City of Bones

Clary’s mom first brought her to Magnus when Clary was a baby and asked Magnus to take her magic sight away. Since there was no way to do so, Magnus created the forgetting spell instead, which needed to be renewed every two years. He can’t undo it, but he shows Clary a rune that tickles her mind “like feathers brushed against sensitive skin” (233). Something clicks in her head, but Clary doesn’t remember anything about the Mortal Cup.

Clary, Jace, and Alec return to the party, which seems somehow easier for Clary to see now. They find Isabelle and Simon, who’s been turned into a rat after drinking a potion. Clary puts Simon in her bag, and the group leaves, crossing paths with a group of angry vampires who get very close before Magnus ends the party and sends everyone away. The Shadowhunters go, but Magnus stops Clary, warning her that it was the Shadowhunters, not the Down-worlders, her mom ran from. Outside, Clary walks at Jace’s side, lost in thought. She opens her bag to check on Simon and finds him gone, the zipper on the pack torn.

Jace and Clary go back to ask Magnus about Simon. Magnus thinks the vampires took him, either because they believed he was one of their own who got drunk or because they want to kill a Shadowhunter pet. Either way, Jace and Clary likely have a couple of hours to rescue him. Reluctantly, Magnus gives them the location of the vampire lair.

Jace and Clary stop at a church to pick up weapons. After asking for admittance in the name of the Clave, the door opens for them, and Jace searches around the altar until he finds the weapons hidden in the floor. The juxtaposition of weapons in church seems wrong to Clary, and she asks Jace if he believes in Heaven, since there are demons and Hell. Jace says it doesn’t matter if there’s a god, but regardless, after his father’s murder, he “just stopped believing God cared” (257).

The vampire lair is at the Hotel Dumort, which was once the Hotel Dumont. Jace and Clary sneak down an alleyway to look for a service entrance, where a boy named Raphael warns them away. He wanders by the hotel sometimes to keep kids from going in because he lost his brother to the vampires. He helps Jace and Clary enter the church and leads them to an ambush—revealing himself as the leader of the vampires.

Jace grabs Raphael, and Clary offers a trade—Raphael for Simon. The vampires aren’t interested. Valentine has returned, and they will soon be able to hunt the Shadowhunters for all the deaths they’ve caused Down-worlders. Clary lunges and grabs rat-Simon, which starts a battle, and Simon bites a vampire who goes for Jace. Wielding a lighted blade, Jace grabs Clary and pulls her away from the vampires. Right before the hoard attacks, werewolves burst through the windows in a spray of glass.

The wolves are there for Clary. The vampires say they can’t have her, and the groups attack each other. Rat-Simon finds a door, and as Jace breaks it open, a wolf charges at Clary. On reflex, Clary throws the dagger Jace gave her earlier and is shocked when it “flew wobbly but true, and sank into the werewolf’s side” (284). On the other side of the door, Jace and Clary race up the stairs until they reach the roof. They board one of the flying vampire motorcycles just as the vampires and werewolves burst through the roof door.

Jace flies the bike off the edge of the roof and away from the hotel. The sun peeks over the horizon, and with a jolt Jace realizes the bike is about to lose power, as it runs on demon energy that doesn’t work during the day. They crash down in an alleyway, and Clary is thrown from the bike. When she sits up, Simon is human again, and she pulls him into a hug, looking over his shoulder to see Jace turning away from her “as if the brightness of the rising sun hurt his eyes” (294).

Back at the Institute, Hodge is furious with Jace for putting Clary in danger. Jace and Simon go to the infirmary to rest, and Alec finds Clary in the hall, where he rants at her to leave because she’s putting Jace in danger. Clary argues that Jace makes his own choices and says the only reason Alec is so upset is because he can’t “admit this tantrum is just because you’re in love with him” (300). Alec threatens to kill her if she ever repeats what she just said and leaves.

Later, Simon visits Clary in her room and thanks her for saving him. Clary knows he would have done the same for her, and Simon admits he drank the potion at the party because he was afraid she would leave him behind for the Shadow world. At some point, Simon falls asleep, and Jace comes to Clary’s room. Tomorrow is Clary’s birthday, and Jace wants to celebrate. With Simon asleep in her room and not feeling tired, Clary agrees.