CITY OF GLASS

“But—you didn’t leave then, did you?” Clary asked, her voice sounding small to her ears. “You stayed….”


“For two reasons,” Jocelyn said. “One was the Uprising. What I found in the cellar that night was like a slap in the face. It woke me up out of my misery and made me see what was going on around me. Once I realized what Valentine was planning—the wholesale slaughter of Downworlders—I knew I couldn’t let it happen. I began meeting in secret with Luke. I couldn’t tell him what Valentine had done to me and to our child. I knew it would just drive him mad, that he’d be unable to stop himself from trying to hunt down Valentine and kill him, and he’d only get himself killed in the process. And I couldn’t let anyone else know what had been done to Jonathan either. Despite everything, he was still my child. But I did tell Luke about the horrors in the cellar, of my conviction that Valentine was losing his mind, becoming progressively more insane. Together, we planned to thwart the Uprising. I felt driven to do it, Clary. It was a sort of expiation, the only way I could make myself feel like I had paid for the sin of ever having joined the Circle, of having trusted Valentine. Of having loved him.”

“And he didn’t know? Valentine, I mean. He didn’t figure out what you were doing?”

Jocelyn shook her head. “When people love you, they trust you. Besides, at home I tried to pretend everything was normal. I behaved as though my initial revulsion at the sight of Jonathan was gone. I would bring him over to Maryse Lightwood’s house, let him play with her baby son, Alec. Sometimes Céline Herondale would join us—she was pregnant by that time. ‘Your husband is so kind,’ she would tell me. ‘He is so concerned about Stephen and me. He gives me potions and mixtures for the health of the baby; they are wonderful.’”

“Oh,” said Clary. “Oh my God.”

“That’s what I thought,” said Jocelyn grimly. “I wanted to tell her not to trust Valentine or to accept anything he gave her, but I couldn’t. Her husband was Valentine’s closest friend, and she would have betrayed me to him immediately. I kept my mouth shut. And then—”

“She killed herself,” said Clary, remembering the story. “But—was it because of what Valentine did to her?”

Jocelyn shook her head. “I honestly don’t think so. Stephen was killed in a raid, and she slit her wrists when she found out the news. She was eight months pregnant. She bled to death….” She paused. “Hodge was the one who found her body. And Valentine actually did seem distraught over their deaths. He vanished for almost an entire day afterward, and came home bleary-eyed and staggering. And yet in a way, I was almost grateful for his distraction. At least it meant he wasn’t paying attention to what I was doing. Every day I became more and more frightened that Valentine would discover the conspiracy and try to torture the truth out of me: Who was in our secret alliance? How much had I betrayed of his plans? I wondered how I would withstand torture, whether I could hold up against it. I was terribly afraid that I couldn’t. I resolved finally to take steps to make sure that this never happened. I went to Fell with my fears and he created a potion for me—”

“The potion from the Book of the White,” Clary said, realizing. “That’s why you wanted it. And the antidote—how did it wind up in the Waylands’ library?”

“I hid it there one night during a party,” said Jocelyn with the trace of a smile. “I didn’t want to tell Luke—I knew he’d hate the whole idea of the potion, but everyone else I knew was in the Circle. I sent a message to Ragnor, but he was leaving Idris and wouldn’t say when he’d be back. He said he could always be reached with a message—but who would send it? Eventually I realized there was one person I could tell, one person who hated Valentine enough that she’d never betray me to him. I sent a letter to Madeleine explaining what I planned to do and that the only way to revive me was to find Ragnor Fell. I never heard a word back from her, but I had to believe she had read it and understood. It was all I had to hold on to.”

“Two reasons,” Clary said. “You said there were two reasons that you stayed. One was the Uprising. What was the other?”

Jocelyn’s green eyes were tired, but luminous and wide. “Clary,” she said, “can’t you guess? The second reason is that I was pregnant again. Pregnant with you.”