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diana-bookfairchild · 1 year

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But the Symbolism. . . (II)

This isn't exactly a continuation, more just me ranting about how amazing and perceptive Jace is.

Firstly, to add onto the previous post, another significant thing Jace gave someone was the toy soldier he gave Max. I'm fairly certain it was a relic from his own abusive childhood with Valentine, and he gave it to Max, his younger brother who - while his family certainly had its own troubles - had a happy and fairly idyllic childhood.

And Max died holding it. That's how much it meant to him.

Pretty sure I don't need to elaborate on that.

In City of Heavenly Fire, in Edom, when Simon feels the burst of pain in his chest from when Raphael was killed, Jace knew what it was instantly.

“Raphael,” Jace said finally, in a flat voice. “He’s your sire, the one whose blood made you a vampire.”

But he didn't tell. He kept it all to himself, instantly changing the subject and pretending the cause for Simon's discomfort was something else.

He knew that at this stage, Alec and Clary would absolutely fall to pieces if they thought Magnus and/or Luke and Jocelyn were dead.

And Jace cared for Magnus, if not for his own sake (though they were absolutely friends at this point) then for Alec's. We know he sought comfort from and confided in Luke in the past.

He kept this knowledge to himself. How much agony do you think this must have caused him? Keeping such a vital thing to himself - that the people they sought to rescue could already be dead. He mustn't even have known they were alive until he got there and Sebastian mentioned they would pay for that.

And sure, maybe it was a tad unfair to the others, but I'm not focusing on that right now. Jace's need to protect the people he loves, even at the cost of their own independence, is so obvious in every action he takes, in the tiniest details spread across the books. I love this.

“Clary,” Jace said, a warning in his voice.

Jace wants to stop Clary from giving too much information about his family to Mark, in the tunnels below Faerie to Edom. Why?

Because:

"—My family? Do they know—” “What’s happened to you? A little. And no, they’re not all right.” His eyes closed.

Jace knows the pain of knowing the people you care about, the people you love, are hurt because of you, and yet even knowing that you can't do anything about it.

Jace empathizes with Mark. Clary even thinks it:

Jace didn’t answer her; he looked stunned. She wondered if Mark, brittle and orphaned and alone, reminded him somehow of himself.

Jace was brusque at the beginning, demanding to know about Mark's time with the Fair Folk, but as soon as he realizes the torture and imprisonment and hopelessness of his family being somewhere he could no longer go Mark'd gone through he became sympathetic. He gave him a witchlight, one he'd always had, the symbolism which I talked about in Part I.

It was Mark's 'I'd rather die' that spurred him on. I think that also reminded him of himself, his impassioned speech to Clary as he went back under Sebastian's control.

“They took you because you have faerie blood, but also because you have Shadowhunter blood. They want to punish the Nephilim,” Jace said, his gaze intent. “Show them what a Shadowhunter is made of; show them you aren’t afraid. You can live through this.”

Mark wanted to feel and be useful. Jace gave him a purpose, something to do. Mark saved Idris and all the Shadowhunters there. A lot more would've died if the precautions against Faeries hadn't been put in place.

Jace was a war tactician and a friend at the same time: he gave Mark hope, was kind to him, and even then ruthlessly used his sense of being lost and the same kindness to make him do something for the war effort.

I can't stress how much I love this dichotomy, and how much it reminds me of Julian (also reading City of Lost Souls Julian - the troublemaking wax melting kid, knowing how much he goes through and how much pain is waiting for him, is just awful).

I could wax poetic about how awesome Jace was in the Blackthorns' interrogation. He wasn't as outwardly biased towards them as Magnus and Clary, but he was unequivocally on their side. His arguments were the ones that convinced Robert.

He agreed with Robert at first (and God, I love Julian's thought process about him):

“He has a point.” Jace smiled at Julian and Emma, and the smile was like gold melted over steel. You could see how the softness was a disguise, and how what lay under it had won Jace the title of best Shadowhunter of his generation.

But then, immediately next switched it around. You can see the way it changes Robert. For Jace, it became personal, and if it was personal for him - he would have done the same - it would be so for Robert, his adoptive father. He goes from stern to exasperated, more willing to be pliant.

He's the one who finally convinces Robert to let Julian speak. The final masterstroke. Robert complies immediately, despite reluctance. I doubt Jace planned how the entire thing went down, but this was a clear show of his loyalty and his brilliance. We see how Jace's strategizing mind works. He remains unreadable throughout, even to Julian - master liar and manipulator.

