They found Tessa curled up on the floor in the bedroom and Jem was hit by a wave of guilt that was so strong it was almost nausea. He gathered her into his arms without being able to speak. He'd been so worried about Will, so glad that Will was there, that he hadn't been paying nearly enough attention to how well she was. She had stood strong and confident, her voice had been clear, she'd made eye contact and smiled. He hadn't realized that she was weak enough to collapse.
"Don't worry," Tessa said into his neck as he pulled her in close. He couldn't even find a voice to tell her how sorry he was but she twisted her fingers into his shirt and pulled his attention down to her. He didn't need to say it. She could read it on his face.
"I'm fine, I'm stupid but I'm fine. I hit back and I shouldn't have, I wasn't strong enough for it but I'm not hurt. You can stop looking at me like that any time now," she said.
"You're a liar on all counts. You are not stupid and you are not fine," Jem said. If she had demanded he put her down he might have believed her when she said that she was fine but she let herself be carried. Tessa hated to be coddled. That she leaned in and didn't argue was more worrying than finding her on the floor.
He took her back to the main room because that was where the heart of the magic was. Though the warding was literally fading back into the woodwork, he wanted to be where he could see it if it flared again before Magnus arrived. He didn't put her down this time. He sat down and she arranged herself so that she could lean into him. Her hair smelled of some sort of floral shampoo but the harsh tang of the fire lingered beneath it.
He pressed his mouth to her hair and breathed in the scent of her. Silent Brothers had no use for the sense of smell so it vanished during the initiation. He couldn't remember if it was a specific rune or a side effect of something else. He'd been surprised when he left how strongly scents were tied to memories. It was a thing he had forgotten. This mix of floral and acrid and under it all the smell of her skin would call up memories of this day for decades.
The guilt eased as she whispered little reassuring things and jokes that didn't make sense and cuddled herself in tight to his side. They weren't alone but the moment didn't have space for other people. Will wasn't far away but he must have understood that he wasn't a part of this. Jem felt his attention on them but then he disappeared into the kitchen. A part of Jem wanted to apologize but that would have meant getting up and he wasn't ready to let go of Tessa yet. He wouldn't be until he was sure she was recovering.
When Magnus arrived a few minutes later with a tiny blue hurricane in his arms, it was Will who met them. They didn't come in through the door. They simply appeared in the room and Jem heard Will's surprised noise and then a child's giggle.
"Your warding looks fine," Magnus said from the rail above Jem's head. He had appeared in the entrance way and now looked down over the living room. He wore a bright yellow t-shirt advertising a place in Peru and he looked almost normal by Magnus standards. There was glitter in his hair but it looked less like it was there intentionally than that it simply couldn't be washed out anymore.
"Ten minutes ago it was a Christmas tree," Jem said.
"That's a strange decorating choice for July," Magnus told him.
The little girl perched in Magnus's arms had skin an almost indigo blue with ears just too large and too pointed to be human. Not quite a bat's but closer to that than human. Her hair was a riot of black curls and her eyes were a sky blue that matched Alec's surprisingly well. She wore denim overalls with flowers embroidered on the knees, a pink t-shirt and she carried a plastic sword in one hand. She brandished the weapon and giggled again and Jem smiled in spite of everything.
"Hello Banana," he said.
"Anna!" Tessa said turning over so that she could lie down with her head on Jem's lap and look up at the little girl.
"Tessa magic," Anna said and it was half order, half giggle.
"No Tessa magic today, little one," Tessa said. "I'm not feeling well."
"Rainbow Tessa magic," Anna said pouring emphasis onto the word rainbow. Will looked bemused as he looked between the child and Magnus with his eyebrows up. He looked anywhere that wasn't at Tessa. Jem felt a flare of guilt for flaunting their togetherness but letting go of her felt too much like abandoning her. Their fingers were twisted together and the little knot of their hands rested on her stomach. Jem couldn't leave her alone when she was like this.
Magnus reached a hand out behind the little girl's head where she couldn't see it and whispered a spell. Tessa's hair spilled down rainbow from the top of her head. It was spread out across his lap and the strands that had been brown were now bright pink and orange. It was a glamour and if Jem worked on it he could see through it but it was a very good glamour.
"No," Anna shook her head. "No. Tessa magic. Not Daddy magic, Tessa magic."
