Chapter 16:
Lololol. Welcome to chapter 16. Bet it came out faster than y'all thought it would. Lolol. I wrote this at like 1 in the morning, so forgive the typos. Love to all and happy reading!
…7….8….9….10. Clarissa, I'm done counting. You can't hide from me, honey. I know all of your favorite hiding places.
I can't let him find me. Or at least, I need to stay hidden for as long as I can. Mom and Seb left for Idris again, so I'm stuck here with the psychopath alone. I don't know why they always insist on leaving me here. I've only ever been to Idris three times anyways and Sebastian has gone with mom literally every single time she's gone. He always has been the favorite, at least with mom.
I found a broken piece of drywall in the back of Sebastians closet the other day. I wasn't trying to be nosey, it's just…I knew I'd need a new hiding place soon. Anyways, I crawled through the hole and buried myself inside the wall. I'm not sure that father will find me at all this time. After Seb and mom left, I convinced dad to play a game of hide and seek with me. I had to ask a couple times, but he only said yes after I mentioned the adrenaline rush he'd get from the chase. My intentions were to keep his mind off of trying to kill me, but I'm not sure it was that effective.
With my knees pulled close to my chest, and my arms wrapped tightly around them, I barely fit in this hole. I can't really move at all, and my lower back is starting to cramp up. It's had to have been at least half an hour since he stopped counting. Gosh, I'm starting to regret suggesting this in the first place. When he finds me he's either going to be even more motivated to cause me pain or he's going to be angry. And I can't have him angry.
"Clarissa, my daughter. You've found a new hiding spot now, haven't you." His laughter bounced off the walls, loud enough for me to feel it echo inside my soul. "Tonights going to be a long night."
His foot steps are growing louder. It sounds like he's entered the room now. I try to quiet my breathing just in case he might be able to hear it. My dad can do a lot of things that don't make sense, like hear things from miles away or see in the dark. I know, I know. That stuff is humanly impossible..or at least it should be.
The door to the closet opens and I stop breathing completely. I think he's moving the hanging clothes around. I can hear him moving some other stuff too, I silently pray that he's not moving the pile of clothes in front of my hole. I close my eyes hoping it will help ease some of my nerves, but it only makes the sound of his voice ten times louder.
"There you are." He wraps his hands around my ankles, tightly, and yanks me out of the hole. I let out a screech as I barely miss a hit to the head. "Don't start yelling yet, Clarissa, I haven't even gotten to the good stuff." I glance at his belt, and instantly wish I hadn't. It was fully equipped with torture weapons.
He bent down, clamping something cold and hard, almost like a metal cuff, around my left ankle. As he began to walk away, I notice that theres a rope attatched to the cuff. Within seconds, I'm being dragged across the floor out of my brother's room and headed for the stairs. I take a deep breath in as I brace myself for the tiny beating my back is about to get from each wooden stair.
As I thump down on the first step, I realize my dad was right. It's gonna be a long night tonight.
I open my eyes and instantly notice my heart beating like crazy. I look to the right and see Jace dead asleep. It must still be the middle of the night. As silently and quickly as I can, I roll out of bed and leave him to sleep in peace. I walk down the hall, wondering if there's a way to get on Magnus' roof. My breathing picks up along with my already rapid heart beat, and I realize I'm about to go into a panic attack. Fresh air is the only thing that can help me now.
I go up the stairs past the third floor and find myself in the attic. It's completely empty up here, except for a single chest that looks absolutely ancient. I walk over to it, noticing the dust coat on top, and try to open it. Sadly for my curiosity, the chest is locked. I look around for a ladder or some way to the roof and find a window. I crawl out of it and onto the side of the house, carefully climbing to the top.
