Chapter 3

Dot let her arms fall wearily to her sides, blinking owlishly as the golden edged sphere in front of her slowly faded, leaving two immovable figures in front of them. The little group stood as frozen as the Parabatai, until Izzy sobbed quietly and started to stumble towards where her brothers lay in the clearing, hand outstretched. Dot swallowed, and shook her head, halting the raven-haired beauty's progress.

"Don't… Don't touch it… She shook her head again, trying to clear the cobwebs from the strength she had used to move space and halt time. Clary rushed to her, tucking into her right side and wrapping her heavy arm around her pale, slim shoulders. Dot took a deep breath before continuing.

"Don't touch it. I don't… I don't know what will happen…" She swallowed again. "I don't know what will happen if you touch it. I've never done something like this before."

Izzy nodded, reluctantly, before dropping her hand and stepping back to where the two women stood. Clary gave her a small smile before turning to look back at her warlock friend with concern. "Dot, are you going to be okay?"

"Dot nodded, before straightening up and shrugging off the red-head's grip. "I'll be fine. So will they. I'll make sure of it. I've got to get to Magnus." She started off, before stumbling and dropping to one knee with a soft cry.

Clary shook her head, before walking back to her friend and helping her back to her feet. "Dot, I'm coming with you to Magnus' apartment. I know he doesn't really want to see any of us Shadowhunters right now," she said quickly, forestalling the warlock's protest, "but you can't get there like this. That spell took a lot out of you, and Magnus is my friend too. We'll both convince him."/

"Dot looked at her hesitantly, before nodding her consent. Together they stood up, waiting for warlock to get her bearings, before turning to the others."Izzy, stay here and keep an eye on the boys. I know you wouldn't want to be anywhere else, and we can't risk anything unraveling this spell. Even though this glen is sacred to the Fey, making it off limits to most Mundanes, there are some DownWorlders who will risk trespassing- especially if they knew that Jace and Alec were here. Although they've both done a great deal towards repairing the damage of the past, there are still plenty of people who would happily see them ended."

Izzy nodded, gripping the handle of her Seraph blade tighter, her whip glinting in the fading light where it sat curled around her wrist. "Nothing is going to get to my family. I swear by the Angel- the Accords be damned." She turned quickly to the remaining Shadowhunters, instructing them to take the prisoners back to the Silent Brothers. There, they would be able to pick them apart and try to find a cure, to reverse the effects of the injection that Alec, and several others, had received.

Dot nodded, satisfied, before turning back to the motionless boys in the cove, her eyes filling up. She took a steadying breath and looked at Clary, whose own tear-filled eyes were trained on the golden-haired Nephilim who had captured her heart from the very beginning. Feeling Dot's gaze on her, she turned away and steadied her warlock friend as they started to head out of the glade./

"We're going to need a ride, I can't get a portal like Magnus's, and with his wards, it wouldn't do much good anyway. With the way that New York cabbies drive, it's probably for the best anyway."

Clary managed to laugh, a small, watery sound, as she wiped her eyes on her leather jacket- the same jacket that Jace had given her their last Christmas together. She cast one last look back, but the Faerie's glamour had hidden their sacred cove from site. She waved her hand to flag a cab and as the yellow Crown Victoria pulled to the curb, Dot pulled out her phone and speed dialed a number.

Clary looked on questioningly, as Dot smiled grimly, saying, "I'm calling the back-up."/

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Magnus sat and stared into the bottom of his glass, hoping to drown away the feelings of emptiness that had taken up ever since his magic had returned. Funny, he thought, the thing I wanted most… He snapped his fingers, summoning a blue flame, studying it as the pale light reflecting in his un-glamoured cat eyes.

How I wish I could trade it for just one more shot, one more chance, with Alec. My Angel. He swallowed, lest the sob that was building inside burst forth into the ugly, wet heaves he had come to know like an old friend. Flicking his other hand, he disappeared any traces of grief from his face and took a swallow of his drink, grimacing at the bitter flavor. I've made a mess of everything- how could I fall so deeply for someone again, just to lose them. I've often longed for the mortal life, and when it's offered to me, along with the chance to spend my days with the one my soul loves, I lose my mind. I just… I just couldn't imagine that anyone could love me- just Magnus. Even my own mother couldn't love me. How was I supposed to know that Alec could do the impossible?

