Dear...God.
I am so so so sorry everybody! Feel free to hate me for this! :'(
I am so sorry to everybody that hates me for this being so late (and so short, yikes)!

Um...I promise I'll update more often now! Marching band season just ended, I'm well into the swing of school, my parents hate me so I spend most of my time in my room, and when my boyfriend isn't being a completely clingy SOB (JKing, I love him so much), I'll be writing, I promise guys.

So here's my first update this side of forever. I promise it'll be more often now.

Um...so we're good to roll, right? ^w^

Alec almost passed out again at the severe pain that flooded his entire being and the connection was severed as the scarf fell from his hand. Gasping, he dropped onto Magnus's four-poster bed, the tracking rune on his forearm fading rapidly.

"What did you see?" Jace asked immediately, dropping to his knees in front of Alec and grasping his parabatai's forearms. Alec stared at him without really seeing him, his mind preoccupied.

"It was somewhere—dark and—and cold," Alec said between quick gasps. "And he was in a lot of pain—just raw, horrid pain. There was someone else—someone with long hair and…green eyes. He was a Shadowhunter. That was the one thought I picked up on, was a Shadowhunter, and something about a rune."

"Did you get a hit on where, maybe, he might be?" Izzy asked.

"No." Alec shook his head, and Chairman Meow climbed up onto his lap. "I didn't."

"Do you know if Magnus has made any enemies? Ones that would want him out of the picture?" Simon asked. Clary punched his arm. "What?" he cried. "It's a legitimate question!"

Alec thought, long and hard. He remembered Magnus talking about Woolsey Scott back in London, but he had died a long time ago. Magnus had told him about a highly disgruntled worker at his apartment building in Peru, but she would be dead too. He continued to tick off people in his mind until one stuck—one that Magnus had labeled "highly dangerous; do not poke with a 32-and-a-half foot pole", one that wasn't dead, one that lived on Staten Island—one that was a Shadowhunter.

He jumped to his feet, holding Chairman Meow, who squeaked loudly. "Staten Island," he said immediately.

"That's a place, Alec," Jace said, raising his eyebrows. "I doubt very seriously a floating landmass kidnapped the High Warlock of Brooklyn."

"It could happen," Izzy said helpfully. "There are a breed of demons that resemble living rock—"

"I mean, that's where we have to go," Alec cut in. "There's someone on Staten Island." He fished in his head until he remembered the name. "Shay. Shay Ravensky."

Magnus didn't know how much time had passed. He couldn't tell day from night. His internal clock was broken. His stomach had stopped growling in hunger, and all he knew was the slow, liquid agony that pulsed through his body from the tiny rune on his forearm.

When he slipped back into consciousness enough to open his eyes, he found the cell dark and empty, like it had been before…but this emptiness was heavier. Colder. He felt like he was being watched.

A moment later, he heard soft voices.

"…even alive?" a woman's voice asked.

"I doubt Ravensky would have killed him," a man replied quietly, his voice a low baritone that was barely audible over the ringing in Magnus's ears.

"Well, maybe not on purpose," the woman replied, and there was a soft shuffling noise like she had moved. "Look—he put a rune on the Downworlder's arm. Frankly I'm surprised he hasn't turned into a Forsaken yet."

"I'm above that," Magnus mumbled through a mouthful of fuzz.

All movement stopped. "Did—Did he say something?" the woman asked, sounding slightly anxious.

"Damned right," Magnus muttered. It was like being half-asleep—he wasn't sure whether he was speaking out loud or just in his head, or even if the words coming out of his mouth made any sense. His mouth felt full of fuzz, his throat rubbed raw with sandpaper. But he wasn't going to be talked about like a zoo animal. "You're speakin' t' the High Warl'ck of Brooklyn." He could barely keep forming words. The agony in his veins was threatening to drag him back down again. But he had to make his position clear. "And as soon as I get out o' here…you all will know th' meaning of 'pain'."

The woman and man both laughed. "If you ask me, Downworlder," the man sneered, "you're the one who knows the meaning of pain."

It took every last ounce of his energy, but Magnus raised his head. His neck shrieked in protest. His spine shivered. His skin crawled and his eyes began to water. But he looked up.

The woman had waist-length black hair, matching eyes, and was wearing a black muscle-cut tank top, black battlegear jeans, and combat boots. She had fingerless gloves on and black spiked bracelets around each wrist. The man was slightly taller, with rippling muscles, same color eyes and hair, and an outfit that nearly matched hers. They were both staring at him like he was a strange yet funny-looking exhibition at a Demon Killing Conference.

And Magnus was sure he didn't look great. His hair needed a good combing, and he was in desperate need of a hot shower.

"Supremacists disgust me," he spat out. The world spun and he swayed, but barely managed to keep talking. "I am going to rain hell down upon you and the rest of your filthy kind—Upworlders. Upworlder scum. Disgusting excuses for children of Raziel. Wastes—of time and energy." His throat began to choke from pain.

"So help me Lilith, you both will die," is all he managed before he succumbed to the swallowing darkness again, letting consciousness fly away like a bird on a sill.