A/N: This is going to be a marvellously happy chapter, isn't it? Alec's funeral. Fun. I swear it'll get better!


Magnus POV

I stared at my reflection in the full length mirror I'd conjured into my bedroom. I'd done my best to make myself look presentable. I must have used at least half of my concealer hiding the dark circles under my eyes and the blemishes on my skin, covered with a layer of powder to keep it looking natural. I'd tied my hair back, since I hadn't bothered to cut it yet, and it was slicked into place with the industrial-strength gel I usually used to style it into my classic spikes. I was dressed in a spotless, neatly pressed white suit, in accordance with Shadowhunter mourning tradition, although I had pinned a red rose to my breast pocket. My eyes were lightly lined with waterproof eyeliner, just enough for emphasis, not enough to make a statement. I looked... different.

I glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece as I pulled on my most modest pair of black boots. Quarter to nine. That gave me fifteen minutes to get there. Plenty of time. I put down a bowl of food and water for the Chairman, and left.

Halfway there, I passed a florists'. I looked in. Usually I would just conjure any item I needed, but today... For that purpose, it seemed wrong. Alec wouldn't like me to lay stolen flowers on his grave. Not that he'd have a grave; Shadowhunters cremate their dead. I didn't like that idea. I didn't want to watch my Angel burn, but what right did I have to dispute tradition?

Walking into the small shop, I looked around briefly before choosing a traditional bouquet of roses, some red, some white. The red rose of love and the white of mourning. Simple yet beautiful. I paid for the flowers, and continued on my way.

I arrived with a couple of minutes to spare, but Jace, Clary, Isabelle, Maryse and Robert were already there and waiting. I could tell Maryse was avoiding looking at me, but Robert unashamedly glared.

"What right do you have to be here, downworlder?" He all but snarled at me. I didn't have the heart to talk back.

"I don't. But I come to pay my respects to the one I love." I spoke calmly, for once not looking to provoke.

"Love?! Don't talk to me about love! It's your fault he's dead! If it wasn't for you and your stupid games, messing with my son's head, he never would have been so reckless!" I flinched. His words cut like a knife, wounding me to my core. Was that true? Had he put himself in the firing line over me? ...Stupid, naive, selfless Alexander... Why would you do that?

Maryse put her hand on her husband's shoulder. "Now, Robert. Not today. Be civil today. If he wants to pay his respects to Alec's memory then let him. What harm can it do?" Robert looked for a moment like he would turn and yell at her, but then the fight left his eyes, and he stepped back.

"Let's go."

The ceremony was held in the courtyard of the Silent City, in the shadow of the mausoleum. A few others had turned up; Luke and Jocelyn, Jordan and Maia. Simon held Isabelle close as she cried. A few other families had turned up from Idris, presumably friends of Robert and Maryse. They gathered around the funeral pyre. A carefully structured altar of wood stood alone, and there upon it lay my Angel. He looked at peace, dressed in an unblemished white silk tunic bound at his waist with a silver ribbon, arms crossed over his chest, seraph blade in hand. His body had been preserved well- it looked no different to how it had that last night a week, an eternity ago. I approached slowly, the sight of him serving to twist the dagger in my heart, causing nearly unbearable pain. I felt tears pricking my eyes once more as I lay the roses at the foot of the pyre. stepping back, I closed my eyes, face pointing towards the heavens.

"Angel Raziel..." My voice was quiet, so quiet I was the only one who could hear me. "I don't know if you listen to downworlders like me... I don't know if you can even hear me, but if you can... If you will, please take care of him... Please look after my Angel, up there with you. He deserves it. After everything he's been through, after everything I put him through... It was never his fault. So treat him well, if not for me, then for his family, for Isabelle and Jace and Maryse and even Robert... And for him. I beg you." I opened my eyes, staring at the azure sky, the same colour as his eyes when he laughed. They were always lighter when he was happy. I vaguely wondered if he could see me now. If he could see the morning sunlight glinting off the tear that ran down my cheek as I remembered him. Remembered his laugh. The way his lips felt against mine. All those late mornings in, where's we'd lay in bed together, comfortable in one another's arms. Paris in the moonlight, one of my best memories of him. Standing atop the Arc de Triomphe, watching the lights of the city dance, staring up at the stars, my arms around him, keeping him warm. So long ago now.

These bittersweet memories play through my head throughout the entire service. I listen to first the words of the Silent Brother presiding over the ceremony, echoing in my head, then those of Isabelle, then Jace. His parents don't say anything, but I know they're mourning in their own way. Then Isabelle approaches me.

"Go on. Say something." Her dark eyes encourage me, but I feel my stomach lurch.

"I... I can't."

"Why not?"

"It's not... They won't like it." I make a vague sweeping motion in the direction of the other Shadowhunters.

"It's not about them. It's about Alec, and what he meant to us. He'd want to hear what you have to say."

"No he wouldn't."

She half smiled sadly. "Magnus, to his dying day, he missed you. He never hated you. I watched him lose faith,but he never lost his love for you. Now get up there and say your piece, because whatever my father says, you have just as much of a right to be here as the rest of us."

Swallowing my nerves, and being led by Isabelle to the front, where she placed a soft kiss on my cheek and whispered "Good luck," in my ear, I thought back to my Angel looking down on me, listening for what I had to say, and I knew I had to say my piece.

"I know a lot of you might think I don't belong here, and I'm not going to try to preach to you that I am, because the truth is that I lost any right to that when I left him. But here I am, because I can't pretend to myself that I ever stopped loving him. And love him I did. A lot of people have told me that is wrong, but how can something wrong feel so right? He was my definition of perfect. It was the little things, always the little things. The blush on his cheeks when I complimented him, the way his eyes lit up when he laughed. His habit of brushing back the hair that always fell over his eyes. His atrocity of a fashion sense," I choked a small laugh through the sudden tears, "He was beautiful, though he never saw it. It pained me when he hid himself, flinched away from the world, because I thought the world deserved to know how amazing he was. If he was here, now, I would say to him that I made a terrible mistake, and I would beg his forgiveness, because now... Now I realise that, for all his flaws, I... I love him. And I can't..." I faltered as the truth of what I was about to say hit me, "I can't live without him..."

I stole a glance at him, his beautiful waxen face, and my heart jumped. I need him. If I can't have him, I'm going to fade away. I'm going to die.

As I stepped down, Isabelle wrapped her arms around me. "That was beautiful. Thank you."

"You're welcome..."

I was the last to speak, and as I rejoined the crowd, the Silent Brother lit a torch, and held it above his head.

As the spirit of the warrior, so shall our bodies burn in the holy flame which shall burn bright and strong as the honour in glorious death. To this brave warrior we say hail and farewell, and may the great Angel Raziel take him under his wings to live on in spirit as the guardian of our sacred race...

He touched the torch to the corner of the pyre, and the wood caught quickly, the flames dancing over to lick at the white silk, charring it black, before Alec himself was consumed by the flames. I cast my eyes away as his pale skin first blackened, then turned to ash under the blanket of fire. The air reeked of burning flesh, and I stared skyward at the rising plume of smoke that carried my love's soul into the afterlife.

I can't live without you...

And in that moment I vowed to do whatever it would take to bring my Angel back to me.

Even if it meant bargaining with the king of hell himself.


Oooh Magnus what you up to? 2nd chapter already oh yeah! Enjoy this one guys, I hope you find it as touching to read as I found it to write. Seriously, I was sat here in tears as I wrote this. But anyways. Until later!