It was nighttime, or as close to the actual thing as I was ever going to get trapped in the Seelie Court. All "nighttime" meant to me was that I was tired and there were no lamps in my room. So basically it just meant it was dark. A green glow emanated from the curtain and died within a few feet of it. Other than that, the room was entirely black.
My hand automatically moved to the shelf beside my bed where my stele and witchlight were kept but I couldn't find them. Why did I need them?
In the farthest corner of the room, I heard a slight scuffle, like someone moving their foot slightly after standing for a long time.
"Light," I said, pronouncing the runes that are carved into witchlights. The effect was odd. It wasn't exactly that I'd managed to create a light in my room, more that I'd made the darkness less dark. It wasn't a huge difference, but it was enough.
One side of his mouth tugged up in a smile. "No one can sneak up on you."
"Why would you think you needed to?" I asked, scrambling out of bed and nearly falling in the process. I am so graceful, everyone wants to date me.
"Is this how you always dress here?" Jace asked. Even if I hadn't been looking at him, I could've heard his smirk.
I glanced down at myself and the light green nightgown I was wearing. "You mean in green? Yeah, the Queen kind of has a thing about green…"
"Not what I meant," he said and stepped closer and the next moment he was holding me.
I had missed him so much. I buried my face in his neck. He was so warm and real and human. Even after months, he still felt exactly the same. Except he was…
"Taller," I said, stepping back suddenly. "You're taller."
"No I'm not," said not-Jace. It was Alec. I was talking to Alec.
I'd hugged Alec?
"But, you were Jace!" This wasn't possible. How could this be possible?
"Now when have I ever been Jace?" Simon asked. Because it was Simon.
"Simon?" I was still tired, okay? So maybe I was a bit slow on the uptake.
"Did you miss me, Jaci?" There was something subtly different about his voice. It was silkier than it had ever been before and his glasses were missing.
Of course. "You're a vampire now."
"You're just as observant as your boyfriend," Simon sneered. "But, I can't exactly call you a copy of him, now can I? No, you're different."
Somehow, I'd managed to end up with my back against the wall and Simon towering over me. "What do you mean," I hedged terribly.
"This light, Jaci," he said softly. "You shouldn't be able to do that. It's wrong, like you. And like me."
"Simon, you're not wrong," I argued. I could feel my heart pounding. "You're just different now and we'll figure something out!"
"No," he spat. "Vampires, werewolves, faeries, Shadowhunters, they're different. You and me? We're wrong, Jaelyn Flynn. I would've been different but you made me wrong. Now neither of us belongs. We both break the laws of existence and do you honestly think anyone's going to be happy about that?"
He took a step back from me and I was now faced with a figure that had brilliantly blonde hair and black eyes. This new figure gazed around at the lessened darkness I'd created and laughed.
"You're Valentine's great plan for salvation?" he scoffed. "You're the bright future for the Shadowhunters? You can't even turn on a light, little girl. How do you expect to win a war? Oh? Didn't anyone tell you about the war?"
He reached for my face and I tried to move away, only succeeding in hitting my head against the wall behind me. His fingers felt icy and I could feel one of his nails digging in just below my ear.
"Because war is coming, little girl. You've made sure of that and you have no one but yourself to blame. Don't worry, though," his smile was terrible, "I'll make sure you survive. Atrocities like us are awfully rare and terribly valuable. I know someone who would pay dearly for you."
Somehow, I found a dagger in my hand and without thinking, I'd buried it in his chest, the hilt sticking out over where his heart ought to be. I glanced up at his face and in horror found myself looking into Jace's golden eyes.
"It's not your fault," he gasped and then fell to the floor.
"Jace!" I pulled the dagger free, trying to ignore the amounts of blood, and began speaking rapidly, but the words were only English. They did nothing
Someone was laughing behind me.
"I was wrong," said the black eyed boy. He was using Simon's voice. "There is someone who's happy that you break the laws of existence after all. In fact, he's so happy, it will kill him."
And Jace grew cold in my arms.
