This is my first attempt at writing a fanfic so I hope you like it. I will probably continue this because it's so fun to write but I might not post it. If you happen to like the story and want me to post more chapters, I will :) Please review and be sure to tell me about any ways i could improve this story or about any grammatical errors I made have made! Hope you enjoy! OH! btw I don't own any of the Mortal Instruments characters... I wish... I'm not creative enough to think of something like that on my own xD
Jace was sitting in his room looking at the undecorated ceiling. Usually he found comfort in his blank walls, but not tonight. His heart was pounding in his ears like a crazy, erratic drum. He was lying there thinking of Clary. Why was he so enamored with her? He had pursued plenty of girls before and none of them had ever held his attention for very long before he was on to the next. Why was she so different? From the moment he met her, Jace felt that she was different, really something special. The way she acted as if she didn't realize she was beautiful; like she'd never been told such an obvious thing before. She had neither the exquisite but cold looks of the faerie, nor the pale splendor of a vampire.
Clary was just Clary, and that in itself drove Jace mad. He had begged Hodge to let him be the one that got to go and bring her back to the institute. But why? He had tried so hard for any girl in his life! Even worse, he had been jealous of that stupid mundane she was with in the coffee shop. Him… jealous? Of a mundane? And one that couldn't even manage a simple 'I love you'? Pathetic. I mean it was obvious how the mundane felt about Clary, even to Jace who barely knew him. But Clary didn't seem to notice the poor kid struggling with his petty feeling. Anyways, Jace had no right to be so jealous; he had only just met her! He ran his fingers through his unusually messy hair as he pondered this. Why did he even care what a mundane felt? It was just something about her drew him in like a foolish moth being drawn to the brilliant light of an open flame. Jace asked himself why? again and again and again without finding an answer.
Enough. He wasn't going to let one girl the better of him. Jace had encountered his fair share of women and none of them had ever made him feel so… different.
He rolled off his bed and landed on his feet. He straightened his sheets, attempting to clear his mind with the simple task. He crossed the room to the door and walked into the hallway, mentally vowing to not think of Clary. He roamed the hallway for a few minutes, not going anywhere in particular, only taking in the familiar walls that had accepted him when his father had- no, he wasn't going to think about his father either. While Jace was lost in thought, he had kept walking through the familiar hallways and by the time he snapped out of it, he was standing somewhere he definitely knew. Clary's room.
It was like a dream, albeit bittersweet. Jace had known deep down that this was exactly where he was going, but he hadn't wanted to admit that Clary's pull was that strong. It was inevitable that he would end up here sooner or later. For some reason he was nervous. But why should he be? He had been at the Institute for years, this was just another room… wasn't it? Jace knew that wasn't true anymore. After mentally kicking himself for the nerves he felt just for being here, he got up the courage to knock. No answer. Jace knocked again, still no answer. Had he gotten so worked up over seeing her when she wasn't actually there? He slowly opened the door, was she sleeping? No. She wasn't there. Maybe she was still talking to Hodge. What time was it anyways? He didn't know and he didn't care. Looking around the room, he was drawn to a small book. It was Clary's sketchbook. If she has the audacity to not be here when someone like him showed up at her bedroom door, then she must have some pretty good sketches. I wonder if there are any sketches of me, he mused, I mean I am a pretty fantastic model.
Jace opened the sketchbook and his jaw almost dropped. He had kind of assumed that Clary would be a pretty great artist but he didn't expect her art to be so detailed, emotional, personal. It was amazing. Not that I would ever admit that to her, he thought to himself. When he recovered from his awe, he started to flip though her book. Jace paused on each drawing, trying to imagine what Clary had been thinking about and feeling when she drew it. Looking through the drawings, Jace felt like he was reading a story all about Clary's life. Where she had been, what she had seen, and what she had experienced. He felt like he was getting to know a deeper, hidden version of Clary. There was something raw and true in her drawing. Just as he realized that this was probably more than she wanted him to see, the door swung open and a tired-eyed Clary trudged into the room smelling a strange green liquid in a vial. A potion maybe?
She glanced at her bed and let out a little yelp and dropped the strange vial she had been smelling. He watched it tumble to the ground and shatter, leaking green liquid on the hardwood flooring.
Jace closed the sketchbook and set it beside him. He was going to play it cool, try his usual charms. He looked up at her. "Oh, dear," Jace said finally. "I hope that wasn't anything important."
