The City of Ash and Bone

The Club

"You've got to be kidding me," the bouncer said, folding his arms across his massive chest. He stared down at a boy in a red zip-up jacket and shook his head. "You can't bring that thing in here."

Y/n Fray leaned forward a bit to eavesdrop. It's a long wait to get into the all-ages club, especially on a Sunday, and not much generally happened in line. His younger sister Clary, standing in line with her best friend, Simon Lewis, leaned forward as well, hoping for some excitement.

"Aw, come on." The kid hoisted the thing up over his head. It looked like a wooden beam, pointed at one end. "It's part of my costume."

The bouncer raised an eyebrow. "Which is what?"

The boy grinned. 'He looks normal enough. For Pandemonium standards anyway.' Y/n thought.

He had electric blue hair that stuck up around his head like the tentacles of a startled octopus, but no elaborate facial tattoos or big metal bars through his ears or lips.

"I'm a vampire hunter." He pushed down on the wooden thing. It bent as easily as a balde of grass bending sideways. "It's fake. Foam rubber. See?"

When he turned Y/n noticed his eyes were an unnatural green: the color of antifreeze, spring grass.

'Colored contact lenses, probably.' He decided.

The bouncer shrugged, abruptly bored. "Whatever. Go on in."

The boy slid past him, quick as an eel. Y/n decided he liked the boy. Something about the way he tossed his hair as he went, a certain air of arrogance about him. There was a word for him that Y/n's mother would have used- insouciant.

"You thought he was cute," said Clary, elbowing Y/n in the ribs with a smirk. "Didn't you?"

He shoved her playfully to the side, but didn't answer.

***

Inside, the club was full of dry-ice smoke. Colored lights played over the dance floor, turning it into a multicolored fairyland of blues and acid greens, hot pinks and golds.

The boy from before stroked the long razor-sharp blade in his hands, an idle smile playing over his lips. It had been so easy- a little bit of a glamour on the blade, to make it look harmless. Another glamour on his eyes, and the moment the bouncer had looked straight at him, he was in.

Of course, he could probably have gotten by without all that trouble, but it was part of the fun- fooling the mundies, doing it all out in the open right in front of them, getting off on the blank looks on their sheeplike faces.

Not that humans didn't have their uses. The boys green eyes scanned the dance floor, where girls tossed their long hair, boys swung their leather clad hips, and bare skin glittered with sweat.

They didn't know how lucky they were. They didn't know what it was like to eke out life in a dead world, where the sun hung limp in the sky like a burned cinder. Their lives burned as brightly as candle flames- and were just as easy to snuff out.

His hand tightened on the blade, and he had begun to step out onto the dance floor when a girl broke away from the mass of dancers and began walking toward him. He stared at her.

She was beautiful, for a human- long hair nearly the precise color of black ink and charcoal eyes. She wore a floor length white gown, the kind women wore when this world was younger. Lace sleeves belled out around her slim arms.

Around her neck, hung on a thick silver chain, was a dark red pendant the size of a baby's fist.

He had to narrow his eyes to know that it was real-real and precious. His mouth watered as she neared him. Vital energy pulsed from her like blood from an open wound.