And when he spoke to Mark later on. He tries to put Mark at ease - doesn't succeed fully, of course, but it does sort of work. He reminds him of the witchlight. And of course, he's understood that Julian is the one running the Institute. I'm guessing it's half the official correspondence he gets from running the New York Institute, and half listening to Julian spinning his tale and helping him out there, but still. He guessed something which not even Emma, the love of Julian's life knew about him. It's kind of ridiculously OP, but also really amazing.

In Lord of Shadows, when he first met Kit, Jace knew exactly what to say. We, as readers, know that Jace would love meeting his blood family and as Alec put it, wanted Kit to like him, but to KIt, he seemed simultaneously someone impressive, and someone he wanted to be far away from.

And this:

-- "You’re fifteen years old. You might think you want to die, but trust me—you don’t.”

Am I the only one whose heart is breaking from the PARALLELS? And the certainty with which Jace says it? Jace-Death-Wish-The-SIze-of-Brooklyn-Lightwood-Herondale? This is as cathartic as seeing Jace finally calling Valentine abusive in The Lost Book of the White.

The 'Herondales Can't Resist a Challenge' thing is definitely part of the reason Kit decides to stay at the Institute. There's also, of course, Ty and Livvy and revenge.

Kit felt a sudden tightness through his body. Talking to Jace earlier had eased some of the anxiety he’d felt ever since his father had died. Jace had made everything seem like maybe it would be easy. That they were still in a world where you could give things chances and see how they worked out.

(The 'I didn't hear anything' at the kids' spying antics?? Jace totally did stuff like that with Alec and Izzy when he was younger).

(Also, like he's not the one who convinced Robert to listen to Julian and then present the testimony without involving the kids. This is canon to me.)

Clary leaves Jace alone in the room with Mark, when they're asking him for advice on Faerie. Playing on his prior connection to the Blackthorn. And Jace gets Mark to cooperate within a minute, revealing some information, but not all of it.

Also, the thing with the Herondale ring. Jace got it from Clary, who got it from Tessa, right when he was beginning to accept that he was a Herondale and took the name. To me, his giving it to Kit - and through Clary no less - was an expression of hope that Kit would be able to find the home and family and love and identity he had. And maybe a subconscious subtle manipulation on the fact that Kit never knew his mother and would therefore be vulnerable to Clary, whom everyone - from Emma to Julian - seems to regard as maternal.

And the way he intimidates Kit into not selling it just cracks me up.

(I love him making sure Emma and Julian have Magnus and Alec's numbers in case they run into trouble. He absolutely recognizes the 'chaos follows me around' tendency he has in them. And that he and Clary asked Magnus to help them. I could talk about that for days.)

Just - the way Jace's sarcasm, his charm, his ability to get people to talk and manipulate them, sweet-talking, humour, superhuman fighting abilities, kindness, emotional sensitivity and perception all meld together is genuinely breathtaking. I get why some people don't like his character - but I love him.

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x-ceirios-x · 24 days

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lovely to be sitting here with you

simon has come to a new revelation with his mark of cain and jace calls in a favor with a friend to make him calm down.

Simon felt like he couldn’t breathe. The first time, he thought it was just a mugger trying to take his wallet or something. Then, just a few minutes ago, two more guys were chasing after him in the street. Jace appeared out of nowhere, fought one, but the other pulled a gun—the Mark on his forehead activated and the guy died immediately. Died didn’t even begin to describe it, it looked like he exploded. Jace told him to start watching his back; someone was clearly following him, trying to attack him.

He went back to his apartment he now shared with Kyle, somehow comforted by the fact he was in Jace’s company, but wanting nothing more than to fall asleep and wake up the next morning like all this was a dream. But it wasn’t, he knew it wasn’t, and that was the most terrifying part. He barely talked to Jace on the way back but let him stay in the living room, thankful Kyle wasn’t home. He heard him on the phone but didn’t bother to pay attention, too busy trying to figure out exactly what was going on.

He wasn’t sure what time it was when he heard something rap on his window—a sharp, piercing sound that made him jump, thinking it was more of those people, now having found him at home. He looked out the window and saw a shadowed figure, dressed in black, and felt chills creep up his spine. That was until he saw the Taki’s coffee cup on the windowsill and the person pulled back their hood, revealing a familiar face: Rowan.

He scrambled to stand up and pushed the window open, allowing them to crawl in from the fire escape. They held two cups of coffee, one that they forced into his hand as they crawled through the window. “Heard you could use a pick-me-up,” they said, incredibly matter-of-fact. They closed the window behind them and leaned back against the wall. “Nice place,” they said, inspecting the room.

