Shadowhunters and Downworlders: A Mortal Instruments Reader(13)

In the first few books, whenever Jace is given the chance to kill Valentine, he can’t pull it off because he can’t divorce himself from his long-indoctrinated need to impress the man he knew as Michael Wayland, the man he thought of as his father. His hand trembles in Renwick’s in book one, and when he kills Agramon on the ship in book two, his first, terrible fear is that it really was Valentine all along. Valentine is Jace’s enemy; he abused Jace, “beat Jace bloody for the first ten years of his life” (as Sebastian says in City of Lost Souls), but he’s also the only father Jace ever knew. If there’s one quality that Valentine has in spades, it’s charisma. It’s how he was able to get all the members of the Circle to do such awful things for him to begin with. Jace guesses right that Sebastian, despite his sociopathy and demon blood, worships Valentine in the same way everyone else did. And what’s more, Jace understands that humor and sarcasm is not the way to convince Sebastian that he knows what he’s talking about.

In the first book, Jace’s momentary alliance with Valentine at Renwick’s is humorless; in the second, his pretended defection when Valentine shows Jace his terrible plan is similarly earnest. Valentine’s hold on Jace lives beyond his sense of humor, so deeply embedded in his psyche that he knows that the humorless, psychopathic Sebastian feels it too. So when Jace convinces Sebastian to fight him fair and square, the way Valentine would want (the argument is debatable, but hey, it works), there’s no joking required, or even warranted. His connection to Valentine is one area of his life where jokes do not suffice.

In City of Fallen Angels, Jace is resurrected and reassured of his place in the world—or, at least, that’s what he wants everyone to think. His cocky swagger and amused arrogance are on full display, but those close to him are no longer fooled. Clary, when confronted with Jace’s continued vulnerability, thinks: “Alec and Isabelle knew, from living with him and loving him, that underneath the protective armor of humor and pretended arrogance, the ragged shards of memory and childhood still tore at him. But she was the only one he said the words out loud to.”

No matter how hard he might be working to exorcise Valentine’s twisted teachings, to Jace, emotions and connection are still a weakness, and humor is the way he tries to keep his distance from the things out there—demon or otherwise—that might hurt him.

An argument with Simon and his new roommate, the werewolf Kyle/Jordan, has Jace back in fighting form: “So basically you’re threatening to turn me into something you can sprinkle on popcorn if I don’t do what you say?” Exasperated, Kyle asks Simon if Jace “always talk[s] like this.” The answer, to Simon’s chagrin, is yes.

Later, as the demon Lilith’s possession takes hold, Jace loses even this facade of sarcasm. Clary thinks “it was hard to see him like this, all his usual burning energy gone, like witchlight suffocating under a covering of ash.” You can always tell when things are going poorly for Jace, when he’s in the thrall of a master manipulator like Valentine or, more literally, when he’s the pawn of enchantments like those cast by Lilith or Sebastian. When that happens, he’s just not funny anymore.

In City of Bones, he has to lose faith in his father before he can join in on Luke’s mocking appraisal of Valentine’s plans. In City of Fallen Angels, it isn’t until Clary breaks Lilith’s hold on him by cutting apart his rune that Jace starts making jokes again, turning the full force of his humor weapon on Lilith herself: “You and your name-dropping,” he mocks. “It’s like I’m with the Band with biblical figures.” (“This is Jace being brave,” Simon thinks when he witnesses it.)

Lilith, however, is not amused. Seriously (pun intended), what is it with these demons? None of them has a sense of humor—that is, until Sebastian and Jace are bound. In City of Lost Souls, Sebastian and Jace go on a wild crime spree through Europe’s most fashionable cities, living it up like a pair of hot yet evil frat boys on the spring break from Hell. Sebastian is no longer Valentine’s humorless, sociopathic son. Whether it’s their magical bond or just by way of spending time with a wit like Jace, Sebastian has somehow developed quite the knack for cracking jokes. The two of them even banter in front of Clary in order to put her at ease when she first shows up in their interdimensional penthouse apartment.

Clary is baffled by the Jace she meets. This time, his possession is of a different nature. He’s not the despondent, heavily controlled automaton she cut into on Lilith’s rooftop. In fact, it’s hard for her to keep in mind that he’s really possessed at all. Thanks to Lilith’s enchantments, he is bound physically to Sebastian, his former enemy, and is also mentally subservient to Sebastian’s will…but he’s happy about it. He loves his new life as the sidekick of a psychopath, and, unlike the other time he was possessed, it’s difficult to determine if he’s faking it, because the central tenets of his character—arrogance, humor, and a passion for Clary Fray—are completely intact. “How could he be Jace and not-Jace all at once?” Clary wonders.

Every time Jace makes a sexy joke or brags about his physical prowess in that arrogant tone she’s grown to love, Clary’s confidence in her mission to rescue him from Sebastian is shaken. Maybe this is the Jace he was always meant to be: happy, funny, madly in love, pure in thought and purpose. After all, she’s spent four books learning that Jace is least himself when he’s not funny, that the jokes stop when Jace is under the thumb of a villain. But the Jace wandering about the streets of Europe and taking her to enchanted nightclubs is a real hoot.