Meant to post this last night when I was too tired to function but was not very happy with them, so I contemplated over them and then decided I already wrote it so might as well post. A mess of random things at random times. Past, present, etc. Take it as you will hahaha. Enjoy!

Kellan

His teeth bite into his lower lip as he draws the rune, black lines of defense, accuracy, and precision darkening on his forearm. He can only hope they will spare him later pain, and that they are worth the pain he faces now. If they lend him some edge on whatever demon he and his brother are tracking, then he decides it must be beneficial enough to use. Maybe he looks like he's concentrating too much, because his brother looks over at him with an eyebrow raised.

"You good?" Zach asks, knowing better than to coddle him.

"Yeah. I'll be ready in a second." Kellan tries to not focus on the faerie blood that protests the rune, finishing up the last line. A little relieved it's over, he tucks the stele away and pushes himself to his feet, wiping his hands off on his gear jacket and tugging his sleeve down his arm. His seraph blade lays on a table waiting for him, and he picks it up so he can fasten it somewhere he can easily reach.

"Cool."

Watching Zach slip on some gloves, Kellan leans back against the table slightly, his fingers instantly going to clasp around the tooth at his neck. He has this little idea that as long as he has it, they'll have luck when it comes to demons. Though others doubt his skill, he thinks he's formidable. He's too humble to think anything past that.

"It's been a while since we've had a bonafide demon hunt," Zach says, and he can't help but break into a grin. "It's great. Fighting again instead of just dealing with petty city things."

"It's dangerous," Kellan reminds him, although he does give a little smile too, feeling glad that they have something to pursue together. The ache of his runes is a distant thought, now, and he can't help but feel his senses have sharpened. "We'll have to be careful. Do you have your Sensor?"

"Yeah. I'm always prepared. Besides, it's just a minor demon," Zach remarks, holding up the Sensor as if to prove it. "You undermine us."

"Just looking out. It's kinda my job." Zipping up his jacket, Kellan pushes red curls back from his forehead, gesturing for them to start heading out of the weapons room. "Grace'll be mad if either of us get a scratch so I'm trying to save us from the wrath of the little sister."

"Ah, generous." Passing him, Zach claps him on the back of the shoulder before glancing over, urging him to hurry. "Well, at this rate we'll never get to the demon."

"I'm coming," Kellan says and rolls his eyes a little in amusement, only a step or two behind him. His family is enough of a reminder of why he inks in the runes each time, despite the trouble he must go through to draw them. He thinks maybe such thoughts might separate him from his faerie side, and he tries to not villainize it when so many others do. When his brother makes another impatient sound, he gives a slight laugh and increases his pace. It's a dangerous life, but he does not think he'd have it any other way.

Aspen

If Aspen wasn't paying attention to himself, sometimes he didn't even notice when he wasn't entirely at the wheel. It would be small things, like walking a block or so longer than he meant, or starting to tighten his hand around the blade of his dagger. He'd had to get some bandages for a few accidents where he accidentally nicked himself, but it was as if the awareness he was catching on limited the occurrences he experienced in a day.

He couldn't have been sure what time it was, but he blanked out, tired from a session with the warlock so his guard was lowered, his thoughts susceptible to manipulation. Though he was faintly aware of being cold, he couldn't place it, like he was dreaming and lucidity was not something that came to him easily. Somewhere, in the cavernous deep of his thoughts, he shivered, attempting to force himself out of his trance. He could not dig his nails into his hand, but was mildly aware that he was gripping something cold, a breeze rustling his hair. The sensations came slowly, as if the world was piecing together. Then it started to be clear. A skyline. The Towns. The small outlines of people walking the streets below. His legs dangling off the edge of the balcony railing where he sat with every intention to jump.

A gasp broke the silence, and he reeled back, landing painfully on his side where he fell back onto steady ground. Swearing a few times leveled his head, if only slightly, and he shook hair from his face. The world came rushing back all at once, an ache in his ribs radiating through his bones. No doubt would it leave a bruise.

He managed to scamper back, his wings pressed against the sliding door back to his room where it was left ajar. Clasping his hands over his mouth, he worked to steady his breaths, hating the feeling of being unsettled almost as much as the feeling of being out of control.

