2
FALLING
“So, did you have fun with Isabelle tonight?” Clary, her phone jammed against her ear, maneuvered herself carefully from one long beam to another. The beams were set twenty feet up in the rafters of the Institute’s attic, where the training room was located. Walking the beams was meant to teach you how to balance. Clary hated them. Her fear of heights made the whole business sickening, despite the flexible cord tied around her waist that was supposed to keep her from hitting the floor if she fell. “Have you told her about Maia yet?”
Simon made a faint, noncommittal noise that Clary knew meant “no.” She could hear music in the background; she could picture him lying on his bed, the stereo playing softly as he talked to her. He sounded tired, that sort of bone-deep tired she knew meant that his light tone didn’t reflect his mood. She’d asked him if he was all right several times at the beginning of the conversation, but he’d brushed away her concern.
She snorted. “You’re playing with fire, Simon. I hope you know that.”
“I don’t know. Do you really think it’s such a big deal?” Simon sounded plaintive. “I haven’t had a single conversation with Isabelle—or Maia—about dating exclusively.”
“Let me tell you something about girls.” Clary sat down on a beam, letting her legs dangle out into the air. The attic’s half-moon windows were open, and cool night air spilled in, chilling her sweaty skin. She had always thought the Shadowhunters trained in their tough, leatherlike gear, but as it turned out, that was for later training, which involved weapons. For the sort of training she was doing—exercises meant to increase her flexibility, speed, and sense of balance—she wore a light tank top and drawstring pants that reminded her of medical scrubs. “Even if you haven’t had the exclusivity conversation, they’re still going to be mad if they find out you’re dating someone they know and you haven’t mentioned it. It’s a dating rule.”
“Well, how am I supposed to know that rule?”
“Everyone knows that rule.”
“I thought you were supposed to be on my side.”
“I am on your side!”
“So why aren’t you being more sympathetic?”
Clary switched the phone to her other ear and peered down into the shadows below her.
Where was Jace? He’d gone to get another rope and said he’d be back in five minutes. Of course, if he caught her on the phone up here, he’d probably kill her. He was rarely in charge of her training—that was usually Maryse, Kadir, or various other members of the New York Conclave pinch-hitting until a replacement for the Institute’s previous tutor, Hodge, could be found—but when he was, he took it very seriously. “Because,” she said,
“your problems are not real problems.
You’re dating two beautiful girls at once. Think about it. That’s like . . . rock-star problems.”
“Having rock-star problems may be the closest I ever get to being an actual rock star.”
“No one told you to call your band Salacious Mold, my friend.”
“We’re Millennium Lint now,” Simon protested.
“Look, just figure this out before the wedding. If they both think they’re going to it with you and they find out at the wedding that you’re dating them both, they’ll kill you.” She stood up. “And then my mom’s wedding will be ruined, and she’ll kill you. So you’ll be dead twice. Well, three times, technically . . .”
“I never told either of them I was going to the wedding with them!” Simon sounded panicked.
“Yes, but they’re going to expect you to. That’s why girls have boyfriends. So you have someone to take you to boring functions.” Clary moved out to the edge of the beam, looking down into the witchlight-illuminated shadows below. There was anold training circle chalked onthe floor;itlooked like a bull’s-eye. “Anyway, Ihave to jump off this beam now and possibly hurtle to my horrible death. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“I’ve got band practice at two, remember? I’ll see you there.”
“See you.” She hung up and stuck the phone into her bra; the light training clothes didn’t have any pockets, so what was a girl to do?
“So, are you planning to stay up there all night?” Jace stepped into the center of the bull’s-eye and looked up at her. He was wearing fighting gear, not training clothes like Clary was, and his fair hair stood out startlingly against the black. It had darkened slightly since the end of summer and was more a dark gold than light, which, Clary thought, suited him even better. It made her absurdly happy that she had now known him long enough to notice small changes in his appearance.
“I thought you were coming up here,” she called down. “Change of plans?”
“Long story.” He grinned up at her. “So? You want to practice flips?”
Clary sighed. Practicing flips involved flinging herself off the beam into empty space, and using the flexible cord to hold her while she pushed off the walls and flipped herself over and under, teaching herself to whirl, kick, and duck without worrying about hard floors and bruises. She’d seen Jace do it, and he looked like a falling angel while he did, flying through the air, whirling and spinning with beautiful, balletic grace. She, on the other hand, curled up like a potato bug as soon as the floor approached, and the fact that she intellectually knew she wasn’t going to hit it didn’t seem to make any difference.
She was starting to wonder if it didn’t matter that she’d been born a Shadowhunter; maybe it was too late for her to be made into one, or at least a fully functional one. Or maybe the gift that made her and Jace what they were had been somehow distributed unequally between them, so he had gotten all the physical grace, and she had gotten—
well, not a lot of it.
“Come on, Clary,” Jace said. “Jump.” She closed her eyes and jumped. For a moment she felt herself hang suspended, free of everything. Then gravity took over, and she plunged toward the floor. Instinctively she pulled her arms and legs in, keeping her eyes squeezed shut. The cord pulled taut and she rebounded, flying back up before falling again. As her velocity slowed, she opened her eyes and found herself dangling at the end of the cord, about five feet above Jace. He was grinning.
“Nice,” he said. “As graceful as a falling snowflake.”
“Was I screaming?” she asked, genuinely curious. “You know, on the way down.”
He nodded. “Thankfully no one’s home, or they would have assumed I was murdering you.”
“Ha. You can’t even reach me.” She kicked out a leg and spun lazily in midair.
Jace’s eyes glinted. “Want to bet?”
Clary knew that expression. “No,” she said quickly. “Whatever you’re going to do—”
But he’d already done it. When Jace moved fast, his individual movements were almost invisible. She saw his hand go to his belt, and then something flashed in the air. She heard the sound of parting fabric as the cord above her head was sheared through.
Released, she fell freely, too surprised to scream—directly into Jace’s arms. The force knocked him backward, and they sprawled together onto one of the padded floor mats, Clary on top of him.