Valentine was remarkably placid while Jonathan fumed. He said nothing as he observed his son who barely ever demonstrated the slightest emotion but was now raging. Clary had betrayed them. They had to get her back. She belonged with them. She had to be taught. He would teach her himself. She was naïve, gullible, stupidly mesmerized by Jace's golden boy, muscle bound charms. A complete idiot could see he would use her and toss her aside. She was nothing to him, a conquest. He was the type of boy that could never get attached. He would suck away her vitality, leave her a dry husk, before he tired of her and discarded her, never giving her a second thought. Valentine could not help but notice how very much this rapacious description fit Jonathan himself. Valentine had ample occasion to witness Jonathan's interactions with male and female subjects during his many years of behavioral training. It was necessary to develop a smooth, charismatic veneer that unfortunately did not come innately to Jonathan.

"This may work to our advantage," Valentine interrupted Jonathan's boiling monologue.

Jonathan ceased pacing and eyed his father suspiciously, "What do you mean?"

"I mean, if there is an attachment between them, it will make them all the easier to manipulate." Valentine envisioned his final triumph over the Clave with his wife, sons and daughter celebrating his eminence. He had abandoned Jace (an interesting nickname that Valentine would not have chosen but made it easier to distinguish him from his own Jonathan) when he realized Jace could not possess the ruthlessness needed to enforce his vision but he had loved him nonetheless and had always hoped to reunite with the boy one day. He did not think it a bad thing if Jace and Clary mated. They were both singularly touched by the angel and he actually could not think of another more gifted shadowhunter who could suitably partner with his progeny. It would also be interesting to see what kind of offspring they would breed given the experiments that were conducted during their own fetal development although he had unknowingly conducted the second experiment on his own issue, kept ignorant of Clary's conception. However, he did not regret it. She had a power he had not imagined but he did not like having her around him. She was almost a mirror image of her mother at that age, when the world was full of possibilities and he had fallen deeply in love but she was also a vivid reminder that Jocelyn had ultimately spurned him and now he knew why. It was her, this child, that compelled Jocelyn to connive against him. She wanted the child more than she wanted him and he despised the girl for it.

If Valentine permitted their love, they would be grateful. He could use their fear of losing each other to control them and if they married he could remove her from his presence. He had no compunction against urging them to marry young. She would reside separately with Jace. He would not need to see her except when he required the use of her powers. He smiled to himself, commending his own strategies. His eyes flicked to Jonathan as he moved toward his father.

"Are you saying you'd let him have her?" Jonathan asked in a deceptively subdued voice.

Valentine said nothing, only watching his son curiously.

"She belongs to me! He doesn't deserve her. He's just a common pretty boy. He's nothing. I incapacitated him in seconds," Jonathan spat venomously.

"I thought you said he didn't care for her, that he doesn't even want her," Valentine replied sedately. "Jonathan, I hope you realize Clary is your sister, not your consort," he measured his words carefully. He was worried about Jonathan. The rabid turn of his eyes and frenzied pacing alarmed Valentine. He had never seen Jonathan so completely lacking self-control.

"Do not attempt to qualify my relationship with my sister," Jonathan answered curtly. "You made me what I am. I am unnatural. Part demon, part angel, part human. There is no one else in the world that can be what she is to me," he snarled.

And what is she?" Valentine questioned in his composed monotone.

"My sister, my goddess, my lover," he answered slowly his hands clenched in tight fists.

Valentine was aghast and tempted to ask his son if he were joking but the concept was too outlandish. They never joked. "I see," was his only response. At one time he would have gotten up, taken Jonathan's underarm, walked him to one of the cells below and beat him senseless. While he knew he still dominated Jonathan he could see this obsession with his sister had unhinged him and made him unpredictable. He sensed Jonathan would not meekly follow his commands where it concerned Clarissa.

"Tell me, Jonathan," Valentine enunciated. "Will Clary agree to these terms in your assumed relationship? Or do you mean to force her, take her against her will?

"We will come to an agreement," Jonathan said haltingly. "I know her. She will come to me," he continued with more assurance.

