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Everything (13/13)

Magnus has relived that night more times than he can count. In the almost month since Alec nearly died in his arms once again, the entire experience has stretched across his consciousness like a bank of clouds, dark with an impending storm, offering little reprieve and almost no chance of escape.

Chapter One / Chapter Two / Chapter Three / Chapter Four / Chapter Five / Chapter Six / Chapter Seven / Chapter Eight / Chapter Nine / Chapter Ten / Chapter Eleven / Chapter Twelve

(Sequel to “Anything”)

For @laelipoo. Thanks for keeping me sane!

Chapter Thirteen: Where Do We Go From Here?

Magnus has relived that night more times than he can count. In the almost month since Alec nearly died in his arms once again, the entire experience has stretched across his consciousness like a bank of clouds, dark with an impending storm, offering little reprieve and almost no chance of escape.

He remembers clearly the way Simon had rushed into the infirmary, tears in his eyes and a hitch in his voice as he tried to speak through the hysteria visibly racking his body. But though Magnus had only been able to pick out a few scattered words – Alec, bleeding – Simon’s panic was more than sufficient to tell the story.

The words still taste like ash in his mouth, the way he had asked without even thinking, “Is he still alive?” just like Isabelle, all those weeks before. And with one tight nod from Simon, Magnus was moving.

There had been so much blood, far more than he’d been expecting as the image of Alec, sliced open on the ground, resting in Jace’s lap met him once he stepped through the door. And he can remember the way he had hesitated, how his feet had felt as if they were fused to the floor as the more conscious part of his brain tried to make sense of what was before him.

They’d only been gone a short while. Twenty, maybe thirty minutes had passed since Alec and Jace left the infirmary with smiles on their faces. And yet something had happened in that span of time that brought them all to that moment.

When he finally was able to make it to Alec’s side, the thought had come to him about how lucky they were. Which had seemed ridiculous, given the way Alec’s life was quite literally leaking from his body at an alarming rate. But if the Circle member that had slashed him had been right handed instead of left, it would have been Alec’s heart cut in half. Or if Raphael had been taller, or Alec shorter, it would have been his neck, his head. As it stood, there had been hope, however faint, and so they were lucky.

Holding Alec’s life in his hands, it had felt different from the track. Finding Alec then had been far easier than digging through the darkness of Alec’s fading soul in search of what was left of the spark of his life. And he had been so weak, Magnus had, his magic so depleted that even the search felt like it might end him. But as soon as he discovered it, his only thought had been to pull. To grab ahold of it with whatever was left of his magic and pull.

And then…

Then Alec had spoken, had said the sorts of things whose only result could be a shattered heart when put up beside the life leeching from his body, pooling on the floor. His blood soaking into the knees of Magnus’ pants as he continued to hold on in spite of what Alec was saying.

As if Magnus had never considered it, had not stood in that aisle, staring at Alec in that tuxedo, and wondered. But you cannot marry a corpse, and so for what had felt like the hundredth time that evening he had pushed down his own emotions in favor of protecting Alec.

It had tried to drag him down, the way he clung to the spark, feeble and dim. He was too weak, too tired, too drained by a night spent saving the lives of others, leaving him so little to save the only life that mattered. So when Jace offered his hand, offered his strength, Magnus had reached out without a second thought.

He had been careful with Alec, the night they saved Luke. But he had opened the floodgates with Jace, pulled at Jace’s life like a drowning man, dragging everything near down with him. And he had wanted to take it all, had been willing, in that desperate moment, to drain everyone in the room dry if that was what it took because the responsibility that had hung around his neck like a noose could be shared, couldn’t it?

With Jace, who was supposed to protect him. Or with Raphael, whose life Alec had tried to trade in the bargain for his own. But he could not do it – could not take everything from Jace, even though he had offered it (take it all). Could not pull from Raphael, even though the sense of guilt he was feeling hung about him like a stench. Because in the end, the blame rested solely on his own shoulders and he knew it.

He should never have let Alec out of his sight. It had been just that simple.

Every time he has closed his eyes in the last month, he has been right back there. Which is likely why he has drained many a liquor cabinet dry as he, Zoe and Catarina have bounced around the globe in search of a peace that Magnus knows he will not find until Alec is back with him. Safe with him, even though he is not sure if that is even possible any longer. But still, he drinks, because while it may not keep the nightmares at bay, it does at least dull their effects, which is something.

It is not much, but it is something.

They are in Paris this week, as if perhaps he thought the City of Love would keep him from dreaming of Alec’s death. As of yet, it has not worked, and in fact last night brought the most brutal recreation of them all.

