midnight | j.w.

1 7 . v i o l e t

Three days.

Three days Dahlia went without a wink of sleep and it was starting to get to her. She'd used countless runes all over her body to keep herself going, to train without stopping, to strengthen herself. The thing was, she wasn't strengthening herself, she was tiring and weakening her body.

She didn't really care though. All she wanted was to rid herself of her nightmares and if that meant not sleeping, then so be it. It was like she'd reverted back to the person she was when Magnus had just met her—quiet, sleep deprived, and void of emotions.

Magnus was gradually growing more worried as days passed. While Dahlia wasn't completely silent like she'd once been, she only spoke when necessary and even then, it was only a few words. On top of that, she was losing a lot of weight due to skipping meals and over training, and the bags under her eyes grew deeper each day.

And Magnus truly believed she was getting better. She'd been smiling more, joking around, training less intensely, so what went wrong? He genuinely thought she could finally let go of her demons—or demon, quite literally—and learn to be truly happy.

What caused her to deteriorate like this?

✧∘.∙∶*✧∘.∙∶*∘.∙∶*

Dahlia heard a soft knock at her door—she assumed it was Magnus because who else would it be? Dropping her weapon, she let her hair fall loose from the ponytail it was tied into. "One second," she called, quickly putting her katana back in its sheath.

After slipping a now-loose sweater over her body, she unlocked the door. "J-Jace." her eyes widened in surprise at the blond's unexpected appearance. "Hi," she greeted, stomach fluttering at the smile he returned to her.

"Hey," he replied, trying to remain passive but, if he was honest with himself, he was just as flustered as her, if not more.

"What're you doing here?" she asked, a soft smile settling on her lips as she watched him nervously fiddle with the ring on his finger.

"I was—um—kind of wondering if, maybe, you wanted to. . . do something?" he asked hesitantly, gaze avoiding hers. "Only if you're up for it. . ."

She giggled lightly and he swore that alone was enough to end wars. Brushing her hair behind her ear and biting down on her bottom lip, she contemplated if she wanted to go or not. After a few moments, she made up her mind, realising that it was Jace and whenever she was with him, she had a good time. "Sure," she said, smiling, "I'd love to. Just. . . give me a minute, I need to get changed."

As quickly as she could, she slipped back into her room and, without a single thought of anything else, she slipped on a decent pair of light blue jeans along with a pale pink hoodie that didn't exactly fit her properly. Now that she'd lost weight, it seemed even bigger on her but even before, her finger tips would barely peak out of the sleeve.

She grabbed her brush and ran it through the knots of hair before doing a quick braid to one side. Taking her phone, earphones and some cash she had, she shoved the items in the front pocket of her hoodie. When she opened the door, Jace was on his phone but as soon as he heard her, he looked up, turned his phone off, and pocketed it.

"No shoes?" Jace asked, raising his eyebrows. She blushed, looking down at her sock covered feet. Pointing to the shoes by the doorway, she grabbed her keys off the kitchen counter and leaned down to slip her sneakers on.