Magnus' roof wasn't too steep, but I definitely had to concentrate when walking to the top. He had the top of a brick chimney sticking out near the side of the roof, so I decided to sit with my back up against it. My legs were dangling off the side, completley free. My body was still on the verge of a panic attack, but I started to calm down when I saw the view. The funny thing about the city is that it's never actually dark. As I look out at the skyscrappers and all the other buildings, everything is lit up. It's comforting knowing that wherever I go in this city, I'll never be in the dark.
My hands are itching to draw this view. It's absolutely breath taking, and in a totally different way than how a panic attack is breath taking. This is just straight gorgeous. I let my mind wander over tons and tons of thoughts, and after a while Jace comes up. I laugh a little as I think about last night.
Quick summary of my first actual date with Jace. It started off nice with some good small talk about fighting techniques. Towards the middle of the date Jace beat me in three different arm wresling competitions, which I'm still bitter about. By the end of the date, there was chocolate cake in my stomach and all over my face. We may have started a small food fight between the two of us….let's just say it was an eventful date.
Overall it was unforgetable and lovely. I hadn't picked Jace as the type to surprise a girl with a date or cake for that matter. He always seemed more like the kind of guy that would take you out to dinner after making you think about it for a week. I'm just really surprised with him.
"Clary? You out here?"
Speak of the devil. I glance around the chimney back at the window I came out of earlier, and see a few wild blonde curls dancing in the wind. "Hey Jace." I watch as he looks around for me, and his eyes widen a little.
"I can't see you." He looked like he was squinting real hard. "Are you flying right now?"
Where in the hell did he get flying from? I have to put my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing. I guess I'll go with it. "What do you mean you can't see me? I'm flying right above you."
Jace's head looked straight up, his eyes still squinting very hard. Maybe he's still half asleep and that's why he's this out of it. "You went flying without me." The hurt was plain in his voice. "I still can't bloody see you though." He started climbing out of the window, but instead of coming onto the roof he stood on the ledge with his arms out like Rose in Titanic.
"Jace what are you doing?" A tiny bit of fear rises in my chest. He looks like he's about to jump.
"I trust you. You'll grab me before I hit the bottom." He shrugged like jumping off a building was an everyday thing for him.
"JACE NO." I come out from behind the chimney and he looks over toward me. His head now cocked to the side.
The fear in my chest dwindles as he turns to join me on the roof. We walk toward each other until we are only inches apart. "I can't believe you lied to me about flying."
"Did you actually believe I was flying? That's impossible."
"Nothing's impossible with you Clary. Besides, I've seen you fly plenty of times when you're in you're other form." Huh, I never considered that he was talking about that flying. "What are you doing up here anyways? It's like five in the morning."
I raise my arms and wrap them around my torso, so it feels like I'm hugging myself. "I had a bad dream." Jace's jaw clentched as that registered.
"You wanna tell me about it?" His serious eyes never leave mine.
"It was just another memory of my father. I woke up before it got too bad though."
"Why didn't you wake me?"
"You looked too..." I see the image of him dead asleep, all cute and comfortable snuggled into his pillow. "too peaceful."
"I don't care if I look like Bambi, if you ever need me don't hesitate to shake me awake okay? Now come here."
Before I could think, Jace was pulling me into his body. His long arms wrapped themselves around my small figure, trapping me against him. I could feel the heat of his body through his tshirt and wondered if he could feel mine too. Giving myself up fully into his embrace, I leaned my head onto his chest, smelling the sweet smell of lemongrass soap once again.
That hug lasted a good five minutes before we sat down and admired the Brooklyn skyline with each other. The sun was beginning to peek out on the horizon. Jace had his arm around me and I was laying my head on his shoulder, telling him about the good parts of my childhood. One huge member of my life growing up seemed to catch his attention.
"Wait. Let me get this straight. Your parents would willingly let you spend the night at a vampire's house?"
I don't see why it's that hard to believe, to be honest. Raphael is basically my second older brother. "I'd spend days with him every once in a while. He taught me all about vampire culture."
"I figured your dad would have skinned a vampire alive if it got within a few feet of you." Jace said.