It had left him shaking in his bed, with aching fingers and blood in his palms from where his nails had broken through skin, his throat raw from the way he had likely been screaming in his sleep. And like many a night before, he had crawled into bed with Zoe under the pretense that he was doing it to bring her a sense of comfort she has needed every bit as much as him ever since she learned of what happened to Alec. But that is not why he did it; it is never why he does it.

He knows that she is not really their daughter, no matter how many times Alec seems to want to make absent claims of the sort. But holding Zoe in his arms brings him a faint sense of serenity that he can find nowhere else in his life of late. And he knows it is because when he is near her, he feels as if he is near Alec as well. Near to a life that, while never promised to them, was still a flicker of a dream, dancing on the horizon.

The three of them, together.

Catarina is back in New York today. She has been a stalwart friend through all of this, a pillar for him to lean against, but she does still have a job, one she needs to return to periodically. And so today, it has just been him and Zoe.

Catarina had asked him repeatedly this morning if he was sure he would be okay without her. I can do my rounds with her, she had said, take Zoe along, make a girl’s day of it. But he has known Catarina for centuries and so he could clearly pick the concern out of her voice.

It had been insulting, as if she thought that he could not even manage the simple task of watching Zoe for a day in the state he was in. And he had told her as much, made it clear that her insinuations cut. Only now, as he sits on a park bench in the waning daylight and watches Zoe play with other children because in her training, if in nothing else, Magnus has seemingly succeeded, all he wants is a drink. Either that or a fire message from Isabelle.

Because she is an angel, she has been in sporadic contact with Magnus ever since the attack on the Institute. The one Magnus fled as soon as Alec was in seemingly stable condition because even in his grief and shock, he was aware enough to realize that if he stayed much longer, he would likely be arrested and be no good to either of them.

She has been sending him fire messages, though. And despite the terse, almost heartless nature of their contents, they have been a lifeline for him throughout this trying month. One he may not have survived without their assistance.

The first one had come roughly twelve hours after he left: He is alive. And over the weeks, there have been more.

He is awake.

He is speaking.

He is sitting up.

He is eating on his own.

He is standing.

He is walking.

The last one was nine days ago, when Alec evidently took his first steps in weeks. And he knows that if his condition worsened, Isabelle would tell him. Or at least he thinks she would. But he had grown accustomed to receiving word every few days and so, like an addict, the not knowing makes his skin itch.

He’s thinking about those three words – he and is and walking – his vision blurring as he watches Zoe and a girl roughly her own age spinning on a merry-go-round when his phone buzzes shrilly in his pocket.

He does not need to check the caller ID because there is only one person in the world that has this number.

“Where are you right now?” Catarina asks without so much as a hello, Magnus, how has your day been?

He looks around him to remember his bearings.

“We are at the playground near the Tuileries Garden, Rue de Rivoli.”

Because in the hundred and forty years since Bell invented the telephone Catarina never bothered to learn the intricacies of polite phone etiquette, she hangs up with a missing goodbye to match her lack of hello.

Her portal opens a few moments later, somewhere a few dozen yards away and behind him, by the sound of it. But he does not bother to look mostly because he is simply too tired to even swivel his head.

“I brought you something from home,” she says as she plops down onto the bench beside him.

“If it is another mini Statue of Liberty, I want you to know that I have been throwing them away for decades.”

“No, it’s better,” she says, and he can hear it now, in her voice. Something almost resembling glee. And so his heart is already racing when he looks up at her and follows the way she tips her head to the side.

To Alec.

For a moment, he is utterly frozen, staring at Alec like he’s some cruel mirage, a dream brought to life only to shatter the moment Magnus reaches out for him. But the way Alec shifts awkwardly, ducking his head and shoving his hands in his pockets as he blushes behind a now full beard, the pink rising all the way to the corners of his eyes – it is so Alec that it makes Magnus realize just how real this is.

His legs shake as he gets to his feet, threatening to give out on him before he can cross the distance between them. And the sense of uncertainty he is feeling is overpowering, like he does not know what he is supposed to do here, with him. Because he has not truly allowed himself to even hope for this, has been bracing himself subconsciously for a future without him, and so having him here, now, close enough to touch?

It is a bit much to wrap his mind around.

He hugs Alec out of reflex, out of the need to simply feel his arms wrapped around Alec’s body so he can assure himself that he is real. But when Alec flinches, the month of nightmares collapses on him like an avalanche.

He pulls back immediately, an apology on his tongue, but before he can say anything Alec is speaking. His voice hoarse, cracking around something resembling a sob as he reaches out to Magnus and says, “No, please, come back.”

He does not wish to cause Alec pain, either physical or emotional, and so he is torn. But only until Alec’s hands are on his shoulders, pulling him back in.