It took him a minute, two minutes, three minutes to feel comfortable to stand, rising on shaky legs. Hesitantly, he reached for the door to slide it open, slipping inside. For once, his head was silent as if the encounter had frightened all thoughts out of him. He could steady himself enough to lock the door and draw the curtains shut, finding it best if he dissuaded himself from even looking outside again. Instead, he cracked open a window, still wanting the fresh air. He'd have to compromise.

Steff

The closet skeleton could not be described. Perhaps she could have if she had looked at it directly, but her eyes had always darted away from it in guilt, skipping over it like a throwing stone. A ripple would pass over the edge of its figure, a bony countenance in her peripheral vision before her mind erased it entirely. She would not give it the satisfaction of her attention.

When she had to retrieve something from her closet, her head ducked down, eyes focused on the ground. Fingers searched, grasping at fabric – tulle, satin, cotton – until she found the right garment and she could retreat back into her room. She'd shimmy into her jeans, drawing her shirt over her head, and kept her back to the closet. If she did not look back at it, it would not see her. Perhaps, then, when she did muster up the courage to face her closet fully, it would be gone. If it had any concept of interest, surely it would soon lose. Long months had passed since its creation. Would it not already have decayed in her head?

Sometimes, she imagined what it looked like. She knew what it looked like, but her thoughts had derailed away from any reality. As if the physicality of her sins was now more abhorrent, more gruesome than she had imagined. It appeared to her in her dreams at times, never head on, but the smell lingered. A brush against her arm, and she would whip around just in time to see movement, but nothing more. It seemed her closet skeleton would haunt her, and she felt like a child at times. She had put it in there, and now she knew not how to withdraw it.

Grace

Grace doesn't know easy sleep.

She doesn't think people her age, even as Shadowhunters, should be so plagued when they darken the lights and crawl under the covers, but she cannot help the film of her thoughts from staying on repeat. It's like the silence and the darkness makes her head into a cork board, pushpins keeping photographs and hints like she's in some game of Clue. Yarn wraps around the pins, pinpointing where she should be looking, but never what she's looking at. Maybe she'll have some epiphany that'll lead her one step closer to Kellan. Maybe if she goes to sleep too fast, she'll miss a detail she didn't think of before.

Chewing at her lip, she lays on her back. Her eyes are closed but she can't help the images that press on her eyelids. Drowsily, she sorts through her thoughts. The witching hour nears, and she tries to stop herself from investigating, if only for a moment. It's all the more frustrating when she can feel a breakthrough, but nothing comes to fruition. There's no satisfying moment where she throws down her cards and exclaims, "Aha! That is the culprit, the location, and the murder weapon!" She has long since outgrown board games.

Shifting in her bed, she turns to lay on her side, her hair frizzy from constantly moving. Each night, of course, she manages to sleep, but she can't help but think she's missing something. It's only more frustrating that someone, somewhere, knows exactly what she's looking for.

Naya and Devi

He's been working on the same bit of dough for a long time. Too long that now she's starting to get bored watching him, her arms crossed on the counter, her chin nestled in them. He rolls the dough into a little ball, flattening it and making it into a thin, flat circle. Every time, he seems unsatisfied, rolling it back into a ball before repeating the same motion again and again. Maybe it's too late and he's getting tired, and that's when she feels a little bad about it.

"You think that piece has been rolled and squished enough?" She chimes in, hoping to break his cycle. He just looks over at her, eyebrows raised, before he makes an annoyed sigh and makes the dough into a circle again.

"Sorry. I guess it just wasn't...turning out right." Picking up a spoon, he puts some of the filling in before pleating the edges neatly. Naya has watched his mother do it countless of times, and Devi's just as good from practicing and observing, so she likes to think she can tell whenever something's wrong.

"If you're too tired, you can do it tomorrow."

"It won't be as good tomorrow."

She frowns that he won't listen, and sometimes she forgets he's a little stubborn as well. A little hardheaded and determined in the quiet sort of way. She doesn't know how he keeps it all in. If she had to stay quiet about everything, she thinks she might just implode or go crazy holding her tongue. Usually, he isn't so short with her, though, so she knows she'll have to be a bit of a nag to get anything out of him.