Magnus came down the stairs and deposited the child on top of Tessa. Tessa struggled to sit up before the toddler could take a seat in the middle of her chest and poke her in the nose. Instead the girl had to take a seat on her lap and poke her in the nose. Jem couldn't see her face but he knew the radiant smile she always gave the little girl.
"She can tell the difference?" Will asked. He had followed Magnus down and was still looking for an explanation.
"She's a warlock baby," Tessa said. "She can tell the difference between her magics. Most warlock babies aren't raised by warlocks but it's as easy as learning your colours if you have a good teacher. Do you have a good teacher Banana?"
"Daddy says he going to teach me swords," Anna brandished her plastic sword and Tessa had to duck back against Jem to avoid taking it to the face. She wasn't talking about Magnus. Magnus was not the person you wanted to be teaching you 'swords.'
"Someday, when you are not so small," Magnus said.
"Banana here is Magnus's daughter," Jem said for Will's benefit. "She was only about a week old when they took her in. Her name is Anna Lightwood and she is two. She once punched me in the face and gave me a black eye. She claims it was an accident."
"Two and a half," Anna said with all the indignant toddler attitude she could muster. Though they shared no blood, she had learned to roll her eyes in exactly the same way as her father. From Alec she had collected a serious smile that started small and bloomed for only special people.
"Lightwood?" Will asked at the same time.
"Bane isn't really a good family name," Magnus said. He stood with his back to everyone near the wall. His fingers flicked infrequently as he looked over the wards. "Alec wanted to make it very clear to his father, the Clave and anyone else who thought they'd have an opinion on her that she was a part of the family. The Lightwoods have historically been such a bland family, they need a little blue on the family tree, I think."
"You married a Lightwood and had a baby," Will said in a very flat voice. Jem glanced at him and he was looking back. They shared a tiny flicker of smile.
"Adopted technically. We didn't actually make her, there are issues of biology at play in that," Magnus said frowning up at the bookcases though he wasn't really seeing books. He was scanning magic.
"I thought all Lightwoods looked alike," Will said with a wider version of that flicker of smile he'd shown Jem. Magnus turned and looked at him out the corner of his eye. The light in the room caught on his cat's eye and it shone gold for a moment.
"Gildenstern and Gertrude or whatever the most recent generation was called when you were running about London did look alike. I stand by that. They were better men than their father but most gnats are better men than their father was. My god, it's been 150 years and I still remember him. That's saying something I prefer to forget the unpleasant ones," Magnus said, "Alec is not them, neither the sons nor the father."
"But he is a Shadowhunter and he is a Lightwood. The Clave allowed him to marry a man, a not human man, and give a not human child a Shadowhunter name?" Will said.
"Allow implies that permission was asked," Magnus said. "I am the warlock representative on the Council and Alec almost died in a demon realm saving the world. Blind eye is probably more apt. They just pretend Alec doesn't do things they don't like. They attempt to pretend he doesn't exist but no one has tried to push him out of the Clave."
"Yet," Tessa said.
"You're a ball of fucking sunshine aren't you?" Magnus said over his shoulder and then made a face that said he hadn't intended to swear in the same room as the little girl. Anna wasn't paying any attention. She was busy making faces at Tessa.
"Shiny and bright," Tessa said with faux enthusiasm before her voice became serious and she said, "The Clave doesn't like different and the Clave doesn't like change."
"I am aware," Magnus said. "I have known them longer than you have."
"But they've never tried to destroy your family. It's a singular experience," Tessa said and before Will could ask a question she wasn't prepared to answer she pressed on, "How is the warding? What needs adjusted?"
What followed was a conversation that made no sense to Jem. As much as he tried to understand Tessa's magic it never got any clearer. She played with the baby and talked about magic and Jem just watched her. He watched the way she held Anna like having a child in her arms was the most natural thing in the world. The girl kept trying to pick pieces of glamour off her hair and Tessa untangled her fingers again and again without losing the thread of the conversation she was having with Magnus.
There was a lull in the conversation that told Jem he had missed something. He looked a question at Will first. It was an old habit that had come back immediately. Will was here so he looked to Will first but Will was as distracted by Tessa making faces and laughing at the ones Anna made as he was. He looked to Magnus instead.