It is difficult not to imagine what he is resting against, to imagine the blood that had poured from a wound still present beneath two thin layers of fabric. But when he takes in one deep breath through his nose, breathes in Alec’s scent, the images begin to flicker like they are the mirage, the fabrication. Like reality does not exist outside of Alec’s body, pressed against his.

There are other things to ignore as well, like the way Alec is clearly thinner, with less muscle mass than before. How his arms, while still powerful, are not as strong as they used to be. But none of that matters because none of that is permanent. And so the only thing he wishes to focus on is this.

There are tears on his cheeks, ones Alec is shedding as well, judging by the slight, quiet way his body shakes as he cries into the curve of Magnus’ neck. His hands rising to fist in Magnus’ hair, holding him tight, holding him close. And it is more than he could have ever hoped for, more than he could have dreamed after the Institute.

When Alec reaches out to lift Magnus’ head, his breath catches at the sight of Alec’s face, this close. At sharper lines and hollowed cheeks, hidden beneath the beard. At a dimness to his eyes that makes them look almost murky. But then Alec’s lips are on his, soft and chaste, and it quiets his concerns so thoroughly that his entire body is instantly flooded with a warm sense of peace.

He is alive, Magnus reminds himself. He is here and he is alive. Everything else is meaningless detail to be worked out later because, as of this very moment, they have a later.

“I was so worried that your progress had slipped,” he admits when he rests his forehead on the uninjured side of Alec’s chest, his hands wrapped over the tops of Alec’s shoulders like that is the only thing holding either of them up. “It has been over a week since I last heard from your sister.”

“My sister?” Alec asks, his voice sleepy almost as he presses his cheek to the side of Magnus’ head and sighs.

“She’s been sending me fire messages ever since the attack, keeping me appraised of your condition.”

“That’s not possible,” he says as he turns his head so that his lips tickle Magnus’ hair. “She and Jace were under house arrest until a few days ago. My mother confiscated their steles the morning after the attack.”

That is curious, Magnus thinks as Alec adds, “You sure you weren’t just hallucinating them?”

But even though Magnus says, “That must have been it,” he’s fairly certain that he has already figured out the missing piece to this particular puzzle.

It is no wonder the messages sounded so cold.

He does not spend any more time on that issue, though, leaning back instead to ask, “How are you here?” Because if Isabelle and Jace were under arrest until only recently, it stands to reason that Alec was as well.

“You mean why aren’t I in the Silent City?” he asks, and there is a smile on his lips now. One that, while tired, is the most beautiful sight Magnus has seen in a long while. “It’s seems like I’m a Shadowhunter again.”

A surge of relief presses through Magnus’ blood. “They have reinstated you?”

“Even better,” Alec replies as the smile pushes wider on his lips while his arms settle loosely around Magnus’ waist. “They offered me a new job.”

Magnus quirks his head.

“You’re looking at the new Ambassador to the New York Downworld.”

“I… was not aware such a position existed,” Magnus says as his eyes thin in confusion.

“It didn’t. I’m the first. And it gets better.”

Magnus is not sure how anything could be better than Alec, alive and no longer on the run from the Clave. But he’s still willing to play along and so he asks, “How so?”

“Before I accepted I… um… sort of gave them an ultimatum.”

Magnus’ stomach sinks as he sighs Alec’s name into the small space between them.

“No, it’s good, trust me. I told them that the only way I’d take the job was if they dropped the charges against you and Zoe. Completely.”

“And they went for that?”

He shrugs. “Not at first. The Inquisitor, she tried to threaten me with the other way.”

“Banishment?” Magnus asks, unable to hide the horror in his voice.

But Alec just shrugs once more.

“Alexander, that was a dangerous card to play.”

Alec tightens his grip on Magnus at that. “I wasn’t about to give up on you guys. So I told her I’d be fine with that. That I always wanted to be a farmer. That I had a little plot of land picked out and everything.”

“You didn’t.”

“Oh I did. And… well… I may have also told them about the threat of the Downworlders leaving the Accords, and how if they kept going after you the split was pretty much assured.”

“You’ve become quite the politician,” Magnus says, but though his voice is a touch lighter, he still feels sick to his stomach.

“Yeah, but so I implied that if she tried to go after you again the whole Downworld would be in open revolt and, lo and behold, she took the deal. I think almost dying at the hands of the Circle made her a little desperate, you know?”

“Alec,” Magnus says as he tries to wrap his mind around what exactly is happening here.

But Alec just reaches up again, cups Magnus’ face in his hands and says, “You’re free, Magnus. Both of you are. You… we can go home.”

They can go home.

Together.