"It was a sleeping potion," she said without looking at him. She was looking at it as she no doubt wished it would go back into the little vial. She tapped the vial with the toe of her sneaker. "And now it's gone." She sounded angry but he wasn't sure if it was because her potion was spilled or because he was in her room. Probably both. How ironic, usually girls want me in their room. I mean who wouldn't? I'm incredibly charming. Jace decided he should probably change the subject.
"If only Simon were here. He could probably bore you to sleep." He said with a little bit of hidden jealousy in his tone. Honestly, Jace was glad Simon wasn't here. It was just Jace and Clary. Alone. In her room. This realization made him dizzy and made his heart race. But why should it? He had been in girl's rooms before and hadn't been nervous. He tried to keep cool and collected exterior when he was anything but that inside. But Clary didn't seem to notice; she seemed lost in thoughts of her own. She walked over to the bed and sat down next to him but she looked exhausted. Jace was elated by her nearness but still kept up his calm façade. She leaned over and picked up her sketchbook.
She looked at the cover like it was the familiar face of an old friend and said, "I don't usually let people look at this."
"Why not?" he said as she looked over him. He realized he must have looked pretty messy. "You're a pretty good artist. Sometimes even excellent." She was an amazing artist, Jace thought, but he wasn't about to let her get an ego. There was only room in the Institute for one huge ego, and I currently hold that position with much pride.
"Well, because-it's like a diary. Except I don't think in words, I think in pictures, so it's all drawings. But it's still private." She said. It made perfect sense to him, he had looked through something incredibly personal of hers. He was starting to feel a bit guilty, but he wasn't about to let her see this. He was going to play it off the best way he could, sarcasm.
He pretended to be hurt and said "A diary with no drawings of me in it? Where are the torrid fantasies? The romance novel covers? The-".
"Do all the girls you meet fall in love with you?" Clary asked. The question was like a blade to his guarded heart. That's it, I've done it. I made her hate me. This thought saddened him. He needed to make her understand why he was here, why he was acting like this, why he needed her.
"It's not love," he said, after trying to think of the best response. "At least-"
"You could try not being charming all the time," Clary said. She sounded exhausted, like she didn't have time to deal with him and his antic. Jace didn't bkame her. "It might be a relief for everyone."
He was going to make her understand. He would make right what he did. Jace had looked at something very personal, something that was pure Clary. He was going to have to do something he rarely ever did because he was desperate and trying as best he could to make her understand something. I need you, I don't know why and I don't know when I'll get over it, but right now I need you. He looked at his hands, willing the scars of old runes to give him the strength to say something.. "If you're really tired, I could put you to sleep," he said. "Tell you a bedtime story."
She blinked. "Are you serious?"
This was it. He felt dizzy and his heart was pounding in his ears like a drum. He tried desperately to stay cool. "I'm always serious." He managed. He looked up at her, she looked like she was confused and why shouldn't she be? He was acting strangely.
Her tiredness got the better of her and she set her sketchbook down and curled up, her hair encircling her head like a fiery halo. "Okay."
"Close you eyes." he said. She obeyed. She looks so delicate lying there, like a little girl who had had a nightmare and couldn't go back to sleep. But he knew better, she was strong and determined.
"Once there was a boy," said Jace, trying to keep his voice even.
"A Shadowhunter boy?" Clary interrupted.
"Of course." He replied, happy that she seemed to want him to continue. But the amusement faded when he realized how much he was opening up.
"When the boy was six years old, his father gave him a falcon to train. Falcons are raptors-killing birds, his father told him, the Shadowhunters of the sky." He continued. She started to relax, letting out tension she probably didn't even know she had been holding onto. "The falcon didn't like the boy, and the boy didn't like it, either. Its sharp beak made him nervous, and its bright eyes always seemed to be watching him. It would slash at him with beak and talons when he came near: For weeks his wrists and hands were always bleeding. He didn't know it, but his father had selected a falcon that had lived in the wild for over a year, and thus was nearly impossible to tame. But the boy tried, because his father had told him to make the falcon obedient, and he wanted to please his father. He stayed with the falcon constantly, keeping it awake by talking to it and even playing music to it, because a tired bird was meant to be easier to tame.
