Well... What can I say? It just popped out after reading when Max's asleep and Jace puts his glasses away . . . It was such a brotherly gesture that my heart clenched and when I was looking around trying to find a fanfic abput this two and discovered none I decided to write my own.

Hope you like it!

Thunderstorm

Four years had passed since the Lightwoods had taken him in, and Jace Wayland was now a handsome fourteen-years-old. After all that time both the Lightwood and him had grown used to each other.

He slowly walked through the Institute, with no light to guide his steps. Though it was probably past midnight and following Maryse's rules he shouldn't be out of bed, he had gone downstairs because he was thirsty and now he was just walking back to his room.

He had vaguely noticed the rain that fell with rage and strength in the outside, but since it was nothing abnormal, he had let it go just as easily and was now thinking of other things such as training and Seraph Blades.

Since his room was the last one in the corridor he had to walk past all the Lightwood's bedrooms, which was the main reason he usually obeyed Maryse.

That day, nevertheless, most of the rooms were empty because Maryse and Robert had left to Idris with both of their eldest children, Alec and Isabelle, two days earlier, and the only ones left in the Institute were Hodge, Church, Max and him.

He was sure to be the only one awake, excepting, maybe, the cat, so, the first time he walked past Max's room, he didn't notice, but the second he was able to listen something inside, which estranged him not only because the kid was usually asleep at that time, but also because it sounded like muffled sobs.

Making no sound at all he located himself next to the door and tried to listen a little more closely.

After a short while he had no doubt at all that what he was listening at were whimpers.

For a moment he considered leaving the kid alone: what did he had to do with whatever he was crying for, anyways? He was not even his relative in real, and, what if the kid was just crying because he missed his parents? There was nothing he could or willed to do to help the child and yet, Max had always been kind to him, and neither had he any reason to leave him to suffer alone.

It could be a serious thing, and though it was more likely that it wasn't, he was certain that if he went back to his room he wouldn't be able to sleep, unless he really knew what was going on.

Besides, he had promised Alec he would check on Max while they were gone, and if something is unforgivable in the Shadowhunter's world is to give your word in vane.

Finally, he decided he would knock at the door and if he received an answer he would get in, but if he didn't, he would just leave.

He did. He knocked once, twice, and no reply came, except for the sobs, that only went even quieter, until Jace had to strain to listen to them.

He knocked one third time, this time deciding that if there was no answer he would enter nevertheless. As he had suspected, there was no reply, so, slowly, very slowly, he opened the door.

He fount the room in complete darkness, just as the whole Institute. The window was the first thing he saw, since it was right in front of the door, and he wondered if the rain sounded louder there, but he almost immediately turned to the bed, where he could see a tiny figure curled up into ball, hiding under the covers, breathing hard and trying just as hardly not to move.

"Max, it's just me" He called out, trying not to scare the kid.

Very slowly the boy's face peaked out from the blankets and blinked, probably trying to look at him clearly.

Jace entered and crossed the room, sitting on the edge of the bed and picking up Max's glasses from over the dressing table.

"You are missing your glasses, kid. No wonder you can't see properly." And with that he extended his hand in the kid's direction, who took the glasses without looking him in the eye, probably scared.

"Max, is there something wrong?" He asked, not wanting to be mean or sarcastic, but sounding a little impatient.

Yet, the kid in front of him only denied. Perfect, the only time he was trying to help someone and it seemed that that someone didn't want to be helped. That had gone wrong, better ask it differently: "Why are you crying?"

"It's nothing!" Answered the kid rapidly, faster than what would have been believable. But he made a mistake, he turned to send the window a mortified glance, so short that a simple human might have not noticed, but since it was Jace the one he was talking to, he did.

"Don't tell me... it's the rain. You are afraid of the thunderstorm?"

"That's not true!" That had been too fast too. And he was avoiding eye contact. Again. Something that, regardless of his height and age, he never did. And if that hadn't been enough immediately after answering it seemed he would start crying again.

Jace was tempted to sigh tiredly when he realized he had been right. The kid was actually scared of the rain and, because he had entered the room, it was now his responsibility.

But it was also something that unconsciously and without him even noticing, made him feel excited and nervous, maybe even glad; he had an opportunity to help someone else, someone that usually looked up to him and admired him.

"Hey, Max, it's fine." He said, without knowing how was he supposed to react to a weeping child, since he had never had the necessity to.

"No it ain't!", replied the kid, sounding somehow angry, not at Jace, but at himself.