Magnus gripped his glass tighter as a swell of memories assaulted him, each one as vivid as the moment it had happened- Alec saving him, casually flipping the blade over and over in his hand as he stood in his club, wide-eyed with shock at the gorgeous, dark specimen in front of him. Alec sighing in relief after their intense kiss at the non-wedding, relaxing into Magnus' grip, the tension bleeding out of him for only a moment, but one that Magnus would never forget. No one had ever trusted him that much, to cling to him like an island in the storm of Shadowhunters around them. Alec laying limp on the roof of his apartment building, hands splayed down at his sides, unresponsive to Magnus' touch- and when he finally had awoken, the genuine confusion and fear in his face as he searched the rooftop with his gaze, only settling once he knew that Magnus was there, that Magnus was safe.

Magnus pressed his palms to the sides of his head, gripping tightly, trying to halt the flow of the tide, trying to stop the Nile from flowing. Jem had warned him, his father had stopped him, claiming that the memories were what made him- but the pain cut so deep, piercing down through the darkest parts of his soul, feeding his demon core. He could feel the bitterness spreading inside- bitterness with his father, with the DownWorld, with love… but never bitterness with Alec. I lost Alec, I let him go. I should've forced him to stay, forced him to tell me what was really going on. From one night to the next… How could I have lost him in such a short amount of time- I should've proven to Alec that my spark, what he fell in love with, is still there. That spark- it's still there. Isn't it?

He looked down into his glass again, swirling the brown liquid and wishing it were something alcoholic, something to drown his sorrows in, that could blur the lines between his grief, his distrust of his father, and his confusion about Alec. But ever since that night, when he had come home so drunk, he hadn't touched alcohol. All he could remember from that night was Alec's devastated expression. When Magnus had wandered into the kitchen the next day, seeing the remains of a fantastic dinner in the trash, in the sink, and no Alec, Magnus knew he had cut his lover deeply. Disbelief, frustration, and sorrow- Magnus couldn't shake the memory of the emotions in those hazel eyes, as though someone had decided to chisel it onto the surface of his thoughts until it pervaded every moment, every waking eon of time and every sleeping second.

Coffee kept him awake, kept him vigilant around his father, and whenever he got too sick of the taste, he drowned himself with water, until he could stand it again. Whenever he tried to dip into the river of sleep, all he could see was Alec's lost hazel eyes as they stared into his own. As their gazes met, he knew that this man he had decided to trust, who he had decided to open the doors to, and who had ripped the fabric of his soul into tatters, had changed him down into the very center of his being, a place he had closed the doors, long ago. Magnus had forgotten what love meant when his first love, the first one who teaches all beings what love is rejected him. Alec had begun to undo those dark chains around his soul- until he stopped. Magnus couldn't help but wonder who had put him up to it- who could so convince Alec that their love was meaningless, that Magnus' light was gone without his magic. Alec meant everything, Alec was his heart.

It was Alec himself who had said that the magic didn't matter, just Magnus. No one had ever spoken to him like that before. Alec had lit a fire within him, a heavenly fire, it seemed at times. When Alec smiled sleepily at him in the mornings, when he ran his fingers through Magnus' unkempt hair, when he subconsciously reached to maintain physical contact with Magnus at all times- and not in a jealous manner, as Camille might have done. It was Alec's way of letting him know that he was there, that Alec loved him, even when he couldn't say the words aloud.

Magnus shivered, the dark, cold air in his loft surrounding him with feelings of dread and contempt- the primary emotions that Asmodeus felt towards the world that Magnus called home. After sending tendrils of magic throughout the apartment to assure himself that Asmodeus had indeed left, Magnus placed his glass on the floor and leaned back into the chair, simultaneously sinking deep into its cashmere folds and into his memories of his dark-haired Shadowhunter, the pain swallowing him as he folded into the darkness of his own soul.