"He learned the equipment: the jesses, the hood, the brail, the leash that bound the bird to his wrist. He was meant to keep the falcon blind, but he couldn't bring himself to do it-instead he tried to sit where the bird could see him as he touched and stroked its wings, willing it to trust him. He fed it from his hand, and at first it would not eat.
"Later it ate so savagely that its beak cut the skin of his palm. But the boy was glad, because it was progress, and because he wanted the bird to know him, even if the bird had to consume his blood to make that happen." He looked down to see if she had realized how important this was to him. He wanted her to understand why he was acting the way he was, he wanted her to understand his past and he wanted her to understand him. Jace. The true Jace.
He continued, keeping his voice steady, trying not to express the turmoil that was churning within him. Why did he want to tell her this? Something about her made him want to tell her everything. Bear his heart and soul and then learn everything about her. "He began to see that the falcon was beautiful, that its slim wings were built for the speed of flight, that it was strong and swift, fierce and gentle. When it dived to the ground, it moved like light. When it learned to circle and come to his wrist, he nearly shouted with delight. Sometimes the bird would hop to his shoulder and put its beak in his hair.
"He knew his falcon loved him, and when he was certain it was not just tamed but perfectly tamed, he went to his father and showed him what he had done, expecting him to be proud.
"Instead his father took the bird, now tame and trusting, in his hands and broke its neck. 'I told you to make it obedient,' his father said, and dropped the falcon's lifeless body to the ground. 'Instead, you taught it to love you. Falcons are not meant to be loving pets: They are fierce and wild, savage and cruel. This bird was not tamed; it was broken.'
"Later, when his father left him, the boy cried over his pet, until eventually his father sent a servant to take the body of the bird away and bury it. The boy never cried again, and he never forgot what he'd learned: that to love is to destroy, and that to be loved is to be the one destroyed." Jace had pulled his legs up against his chest with his arms wrapped tightly around his legs to keep the bad memories away. What was Clary going to the fact that he just poured his heart out to her? Would she think that he was too forward, too personal? She rolled over and looked up at him.
"That's an awful story," she finally said. He should have been relieved that she didn't react too much. Why wasn't he? Part of Jace was still stuck reliving those painful memories he thought he had gotten over years ago. Memories from his childhood shouldn't affect him now. He had forgotten that Clary had said something, he was lost in a winding maze of memory after memory he thought were gone forever.
"It is?" He said finally, only half present.
"The boy's father is horrible. It's a story about child abuse. I should have known that's what Shadowhunters think a bedtime story is like. Anything that gives you screaming nightmares-"
He snapped out of the trail unwanted reminders of his past in time to hear the last bit of her statement. "Sometimes the Marks can give you screaming nightmares," commented Jace, before he realized that probably hadn't been what she was talking about. "If you get them when you're too young." He looked at her, could this little girl really change him? "It's a good story if you think about it," he said. "The boy's father is just trying to make him stronger. Inflexible."
"But you have to learn to bend a little," said Clary with a yawn. Had Jace really succeeded in helping her sleep?. "Or you'll break." He hadn't thought his story was soothing; maybe she was so tired that the even tone he had struggled to keep had actually put her to sleep
"Not if you're strong enough," said Jace firmly. And before he could stop himself, his hand did what he had wanted to do for a long time. He reached out and brushed his hand against her cheek. Her skin was soft and warm and the feeling of being so near to her suddenly sent shivers up his arm. He looked down at her as if she'd shocked him. She looked as if she was fighting to keep her eyes open, but it was a lost cause, sleep had her and she slipped away. For now the past was being held at bay. There was just Clary, peaceful and calm; beautiful in a candid sort of way.
He watched the steady intake and release of her breath for a few moments before he got up slowly and quietly padded out of the room. He was wandering through the hallways with his room as the ultimate destination. Jace made it there purely on instinct, his mind flooded with Clary. Everything about her. She was so different, she saw through him. 'Do all the girls you meet fall in love with you?' Her word rang through his head. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't pinpoint what set her so far apart. Other girls were beautiful. Other girls were smart. Other girls could be easy going. Other girls were creative. But no other girl has the same fire in her eyes, burning with determination and passion. He thought to himself. Was that what made her so enthralling? Was that the one trait that made him act, say and do things he had never done before? Before he even knew it, he was at the door to his room.
Hope you liked my story and be sure to review 3 Thank you all so much!
-Sami
