Pandemonium: Chapter 20
Naturally I must point out that I am extremely indebted to Cassandra Clare for her wonderful characters; furthermore, I must also express my gratitude to a number of other authors and creators for their works, especially William Shakespeare, whose play The Tempest was featured rather prominently last chapter.
A/N: Wow I cannot believe it's already Chapter 20! Looking towards future publications I can say a couple of things: 1) My pace has slowed down considerably, so things may not be published as often as they used to be. 2) The plot is about to get much, much, much thicker, and a whole slew of new characters (well they're not technically new per se, but new to this story) are going to be introduced. 3) We are approximately half way through the story, so yeah.
Thank you all for your support with this!
I awoke to find the professor staring over at me. The sun was low in the windows; a few hours must have passed. I was lying in my bed. Someone got me up here. He looked at me with worry deeply set in his brow. He cleared his throat and said, "I do not think it wise for us to proceed until you are better."
I smiled at him as broadly as I could. I slowly picked myself up and braced my back against the pillows behind me, then I whispered, "I will not be getting better any time soon. I think it is wise for us to proceed as quickly as possible."
He stared at me in a bewildered state for a few moments. Then something came over him, perhaps in that moment he realized my predicament; I do not know, and I doubt that I will ever.
Someone had moved over a table and a chair so that he could sit. His paper was empty and ready for us to continue. Clearly that had been his purpose. He sat down and picked up his pen. I took a deep breath and began, whispering
When Alec woke up in the morning he felt an emptiness both within and without. The without part was easier; Magnus had, at some point in the night, left his bed and probably gone back to his own. The within part, while more difficult to discern, came to him pretty easily; these nightmares were draining him of energy and focus. He needed to find a way to stop them, and one that preferably didn't involve skipping more hours of sleep, despite the fact that it was always a possibility.
In addition to his desire for some food and water, Alec needed to see Magnus. So naturally after taking care of the first two needs, he made his way down to Magnus' meeting rooms in the palace.
It was a bit surprising to Alec that he missed Magnus so. It had only been a few hours since he had seen him last, though he regretted falling asleep so immediately that evening. Still, it was the idea of seeing Magnus so soon that put a little bounce in Alec's step and a wide grin on his face. He basically skipped happily down the entire way to Magnus' rooms, only slowing down as he entered the hallway and got to the door.
Interestingly enough, there were voices coming from the main room-the room in which they first kissed. As he approached the door he could discern that there were only two people in the room: some woman and Magnus. They were speaking rather quietly, so a naturally curious Alec opened the door.
As it turned out they weren't doing much talking. They were kissing.
Alec's jaw slackened as the grin that was previously on his face quickly dissolved into an open mouth stare. His eyes darkened considerably. His skin became a deathly pallor of white. His throat constricted. Where words, words of anger, rage, betrayal, and sadness, ought to be there was nothing but stark silence, the same silence that often enveloped him in the darkness of his nightmares.
Magnus, whose eyes until this point-which was only really a second in the making-were shut, opened them quickly; at first the only thing that was there was astonishment, though Alec didn't register this, but then they quickly noticed Alec standing in the doorway and became apologetic immediately. At that point, though, it was too late. Too much had happened. He did his best to push the woman, a gorgeous blonde with green eyes, off of him, but to little avail. She seemed determined to continue the kiss.
Finally after about a few moments, Magnus was able to push her off.
"Maggie darling," she said, "why ever did you stop?"
He paid her no attention what so ever; instead, he turned to Alec and said, "T-t-t-this is not what it looks like."
Alec said nothing and continued to stare at Magnus, though color began to move towards a lighter shade of pink.
The woman turned around.
She grinned conspicuously and said, "Oh I'm so sorry. I didn't know we were going to have visitors. If Maggie had told me, I never would have done anything so brash."
Giggling a little, she quickly kissed Magnus on the cheek and exited the room in a flourish of fabric.
Alec's face at this point was the deep red of a beat. He couldn't help but feel the need to both cry and scream at the same time. He did neither though; instead he stared right at Magnus and asked the only question on his mind, "Who?"