"C'mon, Dev. I can just get a bowl of cereal or something," she offers, not wanting to make him do something solely for the purpose of making her happy. "I'm your parabatai, you know. That means I have the...senses or whatever to know when you're all weird."

"Don't worry about it. I like cooking."

"What is it? I'm gonna bother you until you say." She makes a face, lifting her head so she can stretch her arms across the counter. "Dev. I'm gonna just annoy you. Dev. Devi-"

"Jeez. It's nothing. I'm just...you know." Devi sets the dumpling down on the tray before picking up another small ball of dough. "Thinking."

Interest piqued, she watches him pointedly. "About what?"

"About nothing, and that's the problem." Sighing, he flattens the dough, reaching for the spoon again. "Maybe I'm worried about what we're ever gonna do. I don't want to be a drag on you. I know you don't like it here, and it's not like we went to the Academy or anything, so we didn't even get time away from our homes and whatever."

"Don't be stupid. You're not a drag," she dismisses easily, waving his words away. "I'm not dying to imperialize anything yet, so don't worry about it. But really, you look super tired. You should go to bed before you pass out and I have to deal with the cooking."

Devi shakes his head, finishing up on the last of the dumplings. "Nah. Now I'm hungry too."

She thinks he might just be saying that to make sure she doesn't nag him more, but she lets him have it just this once. Staying quiet, she contemplates him fondly. He removes the lid of a steaming pot, throwing some seasoning, green onion, and ginger in the mix. Slowly, he lowers the dumplings into the broth, pushing them under the scalding liquid. She guesses that none of them open back up because he looks a little bit less stressed and a little bit more pleased, his posture relaxing as he stirs.

"Can you get some bowls?" He asks, glancing over at her. She just smiles at him and nods, moving to reach two mismatching bowls from the cupboard. Just to be annoying, she wants to tease him again. But she catches a hint of a small smile in his expression and she just sets the bowls down where she had been sitting, content to give him a small break from her insistence.

Ethos

"You're pretty good for someone of your blood," the faerie girl remarked, pushing herself up from where she had been knocked over. Ethos didn't dare extend a hand. Everyone in the Seelie knew what an insult that would be, an impure faerie like him offering help to someone far beyond his blood. He just stood there, wiping a bit of blood from his hand where she had cut him. They were good at training hard enough to get their warriors sharp while still being gentle enough to keep them unscarred. He knew the Unseelie wore their marks with pride, but in the Seelie, it was only a reminder that one had been too slow to dodge.

"I have been trained extensively," he answered, as if he had to make an excuse for beating her in a duel. "Just in case. It is always good to be prepared."

"Still-" her eyes shifted to a few faeries that had been watching and her voice lowered dangerously, "-you're making me look like a fool."

A little taken aback by her words, he let out a quick exhale, immediately looking down to the ground and adjusting his grip on his sword. "I'm sure it was just luck on my part. You're a very formidable opponent."

She observed him for a long moment before she stooped down to pick up her sword. Letting it hang slack in her left hand, she walked near him languidly, part of the playful challenge she'd sported when they'd started gone from her gaze. Lifting a hand to take his chin, she forced his gaze up to meet her eyes. He had no choice but to let her, feeling uncomfortable to be looking at her so closely.

"Are you trying to be show up a pure faerie?" She accused, her eyes narrowed. "Don't think you're that good, Ethos. I only said you were good for someone like you."

"That was not my intent. I know my place." His voice was calm, to her dismay, and she made a sound of disapproval. Letting go, she did not assume a fighting distance just yet.

"Always the kiss-up. You servants are never as humble and...and virtuous as you try to seem." With a bit of disgust and another glance to those that were observing, she kept her words quiet. "Let's duel again. Don't you dare try to best me."

He lowered his gaze again, taking a few steps back before he gave a nod that would be imperceptible to anyone else. If she was asking for him to let her win, that was as much as he could give her. While he did not think himself talented enough in the ways of battle, he did note many of the faeries in high up positions dramatically underestimated the skills of anyone lesser than them. There was no urge for him to prove them wrong, but he did not like an unfair battle. Still, he'd merely have to follow her word.

"I am ready when you are," he said, readying his sword. While he did not like to lose, he would not dare disobey the word of a pure faerie. If the Queen had entrusted her faith in them, then he would have no part in testing it.