(A/N: Still down own it... Just playing with the characters for my own amusement. Only one more part after this one... Yay! Also, there's a note at the end in reference to someone's review from the last part. :-P Enjoy.)
When You Say Forever, 11
It had been two weeks since Alec had remembered. They had talked very little and the Shadowhunters were to return to Idris the following day. Though he was nervous about not having Alec within range at all times, he didn't have much of a choice.
He was sitting in the living room looking over an old text on Vita infinita, just in case. It was shortly after dusk when he tucked the old pages back into their book, since they had fallen out due to their age, and walked back toward his bedroom to put the book away.
That was where he was when he heard the door unlocking, making his ears perk up at the faint sound. Yes, Alec had a key, but it was rare that he used it. And even rarer that he showed up without giving Magnus some notice to pull himself together. It was only when the Shadowhunter was extremely upset that he arrived without call.
Magnus looked at himself in the mirror, expecting to get advice from himself, but his reflection shrugged back at him and looked in the direction of the door, wear he could hear the sound of the main door closing and locking.
Magnus took a few steps toward his open bedroom door and paused.
"Magnus?" He heard Alec call. He didn't sound angry, so Magnus stepped out into the hall.
"I'm here," Magnus replied. He looked down the hallway and saw Alec jump at the end, startled by his voice.
"There's something wrong with me," Alec said, walking toward him. "There's something very wrong with me. And I don't know what to do..."
---
Alec walked toward Magnus, holding the sleeves of his sweater around balled fists. His skin felt like it was on fire and he was digging his nails into his palms trying to distract himself from the pain.
"What's wrong?"
"Well, if I knew, I would tell you..." Alec said, stopping a foot or so from Magnus. "I don't know how to explain it."
"So start at the beginning. Are you feeling ill? Is it something to do with the memories? Are you seeing the light again?"
Magnus reached out and put a hand on Alec's shoulder and tried to lead him into the bedroom. Alec hissed in pain as the fabric of his sweater rubbed his skin and leapt backwards. Magnus pulled his hand away as though he'd been burned.
"Alec, you're burning up," Magnus said. "Come in here, lay down."
Alec walked into the room slowly and wondered how he had gotten all the way there from the Institute with such pain in his legs.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and Magnus pulled up the vanity bench and sat down in front of him, a position they had been in so many times before.
Magnus reached up and touched Alec's forehead but frowned. "Your face doesn't feel warm."
Alec closed his eyes and shook his head. He was afraid to tell Magnus exactly what was wrong... He knew what his assumption would be. He would blame Jace.
"Alec, maybe you should take your sweater--"
He shook his head more fiercely.
"Tell me what happened. Something must've happened," Magnus said.
"We went out this afternoon... Down to some sewer where someone complained about a demonic presence," Alec said, thinking back. "I got scratched by the demon Jace was fighting."
"Do you think it's the poison?"
He shook his head. "We went back to the Institute and—And Jace Marked me. I don't know if he drew it wrong because he had hurt his hand, but he drew a healing rune and..." Alec took a deep breath and pulled up one of his sleeves, wincing as the cotton scratched his skin like wires.
He looked down at his own arm, where the runes that were inked into his skin were nothing more than large boils and blisters shaped like his Marks.
Magnus reached out and held his hand just above one of them and Alec willed him not to touch it.
"They're hot," Magnus said, confused. "I can feel the heat coming off of them."
"All of them are like that. Every last one," Alec said, wincing and pulling his sleeve back down.
"Do you mind if I help you take your sweater off? I'd like to see what he did," Magnus said, looking as though he felt sick.
Alec felt vain; he didn't want Magnus to see his body like that. But he nodded anyway and after several moments of agonizing pain, the sweater was finally gone.
Magnus stood before him staring at him with a look on his face that was a mixture of pity, pain, confusion, and disgust.
"What did he do?" Magnus asked. "I've never seen this before."
