Clary raced out of her house and grabbed a cab as quick as she could. Heading into the center of Manhattan, she got stuck in bumper to bumper traffic. She threw a 20 at the driver and raced out of the cab. Her morning runs were finally going to come into use. She raced in between the cars until she got to the sidewalk where she finally broke out into a full out sprint.

She got to the institute about 7 minutes later. She raced in, got to the elevator, and headed up. For the first time since she left the house she allowed herself to think. Jace is going to be ok. I can't live without him. Clary decided that maybe it wasn't the best idea to think right now. She would just focus on steadying her breathing.

She got upstairs and heard voices coming from the library. She opened the door to see Isabelle sitting on the couch, her legs shaking from just sitting there. Every part of her body told her to get up and do something. Fight. Alec was pacing across the room, his head bent with worry. Robert and Maryse were near the large desk, that only 5 months ago had been used frequently by Hodge.

They heard Clary enter and all four heads shot up to look at her. Isabelle got off of the couch, crossed the room quickly, and gave Clary a big hug. "It's all right Clary. Don't cry. We'll find him. I promise. He loves you too much to let anything come between you."

Clary smiled a thank you and wiped her face. She hadn't even realized she was crying. "So what happened?"

Alec was the one who responded first. Isabelle couldn't bear to tell the story. "The Shadowhunter from Idris, Marcus Alcott, was staying in the room next to Jace's and then the four of us," he pointed to his family, "went to Taki's to get some food. When we came back Jace's room was a mess and they were both gone. I should've known, I mean Jace had said that he had a bad feeling about Marcus but I just thought he was being stupid"

"But why would he have taken Jace? I mean what could he possibly get out of it?" Clary couldn't think of anyone who would go this far to hurt Jace. This time it was Robert answered her. "I honestly couldn't tell you Clary. I promise that we'll find him and bring him back to you."

Clary looked Robert right in the eye and said "No. You won't be the one to track this guy down. I will." Her face was red with rage by this point and couldn't wait to find Jace. Robert looked at her sympathetically. "Look, Clary I know you want revenge but that won't help you. We can though. We've contacted the Clave and we are going to figure this out. I promise."

Alec and Robert shared a look and Alec nodded slightly, but just enough for Clary to notice. Alec finally looked at her and said "Clary, I think there is something you need to see."

Clary was looking at Jace's room, astonished at what she saw. For a teenage boy, Jace was surprisingly neat. She always joked with him saying that it looked like a monk's room. The only think that showed that anyone even lived in this room was the single picture of Jace and Clary with their arms around each other, taken on the night of the fireworks in Idris.

Unfortunately, it looked nothing like that. The bed was unmade, the sheets hanging halfway off the bed. The dresser was knocked over and clothes had fallen out leaving them scattered all over his room. The photo of her and Jace was face down on the floor, the glass everywhere from when it broke. There was a hole in the wall as if someone had punched it. Clearly Jace had fought hard against the Alcott guy, but sadly this was the first battle he didn't win.

Clary looked at the bed she had been on so many times and fought back the tears that came to her eyes. She saw a notebook open on it and walked over to look. What she saw wasn't surprising. Jace had drawn a musical staff and was writing down notes, creating a piece for the piano. Clary knew that when Jace got restless he would either play the instrument that Valentine had forced him to learn as a child, or compose for it.

When she looked at the bottom of the page, she inhaled a gasp and clutched the notebook until her knuckles turned white. In a handwriting that wasn't Jace's was a note meant for her. Ave Atque Vale. Try and find me in time, or you'll be saying these final words for your precious boyfriend.

Isabelle came up to Clary and had to pull the notebook from her to read it. Clary was frozen with the notebook clutched to her as if her life depended on it. Alec picked up the photo frame and looked down at it with eyes wide. Isabelle took from his hand gently and when she looked down at she gave a quick gasp and said "Clary, here you go. You might want to take a look at this."

Clary reached out her hand for the photo frame and glanced down, afraid of what she'd see. Her instinct had been right, what she saw was scarier than the note challenging her. It was the picture of her and Jace but it had been altered to be horrifying. Jace's face had a huge X over it. When Clary looked over and her face to see what had been put there, her whole world went dark as she crumpled to the floor. This was just too much to handle.

Isabelle raced to catch Clary before she could hit her head. Robert Lightwood reached down to pick up the picture and see what had scared Clary so much. He saw the X around Jace's face and then saw a circle around Clary's face. Written in red marker under the two teenager's faces was written two words: You're next.