~Magic, love and betrayal~
Lisa Cartwright's mundane life, as a demon-killing shadowhunter, was shaken at its foundations by a series of mysterious murders. As she starts her quest, determined to find the cause of these assassinations, she finds th...
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"It's never too late to be what you might have been."
-George Eliot
She had just enough time to close her eyes so she didn't have to see herself whizzing towards the ground. She didn't even have time to scream. With her falling lessons and rolling techniques, she was now nothing. Lisa didn't even realize it would be over in a second. She would lie there, in a pool of blood, arms and legs broken. After a few seconds, she thought she was already dead. She must have come down long ago, right? Her surroundings were very still and she felt nothing, as if she were floating. If she opened her eyes, what would she see? Heaven with the angels? Hell, where all the demons are? Or just nothing, the eternal darkness?
She carefully opened her eyes. None of that. All she could see was green grass, less than two inches from her nose. Time just stood still. Then a scream was heard, making her hug the ground. Her whole body ached, especially her back. Slowly she scrambled up, it seemed as if the air was pressing on her. Why had she jumped in the first place? She looked up, Thomas was standing where she had just been. He looked at her in surprise, as if she were a new demon species.
He hurried downstairs. Dazed by what had just happened, she got up unsteadily. How could she have survived this? Lisa felt sharp aches on her back. She looked back and was so startled that she fell back over. Bloody wings, with white feathers, like an angel's, protruded from her back. They were the size of her torso and the feathers were a rainbow color when held in the sun. How did that come out of her back?
She stared petrified at the white wings, she must be dreaming. Thomas came running with Anna and Jonathan close behind. Anna frowned, she also wondered what was going on. Jonathan saw the blood on the wings and turned white, together with Thomas he helped her up. Anna asked if she was okay and immediately took out her stele.
"Is this a daily thing here?" asked Thomas. "That you jump off buildings and suddenly get wings?"
"You jumped off the building?" Anna looked at her perplexed. Lisa couldn't say a word, she was still convinced that she was dreaming. Jonathan touched the wings, and when he determined that they were really attached to her back, he looked at his sister with concern. Who had drawn an iratze on Lisa's arm in the meantime, which made her suddenly feel less nauseous, everything around her became sharper. Her T-shirt was bloodied and it now had two large holes through which the wings pierced. Anna asked what this meant, but Lisa spoke only gibberish. Thomas led them inside, where it was warmer.
"I've never seen anything like it," Thomas replied to their unasked question. Anna led the way with Lisa under her arm, and they walked to the library together.
"Sit," Anna ordered, pushing her into a chair. Lisa couldn't sit on it properly, the wings were in the way, but she obeyed. Anna asked the boys to collect every useful book they could find.
"I'll help." Lisa stood up and turned to a bookcase. Which caused her to knock over a side table with her wings.
"You stay put," Thomas said, sitting on the couch. Absently, she ran her hand over the soft feathers. Lisa didn't realize what this meant, could she fly now? She even had a fear of heights. After a few minutes, there was a pile of books on the large wooden table. Together they began to skim-read them. The three took turns looking at her in surprise.
"Here." Anna held her finger to a picture of a book. In the photo were all kinds of wings, with two subdivisions: Angels - Elves. Judging by the shape, her wings most resembled those of the angels. Could she possibly have extra angel blood? Like Clarissa Fairchild, who could make heavenly runes, and Jace Herondale, who could literally jump a few dozen yards in the air? They all studied the picture and the wings. Anna pulled out a feather and placed it next to the photo. The angels' feathers were lined with gold and had an eye in the middle, like the ones of a peacock. Her feather had a bit of a green and rainbow color in the right light. Just like the feathers of some elves.
"I think," said Thomas, putting his finger to his chin, "this is the result of a combination of angel and fairy blood."
Lisa laughed. "I don't have any fairy blood. My family doesn't even have a kinship with the elves, otherwise, I would know that, wouldn't I?"
"No, and you don't have wings that say otherwise either," Jonathan said. Lisa got a cold sweat, he was right about that. It happened often, there were many families where fairy blood was passed down through the generations. But that usually manifested itself in pointy ears, or a greener skin tone.
"I'm calling the Silent Brothers," Anna said curtly, reaching for a piece of paper.
"No." Lisa shook her head fearfully. "Remember what happened to Helen and Mark Blackthorn?" She could still remember it like yesterday. "Because Helen had fairy blood, she was banished to Wrangel Island by the Clave. And Mark was kidnapped by the Wild Hunt, the Clave didn't even try to find him. They thought he was inferior to the other full-blooded shadowhunters."
Anna huffed angrily. "The Clave thinks they're so much better than the mundanes, but actually they're worse." Jonathan sat down next to her.
"Could it come from your father's side?" Thomas asked. Jonathan and Anna looked at him angrily, he avoided that glance. Anna shook her head at Lisa not to say it. So she still didn't trust him. But Lisa didn't trust Olivia either and yet Anna is kissing her.
"My father was a mundane," Lisa blurted out. Jonathan and Anna looked at her as if they had just lost a game of soccer. Thomas looked indignantly at the table, he hadn't seen that coming. That poor boy hadn't been here a day and was already inundated with every possible problem.
"Unless he wasn't." Thomas's coffee brown eyes pierced hers now. Lisa wanted to start laughing, but she saw Anna and Jonathan turn white. Could it be real? Had her mother been lying to her all this time? And why did those wings only appear now?
"There's only one way to find out," Lisa said angrily. She stood up, slapping Jonathan in the face with her wing. She walked to the exit with the rest close behind her.
"And that is?" asked Anna anxiously. She already knew what she was going to say, as always, but she kept asking.
"We're going to visit my mother." She walked out of the library in anger, Anna pulled her back.
"That's not how you go to Idris unless you want everyone to be scared." That was true, but what was she to do? Pull a sweater over her wings and say she was dressed as the humpback of Notre Dame? At that moment the bell rang through the Institute. Someone was at the door.
______________ What did you think of the chapter? Be sure to let me know in the comments!
Is Lisa's dad really not who she thought he was? Was her life one big lie? Find out in the next chapter -->
Also remember: trust no one
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