I had a bad feeling. Something awful was about to happen, or was happening and I could tell. Or maybe something awful had just happened and I just couldn't tell what. Or remember it. It wasn't like before when Simon had been nearly killed, this was just a sort of uneasiness. Something wasn't right.
Maybe it was just that I'd managed to muck up the whole storyline? I was too tired to understand anything, I had only just gotten out of bed. And I had a terrible headache.
"There is something wrong with you," Caelia stated brusquely before I even had a chance to open the Gray Book to where we'd left off the previous day.
I shrugged. "I think I had a bad dream but I don't remember."
"Think?" she didn't sound impressed. "You know how to fix that and know for sure. By the way, you scratched yourself with a hairpin by your ear."
"And this," I said, gently laying a finger on the scratch, "is why I think hairpins are stupid."
"Tell your hair it ought to behave itself then" Caelia suggested with smallest hint of a smile. "If it would stay in the braid, you wouldn't need hairpins."
"Obviously the braid thing's not working," I muttered.
The dainty faerie flipped open the large green Gray Book resting on the table before me. "We'll review the remembrance rune again," she declared. "Dreams can be meaningful, so it's important that you remember yours."
I glanced at the rune for half a second. "Remember." I kept the idea of a dream prominent in my mind, so that I wouldn't just remember any old thing.
It worked.
Flawlessly.
"Caelia," my voice was shaking, "I need to see the Queen. Immediately."
It didn't seem right. Well, of course it didn't, he was trapped in a warlock's apartment. Jace sighed heavily and moved to stand in front of the offending bookshelf. It was an absolute disaster. How could anyone stand to live in so much disorganization?
He had just finished straightening one row of books when Magnus swooped in and chased him back towards the center of the room.
"If you don't stop touching my things," he warned Jace, "I will personally turn you into a clam."
"A clam?" Jace wasn't impressed. "Out of all your options, you'd pick a clam?"
With a snap, the books all moved back to their original positions. "Clams don't have prying little hands that can touch my stuff."
"I have spent the last day staring at your stuff," Jace argued. "The chaos hurts my eyes."
"It's not my job to keep you entertained," Magnus said with a flippant tone. "Now I'm busy, so don't touch my things and don't disturb me." He paused for a moment before snapping his fingers and causing a small television to appear in a corner of the room. "Watch whatever you want. Some people still have work to do."
Jace waited until he was sure Magnus wasn't about to pop back in before going to his duffle bag and pulling out a book. He'd only ever had short opportunities to glance at it but now he was determined to read it. He turned the book over in his hands. It was a simple cover, solid black except for the title printed on the spine, City of Ashes.
With a strange feeling in his stomach, he flipped through the pages until he found the prologue.
The formidable glass-and-steel structure rose from its position on Front Street like a glittering needle threading the sky.
There wasn't anything strange about that opening sentence. In fact, this book, he told himself, could really be about anything. He'd imagined the section about the Silent City. It didn't make any sense that this book… he decided to keep reading.
The scene being set was of a demon being summoned by a warlock being paid by a man named Valentine.
Jace's heart was pounding as he turned to the first chapter and began reading a scene he had once lived.
"Are you still mad?"
Alec, leaning against the wall of the elevator, glared across the small space at Jace. "I'm not mad."
"Oh, yes you are." Jace gestured accusingly at his –
Everything was the same except Jaci wasn't there. And, he realized as he continued reading, in the book, he was in love with Clary.
A sharp ringing noise cut through the apartment, causing Jace to jump and snap the book closed. It was now dark outside, he'd finished the story an hour ago but had been going back through and rereading portions so that he could commit them to memory. It took him a moment to realize that the noise was his own phone.
"Hello?" Of course, he knew who it would be even without checking.
"Jace?" asked a girl's voice. "It's Clary."
He'd been expecting Simon.
"What?" he snapped.
"It's a werewolf friend of mine," she explained, "Maia. She's been attacked by a demon."
"What kind of demon?"
