An update one day early! At least I think it is...

Raphael folded his hand over my mouth and continued pulling me awkwardly along. I stumbled every few steps, my hand fruitlessly trying to pull his away. I tried to bite him, but that just resulted in another hit to the face.

Too soon, we were back in the clearing. My heart plummeted as Isabelle turned to greet us, her face hard and alien as she appraised me.

"That wasn't polite," she chastised. "Who said you could run away?" She tipped her head to the side. "Jeez, Raphael, what did you do to the poor girl?"

"She was being difficult," he said, releasing me and stepping back. I fell to my knees, clutching my arm; it felt like it had been lit on fire. Pain seared it like the knife was still slicing my skin.

"Clary—" Jace, who had been standing behind Sebastian, looking as if they'd been having an argument, started toward me, eyes wide with horror. His hand reached for me, and I wanted to take it. I wanted him to gather me into his arms and tell me it was going to be okay.

But he never got that far. Raphael shoved him away from me, his hands leaving a bloody print on Jace's shirt—my blood. I felt dizzy.

"Not so fast," said Raphael. His eyes slanted toward Sebastian, who was nothing but a shadow standing off to the side, his eyes watching all. "Are you going to help or not?"

"He's decided to be uncooperative," said Isabelle irritably. "Let's just get this over with. I'm tired of games. Keep your gun out," she added to Raphael. "When Jace gets mad, he gets reckless."

Raphael slid the gun out of his jacket, flicked the safety off, and pointed it at Jace again. Jace didn't even seem to notice. His eyes were locked on me, agonized, and I could see him coiled, ready to lunge toward me. I shook my head ever so slightly, telling him to stay put; if he moved now, he would be shot. Raphael wouldn't hesitate.

"Poor Clary," said Isabelle, moving toward me. She stroked my hair, and I jerked my head away from her, causing my head to spin. How much blood had I lost? I pressed my hand against my arm, trying to stop the flow, feeling sick from the redness that was everywhere, everywhere. "Don't worry, you won't feel anything in a few minutes."

Fear seeped through me like poison. She was really going to do it. She was really going to kill me. This nightmarish night was coming to a close, and I wouldn't survive the ending. And after I went, Jace would be next, or Simon. Either way, we were going to die. All of us.

Isabelle tipped my chin up, wielding her glittering knife, which was now dull with blood. She held the edge against my throat, and I could feel it radiating against my skin, a breath away from ending my life.

"Ready, Jace?" I could hear her smiling. "Better watch closely, or you might miss it."

"Clary," he choked out, and I could hear so many words in my name, so many emotions, things he hadn't gotten to say. Things that I wanted to say back. I held his eyes with mine. I wouldn't mind if he was the last thing I saw. That wouldn't be such a terrible way to go.

"I love you," I mouthed at him, not wanting to say it out loud, not wanting Isabelle or Raphael or Sebastian to hear it. It was for Jace, and Jace alone.

For a moment there was nothing but pain on his face, pain I wanted to take away. I wanted to close my eyes so I didn't have to see it. I wanted him to smile, as impossible as that was, because his smile was what I wanted my last image to be.

And then his face changed, darkened, and I saw the resolve in it. I opened my mouth, wanting to yell at him, to tell him don't even think about it, but it was too late.

He ran forward, so quickly and so suddenly that Raphael didn't have time to react. Jace knocked the gun out of his hand, and it flew through the air, hitting the ground and going off with a deafening BANG! Isabelle flinched away from the sound, the knife drawing just slightly away from my throat, and that was when Jace crashed into her.

They hit the ground hard, the knife twirling out of Isabelle's hand and clattering against a tree trunk, falling to the frozen ground. I doubled over onto my hands and knees, drawing in painful breaths, hardly able to believe that I was still alive, even for a few seconds more.

My eyes focused on the knife, and I started crawling toward it. Every time I put weight on my hurt arm, it was agony. I seemed to move so slowly, like a slug, so useless and powerless. Desperate frustration welled inside of me. I lunged forward, my fingertips brushing the knife, just as Raphael's boot came up and crashed into my shoulder, throwing me sideways.

"Why won't you stay down?" he spat, looming over me, no longer amused. He was glaring now, impatient, wanting this to be over. He looked on edge; I realized that he was afraid that my screaming from before had alerted someone. He was afraid that help was coming.

And if it was? I couldn't even think of that. Couldn't even let myself hope for it.

Raphael lifted his foot again, ready to smash it into my face, but suddenly there was another shadow behind him, reaching up, shoving him away from me. Off-balance, Raphael stumbled to the ground, swearing loudly in Spanish.

My vision was blurry as I gazed dazedly up at my savior. It wasn't Jace, it wasn't Simon—it was Sebastian.

He glared down at Raphael with eyes that were like twin points of black flame. "Back off, Raphael," he said, his voice still as calm as ever. He lifted Isabelle's knife, clasped tightly in his hand. "Or I'm going to have to make you."

Raphael said something in Spanish—probably not very complimentary—and glared hate at Sebastian. "I knew you were a loose cannon," he snarled. "It was a mistake to let you in on the plan."

