Notes: So! Here's a drabble-y fic because I really wanted to post something for the occasion but sadly didn't have time for something longer. Happy Halloween and I hope you enjoyed this!
Just when Alec had thought that the night couldn't possibly get more miserable, it started raining.
It hadn't been all bad, really. It was nice, to a degree, to think that they could even afford to visit Idris without the constant anxiety that New York would get destroyed in the meantime and it wasn't like Alec was ungrateful that the war was over. It was just that he still worried. Visiting Alicante for anything other than business was usually a waste of everyone's time anyway and even now, when everyone was supposed to be having fun, Alec could feel the nervous energy in the air near everyone who'd played any part at all in the final battle. It wasn't really a celebration; it was a thank God it's over party and it was ridiculous for him to be as bothered by it as he was, but there was nothing he could do.
To top it all off, the party in question was a costume party, so masks – in the very least – had been required. Alec strongly suspected that it had all been organised by someone who had spent altogether far too much time among mundanes and while some of the guests had embraced the idea, he himself hadn't really managed to see the point. Everyone could guess who the people around them were; why bother pretending?
"Alec!" The voice came from the window right above his head and Alec looked up, shielding his eyes from the rain as he squinted against the light. The irony in the fact that he was standing in front of his own family manor without even thinking to enter didn't escape him, but he'd refrained so far – he wasn't sure if he'd been here long enough to be allowed to retreat given how fragile the calm in his closest circle of Shadowhunters was. Being Head of the Institute had brought this sort of awareness with itself and the last thing he wanted was to give anyone the idea that there was something wrong. "What are you doing there?"
Jace's voice was hushed despite the distance between them, but Alec could hear him perfectly well. There it was. He'd been so engrossed in everything going through his mind that he'd forgotten that there was a reason to be here, after all. Perhaps not the one the Clave had originally intended, but good enough for him nevertheless. Better than that, actually – it made this entire trip worth it, even if Alec had only seen that when he'd allowed himself to be convinced of it.
If he'd known what things would really be like, he suspected that he would have given up much sooner. Because without the advantage of familiarity – and the bond between them that always felt that little bit stronger when his parabatai was near – there would have been no way for him to tell that it was Jace calling down at him.
He'd decided to opt for a mask too when they'd received the invitation, but it was nothing like Alec had imagined. It fit perfectly to his face and still managed to leave Jace's eyes almost entirely shadowed, flaring out dramatically into antlers in the upper part. It was a near perfect reproduction of the current king of the Unseelie Court and if Alec didn't know its habitants as well as he did, he would have assumed that the mask was made by the man's subjects themselves. As it were, there was likely some glamour involved and Jace had been completely unrecognisable all night.
"You don't need to play the host here," he continued. "Come on. Come in here where it's dry."
Alec's eyes darted over his surroundings for one last assessment – no one seemed to be paying attention – and gave a quick nod before stepping away.
The noise from the celebrations outside was almost completely drowned out in silence the moment Alec closed the door behind his back. He hadn't been allowed visits to Idris too often in his childhood, but he remembered loving the manor just for that and it served its purpose perfectly now as he climbed up the stairs and found the room Jace had to be in.
It was one of the empty bedrooms, he soon found, one of the guest rooms that never actually got used. Jace was still at the window, staring out at the city below, but he stepped away as soon as he heard the door closing behind Alec's back.
"You're soaking wet," he said instead of a greeting. He'd removed his mask already and now that he could take a proper look at him, Alec could see that he, on the other hand, was perfectly dry. "We could've just met here, you know. Wasn't that the idea of coming here?"
It had been, originally. They hadn't had a moment of peace since the war – not one that they could only share between themselves, that was – and they'd both thought that coming here could rectify that. That maybe, if they played their cards right, no one would be able to keep track of them for the night because they'd both be lost in the crowd for once. Granted, it had taken a while for Alec to follow through as he'd been with Izzy when he'd arrived, but, "I'm here now," he said and when Jace kissed him in response, it felt like more than just the closeness they'd both been craving for; it felt like home.