"He seems like he would be the type to hate downworlders, but in all honesty he's just jealous of them. I think that's what drove him to do all of this horrible stuff to me and to you." I pause thinking about what pain my father must have brought into Jace's life. "I'm sorry that he dragged you into all this mess. You don't deserve this."
"Nobody deserves this, yet here we are. Taking one for the team." I giggled at that.
"That's right, we are taking one for the team."
We sit in silence, watching the sun finally begin to rise. Morning orange meets the night's dark blue and the day begins. "Jace, I'm gonna go see Raphael. You wanna come?"
"Eh, why not. Let's go."
An hour later.
Raphael had heard us coming from a block away. He claims to know my voice so well that is shines out over the noise when I'm close. We entered the Hotel Dumort and made our way to Raphael's quarters. About a year ago, Camille Belcourt, the head vampire of the New York clan decided to disappear. Ever since then, Raphael has been leading in her stead.
We talked about everything ranging from me gaining control over my freaky Clary powers and Simons initiation into the clan. Since Raphael was the vampire to turn Simon, he's been guiding him along the whole process. I'm still pissed that Simon's a vampire now, but if anyone was to turn him, I'm glad it was Raphael. I trust him to take care of my best friend.
"Look Clary I'm glad we've gotten to catch up and everything, but I need your help."
"What is it Raph?"
"It's Valentine. He still has two members of my clan..I'm afraid he's starving them in order to have power over me." He paused for a second before looking me straight in the eyes. "It's the same reason I helped him before."
"How can we help?" Raphael looked from me to Jace and back to me. "You can trust Jace."
He nodded. "Your father sent me a location by fire mail. I'm supposed to meet him there tonight to discuss my next job for him."
My initial thought is betrayal, eventhough I know that Raphael's not helping my father because he wants to. "You've been doing things for him?"
"Clare, what kind of leader would I be if I just let my people die tormentuous deaths? You know I wouldn't do any of this if I had any other options."
"You're right. I'm sorry."
"Besides, he hasn't contacted me since that day in the barn, so I have no clue what he's up to. All I do know is that if you go in my place or at least come with me, we might be able to free my people."
Jace had been quiet so far in the conversation. I took a look at him to make sure he was still there and he spoke. "What if the three of us show up, but Valentine only knows you're there. Clary and I can find your people and get them out while you stall." I shrugged in respones. It sounded like a pretty good plan to me, although we used the same plan when trying to rescue Simon, and that was an epic failure.
"That's better than me going at it alone. Let's meet tonight at 9. Here's the location." Raphael scribbled on a piece of paper and then showed us the way out. The address belonged to an abandoned warehouse off Avenue D. I've never personally been there, so I'm not sure what to expect.
Hours later. It's now time to meet up with Raphael.
"Are you sure this is the right address? It looks really…old." Jace was right. The building looked like it had been there for centuries. "I'm afraid if I breathe on it too hard the building might collapse."
Before I could respond, Raphael walked out of the darkness, and gestured for us to follow him inside the building. Once inside, he looked me hard in the eyes and I knew that meant it was go time. I grabbed Jace's hand and pulled him away from Raphael and down the nearest hallway. The building didn't look as old on the inside as it had on the outside. I thought it was a glamour at first, but the longer I looked at everything, the more real it seemed. This building is probably one of my father's "secret places" that he always used to talk about when I was younger.
Room by room, Jace and I slowly searched the building. We kept as silent as we could to hopefully keep our presence here unknown to my father. The rooms were all furnished as if someone actually lived in them, but there were no other signs of people anywhere. I was growing frustrated, almost convinced that there were no vampire hostages in this building, but then Jace tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to a set of stairs.
As we walked down the stairs to what I assumed to be a basement, the air grew musky and thick, each step further down creaked with the added weight of our bodies. It was like we'd gone from a five star hotel to a place with barely half a star. The stairs finally ended and we were suddenly in a room. It was very dark, so neither Jace nor I could see anything. After a good minute of trying to move around blind, I felt a hand on my wrist.