"It was a mistake to hurt Clary," Sebastian replied. He landed a hard kick to Raphael's side, causing him to curl up in a ball, his face screwing up with pain.

My muddled brain couldn't make sense of what was happening. Why would Sebastian agree to help Isabelle, only to turn on her? I knew this wasn't his intent; he hadn't been working as an insider for us all along. He had wanted to go along with whatever Isabelle had had in store for Jace, and the fact that he was helping me now didn't redeem him. It only made him confusing.

I heard a scream, not of fear or pain, but of pure rage. My head snapped around, and I saw Isabelle pinned flat on her back, face twisted with fury, as Jace crouched over her, trying to restrain her. She was fighting back viciously, a rabid animal, refusing to be put down.

Isabelle's eyes shifted to Sebastian, and she shrieked, "Get him off me!"

Sebastian blinked at her once, and then Isabelle's knife fell from his hand, hitting the ground next to me. His eyes met mine, burning, and like always, I couldn't read what they were trying to tell me. Then, without a word, without a warning, he turned and sprinted into the trees.

I didn't know where he was going, just that he was, and he wouldn't be back for us. This was the only mercy he could give us—taking himself out of the equation. Evening out the odds, as pitiful as they already were. Sebastian only knew how to save himself.

"No more interruptions, eh?" Raphael snarled, trying to get to his feet, wincing as he pressed a hand against his stomach.

Before I knew it, my hand had closed around the handle of the knife. I held it out defensively, wishing I knew how to use it. Wishing that the world wasn't fading in and out of focus, wishing I wasn't still losing blood, wishing I could get us all out of here.

I was wishing for a lot of things. But those wishes weren't going to come true, and I knew that.

So I sat there with my shaking hands holding up a knife, not knowing what to do with it, hoping that Raphael would somehow stumble and impale himself on it.

"Raphael, the gun!" Isabelle shouted, and Raphael's attention snapped away from me. He was gone in a flash, and I lowered the knife to my lap, dropped it more like. I felt too weak to hold it up any longer.

Raphael's eyes were focused on Jace, leaving me forgotten. He darted toward the discarded gun, and like a premonition of the future, I knew what would happen next.

There is no feeling quite like the dread and horror and dismay of watching the inevitable fate of one you love. I felt the pain like it had already happened, like I had already collapsed into myself because I couldn't handle this anymore. I couldn't watch him die. I couldn't be the one to blame for it.

I couldn't do anything as Raphael reached the gun, taking it out of Jace's range, lifting it, pointing it. I couldn't even stand up, though I tried. I just kept finding myself on the ground again. I was crying with frustration and fear, and with loss. Jace looked up from where he still had Isabelle pinned down. He didn't look at Raphael; instead, he looked at me.

Raphael steadied the gun. His finger jerked toward the trigger.

And then, something amazing happened.

Or maybe it wasn't amazing. Maybe it was just horrific.

My fried brain couldn't tell the difference anymore.

Because someone threw himself at Raphael, crashing into his outstretched arms, shoving the gun away as it went off. It fired a second time as it hit the ground.

Jace rolled away automatically, even though he wouldn't have been able to avoid the bullet. Even though it hadn't gone in his direction, after all.

And there he was, the one that had just saved Jace's life. He stood wearing a slightly bemused expression, like he couldn't figure out what had just happened, what he'd just done.

Simon. My Simon. Standing with blood soaking his shirt. Standing there with the bullet wound meant for Jace.

Simon looked up at me, puzzled, and then he fell.

There are times when you don't even want to be alive. When you feel like it would just be easier to die. Like now, for me. Because seeing Simon there, bloody, crumpled, shot, it was something I wasn't sure I could live through.

But then your mind catches up with your heart, and you know you have to live, because there are so many reasons. Reasons you can't think of at the moment. But they're there, all the same. Even though you don't want them to be.

I half-ran, half-crawled to him. A weird sound was rising in my chest, a half sob, half wail, and I collapsed beside him, rolling him onto his back, saying something that sounded like, "Please, please, please," but I didn't know what I was pleading for, who I was pleading to.

I was faintly aware of Raphael lying not far away. He was rolling back and forth on the ground, clutching his leg, groaning terribly. The second shot must have hit him, I thought distantly. Good.

"No!" Isabelle was screaming furiously in the background. "Raphael, get up!"

Then her voice was cut off abruptly. I didn't know what happened. I didn't care.

All I cared about was Simon. His colorless face beneath my hands. The blood that covered his clothing. His eyes, closed; his glasses still lying broken somewhere on the ground. He looked young without them. Vulnerable.

"Simon," I sobbed, my voice like broken glass. My hands cupped his face, tried to shake him back to sense. "God, please, no."

I lowered my head onto his chest, my body heaving with breaths I couldn't seem to take in. My fault, my brain thought frantically. This is all my fault.

And then, beyond the rushing sound in my ears, beyond the sounds of struggle behind me, beyond my own loss, I heard something. Something incredible.

