Hey guys, sorry I keep taking breaks. I just went through my exams and tests and all that and since it'll be summer soon, I'll try to update more but I won't make any promises. I'm going on vacation during the summer to Japan as well at the end of July, so I'll be trying to pre-write chapters so I can update like 3-4 times all at once so you guys have a lot to read while I'm gone. :)

Anyway thanks for all the support and reviews. I still have no idea where the heck the plot is going but whatever. I'll figure it out like I always do. I'm not sure when Clary is going to meet Sebastian but it'll be soon. Probably. I don't know how many chapters this'll have either, but it'll be a lot. Probably.

~s

Incase you don't remember: In the small town called Idris, everybody knows what the Circle is. The Circle is a gang of dangerous and lethal people that hunt their victims down in the middle of the night. More dangerous than any sort of Assassin, The Circle is run by a man called Valentine and his heir, Sebastian. Now, Jocelyn Fairchild, who knows goes by Jocelyn Fray, is back in her hometown Idris, creating a new group called the Shadowhunters who fight the Circle.

In the beginning of the summer, Clary Fray moves to Idris, unknowing about the Circle and its members. Little does she know that her mother has been hiding their true identity, and Jace, the boy who she thought was her brother was not who she thought he was. She was somehow connected to this town, and when she meets Jonathan Christopher Morgenstern, she learns that she had a whole different side to herself than she never knew she had. When she starts falling for Sebastian, the chaos happening in her life seems to spiral out of control, and she learns that her connection with Idris was not just a coincidence.

Previously: What she knew right then was that there were definitely three people that knew about whatever was going in Idris: Jace, Isabelle, and Jocelyn.

She just had to find somebody else who knew something. Somehow. Somewhere.

She remembered the bloody words that she'd read last night.

We're coming after you.

Nowhere to run.

This is the hunt.

Warning: Incest

Clary needed to find whatever the institute was. She needed to know why people were being killed and she didn't know about it. How her brother and mother talked creepily about a person named Valentine. Clary needed to find where the institute was, but the things was- she couldn't just… ask Jace or Jocelyn. She needed to find somebody who knew about the institute. Somebody that she could trust.

But she couldn't trust anybody anymore, could she? Not when she'd just moved to this hell of a town and not when she'd just found out that her brother and mother were involved in some sort of group called Shadowhunters and she's had no idea of its existence.

But she had to get back inside the house before Jace did and before her mother realized that Clary wasn't inside where she was supposed to be. She dug her phone out of her pocket and took a picture of Isabelle and Jace and whoever the man in the car was before she ran inside the house.

Once she got inside, she dug her sketchpad out from underneath a pile of clothes, tied her messy hair into a bun and stuck a charcoal pencil inside of it. "I'm heading out~" Clary said, trying to keep her voice as steady as she could, although she was questioning everything.

"Don't be late." Jocelyn, who was also in the process of getting ready for work, whatever that was, waved Clary goodbye.

"I definitely won't be." Clary replied, also sticking a pocket knife inside her shoes. She wasn't going to risk being defenseless in any sort of situation.

Clary walked through the dark alleyways of Idris. The sun was setting at this point, but she didn't care. What she knew was that it was in the night that the true Idris was revealed. The Idris with people- dangerous people that knew about the true nature of Idris.

Clary hadn't cared until last night. Last night when she'd found the dead body of her best friend who to her knowledge had lived in a town across the country. But she'd found him inside a shed in her backyard, his blood dripping onto her feet as the realization that Simon, her best friend, was dead sank in. That her best friend had been killed by some sort of gang. A gang that had a symbol that was strangely similar to a symbol on the locket that her father had left for her when he'd died when Clary was a baby.

She slowly watched the sun set and kept her guard up as she once again checked to see if the knife that she'd brought with her to the city was still tucked into her boots. As the sun set, her hair blended into the darkness along with her clothes and she practically melted into the shadows. She didn't even flinch when she heard the police sirens blaring throughout town- something that she hadn't cared to notice last night.

There were gunshots, screaming, and cries for help everywhere that she could listen. Clary stayed put, wanting to see for herself what sort of horror this town had been concealing from her.