"I-I didn't tell anyone at the Institute. After he Marked me, Jace did the same to himself and then went to shower. I just changed my shirt. It felt strange for a while and then... This," Alec said, gesturing toward his chest, where the runes were red-hot on his skin.
"Where did he Mark you?" Magnus asked, climbing onto the bed and kneeling behind Alec.
"Just below my shoulder... There was a scra--"
"I see it."
---
Magnus traced his fingers over the Mark in the air and could feel the heat coming off of it, like Alec's skin had been freshly branded. It looked like a normal healing rune. How could it possibly have resulted in all of this?
He looked at the rest of Alec's back and felt sick. The marks reminded him of what happened when a Mundane was—Oh.
"Were you Marked before you went to the sewers?"
"No, just after."
"When was the last time you were Marked?"
"I-I don't know. We haven't done much in the last few weeks. Probably a week or two ago. It's been quiet," Alec replied.
If it had been that long, it had probably been before Alec's memories returned. But that still didn't make sense...
"But it didn't hurt immediately! It was like a gradual thing. It always burns when the Mark is first applied, but--"
"I have an idea of what may be wrong," Magnus said. He hoped that he was the one who was wrong.
Alec turned his head and looked at Magnus from the corner of his eye.
Magnus willed his hands to be cool and gently touched Alec's back without a word. Alec hissed through his teeth and turned his head away, closing his eyes tightly. He was tense for a moment and then seemed to relax under Magnus's attempt to cool the burns.
"When a mundane is Marked, they get burns like this... It eventually scars over, but in the beginning, it looks like blistered, hot flesh," Magnus said carefully. "It's extremely painful and more oft than not drives them completely insane. They rip out their own hair, kill anything in reach..." Magnus paused and ran a hand down Alec's spine.
"Do you remember—Do you remember the night you remembered Alexander?"
Alec nodded.
"I told you that warlocks stop aging at the point when their body is fully developed. This usually happens between seventeen and twenty-five."
Alec nodded again.
"When—When I..." He took a deep breath. Even though he hoped he was wrong, he still could be right. And if he was right, he had taken away Alec's free will without trying. And Alec may not appreciate that. "When I sent everything about Alexander into time, I may have—I may have inadvertentlymadeyouimmortal."
Alec froze in Magnus's hands and Magnus tried to prepare himself for whatever Alec was going to say. Instead, the boy did nothing other than stand abruptly and stare at him, wincing as his hands touched his sides, making the blistering Marks rub each other.
After a long moment of staring at Magnus, Alec let it out.
"You what?! I thought you said it had to be consensual! I didn't ask for that! I don't even know if I'd want it! So... So you're telling me that I'm a Forsaken? I'm turning into a--"
"No!" Magnus said, quickly hopping down from the bed and standing in front of Alec. "No, you're not turning into one! Your body still has Angel blood, which is why you aren't losing your mind. I think—I think you might be, um..."
"Might be what? I might be about to spontaneously combust? I might be about to strangle you? Because I think I'm about to do the latter if you don't start explaining."
Magnus took a step backwards and his knees hit the edge of the bed. "I think your body is just rejecting the Marks now. You can't be Marked if your body isn't aging. I think you stopped aging the night you remembered Alexander, meaning that my spell had run its course. And since you hadn't been marked since then, it makes sense that--"
"But how? How is this happening? Doesn't there have to be—I don't know! Doesn't there have to be some kind of hocus pocus and fairy dust for something like that?" Alec was grasping desperately for anything, and Magnus could tell.
"The spell I had to perform to get you to this point was already so complicated... I remember it. Even if I just thought 'If only I had done Vita Infinita sooner' it may have triggered it," Magnus felt his heart break in two just at the thought that he had taken away Alec's right to choose what he wanted to do with his life. For all he knew, maybe Alec would have been straight, brave, and a catch for all the girls if Magnus hadn't gotten in the way so long ago.
"Can you reverse it?" Alec asked, seeming to have calmed down slightly.
"I told you, very few people--"
"Survive. Right." Alec looked down at the floor and then back at Magnus. "What do I do?"