"Um, a Drevak, Luke said." Clary paused for breath. "There's poison in her."
Jace mentally shifted through the information he knew about Drevak demons. Even a Shadowhunter would need more than a healing rune with demon poison running through them. "Get the spines out of the wound. I'll be there as soon as I can."
He ended the call, shoved his phone in his pocket, snatched some gear from his bag and went to find Magnus.
"If you keep me here, I'll go insane."
The Queen didn't look as though she believed me, or maybe she just kind of always used that expression with me.
"Besides," I continued since she didn't seem to be about to say anything, "if you want to use me as an ambassador to the Clave, don't you think you should, well, let me interact with members of the Clave? I'll come back, of course but I feel like I've been here for months. I don't know about you, but I really need to see the sky sometimes. Also!" I was on a roll and not about to be stopped. "You're going to kill me by keeping me in here all the time. I'll die faster in less real-world time."
That got a response. "You will not. You will always age with the real-world time, as you chose to call it."
"So that takes care of one issue," I admitted. "But I'm swear by the Angel that I will completely lose my sanity if you continue keeping me here like you have. I've already started having hallucinations."
"And what is your demand?" There was a slight smile hovering around the Queen's mouth. I hated that look. She used it when she wanted to intimidate someone, but it had stopped working on me a month ago.
"I want to be able to see my friends. When I want."
"Very well," she said. "Caelia!"
My personal babysitter popped forward.
"Make sure she is properly dressed."
"I think we should knock first," Alec suggested. He'd been at the front door when Jace and Magnus were about to leave.
Jace just snorted and threw the door open to Luke's house and marched in. He froze.
Clary was perched on the coffee table with a dagger pointed towards an injured girl on the couch with Simon cowering behind her. The moment her eyes fell on Jace, she straightened up and hid the knife behind her back.
"We had an incident," she said in a high pitched voice. "I took care of it."
Jace decided not to answer and instead stepped aside for Alec and Magnus to enter the room.
"I didn't hurt anyone," Clary protested to no one.
"She stabbed the couch," muttered the injured girl. Jace realized that this must be Maia.
Simon moved forwards cautiously. "I think she's getting worse."
Magnus cleared his throat. When Simon didn't move, he snapped, "Get out of the way, mundane." He threw his coat dramatically as he crossed the room to crouch by Maia's side. "I'm Magnus Bane," he said, displaying a wonderful bedside manner. "I'm the warlock who's here to cure you."
"I know who you are," mumbled his patient. "You look so… so... shiny."
Jace glanced around the room. "Luke's not here. Where is he?"
"He's outside-"
Jace didn't give Simon a chance to finish. He rushed to the door and looked out. Everything was, unfortunately, as he expected. Luke's truck was idling in the driveway with its lights off with no driver in sight.
"I'm going to look for him," Jace announced. "Alec, stay here and keep the house secure."
"I'm coming with you." Clary moved to follow him but Jace put his arm across the doorway, blocking her way outside.
"No," he said, "you're not."
"You have no right to stop me."
An image of Jaci flashed through Jace's mind. "I have every right to stop you, darling sister. Or have you forgotten?" He turned to go out onto the porch.
Clary followed him.
"What do you think you're doing?" Jace asked, whirling to face her, using his full height to tower over her.
She held her head up defiantly. "Coming with you."
"No." He wasn't allowing this to be discussed. "I promised Jaci I'd keep you safe and I can't…" A small, tiny detail he'd read occurred to him. He seized her wrist and pulled up her sleeve to look at her forearm. It was completely bare without a trace of the strange rune that appeared in the book. That meant that if Clary did go outside where they would be attacked by demons, there would be nothing to protect her but her own flailing attempts to use a knife. "You're staying here."
He didn't bother to wait and see if she stayed behind or not, they were wasting time.
"There's his truck," Simon said, having followed Jace outside, "but where's Luke?"
"Excellent question, bloodsucker," Jace snapped at him. "Now stay inside."
Clary stepped out of the doorway to stand beside Simon as Jace ran off towards the truck.
