Chapter Ten: Mother's Day

"Even strokes, Clary, even strokes," trilled Marisa as she and Clary stood in the drawing room overlooking the gardens. "I will not have your parents think you a slacker when it comes to your artwork."

Glowering in the direction of the art instructor, Clary sighed and dabbed her paintbrush into the red and yellow. The tree line in the distance, beyond the garden, looked welcoming-to Clary at least. She would have welcomed any escape from the manor and Marisa, and the woods were lovely. Her tongue slithered out of her mouth and she bit it in concentration as her deft hands dabbed in the color of the changing leaves.

"That's…better," Marisa allowed. "Add shadow to piece, and do try to hurry. I've no doubt that your father expects perfection."

By this point Clary was really considering throwing open the window and vaulting into the flowers. Marisa was like a mocking jay, really, she just wouldn't shut up. From the corner of her eyes, Clary considered the woman. She was tall and curvy, wore her curling hair in a messy bun, and had eyes like a hawk. If her only her voice wasn't so incessant and annoying, Clary would have welcomed her lessons.

Valentine had decided the day after his arrival that Clary needed some form of creative expression. Since she could draw, and he approved of the talent, he hired a private tutor to come and coach her. Two hours were suddenly filled everyday with paint and pencils and empty canvas.

"Now, make the flowers bend, flow, turn gently in the wind like a dance. You need to envision these things, make them breathe, give them life!" she cried and clapped Clary on the back. "Go, go, go!"

I know how to draw, Clary thought tartly. "Alright."

For five more minutes Clary labored over her art, admiring her depiction of the garden and the trees. It was her private garden, the place she and Jace shared. As she added a golden streak to the flowers she thought of Jace. She'd give it to him when it was all done.

"That's a rather lovely depiction of the garden walk-"

"Clary!"

Marisa and Clary spun about to the doors, both thrown open. Clary's hand clenched down on the paintbrush as Marisa sprang into action. "Ah, Jocelyn, have you come to view your daughter's work? I must say, she's progressing excellently. You talent passed down, most likely."

Jocelyn surveyed her daughter's drawing and nodded. "It's lovely, but I'm afraid it will have to wait." She turned on Marisa and smiled sadly. "I'm going to have to steal Clary away from you a little early today."

Marisa pressed her lips, but she'd never say no to Jocelyn, not Valentine's wife. "If you must. I know the lessons you work on are essential to her life skills."

Jocelyn's smile was heartbreaking. "Nothing could be more important. Clary, my dear, come."

Clary laid her brush on the sill of easel and tipped her head to Marisa. Her tutor clicked her tongue and nodded to her mother. Following her swishing skirts, Clary was led by Jocelyn up a level of stairs and into her own room. It was buzzing like a hive.

"Those seamstresses we called finished your new clothes. You have to try them on for a final fit."

Clary inched into her own room and surveyed the boxes piled on her bed. In the corner by the window, the seamstress eyed her nervously, and by a dressing screen propped up, Isabelle waited patiently. By common assent of the servants, Isabelle was named Clary's personal maid.

Clary stared so long at the boxes that Isabelle came forward and opened one and drew out the clothes. She shook out a lovely dress and gestured Clary behind the changing screen.

"You're lucky to get new clothes," Isabelle murmured.

"Lucky my mother could get Valentine to do anything, you mean," Clary sniffed. "And anyway, look at the clothes. Valentine is trying to keep me in the Victorian age."

It was true. It seemed like the fashion in Idris was a few hundred years old. Most of Clary's clothes were new dresses, fitted perfectly. They all had low necklines and flowing skirts. In her mother's opinion, it made her look more mature, to Clary, it made her think of Halloween. There were a few exceptions, pants and shirts for sparring and horseback riding. Boots and gloves, too, but mostly, elegant woman things.

"Oh, that's lovely!" Jocelyn proclaimed as Clary emerged from the screen. "That red does wonders for your hair. Ah, and here's the ribbon. I think you should wear this for dinner tonight, you know, to show your father how grateful you are."

"Would he care much?" sighed Clary.