Magnus took a few steps forward and touched his hands to the marks on Alec's chest, trying to sooth him. In response, Alec closed his eyes and took a deep breath, seeming to get away from the burning for just a moment.
"You can't go to Idris," Magnus said, running a cool finger over the scroll on Alec's shoulder. "They can smell magic like this from a mile away."
"And what should I do about that, Magnus? I can't exactly tell my parents I can't go because a warlock put a spell on me a century ago!"
"I'll call," Magnus said, stepping away. "I'll call your parents and tell them that the scratch you got today was more severe than you thought--"
"Jace and Isabelle were there. They know it wasn't bad."
"Then I'll call them and tell them to go along with it."
"Isabelle won't go away to Idris if she just thinks I'm here shacking up with you," Alec said, shaking his head. He seemed to realize his choice of wording and tilted his head to the side.
Magnus was growing visibly frustrated. "Then I'll explain what's going on--"
"No!" Alec snapped. He seemed to realize the harshness of his tone and recanted. "I mean... I'll tell them. But... I'd rather they were here."
"So I'll call them and tell them to get their butts over here."
"You can do that."
Magnus whipped his cell phone out of his pocket and walked out of the room as he dialed Isabelle's number, closing the door behind him. Alec was thankful that he was gone... He needed time to himself to process the new information about the direction his life was taking him.
---
When the doorbell rang nearly half an hour later, Magnus was standing behind it impatiently, ready to open it.
"What's wrong with Alec?" Isabelle asked, rushing in past him, almost stepping on his slipper-clad feet in her spiky heels.
"He's got a... skin condition," Magnus said, closing the door once Jace had past him. "He just needs to talk to you. He's not going to be able to go with you to Idris tomorrow, but needs you to back him up when he tells your parents--"
"But there are doctors in Idris! They could heal him better than you can!" Isabelle said, rushing into the living room as though she expected to find Alec there.
"Not this time," Magnus said. "This isn't something that's going to go away--"
"What did you do?" Isabelle asked, rushing in on him like a bird of prey. She lowered her voice, "Did you give him some kind of magical STD?"
Magnus rolled his eyes. "No. Not," he said, "That it would be any of your business if I did."
"Where is he?" Jace asked, looking down the hall.
"My room," Magnus said, smirking at Isabelle's glower.
Isabelle walked off in a huff, pulling Jace by the elbow. Magnus followed, wondering why Isabelle suddenly hated him... She used to like him, didn't she?
Then he realized that perhaps getting a phone call saying that there was something wrong with her brother and she needed to get to him right now may have made her think that he was some kind of problem. Hm.
When they opened the door, Isabelle cried out upon seeing her shirtless brother sitting on the bed.
"Your skin!" She cried and immediately turned on Magnus. "What did you do?"
"I didn't do anything," Magnus said, crossing his arms. Even Alec hadn't blamed him so quickly.
"Magnus," Alec's voice sounded shaky. "Could you—Could you leave us alone for a little while?"
"Are you sure?" Magnus asked, receiving a death glare from Isabelle.
"I'm sure," Alec replied with a weak smile. Magnus tried to return a smile, but suddenly felt nervous. How on earth was Alec going to explain it to them without sounding absolutely crazy?
He took a few steps back and closed the door.
---
Jace's face never changed as Alec told the story. He still felt like he was telling a story rather than talking about himself. Isabelle, on the other hand, turned several colors, hissed, and nearly cried on several occasions. When he was done, Alec sat quietly and looked between the both of them. Isabelle was sitting on the vanity bench and Jace was standing a few feet from her in the corner.
"I'll kill him," Isabelle said, standing quickly. "Do you know how many laws he broke? ...Are there any he hasn't--"
"Isabelle, he hasn't broken a single law," Jace said, speaking up for the first time. "Everything that's happened happened almost eighty years before the Accords were even a thought. Unless you plan to build a defense to the Clave based on Magnus having a gay relationship with your brother, you've got nothing."