Before he can thoroughly process this new bit of information, they are interrupted by the sharp scream of one very happy twelve-year-old girl. And as he watches Alec sink to his knees, absorbing Zoe’s running leap, the concern of earlier presses sharply through his body.

“Be careful, dear,” he says as he reaches out for Zoe, ready to pull her back if necessary.

But Alec just holds up a hand, using the other to wrap around Zoe’s waist and hold her close as he says, “She’s fine.” His head turning so that his face is now buried in her neck as he adds, “She’s perfect.”

And as Magnus looks down at them, curled around each other in the dying light of day, Alec’s words burn brightly in his mind:

We can go home.

~*~

It takes Magnus a few days to find the right loft, one with enough room and a good enough view to satisfy all of his varied qualifications. But he’s still hoping for the same things he’s always been – for this to be more than just his home, alone through the years. And so he wants to make sure that it is absolutely perfect, just in case.

Alec is with him today, taking advantage of only half days of work while he continues recuperating. And for some reason Magnus’ insides are twisted into knots as he walks Alec through the condo, freshly bought for cash up front because Magnus has managed to accrue more than his fair share of wealth over the years.

It is like he is a boy again, out on his first date. And it makes him wish that he could slap himself across the face without Alec noticing and worrying because it is silly to feel this way, after everything they have been through.

His anxiety reaches a fevered pitch when they settle outside the room at the far end of the hall on the first floor, his palm sweaty as it wraps around the gilded knob so he can swing the door into the room.

There is already a bed in there, with plain, unadorned gray sheets and a utilitarian, black metal floor lamp hooked up to the light switch. And he’s hoping that the room’s purpose will be obvious, once he turns on the light. But the way Alec scrunches up his left eye in an expression that has oddly been climbing the ranks of Magnus’ favorites tells him that he will likely need to explain himself.

“What’s this one for?” Alec asks, sealing the deal.

Magnus does his best to not allow his voice to shake when he says, “I thought it could be yours.”

“Mine?”

“Yes, yours. I know that you are mending things at the Institute, and so you will probably take up residence there again, but I thought until then, or even after, I would offer… a place. Offer you a place, whenever you might want it.”

He sounds like an utter imbecile, but at least he is not backing out, which is something he feared he would do. It’s why he brought in the bed. Because he knew if he didn’t, if he opened the door to an empty room, he would have been more likely to simply say this is my third study because I am the type of person that needs three studies and leave it at that.

“That’s sweet and all, Magnus,” Alec says in the voice he uses when he is forcing himself to be polite. “But I already had a place in mind.”

Magnus paints a smile on his face and flips his head to the side to indicate how completely fine he is right now. “Oh! That’s wonderful, Alec, that you are branching out. Is the place in Brooklyn? Or is it closer to the Institute?”

Alec laughs, which does very little to help Magnus’ mood. His voice lighter, losing its tight civility when he says, “Magnus, I meant…”

He trails off there, pointing vaguely into the air above him. But Magnus’ apartment is the penthouse of this building, so unless Alec was planning on pitching a tent on the roof…

“I meant your room,” he says with another laugh as he grabs Magnus’ shoulders and leans down so he can look him directly in the eye. “Or… like… our room. I was… I don’t know… thinking that maybe I could move in? With you?”

“Oh,” Magnus says before Alec’s words finally settle in.

Oh.

“It’s just, I want to live here, I do. I was sort of hoping you’d ask, actually, because, full disclosure, I’ve been kind of sick worrying about asking myself. But I don’t need a separate room here because… I don’t know, your bed is always more comfortable than mine?”

“This bed is an identical match to mine,” Magnus says as if he thinks that Alec is only asking to move into his room with him – his bed with him, on a permanent basis – because he thinks that Magnus only splurges on his own sleeping arrangements.

Alec laughs, but this time the sound settles over Magnus like warm water.

“Yeah,” he says as he sways into Magnus’ space, reaching down to link his wrists over the small of Magnus’ back. “But if you’re not in it, then the comfort level drops by, like, 800% at least.”

“That is a very high percentage,” Magnus replies as he leans in to the way Alec is now pressing his lips to his forehead.

His words muffled by Magnus’ skin when he says, “You’re very comfortable.”

“So this will be the guest bedroom then,” Magnus says brightly as he lifts his head so that he can look into Alec’s eyes, grown brighter already in the few days since Paris.

“Unless, of course, you could think of anyone else you would like to have move into the loft? I could add another floor even, if you had the strange inclination to turn this into a halfway house.”

“Actually,” Alec says as he raises one hand to rub the back of his own neck. And there is a shyness to his tone now, a hesitation in his eyes that piques Magnus’ attention instantly.

“There was someone.”

