Isabelle felt wretched. Between waiting for the Clave to come up with a ruling about Clary, and the calls with Flick and Joi just now, she was feeling terrible. She was standing by the window with Church in her arms, stroking the cat's head absently while cuddling him close to her chest.

Clary was sitting on Isabelle's bed between a pile of magazines and a rattling stack of seraph blades. She sighed and flipped her phone open to check the time. "They've been in there for an hour," she said. "Is that normal? Is it a bad sign?"

Isabelle dropped Church, who let out a yowl. She moved over to the bed and sat down beside Clary. She stretched her arms out, and her electrum bracelets with their rune charms jingled musically. "No, it's not a bad sign," she said. "It just means they have a lot to talk over." She twisted the Lightwood ring on her finger. "You'll be fine. You didn't break the Law. That's the important thing."

Her shoulder brushed against Clary's, and it was a small comfort, the warmth of skin on skin. Not much, though, not enough. But Flick's illness aside, it wasn't Isabelle's time to feel anxious at this particular moment in time (apart from the chill of Jace's continued absence, which was a constant companion). She was here for Clary. It was illegal for a Shadowhunter to raise the dead, but not for the Angel to do it. But now that the Clave knew Clary had done it...

Isabelle could tell Clary was running circles in her head on that very topic. "Quit it," she said.

"Quit what?"

"Morbidly thinking about all the horrible things that are going to happen to you, or that you wish would happen to you because you're alive and Jace is... missing." Isabelle's voice jumped, like a record skipping a groove.

"I can't help it," Clary said. "If I were allowed to patrol — if I were allowed to do anything — I think it wouldn't be so bad."

"I don't know." Isabelle sounded weary. She looked down at her shoes. Her stomach lurched again. "Sometimes it feels so futile."

She could feel Clary look up in alarm. "You mean you think he's dead?"

"No, I don't. I mean I think there's no way they're still in New York."

"But they're patrolling in other cities, right?" Clary put a hand to her throat, right as Isabelle looked up. "Of course they are," she said, as she reached out curiously and touched the delicate silver bell that hung around Clary's neck. "What's that?"

Clary hesitated, but before she could reply, the door opened. Both girls sat up ramrod straight, Clary clutching one of Izzy's pink pillows so hard that the rhinestones on it were probably digging into the skin of her palms. "Hey." A slim figure stepped into the room and shut the door. Alec was dressed in Council wear — a black robe figured with silver runes, open now over jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt. All the black made his pale skin look paler, his crystal-blue eyes bluer. His mouth was set in a thin line.

He didn't look happy. Whatever the news was, it couldn't be good. And it was Isabelle who spoke. "How did it go?" she said quietly. "What's the verdict?"

Alec sat down at the vanity table, swinging himself around the chair to face Isabelle and Clary over the back. At another time it would have been comical — Alec was very tall, with long legs like a dancer, and the way he folded himself awkwardly around the chair made it look like dollhouse furniture.

"Clary," he said. "Jia Penhallow handed down the verdict. You're cleared of any wrongdoing. You broke no Laws, and Jia feels that you've been punished enough."

Isabelle exhaled an audible breath. She didn't smile, but she wanted to. She just didn't have the energy to go through with it. Clary reached for her phone, but Alec cut her off before she got further than flipping it open. "Clary," he said. "Wait."

She looked at him. His expression was still as serious as an undertaker's.

"Alec — what is it?"

"It wasn't your verdict that took the Council so long," said Alec. "There was another matter under discussion."

Clary's face twisted. "Jace?"

"Not exactly." Alec leaned forward, folding his hands along the back of the chair. "A report came in early this morning from the Moscow Institute. The wardings over Wrangel Island were smashed through yesterday. They've sent a repair team, but having such important wards down for so long — that's a Council priority."

Wards served as a sort of magical fence system—surrounded Earth, put there by the first generation of Shadowhunters. They could be bypassed by demons but not easily, and kept out the vast majority of them, preventing the world from being flooded by a massive demon invasion.

"Well, that's bad," Clary said. "But I don't see what it has to do with —"

"The Clave has its priorities," Alec interrupted. "Searching for Jace and Sebastian has been top priority for the past two weeks. But they've scoured everything, and there's no sign of either of them in any Downworld haunt. None of Magnus's tracking spells have worked. Elodie, the woman who brought up the real Sebastian Verlac, confirmed that no one's tried to get in touch with her. That was a long shot, anyway. No spies have reported any unusual activity among the known members of Valentine's old Circle. And the Silent Brothers haven't been able to figure out exactly what the ritual Lilith performed was supposed to do, or whether it succeeded. The general consensus is that Sebastian — of course, they call him Jonathan when they talk about him — kidnapped Jace, but that's not anything we didn't know."

"So?" Isabelle said. "What does that mean? More searching? More patrolling?"