Magnus looked down at the floor. He shuffled his feet awkwardly for a few moments and then said, "Her name is Camille Belcourt, and she is-a-a-a friend."
To that Alec nearly gawked. She would disagree with that statement, he irately thought. Though of course, he continued to say nothing.
At first Magnus did nothing but mumble incoherently about how this was a large mistake and how Alec was getting the wrong impression and how his past with Camille meant nothing.
By mentioning his past with her, Magnus had inadvertently gotten Alec's attention in a very very bad way. The look of astonishment and betrayal in Alec's eyes clearly indicated his desire to extricate himself from the situation and from Magnus forever. This was far too much for him to take in at the moment.
As Alec slowly began to back up out of the room, he turned his head away and tried his best not to look at Magnus. And unsurprisingly that was his choice; Magnus was now lying on the cold hard ground, crying and begging Alec to forgive him and to stay to hear everything.
Knowing that if he stayed he would probably give in against his better nature, Alec make the hardest decision of his life-at the point-and left the room slowly.
He trudged up the steps in an uncaring manner. His feet barely made proper contact with the narrow winding staircase. More than once he almost fell and crashed to the ground. He didn't care. Falling would have been easy, simple, reasonable even. He had shamed himself, done sinful acts, and besmirched the named of his family for an eternity all for a man who wantonly kissed someone else. The shame, suffering, and ignominy of existing was too much. Letting himself fall and ending the existence was simpler and much more appealing as he slowly dragged his body up the stairs.
The only thing that stopped him from throwing himself down the flight of stairs to his death was the thought of Izzy, who would have been completely lost without him. With such a thought in his mind, he did the only acceptable thing and survived for that day.
Barging into his room, he slammed the door shut and threw himself onto the bed. With his heart shattered into a thousand different pieces he did the only thing that was left to do: cry.
Somehow for the better part of a few hours nobody seemed to notice that Alec was not running around the palace. In fact it wasn't until later in the afternoon that Izzy decided it was best to find her brother and drag him out of bed. With her she took the rather inseparable Jace and Clary along with Simon. The boys were there to hoist him from the bed if necessary; Clary just sort of came as a packaged deal now with Jace.
When they tired to open the door they found that it was locked and no noise was coming from within. At first they stood around a knocked repetitively for a few minutes. Then of course, they got very worried because there was no real reason for the door to be locked. Jace broke the door open with a bit of a thud, and they all rushed inside to see where Alec was.
They found him lying on his bed mute and staring at the blank ceiling in front of him. The room was in complete disarray. Alec had ripped all his clothes and thrown them around; he had also destroyed his lamp and a number of other fixtures in the room. There were also the feathers from one of his pillows which appeared completely destroyed.
Upon seeing his friends, Alec turned over on to his side and angrily growled, "Get away from me."
Of course with an attitude like that they all did the exact opposite thing. In fact, Izzy sat on his bed (which illicited an even angrier growl from Alec) and asked rather courteously, "What's wrong?"
Alec said nothing and continued to angrily stare into the distance.
At this point, Clary asked them all to leave the room. Jace tried to protest, but was quickly silenced with a look from her. She said that she needed to speak to him alone about something.
After a few moments of silent glaring from Izzy and confused muttering from Jace and Simon, they all left Clary alone in the room with Alec.
"So," she said, "why did you leave him?"
Upon hearing this from Clary, Alec turned to look at her; his eyes were bloodshot from the tears, and the bruise around his left eye was doing nothing to help the situation. He pulled himself up so that he was now sitting on the bed. Looking at her quizzically, he asked, "How did you know?"
Clary just smiled softly. "I had the same reaction after our conversation about Jace."
