Author's Note: This chapter contains mentions of torture and captivity.

Chapter Ten

Simon tumbled through the portal behind Isabelle, his last sight the black of her hair being whipped behind her as she stepped through the blue sphere, before the world was full of the greens and greys of the mountains. When he looked up from the ground, he saw they both lay sprawled in a field of drying wildflowers.

He quickly stood and brushed himself off, and offered a hand to Izzy, only to have it ignored as she rolled to her feet on her own. He cringed, and stepped away, his chest clenching with guilt; just because he had been the one to break things off didn't mean he wasn't hurting, too. Was he wrong for hoping things could be cordial?

No—this was for the best. It had to be, or he wouldn't be able to stand himself. What he had done to her…well, it couldn't happen again. And if Izzy hated him, at least she would stay away. He quickly shoved the feeling down—there were more important things to deal with right now.

Turning, he began to take in his surroundings. They had landed in a field just on the edge of the woods, and beyond the open landscape, where the long, swaying grasses met wooded thicket, there was a large house. Or, castle, to be more accurate. The walls were dark and layered in shingles so thick that it looked as though the place had grown scales. The roof was black and twisted, and the top of it burst through the caps of the trees.

Something about the place brought Simon back to a memory. Sitting on a tire swing, his mother pushing him back and forth, the mountain home their family used to rent in the fall. His younger self flying through the air, sucking in a deep breath that tasted of clean, high altitudes and the coming of winter. Looking down at the apple orchards just over the hill, a strong breeze mingling the scent of ripe and rotting fruit with fresh mountain air.

He shivered, lost in the memory, and took a deep breath, but he could not find the comforting smells of his childhood in his dead lungs, nor feel the frigid cold that blew over him now.

He snapped out of the trance when he heard Alec and Magnus come through the portal, landing one atop the other. Alec blushed furiously, and scrambled to push himself up, Magnus following. Maia floundered through the swirling blue doorway directly after them, and immediately rolled over to hurl in the grass. "I hate portals," she whined, and wobbled to her feet.

"We should get going," Magnus said, the first to take a step towards the eerie house. They all followed instinctually, and Simon realized in the moment just how much of a leader Magnus really was for their group.

Then Izzy came to a stop. "Where's Jocylen?"

They all paused, turning to see the portal still swirling, but it was shutting fast. They waited another thirty seconds, watching the portal shrink, waiting for a flash of red hair, for Jocelyn to stumble out into the field and join them, but no one came.

"Magnus, you've got to keep it open—we need Jocelyn!" Isabelle said, but Magnus only shook his head. "I don't know why she hasn't come through yet, but I have to save my energy for making a portal out. I can't hold this one for much longer—"

Just then, something pierced the light. A hand, long and slender, slipped through the portal from the other side. The fingers were firm and delicate, an artist's hands, and Simon recognized them immediately. But as soon as Jocylen's arm had passed through up to the elbow, it was jerked back, and the portal swallowed itself, slamming shut.

"What the hell was that?" Izzy groaned, kicking at the grass. Simon frowned, squinting at the space where the portal had been, still a habit from wearing glasses, as if there might be a smudge on a lens that wasn't there, and Jocelyn would appear before him. "It looked like…something was keeping her from leaving the Institute," Simon suggested, though he sounded unsure himself.

Izzy shot him a glare, and he nearly shrunk back at the fire in her eyes, unaware of what he'd said wrong.

"We have to get Jace and Clary," Alec said, starting off to the house again. "Get them, then head back and see what's going on."

"Something's not right," Izzy protested, "and we need as much help as we can before going in there."

"Yeah, well, nothings ever right is it?" Alec said sternly. Simon kept quiet and watched the siblings eye each other down, before Izzy gave in with a sigh. Alec was right, Simon thought. There was nothing they could do now.

He didn't dare say it aloud, though.

Without another word, the group marched on through the field and to the edge of the tree line, sneaking around the side of the house. Staying just behind the first row of trees at the edge of the field, Magnus and Maia struggled to move without crunching the leaves, Simon and the two shadowhunters moving ahead soundlessly. When they reached the back lawn of the building, they all paused, taking in the statues spread across the small opening. A maze of twenty or so frozen, marble statues stood guard.

