things to spice this room up? It's so … drab."
"Drab? Wow." Alec stared at his sister for a moment then shook his head. He moved over to the door and bid them a farewell, telling them he was going to go look for Jace. Naevia waved goodbye to him then turned her attention back to Isabelle.
"Sure, that sounds like it would be fun."
Isabelle's smile grew wider. "You're accent is so cute. Boys around these parts will just love it."
Naevia let out a laugh as she removed herself from the bed. "Your mother said the same thing." Isabelle laughed along with her and moved over to her wardrobe.
"Would you like to change, or go as you are?" For the first time since she got there, Isabelle actually got a good look at what she was wearing and made a face, a face that said she approved of her outfit. Naevia wore a gray one shoulder top, that had a thick black strap going over her shoulder and down her back diagonally and smaller black strap attached to the other side. The straps made an abstract upside 'Y.' It was a top that her mother had picked up for her before they left Rome. She also wore black skinny jeans with a pair of black IRO Toby ankle boots. There were two straps on the boots with two buckles. One strap was on the top of the boot and the other down by the 4 inch heel.
"That's gorgeous. Maybe you should just go in that." It was a good thing that Isabelle made that comment because Naevia had no real intention of changing. She wanted to look through the wardrobe by herself, that way if she didn't like anythin she could remove it without feeling like she had hurt Isabelle's feelings. Naevia's style usually varied from what was comfortable and what she felt sexy in. Right now, she was actually a mixture of comfy and sexy.
"You'll have to let me raid your closet." Isabelle giggled, as she grabbed Naevia's hand and bounded out of the room. They moved quickly down the hall to the elevator. There was a cat sitting there now. She stared down at the blue persian and asked Isabelle what her name was and why she hadn't seen her before. The cat looked up at Naevia and meowed loudly at her. Almost like she didn't like the fact that Naevia was calling her a girl. Isabelle placed a hand to her mouth, stifling a laugh.
Bending down, she stroked the cat gently. "His name is Church. He was probably wandering around looking for mice or something. He usually stands guard here." Isabelle straightened up and opened up the elevator. She motioned for Naevia to go first. Naevia stepped in, Isabelle right behind her. Isabelle was just about to shut the door to the elevator when the golden haired boy jumped in. Naevia moved aside so that he wouldn't hit her and crush her against the back wall of the elevator. Isabelle glared at him, tapping her foot on the ground. "What are you doing?"
"I'm coming with you."
"…Why?" Isabelle didn't close the door, she stood there with her hand on it. She continued to glare at him.
"Because I feel like it. I didn't realize I needed an excuse to hang out with you." He moved closer to her and draped an arm around her shoulders. He gave her the fakest smile that Naevia had ever seen. Isabelle rolled her eyes before sighing and shutting the elevator door. Her finger pressed a button and the elevator shook to life, as it did before. They began to move down. Isabelle shrugged Jace's arm off of her shoulder.
"I know exactly why you're coming with us. I doubt she's interested."
Jace let his mouth hang open, in mock shock. He placed a hand to his chest, like he was truly hurt by the comment. "I can't believe you would think I would try and come with you, just to pick Naevia up and sweep her off her feet. I am shocked at you Izzy."
Isabelle rolled her eyes and muttered, 'whatever.' Naevia bit her bottom lip, holding in the laughter that wanted to burst out of her and filled the elevator. She couldn't put her finger on it, but there was something about Jace's attitude that she liked. She watched him as he moved away from Isabelle and leaned against the back wall. He glanced over at Naevia and shot her an incredibly sexy smile. Naevia pushed away the feeling of wanting to blush. She refused to let him make her blush again.
"Where is Alec, by the way? He's not coming?"
Jace either hadn't heard Isabelle or he was just ignoring her because he kept his eyes locked with Naevia's. Isabelle moved forward a little bit and looked between Naevia and Jace. She coughed a little. Jace still didn't budge. Isabelle balled her hand into a fist and delivered a hard punch to his arm. "Jace!"
"Hmm?" Jace turned slightly, finally breaking his gaze from Naevia. It seemed like the punch hadn't even phased him.
Isabelle stared at him for a moment. The look on her face indicated that she wanted to slap him. "Where is Alec? Is he coming with us?" She spoke harshly, and spacing her words out. Naevia's eyes widened a bit as she watched them.
"Nah, he said he was going to stay here and do whatever."
Isabelle nodded. Jace took a sideways glance at Naevia, causing her to blush and quickly turn her head the other way. She could have sworn that before she turned her head, she saw a devious smirk make its way onto Jace's face. Good lord, how she wanted to slap that look off his face. She crossed her arms over her chest and continued to stare at the wall until they hit the bottom floor.
They exited the elevator, Isabelle and Jace slightly ahead of Naevia. They walked outside and stood in front of the institute. Jace threw up an arm and hailed a cab. "I hate cabs but this will have to do for now." Within minutes a cab pulled up and the three of them hopped inside and then they were off.