Jace yawned hugely and expressively, stretching as he did so. I had to duck to avoid getting hit in the face.

"This is boring," he announced.

Maryse's sharp eyes flashed to her adopted son. "You're free to leave."

I grinned at Jace. We weren't perfectly okay yet after he found out I'd altered his memories about his discovering City of Ashes but we were enough okay that I could openly enjoy the fact that he was being scolded by his mother. It wasn't a bad sort of okay.

"Besides," Robert added, giving me an openly curious glance, "I can't imagine you children being interested in the details of how we're getting to Idris."

Now it was Jace's turn to grin at me. Apparently he'd wanted to get us all kicked out of the meeting with Magnus. The Lightwoods were coordinating our upcoming trip to Idris with the warlock who would be making the Portal for us. Isabelle, Alec, Jace, and I had all decided to sit in just for fun on the off chance that we might learn something interesting. We hadn't really learned anything.

"I'm not a child," Alec protested though he didn't look like his heart was in it.

"But your parabatai is," Isabelle pointed out happily. "And on that note, let's go do some training so Jace is less bored."

"Yes," Maryse agreed. "New parabatai need to learn how best to fight together."

I knew she was referring to Isabelle and myself. In order to free me from the grips of the Seelie Court, Isabelle and I had become parabatai so that there was a claim on me that was stronger than blood. I wasn't sure yet how Robert and Maryse felt about it. They were very traditional Shadowhunters and I was a touch unique.

Taking the hint, the four of us said goodbye to Magnus and made our way out of the library.

"Why did you do that, Jace?" Alec demanded the moment the heavy doors had fallen shut behind us. "I thought we weren't even sure we were going to Idris with them? Shouldn't we have mentioned that?"

Jace held up a hand to silence Alec. Touchy much? "We'll talk about it up in the training room. Jaci, do you have the book?"

I held up the novel I clutched in response. I'd taken to carrying it everywhere with me, reading whenever I had a chance.

Isabelle frowned. "Is it a good idea to carry that around?"

I handed the book over for her inspection. "Try not to focus on it so much."

She gasped in amazement. Even though I didn't see it, I knew she would see a white cover with an unusual mark on it, something like a T inscribed inside a circle, made out of flame instead of the plain black cover the book usually sported.

"Sabriel?"Isabelle read, evidently confused.

I took the book back from her. "It's a very complicated glamour," I explained, doing my best to brag without sounding like I was bragging. I might've been a little proud of myself. "I made it so that only someone who knows what the book says will be able to read it. Otherwise they will find themselves reading the first book of Garth Nix's Abhorsen series."

"What's an Abhorsen?" a new voice asked. Max had appeared behind us in the hallway.

Jace started to say something about the young boy minding his own business but I cut him off, suddenly inspired – and really wanting an opportunity to show off my abilities.

"Here," I handed him the book, "it sort of tells you in the prologue."

The four of us stood watching the ten year old read. Max read remarkably fast, only pausing to push his glasses back up his nose. My chest felt tight when I thought about his original fate in the book he held in his hands. I was determined to not let that happen.

"Wow," he said, eyes wide, as he handed the book back to me. "Abhorsen's a necromancer? That's so cool!"

"It's very cool," I agreed, turning to beam at the others. "I'll let you read it once I've finished, okay?"

Max grinned up at me. "All right. I have other books to read right now, anyways!" And with that he bounded off.

But Jace was scowling. "Necromancers are not cool," he growled. He stalked off with Alec towards the training room, leaving Isabelle and myself behind.

"What's up his butt?" Isabelle asked quietly enough that Jace couldn't overhear.

I shrugged in response.

"Did you two have a fight?"

I shrugged again.

"Oh my god, you did! What did you fight about?"

I gave her a look that was supposed to tell her to be quiet and increased the length of my steps to catch up with the boys. As much as I loved Isabelle, I didn't really want to talk about my relationship with her adopted brother at that particular moment. Especially since we'd reached the training room and voices carried fairly well in there.

Jace was carefully marking off a box on the floor, sticking seraph blades at the corners. It made me think of the Malachi Configuration which made me think of the Inquisitor which made me think of Jace as her grandson.

"Have you checked on Imogen today?" I asked.

"No," he responded shortly, turning his attention back to his activity.

"What are you making, Jace?" Isabelle asked. She stepped forward to examine the four blades. "This isn't a Malachi Configuration, is it? Because that would be really stupid."

"You're right, dear sister," he said dryly, "that would be stupid. It would also be stupid to talk about certain things with a possibility of being overheard. Now, get in the box."

Quietly, I stepped inside the square.

Isabelle raised her eyebrows at me. Very rarely did I do anything without some sort of snarky comment, particularly when it was Jace being bossy.

"You at least could've said please," she said as she stepped to stand beside me.

Alec followed her in and Jace followed him after naming the last blade and creating walls of silvery light between the four blades. Cautiously, I reached out to tap the nearest wall. I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding when my fingertips met the silver wall and passed through it with only a slight warm sensation.