Shouting. Voices. Someone yelling, "This way!"

People. They were coming for us.

I lifted my head in time to see the first person enter the clearing. His hair was wild, windblown, his face taut with concentration. Magnus, I thought vaguely. Magnus found us.

His yellow-green eyes settled on something behind me and narrowed. "Hey!" he bellowed, leaping forward. I turned my head reflexively, saw that Jace had Isabelle pinned against a tree, one hand covering her mouth, the other at her throat.

Magnus reached them, attempted to pull Jace's hand away. "What are you doing? Are you insane?"

Isabelle jerked her head away from Jace's hand and shrieked, "He's crazy! He attacked me without warning, and he's trying to kill me-"

"She's the one," I heard Jace pant, his hand covering her mouth again. He didn't take his eyes away from Isabelle's hate-filled face. "The one that attacked me. She brought us here tonight to kill us."

Another figure crashed into view. This time, it was Alec. His eyes found Isabelle and filled with dismay. "Izzy," he choked. "Please tell me this isn't true."

Isabelle, rendered speechless thanks to Jace, didn't even look at him, and the pain in Alec's eyes could have rivaled my own.

Another heartbeat passed, and then the clearing was filled with people—officers, swarming the scene, speaking in loud voices that hurt my ears and rang in my head. I clutched Simon to me, trying to make us appear as small as possible. I didn't want them to touch us.

"We've got it from here, son," one of the officers said to Jace, putting a hand on his shoulder. Jace didn't move; he continued to stare at Isabelle with black loathing, and I knew he would kill her now if he had the choice. After everything she'd done, I couldn't blame him.

"Sir," said the officer, shaking Jace a little. "You said that this girl is the culprit of this scene, didn't you?"

Another stretch of agonizing silence. Then Jace nodded his head mechanically, up and down, and muttered, "Yes."

Alec sagged against a tree, burying his face in his hands. Magnus went to him and put his arms around him, tugging him close. Alec did nothing to push him away.

"Get that one," another officer said, and several of them surrounded Raphael. There were flashlights and stretchers, EMTs and cops. A flashlight shone right into my face, temporarily blinding me.

"We need more stretchers," a cop said into his walkie-talkie. "Lots of injuries over here."

And then there were hands trying to take Simon away from me. They tried to pull me gently away, but I just wrapped my arms more tightly around him, squeezing my eyes shut. "No," I cried. "Don't touch him. Don't take him away."

"You both need help," a gentle voice said. "Come on, sweetheart—"

"No!" I buried my head in Simon's blood-soaked shirt, wild, desperate, just needing them all to go away. Blackness crowded on the edges of my vision, but I pushed it fiercely back. I would not lose it now. I needed to stay with Simon. I needed to.

And then a wonderfully familiar scent wreathed around me, and strong hands grasped my shoulders, turned me away from Simon. Jace knelt in front of me, his face covered in drying blood and bruises, his eyes exhausted and bleak. But the way he looked at me, so worried, so tender, made some of the wildness in me dissipate.

"Jace," I whispered, my voice trembling almost to the point of incoherence.

"Clary," he murmured. "I'm here. I'm here." He pulled me to his chest, and I cried into his shoulder, my hands slipping away from Simon as the paramedics took him away.

Jace rocked me back and forth, his arms wrapped around me so tightly it hurt. But it was a good kind of hurting; I needed it, the pressure, the reassurance that we were both here. That we were both still alive. I held him just as tightly, and we clung to each other, just needing to know that the other was there.

And then there were hands pulling me away from Jace, too. "No," I all but wailed, holding onto him tightly. I couldn't see any faces, just the glaring flashlights, shadows flitting behind them. My vision was fuzzy, my head dizzy. "Jace!"

I heard him say my name. He hung onto me. Then people pulled him away from me, too, and we were separated, and I felt like a piece of me had just been torn away. I couldn't make sense of what was going on. I couldn't decide whether these people were friends or foes. Everything hurt, burned like fire, and I was terrified and lost and I just needed Jace, just needed his arms around me, just needed to feel him close to me.

They hauled me onto a stretcher, strapped me down. I tried to fight them. I called for Jace. I called for Simon and my mom and Luke. Tears mixed with the blood on my face. They tried to soothe me, but their words meant nothing to me, empty promises.

Then there was a sharp pricking sensation in my arm, and almost instantly everything faded to black, my body was dragged heavily down, and I was cut free and drifting through space.

The journey back to consciousness was a long, confusing one. It took me a while to locate all my body parts, to figure out how to move them again. When I did figure it out, it was to a chorus of sharp pains and aches, moving all up and down my body. I felt like I'd been run over by a dump truck, which had then proceeded to back over me several more times before deciding that I'd been satisfactorily flattened.

A groan escaped me, hoarse and rough. "Ouch," I muttered raspily. Then I finally moved to the part where I opened my eyes.

I was in a white room, filled with the sound of beeping machinery. The chemical smell of a hospital surrounded me. It wasn't hard to guess where I was. Duh.

"Clary?"

