“I'm all right,' Jace protested, but his hand gripped Alec's sleeve tightly. 'I can stand.' It looks to me like you're using a wall to prop you up. That's not my definition of "standing."'It's leaning,' Jace told him. 'Leaning comes right before standing.”

“I can stand.”“It looks to me like you‘re using a wall to prop you up. that’s not my definition of ‘standing.’”“Its leaning,” Jace told him. “Leaning comes right before standing.”

“Look. I don’t want to push you into anything, but do you maybe want to —” “Call Magnus? Look, that’s a dead end, I know you’re trying to be helpful, but —” “—kiss me?” Jace finished. Alec looked as if he were about to fall off his chair. “WHAT? What? What?” “Once what would do.” Jace did his best to look as if this were the sort of suggestion one made all the time. “I think it might help.” Alec looked at him with something like horror. “You don’t mean that.” “Why wouldn’t I mean it?” “Because you’re the straightest person I know. Possibly the straightest person in the universe.” “Exactly,” Jace said, and leaned forward, and kissed Alec on the mouth. The kiss lasted approximately four seconds before Alec pulled forcefully away, throwing his hands up as if to ward Jace off from coming at him again. He looked as if he were about to throw up. “By the Angel,” he said. “Don’t ever do that again.” “Oh yeah?” Jace grinned, and almost meant it. “That bad?” “Like kissing my brother,” said Alec, with a look of horror in his eyes. “I thought you might feel that way.” Jace crossed his arms over his chest. “Also, I’m hoping we can just gloss over all the irony in what you just said.” “We can gloss over whatever you want to,” Alec said fervently. “Just don’t kiss me again.”

“It's not funny, Jace," Alec interrupted, starting to his feet. "Are you just going to let her stand there and call me names?" "Yes," Jace said kindly. "It'll do you good-- try to think of it as endurance training.”

“We shouldn’t,” protested Isabelle. “The Clave has a plan.”“The Clave has the collective intelligence of a pineapple,” said Jace.Alec blinked up at them. “Jace is right.”Isabelle turned on her brother. “What do you know? You weren’t even paying attention.”“I was,” Alec said, injured. “I said Jace was right.”“Yeah, but there’s like a 90% chance of me being right most of the time, so that’s not proof you were listening,” said Jace. “That’s just a good guess.”

“Jace leaned down. 'Are you crying?' 'No.' She looked away and swiped her sleeve cross her face. 'Just leaking happiness.”