"Now Jaci," Jace said in a low voice that sent shivers down my spine, "about that book…"

"We should make a list or something," Alec said with a heavy sigh. "There are so many people to watch out for."

"Aldertree and Sebastian," Jace said dryly. "Do you think you can remember all two of them?"

"Don't forget Malachi Dieudonne," I reminded him.

"He's the Consul," Isabelle argued. "That's the highest office! How do we know the book's even right?"

I understood Isabelle's protests even if I didn't agree with them. "We'll keep him on the list. That doesn't mean we're going to kill him or anything. We're just going to pay very close attention to him. Maybe tie him up if the opportunity presents itself."

Alec got to his feet. "I'll get something to write all this down on."

I nodded in response to his leaving and turned back to paging through the book. It had been awhile since I'd read it and I wanted to be sure we knew everything from it that we would need. It was so much longer than I remembered. And just paging through a novel wasn't going to reveal the bare bits of plot I needed. I needed access to a computer and the internet back in my own dimension but that really wasn't possible without Peliel and the only way to contact Peliel was through near death experiences. Needless to say, I wasn't keen on that plan.

"Can I see that?"

I jumped in surprise, completely unaware that Jace had moved next to me, not to mention he was so close. Wordlessly, I handed him the book.

I caught Isabelle's eye. She waggled her eyebrows at the two of us. I blushed and bent to look over the book with Jace. I was so close to him that I could feel the warmth of his skin.

"It seems to me," he said slowly, paging through, "that if we just kill Sebastian the moment we lay eyes on him, at least half of our problems are over."

"Yeah," Isabelle agreed sarcastically. "We'd only be imprisoned for the rest of our lives-"

"And Valentine would still summon Raziel and kill all the Shadowhunters he didn't like," I finished.

Jace frowned at both of us. "I liked it better before you were parabatai who finished each other's sentences."

"What about sentences?" Alec had reappeared with a notebook and a pen. "Let's go through the people to watch out for again."

"Valentine," Jace piped up immediately. "Obviously."

"And Sebastian," I added. "More honestly known as the real Jonathan Morgenstern."

Alec carefully printed Sebastian Verlac/Jonathan Morgenstern at the top of the list. "Reasons to be cautious of him?"

"Actual son of Valentine, half demon, disables Allicante's wards, attempts to murder Izzy, actually murders Max, tries to murder me, and releases a demon army on the Shadowhunters." Jace counted each incident off on his fingers. "You know, I take it back. Killing Sebastian would prevent all of our problems."

Isabelle sighed and flopped on her back. "Maybe we can convince Mom and Dad to leave Max here with Luke and Clary."

"He'll hate us forever," Alec said quietly.

"At least he'd be alive to hate you forever," I pointed out in an even softer tone.

Jace nodded, jaw clenched. "Put that on our 'to do' list."

"Okay." Alec got a fresh sheet and scrawled "Leave Max home" across the top in big, bold letters. "Who next?"

"Inquisitor Aldertree," Isabelle said. "Reasons: Wants to blame everything that's happened here on our family, tortures Simon, plus he's awful."

"Then it's Consul Malachi," I said, figuring it was my turn to contribute to the list. "Reasons: an elitist, also just happens to be Valentine's spy. And the Consul. That'll be easy to take care of."

"We took down an Inquisitor," Jace said cheerily. "She can't even walk right now."

Isabelle raised an eyebrow at him. "She just so happened to be your grandmother and leapt to save your life. I don't think Jaci's Malachi's illegitimate daughter, sorry."

"I might be," I pointed out. "No one knows who my parents are." I tried to pretend that that fact didn't bother me. It did. A lot.

"Do we have any maps of Idris?" Jace asked, suddenly sitting up bolt upright, clutching the book. Evidently, he'd found something very interesting.

Alec eyed his parabatai closely. "In the library…"

"Good," Jace said briskly. "We can use that to locate Valentine's secret lair. In here I track Sebastian but if we find a map we can skip that step. Hmm," he added, "that's also where I find out that I'm not actually Valentine's kid."

"Spoiler alert," I said half-heartedly.

"So what's our plan then?" Isabelle asked. "We tell our parents that we're going to stay here instead of go to Idris, convince Magnus to make a separate Portal just for us, go on a glorified camping trip and hunt down Valentine and Sebastian?"

I ran that potential plan over in my mind. Despite how crazy it sounded, it was also vaguely possible except…

"I have to go to Alicante," I admitted. "So does Alec."

"Oh, right," Isabelle murmured. "The Clave wants to meet the 'Shadow Mage' and Alec's technically an adult."

"Not to mention it'd be weird if we went without our parabatai," Alec admitted dully.

Jace snapped the book shut, drawing our attention to him. What a surprise. "Then we go to Idris like planned except without Max. Once there, either Isabelle or Jaci can seduce Sebastian and get one of his hairs so that we can track him. It'll be more accurate and faster than a map."