The sound of my mom's voice brought instant tears to my eyes. I must have been in a very fragile state, because it was usually harder than that to reduce me to crying. But there she was, standing in the doorway of the hospital room, her eyes red and swollen from doing some crying of her own. The way her face lit up when she looked at me made my tears spill over.

"Mom," I said in a wavering voice, and she crossed the room until she reached my side. She threw her arms around me, and I bit back a gasp of pain. I wanted to hug her more than I cared about my injuries.

"You're okay," she whispered, pulling back and placing her hands on either side of my face, her eyes devouring me. "Clary, I was so afraid…"

One of her tears plopped onto my cheek, and I put my hand over hers, holding it to my face.

A moment later, however, she straightened, her hands dropping away. "What did you think you were doing?" she demanded, still tearful. "You could have died, Clary. Died! I could have lost you forever. Did you think at all before running off?"

I suppressed a sigh. I should have known this was coming. I'd just hoped it wouldn't be so soon. Teary-eyed reunions can only last so long, and then the lectures begin. And then the shouting. But hopefully she'd save that last part for home.

"I didn't think," I said, resigned to the whole process. "I thought I knew…who attacked Jace. And I had to tell him. I didn't think that it might be…"

"A trap?" Surprisingly, she sounded weary. Had the fight gone out of her so soon?

I closed my eyes as my memories started trickling back in painful detail. Isabelle with her knife and her insane smile. Sebastian betraying us, then helping us, then running away. Raphael chasing me through the trees. Jace, wrestling the gun out of Raphael's hand, risking his own life for mine.

And then another memory hit me like a ton of bricks.

Simon.

Simon appearing out of nowhere, smashing into Raphael, saving Jace's life. Simon being shot. Simon falling to the ground. My bloody hands clinging to him, my voice screaming senselessly, not wanting anyone to take him away.

I sat up fast; there were tubes in my arms that tried to pull me back down again. "Simon," I gasped frantically, my heart monitor registering the sudden pounding of my heartbeat. "Oh, no. Simon was shot. He's hurt. Where is he? What happened? Is he okay?"

More tears blurred my vision. I couldn't see anything through them. What if he was dead? I would be to blame. I'd been the one to charge stupidly into the park, to get trapped by Isabelle in the first place. It was my fault that Jace and Simon had had to come looking for me.

I felt my mom's hands take my own and squeeze, and suddenly I was terrified of her next words. I shut my eyes, causing a few tears to slip down my cheeks, not wanting to see the grief and sympathy on her face. Not wanting to hear her break the news.

"Simon is fine," she said, and my eyes snapped open. I stared at her in disbelieving, half-hopeful shock. "He's beaten up and shaken, and his shoulder is a little worse for wear. I hear he took a bullet for that boy Jace." She sighed, the rest of her anger melting away as she took in my face. "Oh, Clary. It's all right." She pulled me against her, sitting a little awkwardly on the very edge of my bed. I hugged her tight, pressing my lips together to keep from sobbing with relief.

"I want to see him," I whispered.

"Soon," she promised, pulling away and brushing my hair out of my face. "He just got out of surgery. He's resting right now."

I didn't want to see him "soon." I wanted to see him now. I had to see with my own eyes that he was alive. I wouldn't believe it until I had concrete proof.

But the feeling I got as I realized that I would eventually see him again, that we would joke and laugh and hang out just like we used to, made it extremely hard to harbor any doubt. Joy, bright and airy, blossomed inside of me. For a few horrifying minutes, I had been certain that my best friend was dead. If he had given up his life to save both Jace and me, I wouldn't have been able to live with myself. I wouldn't have been able to bear letting myself be with Jace. The guilt and the pain would have been too overwhelming.

I wanted to ask a million questions about Simon, to ask how he could be alive, just to hear his name coming out of my mom's mouth, but there were other things I needed to know. "What about Isabelle?" I forced myself to ask, fighting against the fear that her memory dredged up.

My mom's whole face darkened. "She's being taken away," she said, all her earlier anger returning. "To a place where she can't hurt anyone else. She's not right in the head, cornering people in Central Park, plotting to kill them. That's not healthy. That's sick. She should be locked away for a long, long time—"

"Mom." I put out my hand to stop her. I hated Isabelle for what she'd done to us. She'd almost killed us, after all. And yet…a part of me pitied her. It wasn't like she had chosen to be the way she was. It was a process she couldn't have fought against. What must it be like, trapped in your own head like that, not knowing the kind of feelings that other people felt? She had even deluded herself into thinking that Jace was some disease in her family that needed to be cleansed. She had begun to believe that he had replaced her. That he wanted to kill her. And that had terrified her more than anything.

Isabelle was a sad person, really. And now that she was gone, far away from me and the people I loved, I could afford a little understanding. Not much, but a little. I would probably never forgive her for the things she'd done, but I could sympathize. Kind of.

"What about Raphael?"

"That boy that was with her? He had to go into surgery, too. Shot in the leg," she explained, her face twisting into another scowl. "He's no better than that girl. Worse, if you ask me. She had the excuse of being crazy—what excuse does he have?"