Simon looked around, suddenly self-conscious at the lack of decoration, or even a bed frame to hold his mattress, in the room. He’d only been here a few days so far and had to time his return to his house well so his mom wouldn’t see him. He’d only been able to snag the important things: some clothes that were in a duffel bag in the corner, some of the hidden vials of blood in his room, and his guitar, sitting on the floor, still in its case. The important things. “Thanks,” he said plainly. He smelled the coffee cup and realized suddenly it wasn’t coffee, but blood. They’d stopped at Taki’s and brought him a cup of blood while they got their coffee—it felt incredibly strange, but part of him was touched.

He turned towards them, taking a sip of the drink. It felt great—he’d been hungry for hours, but he couldn’t keep the vials in the fridge like he wanted to. It was cold. And tasted fresh, and it wasn’t starting to separate and be all gross like he had to drink earlier that morning. “How the hell did you find me here?”

“Actually, I was planning on stopping by soon anyway. Clary’s been keeping me in the loop about things, I figured you could use someone to talk to,” they explained. “Then Jace called, and I decided tonight was a good night. Could get me out of the house, too.”

“Jace called,” they explained matter-of-factly. “Was planning on stopping by soon, anyway, but he sent me the address. Said you could use a familiar face and I needed an excuse to get out of the house.”

“That’s not him? Definitely.” He understood the silent part of what they said—things were tense right now, as everyone was still mourning the loss of the youngest Lightwood, Max. Particularly their brother, who still barely spoke to anyone other than Maryse, Jace, and his dad, and Maryse herself. He felt like Isabelle was pushing away the feelings and not exactly dealing with it, but he didn’t want to push her before she was ready to talk about it. Rowan, too; they hadn’t talked about it since it happened. Actually, they hadn’t talked about anything about them since everything in Idris happened. They asked about him, but he felt like there were walls around them he couldn’t break down.

Things were tense at the Institute with Rowan in multiple ways. On top of Jensen, their father was home. He didn’t know if home was the proper word to call it, but their dad was in New York and living at the Institute, helping Clary train and Maryse run the place while she was struggling. Clary said he was a nice guy—quiet and professional, but with a lot of knowledge about techniques, fighting, and the world of Shadowhunters. Through various people, she found out he used to be a mundane and trained at the Shadowhunter Academy, so he understood part of her issue. It was one of the reasons Maryse insisted he train her. Now, he was an official in the Clave, on leave to be in New York with the rest of his family. She said she saw a lot of similarities between him and Rowan, though she’d never tell them that. He met the man once, mostly in passing, while he was at Penhallow Manor, and decided that he’d try to avoid him; he scared him in the same way Rowan did when they first met, but something told him Aric Ashfair didn’t want to make friends with a seventeen-year-old vampire like Rowan had.

“How are you doing, anyway?” he asked, carefully choosing his words. He learned quickly that the wrong question would shut Rowan up faster than a warlock’s magic could, which was part of why they talked about him a lot. They were stubborn and reclusive, that was for sure. “With…everything. I hear things are tense.”

“Everyone is looking forward to the wedding,” they said, not really answering his question. They were good at that—giving him an answer to a question he didn’t ask. “It’ll be something…good.”

Simon agreed. With everything so heavy just the month before, a time to celebrate and enjoy their time. Most of the Institute was invited, mostly because of Clary. He wondered if Rowan actually wanted to go or if they were going to make Clary happy. He’d noticed how they clung to her recently, always hanging around when they were in a group, usually looking at her. He saw himself a few months ago and knew it wouldn’t go anywhere—she was too in love with Jace—but that didn’t help the sting at all. He figured that out the hard way.

“How’re things with blondie out there?” he asked, hoping it was something less temperamental to ask about. One late night during a Star Wars marathon, they’d explained the reason the two argued so much. They had a complicated relationship that seemed to be in a tense peace now that he and Clary were together. They still bickered but generally ignored each other now. First loves sucked.

“I showed up, didn’t I?” they asked. He had a suspicion that they showed up for him, not because Jace called. Rowan scoffed and slid down the wall ungracefully, sitting on the floor. It was the first time he thought he saw a Shadowhunter do anything clumsily, but maybe that was why he liked Rowan so much. They felt more real, less like some fairytale, secret knight-in-shining-armor madman that Jace reminded him of. He sat next to them. “It’s fine. Not great, but fine. Everyone feels really separated right now because Alec’s not here.”

“You sound like you miss him,” he said, glancing over at them. Their hair hung in their face, shielding their eyes from him. He noticed they were wearing their glasses, which they rarely did, but he thought they looked nice with them.

They sighed through their words. “I do, but I’m happy for him. I got to talk to Magnus before they left, though, which was nice. Got some…information about my parents, but I’ve yet to talk to Dad about it yet.”

