Cephina's PoV

Again, I fell on my butt, and heard my big brother's laugh echoing. Right after, my aunt (and parabatai's mom), Isabelle Lightwood, well Lovegood actually, scolded him for laughing at me. It has been two hours since I was trying to do this move, and it always ended up with me on the ground and my brother laughing more than ever.

"Shut up John! You weren't better" I said standing up and facing my parabatai again who was also laughing, and avoided my dad's face who surely wasn't happy about my language. But my brother was a real pain, at least Sophia had tried to restrain her laugh the first times I fell, but after the third time it was just too pathetic. Plus, she was falling a lot too, and I had laughed at some point.

"Actually, he was worse" interrupted Raphael. He was the oldest then it was John, Sophia, me, Max and Santiago. He was Sophia's little brother and a real little troublemaker but he was too young to have the same training as we did. Raphael was a shadow hunter, but his brother Max was a warlock although both were training with us. Raphael was a year older than John so both were more advanced in training. Sophia and I we're about the same age and she was my parabatai.

"Come on, let's stop here for today" said Isabelle "you're completely useless and clearly not focusing anymore." She sounded really tired, I had to admit that us five could exhaust most people in five minutes. The fact that she managed to stay with us -sometimes alone- more than two hours every day was a miracle. Happily for her, my dad and Alec often helped. Today it had been my dad.

"What do you guys want to eat tonight?" Asked Isabelle.

This little sentence when it came from her had the power to silence and scare us. She was a really bad cook, even though she tried. The problem was that she tried often, but always with the same result.

She had sense immediately the change of atmosphere, and was making a sad face.

"What is it now, my own family don't want to eat my food?"

Sophia looked at her mom, almost pleading. And so was my dad. My aunt was pretty determined, but like I inherited my parents' stubbornness, I was way worse. So, I tried to change her mind "Hum. Actually, I had planned to try and cook something..." I said, trying to save the day.

Unfortunately, my parabatai's mom wasn't naive, and she looked straight at me with her brown eyes, judging if I was lying or not. It's true that we all had been living together since forever, and she was my aunt, which meant she knew when I was lying. But she also knew I wouldn't easily let go.

"And what'd you planned to cook?" She asked, amused by the situation. I quickly looked at Sophia, who looked back and answered for me: "Chicken. With pasta."
Her mom looked pleased and smiled, she didn't argue which made me understand our mistake. The smirk on my father's face confirmed my theory. I groaned and laid down after she dismissed the class, all cheerful. She just had tricked us, saying she would cook: we got scared, made like if we planned on cooking, then we had to cook.

"You know that you just got tricked, right?" Jonathan said, laughing at Sophia and I.

"What do you mean?" Sophia asked, though she understood as soon as she spoke. "Damn it. You know Cephina, that's the sort of thing YOUR parents would never do."

I saw instantly Raphael's face of disbelief: "Seriously? This is nothing" he stated. Indeed, my parents weren't better, well my dad wasn't. "Cephina's dad casually attacks us anytime he wants and you know it. A week ago, he jumped at John while he was sleeping, yesterday he scared Cephina half to death when she was drawing. You were there, and you screamed."

"Yeah, right, cause casual training is a bad thing." She answered sarcastically, rolling her eyes and avoiding the screaming part. Although I sensed she agreed with our cousin, our parents were basically teenagers.

"Well at least we're not bathed in glitter" John said, clearly having goosebumps "I swear that Magnus tried to kill you that day Raphael."

"We can't really blame him, it was the carnival. He just got a little bit excited" said Sophia, who always defended her uncle though she was laughing. "But it'll never be as funny as you" she said pointing at me "forced to walk in seven inches heel for a day because you'd lost a bet with my mom."

Now the three of us were laughing out loud, indeed I'd reckoned that Alec wouldn't let Magnus put eyeliner on him, even as a costume for Halloween, but Isabelle had thought he would and we had made a bet, which I had lost.
My aunt had then forced me into a dress and heels for a day, while my mom was laughing, telling me about the first time she had been in the institute and how Izzy had dressed her to go to a party.

"Yeah right keep laughing you all, but you weren't that proud when she dressed ALL of you boys for Christmas cause you broke a window. Magnus even help her with the makeup. I still have photographs of this precious day..." I said which made them look king of scared for a minute.

"You sure you wanna go there little sis'?" Asked John, clearly thinking about all the bad stuff he had about me. The thing is, it involved Sophia most of the time, so she quieted too. It was the institute's alarm who broke the silence. Instinctively, we all went down to the library where my mom already was.

"What's happening," Asked Raphael who had become all serious.

"Not much, it's just a demon attack south Brooklyn" My mom said "Do you guys want to go and check it out?" She asked, accenting on the guys, which meant than Sophia and I were excluded. Well, I was more than Sophia. It was Raphael who spoke first, volunteering with Jonathan.

"Why can't we go this time mom ? It's not like we're grounded... or are we?" I said, not really sure and thinking of what was the worst thing I had done lately. She laughed then answered me "No, honey you aren't, Izzy told me you were planning to cook. I supposed you wouldn't want to let your dear aunt a chance to get in the kitchen."

Sophia didn't even have the time to make a sassy remark, as Alec interrupted with pure concern, coming out of nowhere "is Izzy cooking?"

"No, we are." Sophia said, and our uncle's face relaxed. A moment later, Sophia and I were in the kitchen, forced to cook for twelve persons. What a delight. I always forget how many we were.

"Okay, where do you start" I asked, more for myself but we looked at each other and laughed at the same time. We always laughed. Just a look could make us laugh out loud.
The thing is, laughing wasn't helping us to actually do the assigned task. Luckily, we both could be deadly serious when needed, especially when we were hunting, and training. But in any case, it was avoiding Sophia to be sarcastic and sassy. The situation could be desperate but she'd always say something funny, which exasperated me sometimes but I liked this part of her.
We were still laughing when Sophia's little brother came in with their dad, all excited.

"Did you both watched Star wars?" She asked, since they really both were excited and happy.

"Why do you ask kiddo?" Her father said, obviously lying. Santiago came to hug his sister, and showed her how he used his stele as a light saber.

"Okay, put that stele down boy, or you're gonna stab someone in the eye" I said to him, smiling at his cuteness.

"Everyone is eating here tonight, right?" Sophia asked hoping that she was wrong.

"No, I think Magnus and Alec are going to the restaurant, and I think that Jonathan and Raphael are going to eat at Taki's." The evening was going to be perfect.