so uh, whoops? That ReWatch & Coda Writing thing last year didn't quite happen? BUT HEY. It's never too late. Or something like that.
HAVE SOME DOROTHEA 💜
#DotDeservedBetter
The Frays’ apartment was ruined.
That had been part of the plan, Dot knew, making sure there was nothing left for Valentine to track. She hoped it had been done because the plan was working.
She set up the glamour, ignored the way her body still ached, despite the healing. It'd linger, for awhile. She'd been used to working through that, years ago.
She knew she'd adjust again, soon enough.
She hated that she knew that.
And then there was Luke, at last...
Without Clary.
He looked at her with his cop face, his Shadowhunter face, as if the past twenty years had never happened, as if he still lived on the other side of that wall the Nephilim had built, placing themselves on one side and everyone else on the other.
He looked down on her, as if she was the one who couldn't be trusted, as if she was the one who'd lost Jocelyn, who'd failed Clary. He look at her as if they hadn’t spent the last decade trying to convince Jocelyn it was time to stop hiding the truth from her daughter, as if all those late night conversations and high-fives over report cards and arguing over who got to keep Clary’s latest artwork to put on their fridge had never happened.
He had the nerve to warn her about Magnus, as if he wasn't the one who'd pulled a gun on her and taken away the only thing she might have been able to use to help Clary, to track her, to be there for her after her parents had failed her.
Dot had thought of them as family.
She should have known they didn't feel the same.
Once a Shadowhunter...
But Clary hadn't been raised a Nephilim, didn't know, couldn't know what was happening around her.
None of this was Clary's fault.
Clary deserved better, and Dot was damn well not going to be yet another person to abandon her.
*
Magnus wasn’t any better than Luke had been.
Well.
He was armored and armed, pretending he didn’t care, wouldn’t care, pretending he couldn’t imagine why Dot did, couldn’t possibly understand why Dot was risking herself for a Shadowhunter.
She knew him better than that, had known him too long to fall for the flash and fire of his reputation.
She remembered him from before, before all of this happened the first time, back when they’d had their fling, drinking and dancing the nights away almost a hundred years ago. Even then he’d had his masks, had pretended to care more about his parties than his people, but it had been a long time since she’d let him fool her. He had a soft heart beneath his sharp wits, and he was always willing to reach out to strangers, to risk himself for friends, for family.
She remembered him slipping a diamond ring off his finger to tip a cigarette girl whose make-up only barely hid the black-eye she’d gotten from somewhere, a finger lifted to his lip with a shhh, so she’d know not to tell anyone.
The poor girl had kissed his cheek, a smear of lipstick as her breath had stuttered, and Dot was sure she’d been a half-a-heartbeat away from bursting into tears.
They’d never seen her again, but Magnus had gotten a postcard two years later, a simple thank you written above a familiar red shade of lipstick pressed against the cheap paper in a kiss.
He’d almost cried, and he’d never quite forgiven Dot for being there when it happened, had clearly never meant for her to see that glimpse behind his walls, had never wanted her to know how much it meant to him, that thank you.
She remembered him during the Uprising. How he’d run himself ragged protecting as many people as he could, how he’d drained himself dry night after night for anyone who asked, and half of those who didn’t dare.
She wondered if he was afraid he couldn’t do it again, afraid they’d lose too many if he failed.
She wondered if he knew he would, at some point, be pulled back in again, and was holding his power in reserve, just in case.
She couldn’t begrudge him trying to get them all out ahead of it this time, but she’d never have imagined she’d ask him for help and he’d say no.
He never said no.
(If it hadn’t been this, hadn’t been her, hadn’t been because of Valentine, hadn’t been for Clary, she might almost have been proud of him.)
She wondered why he felt he had to hide himself from her, of all people, or if maybe he just thought if he let it out at all he wouldn’t be able to tuck it back in again, wouldn’t be able to keep himself in control for all those people he was hiding away from the Circle.
He’d always had to guard that soft heart of his, or it would have been bruised too much for even him to bear.
He asked her to come away with him, but he didn’t really mean it. He knew she’d turn him down.
He knew exactly why Dot couldn’t go with him.
She thought of the Warlocks she’d seen slipping through the Portal when she arrived, thought of how tired Magnus’ eyes looked in the dawn light on those rare mornings when his glamour slipped, and she supposed she knew why he wouldn’t stay behind, too.
For just an instant, before he flicked his fingers and backed away, before he left her alone, she thought she saw the shine of regret in his eyes.