"Oh and look at this!" cried Jocelyn, ignoring her dour remark. "Grey and blue. I just love the embroidery on the bodice…"

With a snap of her fingers, Jocelyn sent Isabelle and Clary behind the screen to change. The red dress was set aside with a length of ribbon, and she was shunted into dress after dress. Isabelle watched emotionlessly as Clary tired on her new clothes, and Jocelyn oohed and aahed her way through it. The whole process took almost three hours.

"These are all perfect," Jocelyn said to the seamstress. "Your work is amazing. Perhaps, we could call on you again for a ball gown or two?"

The seamstress nodded fervently. "It'd be an honor. I just found this exquisite blue silk…"

Jocelyn and the seamstress tapered off in conversation and Clary turned to survey herself in the mirror. She was in a simple dress, very light green with dark green designs tailored into the skirt and sleeve cuffs. Clary twisted a piece of stray hair behind her ear and pursed her lips into a frown. Her reflection frowned back and then sidestepped as Isabelle joined her.

"You really do look nice," she whispered and then glanced at her own rags. "Though, I suppose telling Valentine you're grateful will be painful. The price you have to pay, I suppose."

Clary could see her father now, smirking as he watched her prance about in a dress. Of course, it wasn't her dress, not by a long shot. She'd have to pay for it in years of training and service to Valentine. He'd make her work for anything she had, be it clothes, books, or food.

"Isabelle," Clary whispered weakly. She wanted to tell someone so badly, she needed to say it, let it out. The secret was eating away at her insides, haunting her nightmares. "I don't want to see my father."

Would she understand it? Clary wondered. Did Isabelle see that she was begging for help? Wasn't it obvious that Valentine was just as cruel as Jonathan?

"Just stare him down and tell him what you need to," she said back, and Clary's heart sank at her thoughtlessness.

"He'll never let me go, Izzy, everything I have, everything I am, it's what he gave me." Clary bowed her head submissively.

"You have Jace," she said, clutching at shreds of hope.

"So does Valentine; he keeps Jace at his side, his personal servant. Jace isn't even allowed to see me unless he asks Valentine!" Clary ached at the idea of Jace. "I only see him at dinner and at night."

Isabelle reached out and touched Clary's hand in the warmest gesture she could, but Jocelyn turned about then and smiled on her daughter. "Look at you, Clary!" she proclaimed and came over, pushing Isabelle into the shadows. "You're absolutely stunning."

"She's gorgeous," cooed the seamstress, admiring her own work.

Jocelyn looked to the seamstress and nodded her head in dismissal. "You're work is much appreciated, thank you." They waited until the old woman left before Jocelyn returned to her daughter. "Clary, we have a little while before dinner, would you care to walk with me in the garden? I wish to speak with you." Her eyes landed on Isabelle. "Alone."

Clary knew she didn't have a choice in the matter. "That would be fine."

In slow procession Clary followed her mother out the door and through the house. A few of the servants smiled at them and said hello, but Jocelyn didn't really notice them, she floated by with a wave and forced Clary onward. Clary considered her mother's punishing pace and wondered what she had on her mind.

The garden was beginning to fade, Clary decided, very much like her hope of ever escaping Valentine. Most the flowers had shed their petals and were dropping under their own weight. The soil was dry and littered with brown leaves, and when a cold crisp wind blew, it scattered the dead petals onto the walk. Jocelyn led Clary to the private courtyard she wanted to share only with Jace, and gestured for her to sit on a small bench.

"Do you like having your father back?" she began evenly, and toyed with a fly-away hair.

Clary slumped her shoulders and nodded. "I do like it when you're around."

"I'm glad to hear that, Clary," her mother said after releasing her pent up breath. "I'd always felt like I'd done you wrong by not having a father in your childhood…for a while, I hoped that Lucian might fill that place but-" Jocelyn shook her head frivolously. Luke was nothing now to her. "-now you have your real father and things are as they should be. I worried when you first met him you wouldn't care for him, and I was right, wasn't I?"

Clary fingered her arms where her father would slice her open if she didn't obey him. "Yes, mother, I wasn't fond of him."

"But now," pressed her mother, "you do?"

An urge to blurt out the truth overcame Clary, but she saw the pleading in her mother's eyes and knew she couldn't rip that dream to shreds. "But now he is far more endearing to me. This house is even nicer when he's around." And that part was true; with Valentine around, Jonathan was hardly ever there to hurt her.