That's my mom for you, judgmental as always. But I couldn't really blame her for ranting about the people that had tried to kill her daughter. I could cut her some slack for once.

"Is he here?" My voice shot up an octave, and the panicky feeling from the park came flooding back.

"No," she said quickly. "He was transported to another hospital. Once he's received proper medical attention, he'll be taken into custody. At least, that's what I've come to understand. He most likely won't be able to plead insanity. From what I hear, he's been up to some shady things in the past. The cops aren't going to want to let him go."

For Raphael, I felt no pity. He did what he did for money, for entertainment. There was nothing about him that I understood.

"And…" I clenched my fist around my bed sheets, a sick feeling clenching my stomach. "What about Sebastian?"

My mom must have heard the change in my voice, because her glower softened a little. "The white-haired boy? I don't know," she said. "He ran away from the scene, I guess. He told those boys—Jace's brother and the one that wears all the glitter—that you needed help, and then he took off, supposedly. No one knows where he is."

I was silent, not knowing how to feel about that. I had underestimated Sebastian. He had helped us after all, in the end; he'd gone to Alec and Magnus and told them to get help. If it weren't for Sebastian, I might be dead now. And yet, it was difficult to muster up gratitude. If he hadn't gone along with Isabelle's plan in the first place, we could have been spared a lot of pain. He had played large parts in her plotting, and I wouldn't be able to forget that.

And he was on the run now. Was he still in New York? Didn't he have a family that would be worried about him? I'd never seen or heard about his parents, didn't know if he had brothers or sisters. I didn't know anything at all about him, I realized. For all I knew, he had no one. Maybe he had nothing to lose by leaving.

Maybe I didn't want him in prison, though. Maybe I was happy he would keep his freedom. Or maybe I just didn't care where he ended up. That was my thanks to him—choosing not to hate him for what he'd done. Because I didn't think he'd want me to hate him.

"Come on," my mom said, mustering up another smile. "I know you're dying to ask about one more person."

I fidgeted, torturing myself for another moment, and then blurted, "How's Jace?"

"He's fine. Minimal damage. Certainly not as bad as the first time. He does seem to be struggling a little with the whole concept, though," she said, shaking her head. "The fact that his sister has been trying to kill him…well, his family isn't coping well with that."

My heart twisted in my chest, aching for them. I thought of Alec's devastated face as he arrived at the scene and discovered his sister at the core of all that had happened. And what about Maryse, their mother? And their father? How would they feel, knowing they had brought Isabelle home while she was still unwell, and that she had posed an immediate danger to Jace?

"I want to see him, too," I said, throwing my covers back, ready to leap out of bed.

"Hold your horses," my mom said, pressing me firmly back. "You're not getting up."

"I'm not going to just lie here," I insisted. "I have to—"

"Rest," my mom said bluntly. "You have to rest. And if you don't do so willingly, I'll call in the nurse and she'll sedate you."

I gave my mom my best betrayed look. "You wouldn't."

"Wouldn't I?" Then she sighed and pushed my hair back from my forehead again. "I almost lost you, Clary. Just humor me for a while, won't you?"

I grudgingly sank back onto my pillows, even as my toes curled with impatience and my eyes darted continuously to the door, as if Simon or Jace would suddenly appear there magically.

"Luke wants to come and say hi. I'm going to go call him and tell him you're awake. Rest," she ordered, eyeing me, and then she turned and hurried out of the room.

I looked down at the thick bandages on my arm. I wasn't that badly hurt, really. The damage was probably more psychological than anything. I would be having nightmares about that night for the rest of my life. But there were more important things than rest right now.

I reached for my IV, ready to rip it out and jump out of bed, but I was stopped by the sound of the door opening.

I quickly dropped my hand back to my side and tried to look as innocent as possible.

Someone leaned halfway into the room, like they wanted to make sure I was awake. It wasn't my mom, and it wasn't Luke. My breath caught in my throat and my fingers curled themselves into my bed sheets.

Jace's eyes met mine and his face broke into a lopsided smirk. "Sleeping Beauty awakes," he said, but beneath the joke there was a current of stark relief, and the way his golden eyes glowed made me shiver.

I propped myself up, unable to tear my eyes away. He came the rest of the way into the room, his smirk softening into a half-smile as he slowly approached my bed. I marveled at his self-control. Why did he have to take so much time? I wanted him over here now. I wanted to be able to touch him, to make sure that he was really here and really safe, right now.

But he sure did take his time. He stopped at the foot of my bed, still annoyingly out of arm's reach, and surveyed me, his arms crossed over his chest.

"You look a little the worse for wear," he remarked, his eyes searching my face, darkening. I wondered what I looked like right now. Judging by the way I felt, not good.

"You too," I answered, trying to remember how to blink. Bruises decorated his face and arms, and there was a long cut on his chin. Even beaten and battered, he was still the best thing I'd ever laid eyes on.

