War of Hearts

Chapter 3

Val's POV

As we waited for Magnus to arrive I thought of the first time I had stepped foot in the institute.

Flashback

We arrived a day earlier in New York than what was originally said. Jace and I shared a look with each other as we stood in front of Robert and Maryse Lightwood and one of their daughters. I ignored the surprised looks that the parents were sending each other as they looked at me.

"Alec and Lucy should be in the training room." One of them finally said. They point us in the direction of the room. We both head over there and I pull Jace back as an arrow almost hits him and duck as a knife flies my way.

"Woah. Same side." My brother and I tell the Lightwood twins as we walk toward them.

"Our bad." The twins say. "Mom and Dad said you weren't coming till tomorrow."

"Well, here we are." Jace says. "I'm Jace." He adds, I smile when he uses the nickname I gave him when we were younger. He looked over at me since we were the same height.

"Val." I said after a minute of debating whether to use my full name.

"Alec."

"Lucinda."

"You're both hesitating on releasing them." Jace says quickly.

"We get enough crap from our parents. Don't need it from you." Alec tells us.

"Sorry." Jace says as he looks over at me again.

"We're not used to, you know, other people." We say together. "Mind if we try?"

Alec holds out his bow to either Jace or I, but Jace walks past him while I smirk and deglamorize the bow and arrows that my dad had gifted me before his death. I walked further into the room and grabbed one of my arrows and notched it. I aimed the arrow at a target and breath.

"See, it's all about confidence." Jace says. I turn to look at my brother and see him pick up a dagger from the table. He turns to me and smirks.

"Once you believe you're the best..." I start off before turning back to the target. I release the arrow as he throws the dagger and both hit the center of the target.

"You'll be unstoppable." Jace finishes.

End of Flashback

He was delirious. "Jace, I..." Alec whispered.

Magnus keeps trying to use his magic to bring Alec back. Lucy left the room after an hour of Magnus trying, and I could feel her fear through our bond.

"It's not working." Izzy said.

I'm sorry, Isabelle." Magnus says as he tries to use his magic again. "Parabatai bonds are like a tether that binds two souls. Jace and Alec share emotions, instincts, strength. It's an angelic bond. My magic can only do so much."

"So Jace is like this, too?" Izzy asked. He stops for a moment.

"Not necessarily. It appears that when Alec called out to him, part of his soul never returned. Now he's stuck, lost somewhere between himself and his parabatai." Magnus tells us as he uses his magic again.

"But if Jace brought back that missing piece of his soul..." Izzy starts off.

"We may very well have the cure. Whatever we do, we need to do it quickly." Magnus told us.

Izzy looked at me. "I'll stay with him, Iz. Go find Jace." I tell her. "I'll let you know if something changes. Take Luce with you."

She nods and leaves the room. I sigh and hold Alec's hand. We were silent for a while listening to the rare moments Alec talked.