Jocelyn nodded her head carelessly; she seemed to be working up to something. "So, you do like having a family?"

"Mom," Clary said finally, looking her up and down. "Mom, what are you getting at? What's all this about?"

In a sudden flurry of action, Jocelyn stood and paced back and forth frantically. Her hands fluttered about her and then came to rest, first on her hips, then her elbows, and finally, on her belly. She bit her lip and eyed Clary to the side. "I have a surprise for you, Clary. And before I told you I wanted to make sure you'd like it."

A surprise? A surprise she'd like? Clary wondered what her mother could give her that she could possibly like. The best words that could come out of Jocelyn's mouth were that she was leaving Valentine and taking Clary and Jace away with her. But Clary doubted that. Perhaps Jocelyn had convinced Valentine to let her and Jace leave, as long as they swore on the angel to never return. Or maybe, Jonathan was being sent away because Jocelyn discovered what he'd done to her and Jace while she'd been with Valentine. All these possibilities, all these hopes, so Clary shifted forward in her seat to listen.

"What is it?"

With an excited sigh, Jocelyn fell onto the bench and clapped her hands together. "Oh, Clary, you're going to be a big sister. I'm pregnant!"

A buzzing was filling Clary's ears. Her nails dug into her palms. Teeth sank into her lips. This wasn't happening. Not this. Anything but this. Her mother was lying. Telling a joke. It just couldn't be. The world was beginning to spin all around Clary, a wicked carnival ride, spinning and spinning faster and faster.

"…another little baby. Just think of it, Clary. There'll be me, your father, your brother, you, and an adorable little baby. The sweetest thing in the whole world. You'll be an excellent sister, I can just tell. I'll show you how to care for a baby, so one day, when you're older, you'll know what to do…"

Oh, yes. Clary could see it now. She'd have another sibling to look after. That's what Valentine would make of her. She'd be the new baby's personal maid, the one to care for it, play with it, feed it. She'd never be a shadowhunter, she'd be a nursemaid. That's what Valentine would make of her.

"Does-does father know?" Clary rasped. Her arms were shaking horribly by now.

"Hm?" Jocelyn paused in her praise and excitement to give her daughter a hard look. "Well, of course he knows. Your father is so excited, too. He said it's about time there was another child around here. He was the one who suggested I tell you, after all."

And the world cracked right there for Clary. She wasn't going to sit by with a placid smile on her face, waiting for her usurper to arrive. She wouldn't let another child enter this world only to be used and abused by a man with no heart. Fragments of her world fell around her and Clary, shaking now uncontrollably, stood to face her mother.

"You're crazy," she said in a whisper. "You're crazy and I hate you! I hate what you've become, or what you pretend to be, or what you've returned to; I hate it. You're like some sheltered child, never seeing the world for what it really is, just choosing what you must look at. And you, you stupid careless mother, want me to pander to your little baby?

"I would rather be reduced to a slave than be your baby's nurse. In fact, mother, I hope that baby never sees the light of this world, because God forbid what it'll have to face when it arrives." Jocelyn's face fell into horror at those words. "I will never love that child, never care for it, and I'll never love you either-"

"Clary-"

"You took my love and you smashed it into little pieces the moment you turned your back on me. The moment you went back to Valentine's arms and started blocking out the memories and the nightmares and the ugly truth staring you in the face! You would rather pretend everything's fine than try to protect your own daughter from the man who beats her?"

"No!" Jocelyn denied, shaking her head angrily. "You're wrong, Clary, I love you."

"You don't love me. If you did, you wouldn't be pregnant with Valentine's child, you wouldn't be playing the simpering wife. You'd be trying to help me escape." It felt so good to vent, to just scream and scream and have no one hit you, or tell you to stop. Everything Clary had been feeling since Valentine won, the betrayal, the fear, the pain, it came spilling out like a gushing wound. "But now, now it doesn't matter anymore what I feel, does it?"