“Let me guess? Isabelle?” he asks, still trying to play this off as a joke until he is sure of what Alec is asking.

“No I was thinking… Zoe?”

Magnus’ breath locks in his own throat.

“I don’t know, Magnus, I was thinking… hoping, anyway, that we could… like… keep her?” He sighs. “That makes her sound like a puppy. I don’t think she’s a puppy, I just thought… I don’t know what I thought, that I could move in maybe and that we could take care of her. Together. Like we have been only more… permanent?”

Magnus must be making a very strange face, because something starts to sink in Alec’s expression as he continues.

“I know we’re both kind of workaholics, but I talked to Cat and she said she’d help. And I’m sure everyone else would be willing to chip in, too, you know? With, like, babysitting and stuff. And I mean, we’ve sort of already been doing it, right? And I figured if we could do it while we were on the run from the Clave, how much easier would it be to do it now? When we don’t have to worry about crap like that?”

“You talked to Catarina about this?” he asks because he is incapable of focusing on anything else Alec just said.

“Yeah. I wanted to run it by her first, see if she thought I was crazy to ask.”

“And what was her assessment?”

Alec smiles crookedly and rubs the back of his neck again. “Fifty percent you’d say no, fifty percent you’d pin me to the bed and kiss me senseless?”

Magnus smiles at the joke, but the smile doesn’t even come close to matching the way he’s feeling inside.

He feels as if he has just awoken from the best dream of his life, only to realize that it was not, in fact, a dream.

“Those aren’t very good odds,” he says, continuing the tease.

And his expression must be softening sufficiently as well because Alec’s voice is smooth when he replies, “I’ve worked with worse,” and leans in to press a kiss to Magnus’ cheek.

“So is that a yes then?” he asks a moment later, his eyes a mixture of worry and hope.

And Magnus can almost not temper the joy in his own voice when he says, “If that is truly what you want, then yes, Alec, it is a yes. Only this cannot be her room.”

“Why’s that?” he asks, his eyes narrowing in faux suspicion.

“Because I had already picked out a much larger one for her at the other end of the loft.”

Alec beams at that, and Magnus feels buoyed by the intense levels of promise latent in that single expression.

“I have a present for you,” Alec says on the other side of the smile, his eyes sparkling with mischief now as he leads Magnus to the end of the bed and pushes him down to a sitting position. “Stay here. And close your eyes.”

There are very few people Magnus is comfortable shutting his eyes around for any extended period of time, but Alec is at the top of that particular list and so he does as he is told.

He can hear wheels on the hardwood in the hall a minute or so later, the sound dulled when Alec pulls what is likely some sort of cart onto the new, plush bedroom carpeting. And then he is sitting down next to Magnus on the bed and saying a quiet but excited, “Open them.”

When Magnus sees what Alec has brought him, he can completely understand why he had been so excited.

“The salvage team found it at the loft,” Alec says as Magnus runs one hand almost reverently over the large safe placed in front of him. “It was the only thing that survived the fire. It’s been in evidence collection ever since. Once the charges were dropped, though, I convinced them to give it to me so I could give it back to you. Since no one could figure out how to open it anyway, they were pretty quick to comply.”

Magnus pushes a wave of magic over the safe at that, releasing the locks instantly.

“Well, that works,” Alec says with a small laugh. “Anyway, I figured it was probably pretty important, given that it was a giant magical safe and all. So… um… happy housewarming, I guess.”

Magnus pulls his hand back from the safe, but only so he can turn to Alec, hold his face in his hands and place a soft kiss to his lips.

“Thank you for this, Alexander. This safe holds my most precious belongings.”

“So what, like jewels and stuff? Original shares in Apple computers?”

Magnus smiles, brushes his lips to Alec’s jaw and pulls back. His voice softer than it has been in weeks when he replies, “No, even more precious than that.”

When he opens the safe and Alec finally sets eyes on its contents, he releases a small, “Huh,” that indicates it is not what he was expecting. And Magnus cannot blame him.

Most people fill their safes with the exact kinds of belongings Alec mentioned. With money, or things that are worth a lot of money, like Ming vases. But when you have lived as long as Magnus has, have created storehouses of wealth on six of the seven of the earth’s continents, the word value takes on an entirely new meaning.

“This was the first, and only birthday card Raphael ever made for me,” he says as he takes the small, brown paper card from the top of the safe and hands it over to Alec. And it is a testament to how wonderful of a person Alec is that he treats the card as if it were made of the world’s finest, most delicate china.

“So Raphael knows when your birthday is and I don’t?” he asks, but his voice is not hurt so much as it is interested.

