UPDATE! Because I would rather work on this than do my actual schoolwork... Oh well! I hope this chapter is not too bad, I have been having a terrible week and am pretty unsure about this u_u. BTW should I stop with the lyrics at the beggining of the chapter. I put them there because they are meant to reflect Alec's struggle (besides, I love the bands) but maybe they are annoying? ANYWAY here you go. Tell me what you think!

Chapter 4: Secrets

I was torn by the storms in my head

Like a victim of fate, born to regret.

-Torn by Kamelot.

Alec had never been good at comforting people, not even when his sister broke up with her boyfriend of the month or when one of Max's toys was accidentally broken. Because of that he lay sited on the floor, beside Clary, both their backs leaning against the mattress of his bed.

She had freaked out after seeing his mouth and hands dripping with blood. Quickly she had stumbled into his bathroom to wet a hand towel and had proceeded to wipe his hands, chin and lips with her tender touch. Alec had wanted to protest, he wasn´t used to people fussing over him, but he controlled himself knowing that this was Clary's way of coming to terms with what she had just seen.

When she had finished cleaning him up, she sat beside him and tried to control her breathing, all the while whipping the constant stream of tears running down her face.

Fortunately Clary was a level headed person, she knew the others would be expecting them downstairs to go on patrol very soon, so she had broken down, but her whole crisis had lasted a bit under fifteen minutes. They had little time, she was ready to listen to Alec tell his story.

"Tell me" she demanded softly "Maybe I can help you"

I hope so Alec thought, but he didn't really think there was a lot she could do.

"There isn't much to tell" He replied at last "Remember the park a few days ago?"

Clary nodded. How could she forget?

"Well, when we got separated a demon attacked me"

The redheaded shadowhunter lifted one of her brows.

"The days you spent in the infirmary kind of already told me that"

Alec pretended not to notice the interruption "While you were fighting the fireballs and the horde of demons I was set apart from you guys and attacked by another demon"

He quickly glanced at Clary who made a tiny motion with her head, encouraging him to continue.

"He placed a curse on me" He heard the sharp intake of breathe beside him. That was exactly the reason he had anticipated from her. He turned to face his friend, the little color that had returned to her face fled once more, leaving her pale and slightly ill-looking, he saw her shift position where she lay sited on the floor.

"What sort of curse?" She inquired, fear painting her every word.

He tried to make sense of his jumbled thoughts in order to properly explain to her. Alec opened his mouth to speak, only to find that the words remained stuck in his throat. The shadowhunter inhaled deeply to calm himself and he tried again, but still the words wouldn't come out. He looked at Clary, who still stared at him expectantly. It was then that he noticed it.

There was a shadow hidden in the corner of his room, directly behind Clary. It remained there, impassive, without moving, but Alec instantly recognized those red eyes with specks of orange around the dark pupils.

Sonneillon was in the room. The demon had found him.

It was Alec's turn to pale, Clary didn´t seem to notice the demonic presence in the room, which only served to unsettle him further.

"Now, now. Why would you want to ruin my fun Alexander?"

Like in his dreams, the demon's voice resounded only in his mind. Why couldn't Clary hear the demon? Why couldn´t she see it? Instead she stared at him, calling loudly for him to 'Snap out of it' but he couldn´t, all he could hear was Sonneillon´s voice, taunting him.

"If you go on telling your friends the specifics abut the curse, then our game would be over far too soon".

"That's it, isn´t it? I never had a chance" Alec thought that he had said the words only in his mind, but Clary's response convinced him otherwise.

"What do you mean Alec? Talk to me!"

He heard the demon's jeering laughter and felt a wave of nausea and fear wash over him. He had finally gathered his courage to tell his family about the curse, to open up and ask for their help so that they could help him figure out a way out of this mess, and now this happened? How could he ever hope to break the damn curse if he couldn´t share the details with anyone?!