And then the older understood what was going on. It was not the rain in itself, it was something else entirely. The kid was scared, which was nothing but normal, and even though he was crying, it was not because of the rain, it was because he feared something, in itself. It was because no Shadowhunter is ever allowed to feel fear.

Now, that was something Jace completely understood -even if he would ever admit he did-, feeling something and being unable to show it because 'it was forbidden'.

"Everyone is afraid of something once in a while, kid." He started, this time sure about what he was saying.

"Shadowhunters aren't." Was his immediate answer. He'd been right once more.

"That's a lie. Everyone is."

The kid finally dared to look at the one he considered his brother, his huge, gray eyes behind the glasses, though teary, filled with hope, somehow expecting Jace to be telling him the truth.

"What are you afraid of?" Asked him after a few seconds, with a hint of expectation in his voice, and even Jace was surprised of how innocent the question sounded. Of course a bunch of his enemies were after the things he loved or feared, to use them against him during a battle, but the Lightwood just sounded curious . . . not a simple malicious stop in his voice. Yet . . .

"I can't answer that." He immediately responded.

"It can't be. Y-you were not lying, were you, Jace?" Questioned the kid, and even Jace had to notice there was a note of panic in his voice, because he trusted him, and it seemed he was not being trustworthy at the moment.

"What? I'm not lying."

"So . . . ? Please?"

He rolled his eyes. That was no wise in no way "I'm afraid of ducks." He responded, finally giving in to the child.

"Ducks, the birds?"

"They're beasts!" he answered, with a dead serious voice that allowed no place for joking. "Horrible, not-worth living beasts"

For a few seconds Max looked a little puzzled with his sudden emotivity, but after a short while everything went back to normal: Jace had no emotion in his face or voice, while Max asked nothing and was happy by just not being utterly alone in the room.

After a short while, Jace finally figured out what he was supposed to do next, even if it didn't please him in the least.

"Hey, I can stay here for tonight only, if that makes it better. Does that sounds any good?" He asked, although he was not actually happy with the idea of staying in the kid's bedroom for whatever was left of the night, but he would take it as a simple job. However, immediately afterwards he saw how the boy's face filled with gratitude, one that simply had no words to be expressed with.

"It does!" he answered, rather relieved.

"Listen, you go back to sleep, okay? I'll stay here 'til morning" as soon as he was done talking the kid was already obeying his orders, sneaking back into the covers and getting ready for going back to sleep.

"Thank you, Jace" he murmured, rather sheepishly and drowsy, but even then Jace was able to identify the gratitude and respect in his voice. It was the same he used for when he talked to Alec, or to Isabelle. It was as if he were talking to a brother. And that only made Jace's heart ache.

Max was not his brother. He was not a Lightwood. And, most importantly, he was not, by any reason, allowed to feel, let alone feel love. "To love is to destroy, and to be loved is to be destroyed."

He remembered. He knew. But, sitting there, in the middle of the night in Max's bedroom, looking right into the kid's beaming eyes he couldn't help but to feel . . . somehow . . . heart-warmed.

Soon after, Max was already fast asleep and he was left to wonder, again, his father's words.

He turned to look at the sleeping figure next to him. He had to admit the kid looked peaceful, once he was not going on a dramatic number over some water. He smiled, but the gesture soon transformed itself into a grimace.

He had loved that hawk, and it was dead. He had loved his father, and he was dead now. If he dared to love someone else, what assured him that the end would be different?

Perhaps it wouldn't be that way, but he was not willing to take any risks, he decided. That night he would stay there, as he had promised, but only because he had promised to, not because any sentimental issue or attachment obligated him to.

Three years later he was dressed in white, in front of Max's dead body.

Even if he had tried as hard as he could to not grow attached to the boy, even if he had always stayed distant, even if he had pretended he didn't realize how important he was in the kid's life—it was something undeniable that the boy's unexpected dead was something that made his heart ache with numbness, with emptiness, the way it had when his father had died.

No, not really. This time it was something different. It was different because he felt responsible of Max's dead.

He should have known, he should have protected the boy; and he didn't.

The kid had always viewed him as an elder brother, as he saw Alec, nothing more, nothing less, he had seemed as wise as any adult to the kid, and now . . . now he was dressed all in white, for his funeral, something he just couldn't bring himself to get.

Breathe into it, he told to himself. It's fine, just breathe into it. You know nothing can change this, you knew since the beginning that this would be the end, you knew.

After all, love couldn't reap anything but hatred.

Could it?