"I think I liked 'mundane' better than 'bloodsucker,'" Simon muttered to her.
Clary tried her best to give him a smile. "With Jace, you don't really get to choose your insulting nickname. Come on." She held her dagger up in front of her. "Unless you're staying behind?"
"Clary," Simon protested, though he followed her anyways, "Jace will be fine on his own."
"Seriously, Simon?" she snapped. "You're a vampire now!" She pulled her witchlight out of her pocket and approached the spot where Jace was crouched beside Luke's truck, examining the grass.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Jace wasn't shouting, but the deadly calm of his voice was almost worse.
Clary, however, chose to ignore it. Sometimes Jace needed help to and besides, Luke was her uncle. "Have you found anything?"
"I haven't had a chance to look," Jace snapped. "I'm being followed by a mundie and a useless vampire."
She opened her mouth to snap back at him, but a flicker of movement caught her eye. Some horrible thing had moved off by the river bank.
"Look!" she cried. "By the water!"
Jace took off like a rocket in the direction she'd pointed. The movement Clary had seen belonged to a pair of demons that were crouched over the still form of Luke.
Of course, Jace wasn't surprised.
"Are those the same things that attacked Maia?" Simon asked, wide eyed.
"No. These are Raum demons and they're much worse." Jave took in the pair of scaly, tentacle-armed beasts. "Stay back," he advised and then launched himself towards the demons.
Clary stared in horror at the scene before her, watching Jace wrestle with one of the demons, trying to avoid its tentacles and the black ichor that flowed from the creature's wounds. They were perilously close to the water's edge…
"Clary, watch out!" Simon shouted as the second demon lunged straight towards her.
She forgot entirely about her knife and flung her arms up in front of her to attempt to block the demon, but it did no good. The awful thing barreled into her, knocking her backwards. She landed painfully on the uneven ground, striking her shoulder painfully. The demon's tentacles were around her neck, tightening, and she was helpless to stop it.
And then Clary heard a voice. She couldn't understand a single word it said, she just knew that she liked what the voice was saying. The words were beautiful and made her feel both happy and afraid. But it wasn't the same sort of fear she'd felt when encountering the demon. This kind of fear was just knowing that the words, whatever the voice was saying, were incredibly powerful.
She realized then that her eyes had been closed and she opened them to see a figure standing above her and the demon nowhere in sight. The figure's back was to her and whoever it was wore a cloak that made it impossible for Clary to tell who it was. But the voice was definitely coming from the figure and the longer she listened, the more familiar the voice was.
"Jaci?" Clary asked, unable to fully believe it.
Her older sister turned to look at her. "Thank the Angel, you're still alive."
Jaci dropped down by her side and immediately began checking Clary over for injuries. "Are you hurt? Did it break your skin anywhere?"
"How did you do that?" Clary asked, dazed. "Where did you come from?" She hissed in pain as Jaci helped her sit up.
"First I'll draw an iratze for you and then, once everyone's inside, you can ask questions." Jaci worked while she spoke, pulling out a stele – Clary noted vaguely that it looked almost green – and drawing healing runes.
"Get away from her!" shouted a voice.
Jaci looked in time to see Simon charging towards her, wielding a length of pipe.
"Hit me with that, Simon, and I will end you," Jaci said in a calm voice, rising to her feet and dramatically lowering her hood.
Simon stopped dead in his tracks, letting his weapon fall to his side. "Jaci?"
"Who were you expecting?" she joked.
Jace was the next to appear on the scene. He had black demon blood smeared on his clothes and skin and he was panting. "What happened?" he asked, eyes racking the riverbank for the demon, not even noticing that there was an extra person standing there. "Where'd it go?"
"It dove into the river," Jaci said, staring intensely at him though he still didn't notice. "I don't think I managed to kill it, just chase it off."
"Clary," he sounded furious, "I told you to…" But he trailed off as his eyes fell at last on Jaci. "Jaci?"
She shot him a half smile. "Surprise."
