ONE-SHOT! SPOILERS!
Who hasn't ever been inspired to write a Jem-Will as brothers fanfic? Because I was, so I did. Simple as. Herondales and their parabatai, FTW.
Disclaimer: I only own the plot. Characters to Cassandra Clare.
"I DON'T SEE HOW I CAN'T GO IN THERE!" Alec yelled.
Jace was injured. He was in the infirmary. Alec was not.
"Darling, you know-" Magnus started.
"I'M HIS BROTHER!" Alec yelled again.
Somehow, despite the circumstances, Magnus found himself trying not to laugh.
"MAGNUS?!" Alec yelled.
Magnus kept a straight face. "I know you're his brother. I understand-"
"No. You don't know, you don't understand. The bond Jace and I share, I need to be in there. When I'm near him he's stronger."
That sentence was enough for Magnus. The past, the past he'd tried so hard to forget about, emerged.
Two boys. Opposites. Gentle and harsh, kind and cruel. Light and Dark. Silver and Black.
But they weren't different, not really. If anything, they were the same. Both broken, tortured.
There's something dark in him. Something black and dark that he's hiding. He's got some sort of secret, the kind that eats you up inside.
That was one of them. Cursed, cruel and broken. As for the other…
Forced to see his parents murdered, sentenced to die and depend on the drug that was killing him since childhood. Any of these could have broken him and left in pieces, an ugly, reserved and unkind version of himself. But no, he remained a gentle honest boy, always humble, always selfless, always loving, always giving and never demanding anything back. He was impossible not to like.
Kind, gentle, caring.
Jem and Will.
Will and Jem.
Magnus could remember the time all too clearly when Will had come to Magnus in the middle of the night, saying he was cursed, saying Jem was dying. Telling Magnus everything.
Magnus had cared for Will. It was not the black hair and the blue eyes.
It was the fact Magnus liked broken things.
Magnus sank to the ground suddenly.
Will? Will is that you?
James? Are you there, James?
"No." Magnus whispered softly. He tried to clear the thoughts. He forced them back. He felt a tear fall. He wiped it impatiently, glad he wasn't wearing that much make-up.
Will and Jem.
Jem and Will.
Just Will.
Just Jem.
But it had never been like that. Never. Even in Jems departure from the London institute. He had been alive in Will. Now Will was dead, he was alive in Jem.
Magnus had never seen a parabatai pair like them to this day. And he had no desire to.
I'll be in the library, if you need me.
Magnus had promised that to Will, and he had never broken it. He was searching, still searching. He wouldn't give up on this, not yet. Jem should never have been dying. Jem should never have joined the brotherhood.
He would never have had to, if Magnus had ever found a cure.
Alec had once asked him about all the books Magnus owned. Why they were all about Demon poisons, medicinal spells, demonology. Magnus had replied with a vague answer about a hobby.
A hobby was something you enjoyed.
"Magnus?" Alec's nervous voice broke his thoughts. He no longer sounded angry. He sounded worried.
Magnus rose silently. The doorbell rang, and Alec went to get it, Magnus following him.
Alec opened the door to see a silent brother on the steps.
Magnus remembered Alec's vague words before. I've called for the silent brothers. Now let me see Jace.
This wasn't just a silent brother. Magnus knew from the way he stood, and if not that, the way his hood was drawn back, showing black hair, with a single streak of silver.
Jem.
Magnus' voice cracked as he spoke, speaking the words he had asked Jem almost eighty years ago.
"Still a Silent Brother, then?" He asked.
"It does tend to be a permanent state." Jems voice went through into his head.
"James." Magnus said, his voice barely a whisper.
He noticed the silent brother falter, the lifeless, stiff way they stood vanishing. He stood normally again, if not only for a moment. He was Jem again.
"My name is not James." He said, after a long silence.
"Yes. It is." Magnus said.
Alec coughed. Magnus actually felt a fleeting hatred towards him, if only for a second.
Jem looked to Alec, and presumably said something to him.
"Lightworm?" Alec asked, confused. "It's Lightwood."
Magnus burst out laughing. Alec's confused expression, Jems surprised expression, like he hadn't meant to call Alec as such, and the slip-up in general.
"I suppose you haven't thought of the endless things Will would say if he knew you were in love with a Lightwood, Magnus?" Jem asked him.
"Oh, I have. Countless times. I then often find myself wondering what would happen if Jace and Will ever met."
Jem looked thoughtful. "The end of the word." He said quietly with amusement.
"Oh, no, it wouldn't just be that. It would be an ouroboros." Magnus replied, memory alight.
Jem seemed to falter again. "In that case, maybe it shouldn't happen." He said, before he and Alec vanished into the lift.
As soon as he was gone, Magnus realised how empty and alone the institute was. But he half expected Will to come around the corner, to hear a small explosion coming from the crypt, sweet music coming from Jems room.
No. He had never known two people like Will and Jem. And if he ever would, then Jem would be right.
Their souls would be eternal.
"I'm sorry, Jem. I'm so, so sorry." He whispered, before he walked from the institute, vague thoughts of the London shadowhunters of 1878 on his mind.
I'm apologising if you think that Will and Jem are like Alec and Jace. In some cases they are. But Will doesn't go around breaking Jems phone, now does he? (Mainly cause phones weren't invented.)