Alec swallowed hard and watched Isabelle sink back down onto the bench.
"We don't know that he's telling the truth. He should be brought before the Clave—"
"The spell can't be performed unless the person is willing, Isabelle. He couldn't have done it on me at any point," Alec said, leaning forward and putting his head in his hands.
"And there's no way to reverse this?" Isabelle said.
"Not without risking Alec's life. Weren't you listening?" Jace said, taking a few steps toward them. "I think what we need to do is come up with a good reason why Alec can't go to Idris and then we'll worry about it when we come back."
"How can you be so casual about this?" Isabelle snapped, standing again. "How can you just act like this isn't Alec's life that Magnus is ruining--"
"Alec has time to think about whether or not this is ruining his life," Jace said. "Don't try to make the decision for him."
Both Alec and Isabelle stared at him.
"You mean you're just okay with this? La dee da, have a nice eternity with the Downworlder?"
Jace shrugged. "It doesn't seem like it'd be so bad."
"You bastard. You are such an arrogant little--"
There was a knock at the door and all of them looked at it as Magnus poked his spiky-haired head in.
"It was getting a little loud... I thought I should just check in," Magnus said, looking only at Alec.
"We're fine, Magnus. Um, you can come in, I guess," Alec replied. He was ignoring his sister's petrifying glares toward the warlock and patted the space next to him on the bed.
Once Magnus was seated, he looked at Jace and Isabelle. Isabelle met his eyes with an icy stare and Jace looked almost bored of the situation.
Alec cleared his throat, "So, um, I guess we need to figure out what we're going to tell mom and dad."
"You could tell them the truth," Isabelle said. "They deserve to know that their only son has chosen to become a Downworlder."
"I didn't--"
"That's unfair, Isabelle," Jace said. Everyone looked at him, again.
"He did, didn't he? He just doesn't know he did it, since Magnus said he did it before. Alexander was going to give up his family, whose to say that Alec wouldn't have done the same?"
Alec looked down at the burning hands in his lap. He had been wringing them together the entire time he had explained everything to Jace and Isabelle... Now the blistering Marks were broken and some were bleeding. They still burned. As he stared, Magnus put his hand over them and he immediately felt the soothing coolness of the touch.
"Isabelle, there will be time to talk about all of this once you return from Idris. Perhaps you'll have a better grasp on the situation when you get back--" She snarled. "And maybe not. But in the meantime, we all need to come up with something to tell your parents."
"Why don't we just stage his death?" Jace said from across the room.
"What?"
"Not tonight, obviously, but when we get back. We'll all go out somewhere and we can come up with a substitute for Alec's body and stage his death. That way your parents never need to know about this. For tomorrow, we can just tell them that he's sick from a demon poisoning today... And Magnus doesn't think he can travel to Idris."
"It's just a portal, Jace, it's not like he's hopping a plane--"
"But there are cases where people can't travel by portal because of weaknesses, aren't there Magnus?"
Magnus nodded.
"So we'll go back and tell your parents that Alec is sick. They'll call Magnus and he'll come up with a suitable problem," Jace was walking toward the door. "Are we done here?"
Alec stared at Jace. He was taking this too cooly.
Isabelle stood and followed Jace out the door, leaving Alec and Magnus. Alec jumped up and followed them. And Magnus followed Alec.
"Jace," he called softly into the hallway.
Jace turned, his face set hard. He raised his eyebrows.
"Can I talk to you?"
Jace rolled his eyes and walked back toward the bedroom. Magnus stood just outside the door and then pulled it closed behind Jace and Alec, leaving them alone.
"Why don't you have anything to say about this?" Alec asked.
"What do you want me to say?"
Alec didn't know.
"Something," Alec said. "You're just—You're being so cold about it, like it doesn't even matter to you. We're brothers, Jace."
Jace looked past Alec and out the window.
"You're going to have a life, Alec," Jace said. He looked back at Alec, at the burns on his flesh. "You're not going to be kept at bay by the Clave and you're not going to have to risk your life every five minutes just because someone whistles."
