A/N: I just needed this to happen so I wrote this down. This OTP is everything I think about right now. Everything belongs to Cassandra Clare.
P.S. I'm still in the middle of reading CoLS, so I have no idea what happened to them at the end of the book.
Will you still love me when I'm no longer young and beautiful?
The vestiges of a mundane song Alec had heard the previous night still clung onto him like an accusation. He awoke on Magnus' bed, aware that the warlock was still lying asleep beside him, feeling the warmth of Magnus' arm across his bare stomach. They'd been sleeping together for almost a month now, but Alec seemed to never get used to it. As he lay there, wide awake and alert in the stillness of the morning, with nothing separating him from his boyfriend's body but his boxers, he let out a heavy sigh. It was now safe to say that he was depressed. Now more than ever, he hated the nagging dull ache in the back of his mind that reminded him each day that every time he woke, he had one less day to spend with Magnus. It was all because of that stupid song, he thought, and recalled where he had heard it: too tired to walk back to Magnus' loft, he took a cab. That song had been playing in the radio, and eerily so. He had never heard of anything more true to his situation.
Magnus stirred in his sleep, putting his head on his shoulder. Alec wearily put an arm around him, and briefly wondered if Magnus was feigning sleep, because he smiled. Alec liked him this way, when he was asleep and vulnerable and younger than he had ever looked before. But he knew well enough that Magnus' physical appearance won't be able to hide the fact that he was hundreds of years old. With a jolt that woke Magnus up, he suddenly realized he doesn't even know Magnus' exact age.
Magnus looked up at him, blinking back sleep, squinting at him with his cat's eyes. Alec tried his best to smile up at him, but he knew that nobody knew him quite as much as Magnus did- not Jace, not Isabelle. Magnus knew him best.
"Waking up to see you worrying does not constitute for a great morning," Magnus said, leaning up to kiss him in the jaw. Alec suppressed a shudder. "What's bothering you?" he continued, sitting up and pulling Alec to his lap, so Alec had no choice but to look up at him.
Alec didn't know what to say. It was one thing to tell Magnus about his concerns, but to talk about it for the thousandth time with him really wasn't going to solve anything. He knew that much. He didn't have the heart to keep seeing Camille secretly anymore, didn't want to ask for her help in turning Magnus mortal, because that he decided wasn't something he should control. Magnus is responsible for his own life, and Alec taking that away from him was nothing short of selfish.
Magnus groaned at the faraway look in Alec's eyes, knowing that it was yet another round of the same old conversation they've been having for the longest time. "If only I knew how to take the worry away from you, I would," he said mournfully, meaning every word with all he had. "I think it's time for you to accept the fact that nothing beautiful is ever permanent," he continued, looking at him with an intensity that made Alec want to look away.
"But you are. You're permanent," he muttered. And so was Camille. And Simon. He cursed Raziel silently for not making Shadowhunters immortal too. Magnus smiled at him sadly. "I won't mean anything when you're gone," he admitted, much to Alec's dismay. He didn't want to hear it from Magnus. Alec's mind leaped with a wild hope.
"It doesn't have to be this way, and you know that."
Magnus shook his head forcefully. "I don't want to see you turn into something you'd regret later on," he said, but Alec protested. "I won't regret doing anything if it meant being with you."
"Oh, but yes you would. When all of your friends and family are gone, you would hate me for it. And I'd rather be alone than see you hating me."
Alec swallowed hard, only vaguely aware of Magnus stroking his hair.
"All I want more than anything is more time with you. To know you better," he said, and Magnus looked at him incredulously. "But you already know everything about me. It's just my past you're thinking about. That doesn't matter."
"It does matter," Alec argued. "I want to know who you were before all of this. And didn't it ever occur to you that I don't even know how old you are?"
"I'm 800 years old, Alexander. If that's what worry's you, I could give you all day to ask me about anything you want," he said, as if this was going to make Alec feel any better. Realizing how old he really was made Alec feel like he was growing apart from him. Despite everything they've been through together, nothing could ever replace time and experience. He had none of that.
"And doesn't it bother you," Alec went on, Magnus' words having no effect on him whatsoever, "that you're basically going out with a teenager? I could easily be your great-great-grandson," he said spitefully. Magnus snorted at that. Alec knew himself that he was being stupid, but it was the only way to get this off his chest. He had to talk about it. He never had enough words to tell people how he felt, but he was willing to change. Anything for Magnus, he thought.
"I was never a fan of cliche, Alec, but we both know that age doesn't matter. That's what I've been telling you all along. I don't care about my past because all I've ever wanted is to stay in the present. With you. Love does not know how to set boundaries, and I've never been taught to either. It's really not my fault I love you."
Alec was breathless. "And it's not my fault I can't love you back for as long as you love me, and I hate that. I hate that every day, when I wake up I am reminded that one day this will all be over, and you would forget about me. You would move on, find somebody, and I would die and leave you, hoping that I've done enough to leave my mark on you, that I wasn't just another love affair for you, Magnus. I want me to mean as much to you as you mean to me, and I would die never knowing if I would."
Magnus only looked at him then, surprised at his little speech or was out of something to say he didn't know, and he didn't want to. He just wanted a way out of this misery. He thought nothing Magnus said could change that, but his next words came out as a surprise. His voice was surprisingly gentle.
"All my life I've been looking for someone who would give me a reason to live through this painfully long and unending existence, and now that I have found you, knowing that you would never realize that you mean everything to me, Alexander, is the most painful thing I have ever felt. I would die for you, Alec, if that's what it takes. I'd be more than willing to end my life if that means you'd die happily with me."
"I don't think I understand..." Alec's voice trailed away, and he felt sick to the stomach. He had clearly made Magnus upset.
"I could make myself mortal for you, if that's what you want," Magnus said finally.
But no, Alec shook his head, he can't ask that from Magnus Bane. He didn't want to be the selfish person he already was, and he wished he hadn't said anything that morning then, if it meant that it would make Magnus desperate too. Desperate like him.
"The world needs you, Magnus. It has to be me," he said hastily before Magnus could respond. "To adjust to you. It's a risk worth taking for you. I would leave everything behind, it doesn't have to be you."
Mortality and immortality were two inexplicably great things to ask from people you loved. Alec knew consequences would be great, and love was far more greater than anything, but the actions you did for love, that's what matters in the end. He wouldn't be able to stand in front of the Angel out of shame. He had to be bigger than this.
"All my life I've been needed, asked to do things for the sake of others. 800 years, Alec, I've been serving this world, and nobody cared about what I needed, nobody asked," Magnus said now, and it hurt hearing these things from him, knowing they were true.
"I am tired of being needed by everyone. I just want to be needed by you, because you're all I need," he continued. Alec sat up, looking him in the eyes. He touched Magnus' face, wanting to make him feel what he felt through that touch. Magnus put his hand on top of Alec's before he spoke.
"I need to be mortal, Alec, because I need you. I need you to be happy. And you being happy makes me happy as well. There's nothing I want more in this world."
Alec was afraid of what will happen, but he knows that underneath this desire of wanting to do the right thing, was the burning desire for this. He didn't want to admit his weakness to anyone but Magnus. Today he was past the breaking point. His entire being ached for this. But he saw in Magnus' eyes a sense of determination, a sense that he wants the enormity of it, just as much as he did. He touched his forehead to his, the way they had always had, and said the thing they had always said:
"Together?"
"Together."