Clary POV

"You're getting good" remarked Jace proudly, pulling me in for a hug by my waist. This would normally have been a caring and romantic gesture if not for the sweat that coated both of us thanks to a particularly gruelling training session that we had just finished.

"And you stink!" I teased , laughing at his mock offended expression and swatting him with my towel before throwing it over my shoulder, grabbing my water and - after waiting for Jace to do the same - beginning to walk out of the training room. As Jace walked alongside me, he made an exaggerated mime of wiping his hand down his shorts before reaching out to hold mine, interlacing out fingers to show the world just how perfectly we fit together. I smiled, looking down at our hands before a violent cough that shook my small frame interrupted my harmonious thoughts, lasting only a few seconds but long enough for me to loose my breath and for Jace to be wearing a concerned expression.

"Are you okay Clary?" Jace asked, his face still contorted in worry.

"I'm fine" I rasped, shocked at my own voice. Clearly the coughing fit did some damage.

"Yeah, you sound it to" Jace retorted, sarcasm dripping from every sailable.

"Nothing a little water cant fix!" I say, clearing my throat and sipping my water gingerly, afraid to set off another fit. I smiled up at him to indicate that I truly was fine and it seemed to soothe him slightly. We began to walk back to our rooms again. "See? I'm fine. Do you guys seriously just never get sick? I bet this is just the beginning of a cold, I get them all the time, I have since I was little. My mum always used to say it was because I'm short, there's less of me to resist the illness. But I'm pretty sure that was just made up so she could have a dig at me, honestly"

"Mayrse hates even the idea of germs so no, we never got sick as kids due to the constant mist of disinfectant we were raised in." He joked, smiling briefly but then turning serious when he continued "the only time one of us got sick is when Alec got poisoned on our first demon hunt...". He turned to look at me, worry once again flashing in his golden eyes before it disappeared to be replace with love when I smiled up at him (damn my tiny height), reassuring him once again that I was fine although if I as truly being honest with myself, I doubted this was just a simple cold. This cough had been going on for weeks now, but Jace, Alec and Izzy had been away on a mission in Idris and I had stayed at home with my mother and Luke. The cough had started then - around 3 weeks ago now - but I had written it off as a bug that would pass soon enough, I wasn't lying when I said I got sick a lot as a kid but I normally got better within a few days, a week at the most. It had never been this long. And my only symptom is coughing, there has been no fever, no headache. All this leads me to wonder, why hasn't the bug just gone yet? And is it possibly something worse than my first thoughts?

None of this I say out loud of course.

Jace Herondale may act like a total dick but those walls that had been so carefully constructed by him to push others away come tumbling down when he's with me. He trusts me. He loves me. And he worries for me. I wont give him any more to worry about, his past troubles him enough. If this cough doesn't go soon, I'll go see Magnus and get him to give me something to cure this bug. I'll have to beg him not to tell Alec though, Alec wont be able to resist telling Jace. I'll come up with something.

It probably wont even get that bad.

I say goodbye to Jace with a chaste kiss, short and sweet, as we separate to go into our individual rooms, his door opposite mine in the wide hallway. I make a beeline for the bathroom, intending on taking a shower to remove the build up of sweat still clinging to my body. I don't make it that far. A great coughing fit takes over my body as I convulse, collapsing on the floor when I cant hold my body weight any more. I pull my hand away from where I had been covering my mouth and see flecks of red. Blood. I hear the door fly open and Jace's frantic voice asking if I'm okay. I don't even register it. The only thought that is running through my head is that I'm coughing up blood. I feel Jace's arms wrap around me, his golden hair the last thing I see as I begin to pass out, still coughing. This is no simple cold, I think, as I slip into the comforting darkness that calls out to me, promising peace and comfort.

A/N: All rights to Cassandra Clare for the Shadowhunter characters obvs. Plot line ideas are my own :)

This is my first ever fanfic, I hope you enjoy! please leave me constructive reviews in the comments if you like, Love you all. Thank you for reading 3

Also, Clary is not dead...Not yet anyway ;)))))))))))))) JK, maybe... xxxxxxx