The City of Ash and Bone

The Shadowhunters

Clary pushed the door to the storage room open, and stepped inside. A few seconds later Y/n followed panting lightly. Pushing through crowds was harder when you weren't the size of a pole, like Clary.

For a moment they thought it was deserted. The only windows were high up and barred; faint street noises came through them, the sound of honking cars and squealing brakes. The room smelled like old paint, and a heavy layer of dust covered the floor, marked by smeared shoe prints.

'There's no one here.' Y/n realized, looking around in bewilderment. It was cold in the room, despite the August heat outside. His back was icy with sweat.

Clary bent down to untangle her sneaker from the cables- Y/n heard voices.

A girl's laugh, a boy answering sharply. Y/n saw them through a hole in the small shelf ahead of him.

It was as if they had just suddenly sprung to existence between one blink of his eyes and the next.

There was the girl in her long white dress, her black hair hanging down her back like damp seaweed. The boys were with her- the smaller, fair one, whose hair gleamed like brass in the dim light coming through the windows high above... and the tall one... black hair darker than ebony, and, though he could hardly see them, the most beautiful blue eyes.

The fair boy was standing with his hands in his pockets, facing the punk kid, who was tied to a pillar with what looked like piano wire, his hands stretched behind him, his legs bound at the ankles. His face was pulled tight with pain and fear.

Y/n peered around the shelf. The fair haired boy paced back and forth, his arms now crossed over his chest.

"So," he said. "You still haven't told me if there are any other of your kind with you."

'Your kind?' Y/n wondered what he was talking about. Maybe they'd stumbled into some kind of gang war.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"He means other demons," said the dark haired boy. 'Damn. Even his voice is sexy as hell.'

"You do know what a demon is, don't you?"

The boy tied to the pillar turned his face away, his mouth working.

"Demons," drawled the blond boy, tracing the word on the air with his finger. "Religiously defined as hells denizens, the servants of Satan, but understood here, for the purpose of the Clave, to be any malevolent spirit whose origin is outside our own home dimension-"

"That's enough, Jace," said the girl.

"Isabelle's right," agreed the taller boy. "Nobody here needs a lesson in semantics- or demonology."

'Of course. Pretty people always have something wrong with them. Either straight or asexual or something. This ones lost a few screws.'

Jace raised his head and smiled. "Isabelle and Alec think I talk too much," he said, confidingly. "Do you think I talk too much?"

'Alec. That has to be short for something.'

The blue haired boy didn't reply. His mouth was still working. "I could give you information," he said. "I know where Valentine is."

Jace glanced back at Alec, who shrugged. "Valentine's in the ground," Jace said. "The thing's just toying with us."

Isabelle tossed her hair. "Kill it, Jace," she said. "It's not going to tell us anything."

Jace raised his hand, and Y/n heard Clary gasp quietly behind him. She gripped his waist and burrowed her head into the nape of his neck. He held her close, arm wrapped protectively around her back.