"Woah. I didn't know Sebby had Medusa powers," Simon whispered.

"No kidding," Maia replied, just as Izzy hissed, "They're just statues."

The others ignored them, pressing cautiously onward through the statues, but Simon couldn't help but feel uneasy in noticing each stony figure was either crying, or wounded, or both. When he saw that each had stubby, jagged extensions from their back, and realized they were the bases of where wings should sit, he shuddered. Each one of them was a broken-winged angel.

One of them in particular stood out, just to Simon's right, towering above all the others. The angel was on one knee, and despite it being made of stone, Simon could tell by the way the muscle flexed, the raw tension in them, that the figure was captured in place as it was being forced to the ground. The face was shaped perfectly, the hair infuriatingly, flawlessly curled yet messy, the way Jace's normally was. The angel had beautiful wings—or once did. The right was bent, its feathers ruffled, a gaping hole through the top fleshy part. The left was broken completely off, like many of the others in the yard, laying crumbled into chunks on the ground behind its owner.

Something about the beauty of the statue made Simon think that it should be painted a holy, golden color, not the ghoulish grey-black it was carved in. And then he saw the sword in one hand, driven blade first into the ground, as if it could keep the angel from being pushed any lower, and the cracked cup in the other.

The gears spinning in Simon's mind finally meshed: it was Raziel. When he saw the look on Alec's face as he passed the statue, Simon's suspicions were confirmed. Both of the shadowhunters wore a barely masked horror, but passed the figure quickly. Simon felt as though whatever blood he'd fed on earlier had frozen in his stomach, and he nearly staggered in the sickness and macabre of it all. Shifting his eyes to the ground, he ran to catch up with the others, frantically pushing the suffering angel from his mind.

Soon, they were all gathered near the back door.

"What's the plan?" Simon whispered, his voice wavering only slightly as he crouched beside Magnus.

"We go in. We get Jace and Clary. Magnus makes a portal. We leave. Got it?" Alec's directions were eagerly sparse. It had been obvious back at the Institute that Alec had been more concerned with getting in and rescuing his friends than moving forward with an actual, organized plan, but Simon had hoped that he'd come up with something better than this.

He glanced around briefly to see if anyone else beside himself appeared uneasy with simply running in, but found only stoic determination on Izzy and Magnus—Maia appearing confident and unbothered—and knew no one here was going to sleep until Jace and Clary were free.

It wasn't that Simon wouldn't run head first into danger to help save Clary, it was just…he'd feel more comfortable with a solid plan.

"What if demons attack? What about Sebastian?" Simon questioned.

When Alec turned to face him, Simon could barely believe the ferocity behind his blue eyes. "Kill any damn demon that's stupid enough to get in our way. And Simon?"

"...Yeah?"

"If you see Sebastian," Alec said, "drink away, my friend."

Maia grinned and patted Simon on the back, and he watched as her nails grew and sharpened rapidly. He let his fangs unsheathe themselves at the thought of blood, and refrained from commenting on the fact that he was quite familiar with how Sebastian's blood tasted like absolute shit.

"Will do," he replied, fangs glinting in the sunlight.

And so, plan or no plan, they went in.

Jace was only half conscious when the door to his cell was opened.

"I'm going to kill you," he growled, rattling his chains as he tried to push towards the tall figure in the doorway.

They hadn't left his arms free for long, Sebastian's Endarkened coming in after a day or so of lying on the ground to string him back up, and no one had visited since. He didn't have to clench his fists to keep his hands from shaking in rage, his upper extremities having long gone numb and stiff from the restraints, as a figure in shadow took a step into the room.

"I swear on the angel, I'll k—"

"Jace." The voice that spoke his name was familiar, comforting, and Jace blinked rapidly as he squinted into the light. His mind slowly started to register the scene, and the sounds coming from outside the cell. The man in the doorway wasn't Sebastian. It was—

"A-Alec?"

"Oh, God, Jace." Alec said, rushing forward to inspect his parabatai's tortured body. "I—I could feel what he was doing. He was—"

"How did you find us?" Jace asked hoarsely, but Alec was ignoring him in favor of running his hands over his injuries. Jace tried not to flinch away at the touch, before pulling at the chains again. "C'mon, get me out," he grunted, and Alec at last nodded, worried eyes shifting back to a focused glare as he pulled his stele from his pocket and began marking the chains.