"Jace, what is it?" I whispered, but there was no response. Instead he tightened his grip on my hand and started shaking it frantically. "Jace stop. You're freaking me out."
"Stop what?" I heard Jace whisper from a few feet away. But that was impossible…if Jace was a few feet away from me then who was attached to my wrist?
"Jace…please tell me you're shaking my wrist right now?"
"Clary you sound crazy. Do you actually feel something on you?"
"I mean, someone's currently death gripping my wrist right now and it's pitch black in here and I'm freaking out."
"Hold on." I could hear the worry in Jace's whisper as he spoke.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
"Drawing a night vision rune on my arm."
The sound of sizzling filled the room, like bacon in the morning. I turned towards the sound but everything was still too dark to see much of anything. I could only see the faint outline of the symbol as it glowed on his skin, but it wasn't enough light for either of us to see the room. Just a single moment after Jace finished the rune, I heard him take a sharp inhale, gasping.
"By the angel…" Jace stood there silent for what seemed like hours before I finally heard his footsteps coming toward me. He quickly drew the night vision rune on my free arm and within seconds I understood why Jace had gasped.
I found myself inhaling quickly as the contents of the room revealed themselves to me. The room was a small square, bare walls and concrete flooring. There were no windows, and absolutely no source of light anywere. Now with night vision, I looked down at the hand wrapped around my wrist, following the arm up until my eyes landed on it's owner. She was thin, too thin, with golden blonde hair and wide green eyes gaping at me. In fear, I yanked my hand back safely by my side, and noticed that the woman was locked in a cage and that there were more people with her. A tall man with blue eyes and blonde hair stood close behind the woman, he was staring at Jace, an odd expression on his face.
I noticed that they were both moving their mouths, but no sound was escaping, like they couldn't physically made sounds. Moving my gaze past the couple, I saw two figures that I assumed to be the vampires, and a woman in the corner folded up into herself. Her face was hidden, but there was something about the shape of her body that was strikingly familiar to me.
The color of her red hair, the curve of her back, and even the way she wrapped up into herself made me think of my mother. I considered it actually being her for a hot second, but then my mother's lifeless body flashed through my head. Her throat completely slit through, blood everywhere, soaking my clothes that dreary afternoon. This couldn't be my mother…right?
Jace's hoarse voice broke me out of my thoughts. "You're not real. You can't be…" he started to pace and run his hands frantically through his hair. His facial expression was one I'd never seen on him before. "I watched…I saw you both die."
I realized the look on his face was absolute horror. "You're not telling me these are you're-"
"My parents," he looked me hard in the face, "my dead parents." The blonde man and woman exchanged glances with each other, eyes widening, before they looked back at Jace. They mouthed more words, but no sound was made, and they moved as close to him as they could in the boundaries of their cage.
What if this means that…my heart beat picked up and my body filled with hope. "Mom?" I said, my voice wavering as I spoke. The woman in the corner jerked her head back suddenly, and I saw the beautiful, familiar face that raised me. I turned to Jace. He looked like a deer in headlights, like a child leaving their mother for the first time to attend pre-school, like exactly how I felt right now. "We have to get them all out of here now."
The vampires filled us in as we broke them all out of the cage. Apparently my father had been experimenting on them as he had done to Jace and I, but it was different. He had put silencer runes on my mother and Jace's parents, which was why they couldn't speak.
They also told us that they'd lost track of how long they'd been down here without food. Our parent's had been taking turns giving blood to the vampires. I guess my mom had given a little too much, considereing she could hardly stand when we finally got them out of the cage.
The trek up the stairs and out of the building was long and tedious. We had to made sure that none of us were seen and they were all weak from lack of food, so we had to take several breaks. Jace offered to carry my mother, considereing how bad of shape she was in, but he didn't speak much at all other than that. He hadn't seen his parent's since he was 10 years old….when they died.
