We have a little bit of pack fluffiness in this one? Please enjoy? Haha.
"Pass the wings!" Isabelle said through a mouthful of food.
"I want more beer—stop trying to horde the bottles, Bat—I know there's tons in the fridge!" Jordan snapped.
"Seriously, you need to have at least some salad," Clary scolded.
"Yes, mum," Lydia poked out her tongue.
"Oh my god, close your mouth when you're eating!" Maia huffed out as she swiped at Bat's shoulder.
"I swear to god, Mags, if you keep on hogging those wings I'm going to wolf out on your ass!" Isabelle was still speaking through a mouthful of food.
"I'll have you know that there's only one person I like wolfing out on my ass, biscuit, and it ain't you," came Magnus' sassy reply before two buffalo wings were actually thrown down to the other end of the table.
"Oi!" Alec reprimanded, his cheeks going red at his lovers comment. "Just because there's werewolves at the table, doesn't mean you actually have to act like animals!"
"At least someone's pointing that out," Helen murmured, but there was affection in her voice.
"More wings!" Isabelle chanted, swiping the back of her hand across her mouth before holding them both out. "Again, again, again!"
"Don't you dare..." Aline began, holding up a finger to Magnus, obviously attempting to dissuade him from throwing more buffalo wings, but Magnus was already picking them up.
"Go, go, go!" Simon was chanting, cheering Magnus on as he sent two more wings soaring down the table.
"Ow!" Bat spoke for probably the first time since he came into the house, the wing bouncing off his forehead. He rolled his eyes, but there was a smile on his face as Isabelle picked it up from where it had landed on the table, and she handed him a paper towel for the sauce that had smeared down the side of his forehead.
It was loud and it was messy and the clean up tomorrow was probably going to take a while, but Jace didn't care. Because this—the noise and the feeling of family and the happiness that was filling this dining room—it was everything that he had been missing for years. Everything since he left this town...That hole in his heart that he was scared was never going to be filled—right now. This was it.
Clary was sitting down on the right side of the table, and while Jace had wished that she had sat next to him, he was just glad that she was in his direct line of sight. She was between Bat and Alec, and she looked slightly disgusted but definitely amused by the eating habits of the werewolves around her. Once again, Jace was hit by just how comfortable everyone seemed together. Clary's 'pack' and his own, melding together, they were already like a family. Magnus was head over heels in love with Clary, Aline and Alec had become fast friends since she had started dating Helen and were discussing taking archery lessons together, and Simon and Isabelle had finally admitted to being a 'thing'. They weren't mates, but they still seemed to fit together well.
But as happy as Jace was with everyone else, it was Clary this his mind kept circling back to.
It was ridiculous how happy she made him.
And every single werewolf in the room could feel it, the way his wolf was satisfied when she was near, and calm, and even though it was a full moon, and every single one of them was keyed up and anxious to shift and run, there was also this relaxed feeling among them, that everything was okay. Jace was pretty sure that even the humans in the room could feel that as well, and he knew that just how happy he was was written all over his face as he looked around the table at his friends. His family—his pack.
"Okay, that's enough," Clary growled as her hand snatched through the air, lightning fast, reflexes almost as fast as a werewolf. She grabbed the buffalo wing that Magnus was throwing again at Isabelle, and earned pouts from both of them. "You are at a kitchen table, you do not need throw food." Aline smirked at the two of them and Magnus grumbled something unintelligible under his breath. Alec looked triumphant as he smirked at his boyfriend, and it looked as though he was holding back from poking out his tongue. Jace couldn't help but snort at the way Isabelle had to stretch across the table to get the tray of buffalo wings, picking a few up and putting them on her plate.
Suddenly, the remaining kernels of corn that were left in one of the bowls lifted into the air and went flying, purple streaks of magic in the corn, pelting Clary, getting stuck in her hair and falling on her shoulders and a couple down the front of her shirt. Silence fell over the table as Clary's green eyes went wide and she didn't say anything for a moment.
"Uhhh..." Lydia made a face, when Clary lunged forward and grabbed a handful of salad and sending it flying back toward Magnus. It also hit Maia and Helen, and there were indignant squawks, but suddenly there was food flying in all directions and Jace let out a yell as he pushed back from the table and got to his feet, taking a few steps to get out of the firing zone. He couldn't quite believe that a full on food fight had just broken out in his dining room, among a bunch of adults, and he tried to put it down to the fact that all of the werewolves in the room were worked up because it was a full moon, and the humans in the room were just taking their cue from them.
Except neither Magnus or Clary were werewolves, and they were clearly the instigators here.
"You keeping your distance?" Clary asked as she came over to him, a wide smile on her face as she came over to where he was. There were corn kernels in her hair, a smear of barbeque sauce on her cheek and something red—maybe tomato or capsicum—was clinging to her shirt.
