So...next chapter up! ^_^ well...enjoy...not sure if there's anything else I wanted to say...hope I didn't forget...? _

Writerswand

Starcrossed

Chapter 10

Natalie

*Maia*

Just as we entered the great room it exploded in a thick, yellow-ish fog that stunk of demon. Demons are bad, but they stink just as much as they are bad. I coughed as the fumes infiltrated my nose.
When the room cleared there was the girl we found at the night club—sitting on the floor, eyes wide.
Clary sat on the arm rest of the couch, rubbing her arms. Alec stood next to her. Magnus's sleeves had fallen back to his elbows, revealing his skinny arms, as he rubbed his hands together. Isabelle was cleaning demon blood off her whip.
"I leave for one minute and something goes wrong!" Jace joked darkly, relived no one was hurt, but also worried about everything overall. "What happened?"
"When the girl woke a lesser demon sprung from her sub-conscious, the protection rune around the house is still intact though, it was probably the demon that got her in trouble at Pandemonium, it was looking for a host most likely," Magnus explained.
Jace nodded, but the girl shook her head:
"No. That's not what happened," she said, her voice jumping up and down, but her body remained stable, her eyes cloudy and dazed, unfocused.
I looked the girl up and down, then at the drawing Clary's sketchbook was open to. Exact match, it was also how the girl described her cousin: long auburn hair, green eyes, Irish complexion, thin, pretty tall for fifteen, the state of her eyes also seemed to fit the distracted adjective. She wore skinny jeans that looked recently torn, a purple cami, and a green hooded jacket over that.
I flipped the page to the next drawing. Exactly what I thought, the girl was short, pale skin, and had wavy, short, bouncy, dark hair that fell to her shoulders, a red hairband to accessorize. She had big blue eyes that were very pretty. Yep, this was definitely Cammy.
"Then what really happened?" Isabelle asked, eyebrow raised.
"You won't believe me," the girl said, looking down.
"We've heard a lot of weird stuff before," Alec said blandly.
The girl nodded, pausing for a moment to look at each of us for a moment, as if she was deciding if we were trustworthy.
"It happened late in the afternoon. I was walking to my cousin's house, the street was strangely deserted, and the buildings surprisingly quiet. Then suddenly I was enveloped in a thick fog. I heard inhumane hisses and whispers, I was disoriented, I had no idea what was happening around me. I was taken to a place I didn't recognize, but the musty smell told me it was underground, I don't think it was a subway tunnel, but I'm not sure. I was chained to the ground near to tall guys, one had long white-blond hair, and the other wore his in a dark ponytail, both were very crisp in their dress. They didn't look at me, I couldn't make out what they were saying, and it sure didn't sound like English.
I was soon taken above ground and led to the front of an iron gate that surrounded a church. It was pretty, especially with that golden light around it. The white-blond haired guy walked over to me holding a wand like thing. He pushed the sleeve of my jacket down to reveal my bare shoulder and pressed the wand down on my skin. It burned. I screamed. The guy laughed and leaned towards me, he whispered in my ear in a silky voice: 'Take this and break the protection around this Church, fail me and your punishment will be much worse than that small burn,' I slowly and reluctantly took the wand and the guy showed me and piece of paper with a carving on it. He called it a rune; it looked like a broken circle. Somehow I knew what to do. I stood before the Iron Gate and drew the rune. When I finished the gate swung open and creatures swarmed the area from every direction.
The guy smiled and thanked me, but I hated him. He asked for the wand back but instead I stabbed it into the chains around my ankles and they disappeared. Without thinking I drew another rune in the air that jolted everything far away from me, I don't know how far but I ran. I ran to my cousin's house but her mother told me she was out. Pandemonium, was my first thought.
I went there and found her. I tried to tell her about what happened but she just wanted to get inside first, but then we got separated and little did I know that one demon managed to pursue me and now I'm here…" The girl trailed off from her story. Her mouth must be dry.
There was silence for a good two minutes.
Magnus broke it. "Hey, we don't even know each other, I'm Magnus Bane, supreme warlock of the New York State area," he winked.
"…I'm Natalie." She nodded.
We all introduced ourselves and Clary pulled out the stele that she received before we left Idris.
"Is this what the wand looked like?" she asked, holding it out for Natalie to see.
Natalie nodded. "Basically, I still have it though." She said pulling the stele out of her jacket pocket. It was a pretty crystal white stele with some black splashed inside it. Like a pure form with darkness inside harming it.
Jace walked towards Natalie. "May I see that?" he asked.
Natalie nodded and slowly handed it to him.
As soon as the stele came in contact with his skin he yelped and dropped it. Natalie managed to catch it before it hit the ground.
"It burned me," Jace said, shocked. Was
"Well…the white-blond haired guy did wear gloves…" Natalie trailed.
"Hold on, I'm confused. How come when someone presses the stele to her skin she gets burned, yet she's the only one that can use the stele without getting burned?" I asked.
Everyone was speechless, the room was so silent it was deafening.
"I'll look into things, but right now we all need to get some sleep, we should depart and meet again later," Magnus said.
"Wait, Simon was saying something about the Institute earlier," Jace said.
Simon nodded. "It all makes sense now, rouge downworlders and demons have overrun the place. It's too much to put up a good fight without knowing anything,"
"Well then we obviously can't go back there…" Alec trailed.
"Can't we just stay here?" I asked.
"I guess…but we don't know how long the protection rune will last, or if I'll be able to draw another one strong enough…" Clary trailed.
"You do realize you're all in the presence of an extremely powerful warlock who can either invite you to crash in his safe home for the night or blow you up to smithereens?" Magnus asked, eyebrows raised, smiling.
We all just stared at him for a few moments.
"It's Magnus's place then," Isabelle yawned.
Then my curiosity spiked up. "Hold on, where's Jocelyn and Luke?"
Clary rolled her eyes. "They went out for the weekend, those two are disgustingly in love,"
Magnus smirked. "And one could say the same about you and Jace…most of the time,"
I suddenly remembered I've been holding Clary's sketchbook…eh…why worry them all now? I'll wait till after we caught some sleep, later in the morning…or afternoon, seeing how late it was and how tired we all were…

