Overwhelmed [3] 《SHADOWHUNTERS》

Chapter Three

Alec was awoken with a heavy knock against his bedroom door that had him flinching up with a jolt. He immediately noticed the pull on the left side of his hip that told him his parabatai was near and assumed that's what lay on the other side of his door. He shouted a groggy, "what?"

He tried to blink the exhaustion from his eyes and avoid the risk of falling back into his cocoon of blankets as the door clicked open. He glanced over his shoulder to see the blond poking his head through the door. Alec furrowed his brow suspiciously. Jace usually barged in unless he was recently guilty of something.

Becoming more alert, the Lightwood repeated more sternly, "What?" as he forced himself to get up. Jace shuffled into his parabatai's bedroom and closed the door behind him. There was a piece of paper in his grasp and he looked worried.

"Have you seen Andy?"

Alec swore all of their conversations were only about Jace's sister as of late. He couldn't get him in a room long enough to drill him and get any real answers. Her name still inspired a bit of rage in him, too, voice strained as he responded, "No."

Jace was befuddled by the reaction and the emotions he had picked up through their bond, but he put it to the side for the time being. "I can't find her anywhere in the Institute, and I had an old friend check all the clubs she frequents. Nothing." He stated as he strode further into Alec's room.

"Why would she be at a club?" The raven-haired man muttered, kicking his legs out of bed and trying to rub the exhaustion from his face. He looked up to find a piece of paper being shoved into his face. He grumbled about what it was, but Jace waited for him to unfurl it himself.

"I found that in her room. It's why I figured she'd be on a bender." Jace crossed his arms as he watched Alec read the note with a scrunched up nose. The paper simply said Sorry in advance. in Andy's familiar scratchy handwriting, a large scribble beside it where she had tested the pen. "Did something happen with you two?"

Alec paused, knowing that phrase could very well elude to anything. He still wasn't sure whether or not Jace had ever caught on to when he and Andy slept together. "What do you mean?" He asked carefully, folding the note back up into a square. He handed it back to Jace as he got up, heading for his closet. Clearly, he was not going to be left alone to snag a few more minutes of sleep as he had hoped. Or hours. Hours sounded nice.

His fantasy was split. Jace scuffed his toe into the dark carpet that lay beside Alec's bed. "Well, Andy and I haven't exactly been on the best terms lately, but she seemed a little off the past few days. More off, I mean."

Alec frowned. He was hoping the woman was just being strange with him because he had done something to aggravate her. "We fought a little, but nothing bad," he lied. "See if your friend found her and I'll call Magnus. If we don't hear anything by tomorrow I'll send scouts."

Jace was taken aback, making eye contact with Alec in the mirror. "Please tell me you're not following protocol for my sister." He scrutinized. "You know she's doing something stupid."

Alec frowned. He really didn't want two Herondales against him at once. One was already bad enough. "Fine, if Izzy is feeling up to it, we'll gear up and look for her tonight." Jace was about to protest, but Alec continued. "If not, it's just the two of us."

A smirk fell onto the golden boy's lips as nostalgia sparked in his eyes. "Is it bad I kinda hope Izzy isn't feeling up to it?"

Despite the abrasive start to his morning, Alec chuckled, knowing exactly what his parabatai meant. "If she heard you say that, she'd leave you for demon bait."

°◊°◊°◊°

Clary had the gut-twisting sense that something was missing before she had even rolled out of bed that morning. She checked her gear and weapons – they were all where she had left them, sloppily laid out on the strange couch by the window. She searched for her sketchbook, only to find it kicked under her bed with her torn up pack of colored pencils on top. She lost herself in the drawing she had done: it was therapeutic in nature, a scene from that night at Lake Lyn.