"We will have to leave the Manor now," Valentine announced, wanting to change the topic. He would need time to reflect upon this development at length to determine the best course of action. He was disturbed by his son's perverse and incestuous inclination toward his own sister but he had long ago learned to regulate his reactions to his son. He had known the child would be extraordinary, different. He had grown powerful, nourished by a greater demon while forming in his mother's womb, but still Valentine had not comprehended the levels of inhuman cruelty and brutality the child possessed. Lilith had warned him but he had not understood that the child, his son, would not know, share or even desire human attachment … until now. He wondered why it should be his own sister that would stir an emotion from the boy. Was it his demon blood that compelled him or her angel blood that lured him? Or was it some depraved mixture of their shared genetics along with both of these elements?

"Where will we go?" Jonathan's obsidian eyes bore into him.

Valentine felt vaguely uneasy returning Jonathan's piercing gaze. "To Renwick's. I've sent Blackwell and Pangborn to ready our quarters. Be ready to leave in five minutes. I must attend to your mother." Valentine got up and left the room still feeling Jonathan's unmoving eyes on his back.


Jace had lived many years without fear ever since he arrived at the New York Institute orphaned and alone. But he knew it then, when he woke from the blows that had rendered him unconscious. Alec was anxiously hovering over him tracing iratzes on his body and Izzy was looming above, peering fretfully down at him. His stomach constricted painfully and his heart seemed to stop as an icy chill bloomed in his chest. Clary! Where was she? Was she OK? If Sebastian touched her! He tried to jump up, go to her, find her, but Alec and Izzy steadfastly held him down. A leg was broken and his wounds were deep. He had to stay still a little while longer. It would only cause more injury and further delay to try to move now, they reasoned with him but were practically sitting on him to keep him immobile.

"How long? How long have I been out?" Jace asked hurriedly.

"It hasn't been long," reassured Izzy. "Just stop, Jace. Now can you explain what happened?"

"Sebastian … is batshit crazy," Jace shook his head.

"And incredibly fast," Alec muttered. "I've never seen anyone but you move like that. And the way he threw you ... What was he carrying on about? One second he's yelling about someone named Clara? Then the next thing I know he's flailing at you with a sword and throwing you across the street," Alec puzzled.

"Yeah," Jace mumbled shaking his head. A disorienting haze still fogged his head. "I wasn't prepared for that. He won't catch me like that next time."

Who," Izzy interrupted, "is Clara?" She wove her gold electrum whip around her wrist. "And how in Raziel's name did he snap the arrow out of your hand," she turned her head to Alec, "and knock my legs out from under me at the same time?"

Jace propped himself up and found he was strong enough to push Alec and Izzy aside, "Enough, I've got to get to Clary."

"Who the hell is Clary?" both Izzy and Alec sputtered but didn't hesitate to follow Jace as he briskly hobbled to the werewolf headquarters.

It took way longer than it should have to get to the abandoned police station. He had healed enough to run by the time they reached the street corner. His heart stopped at the sight of Clary on the ground. She was clinging to a wolf boy in human form. He was in pretty bad shape from the look of it, some broken ribs, pretty severe welts and bruises but no permanent damage that Jace could see.

When the werewolf leader came up behind her Jace sprang into action, pulling two seraphs out from his inner gear sleeves at the same time summoning the angels, Amitiel and Dumah. He could feel Alec and Izzy tensing for a fight and readying their weapons beside him.

"Get your paws off her," the words came out before it dawned on him. She knew him. She was sobbing uncontrollably but holding onto the werewolf - middle-aged, medium height, solid build, shaggy brown hair streaked with gray and some bookworm type glasses - with an obvious desperation.

"Who are you?" Jace asked just as the werewolf glared at him and said, "What do you want?"

"Clary," was Jace's only answer.

She turned then and Jace could see the purplish, red handprint at her throat, the dried blood below a split lip and the angry red swelling across her cheek.

"Jace," her voice was low and raspy. "Thank God you're okay. Thank God," she whispered and dropped her head back in a faint.