Alec shook his head. "They're not discussing expanding the search," he said quietly. "They're de-prioritizing it. It's been two weeks and they haven't found anything. The specially commissioned groups brought over from Idris are going to be sent home. The situation with the ward is taking priority now. Not to mention that the Council has been in the middle of delicate negotiations, updating the Laws to allow for the new makeup of the Council, appointing a new Consul and Inquisitor, determining different treatment of Downworlders—they don't want to be thrown completely off track."

Clary stared. "They don't want Jace's disappearance to throw them off the track of changing a bunch of stupid old Laws? They're giving up?"

"They're not giving up—"

"Alec," Isabelle said sharply.

Alec took a breath and put his hands up to cover his face. He had long fingers, like Jace's, scarred like Jace's were as well. The eye Mark of the Shadowhunters decorated the back of his right hand. "Clary, for you — for us — this has always been about searching for Jace. For the Clave it's about searching for Sebastian. Jace as well, but primarily Sebastian. He's the danger. He destroyed the wards of Alicante. He's a mass murderer. Jace is..."

"Just another Shadowhunter," said Isabelle, her voice all quiet and soft all the sudden. "We die and go missing all the time."

"He gets a little extra for being a hero of the Mortal War," said Alec. "But in the end the Clave was clear: The search will be kept up, but right now it's a waiting game. They expect Sebastian to make the next move. In the meantime it's third priority for the Clave. If that. They expect us to go back to normal life."

"That's what they told us after Max died," said Isabelle, her black eyes tearless but burning with anger. "That we'd get over our grief faster if we just went back to normal life."

"It's supposed to be good advice," said Alec from behind his fingers.

"Tell that to Dad. Did he even come back from Idris for the meeting?"

Alec shook his head, dropping his hands. "No. If it's any consolation, there were a lot of people at the meeting speaking out angrily on behalf of keeping the search for Jace up at full strength. Magnus, obviously, Luke, Consul Penhallow, even Brother Zachariah. But at the end of the day it wasn't enough."

Clary looked at him steadily. "Alec," she said. "Don't you feel anything?"

Alec's eyes widened. "I know you're upset, Clary," he said, his voice sharp, "but if you're suggesting that Iz and I care less about Jace than you do —"

"I'm not," Clary said. "I'm talking about your parabatai connection. I was reading about the ceremony in the Codex. I know being parabatai ties the two of you together. You can sense things about Jace. Things that will help you when you're fighting. So I guess I mean… can you sense if he's still alive?"

"Clary." Isabelle sounded worried. "I thought you didn't..."

"He's alive," Alec said cautiously. "You think I'd be this functional if he weren't alive? There's definitely something fundamentally wrong. I can feel that much. But he's still breathing."

"Could the ‘wrong' thing be that he's being held prisoner?" said Clary in a small voice.

Alec looked toward the windows, the sheeting gray rain. "Maybe. I can't explain it. I've never felt anything like it before."

"But he's alive."

Alec looked at her directly then. "I'm sure of it."

"Then screw the Council. We'll find him ourselves," Clary said.

"Clary... if that were possible… don't you think we already would have ––" Alec began.

"We were doing what the Clave wanted us to do before," said Isabelle. "Patrols, searches. There are other ways."

"Ways that break the Law, you mean," said Alec. He sounded hesitant.

"The Seelie Queen offered me a favor," Clary said. "At the fireworks party in Idris. And a way to contact her."

"The Queen of the Fair Folk gives nothing for free."

"I know that. I'll take whatever debt it is on my shoulders." Clary seemed decisive on that point. "I just want one of you to come with me. I'm not good with translating faerie-speak. At least if you're with me you can limit whatever the damage is. But if there's anything she can do —"

"I'll go with you," Isabelle said immediately. She really needed to be doing something right now. Badly.

Alec looked at his sister darkly. "We already talked to the Fair Folk. The Council questioned them extensively. And they can't lie."

"The Council asked them if they knew where Jace and Sebastian were," Clary said. "Not if they'd be willing to look for them. The Seelie Queen knew about my father, knew about the angel he summoned and trapped, knew the truth about my blood and Jace's. I think there's not much that happens in this world that she doesn't know about."

"It's true," said Isabelle, a little animation entering into her voice. "You know you have to ask faeries the exact right things to get useful information out of them, Alec. They're very hard to question, even if they do have to tell the truth. A favor, though, is different."

"And its potential for danger is literally unlimited," said Alec. "If Jace knew I let Clary go to the Seelie Queen, he'd —"

"I don't care," Clary said. "He'd do it for me. Tell me he wouldn't. If I were missing —"

"He'd burn the whole world down till he could dig you out of the ashes. I know," Alec said, sounding exhausted. "Hell, you think I don't want to burn down the world right now? I'm just trying to be..."

"An older brother," said Isabelle. "I get it."

Alec looked as if he were fighting for control. "If something happened to you, Isabelle — after Max, and Jace —"

Isabelle got to her feet, went across the room, and put her arms around Alec. She hugged him tightly, probably a little too tightly, but to his credit, he didn't complain. Besides, his arms were around her too. "Come with me," she whispered. "Come with us. I can't stay here, you know I can't." Alec sighed, but tugged her hair affectionately, nodded, and released her. "We should all go," he said, loud enough for Clary to hear, too. "But I have to tell Magnus, at least, what we're doing. It wouldn't be fair not to."

