The Dark Artifices: Lady Midnight

Chapter Two: When Fairies Sing

Jules was an artist, but the walls of his room was devoid of color and decoration. His bed was shoved rather hastily into one corner near a large window, and the only other furniture in his room was a dresser, a weapons table, and a bedside stand. An easel was propped up in the center of the room, a trunk of open art supplies next to it, spilling with mess. Sketchbooks, brushes, erasers, tubes of old paint, and pencils were scattered all over the wooden floor, old papers and pictures crinkling under Emma's feet. She knew what Helen would say. What a disaster.

"Angel." Emma said, keeping an eye on the floor as she waded through the mess of canvases and paints and the likes and into the center of the room where he was painting. Jules was crouching, covered in paint, long fingers multi colored and stained with nicotine. She sighed. "Its like a demon horde exploded in here-" she cut off, stumbling over a pencil case, and looking up to see his painting.

The faces of Mark, Helen, her mother and father, and Jules's parents stared back at her, all smiling the smile of faint memories, all encased in a ring of fire and the runes for honor, strength, family, and love.

She felt her sarcasm and humor slide away, her chest brimming with emotion and her brown eyes glistening with feeling. "Jules ..." He turned to look at her, brown hair tussled, eyes wide and pained and vunerable. Julian wasn't the type of person to talk about his emotions, since it was usually him everyone depended on to stay strong, so he painted what ever was in his head in order to express himself. Emma had seen it over and over again, seen him create lucid lines that flowed with the emotions he couldn't bring himself to show, seen him pour colors onto the canvas to make vivid images come to life, seen him set tones and mood and feeling with a stroke of the paintbrush. Jules was quiet and sensible, but if he opened up to anyone, it was through his artwork, or if he talked, it was only to Emma.

"Letting go doesn't mean forgetting them. It just means making it hurt less." He said softly as she tiptoed her way to where he was mixing paints. "But everyone seems to be forgetting- just going on with it, never thinking about them." He tossed the paintbrush into the mess of his room, something dark in his blue green eyes. "But Mark and Helen- they aren't even dead. But we're acting like they are. Instead of finding them. Instead of bringing them back. " He stood up rather abruptly, nearly knocking over the painting and startling Emma. "We're just sitting here, like we have been for five years, listening to the Clave, when we could be doing something!" He sat down again, frustrated, and said in a small voice "It's not fair."

Emma blinked.

It was unlike Jules to be so philisophical, or rebellious, but here he was, angry, basically saying This sucks, I want my siblings back, screw the Clave. Angel, she'd rubbed off on him pretty well. She agreed with him- not just the screw the Clave part, that was implied- but the we should get Mark and Helen back, this sucks part, also. She lost her parents too, the same day that Mark was taken and his father was changed, but the Clave closed the investagation. At the time with a war on their hands, it was understandable. Now, however, five years later, they hadn't bothered to look into it again. And they expected Shadowhunters to cooperate?

Julian sighed. " I'm sorry about what happened last night. I shouldn't have freaked out like that. Ty was right, though. You and Livvy-"

"Are fine." Said Emma sternly, coming back to herself. "You're human, Jules, and maybe an Angel fighter human who kills himself from stress and puts himself on the breaking point of existence, but you're still human. You're allowed to have feelings. And show them."

Jules rubbed at his face tiredly. "I'm supposed to be strong for them, not fall apart in front of them-"

"Julian Blackthorn, if you thought you could keep taking care of us all without cracking once than you have gone more delusional than you were in the first place. I understand I'm injuring your ego, but you aren't perfect. You're seventeen and taking on way more work than anyone in this Institute. Cut yourself some slack. "