City of Bones (The Mortal Instruments, #1)(134)

“At least let me get up,” said Luke. “Let me die on my feet.”

Valentine looked at him along the length of the blade, and shrugged. “You can die on your back or on your knees,” he said. “But only a man deserves to die standing, and you are not a man.”

“NO!” Clary shouted as, not looking at her, Luke began to pull himself painfully into a kneeling position.

“Why do you have to make it worse for yourself?” Jace demanded in a low, tense whisper. “I told you not to look.”

She was panting with exertion and pain. “Why do you have to lie to yourself?”

“I’m not lying!” His grip on her tightened savagely, though she hadn’t tried to pull away. “I just want what’s good in my life—my father—my family—I can’t lose it all again.”

Luke was kneeling upright now. Valentine had raised the bloodstained sword. Luke’s eyes were closed, and he was murmuring something: words, a prayer, Clary didn’t know. She twisted in Jace’s arms, wrenching around so that she could look up into his face. His lips were drawn thin, his jaw set, but his eyes—

The fragile armor was breaking. It needed only a last push from her. She struggled for the words.

“You have a family,” she said. “Family, those are just the people who love you. Like the Lightwoods love you. Alec, Isabelle—” Her voice cracked. “Luke is my family, and you’re going to make me watch him die just like you thought you watched your father die when you were ten years old? Is this what you want, Jace? Is this the kind of man you want to be? Like—”

She broke off, suddenly terrified that she had gone too far.

“Like my father,” he said.

His voice was icy, distant, flat as the blade of a knife.

I’ve lost him, she thought despairingly.

“Get down,” he said, and pushed her, hard. She stumbled, fell to the ground, rolled onto one knee. Kneeling upright, she saw Valentine raise his sword high over his head. The glow from the chandelier overhead exploding off the blade sent brilliant points of light stabbing into her eyes. “Luke!” she shrieked.

The blade slammed home—into the floor. Luke was no longer there. Jace, having moved faster than Clary would have thought possible even for a Shadowhunter, had knocked him out of the way, sending him sprawling to the side. Jace stood facing his father over the quivering hilt of the sword, his face white, but his gaze steady.

“I think you should leave,” Jace said.

Valentine stared incredulously at his son. “What did you say?”

Luke had pulled himself into a sitting position. Fresh blood stained his shirt. He stared as Jace reached out a hand and gently, almost disinterestedly, caressed the hilt of the sword that had been driven into the floor. “I think you heard me, Father.”

Valentine’s voice was like a whip. “Jonathan Morgenstern—”

Quick as lightning, Jace seized the hilt of the sword, tore it free from the floorboards, and raised it. He held it lightly, level and flat, the point hovering a few inches below his father’s chin. “That’s not my name,” he said. “My name is Jace Wayland.”

Valentine’s eyes were still fixed on Jace; he barely seemed to notice the sword at his throat. “Wayland?” he roared. “You have no Wayland blood! Michael Wayland was a stranger to you—”

“So,” said Jace calmly, “are you.” He jerked the sword to the left. “Now move.”

Valentine was shaking his head. “Never. I will not take orders from a child.”

The tip of the sword kissed Valentine’s throat. Clary stared in fascinated horror. “I am a very well-trained child,” Jace said. “You instructed me yourself in the precise art of killing. I only need to move two fingers to cut your throat, did you know that?” His eyes were steely. “I suppose you did.”

“You’re skilled enough,” said Valentine. His tone was dismissive, but, Clary noticed, he was standing very still indeed. “But you could not kill me. You have always been softhearted.”

“Perhaps he couldn’t.” It was Luke, on his feet now, pale and bloody but upright. “But I could. And I’m not entirely sure he could stop me.”

Valentine’s feverish eyes flicked to Luke, and back to his son. Jace hadn’t turned when Luke spoke, but stood still as a statue, the sword unmoving in his hand. “You hear the monster threatening me, Jonathan,” said Valentine. “You side with it?”

“It has a point,” said Jace mildly. “I’m not entirely sure I could stop him if he wanted to do you damage. Werewolves heal so fast.”

Valentine’s lip curled. “So,” he spat, “like your mother, you prefer this creature, this half-breed demon thing, to your own blood, your own family?”

For the first time the sword in Jace’s hand seemed to tremble. “You left me when I was a child,” he said in a measured voice. “You let me think you were dead and you sent me away to live with strangers. You never told me I had a mother, a sister. You left me alone.” The word was a cry.

“I did it for you—to keep you safe,” Valentine protested.

“If you cared about Jace, if you cared about blood, you wouldn’t have killed his grandparents. You murdered innocent people,” Clary cut in, furious.