"Do you want to use my phone?" Isabelle asked, offering the battered pink object to him.

Alec shook his head. "He's waiting downstairs with the others. You'll have to give Luke some kind of excuse too, Clary. I'm sure he's expecting you to go home with him. And he says your mother's been pretty sick about this whole thing."

"She blames herself for Sebastian's existence." Clary got to her feet. "Even though she thought he was dead all those years."

"It's not her fault." Isabelle pulled her golden whip down from where it hung on the wall and wrapped it around her wrist so that it looked like a ladder of shining bracelets. "No one blames her."

"That never matters," said Alec. "Not when you blame yourself."

In silence, the three of them made their way through the corridors of the Institute, oddly crowded now with other Shadowhunters, some of whom were part of the special commissions that had been sent out from Idris to deal with the situation. None of them really looked at Isabelle, Alec, or Clary with much curiosity. They took the elevator downstairs; the nave of the Institute was brightly lit with witchlight as well as the usual tapers and was filled with Council members and their families. Luke and Magnus were sitting in a pew, talking to each other; beside Luke was a tall, blue-eyed woman who looked just like him. She had curled her hair and dyed the gray brown, but Clary still recognized her—Luke's sister, Amatis. Magnus got up at the sight of Alec and came over to talk to him; Isabelle recognized Aline Penhallow across the pews and darted away to talk to her. Standing next to Aline was a slim girl with pale white-gold hair that curled in ringlets; it was drawn back from her face, showing that the tips of her ears were slightly pointed. She wore Council robes. It turned out to be Helen Blackthorn, Aline's girlfriend.

Isabelle spoke to them for a moment, small talk, mostly. When Clary showed up by them, Helen told her sheäd voted for the Council to keep prioritizing the search for Jace. "I'm sorry we were overruled."

"Thanks." Obviously not wanting to talk about it, Clary turned to Aline. "Congratulations on your mother being made Consul. That must be pretty exciting."

Aline shrugged. "She's busy a lot more now." She turned to Isabelle. "Did you know your dad put his name in for the Inquisitor position?"

Isabelle, even with all her numbness lately, managed to freeze. "No," she said. "No, I didn't know that."

"I was surprised," Aline added. "I thought he was pretty committed to running the Institute here —" She broke off, looking past Clary. "Helen, I think your brother is trying to make the world's biggest puddle of melted wax over there. You might want to stop him."

Helen blew out an exasperated breath, muttered something about twelve-year-old boys, and vanished into the crowd just as Alec pushed his way forward. He greeted Aline with a hug and looked at Helen in the crowd. "Is that your girlfriend?"

Aline nodded. "Helen Blackthorn."

"I heard there's some faerie blood in that family," said Alec.

"A little," said Aline. "Look, I wanted to thank you, Alec."

Alec looked bewildered. "What for?'

"What you did in the Hall of Accords," Aline said. "Kissing Magnus like that. It gave me the push I needed to tell my parents... to come out to them. And if I hadn't done that, I don't think, when I met Helen, I would have had the nerve to say anything."

"Oh." Alec looked startled, as if he'd never considered what impact his actions might have had on anyone outside his immediate family. "And your parents — were they good about it?"

Aline rolled her eyes. "They're sort of ignoring it, like it might go away if they don't talk about it. But it could be worse."

"It could definitely be worse," said Alec, and there was a grim edge to his voice. Aline's face melted into a look of sympathy. "I'm sorry," she said. "If your parents aren't —"

"They're fine with it," Isabelle said, a little too sharply.

"Well, either way. I shouldn't have said anything right now. Not with Jace missing. You must all be so worried." She took a deep breath. "I know people have probably said all sorts of stupid things to you about him. The way they do when they don't really know what to say. I just — I wanted to tell you something." She ducked away from a passer-by with impatience and moved closer to the Lightwoods and Clary, lowering her voice. "Alec, Izzy — I remember once when you guys came to see us in Idris. I was thirteen and Jace was — I think he was twelve. He wanted to see Brocelind Forest, so we borrowed some horses and rode there one day. Of course, we got lost. Brocelind's impenetrable. It got darker and the woods got thicker and I was terrified. I thought we'd die there. But Jace was never scared. He was never anything but sure we'd find our way out. It took hours, but he did it. He got us out of there. I was so grateful but he just looked at me like I was crazy. Like of course he'd get us out. Failing wasn't an option. I'm just saying — he'll find his way back to you. I know it."

Isabelle felt her bottom lip tremble, and she knew her eyes were probably suspiciously wide and shining. She excused herself, and hurried away. If she was going to cry, she wasn't going to do it in front of everyone.

[ooc: NFB, NFI, OOC-okay! Edited from Cassandra Clare's City of Lost Souls. SECOND-TO-LAST BOOK, PEOPLE!]