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City of Glass

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A Guide to The Mortal Instruments

City of Glass is the third book in the urban fantasy series The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare. It is a journey that explores Simon's and Clary's experience in the Shadowhunter city, and Clary works on saving her mother, as they travel from New York institute to Alicante, Idris.
Clary is at Luke's house with Simon packing for her trip to Idris, in which both of them have conversations based on Clary's goal to save her mother, and the struggle she will face when she reaches Idris. Jace persuades Simon to lie and say that Clary decided not to go to Idris, in order to protect her from the Clave, who he feels will try to turn her into a weapon. When Clary visits the Institute, Magnus tells her that the Lightwoods had to travel through the portal, due to an attack by Forsaken. During the battle, Simon is injured and Jace takes him to Idris to save his life. With her power to create runes, Clary is able to create a portal and she travels with Luke through the portal.
As Simon wakes up to realize that he was pulled through the portal and now is in Alicante, he realizes the truth behind Jace's motivation to not make Clary come to Idris. Later at the Lightwood house, he meets Sebastian Verlac and Aline Penhallow. Over time, Alec comes back from the Clave meeting to tell Simon that he will be sent back to New York by Aldertree, the new Inquisitor. When Simon arrives to leave for home, it is revealed as a trap to bring people back to the Clave's trust and he is imprisoned and is questioned on his new ability to walk in daylight as a vampire. After the questioning, he befriends a fellow prisoner named Samuel Blackburn.
After Clary opens the portal and goes through it, she falls into Lake Lyn and Luke is able to save her, but as she comes out of the lake, she starts to hallucinate. Luke decides to take her to his sister, Amatis. After treatment, Clary wakes up in a bedroom and meets Amatis. She is warned that she is not allowed to see Jace. Even with the warning, she sneaks out to find Jace. She later finds Jace in the Lightwood house library, kissing Aline. After seeing this, Clary runs away. After a while, Sebastian joins Clary and drops her back to Amatis's home.
Later, Alec finds out that Simon never made it back home and is prisoned in Alicante, and at night Jace goes to visit Simon and save him, but Simon refuses to escape, because it would shine suspicions on the Lightwoods. The next morning in Simon's cell he finds that Isabelle has left blood for him. Raphael visits Simon and informs him that he is now being hunted by every Downworlder, because of his Daylighter powers. In the morning, Clary is woken up by Sebastian to find Ragnor Fell, but instead they find Magnus who tells them that Fell is dead. Magnus then informs Clary on where to find a cure to save Clary's mother with the Book of White. With this, Clary travels back to Amatis' home.
When Clary returns, she informs Jace that they need the Book of White, and they set off on a journey to find it. Clary draws a portal to Wayland Manor, where a trapped angel reveals that Clary received angel blood in the womb, and Jace received demon blood. They give a seraph blade to the angel, who then stabs himself. Both of them barely make it out alive before the manor collapses, as it was tied to the life force of the angel.
On their way back, they find out that Alicante is being attacked by demons. In the battle, the youngest of the Lightwood family, Max, is killed. After the battle, Clary and Jace rescue Simon from the prison and realized that his fellow prison mate was Hodge.
After a few days, they have a funeral for the people who were killed in the attack. Later that day, Simon meets up with Isabelle to comfort her as Jace walks Clary back to Amatis's place. Clary then meets up with her mother, whom she is very angry at. Later, her mother tells her the truth: Jace was raised by Valentine, but is not his biological son, but rather Sebastian is, and by extension Clary's brother.
Clary runs to the Accord Hall to work out a plan to make both Shadowhunters and Downworlders fight together, and during the decision process, Jocelyn, Clary's mom, reveals the truth, and in the end, the Clave decides that both can work together to win the battle. This allows Clary to use her rune abilities to create an alliance rune that allows Downworlders and Shadowhunters to share their powers. All Downworlders agree to this except for the vampires led by Raphael. He has a condition saying that the vampires will only fight if Clary hands over Simon to kill him. Clary comes up with a plan and draws a rune on Simon's forehead called the Mark of Cain which only Daylighters can have. This protects Simon as anyone who tries to attack him will die, which means that Raphael cannot kill him.
Meanwhile Jace fights Sebastian and is about to die when Isabelle rescues him. Together, they kill Sebastian. Jace tracks down Valentine at Lake Lyn, where he is about to raise the Angel Raziel. He also finds Clary there, who Portaled there but was bound by Valentine. Valentine kills Jace, using his blood for the summoning. However, right before Valentine finishes the ritual, Clary erases the runes in the sand that symbolize his name and instead writes hers over them. The angel rises, but as Valentine is no longer the one who summons him, the Angel kills Valentine and grants Clary's wish to bring Jace back to life. The story ends with the confession of love between Jocelyn and Luke.