As Alec's face turned up to look at the shackles, Jace noticed the dark circles under his eyes, sleeplessness written into the lines of his face, his hair sticking out at odd angles, nearly as spiked and messy as Magnus'. When the left chain busted, Jace cried out as his arm dropped limply, his body slumping forward with it. The rush of pain stabbing up through his shoulders and back left him gritting his teeth, and Alec winced apologetically.

Drawing another release rune hastily across the second shackle, Alec returned his stele to his pocket, and Jace's hands slapped the floor as he collapsed fully. His face burned as he tried and failed to push himself up, and his mind unhelpfully conjured the image of Sebastian laughing above him.

But the image was gone as Alec gripped under his arm and pulled him upright, and Jace rolled his wrists to try and loosen the stiff, aching muscles while Alec shouldered his weight.

"Magnus, we need you!" Alec shouted at the still open doorway. Only now were Jace's ears focusing on the commotion in the hall, the familiar sounds of clashing metal and people yelled. Magnus' silhouette hurried into the room; a long but thin gash was cut between his forehead and hairline. Blood ran in a stream down his jacket from another cut along his forearm.

"Shit," Magnus cursed, swooping forward to lay his hands on Jace's shoulders. His under eyes were as baggy as Alec's, his exhaustion apparent in his wobbling gait. "How badly does it hurt? Can you walk?"

"I-I'm good," Jace insisted, and attempted a step forward to prove it, only to fall forward into Magnus' arms. He cried out in pain as his ankle snapped to the side, whatever forgotten injury there reawakened under Jace's weight, but just as quickly as the shout left his throat, blue sparks were dancing over his skin and strength was jolting through him.

Jace glanced at Magnus questioningly, and he nodded in return. "That should hold you for a bit."

This time as he stood, he did not fall.

"Let's move," Alec said, and Jace followed him to the door. As soon as Jace crossed the threshold into the hall, something lunged at him. His instincts reacted before his mind had fully processed the attack, and he ducked just in time as a demon sailed over his head. The creature lunged at him again, and rolling to the side, Jace slammed a fist into its face. There was the satisfying sound of knuckle on flesh, but as soon as he tried to move forward, another demon, this one with rough, bristly skin, slammed its long tail into his face.

The force knocked him flat to the floor, his mind dull and ringing. The energy Magnus had given him was enough to get him moving, but his body still wasn't ready for a fight, and pain rolled through him in waves. It felt as though someone was driving a nail through his skull.

His arms came up to protect his face from another blow, but nothing came. A distant voice called his name, and slowly, Jace came back to his body.

"Jace…Jace, come on, we gotta go…now, Jace!"

Someone pulled him to his feet and pressed a seraph blade into his hand. Demons appeared on his right. He lashed out, and they crumbled to dust. More, in front of him—Alec beheaded them in one swipe of a blade. Another charging at them got an arrow to its temple.

Jace moved through the crowd of monsters, disoriented and claustrophobic, his heart and lungs racing.

Something was missing. Something wasn't right—

"Where's Clary?" Jace demanded suddenly.

"We can't find her," Alec grunted as he dragged Jace along, flinging arrows at anything that came within a few yards.

"No. No, we have to find her. We have to get her, too." Jace jerked his arm from Alec's grasp, stumbling back. "We have to—Sebastian is—"

"Just keep moving," Alec pleaded, shoving him down the hall, and Jace's protests were cut off by a scream. It was distant underneath the sounds of the chaos, but audible nonetheless. It was a scream that he knew. A scream that made him want to curl up in a ball and wither away for not being able to prevent it ever sounding.

Alec turned toward the sound as Jace did, and from behind a corner appeared Izzy, her silver whip cracking in hand, and Simon, clothes ruffled and blood stained across his hands and face. A wolf loomed behind them, taking down anything that got close, guarding their backs as they regrouped.

"No—no, stop," cried the voice.

Jace surged forward, fueled by anger, and hatred, and pain, and love, and every inconceivable emotion all at once.

The person screamed again, this time a startled and whimpering noise.

Jace burst into a desperate run, calling her name. "Clary!"