Shadowveil

The Vision

Clary hunched over her knees, twisting her fingers tightly. She could see her reflection in the polished walls of the Gard; the pale, streaked oval of her face, the copper of her hair, the bite of Marks against the whiteness of her arms. Exhausted whispers hushed through the room as people tried to make survival plans, too tired and wary now to shout and bang their fists. 

With Nephilim and Downworlders alike, there were almost sixteen hundred people in the room. Not enough. They never had enough, Clary thought. She traced her fingers over her neck, feeling the unbroken skin and remembering the pain as Jace wielded her own sword against her. She felt like crying. Why was Jace such a magnet for possession--why not her, or Alec, or Simon?

There was a band of raw skin under her engagement ring from how often she'd twirled it around her finger in the past half-hour; she felt the sting of it now as she started to worry at the metal again. The echoes of a conversation from long ago drifted to her. "I stabbed you. With a massive sword. You caught on fire." Jace's low laugh, the flash of a smile. "Well, maybe our problems aren't like other couples'." 

Clary sniffed tearily and swiped a hand across her eyes. That was certainly true. They'd never had time for a normal relationship, not really. She first met Jace by watching him kill a man; the second time they met, he'd stalked her outside a coffeeshop, Marked her with a rune that could have killed her, and insulted her. After that there'd been a whole slew of problems--they suddenly found out they were siblings, started dating other people (and poor choices, too; Clary kissed her brother and her best friend Simon, and Jace kissed Aline, who was actually a lesbian). 

And of course there was Valentine and all of his psychotic fanaticism, and his demons, and his brainwashing. Then as soon as he finally croaked, Sebastian took his place and started the Endarkened War, and Clary had to do the aforementioned stabbing. And then Jace was the vessel for Heavenly fire and they could hardly touch. With a sigh, Clary leaned her head against the cool smoothness of the wall. It would always be like this, she knew. They were two pieces on a massive game board, and there was always a battle or a crisis happening somewhere that they would need to get involved in. 

Well. That was life, and it didn't do any good to mope about it. She gave herself a brisk shake and stumbled back to her feet, feeling her sore muscles protest as they were pulled in various directions. She shoved all of her feelings into the mental box marked I am a Shadowhunter and I don't have time for this before moving to join the strategizing group, which appeared to have reached a grim conclusion. 

Alec looked at her gravely, the torches playing off of his dark hair. It was hard for Clary to remember, sometimes, that they'd once hated each other, and he'd slammed her into a wall. "Clary," he said soberly. "Good timing. How do you feel about leading a team outside?" She blinked, wondering if her hearing was starting to go. "Outside the Gard? Isn't it swarming with demons out there?"

He grimaced. "The main bulk of the army won't reach the Gard for another two hours or so, especially since the Silent Brothers are raising the dead to slow their ranks." Clary choked. "Raising the de--never mind, I don't think I want to know. So why do I have to go outside again?" Alec frowned at her, running a hand over his forehead. "We've decided the best course of action we can take is to try to stop the demons before they reach the Gard. If we could even decimate their forces, that would be a huge help."

"But they came through our runic barriers earlier like they were nothing," Clary argued. Alec flapped a hand at her. "We're not talking about runes here, Clary. We're talking about mundane warfare." Her mind filled with images of tanks rumbling across a field and drones dropping bombs above enemy lines. Did the Nephilim secretly have tanks? They'd need an awful lot of adamas-- Alec snapped his fingers to get her attention. "Whatever you're thinking about that's making your eyes cross, it's not that. We won't be setting defensive runes or wards. We'll be setting the physical runes."