Hey! SO this isn't the story that I was going to post, but I'm still working on it, so it'll be soon! My friend wrote this, and gave me permission to upload, so thanks to her continual support, dictionary-like brain, and a ton of candy, I've made it through the first three chapters and the beginning of school. Hope you like it. *sigh*

¨Emily? Emily, come on, wake up,¨ Jace says, shaking me gently.

I wake up, confused.

I'm laying on one of the beds in the infirmary at the Institute.

¨´Bout time you get up.¨

Suddenly I remember a dark brown wolf clamping down on my leg.

I push myself up, wincing slightly as pain shoots up my leg where the werewolf-or at least I'm guessing it was a werewolf-bit me. "Oh, crap."

Jace stifles a laugh. "I'm guessing that means you remember what happened."

"Yes. I remember what happened, Jace. It'd probably be pretty hard to forget."

Jace looks down. "Your leg was pretty bad when we got here."

I look at the bandages on my leg and instantly regret it. The bandages are soaked through with blood-most dried, but some fresh. I shudder and look back at him.

"How long have I been out?" I knew it would be bad, but I had to ask.

"Only a few hours." Well that isn't too bad. " Are you okay? You look a little pale."

"No, I'm not okay. I was bitten by a frickin' werewolf a few hours ago."

Jace hesitates. "Well, you'll probably be okay. Not all werewolf bites result in lycanthropy, you know."

"I know."

He glances at my leg again. "We tried healing your leg. Hodge says it'll heal on it's own soon, though."

I nod and stand up, wincing again as I put weight on my leg.

"Maybe you shouldn't-"

I shake my head. "I'm fine."

I limp back to my room, Jace tailing me the whole time. "What do we do now?" I say, sitting down on my bed.

Jace moves a pillow and gingerly sits down next to me. "Wait for the next full moon, I guess."

"That's…" I silently count the days in my head. "18 days from now."

He nods.

"Great. Now get out, I need to change."

Jace leaves and I flop back onto my bed. I was exhausted. Which was surprising, since, according to Jace, I'd been asleep for several hours.

There's a knock on my door.
I sit up. "Come in."

Isabelle opens the door and comes in, sitting on the bed beside me. "How're you doing?"

"Okay."

"Are you sure? You look a little...different.."

"Well, I'm nervous. I have to wait a little while for the next full moon."

She thinks for a second. "There might be a way to tell now." She takes a small silver bracelet off of her wrist and sets it on the bedside table next to me. "If you touch it, it's possible..."

"Interesting method. But effective, as always." I reach out to touch it.

The second my palm makes contact, I yelp and draw my hand back.

"Well, that's unfortunate," she says, slipping the bracelet back onto her wrist. "I really hoped that I would get to enjoy a little while longer with you." Wow. She really doesn't care.

I look down at my hand. "I guess I have to tell Jace, huh?"

She nods and leaves the room, shutting the door gently behind her.

As soon as she leaves, I get up and open a drawer, pulling out a clean gray T-shirt and black jeans.

I change into the new clothes and leave to find Jace. He's probably in the music room or the greenhouse. He always said it reminded him of Idris. I can't remember what it's like there, even though Jace and I are the same age. Not that there was much that we left behind. Our parents were dead, our lives blank, our hope eradicated.

I find Jace in the greenhouse. I don't want to tell him. Doing that would make it feel true. Maybe if I don't tell anyone, it won't be real. Maybe I can wake up and it'll all be a bad dream. But I'd rather him hear it from me than from Isabelle, or from Clave officers coming to take me to an observation room. Hopefully, Hodge won't reach out to the Clave and tell them about it. Tucking my injured hand into my pocket, I go up to him. "Hi."

He doesn't look at me. "How're you doing?"

"Good."

Jace turns around. "Why are you hiding your hand?"

"Why are you not hiding your hand?"

"Show me your hand, Emily."

I show him the backside of my hand so that he doesn't see my injured palm.

"The other side."

I reluctantly flip my hand over. Jace looks at it for a minute, then looks up.

"What is that?"

I drop my hand back to my side. "It's a burn, idiot."

"From fire?"

I shake my head.

"What's it from then?" I saw the realization cross his face. "Oh."

"Silver." I said, confirming his fear.

"So that means…."

"Yeah, wise guy."

"Oh. Well, I guess we should tell Hodge."

I hesitate. "Do we have to? He'll probably tell the Clave, and… I don't wanna be locked up in one of the observation rooms." I shudder at the thought of being locked up in the tiny cells in Idris. I've never been in one, but we've read about them in the Codex (they aren't in the codex), and they sound absolutely dreadful.

"I'm sorry, Em, but we have to." I nod and follow him out the greenhouse doors, nervously twisting the gold ring on my right middle finger.

Thanks for reading. I'm going to sleep now.