Chapter 4: What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger

Jace's Point of View

Just as it clicked, it all came crushing down on me – literally. She sprung out at me, hands extended like claws. For all I knew, they could have been claws. She knocked me down, pushing me onto the floor, leaving me sprawling on the ground like an old rag doll.

She stalked over, her eyes now a deep, vibrant, bloody ruby instead of the soft green. She gave me her wicked smile again, her crimson eyes flashing with humor. I stayed were I was, frozen. How could I have been so stupid? I'm such a dumbass! I chastised myself. Well, perfect way to end this atrocious day, with me dying. Well, I guess I deserved this…wait no, that would be too easy. I should have to live with the guilt. This is being way too easy on me.

Well, not like I didn't want to live…well half live now. My other half isn't with me now…I thought as I looked around the room for weapons. I should have known there wasn't any – I mean, I was here before. And I replayed the memory so many times since that was the first time I actually saw Clary…

Pushing it out of my head, I tried to recall if there was anything – anything at all – that could help me. It was hopeless; unless you count the wires, I didn't have any weapons – or anything else but my stele.

I looked up at the girl – I didn't even know its name – and she came even closer, moving ever so slowly, as if to prolong my death. She's toying with me! I thought, outraged. No one toys with me. Not now, not ever.

With rage and determination filling in each and every one of my cells, I pretended to lay there, dazed, as if I was actually mundane. It was the only chance I had without weapons. Sure, I am most definitely beast at hand to hand combat, but something about this demon told me it wasn't going to be easy – not that fighting with any demon is easy. This looked nearly impossible.

She came over and straddled me, and I tried not to gag. If she wasn't trying to kill me or wasn't a stupid demon, it probably would have been romantic. Right now, not so much.

One thing I don't get how I didn't smell her before, I mean, demons stink. Like smell like garbage – literally. But I couldn't smell this one… not unless I knew what she – it – was and tried to smell her, but even then, it was so faint that I could have be imagining it. I think I was. I couldn't smell it after trying again… but that doesn't make any sense! As I deciphered the meaning behind this, I was shocked – the only other time I came across this kind of thing, it did not go well at all. I almost died, barely defeating the thing–

She shattered my thoughts by continuing to draw swirling patterns on my chest while loudly exclaiming, "That was too easy!" I pretended to act even more confused and let a little bit of fear leak into my gaze. Yeah, bitch, I thought, wanting to murder the girl right then and there. Well, you're wrong. You have no fucking idea you the hell you are dealing with. I wanted to tear that girl into so many damn tiny little pieces that she would beg me to kill her and get it over with.

Pretending to be a confused mundie, I looked up at her with an innocent look. "W-why are you doing this? What's too easy? What do you mean got you?" I stuttered at her, hoping she would think I was just a harmless mundie and buy my act. I got to admit, I thought I was doing a hell of a good job.

"You ask too many questions mundie boy," she spat out at me, putting a lot of emphasis on mundie. I was taken aback…did she know? No, of course not! I wasn't wearing any runes that she would be able to see and others can see me. I wasn't even carrying a blade with me, though the Angel knows how much I needed one right now.

"Mundie? What is-" I started to say, sounding like one of the stupidest mundanes in the history of mundanes.

"Save it," she snarled at me.

"Wha-" I started again.

"I know what you are, little Shadowhunter," she hissed at me. She smiled as a look of pure astonishment crossed my face. How the fuck did she know that I was a fucking Shadowhunter! That isn't possible, you can't tell unless your one, which she obviously wasn't, or if she see my runes or seraph blade…how in the fucking world did she know? Just my fucking luck, I mentally cursed bitterly, a metallic taste filling my mouth.

Trying one last attempt, knowing it was useless but I couldn't help but the try anyways. "I don't know what you are talking about!" I lied.

"I got to give it to you, you might have anyone else convinced, but not me. So I give you props," she said, her eyes momentarily turning an emerald green before turning into burgundy again. I could tell she genuinely meant that, and this just confirmed my suspicions even more.

Demons don't have human feelings. At all. Unless, it's cruelness, evilness, cunningness…you get the picture. All the evil characteristics that makes up a human but it makes them a horrible human being that isn't deserved to even be called a human.

