Immortality

Time Shot One

"Will you get off your lazy ass already?" I stared at the boy in front of me.

"That vulgar language is quite irritating." He looked at me, flabbergasted.

"And you being 100 years old is quite creepy," he responded to me in a mocking tone. 

"Valentine, I will not be teased. This is all new to me. I know I'm part Shadowhunter and I would like to become one. It's for my dad." It had been a long time since my dad had become a Silent Brother, but I needed to make him proud. Even if he didn't truly know that I was his daughter.

"Come on Marcy, you need to lighten up just a bit. Come have a drink with us all." His smile could light up the whole room. And honestly, I loved the company he kept. And training with him was fun.  "You should show me some of your magic sometime. Not every day a warlock becomes a Shadowhunter." He clearly wasn't taught about Tessa Gray. But I had lived that life. I had received my first runes a few years after the automatons took down my father. But I had never really trained. Well, not seriously. Especially once my Parabatai died...

"You'd be surprised. We may be rare, but we do exist." Something just told me not to mention her name. I couldn't place it, but I had to keep her a secret. Probably because we were so rare of a breed. Naming her could get her reinvestigated by the Clave and none of us had any time for that. 

"You grew up in London, right?" I smiled at him. 

"I did. I miss it, but this Institute is nice." I looked around the Los Angeles Institute with a smile. Something about Los Angeles felt like home. I think it was the thick air and the amount of people in it. But nothing could replace London for me. I knew that I would end up back there after some time. 

"So, what is one of the things about this time period that is the most different from when you grew up? Besides my vulgar language?" There was that teasing smile of his again. He would make any girl swoon.

"The fashion. It is so strange to not have the dresses that we used to wear. I still can't get over it. Women are just so undignified to me. It's wrong to be so underdressed. Dressing like men..."

"Wow. You were probably beautiful in one of those getups." This sixteen year old boy was such a flirt and I truly wanted to knock him over the head for it. I remember Will being the same way. But Valentine was nothing like Will. There was a darkness around him that I couldn't put my finger on. But it wasn't the darkness of Nathaniel Gray and Axel Mortmain. This was different. 

And at the time I never would have thought that it would have been a darkness that had turned so evil. And it was something that I would live a long time regretting. But not all of his darkness and evil ways was all bad for me. I did end up with a few good things. But I still wish I had put an end to Valentine Morgenstern much earlier than it happened. But maybe then I wouldn't have met her...

Being a part of the Circle was definitely something interesting. And honestly quite disgusting to see his experiments done on Jocelyn. He was an evil man but unfortunately I think I was too afraid to leave. Magnus never knew. He never knew about the Circle member that I murdered for Valentine. 

But there was a lot that Magnus never knew. When I was much younger I attempted to murder my brother, Benjamin Theodore. We shared the same mother. Our father was different. I also murdered Willow as well. My evil, bitch of a mother. 

But without Valentine, I wouldn't have my daughter. My sweet, sassy Lynette. But Jonathon never knew that she existed. Because if he did, he surely would have tried to corrupt her. And I couldn't let him experiment on her like he did on me or like he experimented on her...

Valentine got Jocelyn pregnant. And after he murdered more Shadowhunters, he captured me to raise Jonathon up to marry me. He wanted us together in the worst way. And that definitely did happen for a while. Before he learned that my baby survived, I sent her off to the Blackthorn family in Tokyo. I needed them to raise her. Lynette Blackthorn is what she became known as. No longer Lynette Carstairs or Lynette Morgenstern. She would never be known as Lynn Morgenstern. 

Jocelyn hated me. She thought that I was trying to take Valentine from her. Which wasn't true. I had just met him first. I didn't like him in that way. Never had. Hell, I didn't really love Jonathon. But I thought I did at the time. I didn't know I was more into women until I met my love. 

My time in the Circle definitely taught me that even amongst the Shadowhunters there was extreme corruption. I thought it was only mundanes and Downworlders, but I wasn't thinking of Benedict Lightwood and his workings with Mortmain. All I could think of at the time was how evil the vampire de Quincy had been and again with Mortmain. Held down by the Shadowhunters and their laws. I thought that was what caused the corruption was the pain and suffering they suffered at the hands of the Nephilim. But I was wrong. It was anyone in the world. Anyone that just wanted more power. And honestly, there was a thrill to the power. 

I saw how Benedict was sucked in. Same with Jocelyn and Lucian Greymark and all of us. Valentine made us feel important and wanted. And I guess after being on the run for a while, it felt good to be wanted. But things began to change when Jocelyn finally left and the Clave started rounding up the Circle members. Once again I had to run away. And it led me back to my adopted father, Magnus Bane and his daughter Kana Bane. And she and I started our years of experiments.