Clary
Jace darts out of Jonathan's reach, Phaesphoros barely missing him. I unsheathe my sword and make my way up to the top of the small hill. Adira is up there, sparring with another Shadowhunter- no, an Endarkened Shadowhunter. There is a Forsaken charging her way, so I make quick work of it and flit around the small square, checking the perimeter for other dangers.
There aren't many. Just Adira and I watching warily, and Jonathan and Jace charging at each other. Jace has gotten a dagger stuck in Jonathan's knee, the same knee that Simon hit earlier when he made away with me while I was unconscious.
But when Jonathan has Jace cornered, I do not hesitate to storm him from behind. I do not hesitate to bring my sword down on his back.
He doesn't miss a beat, either; Jonathan moves quicker than I can follow, and my blade bites into his arm rather than his back, where it should have been. He swipes at me, but I manage to fend it off with my sword. The impact of steel on steel reverberates through my arms in an aching swell of power, and I stumble back.
"Clary, get out of here!" Jace shouts at me before he tackles Jonathan to the ground. Screams pierce the cold night air. Jonathan's screams. They're filled with agony, and I know that they can be heard echoing all through Alicante. The Heavenly Fire is actually burning, and smoke is rising from the two, almost indiscernible from one another in the fiery blaze.
Jace falls away with a cry of pain, and his fire dims. There's blood all over him, so much blood. I'm at his side in an instant. It's his blood, and Jonathan is holding the sword that pierced him. I hold my hands over the wound in Jace's stomach, but it doesn't nothing to ease the steady scarlet flow, pumping out of him like water.
Hands are at my shoulders. "I've got him, Clary!" Adira says, and jerks her head into Jonathan's direction. "Take care of the bastard."
And I try, oh do I try my damnest to finish him off, but I don't have Heaven's fire on my side. I just have Heosphoros, but it'll do for now. I just hope that Jace is alright.
"Does it hurt?" I call to Jonathan, taunting him. He looks up at me with pleading green eyes. Green as freshly cut grass, just like our mother's, just like mine.
"Sister, please…" He whimpers. I can't believe him, begging me for mercy after all that he's done. "Help me."
The desperation and hope mixed into his voice are something that throws me for a spin.
"What is wrong with you?!" I scream, Heosphoros held tightly in between both of my hands.
"I- I-" he stammers, tears flowing through his green eyes. Why are they green all of a sudden? He crawls forward from his heap on the ground. He sobs and crumples before me. I hear Isabelle call out from behind me.
"Clary! Do it!" I look back, conflicted. What if he's okay now? What if the Heavenly Fire worked on Jonathan, like Glorious did with Jace, burning away the taint of darkness that Jonathan bestowed upon him?
"Please kill me." His voice is ragged and choked with more unshed tears. "Sister, please. I beg of you. Kill me before the demon comes back. Please."
Isabelle
Simon's arms are holding me together, keeping me from charging to Jonathan Morgenstern and killing him myself, but my insides are crumbling. I knew. I knew it was my mother before we got close enough to even discern it. And the way that Jace took off… I should be there with him, helping him kill Jonathan.
He killed my mother, whether he did it by his own hand, or by one of his cronies, it doesn't matter. First Max, and now my mother. Why, though? What did she ever do to him? Absolutely nothing, just like Max. Just like the rest of the Nephilim who Jonathan finds absolutely disgusting.
It doesn't matter. Tears will not bring back my mom, and I'll have time to mourn later. Once this bastard is dead. Right now, I need to find my parabatai, and I need to help her end all of this.
"Simon, let me go," I say through a throat thick with tears. His arms slowly loosen and let go of me. He holds me at arm's length and tilts my chin up to look him in the eyes.
"I love you, Isabelle Lightwood. But right now, we need to do right by your mother."
I nod and we leave her burning body behind. There's nothing that we can do now.
We eventually find Jace by his flaming beacon of Heavenly Fire. Except he's lying on the ground with a blonde woman crouching over him. Adira. I race up to her and yank her back away from my brother.