Alec was taken aback. "But you love being a Shadowhunter."
"So do you," Jace said. "But sometimes there are things you love more."
Alec felt something stab his heart. Clary. That was what Jace's demeanor was about.
"Jace, I'm sorr--"
"Don't, Alec. Just... You didn't have to make a choice about how you felt because it was made for you. Just be happy that it was made in the way you would've gone eventually. Because if it hadn't been, you'd hate it later."
Alec knew that Jace wasn't talking about him anymore, but didn't know what to say.
"You've got a chance to be with someone who loves you, Alec. Forever. And I know the guy hates to clean, but you've got time to train him," Jace said, smiling sadly at Alec. "And if he gives you any trouble, you've got me to call. Or Isabelle, since I think she wants his blood right about now."
Alec laughed slightly.
"You'll always be my brother, Alec," Jace said, putting a hand on his shoulder. It burned, but Alec ignored it. "I'm not going to disappear just because your parents think you've died. And I know it might seem like Isabelle is angry right now, but..." Jace took a deep breath. "She's never been in a hopeless love."
Alec had never seen such a vulnerability behind Jace's eyes, but he knew he never wanted to see it again. When Jace took his hand away, Alec was sure he took bits of Alec's flesh with him, but he just gritted his teeth and watched Jace open the door and walk away.
He had his blessing.
---
Magnus was extremely thankful when the door opened and Jace walked out of his room. Partly because Isabelle had been standing at the end of the hall clicking her heel and playing around with the gold whip she always carried and partly because he still felt uncomfortable about Alec being alone with Jace.
Once the two of them were gone, Magnus walked back to his bedroom, where he found Alec looking out the window down at the street, watching as Jace and Isabelle walked down the street.
He put his hands on Alec's back again and heard a contented sigh escape the boy's lips.
"What did Jace say?"
Alec was silent for a moment. "I think he just wants me to have the kind of happiness he can't," Alec replied, turning to face Magnus. "Because even though this choice was made for me, I probably would've made it myself in time. But where he didn't know what to feel about Clary...."
Magnus nodded in understanding.
"And I would have, Magnus, I know I would have," Alec said, leaning into Magnus's touch against his burning skin. "I just didn't think it would be so soon."
Magnus leaned forward and kissed him, carefully running his hands down Alec's arms.
When he pulled away a moment later he realized that Alec's eyes were open and looking at him curiously.
"What?" He asked.
"Do you really think you'll be able to put up with me forever?"
"As long as you don't try to alphabetize my spice rack, I'm perfectly okay with forever," Magnus said, brushing Alec's hair away and kissing his forehead.
"A few weeks ago, I told you I wanted to be with you forever," Alec said as he put his hands on Magnus's waist.
Magnus nodded and thought back to that night.
Alec laughed nervously. "I didn't think I meant it literally."
"Sometimes we say things as jokes that our mind actually means seriously," Magnus said, leaning forward and touching their foreheads together. He stared into Alec's eyes as the boy seemed to think about it for a moment.
"I don't know that I'd say my mind. My mind is telling me that I'm going to wake up and laugh at myself. My heart is the one telling me that I'm awake and I'm not crazy for believing everything you've said."
"Well, I love your heart," Magnus said. He put his hands on Alec's chest and felt his heartbeat under the heat.
"And it loves you," Alec said, kissing Magnus quickly. "Forever."
---
A/N Pt. 2: BET YOU DIDN'T SEE THAT COMING! ...Aside from Jusmine who (I think) said it as a joke and will be like "Oh.. Um... So I was right?" BOO TO YOU! And if you did see it coming, well... :( I didn't think I was being predictable. Bah. I've been tossing the idea around in my head for a while and then I decided on it about ten minutes after I posted the last chapter... Then Jusmine posted that review and I was like "Well... Maybe I shouldn't do it." Then I was like "Screw it, I'm going with it." ;) Good job, Jusmine :-P