Chapter 11: What Happens in LA Stays in LA

"See anyone you recognize?" a voice questioned Clary.

Clary looked up, shocked and shaken badly.

How was it possible that she was in pictures she didn't remember taking or ever happening? She looked up at the source of the voice, only to see a woman with dark hair that was pulled into a bun and dark eyes that were sharp and fierce. There was a fierce, fiery aura to her that made Clary feel respect and slight fear towards her. She also looked like an older, sharper version of Isabelle. No doubt this was Maryse Lightwood.

"How is that possible?" Clary gasped, her eyes flicking back to the book.

"It is because it is." the woman answered simply, Jace appearing beside her. He took the steps two at a time, in the end just jumping over the railing and onto the ground floor. His landing was muted, graceful, effortless and perfectly absorbed like a cat's, no false move or landing on his accord.

"Could you just give me a moment, Jace?" Clary gasped, holding her hand up. She wasn't sure if she could take this stably; whatmore with Jace around her. Jace stopped a few feet from where Clary stayed planted, looking impatient and sad. "How can that have happened?" Clary murmured as she kept her eyes locked on the photo of her and Jace.

"Clary, I know it's hard for you to believe but is true. That's why I reacted that way when I saw you in London." Jace said gently, ignoring Clary's request to stay away. He stepped in front of Clary, gripping her arms gently.

Clary's head was spinning like top.

Confusion and distress were one of the countless feelings that were running through Clary, making her lightheaded.

"Here, sit down." Jace said, steering her towards a grey, worn looking couch.

Clary legs felt like they were made of water as she shuffled to the couch, Jace gripping her arms tightly for support.

"This is impossible." Clary breathed as her backside hit the soft plush cushion of the couch. "I can't believe any of this. Not anything ..."

Jace sat beside Clary, smiling sadly at her.

"Shadowhunters have a saying, Clary; all the stories are true. Mythical creatures, stories whispered around campfires ... all of them are very real and very dangerous. So you'd better start believing," Jace said, getting up. He walked over to a teapot that sat on the oak desk and poured the contents into a chipped ceramic cup.

Now, for some reason, Clary noticed what he was wearing.

A light and loose grey shirt, the cuffs and collar unbuttoned The first button of his shirt was unbuttoned too, showing his chest which was inked with black runes. He wore black leather pants and was wearing comfortable looking shoes. His halo of curly golden hair fell in his face when he moved and he pushed it back impatiently.

"Here," Jace said, offering Clary the white ceramic cup, the rim slightly chipped.

Hesitantly, Clary took the warm cup, wafts of smoke rising from the hot liquid inside. "What's this?" Clary asked suspiciously. What if it was some magical potion or some mythical creature's pee?

Jace laughed at her expression, crossing his arms across his chest.

"Don't worry, it's not faerie juice. It's chamomile, said to soothe the soul and solve most of your problems." Jace said, smiling arrogantly.

A small part of Clary's head wondered what faerie juice was while a bigger part of her mind darkened.

"I don't want to soothe my soul. I want to find out who sent the demon to my house to kill my mom and kill them like how they killed my mom." Clary muttered, glaring at her cup of chamomile.

Jace took a deep breath. "I'd want to find out too what the hell is going on. How you're still alive - not that I'm not happy you are - actually, forget happy. I'm beyond-"

"Wait, what do you mean by 'How you're still alive?'" Clary asked, her brows furrowing in confusion.

Jace stiffened slightly as he gritted his teeth. He opened his mouth to speak but Maryse beat him.

"Are you Clarissa Fairchild?" she demanded, narrowing her eyes at her in a suspicious manner.

"Mom!" Jace protested, standing up. His eyes were narrowed to slits, his teeth slightly bared at his mother.

Maryse ignored him, looking at Clary meaningfully.

"No, I'm not! My name is a Clary Ashworth, I am not a Demon hunter … or Shadowhunter or whatever you call yourselves! My mother was a mundane too, in case you were wondering!" Clary fumed.

"Your Marks point otherwise. How can you have them much less survive them if you are a mundane? Humans cannot withstand the process, the runes are too strong for them. If a rune were to be applied to a mundane's skin, the rune would turn them into Forsaken - mindless creatures that obey whatever their master commands them to do." Maryse said, stabbing a neatly trimmed finger at the white scar on her right hand.

Clary looked at her hand in disbelief. "But … how?" Clary whispered, clenching her hand into a fist. The scar shimmered slightly as it hit the light.

"You are a Shadowhunter, Clary. You are Clarissa Fairchild whether you believe or not. I would know." Jace said softly.

"But I don't. I don't know anything about Shadowhunters or Clarissa Fairchild. I was raised all my life as a Ashworth and a mundane. I can't tell a butter knife from a kitchen knife." Clary groaned.

