Brothers by Blood (Alec Lightwood twin)

Chapter 77

ALEC'S POV

I was sitting at my desk in my office writing a report when I heard a knock on my door. I looked up to see Jace and Clary standing at my door.
"Alec, we need to speak with you." Jace said.
"Jace, you're my parabatai and my brother, you don't need to ask." I told him. Both of them smiled before walking in, closing the door behind them.
"We have some news for you and we're not sure whether it is good or bad. My feeling is bad."
"What is it?"
"You know how Clary has a brother named Jonathan who has demon blood?" Jace said, more of a statement than a question. I nodded. "Well, he's alive." Jace revealed. My eyes widened and I could tell that they could clearly see the look of shock on my face.
"How do you know?" I asked.
"I was reading through Valentine's journals and noticed that he was studying both Jonathan and I at the same time. We were opposite ends of the same experiment. I had angel blood whereas he had demon blood. We were also the same age, and the journals date back to when I was a child, well before I came to you guys. Clary told me that Luke had told her that Jonathan had died in a fire when he was an infant, as Jocelyn had told him. However, some of the journals only dated back 10 years ago, so how would it have been possible for Valentine to still be studying him if Jonathan was already dead?" Jace told me. I was shocked at what he had just told me, but
"The angel Ithuriel also came to me in a vision telling me that Jonathan was still alive." Clary added.
"An angel came to you?" I asked. I was partially skeptical, but it was not the first time it had happened, so I gave her the benefit of the doubt on this.
"Yes." Clary said confidently
"Let's say I believe that last part, when did this occur?" I asked.
"When we were at Lake Lyn. We were separated. Initially, I thought he meant Jace, but we have now realized he actually meant my brother instead." Clary told me.
"Thank you for letting me know." I thanked both of them. "I am fairly sure that Jonathan will become a threat sooner or later, and we should be ready when he does. Have a read through those journals and see what you can find, if anything, that could be counted as a weakness for Jonathan." I suggested.
"Sounds good. I'll keep you updated on anything we find." Jace said. Clary nodded, agreeing with him.
"Will do."

*The Next Day*

JACE'S POV

I was sitting on my bed reading through one of Valentine's many, many journals since sleep wasn't my friend at the moment when I heard Clary start screaming. I threw the journal down and sprinted out of my room towards hers. Thankfully, she was only two doors down, next to Izzy.
"No, no, no!" She kept repeating. I rushed over to her bed and began shaking her shoulder in an attempt to wake her.
"Hey, hey, hey! Hey! It's OK. Wake up. Wake up. It was just a bad dream." I said, trying to wake her up. A few moments later, her eyes fluttered open.
"Jace. What...what are you doing here?" Clary asked, looking at me with slight awe in her eyes.
"I, uh, heard you screaming. Are you all right?" I asked.
"Yeah. I, uh I was back at Lake Lyn. Underwater. Drowning." She replied.
"Well, you're alright now." I told her, taking her hand and sitting down next to her.
"You know, everything that happened back at the lake, I...I can't get it out of my head." Clary said
"It's not exactly top on my vacation list, either." I replied sardonically.
"My brother's alive. Somewhere out there, Jonathan exists." She said. I could hear a hint of longing in her voice as if she longed to find him, although I'm not quite sure that was a great idea.
"I know. It's a lot to process." I said.
"He was a child." Clary tried to reason.
"With demon blood. Don't forget that." I reminded her.
"And no one but Valentine to teach him the difference between right and wrong. If he's out there, I want to find him." Clary said seriously.
"We will." I promised.
"How? We don't even know where to start." She asked. She paused, and I could tell something had dawned on her. "Wait that's not true." She said. She jumped out of bed, rushing over to one of her drawers, opening it and taking something out of it, closing the drawer behind her. She walked over to me to show me what she had in her hands. "Do you remember this?" She asked, showing me the box that contained Jocelyn's keepsakes of Jonathan.
"Yeah." I replied.
"My mum's keepsakes from when he was a baby. I mean, we thought they were yours but they're Jonathan's. We can use what's inside to track him." She said. She then opened the box only to find that there was nothing inside. Someone had emptied it.
"Looks like somebody beat us to it." I said, looking up at her. "We need to tell Alec about this." I added.

*Later*

ALEC'S POV

Max was standing in front of me, looking up at me expectantly. I had requested him to my office because I wanted to inform him of a new development concerning him.
"The Clave is very impressed with your progress. They think you're ready for your first mission. What do you think?" I said, more of a statement than an actual question.
"I've been ready since the day I got here." He said, a grin on his face. Despite how much I wanted to protect my little brother, as Head of the Institute, it was my responsibility to treat him like an actual Shadowhunter now since he has had his rune ceremony.
"Well then, you better get your butt over to training. You know how much our sister hates tardiness." I ordered. We both knew what Izzy was like when she got annoyed and neither of us wanted that. As he was leaving the room, Jace and Clary walked in. I turned my attention towards them "Any sign of Jonathan?" I asked.
"No. We tracked the box itself, but it was a dead end." Jace said. I noticed Max lingering by the door, so I gave him a look that said, "Get to training". He rolled his eyes, but obeyed me nonetheless.
"So Valentine sent Duncan to steal a pair of baby booties?" I asked.
"Someone did. Someone who wanted to circumvent us from tracking Jonathan. And now we have no leads on either of them. We've got nothing." Jace revealed.
"Actually, we have less than nothing. There's something you should know. The Clave doesn't have the Soul Sword. They never did." I told them. Both looked shocked.
"So the Clave has been lying this entire time?" Clary asked.
"Wouldn't be the first time." Jace replied sardonically.
"The Clave is trying to prevent an uprising. If the Downworld finds out that we don't have the Soul Sword, there would be total chaos." I said.
"But the sword's been deactivated. It can't be used on Downworlders." Clary said.
"Not in the way Valentine used it before. But it's still a Mortal Instrument. If you combine it with the other two Mortal Instruments the cup and the mirror he could use it to raise the Angel Raziel." I told them.
"I thought that was just legend." Clary said in shock.
"Well, the legends are true. The Angel will grant him one wish. Anything he wants." I said.
"The end of the Downworld as we know it." Clary said. Neither Jace nor I said anything in reply, since we both knew what he said was true.