"What do you want?" I hissed at her, dropping all pretendence at once while trying to shove her off me. It was a futile attempt. She definitely had some supernatural strength in her. Few – if any – humans were stronger.

She smiled a little, just a twitch of a corner of her mouth, and it made me want to cringe; I was sure that my suspicions were correct. "Glad, you admit it boy," she approved, smiling a bit more.

"How did you know?" I heatedly asked, seeing that she wasn't going to answer my earlier question.

"Easy there, Shadowhunter. Asking nicely helps." Her smile grew, and I felt like punching it off. Hard.

My silence and scowl must have been enough for her to sigh. "Of course I know, everyone does," she replied sounding a bit less evil and…truthful. Well, half-truthful. It sounded like she wasn't saying something, holding it back. Her eyes slowly changed back into the beautiful green again.

I narrowed my eyes in response. What did she mean by everyone knew? "Look, we gotta do what we gotta do," she answered, sounding open and a bit…apologetic? I shook my head mentally, confusion eating away my brain.

"And?" I asked, since she sounded a bit truthful now, it wouldn't hurt to find out more, and plus, keeping her talking might help the chanced of prolonging my death and my slim chances of someone finding me. Might as get something out of it, even if I didn't have any chance of living whatsoever.

"And what?"

"And you're doing this why?" I asked, putting a lot of emphasis on why.

There was a long pause. "I wasn't even suppose to talk to you," she answered while biting her bottom lip. So, under orders, I thought. Not good. Nice to know the douche that wants me dead has some killer ass good people working for him.

"Fine. What's your name?" I asked, voicing the first thing that popped in my mind. I don't even know why I care, not like it's going to help me.

She looked away, as if debating whether or not to tell me. Or maybe she just wasn't going to answer me, I thought after a while. It's just a name, why does it really matter for her to tell me?

"Samara," she whispered. It looked guilty for some odd reason – well, other than the fact that she is going to kill me after a while – but that's not the point.

"Samara," I repeated. Something about the name or word was familiar, the way it rolled off my tongue, it seemed so very recognizable but it was just out of grasp. I tried and tried to reach for it but I couldn't. Something about it….

Her eyes flashed suddenly and she whipped out a knife before I could do anything and raked it across my chest. Damn shit, I thought. This was Samara's – if that was even her real name – plan. To let me drop my guard and then BAM! Well, it was my fault. Just like everything else that happens to me.

I pushed her off, not caring whether I hurt her or not and she slid on her back a couple feet away from me, looking a little…I couldn't read her emotion. I saw something glint on the floor. Her knife.

I quickly picked it up before she could, and I got it, just barely despite it being closer to me. Damn, just like I suspect, I thought. Super speed too.

She reached out for it and I slashed out at her, and she tried to move too late. Her arm sliced open like someone slicing bread against the blade. Deep scarlet blood dripped down her arm. It was such a deep scarlet, it almost looked black…

I recalled Clary tripping over the cable and I started forward toward it, intending to use it to bind her up. In a blink of an eye, Samara was right in front of me, despite being a good couple of feet away from me before. She shoved me hard against the wall and I heard by head connecting with the wall, hitting it with a sickening crack.

Blackness dotted the edges of my vision and threatened to overpower me. Samara, thinking I was unconscious or something of that sort, whispered sorry shakily to me before starting to tie me up with rope that the Angel knows where she got it from. Why the hell would she tie me and say sorry? Makes no sense whatsoever….

I saw the door open from the corner on my eye but Samara was too concentrated on tying me up gently – which was a bit of a shock – to see it.

I saw a human figure melting into the shadows and I mentally screamed, RUN. Run away before you get hurt, you stupid mundane! If you want to live run! She's more dangerous than she looks, believe me! I briefly wondered if I was imagining it but that wasn't true, my vision was starting to clear. Maybe I hit my head hard enough to make me hallucinate something, I pondered.