"But you haven't been a mundane all your life. It's just a mystery why you don't remember and what really happened in LA." Jace sighed.

"Wait … what happened in LA?" Clary asked, looking at the both of them.

Jace winced at memory and seemed to choose his words carefully before speaking. Even when he looked like he had chosen his words, he stayed silent a few long moments before taking a deep breath, speaking.

"Clary, you died."

Jace winced as he remembered the day he had received the letter … how he had practically been thrown into a coma caused by heartbreak. He had been unconscious for a day and when he woke up he hadn't believed the events of the last twenty four hours. He relived those days in a flash before his eyes:

Two hours later he was up and ready to go to the Silent City to identify Clary's body. He had been in a cloudy world that didn't seem real to him, his own grief and anguish blurring the lines of reality and nightmares. There were no dreams at that point in time; nightmares that was reality itself plagued Jace as he had tried to convince himself it was fake.

The only moment that day when Jace's reality had come into precise coherency was when he was in the examination room, standing before a metal table. He hadn't remembered the walk of the carriage, the walk down the cold, suffocating steps into the Silent City. On the table laid a body covered by a white sheet, red hair peeking out from the top.

Numbly, Jace pinched the top of the sheet with his thumb and index finger and gently pulled it down.

Clary lay on the metal table, her condition too horrible to forget, the picture of her scarred body forever branded in Jace's head. The body had been destroyed beyond recognition but Jace could recognize the blood stained Morgenstern ring around her neck where it had always stayed and she wore the ring Jace had bought her for Christmas on her left hand, still silver and shiny on her bloodied and ravaged fingers.

Most of her skin was raw, red or eaten, slashed and destroyed and gnawed by the demons that had attacked her. Her eyes had been clawed at and her lips had been split and torn. Her hair was a darker red in some areas, darkened by blood.

Isabelle sobbed once behind him before leaving the room, Alec following her, leaving Jace alone with his beloved. Once active runes appeared occasionally on her shredded skin, faded to pale silver designs.

As if his whole body was jolted alive again, Jace let out a loud sob.

The boy that never cried again was crying now over his dead girlfriend.

Jace had promised never to cry again, to make his resistance and will stronger. But how easily that resolve broke. Jace fell to his knees as he sobbed, letting the tears flow freely. He didn't care if a Silent Brother was staring at him now from the corner of the room or if someone was documenting this and proceeded to write a book about this. He didn't care.

I believe that this body is Clarissa Fairchild? the Silent Brother's voice said, appearing in Jace's head. For the first time in a long time, he heard a small flicker of emotions in a Silent Brother's voice. Empathy and pity.

"Yes." Jace said, shakily getting to his feet. "Would you kindly step out for a moment, Brother Ezekiel? I want a moment with her." Jace turned around to look at Brother Ezekiel.

The Silent Brother nodded before turning to leave, his parchment colored robes billowing around him as he left silently.

Jace turned back to Clary. He could feel a tear escaping his eye as he leaned down and planted a gentle kiss on her forehead.

"Ave atque vale, my love. May the Angel bless you." Jace murmured. Gently, he unhooked the Morgenstern ring from around her neck and slipped it into his pocket. He wanted something of hers that he could keep. He caressed the side of her face before covering Clary's body with the sheet again.

Feeling his heart break into a million pieces, he exited the room, nodding to the Silent Brother as prepared to leave the Silent City.

Her cremation will be at sundown, the Silent Brother told him, his mental voice quieter and gentler than before.

Jace nodded again before climbing the steps onto the surface.

At around 5 in the evening, Jace watched as Isabelle walked past him - or, rather, shuffled past him - dressed in a flowing white dress with long sleeves decorated with the runes of mourning and peace and grief. Alec was dressed similarly in white, his cuffs also decorated with the red colored runes meant for mourning.

"Are you sure you don't want to go, Jace?" Isabelle asked, her voice hollow and sad.

"I'll be fine." Jace murmured.

"But ..."

"Let him be, Izzy. Don't let his last memory of her be of that." Alec murmured, wrapping his arm around Isabelle's shoulders. "Don't wait up for us, Jace."

Jace watched as his family left before going to bed, too tired to fix his broken heart.

That night and every night after that for the next few months, Jace realized he was wrong about dreams being impossible for him anymore because he dreamt about a certain fiery redhead that had changed his whole world more than possible, stopped a war and saved countless souls including his own. The redhead that had loved him and he had loved her.

Jace decided to go simple.

The words themselves tasted vile in Jace's mouth as he said it, like they could burn a hole in his tongue.

"Clary, you died."

A/N - Hello! I know that it was extremely short. Sorry. I'm doing this cliffhanger to build suspense, not torture you guys. All credits go to the lovely Cassandra Clare.