"I've always loved you, always cared for you…"

Clary narrowed her eyes at her mother's words. "You have a new baby now, mother. You're probably hoping right now that it's a girl. A little baby girl to replace me in this dysfunctional rag-tag assortment of people you call a family. Yes, that's right, a little red-haired girl to be the perfect daughter you've always wanted. I'll just be that ugly memory, won't I? The daughter you didn't want. Lock me away in a basement or an attic, why don't you? Or better yet, let me be the nurse to my new little sibling. I won't even be your daughter anymore, just that girl who cares for the baby."

"Clary, what you're saying, it hurts me," Jocelyn pleaded with wide pathetic eyes.

"Well, mother," Clary began with a bark of a laugh, "your abandonment hurt me, and you know what they say: actions speak louder than words. If I'm in pain, you don't care, even if you're the reason, you don't care."

"Please, Clary," said Jocelyn, hands outstretched. "Come back to me."

"There's no going back, mother." Clary drew back a few steps. "I just need to know one thing before I go. You'll do that for me, won't you?"

"Anything," breathed Jocelyn.

"Why wasn't I good enough for you? Why did you have to leave me and run off with Valentine to be happy? Wasn't it enough to have a daughter that loved you?"

"I didn't run off," said Jocelyn at once. "I'd never leave you, Clary. I'm here with you now, aren't I?"

"You're here," agreed Clary. "But I don't consider it with me."

With those words, Clary lifted up her skirts and took off. Her shoes sounded loudly as she thumped over the grass of the front lawn and up the steps. She threw open the doors and banged them shut before running up to her room, where she locked the door and collapsed on her bed to cry and cry and cry. To let all the tears out and just wallow in her pain. She didn't know how long she's been on the bed before a floorboard creaked and swish of fabric let her know she had a visitor.

"You sit like that too long and you'll crumple the dress."

Clary lifted her head and sat up straight. By the window, leaning against the sill, was Isabelle, giving her a dark eyed stare. Clary wiped her eyes but it was too late to undo the damage done. She'd been crying for hours probably.

"Izzy," she choked out. "Izzy, my mother just told me…"

"She's pregnant?" guessed Isabelle at once.

Swallowing her surprise, Clary raised an eyebrow. "How did you know?"

A coy smile and Isabelle joined Clary on the bed and took her hands in hers. "The servants know everything around here. We hear the best gossip and secrets. How'd you take it?"

Clary laughed then. "I exploded at her. You know, the usual teen drama. I told her I hated her. That I hoped the baby was never born. That she didn't love me. All the good stuff."

Isabelle considered Clary's prospects a moment. "Not bad for an amateur. You probably did me proud." She saw tears in Clary eyes and hugged her for a moment. "Now, though, you gotta pull it together."

"What?" gasped Clary, looking down at her rumpled form.

"You heard me," Isabelle said stoutly. "It's time to go into ice princess mode. You need to be the most impeccable daughter in the world. You need to be perfectly above everyone, especially your mother."

"It's a little late for that."

"No it isn't. I'm gonna clean you up and get you out there. You need to show your mother that it's over. It was ugly, but now it's over. You won't even consider her anymore. For you, she's dead."

"A little harsh," admitted Clary.

"Maybe, but it'll make her think twice. Come on, girl, get up."

Isabelle shooed Clary into a very hot bath and had her soak; the heat seemed to wake all her cold muscles and jumpstart her mind. When she got out in a bath towel, her thoughts were alive with revenge. Then, though Clary hated it, Isabelle had her sit before her mirror as she arranged her hair into an elegant bun, and then found the red dress and ribbon. With a pair scissors, Isabella cut the ribbon and wound a piece around Clary's bun. She helped Clary shuffle into the dress and then tied the other piece of red around her neck.

Even though Clary protested, Isabelle applied light make-up. She had to admit, it made her look more mature with her eyes lidded in brown and lined in black with big lashes and berry red lips. Isabelle lifted Clary's chin for her and made her practice a polite though cold smile.

"Dinner's in five minutes. Just go down and be as cold and mature as you can."

Clary tried to stutter out a thanks, but Isabelle shoved her out the locked door and down the steps. The bell that signaled dinner rang as Clary arrived at the doors. She pressed them open and gazed imperiously across the room. Her face, she was sure, was an impassive face that betrayed none of the tension stringing through her body.