Suddenly, Samara stopped working on tying me up – she was almost finished – and whirled around, her stance fierce. She looked like she was a trained Shadowhunter…maybe even better trained. Or perhaps, just stronger. However, she was too late, and I saw her head connect with something metal, clutching her head where she got hurt with one hand before sliding towards the ground, clearly unconscious.

I blinked. The person who I couldn't see before was standing there now, a metal serving plate gripped in one hand. Her black hair was elaborately styled in curls and she was wearing a loose white blouse tucked into a black high waisted skirt and a black chunky necklace draped around her neck and stopped slightly above where the skirt started. In her other hands were black stilettos. Black bangles curled around her wrists. How those didn't clank together and didn't expose her was a mystery to me. Her almond shaped eyes had smoky eye makeup with sliver. Eyeliner and mascara laced the rims of her eyes. Her almond colored skin set of the dress in a sexy way.

What made me gap wasn't any of those things; it was because she couldn't have came all the way from there. Most importantly, how the hell was she here? And why didn't she tell us?

"Aline?" I whispered. "Aline Penhallow?" I swallowed nervously. She jerked her head down once before she started untying the ropes that Samara tied around my wrists and ankles.

After she was done untying them, we both left the room as fast as possible – we didn't know what to do with Samara. Aline drew a healing rune on my chest and I left on my shirt, hoping no one would notice that it's actually blood in the dim lighting. Rubbing my wrists, we made our way down to the bar. Aline ordered us both drinks before turning to face me.

"What the hell was that?" she asked me.

"What?" I asked, confused.

"Why couldn't you protect yourself, especially from a mundie? What the hell happened to you Jace?" she asked, concern and worry evident in her voice.

"One, she's defiantly not a mundie. Two, I have a pretty good idea of what it is," I informed her and I gave her a look, raises my eyebrows to indicate that she should think. Her eyes widened in confusion before she gasped, a hand flying to cover her mouth.

"You don't really think…" she trialed off.

"Oh, believe me, I do. What was worse was I didn't have a single thing on me! Unless you count my stele but that doesn't count really count to me. How the hell do you expect me to defend myself from that?"

"What are you talking about Jace?" Aline asked, clearly looking worried about my mental health. "You have a knife in your hand right now!"

"What…." I looked down and sure enough, the knife that Samara slashed me with was griped tightly in my hand. I was surprised I didn't drop it when my head banged against the wall. "Oh, right. She slashed my chest with it and I stole it from her before she shoved me into the wall, making me almost lose conscious. I guess I still had it gripped in my hand," I explained while shrugging at the last part. Aline nodded her head in understanding before finishing her drink.

I looked at my drink; I hadn't touched it at all. I glanced at it one last time before draining the glass and kept ordering some more. We just kept drinking and talking. About what they did in Idris. How everyone was. How everything here was. I briefly mentioned about me and Clary breaking up and she looked like she wanted details but I think from look on my face, she decided not to pry.

By the time we decided to go home, I was well passed buzzed but not drunk. We stood outside and she said she couldn't come back to the Institution just yet because she was staying with family. Somehow, even through my drunken haze, I didn't believe it but since she didn't pry I decided to show the same courtesy to her too.

Before we went our separate ways, I gave her a kiss on the cheek and she blushed, a faint pink crawling up her cheeks and whispered goodbye. By the time I arrived at the Institution, it was well past midnight.

I sighed; the whole Samara situation bothered me. I had no idea what the hell she wanted from me. One second she was seducing me, next she was attacking me, then she looked vulnerable, and then she attacked me again. I just don't get girls sometimes, I thought humorlessly. Like, what the hell was up with that? Couldn't she make up her freaking mind? God, damnit. Oh well, it was swell that nothing actually happened but what I suspect still makes my nerves tingle all over, which was saying something. Something very, very bad.

I just thought about everything that happened today – well, yesterday – the whole time after I came back from the Pandemonium Club, I didn't go to sleep and I could feel the drunken haze slowly ebbing away as the hours ticked by.

But somehow, impossibly, all my thoughts found a way to make its way back to Clary. As if I would die without think about her constantly. She never left my mind; she was like a clock in the back of my mind. Except instead of tick tock, it was Clary, Clary. Sighing again, I finally climbed into bed, wondering how she was doing.