Alec let out a deep breath. He closed his eyes and steeled himself in preparation for the explanation. Then slowly, he began:
"I left this morning in a good mood. I wanted to see Magnus. Just to see him, maybe kiss him, nothing more. It was going to be a short pleasant visit in the morning before we got ready for all the day's work. As I was walking to his office, I heard voices. They were muffled and soft, but I entered anyway. I mean what could he have to hide, right? Well it turns out the answer is a lot. There was this woman-this blonde. She was all over him like Jace and his breakfast. When she finally stopped she called Magnus "Maggie" and barely blushed as she left. Then Magnus told me that they had some sort of a relationship in the past. He tried to explain and beg and what not. I just left before he got to me. Now I'm here and it's over."
Clary stood silently for a minute and said nothing. Then, softly she said, "Perhaps it might be good for you to hear his explanation first?"
Alec's face darkened. Angrily he said, "I know what I saw, and that doesn't need any explanations."
Clary said nothing to that, but had a look of disdain on her face. She then asked, "Do you still...?"
"Love him?" Alec completed her sentence. "I don't know. I'm not sure. I think so, but I don't even know what love is anymore. He said he loved me, but that meant nothing obviously. The worst part of this wasn't losing him; it was losing myself."
"Well," Clary said, "you're going to have to tell them. And more importantly you're going to have to work with him until the ascension ball at least; after that you're free to get rid of him."
Alec groaned with pain upon hearing that. Facing Magnus again would be an impossible task. Facing his friends, however, was going to be much easier now.
He got up from his bed, went to the washcloset and splashed cold refreshing water on his face, allowing him to refocus his energy on getting the next task done. He walked into the room and sat down on the couch. Upon entering the hushed speculative conversation that Izzy, Jace, and Simon were having (and oddly enough Izzy and Simon were sitting rather close together on a couch much like he and Magnus were a just the day before) abruptly ended. Alec took a deep breath and began:
"I found Magnus kissing some blonde woman this morning in his office. She walked away unabashedly and he confirmed that they had a prior relationship. He tried to apologize and make amends, but I left before he had the chance. We're done. It's over. I had the inclination that something like this might happen the first time I saw him. It was never something he did or said; it was just that feeling that I had. I don't think I'll ever have that feeling again, but I don't think I ever should."
Jace and Izzy simultaneously stood up, fists balled in rage and seethed, "I'M GOING TO KILL HIM!" They immediately huffed and moved towards the door, Clary and Simon trying to stop them. It was basically to no avail, until Alec stood up and softly said, "Stop."
"This is something I have to deal with myself. I can't just go around having everyone who breaks my heart killed."
Jace laughed and snarked, "Isn't that what being a prince is about, though?"
Alec's lips slightly curved upwards in what could have possibly been marginally construed as a smile. Then with the same heavy tone he said, "I need him to still work for me till the ascension ball. Then I tell him that I no longer need his services, and he leaves us forever. End of the story. We both live happily ever after, apart."
From outside the door they heard a muffled cry and then the sound of someone running down the stairs. Jace was able to pull the door open just in time to see spiked black hair and too tight trousers running down the stairs. Still seething, he shouted, "That's right, you run coward! Next time I won't give him a chance to be this nice to you!"
He then walked back into the room and told them of what he had seen.
Alec simply shook his head and told them to get Carstairs; they were going to have to figure out a way to have Magnus still work for Alec while not actually having any contact with him whatsoever. Alec sat down, breathed heavily and tried to calm his fraying nerves.
At that point Magnus had finally made his way out of the palace entirely and into his household. To his ultimate surprise, he found Camille sitting there on his favorite chair, petting his cat Chairman Meow whilst twiddling her idle fingers on the armrest.
With enough venom in his voice to kill a herd of elk Magnus said, "What are you doing here?"
"Well," she said, "we were interrupted before I could tell you why I came back in the first place! I figured we needed a more private place to complete our conversation...and yes, I did mean that in a suggestive manner."
"Just spit it out and leave," he seethed.
"Fine," she retorted coldly, "if you're so willing to get rid of me, then I'll just let you know. I left two years ago because I was too ashamed to tell you or anyone. I had to go to the countryside for a while because our actions caused-no created a bit of an issue for me."
Magnus looked at her with a puzzled look in his eyes, and asked, "What do you mean?"
"Maggie dear, we have a son."