Magnus gave him a look that made him wish he knew the warlock better. There were nuances to the head tilt and half smile that Jem didn't understand at all. Tessa would have understood it but she was still too distracted by the baby.
"When did it start?" Magnus repeated.
"About a half hour ago, maybe less," Jem said though they were all still watching the show that Tessa and Anna were putting on.
"I should bring her around here more often," Magnus said. "Anastasia what are you doing to Tessa's hair?"
"Ah-nn-ah," Anna told him still twisting her fingers into Tessa's hair. She might have been trying to separate the colours but she was only succeeding in making a tangle.
"Mariana?" Magnus suggested. He didn't conceal his smile.
"Anna," she said as she stuck her lower lip out in a pout. It was as contrived as Magnus pretending he didn't know her name. Jem tried very hard not to let himself imagine what it might be like to have a daughter of his own to tease.
"Antonietta, let go of her hair," Magnus said and Anna released the ball of still rainbow hair that she had been holding in both tiny fists. Some places were brown again where she had succeeded in stripping off the glamour with her unreliable baby magic.
"I am Anna," she said crossing her arms in a gesture that was obviously stolen from an adult in her life and made Will start to laugh hard enough that he had to catch a hand on the bookshelf.
"I swear you looked at me exactly like that the night I bled all over Camille's carpet," Will said looking at the girl and then back at Magnus. Anna turned the glare on Will and looked at him a little confused. Jem suspected she hadn't noticed there was a stranger in the room before that moment.
Tessa waved him over and he came to sit on the low coffee table in front of the sofa. He sat just far enough away that he wasn't really sitting with them. Tessa had gathered all her hair and tossed it back over her shoulder and Jem idly played with the strands.
He had woken into a world that treated touch very differently than the century of his birth and for a long time he had found the public displays of affection uncomfortable. Some things were not appropriate when other people were around but he'd stopped letting many century old manners get in the way of touching Tessa. It had been conscious at first but it had become almost an instinct. He held her hand, let his arm linger around her waist, played with her hair.
He did it without thinking about it until he caught the flicker of Will's attention and dropped his hand. Tessa either didn't notice or ignored them. She reached out and waited until Will put his hand in hers and then pulled him a little closer. He let himself be drawn in so he sat across from them. Magnus dropped down beside him and gave Tessa a look that might have been a warning.
"Anna," Tessa said turning the girl to look at Will. She was suddenly and uncharacteristically shy, leaning into Tessa and looking at her father for reassurance. "Anna this is Will. He's a friend of ours. He comes from way back when and proper introductions were important then. Can I introduce him?"
Magnus nodded at the little girl who turned and nodded at Tessa.
"William Herondale, may I present Miss Anna Lightwood," Tessa said in a mock formal tone. Will barely hesitated before he gave the girl a little bow and then kissed her on the back of her tiny blue hand. She giggled again and it broke the spell of the shyness.
"You got funny magic," she said to Will. She stood up in Tessa's lap and leaned forward to push her hands against Will's face. She did it far faster than anyone expected. Will jumped in a way that was undignified enough to be called flailing and Magnus caught the child before she fell to the floor. Tessa laughed short and hard as much in surprise as anything else.
"Funny magic?" Will asked when he'd caught his breath after the shock of having a child launch herself at his head.
"Funny funny," Anna told him and then started to giggle again as though it was truly comedic. Magnus held the giggling child in his arms and looked between her and Will a few times. Whatever she could see, he couldn't.
"Stay still," Magnus said and then reached out to do exactly what his daughter had done a moment before. He grabbed Will's head so that his palm was against Will's forehead. Will made a protesting noise but didn't jerk away. It was a testament to how much he trusted Magnus. Jem couldn't imagine very many people who Will would tolerate grabbing his face.
Magnus frowned and passed Anna to Jem with one arm. He collected the squirming child and returned her to Tessa. She crawled out of Tessa's lap and back into his immediately. Tessa sat facing away from Jem as she leaned against his shoulder. Her bewitched hair fell against Jem and Anna sat on his lap so she could reach for it. All Tessa's attention was on Will and Magnus. Jem was left to manage the baby by himself. He pulled Tessa's hair away from tiny fingers and dropped it back over her shoulder to the other side.