“I do not know when my actual birthday is,” he replies as he runs his fingers through the belongings neatly organized inside the safe. Over Ragnor’s photo album, a log from the fire that had almost consumed Catarina the night he both met her and saved her life. “Warlocks do not tend to celebrate them as it would be silly to commemorate every year in a life stretching into centuries.”

Magnus looks to Alec then, and there is an expression of such disappointment on his face that it almost makes him laugh.

“Are you upset that you will never be able to throw me a birthday party?” he asks as he trails his fingers gently through Alec’s beard.

“What? No. I was just… wondering. Something. Um. I was wondering about this,” he says, holding up the card like a shield. “If you don’t celebrate birthdays, when and why did he give you a card?”

“It was a few months after he came to stay with me, and he was feeling… particularly down,” Magnus replies as he takes the card and sets it gently back into the safe. “I thought if I gave him something to celebrate, it might lift his spirits.”

“Did it?”

Magnus lets his thought drift back in memory now, to the way Raphael had smiled for the first time since he met him that night as Magnus introduced him to every Downworlder within a three-city area. To people like him.

“Yes, as a matter of fact it did.”

Before Magnus can add anything to the story, Alec is reaching into the safe, his voice almost appalled when he pulls a piece of fabric out and says, “Hey, that’s my shirt!”

Alec is correct; it is, in fact, his shirt. And Magnus might feel embarrassed by its discovery if not for the fact that a few short minutes ago Alec asked to move in with him so they could essentially raise Zoe together. So the only thing he is feeling is incredibly secure.

“I’ve been looking all over for this,” Alec says as he runs his hands over the worn cotton. “Where did you get it?”

“It is entirely possible that I stole it from your room when I was at the Institute doing the autopsy on the Forsaken that attacked you,” he says without a single ounce of shame in his voice.

Alec smiles at him, the crooked, confused one when he asks, “Why?”

“It was the one you were wearing the night we had drinks together, the night we saved Luke. I thought…” He pauses so he can take a deep breath before admitting, “I thought that if things went… another way, with us, that I might want a small token to remember you by.”

The way Alec is looking at him, his eyes full of openness, acceptance, makes Magnus’ heart ache, and so he adds, “Plus, I wanted to save you from ever having to wear it again. It is a remarkably hideous piece of clothing, and that is saying something, coming from your wardrobe.”

“Hey!” Alec bites as he pulls the shirt to his chest like he is trying to protect it. “This was one of my nicest t-shirts. I was trying to look good for you.”

Magnus laughs and rests a palm over the side of Alec’s neck, swiping his thumb up along his jaw. “And I appreciate the effort, but might I suggest next time asking Isabelle or Jace for advice?”

“You’re a jerk,” Alec says, but the way he pulls Magnus’ hand to his mouth so that he can kiss the center of his palm tells a different story entirely.

“It’s too bad you didn’t put your poems in here,” he says next, the mischief back in full force, dancing in his eyes.

“Oh, don’t worry, I have them all memorized,” Magnus replies, playing along. And he is having so much fun with this game that it actually takes him off guard when Alec leans in to kiss him.

It is not as heated as the ones they shared before the incident at the Institute, but Alec’s hands are on him a moment later, rucking up his shirt, trying to find skin as he leans over in an attempt to push Magnus down onto the bed. But Magnus resists him as the same fears he’s been dealing with the past few days begin to work through his system.

“Magnus,” Alec moans when he slides to the side, out of Alec’s reach. And his eyes are so full of need already that it makes Magnus’ breath hitch in his chest.

“What?” Alec asks, his voice angry almost as he returns to a sitting position and glares out at Magnus in defiance, for lack of any better way to describe it.

“Alec, you are still hurt.”

Alec sighs. Deeply.

“Magnus, it’s been a month since we’ve been together. Four weeks, actually. Four weeks, two days, and…” he pauses so that he can take his cell phone out of his pocket to check the time, “eleven hours, give or take a few minutes because I didn’t check the time before we ducked into that closet. But it’s been a month, Magnus, and… and I’m not made of glass.”

“I do not think that you are made of glass,” Magnus replies even though there is evidently a part of him that fears exactly that.

Alec chews on the corner of his bottom lip before nodding his head and saying a quick, “Okay.” And then he is taking off his shirt, lifting the black cotton tee over his head in a way that steals Magnus’ breath more thoroughly than anything that came before it.

He does not want to look at it, does not even want to lay eyes for a moment on the scar slicing its way across Alec’s torso. But when he turns his head away, Alec says, “Magnus, please, look at me,” in a voice so desperate that he does not have the heart to resist.

He looks at Alec, trailing his eyes down from Alec’s face to the marred flesh beneath. And it shakes him all the way to his core to see the puffed up skin marking the wound that almost took Alec’s life.