I emerged from the wandering hallways and into the large sitting room of Magnus's place. I looked at the Big Ben styled grandfather clock that stood against the wall. 12:30 PM I stretched my arms out and yawned. I noticed Natalie sitting on one of the sleek black couches. I walked over to her and sat down.
"When did you wake up?" I asked.
"Only about a half an hour ago," she answered me.
I nodded and we sat in silence for a few moments. Then I thought of something.
"Crap! You're parents are probably worried sick about you!" I cried.
Natalie shook her head. "Not exactly, my mom died while giving birth to me-"
"Oh, I'm so so-"I began.
"Don't be, I hardly knew her. I mean, I'm sure she was a great woman, from the way everyone speaks of her, but how can I be sad if I never knew the lady?" Natalie frowned.
I nodded slowly. "Well…what about your dad?"
Natalie looked up at me with wide eyes, then suddenly-without warning- burst into tears.
I was struck motionless. "Did I mention something private? Did something happen and you don't want to talk about it? It's fine, I-" I began but Natalie sniffle and wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her jacket.
"No," she choked on tears. "It's just that I saw the whole thing. I watched the whole thing happen, yet I couldn't do anything,"
I frowned. "What happened?"
Natalie looked at me straight on, her green eyes rimmed red from crying. "My father was the only thing I had, the only thing I had, and I watched him get murdered, murdered by a filthy demon!" Natalie sobbed. I watched as the demon tore at him with its claws, he didn't even scream. I watched as it ripped through hi sternum, and tore out his heart. My father lay on the ground motionless as the demon…licked his heart," Natalie broke into uncontrollable sobs as I wondered what her father saw.
"No one, no one believed me when I told them about the things I saw from your world Maia, My father didn't even believe…'till then…but then it was too late," she said through sobs.
By now I had my arms wrapped around the girl; her frail body shook as she sobbed harder.
"When did this happen?" I asked softly.
"Last week," Natalie sobbed.
My eyes widened. "You've been taking care of yourself then?"
"I guess, but I don't really know, the past week has been a little…hazy,"
Just then I happened to look up and saw Clary standing at the foot of the hallway; it made me remember the sketchbook. I stood up.
"Stay with her k? I have to go get something," I told Clary before walking back into the bedroom where I slept.
While walking through the dimly lit hallways and not really paying attention I walked straight into both Simon and Jace, whose rooms must have been opposite each other.
I stumbled back a few feet after we collided and looked up. "Sorry," I mumbled, pushing pass the two guys. I walked straight to the room in which I stayed the night. I walked in and grabbed the sketchbook from the nightstand and walked back into the sitting room.
Alec, Magnus, and Isabelle were in here now, as well as Jace and Simon. Alec and Magnus sat on the couch on either side of Natalie, Clary sat on the armrest, and Isabelle leaned against the back of another couch. Jace and Simon stood around. The room was dimly lit by the light that filtered in through the natural light window on the ceiling.
Magnus clapped his hands and the room became brighter. The grandfather clock strangely shaped like Big Ben chimed 1:00 PM.
Clary noticed me holding her sketchbook. "What-"
I walked over to Natalie and showed her the drawing with Cammy, the vampire, and what I assumed was a werewolf. "This is your cousin right?" I asked.
"Yeah, that's her, how did you-" she began.
"I met her at the nightclub, she was looking for you" I said simply.
Natalie's eyes widened. "Camilla! I hope she's alright…" she trailed.
"I think she might be in danger," I said.

"OK—I'm confused," Simon said.
"When aren't you?" Jace asked.
"Cool it lovebirds," Magnus grinned.
Simon sighed. "Why the sudden involvement of two mundane girls in the Downworld?"
This was after the Natalie-Cammy situation was explained to the best of our ability to everyone.
"The other girl's bait I think," Alec said.
We all turned to him.
"Well, earlier Magnus and I were in the library, he was looking for something," he began.
Magnus clasped his hands together. "Oh yes, The Natalie Situation reminded me of something I used to know about-" he turned to face the fifteen year old-"You are what we call a Stellar: (which by the way is where stele is derived from) a mundane who can see through glamour and draw extremely powerful runes, but alas, they cannot have runes drawn on them because they are but mundane. The last Stellar was a young British lady that lived in the Victorian era, her name was Julia," Magnus explained.
A moment passed with no words exchanged.
"Ah," Natalie said. "But can we please get to the fact that my baby cousin might be in danger?"
Isabelle sighed. "And what can we do? We don't know when the scene in the drawing will occur, or if it already has. By the Angel, do I ever find the Accords annoying, binding Shadowhunters to protect pitiful mundanes…" she trailed.
Clary pursed her lips together and Natalie sighed, girl knew too much for her own good, particularly a mundane…what am I talking about? I was once mundane! …I hate Isabelle…
"I have an idea," I said.
Everyone turned to me, as if they all forgot I was here. I'm normally one of the ones talking in times like this.
"Well, not really. It's rather simple. I think we should all go on with normal life and try to attract as little attention as possible. But we should investigate further, you know normal Shadowhunter stuff. Patrol the streets at night, take shifts…oh what do I know…I'm no Shadowhunter…" I trailed.
This was going to be just great…