❝ This above a l l:
to t h i n e own
s e l f be t r u e. ❞
─ 𝐡𝐚𝐦𝐥𝐞𝐭; 𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐤𝐞𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐞
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𝐀𝐥𝐞𝐜 𝐋𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐨𝐝 𝐱 𝐌!𝐎𝐂
𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐡𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐧�...
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❨ 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐮𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 ❩
❈ ──────────── ❈
𝐋𝐄𝐎𝐍 𝐖𝐀𝐒 𝐒𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐎𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐑 𝐍𝐄𝐗𝐓 𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐂𝐇, 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐌𝐀𝐆𝐍𝐔𝐒 𝐒𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐋𝐘 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐊 𝐁𝐀𝐂𝐊 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐇 𝐈𝐍 𝐅𝐑𝐎𝐍𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐂𝐋𝐀𝐑𝐘. She was sketching in the notebook he conjured for her before he started to tell the story that Luke seemed to want to tell Clary.
"When I first heard about your father, around the time he and Jocelyn first got together, long before the Uprising and the Circle, Valentine elevated the Morgenstern name — to be synonymous with virtue. And your mother was at his side."
Leon frowned and turned his gaze onto his hands as they dangled on top of his knees. He hated whenever he was reminded of the worst day of his life.
"But by the time my people came to know him, barely two years later...his name had become synonymous with devastation." Leon looked back at the warlock, despair on his face with the memory. "Your mother told me it was then she first saw the signs."
Magnus walked over to the open door to the balcony, looking into the city, talking about warlocks that Valentine callously murdered over two decades before.
"They never found all the bodies," Magnus explained. "We'd all stood with the Clave for centuries."
"How could that not matter to him?" Clary asked Magnus.
"He was obsessed with ensuring purity of blood," Magnus answered, a bitterness lying beneath his voice. "Convinced that the impurities were a threat to peace."
"He was a threat to peace," Clary muttered.
"Mad men rarely make sense," Leon piped up, bitterness in his voice, too. "Mostly, they just hate."
"And he hated the Downworlders, for the gifts that we possess that he could not have," Magnus continued. "He hated us enough to kill us all."
Clary finished the drawing and she stood from the chair she sat in. Magnus took her place so that he could look at the drawing but Leon stayed seated on the floor as the redhead started pacing, crossing her arms over her chest.
"Ever since my mother was kidnapped, and the Shadow World invaded my life, so many Downworlders have helped me, not even thinking about what it might cost them. How could Valentine not see good in any of them?"
"He was blinded by his ambition," Magnus answered.
"Why didn't the Clave stop him?"
"He was clever. He and his followers, they managed to convince the Clave that the Downworlders they killed on their special missions had violated the Accords in some way," he explained while Leon listening. Magnus stood up from the chair to walk away, "Complete fabrications."