"This really isn't something that I need to get involved in," Jace said with a roll of his eyes. Clary raised an eyebrow at him, and Jace would later blame it on the fact that she already smelt like a mixture of different foods, and there was so much chaos happening in the small room, that was why he was unprepared for her to suddenly pull out the arm from behind her back with a scoop of mashed potatoes, and mush it into his face. A cheer went up from Isabelle when she realized what had happened, and then Magnus caught on as well, and Jace was hit in the face with a head of broccoli. "What the—"
"Just because you're the big, broody, fearless leader around here, doesn't mean you can't have some fun as well," Clary giggled, reaching up to brush a quick kiss to his cheek before she darted out of the room as Simon made a break for her.
Jace was glad that his pack and the rest in his home were distracted, because it was just simple things like that from Clary made his wolf so happy that he could barely stop his heart from beating out of his chest, and he knew his cheeks were red. She knew his position, and she respected that, but not so much that she shied away from him, and couldn't still have fun.
It was a while before everyone calmed down, but none of them bothered showering. They were just going to be getting sweaty and dirty all over again when they went out running in just a few hours. Everyone had brought a few changes of clothes when they had come over, and the girls went upstairs to get changed and do a half job of cleaning themselves with some towels while the boys stayed downstairs. Nudity among werewolves was something that was expected, given how often they didn't want to be restricted by clothes when they were running, and how they would sometimes end up tearing them off while training, but they weren't all pack yet, and Jace was happy to let things take a slower, natural pace as they all got more comfortable with each other.
The clean up of the kitchen took almost three times as long as the actual food fight had lasted, and Jace still wasn't completely happy with the way it smelt like a mixture of food, but he wasn't going to say anything. He would come back in here tomorrow morning and give the whole thing another clean, and then Isabelle would undoubtedly tease him about it and call him a perfectionist.
"It's almost ten," Clary murmured in his ear when she came back downstairs and walked up behind Jace, slipping one arm around his waist so that her hand was flattened against his hardened stomach. Jace rested his hand over hers as he looked toward the window. It was dark, the sun had completely disappeared over an hour ago, and the full moon was high in the sky. It was almost time for them to leave the house and head out into the woods. Over the next half hour or so, everyone in the house got ready to run.
That meant changing into clothes that they didn't mind getting ripped or stained, and the non-humans in the room putting on sturdy shoes. Jace, Alec and Isabelle all looked surprised as Clary and Lydia pulled out steele's from their bags and traced them over fading runes on their stomachs. There was only one rune that was burnt dark and permanent on their bodies, and that was the Angelic Power rune. Jace had seen a couple on Clary, all at different stages of fading, and he hadn't realized that she still used them.
"Stamina," Lydia winked over at Jace before nudging Clary in the side and giggling. Clary just rolled her eyes at Lydia before wincing as her skin burnt. There was a quick flash of burning flesh through the room, that each of the were's picked up on, but it faded quickly, obviously their angelic blood healing them faster than a normal human. Isabelle and Maia were both almost vibrating out of their skin as they paced anxiously by the door, waiting for Jace to be the one to tell them that they were ready to go. Simon and Bat weren't much better, tapping their feet at frustratingly uneven rhythm on the wooden floors.
"Let's go," Jace said, making a move for the front door. His voice was low, but it was heard by everyone crowded in the lounge, and the energy shifted from anxious and almost needy to complete relief and joy as the were's in the room practically bolted out into the night.
It was lucky that the woods were right there, because none of the were's—including Jace—were even bothering to cover up their glowing eyes and the way their claws were starting to come out through their fingers and toes. Clary noted as she started to pick up her pace that Simon and Isabelle were sticking close to each others sides as everyone began to run. None of the were's were running as fast as they could, as fast as they wanted—as fast as they wanted—but Clary could see that they were about to.
To her left, Jace let out a inhuman howl that pierced through the night and shook through trees around them. A shiver went down Clary's spine at the sound, and she could feel the vibration in her bones. A smile spread across her face as she started running. She couldn't run as fast as the werewolves around her, but she could still run faster than a human. She heard responding howls mixed with shouts as the pack replied and let themselves run free, pushing their legs faster and harder. They split up as they got into the forest, running at different speeds, and Clary was running alongside Magnus at one point, but she felt a flash of his magic and saw a spark of blue and then he was gone.
Clary wasn't sure where Lydia was, but she knew that her friend would be nearby, and then there was a figure in front of her, and she made out long dark hair, followed quickly by a second, who she knew almost instinctively that it was Simon, so she knew that it was Isabelle with him.
She ran further into the forest, pushing her feet off the ground, her arms moving at her side as she twisted among the trees.
The forest felt better.
It felt better than it had in so long.
