As promised, Izzy asked her parents the following day over supper.
"Are you two hiding something from us? You know, we technically should be working together," she said, allowing a hint of sarcasm to seep into her voice.
They could see Maryse whispering furiously to Robert, "I told you we should tell them. It's important and they care about Jace and the Institute just as much as we do."
She continued in this vein for some time longer, until finally, Robert's will cracked.
"Fine," he said to his wife, "We'll tell them, even though it is so totally illegal, but whatever." He sounded like a moody, reluctant teenager.
Maryse now addressed Clary, Izzy, and Simon.
"They say Jonathan Shadowhunter had ten children."
Izzy was nodding along, probably wondering why her mother was telling her a story she'd already heard a hundred times.
"The children had a terrible fight with each other. One group believed the world should be left pure for humans. The other felt that humans, downworlders, and shadowhunters could all coexist peacefully. They separated into two groups and reproduced within those groups.
"We are descended from the second group. Valentine and the circle were descended from the first."
Clary interrupted. "But you two were in the Circle. How can you be in the second group if you helped Valentine?"
"Anyone can work for the other side. However, it is illegal for there to be any kind of romantic relationship between people of opposite groups."
"But what about... what about me, then? How can you be so sure I'm with you? Valentine was my father, and he wasn't on your side," said Clary. She didn't know what to do with all of this new information.
"Your mother was. It was a completely illegal marriage."
"But why? Why is it so illegal? And my mother said that it was a happy marriage and that her whole family approved!" Clary's head was ready to burst, and she needed to speak to her mom, stat.
"I'll start with the latter question. She lied. They were married in a mundane legal office. They still applied marks to each other, afterwards, in private, I would assume. To answer your second question, it's not really the marriage that's so horrible -- it's the children. They have a tendency to go dark and ally themselves with demons, like Sebastian did."
"But I thought that was because of the demon blood Valentine injected! Are you saying that everything we learned about Valentine and Sebastian and my mother and I was all one big, fat lie?" Clary was getting angrier now, and she could hear her voice rising. She had thought it was bad enough that her mother had hidden the Shadow world from her for fifteen years, but this was much worse. Even when the 'truth' had been told, it had just been an even bigger lie.
Maryse jumped in. "Valentine did inject Demon blood into Jocelyn. That may have... aided his transformation, but it was mostly that the parents were from different bloodlines.
"We think that the reverse happened to you. Due to the higher concentration of angel blood in your veins, it may have cancelled the other things out."
But you don't know for sure, thought Clary silently. There were literally a hundred questions she could and should be asking, but she voiced none of them. Instead, she quietly slipped up to her room.
Turning this over in her mind, she fell uneasily asleep, wondering how the hell they would find Jace, and what to tell him if they ever did.
***
Hahahaha it's done and I hope all of my 2 readers are happy... I made my Sunday night deadline with 12 minutes to spare HAAAA
I do have a plan. A thing will probably happen soon. Probably.
If you got that reference then ilysm be my best friend please really I need friends.
Happy Mother's Day whether or not you're a mother!!!
Please vote, comment, and have a spectacular day.
Bye!!
-Ev.