"I'm trying to help him!" She shouts, her stele being torn away from his broken and bloodied skin. I take her place and finish the iratze. Seeing the amount of blood he lost, I also place a sangliers on him. His eyes are looking around wildly, and he seems to be coming to.
"Clary!" he calls faintly. I look around and find her on the far side of the small courtyard, standing over Jonathan with her sword held at him. He seems to be looking up at her, pleading.
I step away from Jace and closer to Simon.
"It's him," Simon whispers. I give him an incredulous look.
"Of course it's him!" I snap back.
"No, I mean, look at him, Isabelle. Look at his eyes." I do, and see that they are identical to Clary's. But how is that even possible? Did the Heavenly Fire burn out the evil? No, that's impossible. There was too much demon blood for any bit of humanity to remain.
"Clary!" I call out to her. "Do it!"
She chances a glance back at me, and I see the conflict in her eyes. She wants to believe that he's been cured. That he's okay, now.
But he'll never be okay.
"Sister, please. I beg of you. Kill me before the demon comes back. Please."
His voice is genuine, but then again, he also seemed genuine when he was playing the part of Sebastian Verlac.
Clary
As soon as he tells me to kill him before the demon comes back, I know that this isn't over yet. He's coming back, and when he does, he's going to try and kill Jace and I. I step forward and pull my sword back, ready to let it arc down and end it all. As I rear back, I see that flicker, that small fleeting look of shock and recognition in his eyes before they turn black once again. I put more force behind the blow, but he's moved out of the way already.
"Well, that was embarrassing, please do excuse me," he says as he lunges for me. I barely clear myself of his raining blows.
I actually manage to fend him off for a second, or so I think. Because then his blows become harder, more serious, as if our sparring was only a warm up for the real show. I can hardly keep up, Heosphoros is clanging against its brother, Phaesphoros, battling to see who will cave first.
I know who will. There's no way that I stand any sort of a chance up against the demonic entity of my brother. We need a gift from Heaven to win this battle, and Jace has just that running through his veins, waiting to be unleashed on Jonathan.
It's hard, but I'm able to hold off for just a second, mainly by flitting around and keeping my distance. It further aggravates Jonathan, and his eyes blaze in hatred.
"If it's a fight you want, Clarissa, then we will fight. But I won't waste my time running about!" He's highly irritated, and I think good. It'll cloud his mind and allow Jace his opening.
"Why don't you tell me what this is all really about, Jonathan?" I shout at him, keeping a few meters away to avoid injury. "Why do you want us dead so badly? You're obviously not following Valentine's path; he just wanted purity, but you- you want death. So tell me, big brother, what is it that you are after?"
"You are a daft little bitch, aren't you?" He hisses, his sword wavering slightly. "You don't understand, after all this time? You can't see that I want you by my side, and I want that moronic pig you call mother dead."
"Because she couldn't love you? Because you were a monster?" I taunt. He goes rigid all over.
"I did not choose to be born this way, sister. But I am glad. I'm stronger than you, I'm smarter than you, and I'm going to be the one to kill you all. Can't you see?"
"Can't you see, Jonathan?" I shift my weight and move my body slightly to the left, so that Jonathan move opposite of me, closer to where Jace is watching. I know that he's waiting for his opening, and I'm ready to give it to him. "You're nothing but a spoiled little brat. Valentine saw to that, didn't he? He gave you a taste of power, and you couldn't contain yourself. That's why we're really here, isn't it? Because you're one fucked up megalomaniac."
I can see the very small amount of self-control snap in his eyes and he is on me like a hawk. I feel a punch rained down on my cheek, and lose myself in the pressure on my face and the searing pain in my abdomen. Warm blood trickles down my side into the dirt below.
The pressure is relieved after only seconds, and I see the blur of gold engulf Jonathan from behind in a vice grip. There's no way to get out of it with the fire consuming him. I know he's done. I know Jace has him now, and the fire of heaven will serve it's purpose on earth.
I close my eyes and let myself go, knowing that we're finally, truly safe.