“I’m sill here,” Alec says. And Magnus doesn’t quite get his words until Alec reaches out for his hand so he can lift it to his chest, press Magnus’ palm flat over the uppermost portion of the wound.

He begins to drag Magnus’ hand downward then, over the expanse of the scar. His grip shaky around Magnus’ wrist to match the tremor in his voice when he says, “This isn’t… it’s not a sign of something bad that happened, it’s not a marking of, like, a curse or something. It’s a testament, Magnus, to the fact that I’m still here, with you.”

He raises Magnus’ hand so he can rest a kiss along his knuckles.

“I’m not going anywhere. And neither are my organs, if that’s what you’re afraid of. That you’re going to, like, jar them out of my body or something. I’m okay. I’m stitched up, I’m healing, and I’m okay.”

He reaches down, takes both of Magnus’ hands in his own and squeezes.

“It’s not a reminder of me almost dying, it’s a reminder of me living. Of you, saving my life. Of me needing you more than I ever have before and you being there, finding me because that’s what we do, right? We find each other. We’ll always find each other.”

“What do you want from me, Alec?” he asks quietly when he’s finally able to remove his eyes from the scar long enough to look Alec in the eye.

Alec moves closer at that, resting his forehead against Magnus’ so that he can feel Alec’s breath warm over his lips when he says, “What I’ve always wanted, Magnus. Everything. Every… every part of you.”

In that moment, Magnus surrenders. But he refuses to give up caution entirely, and so he makes sure that every kiss, every touch between them is as gentle as possible.

He knows exactly what Alec had meant when he said everything, remembers the way Alec had looked up at him at the Dumort, the way he had reacted their last night in Indonesia. And he does not wish to hurt him, to put too much pressure on a body that has only been back on its feet for less than two weeks. But he made a promise to himself beside that lake that he would never deny Alec anything again so long as he could help it, and if he is completely honest with himself, this is not something that even he wants to help.

Magnus wants Alec every bit as much as Alec wants him, perhaps even more so after he came so close to losing him. So he submits to that desire, stripping Alec down until there is only skin remaining, allowing Alec to do the same for him. And then Alec is on his hands and knees and Magnus…

It wants to remind him of the day after Zoe’s arrival, of letting his magic slip and burning Alec’s neck. But he shoves that memory aside as he drags his palm down Alec’s spine, feeling the way Alec shivers at his touch all the way into his own bones.

So much of their time together these past few months has been heated, fast and hard like they were both afraid that any moment they would be torn apart. But they are home now, they are safe and free and home, and so Magnus takes his time, relishing the fact that a slow burn is no less of a burn than the flash fires they are used to.

He is thorough in his work as he summons lubrication and begins teasing Alec open, taking his time to both decrease his discomfort and increase his pleasure. And he can feel Alec coming undone beneath his fingers already, beneath his lips, just like that night in Indonesia.

He uses small touches of magic to keep Alec’s heart rate level, because he cannot entirely erase the fear. But if Alec minds it, he does not mention it. And the soft, breathy moans escaping where Alec’s mouth is bit around a pillow this time to save himself further injury indicate that he is enjoying this.

The spark is easy to find now that he knows where to look for it, the one that represents the life inside of him. Alec’s burns blue, like the center of a flame, like Magnus’ own magic. But though on that awful night the blue had been barely a small fleck of ice, melting away, it is strong today. Alec had not been lying about that, how he is okay, not made of the glass Magnus had been dreading.

He keeps constant track of the spark, his magic licking around it, keeping it safe as he adds another finger and stretches in a way that makes Alec release a low, keening hum. He tries not to pay attention to that, though, or to the way Alec’s muscles feel, bending to his will, extending open to accommodate him. Because he needs to keep his focus here.

That proves to be a very difficult endeavor when he slicks himself up and slides inside.

When Alec had told him he wanted this at the Dumort, it had overwhelmed him. The earnestness with which he’d asked for it, the soft plea in his voice had, at the time, been far too much for him. How Alec had offered him something he had only ever dreamed of up to that point. But here? Now?

Once he is inside, Alec tenses at the pull. But Magnus simply places his palms around Alec’s hips and lets another pulse of magic slip into his skin, emanating out from the spark he will not release until they are through, if ever. Protecting it like it is the most precious thing in Magnus’ world because it is.

The spark only gets brighter as they go, flashing in a way that seems blinding behind Magnus’ shut tight eyelids the first time he allows himself to thrust. And he imagines that this is what it is like to be inches from a burning star. Not a dancing light overhead, but the roaring fire of an actual star, burning beneath his skin.

He was wrong, that night at the loft. He is not a supernova; he is a nebula, the place where stars are born. And in that realization, in this moment, Magnus is able to feel it.