Silence settled over the room, if you don't count the sounds of hospital machinery. It wasn't awkward, though; we were both just taking the other in, really drinking in the realization that we'd survived through something traumatic. We had both believed that we were going to die in that clearing, and yet here we were.

Finally, when I couldn't stand it anymore, I said, "Are you going to stand there forever?"

Jace's smile reappeared, curling his lips upward. "Is that an invitation I hear?"

"As a matter of fact, it is."

"It's about time you asked," he said, and then he was around the bed, leaning over me. He still had some dirt smeared on his cheek from when he'd fought with Raphael; he smelled like grass and nighttime. I had no idea how much time had passed since Isabelle had lured us into Central Park, no idea how long I'd been unconscious, but it hadn't been long enough for Jace to go home and clean up. Idly, I wondered if he was confined to a hospital bed, too, whether he'd snuck out of his room like I'd been planning to do, or whether his injuries were minimal enough that he got to wander free.

But that wasn't important right now. The fact that Jace was right in front of me, his face so close to mine that the tips of our noses almost touched, was the crucial detail in this scene. I reached up and plucked a piece of dead leaf out of his hair, sifting it between my fingers until it crumbled into nothing.

"You're a mess," I told him, unable to totally suppress my smile.

"I've been called worse," he said, and then he leaned the rest of the way down and kissed me.

At first it was tentative, hesitant, like he was afraid he would hurt me if he tried anything else. No matter how sore I felt, I would never be too sore for a good, hearty kiss. And I wasn't having his gentleness. So I reached up, able to wrap only one arm around his neck since the other was hindered by a tube, and pulled him hard against my mouth, refusing to let him escape.

The kiss deepened, and every part of me tingled. His hands cupped my face, and even though he pressed against places that hurt, even though my lungs protested lack of air, I didn't care. I threw myself into the kiss with somewhat embarrassing gusto. But hey, I had been about ninety-nine percent sure we were going to die and that I would never get to kiss him again, so I had an excuse for my enthusiasm.

"I was so afraid," Jace whispered when we came up for air, both of us breathing hard. "I thought you were going to die."

"Please," I said, smiling at him, my lower lip brushing against his as I did so. I wouldn't allow any extra space to come between us. "It takes a lot more than that to take me down."

"Right," he said, his mouth moving to mirror my smile. "I should have known better."

"You really should have."

I pulled him to me again. Before now, I'd never really been into romance—I didn't read romance novels, or go to chick flicks. I rolled my eyes whenever I heard one of those corny love lines. Once, out of curiosity, I leafed through a romance book at the library, and every page seemed to hold something along the lines of, "his smoldering gaze seemed to melt the skin off her bones," or "she'd never felt a burning love more fiercely than she did for him." It had seemed so cliché and stupid to me, and I'd cracked up with laughter.

But now? I wasn't laughing anymore. Because I could have sworn that the feeling of his skin on mine, our lips moving together, really was melting me. And I never had felt anything like this before. There would always be a part of me that doubted this, of course. That wondered how someone like Jace could ever like me that way. That couldn't quite believe this would last forever, or that we were soul mates, or whatever you want to call it. And yet the way Jace held me, the way he looked at me, it was almost enough to erase all those uncertainties and insecurities. Clearly, he saw something in me that I didn't, something that was worth caring about.

Wow. I'd become a character in a romance novel.

Suddenly, Jace broke away, a funny look on his face. "What?" I said, instantly alarmed, wondering if I'd done something wrong.

"Your heart monitor," he said, and I realized he was trying not to laugh.

I listened and was rewarded with instant mortification as I heard the loud, frantic beeping of the monitor. Okay. So maybe I shouldn't be making out when my heartbeats are being monitored. Good future tip to have.

A nurse bustled in then, probably alarmed by the change in my heart rate. The concerned look on her face turned to one of irritation when she walked in and saw Jace standing over me, his hands still holding my face, my arm still slung around his neck. All in all, not a very good pose to have caught us in.

"Excuse me," she said frostily to Jace. "You can't be in here right now."

I jerked my arm away, wondering if smoke was rising off my skin. It sure felt hot enough. Jace, however, took his time removing his hands from my face. He looked calm, relaxed, and he seemed to be thoroughly enjoying himself. He straightened and gave the nurse one of his charming smiles.

"I'm sorry," he said, sounding deceptively sincere, and I almost snorted. "I was just very concerned about Clary. I wasn't sure if she would even be alive when I came to see her. I thought I'd never see her again." I shot daggers at him with my eyes, but he ignored me. "I got carried away."

The nurse's face softened a little. "Teenagers," she muttered to herself, but at least she didn't look like she was going to call security or anything.

Jace smiled at her again, and even she couldn't withstand the force of it. "Would it be okay if I stayed? I promise I'll behave myself." He raised his hand solemnly and I rolled my eyes.

The nurse gave us both a suspicious look before relenting. "Fine. But I'll be watching." She pointed a finger at him and then left the room again.

Jace flopped into the folding chair beside my bed, grinning away to himself.

"Your acting skills are spectacular," I said sarcastically.