You are a smart boy. Sonneillon chuckled. I'm sure you can figure something out. For the meantime, let this be our little secret. Your family will eventually find out anyway…

The cloud-shaped demon shifted once more before disappearing. A distant part of Alec's mind registered that the demons eyes had acquired a distinctly human quality, instead of the crimson slits they had been when they first met, he had also looked a bit less like a cloud, his shape was elongated and he could make out the shape of tentative extremities.

The demon was looking more substantial. More real

Clary's panicked voice brought him back to reality, she had grabbed him by the shoulders and was shacking him with all the strength she could muster –which wasn't much really.

"Alec please, get a hold of yourself! Say something"

He tried, but his first attempt came out as a mumble, he cleared his throat and tried again though his voice still sounded hoarse and faint.

"The curse…" he said "The curse cast on me has condemned me to die" The blue eyed boy exhaled a sigh of relief at his confession, at least he could say that much, but that only meant that the demon truly didn´t think the shadowhunter had a chance to survive.

Clary was crying again, Alec's heart went to her, true they had had a rocky start but that had come to actually like and care for each other in the past few months, and even if they were not awfully close she still worried about him. It made him feel both happy and extremely guilty.

"Isn´t there something that can break the curse?" She asked, her voice thick with tears.

"Yes, but I can´t tell you what it is" Clary opened her mouth as if to interrupt, but he continued "It's not because I don't trust you, or because I don't want your help. I had just decided tell you everything and ask your advice after what you saw, but I learned just now that I can't really share the specifics with anyone. I can only tell you that if I don't accomplish the condition established in the spell used to curse me, I will be death in ten days".

"Maybe I can help you, if you give me a few hints" She added hopefully.

"That's something I have to do by myself. No one can help me, but thank you" he squeezed her hand in a gesture that meant to be reassuring. He didn't know who he wanted to convince more Clary or himself.

"Perhaps I could create a rune, something that would help you" She said that while staring at Alec's battered chest, with its half-healed burns, bruises and the cursed mark above his heart, surely he was quite a sight.

"I wonder…" She trailed off, reaching inside one of her pockets for her steele. She approached him carefully, as if he was a frightened animal about to flee. With a feather-light touch she placed one of her hands in his abdomen, to steady her shacking fingers and with the other hand she started to draw an iratze. Alec realized it was one of her special runes, with all the angelic power she could channel into it, she placed extreme care into drawing each line, making sure her power sipped into each line she drew, she added another rune for good measure and Alec was shocked to realize that his burns had at last begun to heal faster, and that breathing wasn't as agonizing as it had been a few minutes back, most importantly, the runes hadn´t faded even after all the healing they had done. Clary's gift for runes was something else.

"That should make it a bit better while you figure out what to do" she shot him a sad, apologetic smile, and against his natural instincts, Alec gave her a hug.

"You made it a LOT better, thank you. For this, for listening, for keeping my secret"

The redhead scoffed "That last part is against my will, so you shouldn't be thanking me. We should probably go meet Jace and Izzy for our patrol before they come here to kick down your door"

Alec nodded in agreement "I know you don't agree with me, but I think telling them I'm cursed to die without being able to explain why or how I might be able to revert the spell would only make them worry sick about a situation they can do nothing to change, I would rather have them hate me for hiding this that see them suffer along with me as I slowly die"

"Do you really think there's nothing to do?"

Alec didn't know how to answer. He knew what he needed to do, but he also knew Magnus. The warlock was too stubborn to listen to reason, and the only chance Alec had was taken from him now that he was unable to tell anyone about the condition to lift the demons deathly spell. Sonneillon did not expect or wanted for him to succeed.

"I don't know. I hope so, we should get going" Alec grabbed his shirt from the floor and put it on in one swift movement. He had been embarrassed about Clary seeing him naked from the waist up, but luckily no treacherous blush had given him away.

Both shadowhunters exited Alec's room and headed down the stairs and towards the institute's main entrance were Izzy and Jace were waiting for them to arrive.