Clary realized that even though she was hidden in the shadows, somebody could see her. Her hair was too noticeable, her pale skin too bright for the darkness to fully conceal her. She pulled her sleeves farther down and reached to pull her hood up to cover her hair.

"Lost?"

She flinched slightly before turning around, kicking her foot up so her knife landed into her hand. She prayed that the stranger didn't see it in the dark. "Excuse me?" She said, her hood falling back down.

"I said, are you lost?"

Clary wasn't sure if she could trust whoever it was if she couldn't see them. She turned on her phone flashlight and violently turned it at the stranger's direction, not thinking for a moment whether or not the person could be dangerous.

But the stranger had dodged the light.

"Don't trust me?"

"Come into the light." Clary demanded, trying to hide the waver in her voice. "Then I'll see if I can trust you."

He stepped into the light. His eyes were pitch black, just like the darkness that surrounded them. In contrast, his hair was as pale as the moon that wasn't visible today, almost as light as snow but with bits of color that made his hair look ghostly. The only way to tell that his hair wasn't completely white was his skin, which was clearly as pale as snow.

In short, he looked like both heaven and hell wrapped into one sort of hybrid. He almost looked inhumane.

He looked down at her. "Are you okay? It's dangerous to be out here at a time like this. You don't look like you know what goes on at night." All of a sudden he looked more human to her. The concern he was showing was genuine.

"I know enough." Her tone was sharp, and a little bit harsh.

There were gunshots in the distance. "Shadowhun-I mean, you should get out of here." He said quickly.

Clary started to leave, but she realized what he'd just said. Shadowhun-Shadowhunters. By coincidence, she'd run into a man that knew just who the shadowhunters were. It was perfect. Maybe her stupid plan would work after all. She grabbed his hand to keep him from leaving. "I need to know." She said quickly without thinking.

"What?" He seemed shocked at what she'd said.

"I need to know about the Shadowhunters. What they're doing. What they are."

The original concern on his face melted into something else but as quickly as it came, it disappeared. "It's not safe out here." He said. "Follow me."

He took her hand and they melted into the shadows, going far too fast for Clary to be able to see what was going on. At last, she was flung through a door and landed hard against the wall.

She couldn't see anything. It was too dark.

"You shouldn't know what the Shadowhunters are. Are you one of them?" His tone was hostile.

Clary didn't know what to say. The kind stranger that had approached her mere minutes ago seemed to have vanished and had been replaced by someone totally different. "No-" She managed to say. "My brother is one. Jace. Jace Fray."

The boy looked away for a moment but then looked back at her, the hostile interrogator gone once again. "My cousin Aline is one. I'm here in town to visit her from France." He said quietly. "But you don't seem to be one of them… and yet you found out. I guess you've heard about the Circle, then."

Clary nodded. "I've heard about… Valentine."

The boy looked at her for a moment, as if trying to look for words to say. "And his son, Sebastian Morgenstern?" The way he said his name gave her an off sort of feeling, but she continued to listen to the beautiful stranger.

Clary shook her head.

The boy's shoulder seemed to relax. "Do you want me to call Aline and take you to the institute? Your brother must be worried if you've been missing."

Clary felt the blood drain from her face. She was supposed to be back before dinner… and right now, it was around midnight. They would think she had run away, or that she was hurt… or that she was dead.

She needed to find them… which meant trusting a stranger who could possibly be one of the enemy.

But she needed to trust him in order to get back. She had no clue where she was and if she did try to find the institute by herself, then she could very well end up dead. She held out her hand to him. "Take me there."

He tightened a knife onto his belt and looked back at her, nodding.

"Oh, by the way.." She said after considering it for a few seconds. "I'm Clarissa. Clarissa Fray."

"I'm Jonathan. Just Jonathan."

His obsidian colored eyes seemed to pierce into hers as he took her hand into his and they slipped back into the darkness.

Hey guys. Sorry for not updating for a month. I was feeling really unmotivated so this chapter was actually written throughout the course of this month. I'm really sorry haha. I'll update a lot more now that the stress from exams and stuff are over. Expect a Dark Artifices fic soon :) and maybe a couple one shots if I'm feeling inspired. Love you guys

~S