There is no explanation for it. The spell had only been a temporary one, not meant to last beyond a few days. And it is not like he had almost died alongside Alec at the Institute, that they were bound in such a way that if one of them were to slip from existence, the other would as well. But he can still feel it here, now, as he loses himself to the rhythm of his body, buried in Alec’s.

He can feel Alec. Beneath him, around him, but also within him. And it is only a faint presence, hardly more than the flicker of a candle, but it is there, and Magnus is not entirely sure what he is supposed to make of that.

It has been months now since the spell but it feels fresh, like waking up next to Alec finally and feeling every panicked emotion in his own blood only it is not panic here. It is pleasure. Alec’s. Simple. Raw. Deep. And it makes Magnus’ spine burn, makes his muscles ache as he reaches beneath him to take Alec in his hand, slick skin against slick skin.

He loses himself. Feels both removed from his body and in touch with every single nerve ending. And Magnus has done this many times before, is centuries past the point where he would count acts or even partners, but he has never felt like this before. Like he is experiencing literal heaven, a place he always assumed his demon blood had locked him out of.

Alec reaches back for his hand. And though it upsets the balance, Magnus removes his free hand from Alec’s hip so he can take it. Can hold it in his own as he buries himself deep enough finally to reach the spot at the core of Alec. The one he had been working towards all along.

The sensation that floods Alec when he does so is overwhelming, forcing Alec to choke out a strangled cry as he slips down to one elbow. And Magnus cannot help the way he simply collapses over Alec’s back and comes at the same time that Alec spills over his hand. Their connection fading into the background as he presses his lips to the sweaty skin of Alec’s shoulder blade and attempts to remember what it feels like to breathe.

Even when they both roll to the side, Alec refuses to let go of his hand. And it makes for an awkward position, his arm pulled over and wrapped under Alec as he pulls out of him and uses his magic to clean them up as best he can. But his heart is thundering in his chest, beating in time to the strong pulse he can feel where he is pressed to Alec’s back, and so the discomfort of their embrace is of little consequence to him.

He almost laughs when he realizes what this is, how this is only the beginning, the starting line of a life they have agreed to somehow share with one another. And as he lets his magic unspool from around the spark, now flashing stronger than he has ever felt it, he allows himself a few fleeting moments to imagine what that might be like.

Sixty years, give or take, just like this.

“I thought gray wasn’t a style,” Alec asks what could be either minutes or hours later, his voice sleepy as he presses a soft kiss to Magnus’ wrist and curls into the rather bland sheets Magnus had chosen especially for him.

“That it was barely even a color?”

Magnus laughs. It’s light and quiet, but it feels like the world to him as he says, “Somehow, it has managed to grow on me.”

“I’m glad you’re finally open to my suggestions, because I had some ideas for the rest of the loft.”

Magnus laughs again, twice in a row like that is something he is all of a sudden capable of as he trails his lips gently over the back of Alec’s neck. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, darling. I will allow you to finish off the guest room, but I make no promises about the rest of the space.”

“Zoe’s room, too,” he says, and Magnus actually bucks at that, given how serious his tone sounds.

“Why Zoe’s room?”

“Because she’s not six years old, Magnus, and unicorns are terrible.”

His third laugh is more of a snort than an actual laugh, but it feels just as good as the previous two as he asks, “Are you trying to tell me that I did not do a good job of decorating her previous bedroom?”

“Let’s just say that at least the fire served one good purpose.”

Magnus pulls his hand free of Alec’s so that he can roll him over, pin him to the bed and kiss him senseless, exactly the way Catarina had half predicted. And he doesn’t even care that Alec just technically called his decorating tacky because sometimes the retaliation can be worth it.

And this is. All of this is incredibly worth it. Every struggle, every misery, every pain that they’ve experienced from the moment Zoe was placed in their lives has been worth it simply because it has brought them here. And as far as places go, here is, as Alec would say, pretty freaking terrific.

Ah! So I wanted to first just thank every single one of you lovely people for reading, commenting, meta-ing, here and on AO3, and just being incredibly awesome. I'm so super new to this fandom, and everyone has just been so wonderful and welcoming and I can't say enough how much I love you all!

And second, I wanted to say that there will be a third story in this verse. I always sort of wanted to go that way, with the third one focusing plot-wise on the battle with Valentine, and as I got closer to the end of this one, the plot just started exploding in my head. So it's coming. I will probably take a short break to figure out the plot a bit more concretely, and to freak out over the start of the new season (OMG THREE MORE DAYS YOU GUYS HOLY CRAP), but I will be back. And I hope you all will be too!

*blows kisses*

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