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Clary drowned out Jon's consistent moaning in the background and focused of the expression on Sebastien's face. He was usually a closed off person, never revealing any emotion and never giving anything away. But recently his walls had started to crumble down and she wasn't the only one who had noticed it. She stole this opportunity to really study him; he wasn't paying her any attention and seemed to be glaring intensely at something in the distance. He wore his signature frown and his shoulders were hunched and his jaw set, his hands were subconsciously clenching and unclenching at his sides. Everything in his body screamed anxious, but for what, she didn't know. But what was so unusual was the emotion in his eyes; it was one of pure and unadulterated fear. His gaze was so intense that she had to look away. What could possibly be so bad that he looked like that, he looked broken, like he held the weight of all the world's problems on his shoulders, like his soul had been mercilessly torn apart.

Clary sat in her room, her sketch book balanced on her knees and her hair pulled up into a messy bun at the nap of her neck. She looked out of her window at the streets below, people going about their daily business unaware of anyone else. She was pulled out of her trance by a knock at her door, she flipped over the picture she'd had been drawing and got up. There standing at her door was Sebastien. Under the lighting she could see heavy black bags under his eyes and she wondered how she could have missed this change in him. He looked up at her and she saw small tear tracks down his face. Now she was scared, never in all her life had she seen him cry, not when he fractured his collar bone trying to prove himself to Valentine, not when mum was shot, not when Jon broke down, never. Something was seriously wrong and it broke her heart to see him like this. He silently walked into her room and lay down on her bed, his back pressed up against the head board and his eyes closed, like if he opened them; the dam would break and everything he had been keeping shut inside would come spilling out. She carefully situated herself next to him, mimicking his position. They lay in silence for a few seconds until he broke the air.

"Do you believe in fate?" she looked over at him and saw that his eyes were still closed looking up at the ceiling.

"I think for fate to exist there must be someone to initiate it."

"You mean a God?" he had turned to look at her now with his eyes open in question. Religion was not something that existed down here, the word GOD was rarely mentioned as it had died out with countless numbers of other things.

Clary shrugged her shoulders and twisted her head around to meet his stare, "Yeh I guess so. To be honest I'm not sure I believe in God, it's a nice thought; to think that there is someone watching over you, someone who cares. But if there really is a God out there, how could they let all of this happen. To let so many innocent people die every day if they had the power to put an end to all of it." She went back to looking at the ceiling and they fell into a deep silence again.

"Freedom" he said after a long time.

"What?" She frowned in confusion.

"Freedom, the answer to your question. God doesn't control every move we make because that would be taking away our born rights, taking away our freedom."

"Does this mean you believe in God?"

He contemplated it for a moment before answering, "I suppose I do." He turned to look at her, "What about you? Do you believe there is a life after this one?"

She closed her eyes and sighed in thought, "I really wish I did. Perhaps that would make everything so much easier."

Before she could continue the door flew open revealing a very pissed looking Isabelle, Her nostrils were flared and she breathed heavily as if she had been running, one hand clung onto the door frame and the other hung at her side. Sebastien took this as his cue to leave, kissing her forehead on his way out. Yeh something was definitely up with him. As soon as Seb closed the door, Izzy flung herself on Clary's bed, effectively pushing her off in the bed.

"Can I help you?" Clary said from her position on the floor

"Yes"

"Care to elaborate" she rolled her eyes as she climbed back onto the bed.

"I'm mad"

"Yeh, I'm going to need a little bit more to go on than that Izzy."

"Your brother has yet to ask me out", she said bluntly.

"Err, which one?"

Izzy gave her a diminishing look, "Jon, you idiot. You know the tall, sexy, hot piece of as-"

Clary clamped her hand over her best friend's mouth, "Please don't finish that sentence"

she slowly removed her hand giving her a look of warning.

"As I was saying, why has he not asked me out? We've kissed multiple times, hell we even had se-" Clary slapped her hands over her ears.

"Izzy please, there is only so much my stomach can take." She removed her hands and finally gave her friend her full attention.

"Maybe he is just scared"

"Scared?" Izzy frowned in confusion.

"Yeh, I mean Jon's never actually been in a real relationship before. This is just as new to him as it is to you."

She seemed to ponder this for a moment before smiling brightly and bouncing on the bed. "Your right" she proclaimed with enthusiasm that was very unlike her, "he's probably just waiting to ask me before the dance". Oh crap, she had completely forgotten about the dance that was held before the EARTH trials. All the schools went and it along with the actual games were being held at their school. The chosen ten students from each school would lead the dance along with their partners, the selected few became extremely popular in the days leading up to the dance. Everyone wanted to be the centre of attention and it looked like Izzy was no exception.

"Urr, yeh, I'm sure that's it"

"So what are you wearing to the dance" Izzy looked up at her with a very serious expression on her face, to which Clary just raised her eyebrows.

"Iz I don't even know who I'm going with let alone what I'm going to wear."

"Well a little birdy told me that Raphael has been thinking of asking you out for a while." She just shrugged her shoulders, to be honest Raphael kinda creped her out a little bit, sure he was cute but the fact that he always smirked and started muttering to himself in Spanish every time he saw her was a bit weird.

"I was going to ask Will" Izzy gave her a dumbfounded look, "What, he's hot".

"Are you insane, you can't ask him, he has to ask you!" Izzy flapped her hands around in distress.

"Ok Izzy calm down it was just a suggestion. Simon and I were actually just thinking of going together as friends."

Izzy just looked at her with her mouth hanging wide open, a rarity for Izzy.

"Just…just…fr…friends. Clarissa Adele Morgenstern! You will not go to our first real dance with JUST A FRIEND! I, I can't even look at you right now. Lightwood out" and with that she stormed out the room slamming the door for good measure.

Clary smiled to herself at Izzy, it was nice to have something so solid and right in your life, something that never changed. She lay her head back down on the bed and thought about everything and nothing. What Sebastien had said had really stuck in her mind, since when did he get so philosophical. Something had to have scared him into opening up to her. He never laid his emotions so clearly on display like that. And for the millionth time she wondered what it was that could have made the wall surrounding her brother for so long break down. Because it must have been something colossal to wound him so severely, something so soul shattering,

Thanks for reading, let me know what you think, what your favourite line was, or anything else. Would you like me to continue frequently with these short chapters or longer less frequent ones?

:)