She didn't realize how off the forest had felt until Jace had been there. She had been running through these trees for years, and they had never felt bad or wrong, but now they felt right. Maia, Simon and Bat had been talking about how the whole township was feeling better—settling after the unexplained deaths, and when Luke and Gretel came into town to check in on Clary a couple of times, they had noted it as well. While Clary was good at reading peoples moods and expressions, just feeling the way the forest felt better wasn't normal for her.
It was Jace.
It was her mate.
That was why she was able to feel it, just like how she could feel the sadness that had clung to the house and to him when she was first come to the Herondale, and how she could feel it as he got happier.
It was the bond that they shared, and every time they were together, she could feel it pulsing stronger between them. She could also feel it growing stronger with Jace's pack, and with her own friends. She could pick up on things a lot quicker than she had before, although it seemed as though with her own friends, it was just building on the friendship that she already had with them.
Alec ran by her for a bit, slowing down his pace so that they were alongside each other, and she could feel the the happiness flooding off him as leaned in to touch her shoulder with a clawed hand before he put on a burst of speed and disappeared into the forest.
Lydia appeared at her side, and the two ran next to each other, taking breaks when they felt they were about to pass out from exertion. The Shadowhunters—along with Jordan—often ran with the were's when the moon was full in the sky, and Clary used to run every month with Luke and his pack, but it still tired both girls out, given they didn't recover as fast as the werewolves.
It was getting into the early hours of the morning when there was a howl that cut through the silence of the night. Lydia heard it, and she faltered, but it was Clary who knew that it was Jace, calling them home. She could feel it vibrating through her bones that it was him, and that he was calling them back to the house.
The house that felt like a home.
It took them a while to get back to the house, given how deep they had run into the woods. Clary fully expected for them to be the last ones to get back to the house, other than perhaps Jordan, and she was surprised when her and Lydia finally broke out of the trees and dragged their feet up the stairs o the house, to find everyone there except Magnus. Jace looked completely refreshed, his feet and hands dirty, the shirt he was wearing torn, and his sweatpants slung low on his hips. Clary's heart beat a bit faster in her chest, and she was glad that everyone else in the room was distracted with the left over dinner that they were all stuffing their faces with.
"You weren't with Magnus?" Alec asked as he finished off one of the chicken wings, tearing off a napkin from the roll on the table.
"No, I haven't seen him since—" Clary cut off when Alec and Jace both jerked their heads toward the door and a moment later, it swung open and Magnus walked in. He looked slightly disheveled, which was to be expected, but he also looked a bit confused. His confusion was obviously in his scent as well, because the were's in the room quietened down and looked toward him with questioning looks.
"You alright?" Alec asked, approaching his boyfriend and giving him a quick kiss on the corner of his mouth.
"Yeah," Magnus made a face that was something like a grimace. "There's just—there was magic in the forest. Not a lot, but a little bit."
"Some kids fooling around with a spell book?" Maia suggested, because it wasn't unheard of. Sometimes kids who had a touch of warlock or seelie power would find an old spell book that their parents owned and try out some spells. Usually it just lead to nothing and disappointment, but Clary remembered a few years ago when there was a girl in town who ended up with a tail for two weeks before her parents took her to a warlock to get it removed.
"Maybe," Magnus didn't look entirely convinced as he laced his fingers together with Alec's and came into the kitchen where everyone else was swarmed. Jace was watching Magnus carefully, his eyes flickering over his pack as the conversation resumed and the werewolves went back to cleaning up pretty much every crumb of food there was.
"Hey," Clary nudged Jace's side, her fingers brushing over the back of his hand. "It's fine, it'll be nothing." She gave him a small smile before joining the rest of the pack in the kitchen, Jace following her after a beat.
My biggest recommendation this time is Sense8, which I've undoubtedly recommend before. I will never, ever get over Netflix cancelling it. It was such a beautiful, incredible show, celebrating diversity and culture and love and hope, and I'm rewatching it now, and it just...It heals my soul. So please watch it! Also, as a side note, the sex scenes are the most sensual, intimate thing in the world. Also I've recently watched Quicksand, Bondage and Derry Girls, and I recommend them all. My hubby and I binged Bondage while stoned, and it was the best experience ever. Haha. And then with Quicksand, I do want to say that there is a trigger warning, it'll be obvious in the synopsis, so just...Be warned.
In the music world, I suggest What's Up Danger? by Blackway featuring Black Caviar, Doom Days by Bastille, Can't Love Me by Novi and Tyler Blackburn and No Ceiling by Cody Simpson.
Questions - who was your favourite at the Met Gala? Mine was Ezra Miller! Closely followed by Zazie Beets and Lily Collins.
What was the last song you've listened to? 21st Century Liability by Yungblud is currently playing, so that for me!
Leave a review, let me know what you guys think x