"Took you long enough, Is everything alright?" Jace asked, looking from Clary to Alec and back again, if he noticed that his girlfriend's eyes were slightly red he didn't comment on it, though he shot them both a questioning look, so did Izzy, for that matter, but Alec had learned long ago to tune out his siblings concern over him.

"Alec was asleep and it took quite some effort to wake him up, for a moment there I feared he had passed out" Clary's tone made both Isabelle and Jace relax, his adoptive brother even gave him a mocking smirk.

"Still feeling sick are we?"

"Back off Jace, he was injured, it's normal that he feels tired" Isabelle still looked concerned, she walked over to Alec and held his hand, a questioning look in her dark eyes.

"I'm fine really, I just needed some extra sleep to regain my energy" He smiled at his sister, and took his hand from hers, before stepping towards Jace.

"Let's go, we have a long day ahead of us"

Thanks to their glamours, no mundane noticed the four young shadowhunters as they headed towards their destination in uptown Manhattan. They had received reports of a rogue vampire wreaking havoc in the area, and so, it was their duty to investigate.

When they arrived at the place mentioned in the report, they were baffled to find nothing, they all agreed to separate and have a proper look around the many dead-ended alleys and empty streets, half an hour later they all reunited without anything significant to report.

"The local vampires probably took care of the mess already" ventured Jace.

"I don't think so" Izzy said "It was the vampire clan that asked us to look into it just yesterday, perhaps it's looking for mundanes to prey upon".

Before anyone could say another word a loud crash behind them caught their attention. A dark figure jumped from the shadows of a trash container in one of the abandoned alleys and sprang at them.

"Well, we found our vampire!" Jace's gin earned him an eye-roll from his siblings and his girlfriend, before they all reacted.

Clary avoided the vampire's fangs, which had come dangerously close to one of her arms. Jace charged at it, seraph blade in hand, he nearly managed to stab the downworlder in the heart, but before he could the vampire fainted around him and kicked him hard enough to make the blond shadowhunter hit the brick wall behind them with a loud crash.

The vampire tried to charge at Izzy next, but she repelled the attack with a mighty swing of her whip, Alec used the downworlder's momentarily distraction to charge, he couldn't use is bow in such close quarters but he was as good with a blade as any other shadowhunter.

"Come on you bastard, come at me!" Alec screamed, catching the vampire's attention, the crazed creature bared his fangs at the shadowhunter and for a moment seemed ready to tackle him to the ground, but seemed to think better of it after smelling the air.

"I don't like diseased blood" it said, and turned from him towards the other shadowhunters. Clary was crouched over Jace, who seemed totally fine, if a bit stunned and scratched. Izzy was standing beside them expectantly, whip ready to attack.

Something buried deep inside Alec snapped at the vampire's words. His diseased blood didn't catch the attention of even a vampire that was half mad with hunger. He was that bad? He heard Sonneillon's voice, resounding tauntingly inside his mind. Keeping count of his days. With all the strength he was capable of, Alec took a misericord from his weapons belt and ran towards the vampire, catching him unaware and stabbing him through the heart. It fell to the ground and stayed there, bleeding out into the dirty pavement of the alley.

Alec grinned wickedly. Looks like even my weak body with my diseased blood were enough to end your pathetic excuse of a life. He turned towards his family, all three of them were staring at him with dumbfounded wide-eyed expressions.

"Are you ok?" Izzy asked, her voice sounded concerned and, oddly enough, frightened.

"Never been better" Alec said, though he was finally coming out of his rage-induced trance.

Oh angel, what have I done?!

His peripheral vision registered Jace standing up from the ground. His adoptive brother cleared his throat.

"Well, we wouldn't have been able to make that vampire see reason. It was bound to happen, let's go home"

They all started walking, Alec always remained a few steps behind them, immersed in his own thoughts, though not so far gone insid his head as not to notice his siblings glancing behind them to check on him. Worry written all over their faces.

Sooo... Why did Alec go bananas at the vamp? Please review! :D