Simon raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Like what kind of information?”

“Like Magnus was best friends with my mom, which he neglected to tell me. And that my dad was a mundane, but I’m sure Clary told you that because he mentioned it to her, but not to me.” BItterness seeped into their voice as they spoke, but they took a sip of their drink to calm down. “I dunno. Lots of stuff, but I feel like I have more questions than answers right now.”

“I get that,” he said. He understood his family, at least, and where he came from, but he felt like every time he turned around, some other all-powerful, immortal being was chasing after him. Raphael, then Camille, and these muggers had to have orders from someone. It was all so confusing, he felt like his head was going to explode. “Life is just ducky lately, isn’t it?”

They chuckled wryly. It was the first hint of a smile he’d seen from them recently, which concerned him, but there was only so much he could do to help. These little meetups helped them both, though; they got to pretend the rest of the world didn’t exist for a little while and it was just the two of them. He used to do that with Clary when they were younger but it was a different feeling entirely with Rowan. They were someone he could be himself around, but he could be more of himself that he wanted to be, not just the geeky, awkward twelve year old with braces and coke-bottle glasses everyone seemed to have minted in their minds. It was something new, but he liked it. “That’s the PG way of saying it, I guess. But I guess it’s not all bad.”

He turned slightly toward them. “And why’s that?”

Rowan shrugged nonchalantly and looked up at him. “I dunno, I think you’re pretty cool, Simon. And you’ve got good music taste, so that’s a plus.”

His face broke into a grin. Never in his life had he been cool, but maybe their definition was a little different than everyone else’s. Jace was cool, Alec was cool, Magnus was cool; he never stood a chance around either of them. But so was Rowan, just in a different way he couldn’t describe. He just liked being around them, maybe. “I think you’re pretty cool too, actually. Even though we’re, like…totally lame nerds.”

They laughed—a real, genuine laugh that only broadened his smile. “You can say that again. I spend my afternoons reading Shakespeare and Wilde because I like it.”

“I’d call you a dweeb if most of my head wasn’t filled with comic book plots.’

Whatever tense air they carried with them broke in that moment. He knew they carried around a lot of baggage and it made him happy when he could see them visibly relax. The little rain cloud that seemed to follow them around dissipated as they sat there, avoiding serious topics in a complicated dance but still finding quality time to spend together.

Eventually, they pulled a book out of their jacket. They started reading in the calm quiet, and Simon decided to grab his guitar. It had been some time since he got to actually play for fun, that wasn’t with the band, and he knew they wouldn’t mind. They never did.

So he sat there, fiddling with songs he’d been trying to figure out, humming under his breath, sitting next to the one person in his world that made him feel a little less crazy whenever he was with them.

“I like that song,” they muttered after a while, eyes tearing away from their book for a split second. “Goo Goo Dolls, right?”

“Yeah,” he said, happy that they recognized it. That meant he was at least a little right about the chords, though it didn’t sound quite right. He didn’t have his magazines with the tabs since they were still at his mom’s house, so he had to make do with what little he remembered. “I do, too. Good song.”

They hummed in response and returned back to the book, absorbed in the world in a way he barely understood. He didn't know how they could be so interested in politics and romantic drama in a language he could barely understand—sure, it was English, but it was really hard to read English, and it only made sense when they read it to him, for whatever reason. It was a little impressive that they could rattle off most of the famous soliloquies, but he could quote most of his books, too.

The two of them went back and forth talking about whatever it was they were into frequently: one night, he spent three hours talking about Star Wars and they went through the entire plot of Hamlet. He barely understood the plot, but he remembered how much they laughed when he stumbled through reading the to be or not to be bit and how perfectly they read it.

There was a sharp knock on his bedroom door and Jace poked his head inside without waiting for a response. “Oh, good, you’re both completely dressed and not in an uncomfortable situation. Get out here.”

Rowan huffed and looked like they wanted to throw their book at his face. “You do realize he has a girlfriend, right?”

“Two, actually, so I thought the bar was low.”

He closed the door before Rowan had a chance to respond, but when Simon looked back at them, they were staring at the wall. If looks could kill, his entire apartment and the one next to theirs would have been torn to shreds.

“Ignore him,” Simon said, rolling his eyes. He left his guitar on the mattress and stood, bringing his cup with him. “He’s trying to screw with you. It’s not like that would ever actually happen, right?”

An indiscernible look crossed their face for a fraction of a second, something so fast he almost missed it. “Right,” they muttered, standing along with him. “Just go see what he wants.”

“You coming?”

Rowan sighed like they didn’t want to, but eventually relented. “I guess so.”

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