Hey there, readers. I just wanted to thank everyone for reading and reviewing. This is my first fan fiction, and I'm super nervous to be sharing my writing with actual humans. A special thanks to those who reviewed, it's incredibly inspiring to get a few kind words.
I'm completely addicted to this story right now. It is so much fun to write that it's been distracting me from the original book I keep promising myself that I'm going to work on when I sit down. I keep thinking I'll grow out of procrastination but alas, Malec is just so darn cute! I was suppose to go to yoga today but instead I'm sitting here with my cat and my cup of coffee writing about Magnus and Alec. It could be worse!
This chapter is a bit short, but I've got another good one coming up soon. Thanks again for reading and welcoming me into this cool writing community. : )
Chapter 7
Alec's blade glowed in his hand, but he could see nothing as he plunged into the smoke and flames inside the Institute. The hastily drawn rune Jace had applied for fire resistance burned on his arm, and his eye's immediately started to water. Simon, who was especially flammable, had taken the car, but he could hear the others behind him, scrambling through the dense smoke. The body of a demon, still twitching and oozing gore, lay at his feet forgotten.
The air was so thick it was like trying to breath hot water, and he choked as he yelled his mother's name into the chaos. He didn't really expect an answer. The heat and flames were like a living thing pressing around him. He couldn't imagine anyone surviving such a thing.
He felt rather then saw Jace sweep his blade clean through a demon without breaking pace. Black ichor spewed over his face, but the air was so hot he barely felt it's burn. Izzy put her hand on his arm, pulling him toward the living quarters. Her eye's were white flashes in her already soot covered face.
They had just groped their way around another blind corner when a white hot pain flared up from his thigh. A shax demon had come out of no where, its pincer buried deep in his leg as it scrambled up his body. With an angry shout he twisted his wrist, trying to stab down at it, but the angle was wrong.
Before any of the other could react, Magnus sliced cleanly thorough the mandible that was skewering his leg and then swung his dagger up to sever the demons head neatly. There was no time for thank you's, but he met Magnus's eye just the same. Magnus flipped the dark seraph blade in his hand and winked. Alec had a second to wonder where the warlock had acquired his skills with the knife as Jace led the way down the passage. Alec forced himself not to limp as they groped their way in the dark.
The hall opened up into the family space of the Institute, and Alec was surprised to see the stars overhead. The roof had collapsed in the heat. Flames still licked out from the side rooms but this area was dripping. The steam from the dying fires evaporated immediately. Somehow the air was even thicker here, the humidity almost visible, and sweat trickled down his back.
"The fire department must have gotten here." Clary whispered.
He felt Magnus move beside him. His awareness of the warlock so much like his parabatai bond that he seemed to be able to sense wherever he stood in the room. The others gathered around to assess the steaming mess.
"They got out." Jace said next to him, in a voice that didn't broker argument. "We'd know if they didn't. We would feel something."
Alec nodded but didn't respond, surveying the damage. The home where he had trained and grown was now just a black wreckage filled with the ash covered bones of furniture. He dreaded taking a closer look, afraid that a search would reveal the bodies of his fallen friends or family. Izzy put a hand on his arm. He was surprised to see the clean streaks of tears running down her cheeks.
He started to speak, but he caught a slight movement in the corner of his eye. On instinct, he pushed his sister aside just as a glowing dagger flew end over end to bury itself in the floor where she had stood.
As it always did in battle, time seemed to slow down as the three figures moved out of the shadows. His hand had nocked his arrow and pulled the bow taunt before they had fully materialized out of the grey smoke like ghosts. His muscles tensed as he recognized the dark red outline around the black battle gear of the dark shadow hunters . The blasphemous glow of the seraph blade cast their faces in harsh shadows and light. He heard Jace curse and spit on the steaming ground as one figure stepped forward, his face arranging in an eery smile considering the circumstances.
"Valentine." Jace sneered, shoving Clary behind him even as she tried to push forward with her own dagger.
"My children," Valentine spoke softly as he moved closer, his eye's on Clary and Jace. Alec tracked him with his arrow, his fingers tight on the wire. He had never wanted to kill someone as much as he did at that moment. His body burned for it. Valentine barely spared a glance in his direction as he spoke to Jace. "Why don't you call off your troupe of baby shadow hunters? You could shoot me of course, but then you would never find out what happened to your adopted family."
Valentine casually balanced the tip of his seraph blade on the floor, leaning on it like a cane. "Maryse was particularly feisty when we took her, but I took care of that easy enough. Lightwoods never have known when to give up." Alec snarled and pulled the bow a fraction tighter, but Jace's sharp look kept him from burying his arrow in Valentines black heart.