He took a moment to take in her appearance. It had only been a day since he'd last seen her but she looked noticeably different. It was almost as though she were taller, and she was dressed differently than he'd ever seen her. Her long hair was pulled back in a complicated braid with a few strands coming lose near her face. A slim, silver circlet rested on her brow and instead of a jacket, she wore a dark green cloak. Her actual clothing looked like a strange cross between Shadowhunter gear and something Isabelle would wear. Overall, the effect was pretty intimidating.
Jace wanted to take her in his arms and hold her forever, but he resisted. "We need to get Luke inside, he's hurt."
Both Jaci and Clary nodded curtly and immediately took off towards where Luke still lay by the edge of the water.
"I can't believe it," Simon muttered to Jace, letting the pipe fall from his hand.
Jace frowned at the length of pipe. "Where did you get that?"
Simon looked surprised, as though he hadn't even realized he'd been holding a pipe. "I wrenched it off the side of a telephone pole. I guess you can do anything when your adrenaline is up."
"Or when you have the unholy strength of the damned," Jace pointed out.
Wisely, Simon decided not to respond to Jace's comment. "So Jaci. She looks different."
"She's still Jaci," Jace snapped. He didn't know why Simon's comment bothered him so much, just that it did and so he went over to assist the girls in getting Luke into the house.
Magnus was waiting on the front porch as Jace and Simon hauled Luke up the steps. The warlock wordlessly led the way inside, gesturing to the now empty couch; Maia had been put up in Luke's room.
Jaci hung back, near the door and mostly out of sight as the room broke into a flurry of activity as Magnus began healing Luke with his blue magic. She glanced down at her hands and saw they were smeared with Luke's blood. Staying quiet, so as not to distract Magnus, she removed her cloak, left it draped on an armchair, and made her way to the bathroom to wash up. She wasn't going to be any help standing anxiously in a corner.
Jace saw her leave the room and discreetly followed after her. He heard running water in the bathroom and knocked softly at the door. It opened immediately.
"Jace." Her voice was soft as she grabbed his hand and pulled him into the bathroom. She'd left the sink running. "Sit down," she instructed, grabbing a washcloth and wetting it in the sink.
"It's nice to see you, too." Despite the terrible things that had happened already that evening, he couldn't help but smile as he took a seat on the edge of the tub.
She was smiling, too, as she began to gently wash the ichor off his face. "You always, I mean always have blood on you."
Jace grinned, knowing that she was quoting him. "It's not mine."
"If it were yours," she started in a threatening tone, "I'd have to kill you. Tilt your head back."
Jace did as she instructed and sat patiently while she cleaned the demon blood off his neck.
"There," she said at last. "I got most of it off, but it'd probably be best if you still showered anyway."
He nodded in agreement though neither of them moved. He still sat on the edge of the tub and she stood in front of him, still clutching the now filthy cloth.
"How long has it been?" Jace asked quietly.
Jaci raised her hand as though to touch his hair or his face, but she hesitated. "Months. It's been months, Jace." Her hand dropped to her side.
He reached forward to grab her hand. He held it in his lap, tracing the lines of her palm gently. "I'm so sorry."
She pulled out of his grip and deposited the soiled washcloth in the sink. "It isn't your fault. Besides, I asked her to make the time move faster. The sooner I learn everything the Queen wants me to, the sooner I can leave," she explained. "But," she bit her bottom lip, looking at him through the mirror, "it's been awful. I've started having these dreams that don't make sense. I think I might be going insane."
He could see how concerned she was. Silently, he rose to his feet and stood behind her, facing the mirror. Jace wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her close. Her scent was familiar and comforting.
Jaci relaxed into his embrace. "I missed you."
Jace nuzzled her neck, gaining himself the reward of her smile. "I'm glad you're back."
She turned around in his embrace and wrapped her arms around his neck. "We could slow dance," she pointed out, one corner of her mouth turned up.
"I'm going to kiss you now," he said.
"Not if I kiss you first," Jaci pointed out and then went on tiptoe to press her lips to his.