He seemed to be avoiding their gazes and wouldn't even let them touch him. My heart aches, because I know he is hurting. His parent's didn't even recognize him at first. It wasn't until he'd said it out loud that they'd looked at him long enough to realize he was their son. I can't imagine my mother not knowing me like that. I think it would tear my heart in half.
Once we finally got the whole crew outside it felt like I could breathe again. "What now?" I asked Jace.
He shrugged and tensed. "Clary," Jace took a quick glance over at his parents, and his lips pressed down into a thin line. "I'm going back in, and I'm gonna kill him."
I knew there was nothing I could say to stop him. The look on his face told me that much. So, I turned back to everyone else. "Vampires, I need you to take these three shadowhunters to safety. Raphael will be with you shortly. We are going to go back in and make sure he gets out safely, okay?"
The two vampires nodded and began to drag our parents away, who all protested silently but were too weak to get what they wanted. I turned back to Jace who was already looking at me. He was breathing hard, angry, and I noticed a blue tear fall down his cheek. What the heck? That's only ever happened when I turned. I thought it was an after effect of my powers and our connection.
Before I could think about it much longer, Jace's left eye started turning black. Is he…oh my gosh he's turning into what I turn into. As the dark blackness fizzed into his right eye, I knew he was in complete demon mode, and very very angry. Brother Zaccharia had told us it was possible for Jace to become what I am, but it was supposed to have been very low odds that he ever would. Jace must be really angry right now….like scary angry.
He looks me dead in the eyes and I feel tears start to fall down my cheek. I raise my hand and wipe some of them away to find that they are blue. This hasn't happened to me before, and feels odd. I begin to sense Jace's anger flow through me and remember that he's had no training with these powers.
Tessa had made it clear in my mind that having my demon powers and angel powers balanced at all times was a necessity, but if I'm fueling off of Jace right now I'm only going to be angry. Knowing that we will most likely lose the fight, or worse cause damage to innocent people, I grab hold of Jace's hand and rub my thumb over his skin.
"Give me some of your anger Jace. Give me some of your anger so that your head will be in the right place before we go take out my father. Okay?"
He hesitated for a while, making me worry that he wouldn't listen to me, but then he nodded. One second I was just holding his hands, and the next I could feel our bodies exchanging emotions. I looked down and noticed that our arms were glowing blue. Must be the anger switching places inside us, I thought.
I watched as one of Jace's eyes turned blinding white, and knew that we were almost ready to go fight my father. The only thing left to be done, was for me to turn into freaky Clary so that we could fight in this form together. With one hand still clasped in Jace's, I inhaled deeply and let my inner powers seap out onto the surface. The transition was quick, and felt normal to me, something I'd been trying to accomplish for what seemed like years.
I looked over at Jace, my white and black eyes looking into his and smiled. We nodded silently at each other and walked back up the stairs into the old crusty building. Jace kicked the door open just as Valentine and Raphael walked into the main entry room.
Both of the two men in front of us were surprised, but I wasn't sure whether it was because of our presence or because we were both in this freaky form right now. My hand was still in Jace's as we walked forward slowly at my father. I thought back to the dream of my father I'd had earlier that night. The memory of that it flooded back into my mind and I tensed slightly. I gathered myself, looked my dad straight in the eyes, and began speaking to him inside his head.
Tonights gonna be a long night, father.
Jace and I smiled at each other before moving forward and beginning the fight.
And there was chapter 16 everyone! I didn't think I was going to finish this chapter before school started back up but things just started happening and here it is. How are Jace's parents alive and where have they been for the past 7 years? And Jocelyn was definitely dead in chapter 1, so how is she alive now? Also, Jace just turned!
This chapter was busy, but a lot of cool stuff went down. I hope you guys enjoyed it and can't wait to see what happens in chapter 17. Plz leave a review and tell me what you all think!