"I try." He leaned back, stretching his legs out in front of him, and surveyed me with the most contented look on his face.

"I don't think I've ever seen you look so…relaxed," I said, wiggling in my bed to get comfortable. "I would think you wouldn't be very, um, happy, being in a hospital again. After what happened the first time."

He shrugged. "It's over," he said. "At least, the worst of it is. No one is hunting me anymore. There will be a big fallout after what Isabelle did, but at least we're safe now." His eyes grew shadowed when he said her name.

I reached out, my fingers open. He obligingly put his hand in mine, squeezing it. "I'm sorry," I said quietly.

"There you go again. Apologizing," he said, but his smile was a little twisted, and he stared hard at the ground.

"I mean it. I'm sorry about Isabelle. How…how are your parents taking it?" I asked tentatively.

He exhaled, long and slow. "Not well," he said finally.

"And Alec?"

"Even worse."

We sat there quietly for a moment. His thumb traced absent circles in my hand, making my whole arm tingle.

When he spoke again, I expected it to be something about Isabelle or his family. But his mind had wandered to a different subject during our silence. "I remember when our positions were reversed," he said, his smile coming out more genuine this time. "I was the one in the hospital bed, and you were visiting me."

"Except we hated each other's guts back then," I said.

"True. And mostly our conversation consisted of insults and blackmail." He cast me a wry look.

I shrugged. "I needed to get my answers somehow. I feel no remorse for blackmailing you," I said calmly.

"You're evil, you know that?"

"I know."

Jace flashed me a grin that quickly faded again. A distant look came into his eyes, and he stared at the wall. I wanted to ask him what was wrong, but instead I waited quietly. He would tell me if he wanted. I'd learned that much about him.

"The one thing that doesn't really add up," he said slowly, "is Sebastian."

I squeezed his hand, maybe a little too tightly. Sebastian was a subject I wasn't sure I wanted to go into. But then, it wasn't fair for me to refuse to discuss him. Sebastian had been Jace's best friend, after all, and if Jace wanted to talk about him, then I wasn't going to stop him.

"Which part?" I said softly. "The blackmailing-your-brother part, the part where he helped Isabelle, or the part where he ended up saving us?"

"All of it." Jace shook his head, like he was trying to clear his thoughts. "I mean, why help Isabelle in the first place? What was in it for him?"

"Isabelle mentioned that he was a sucker for a pretty face," I remembered. "Maybe they were…you know."

Jace made a face. "Don't even say that. I can't live my life with that mental picture."

"He shouldn't have done it. I wish he hadn't," I said quietly. "And I wish he hadn't gone to such awful measures to keep Alec quiet."

"But all along, he was helping her," said Jace bleakly. "And I never realized it. He must have known who it was, right? But still, he told us that he didn't know. He actually teamed up with you to track down the attacker. He tried to frame Magnus. But the whole time, he knew it was Isabelle."

I hated the anger and pain in his voice. I felt a flare of anger at Sebastian, but it quickly fizzled out. I didn't know what to feel about him. It was all too confusing.

"I don't understand it, either," I said. "But he wasn't all bad. He told Alec and Magnus to call the police."

"But then he ran. And he was helping her, at first," he growled. "He changed his mind only after he realized Isabelle was really planning on killing us."

"That's got to count for something," I argued. "He didn't want us dead, at least."

"He didn't want you dead. He couldn't care less about me." His voice was rough, and I wanted to climb out of my bed and put my arms around him, but I didn't. I did hold on tight to his hand, though. "I should be grateful, I guess. Even though I hate the idea of Sebastian liking you, it saved us."

"Yeah," I said, staring down at my lap. "And now he's gone."

Jace didn't answer. He drew his hand away from mine, which felt cold and empty without his fingers intertwined with mine.

"Enough about Sebastian," said Jace abruptly, and when I looked up at him, the dark look had vanished from his face. He was looking at me with that look he got when he was trying to hold back a really big, triumphant grin. Warning sirens instantly started blaring in my head. "I have something else to ask you. About the park."

Why did he want to keep talking about that? I just wanted to forget that it had happened. It had been nothing short of a nightmare. But I just regarded him warily, waiting for him to continue.

"You said something that was quite…interesting," he said, lips twitching. "Well, you mouthed it, really. But that still counts."

I stared at him, confused, until it hit me. My stomach dropped through my feet, through the ground, down to the core of the earth. I had completely forgotten what I'd said to him, when we had both been on the verge of dying.

Heat rose into my face. "Oh, no." I groaned and buried my no-doubt red cheeks in my hands.

"I'm guessing you remember," he said, and I just moaned again, mortified. I heard his chair creak as he stood, and then my bed sank as he sat down on its edge. His hands took my wrists, pulling my fingers away from my face. I kept my eyes trained fiercely on the blindingly white bed sheets, unable to bring myself to look at him.

"Hey," he said. "Clary, look at me."

I didn't want to. I was afraid I would see mocking laughter in his eyes. He took my chin and lifted it, giving me no other choice. I met his eyes, feeling strangely guilty, like I'd done something wrong.

