predestined | jace herondale

43

Lilith looked between me and where Jonathan's demonic body laid, "The family resemblance is striking."

"Really?" I scoffed deeply, my eyes falling onto Jonathan, "To tell the truth, I just don't see it."

Lilith faced me, "You're a sassy one, aren't you?"

"Sorry for the delay, my Queen." Jace apologized and handed her the bone, "Valentine's rib."

"All that matters is we have everything necessary to begin." Lilith slowly took it from him, setting it on the glass as it melted into the coffin Jonathan was in.

"My Owl is going to need his energy." Lilith faced us once more and stood in front of Jace, a red fog leaving her lips as she connected her lips with his.

Anger was all I felt.

"Thank you, my Queen." Jace exhales when they pulled away, staring at her as if she was his everything.

"Leave." Lilith ordered as he obeyed, her eyes landing on me, " Oh- anger isn't a good look on you."

"Neither are those clothes." Lilith noticed, then gestures for Ollie to come over, "Get her cleaned up and into a change of clothes for her brother's rebirth."

"Perhaps something blue." Lilith suggested then smirks at me, "That's what your kind wears when the lost return, isn't it?"

-

"Raising Jonathan from the dead-" I trail off when I brought back into the room, losing the cuffs and in a blue dress, "Is he really worth all the murder?"

"The things we do for our children." Lilith set down her cup of tea, "Besides, the mundanes killed by my disciples will do far more for this world in death than they'd ever do in life."

"And yet you need me alive." I brought up, wanting answers, "How does that work, exactly? I mean, you can't really just borrow my heart."

"Oh, I'm afraid that's exactly what it's like." Lilith came so close that she stood directly in front of me, "But- the heart isn't what you think."

I opened my mouth to question but she continued, "Jonathan needs to share your life force in order to breathe again, so I might hold him once more."

Lilith folds her hands together, "Losing Jonathan hearing him call for me with his final breath was the single most painful moment of my very long life."

I scoff, "You say that like you loved him."

Lilith looks between my eyes, "Why wouldn't I?"

I eye her, "Demons aren't capable of love."

"A failing of frail human imagination." Lilith shook her head at my words, "Demons live, we die, we feed, we lay- why wouldn't we love like you?"

Lilith clenches her jaw, "I need to care for Jonathan like you, your sister and your father never would."

I almost laughed. "If there's one thing that Valentine and I can agree on, it's the fact that the world is a much better place with a monster like Jonathan dead and buried."

Lilith's hand flew, coming in contact with my cheek as I grunted slightly, her using her magic to trap my wrists and ankles in metal bars, "My son is not a monster!"

-

Ollie walks back into the room after a few moments and right for Jace, her voice low, "The fire alarm just went off downstairs."

"The mundanes are evacuating the building." She then adds in, making my confusion increase.

Jace stood still, "There's no fire."