Jace's face was a mask, all signs of his boyishness stripped away as he faced in father. "What do you want, traitor?" he said, his voice cold.
Valentine laughed, but his eye's were hard. "Don't you know by now my son? The Clave has fallen. They have lost sight of the reason the Angel sent us here. The Accords are a distraction. Shadow hunters are not meant to police the problems of demons and their children. They are monsters who deserve to be exterminated. Only then will our world be at peace." At this he cast his gaze toward Magnus, who stood next to Alec, his hands strangely absent of the blue fire that usually crackled there. "I bet you don't even know the true nature of the warlock you've chosen to do your dirty work. His father would be proud to see the way he has injected himself in your little rebel group." Magnus stiffened, but Alec didn't have time to consider his words.
Magnus stepped forward. He cocked his head, his gaze steely as he said, "I have seen many men through history who had the same ambition. You are wrong Valentine. Whether we are of the angel, mundane, or of the demon realm, our nature is in our deeds, not in our name." Magnus's voice was quiet but seemed to reverberate through the giant empty room with an intense power. "What of your parabatai, Valentine? Lucian is a werewolf. Do you believe the man you once loved as a brother is of the devil?"
Valentines features softened momentarily in grief, and Alec got a flash of the man he must once have been. A man good people had chosen to follow. "There will always be casualties in war, warlock." He started backing away from them, his men following. "The destruction of the Clave is the first step to restoring balance to a broken world. We will come and bring justice to the demon down worlders, each in kind. And when the mundane world is cleansed, we will turn our sites to Idris."
He paused, and his eye's were filled with the fire of a zealot as he stood in the rubble. "Clean up the trash," he said, his eye's flicking behind them for the first time.
Magnus gasped, and Alec felt his veins turn to ice at the sound. He turned in time to see the tip of a glowing seraph blade protruding from Magnus's chest. The warlock grabbed the end of the blade, and the sharp edge sliced through his hands, as the dark shadow hunter pulled it out of his back with a sickening sound.
Alec caught him as he started to fall, and the room burst into sound and fury. In a blur, Jace was gone as Valentine disappeared through the steam and smoke. He barely registered as Izzy spun gracefully, her whip slicing through the neck of the man behind them like a vengeful angel. And then Clary was there, helping him lay Magnus down amongst the soot and the char of the Institute.
Alec felt the panic inside of him like terrible cold waves. Magnus's face was so pale, his lips were white around the edges. No. No. No. Alec moved Magnus's hands, tearing at his shirt to see the gaping wound. The edges of it pulsed with blood, which ran like a dark river down the sides of his chest. He pressed his hand on the gaping hole anyway, and leaned over Magnus, his voice urgent. "Magnus, your magic. You need to use it now. I can't…" he gestured helplessly, "There is nothing I can do."
Magnus opened his lips to speak, and Alec watched in horror as a thin trickle of blood ran down his face. Magnus gasped again before rasping, "I can't, Alec. It is gone." His hands spasmed on Alec's, and he tried to laugh but lost himself for a moment in coughing. "I always wondered how I was going to die." Magnus's smile turned into a grimace and Alec felt such a sharp pain under his ribs that he almost thought they were being attacked again. "Not such a bad way to go I suppose…" Magnus trailed off, going limp in Alec's arms.
A wave of despair so thick he couldn't breath rose up in his throat. As Magnus's hand relaxed and fell to his side, Alec felt a dark hole open up underneath him. He wavered.
"Alec!" Clary gripped his upper arm so tightly that he looked at her. She gazed at him, her eye's shining with tears. "Don't give up. Magnus wouldn't."
Like a switch had been flicked, he felt resolve surge back into his veins. He reached down and shook the warlock, yelling his name into his still face. Relief washed over him as Magnus's dark lashes flickered open, and his strange cat eye's slowly focused on Alec's. Hope jumped through his body like electricity.
Magnus grimaced again. "Ow."
Somehow despite everything Alec laughed. He took Magnus's hand in both of his own. "Take my energy. You did it once before. Maybe it will work again," he pleaded. Magnus's breath was shallow but he nodded, his strangely beautiful eye's never left Alec's face.
Alec felt a tingle in his hands and then warmth traveled through his body. A bright blue flame appeared like a small sun in between their hands. He could barely hear Magnus as he muttered the spell under his breath, his lashed fluttered closed. The blue fire blossomed, enveloping them both. Magnus gasped his name and the blood pumping from the gash on his chest slowed as he lost consciousness again. Alec's heart broke open, and he sagged with with relief.