He wasn't laughing at me. He was looking at me with a small smile on his face. "I just want to be sure that I understood you right," he said, his hands still holding my wrists.

"I was scared," I said quickly, wondering if I could erase any damage that had been done. "I was freaking out, panicking. So I just said it. You know how people say things in the heat of the moment. It just sort of happened, you know?"

"Stop babbling," he said, smirking, and I shut up, scowling at him. Then he became serious again, and his eyes were too intense on my face. I looked everywhere but at him, wishing my skin would return to its normal temperature.

"You said you loved me," he said softly.

I tugged on my hands experimentally, wondering if he would release them so that I could hide behind them again, but he held fast. "Yes," I said testily, not sure how else to channel my embarrassment. "I said it."

"Well?" His eyes searched my face, like he thought he would see the answer written across my forehead. "Is it true? Or did you really just say it 'in the heat of the moment'?"

I forced myself to meet his eyes. He looked almost…hopeful. But that was absurd. Why would Jace Wayland need to be hopeful about whether or not I loved him? Surely he didn't care that much…but if he did…

If I really wanted to protect my dignity, to prevent myself from becoming that girl who proclaims her love way too early in the relationship, I could lie right now. It wouldn't be so hard. Even if he didn't believe me, I could cling to the illusion that I hadn't lost the upper hand (not that I'd ever really had it in the first place).

But what was the use in lying?

So I said, almost inaudibly, "It's true."

Jace smiled slowly, like the sun breaking over the horizon, a brilliant smile that made my heart beat faster—something my heart monitor gladly displayed for all to hear. "So you love me," he said, like he still needed to make sure, almost like he was marveling at it.

"Yeah, well," I grumbled, scowling through my blush, "I thought I might as well tell you, since we were going to die and all."

He put his hand on the back of my neck, his fingers a nice pressured warmth on my skin, and tilted his head to the side in that way of his that made my stomach flutter. "Well, Clary Fray," he announced, leaning closer to me, getting all up in my grill, "I'm glad to hear it."

I sighed. Great. I was never going to live this down. He would tease me about it for the rest of my days, assuming I didn't die of mortification first. Now I was "that girl," and he probably thought I was ridiculously clingy and obsessed now. I mean, were we even officially dating yet? I suppose one could argue that we'd been through enough that our feelings had been accelerated, but still. Too soon, man. Too soon.

Jace leaned forward suddenly and kissed me. It was a firework explosion of a kiss; I could feel himself throwing everything into it, like he wanted me to feel like I was burning up on the inside. It didn't last as long as the first had, but when he drew away, his face was flushed with color and his eyes were bright, alive.

"I think you're the most amazing person I've ever met," he said.

I just leaned my head on his shoulder, pretending I wasn't hiding, secretly relieved that he wasn't freaked out by what I'd confessed.

Because it was true. I did love him, although I probably shouldn't, for a number of reasons. First of all, I didn't want to fall in love at age seventeen. I was far more susceptible to that nasty little thing known as a broken heart at this age, when I was young and naïve and full of unreasonable passion. How well did I even know Jace, really? I did know that he was capable of cruelty, and that he had the capacity to hate without good reason. But I also knew that he could turn hate into love, and he could take off his harsh, smirking mask when he wanted to.

But even after all we'd been through, there was that annoying, dubious part of me that kept bugging me about how a guy like him rarely seemed to go for girls like me, and that we had a long, harsh past together that made this sudden mushy romance seem kind of far-fetched.

And there was the biggest point of all, of course: He hadn't said he loved me back.

My stomach clenched uncomfortably, but before I could blurt out anything stupid, before I could ask The Question that would no doubt scare him away, the nurse came back in and ordered Jace out. This time, no amount of charming smiles would tempt her into letting him stay.

Right there in front of the nurse, Jace kissed me again, and it was a soft, sweet kiss that made me shiver. "I'll see you soon," he promised, touching his forehead briefly against mine. He got up, gave me one last smirk, and strode out of the room under the glower of the nurse, who was not happy to have caught us sitting so closely again.

As the door closed behind him and the nurse hurried over to check my IV, I felt a strange sort of resolution form in my gut, in my heart.

Jace would say it back to me. That grin on his face made me think he was going to enjoy dangling my confession over my head for a long time, but maybe he secretly felt the same. And if he didn't now, then he would. I would make sure of it.

Jace Wayland was going to say he loved me, even if I had to tie him down and force him.

Oh. That sounded kind of wrong.

Wellity well! Wasn't that a corny scene of romance? I can't help it. I'm a sucker for those lovey clichés.

Guess what? The next chapter is...wait for it...THE LAST! That's right! After 37 soon-to-be 38 chapters, this story is finally wrapping up. I'll save my Speech of Gratitude for the next chapter. It'll be long and mushy and soppy, but I'll mean every word of it. For now I'll stick with this: Thank you for staying to read through the story. I know it's been long, and I can't thank you enough!

Also...OVER 1,000 REVIEWS? This is my dream come true. Well, my Internet dream. Thank you so much!