Celia cracked open the door to the family townhome and shut it carefully behind her. The Lenox Hill streets had been quiet and sleepy, but she still worried the same couldn't be said for her own family. It was early, only seven o'clock, and she hadn't been home all night. After staying out getting ice cream with the Departed, she'd wandered around bit in the empty streets. She had meant to pop into the clubs and parties she so often haunted on lonely nights like that, but for once, she hadn't been able to bring herself to. No matter what she did, she couldn't tear her mind from Jace and Alec. Isabelle, at least, they had managed to cheer up a little bit, but Jace…

She dropped her keys in the bowl on the side table then carefully removed her heels; best not to wake anyone at this early hour and give rise to uncomfortable questions. Shoes in one hand, she jogged up the stairs to her room, creeping along the hallway, carefully listening to see if anyone else was awake. She came to her door and slowly started easing it open, tongue pressed against the back of her teeth in concentration.

"Good morning, Celia." Ky's voice slid softly across the hallway from somewhere behind her. She turned around, trying to suppress any expression that might prove her guilt. As it was, her eyes were wide with shock at being discovered.

"Ky." She said, startled.

He smiled wanly. He was leaning across the railing of the stairs, hair awry and deep circles under his tired gray eyes. He looked awful, wearing fraying black sweatpants and a pale blue shirt from an old school play he'd been in. He held a knife loosely in one hand and Celia deducted that he had been up in the spare room they used as a family training space, practicing in the watery light of the dawn and waiting for her to come home.

He moved without sound down the steps and stood in front of her, only about a foot away, and staring down at her.

"Where were you Ceals? I thought I told you to be home at a reasonable hour." The worry, as well as the hurt, was evident in his voice. Celia felt a sick roiling in her stomach. What had Ky ever done but take care of her, and now here she was, blatantly ignoring that care, and wandering off. Even she felt the hints of betrayal.

She firmly pushed the thoughts aside. It was a shame, she thought, and not for the first time, that Ky would likely never get to be a parent; no child would ever want to let him down. Really, it was only the idea that he was not her father and that he therefore didn't have any true power over her actions that allowed Celia to go about as she did. Sad, but true.

She leaned in, glaring. "You can't tell me what to do, Amedeo." She hissed. "Tu non sei mio padre."

He looked at her as if she had slapped him, but then his face went hard. "That's uncalled for."

She pushed her door the rest of the way open, and Ky followed her in. Clary had helped her paint her room an outrageous shade of red with black, white and grey splatter paint freckling the walls and the ceiling when they were thirteen, but over the years, Celia had tacked several pictures of herself and the Departed over their handiwork. Spare clothes, especially undergarments, littered the floor so thickly, she could hardly see the carpet. Scattered throughout the sea of fabric weapons and several piles of precariously stacked books rose like small islands.

Ky looked around, exasperated as always at the state of her quarters. She was half tempted to scoff back that he was no better, but she resisted, opting instead to kick obstacles out of the way as she pulled her hair out of bun.

"Celia, you can't keep doing this." His whispered voice was low and urgent, and very harsh. Celia rarely fought with her brother, but his temper had been short as of late and hers as well. Disagreement had been waiting on the horizon like a deadly charcoal smudge of a thunderstorm.

She whipped around. "And why not? Who are you to tell me how I do and don't spend my life? It's mine to live and ruin and no one else's!" She struggled to keep her voice down and not wake her slumbering parents. As she spoke though, her arms waved wildly, as they always did when she argued with Ky. She blamed her Italian heritage for the habit; at times, it felt as if the extremity of her emotions were slipping from the tips of her fingers, like birds.

Ky gasped, focus caught on her arm, where a bad burn was planted on the inside of her elbow like a kiss. He rushed forward, pulling his sister's slim hand towards him and pushing up her sleeve to look for more burns. "Celia," He said, his voice quiet and tender. "What happened?" His eyes, large with distress, turned up to meet her own and her shoulders sagged. "What happened?"

She pulled away. "Nothing. I met a demon on the way home. I took care of it."

"Why didn't you say anything?"

She dropped her head. "Because I didn't want you to be angry."

"Oh, Celia," he said, wrapping his arms around her in a tight bear hug. "I could never be truly angry with you."

"You've just had so much on your mind…"She started, looking up at him.

He kissed her forehead. "I will always have time for you. Now sit down and let me look at that."

Celia plopped down on the bed as Ky ran careful fingers up her arms, checked under her chin.

"They're demon burns, you won't be able to do much, even with a stele, and I already gave myself an Iratze."

Ky finished his check and touched her cheek lightly with his fingertips. "I'm your big brother. Sometimes, I just need to see these things for myself in order to believe them."

She smiled. "Do you have any coffee, then? Because it's early, and I need a kick-start."

Ky laughed. He always had coffee; he needed it first thing in the morning before he could ever be of any use. "Of course," He said, offering her his hand. She took it and pulled herself up, then followed him out the door. She bumped him with her shoulder

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

"Are you OK?"

He stopped and looked at her. He studied her face for a few moments before he at last sighed. "I don't think that I'm going to be alright for a while, Ceals."

"Is it really that hard?" She asked, looking at him. Celia had never really loved someone as much as Ky had loved his boyfriend, then had to face the kind of messy end that he did. She wanted desperately to understand, but knew, deep down, that she never really would.

He didn't say anything, but the answer was written just as plainly on his face. Celia felt tears in the back of her throat. Ky was just so beautifully innocent, it was difficult to see him so shattered like this. She took his hand, swinging it a bit. "Come on, we both need something in our stomachs right now, and if it's the big brother's job to look after the little sister," She straightened up, "then the little sister must take the time to, on occasion, look after the big brother."

He smiled, but there wasn't and joy or happiness at her humor in it, and allowed himself to be led down the stairs by Celia towards the kitchen; the caretaker for once being taken care of by his charge.