"Damn it!" I whispered through my teeth, feeling the pain streaming through the left side of my back, just above the kidneys.

Since I was fighting with four demons at once, one of them managed to pierce me with one of his horns. It wasn't of much use to him very because I stabbed him back with my Seraph blade a second later. But it still distracted me. Blood was dropping from the wound, soaking my gear and making my skin slippery. I couldn't move as smoothly as before, especially the left side of my body. The only good news was that my weaker side was wounded. My right one still had all its killer instincts, so I could continue to fight, running the blade into demons' bodies. The continuation of the fight made me forget about the injury and even the pain for some time. It was because I had no time to think about it.

I managed to kill two out of three of remained demons, but the last one found itself suddenly behind my back. At the moment I couldn't see it, but I could feel his preparation for attack. I tried to stop it by putting the Seraph blade in front of my back, but I couldn't. The pain in the back stopped my movement and I was unprotected. I didn't have enough time to turn around and use the other blade.

I felt my pulse speeding up. I was at demon's mercy and they weren't known for their merciful characters. At that second I could only hope this demon was a poor shooter, because I couldn't save myself. I could feel weakness overwhelming me.

That bloody demonic bastard must have poisoned me. I thought, trying to think of something that would save my life.

But, nothing crossed my mind. I was losing blood quickly and demons' poison was streaming through my veins. My injury was too sensitive for any kind of movement, even for dodging another poisoned horn.

Crap, crap, crap! I repeated, knowing that the horn was coming. I felt fear following poison in my veins, overwhelming every part of my body. I wasn't used to being helpless, and now that I was, I started to panic. I didn't know what to do; I stood frozen in the middle of battlefield.

Suddenly, I heard noise behind my back, a horn crossing paths with a Seraph blade. In few moments, someone was standing in front of me.

"Sam!" Jonathan yelled.

That was the first time he saved my life.

The day after Jonathan had become my parabatai, I had left to the Clave to make a request for joining the London Institute. I had told them our names and showed my half of parabatai rune. Man I had been talking to had frowned when I had told him that the rune had been made outside of Clave's chambers, but I had used lack of time, not the appearance of my parabatai, as my excuse and he had believed it. He hadn't asked questions about Jonathan's name, which had showed me Jonathan's cunning at picking the surname. Another Fairchild was suspicious to nobody, as that surname was spread all around the world.

The next day we had already been on a plane to London. Since I had never travelled outside Idris, I had been excited like a child. Jonathan had found my excitement amusing; I could have seen it in almost mocking shine of his black eyes. But, I hadn't cared and nothing could have spoiled my first travel.

It had been only three weeks since our arrival in London before we had been sent into the big fight that had included more than fifty other Shadowhunters. We had fought other demons in those three weeks, but this had been one of the biggest battles I had ever taken part in, maybe the second biggest after Idris. But, until this fight I had still seen having a parabatai as something I was forced to do. I had tried to look after Jonathan, but his well-being had been secondary thing on my mind and I had believed my well-being had also been less important to him than fighting.

At that moment, when he protected me, I finally understood that having a parabatai had its advantages. And I was determined to return the favour the first time I had the chance.