When I wake up, sun is shining through the flimsy curtains of Amatis' spare room, the one that I've nearly claimed as my own. I roll over and groan, my head thrumming with a migraine.
"Easy, there. You're gonna have a killer headache," my parabatai says from a distance. I let my head fall to the side and gaze up at her warily. I remember Jace pulling Jonathan off of me after I taunted him to attacking. And I know that Jace did the job, but I can't help asking.
"Is he dead?"
"The Heavenly Fire… It turned him to ash, Clary. There was nothing once Jace was done with him."
"Good," I mumble. "Is everyone okay?"
Isabelle shakes her head. "Not quite."
I stare at her until she tells me more.
"Luke is in the infirmary. An Endarkened attacked him once he shifted back into his human form. He's okay, but he was so mentally and physically exhausted that he's not healing properly. He's going to have to do it the old fashion way. Your mom's okay, though. She was with him when it happened."
"Jace?"
Isabelle sighs. "He's much the same. The Silent Brother's say that he won't wake up because he's still trying to process so much. He's fine, but it might take a few days."
"Dammit," I mutter, and slowly lean myself up onto the pillows.
I know that she's holding more back, but I don't think that she'd appreciate me pressing her. I remember seeing Maryse.
"Adira's been waiting to see you. I've told her she can shove it, but I figured you'd like to know, anyways," she says nonchalantly, as if it completely passed her mind until now.
"She's fine, Isabelle. She did what she had to for her sister, you know that." I don't know why I find myself defending the girl that I despised less than a week ago. Probably because I would have done the same exact thing for my family. That's just what you do.
"I don't know anything, and I won't believe anything until she's questioned under the Sword."
"I suppose there's going to be a trial?" I ask.
"Tomorrow afternoon. I think that's why she wants to talk to you. Do you want to see her?" Such a caring parabatai, Isabelle is. Nevertheless, she is being a little harsh on Adira.
"Yeah. And Izzy?" She pauses on her way to the door. "Just give her a chance, okay?"
Isabelle nods and leaves the room. I slowly get up and shower, savoring the steam rising and frizzing my hair as I undress. My first order of business is a scalding hot shower to wash away the grime and stench of the past few days. I have to shampoo my hair twice in order for it to feel fully cleansed. I even shave, just because. I actually have the time to do what I want without being rushed, and it's so nice.
When I'm done and wrapped up in a towel, I make my way back to my room to change, but I see Adira standing outside the door. She looks up and smiles tightly, as if she doesn't know how. I smile back awkwardly and shuffle around her and into the room while just in my towel.
"Just give me a second." My leisurely pace turns into a quicker one as I swiftly change into a pair of yoga pants and a tank top and run a brush through my tangled hair. "Come in!"
The door opens and Adira stands at the threshold, contemplating, before coming in fully and shutting the door behind her. I sit on the edge of the bed and watch her pace over to the desk and sit on the edge.
"What's up?" I ask after a moment or two of hesitation from the both of us.
"Lots of things," she answers vaguely. "I'm worried about Kareena, first and foremost."
"Understandable," I answer quickly. It makes perfect sense that she'd be worried about her little sister. "How's she holding up?"
"She's shaken up, and she's been having horrible nightmares. But I think that she'll be alright eventually. I hope we all will." She gives a wistful smile and I return it. I hope for that too.
"It'll take some time, but…" I shrug and let the ending linger, just like the future currently is. Who knows what's to come next now that Jonathan and his Endarkened are gone. Isabelle told me that they had to destroy the Infernal Cup to destroy them. The Silent Brother's had no way of curing them.
"I was actually wondering if you would be willing to testify for me. I know that you have no reason to do anything of the sort," she sighs and pauses before her brown eyes meet mine. "I was sort of thinking that you understand where I'm coming from. I did it all for Kareena, she's my only family and I needed to protect her."
"I understand." I'm moved by her words, and I know that the Clave is going to lay a very heavy hand on Adira's trial, so if I can help lessen the blow, I will. The Angel knows I've done the same for the people that I love.
Only two chapters after this. Lemme know what you think!