Will pressed his lips together in a line and everyone waited for Magnus to make a diagnosis of what 'funny magic' actually meant. Will was annoyed and the longer Magnus fussed with magic no one else could sense the more annoyed he got. Jem leaned forward and kicked him gently in the leg in a warning that Will didn't really need any more. Will's expression smoothed out into exaggerated calm. Jem snorted. Will looking calm and serene while someone held him by the face was hilarious.
"It isn't coming from him," Magnus said. "Anna?"
Deprived of Tessa's hair to pull, Anna had flopped sideways over Jem's arm and was pulling Tessa's stack of paperbacks apart because she thought it was funny that each time she dropped one Jem would pick it up again. She looked at Magnus and sat as still as Jem had ever seen her. She frowned. He rarely called her by her proper name without some bizarre addition. Jem had heard her called Anna the Glitter Zebra once and Ms Anna McFanna Ice Queen another.
"Can you tell me what the funny magic looks like?" Magnus asked her gently. She held out her hands to him and he scooped her up. Will looked relieved to have the hand off his face. Jem loved watching Magnus with Anna. She managed to turn him from High Warlock to marshmallow without any effort at all.
Anna waved her hands at Will's head and he leaned back just a bit in case he was about to get his face grabbed again. "Funny, bubbly, orange," she pronounced.
"Bubbly," Magnus said. "Like it's floating?"
"Bubbles! Orange and bubbles and canIhaveacookieplease?" Anna said running the last phrase together until it was a single word.
"You can have a cookie with your lunch," Magnus told her before turning back to Will, "There's a spell following you or maybe it is just portal residue. That couldn't have been a small portal you stepped through. We're going to need a seer who isn't distracted by cookies and princess dresses, I'll see who I can call."
"Lijing," Tessa suggested.
"Is a psycho," Magnus said.
"Is a friend of mine," Tessa said.
"Is a psycho friend of yours similar to the other psycho friend who dragged you to Europe to play with portals and pyromaniacs. You need less psycho friends," Magnus told her.
"If I didn't have psycho friends, I wouldn't have you," Tessa said in a sweet voice. Magnus rolled his eyes and Jem knew the teasing smile Tessa gave him without needing to see it.
"It isn't safe for me to stay here," Will said interrupting the conversation and pulling everyone's attention back to someplace that Jem didn't really want it to be. Will pressed on, "I'd lead the pyromaniac as you call him directly to you."
"He'd find us anyway," Tessa said and she changed the way she was sitting just slightly. She shifted so that she leaned against Jem rather than sat beside him. It was invisible but he could feel it. He found her hand and hooked his little finger with hers. She didn't relax but she squeezed his finger in silent gratitude. Will was leaving and though he would only be going across town it was still leaving.
"He's right though and he needs to let Maryse ask him a thousand questions," Magnus said.
Tessa nodded and Jem could feel the unhappiness wash off of her. He wondered if the others could tell. These were the two other people in her entire life that knew her as well as he did. Did they know what the little moment of straightening her shoulders or the smile that didn't quite make it to her eyes mean?
Tessa very gently resisted the suggestion that Will needed to leave but she didn't actually argue against it. Jem couldn't come up with a consistent argument as to why he needed to stay so he didn't make one either. Will's mood was harder to decipher but he left with Magnus with a smile and a wave and a barely suppressed look in his eyes that was all conflict.
"He's real," Tessa said when they were alone.
"He's real," Jem confirmed.
"I don't know what to do about that," she said.
"Me neither," Jem said.
There was a long silence as she cuddled into him so that her head rested on his chest and his heartbeat knocked gently beneath her ear. He pulled the knit blanket a little closer around her. They had been two people with a shared missing piece for decades and now suddenly the missing piece was there. He just wasn't quite the right shape to fit in where he should have.
AN: Someday I will write a proper Malec fic about that child. I had buckets of fun writing willful warlock baby. There was a minidebate on Tumblr about her name because you'd think Magnus would choose something dramatic. That said, we settled on Anna because it's an old Lightwood family name and for someone like Magnus who chose his name to impress and intimidate to give a child a simple and direct name is a sort of declaration: "I will keep you safe, you never have to be anyone or anything but who you are," I imagine him to be an exceptionally protective parent - not sheltering but defensive - you don't mess with his child or he will take you apart.