"What?!" Isabelle's voice was not kind.

I fought back the urge to slap Jace. "Seduce Sebastian? That's disgusting!"

"I'm your sister!" Isabelle shouted.

"I'm your girlfriend!"

"And Sebastian's an evil bastard," Jace reminded us. "You ruled out killing him."

Alec, fortunately, cut in before Isabelle and I could tear Jace apart. "There's no use tracking him if he's with us the whole time. But if we wait to find Valentine until Sebastian leaves then Sebastian will have the opportunity to disable the wards. And if we stop Sebastian from disabling the wards, then we also stop him from finding Valentine and therefore leading us to him."

"Allowing Valentine to summon the Angel and kill us all," Jace said matter-of-factly.

My mind was racing. Potentially, I had an answer that might work. "Valentine can't summon the Angel or a considerable amount of demons without the Mortal Sword. And the sword would force Sebastian to tell the truth…"

"That'd be great if we had the sword," Jace said sourly.

I glanced at Isabelle who had a confident smile on her face.

"Oh," she said, "we have the sword."

It had been decided that the keeper of the book was also the keeper of our notes so I was taking this opportunity to pour over them again. They were pathetically short, in my opinion. We – a group of teenagers – were going to try and prevent a war with a megalomaniac and our plan so far was to keep the ten year old at home and not trust a handful of people. And do something vague involving Maellertach. Wonderful.

Peeta mrowed and moved onto my lap to have his ears scratched. A pang of guilt stabbed my stomach. I hadn't exactly been the best pet owner since becoming a Shadowhunter. And now I was going to Idris and leaving him behind in the vast, empty Institute with Church as his only companion. I didn't understand why the little cat loved me.

It was late and I was tired so I decided to get ready for bed, setting aside novel and notes. We were leaving for Idris in two days and the counter in my bathroom showed evidence of attempted packing. A small toiletry bag that Izzy had given me sat empty and open beside the things I would need in Idris but also needed before leaving.

"You know you don't need to worry about taking soap with."

I jumped about a mile. "Jace! What do you have against knocking?!"

He flashed me a half smile. "Nothing, I just think you're cute when you're surprised."

"One of these times I'm going to be armed and there'll be a dagger sticking out of your chest. Is that still cute?"

He didn't respond immediately and I took the moment to take in his appearance. He wore a thin white t-shirt and his favorite pajama pants that he'd finally stolen back from me. Fortunately, Isabelle had given me a pair of leggings to replace them which I was wearing coupled with a long sleeve t-shirt I might've possibly stolen from Jace's room. He didn't seem to mind at least.

"No," Jace answered finally. "But it is a little hot."

I choked back a laugh very attractively. "You and your fetishes."

"Would you like to hear about my other fetishes?" he asked suggestively, closing the space between us and backing me up against the edge of the tub.

"Are you trying to seduce me?"

He narrowed his eyes. "Is it working?"

This time, I laughed openly. "No. Now I'm just imagining you having a foot fetish or being really into pony play or something!"

"What the hell is pony play?"

I felt my face go hot. "People pretend to be ponies and, erm, riders."

Jace stared at me, clearly confused. "How do you know about that?"

"I used to watch a lot of crime shows and one of them involved pony play. Can we change the subject?"

"We could take a shower," Jace suggested, keeping his voice even but I could faintly see his pulse racing in his neck.

My stomach lurched not unpleasantly and I felt slightly lightheaded for a second. I'd seen Jace wearing nothing but a towel and the idea of seeing Jace without the towel made my heart flutter. But that also meant Jace would see me. See me with all my scars and flaws that I was still working on accepting and embracing as part of me. While part of me know that Jace wouldn't care about my imperfections and would even be able to make me not care about them, another part was very aware that I wanted to come to terms with my body as beautiful without anyone else's help.

"I showered earlier today," I admitted regretfully. "Besides…" I figured I might as well tell him the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Especially since I still felt guilty about hiding his own memories from him. "I'm not exactly to a point where I'm comfortable with you, well, with you seeing all of me yet."

"Yet," he echoed, backing up half a step.

I nodded as confirmation. "You can sleep in here if you want but I have to brush my teeth first.

Jace pressed a soft kiss to my forehead. "Don't be long."

With my heart racing, I watched him cross my room, switch off the light, and climb into my bed. I brushed my teeth faster than I should've and went to join him, snuggling into his warmth.

To me, it had been months since I'd been in his arms like that, so close I could hear the beating of his heart. Almost lazily, he traced meaningless patterns on my back. I'd missed him. It took being separated from him and then being reunited for me to know completely, five hundred and ten percent, that this was how I wanted to spend every night for the rest of my life.

Only being able to see faintly, it took me a moment to find his lips and I kissed him awkwardly, noses and teeth getting in the way. I felt his mouth twist up in a smile briefly before he rolled so that he was above me, kissing me as if he never intended to stop.