Stiles's POV

This shouldn't be how it works.

I shouldn't have agreed to come back here, even if I don't remember agreeing.

Now here I am sitting here on my bed while my "siblings" figure out what they're going to do with the potential traitor. In case you didn't understand, that would be me.

Lydia didn't want to leave my side, but she had to go explain everything to Scott and Simon. Even if she wanted to come inside with me, she wouldn't have been able to without...assistance. I don't know how to explain it. She's not a Shadowhunter. There, that makes more sense.

Allison wasn't in the room with me either. She was currently yelling at the others for even considering me betraying them. I'm lucky to have her, but sometimes even she doesn't understand what's going on in my head.

Valentine's words just keep replaying on a loop in my head. They don't stop.

If I don't join him then people will start disappearing. There's only 24 hours left until that happens, and I can't tell if he's bluffing or not. This is really one of those things where I don't want to try and call him on it just in case he really isn't bluffing.

The only problem is, I have no idea where I would meet him, and if I know my family, they'd track me there without a doubt, and this alone could cause complete deruning, or I could be sentenced to the City of Bones.

Yeah, definitely wouldn't want that one.

But I really don't need anyone to disappear, but I can't cause a scene so I have to find a way to get out that isn't through the front door.

There isn't one that I can remember, but that might not be true since it's been almost a decade since I've lived here. I also can't ask anyone for help in finding it though, because then that would be a dead giveaway of what I would be trying to do.

There's also no way that I can go out the window since this place is kind of like shielded to the naked eye, so it might look weird to see someone climbing out an old church's window without context.

Come on Stiles think.

There has to be something that can get you out of here.

Wait a second.

Allison can help.

Maybe if I explain this situation to her, she'll understand why I have to go to him, and maybe she'll help me get out of here without being noticed.

Or even better, maybe I can even ask my parents to help since they literally hate me and want me out of here more than anyone. Especially my father. He'd probably be the one to hand me over to Valentine even if he wasn't already asking me to join him.

This is just all ridiculous. Either way I'm losing something. If I stay with them then they get kidnapped, unless Valentine is bluffing, but if I go with him then I have an entire institute fighting against me including the people I was trying to protect in the first place.

So either way I'm as good as dead.

There's no way out of this, but I'd rather have them alive, safe, and hating me, then to have them dead, dead, and deader.

You know?

"Hey." Someone said as the door opened.

I looked up to see Clary standing in my doorway.

As soon as I had decided that I looked up enough, I looked back down at my hands which I was wringing together.

She obviously has picked up on the fact that something was bothering me, so she came and sat down next to me before placing her hands on top of my shaking ones.

I could feel myself on the verge of tears, and even though I was trying to be discrete about it all, Clary being in here trying to console me definitely warnt helping anything with that.

The feeling wasn't going away though that she was just in here to get information from my siblings, so I had to make sure I kept my composure intact. There wasn't anyone that I could trust at the moment, not even my own parabatai.

Not even my girlfriend.

Not my best friend.

Not my parents, or my siblings.

Magnus and Raphael are off the board too, seeing as how close they are to Alec and Izzy. I would get exposed in less time than it would take me to blink.

I was completely, and utterly alone.

You know, when you're younger, you always feel like you're alone, and you make it a point to show people how lonely you feel for attention, but you never actually know what it's like to be lonely until you actually have no one to turn to. And I'm not talking about how when you're depressed that you feel like you're alone, no. I'm talking about having quite literally no one you can talk to because you're so scared that they'll die because of it, or that they'll try to kill you because of what you're thinking of doing.

"Stiles." I looked up at the call of my name to see Clary's weak attempt at a pity smile.

Very weak attempt.

"Don't pity me Clary. Trust me, with the anger from my family, and the worry from my best friends, I don't need pity from you."

She was a bit taken aback as she let go of my hands and scooched a little bit away from me on the bed. Which then made me instantly feel guilty.

"Clary I'm -"

"No. Trust me, it's fine Stiles. With everything you're going through right now, you deserve to be a little angry and standoffish. Trust me. I would be too, and I also know that even though you don't want to hear what I'm about to say, that I have to say it anyway out of fear from my own conscious. I know how it feels. To be tempted by valentine, but whatever he told you, we're going to figure something out."

She then took a breath before looking me directly in the eyes. .

"As long as you have me, you're not alone anymore."