Chapter 8 – Darkness in the Mausoleum

"I must be insane," Magnus muttered to himself, knocking on the ornate double-doors of Angelotti's mansion. Three days ago he had created a portal in order to help the vampire retrieve his human descendant Joseph from the depths of downtown Miami. He hadn't been personally involved in the boy's rescue, only in ensuring their safe passage and return. He'd got the distinct impression Angelotti wanted to keep the details of Joseph's circumstances a secret from him, and Magnus had no desire to intrude on their privacy, although he hadn't been able to quell his curiosity when he'd finally caught sight of the boy – he looked a frail, half-starved creature, with wild eyes and nasty cuts and grazes all over his hands and wrists. He hadn't spoken a word. Angelotti had been snappish and preoccupied the whole time, and Magnus had found himself ushered politely from the house by Angelotti's subjugates a few minutes later. He hadn't minded at all. He was eager to get home in case Alec had changed his mind and returned, and was bitterly disappointed to find the place empty.

The three days that followed had been full of turmoil. He'd left numerous messages on Alec's phone, all of which the Shadowhunter had ignored. More than once he'd put on his shoes and coat and resolved to make his way over to the Institute to demand that Alec spoke to him, but something always held him back. It wasn't pride that stopped him – he would've begged Alec on his knees if he thought it would make any difference – it was fear that he would only make things worse. In his experience, when someone told you they wanted space, the worst thing you could do was deny it to them. Of course, someone wanting space was almost always a precursor to the end of a relationship, but he pushed that horrible thought down and buried it. In his heart, he didn't truly believe that it was over. All his instincts told him that their love was strong enough to endure, no matter how bleak things looked at present. But he couldn't deny the simple fact that Alec hadn't spoken to him in three days and was showing no immediate sign of wanting to reconcile.

And now this evening, when he'd received a phone call from Bianca requesting his urgent assistance yet again, he'd been tempted to refuse. Part of him was mad at Angelotti for sparking off this row between him and Alec, though he knew it was ultimately ridiculous to blame anyone besides himself. He'd almost opted to stay out of it and let Angelotti deal with his own damn problems for once, but in the end he found that he welcomed the distraction. The thought of spending yet another useless evening alone wallowing in guilt was unbearable, and now here he was.

The doors of Angelotti's mansion swung open to receive him, and Bianca stood in the hall with a sour and reproachful look upon her face.

"If you'll follow me," she said curtly, beckoning him up the stairs to Angelotti's private chamber.

"So we're dispensing with the small-talk altogether, are we?" Magnus asked, raising a sardonic eyebrow.

"You look horrendous," Bianca snapped, turning her head and glaring at the warlock as they climbed the stairs.

"All right," Magnus replied, feeling a little needled, though he suspected she was probably right – he was dressed far more plainly than usual, with no make-up or hair products, and he'd barely slept or eaten in days. "Silence it is."

When he entered Angelotti's chamber, the vampire dismissed Bianca, and waited silently as she left the room before turning to Magnus with supplicating eyes.

"My friend, I fear I owe you an apology," he said hurriedly. "I have showed you little gratitude for your invaluable aid so far. Let me begin by saying that I fully appreciate the help you've given me in this matter."

"Oh, spare me," Magnus groaned, throwing himself down upon a lavish velvet chair. "If there's one thing I've learned about you over the years, it's that you only ever apologize when you want something. So come on, out with it!"

"It's Joseph," Angelotti said quietly. "He has escaped."

"Escaped?" Magnus repeated. "Well that rather implies you were keeping him here against his will."

"Technically, I suppose I was, though only for his own safety."

"Are you going to tell me what's going on here?" Magnus asked, folding his arms.

"Are you going to help me or not?" Angelotti demanded, his voice ragged.

"Yes, I am," Magnus replied. "But it might help if I knew what kind of trouble the boy is in."

"This isn't about Joseph, not really. It's about me."

"Modest as ever," Magnus muttered.

"I mean it," Angelotti continued in a low voice. "I was always the intended target here. Joseph was merely the arrow with which to pierce my armor. He's been turned into a human subjugate by an old enemy of mine."

"An old lover, you mean?"

"How did you know that?"

"Lucky guess," Magnus shrugged.

"Well the lady in question was more than my lover," Angelotti said, lowering his gaze. "She was my wife. Her name is Gloria, and she despises me more than anything else upon this earth. It wasn't always so. There was a time when she loved me well enough, and I swear that I loved her as deeply as a man ever loved his wife. We had two children – a son and a daughter – but everything changed when we became Children of the Night. Our love withered, and my affections passed to another – to my wife's sister, Magdalena, a mortal girl with all the sweetness and innocence my wife had once possessed, and a most singular beauty of her own. I tried to keep it hidden and buried, but I adored that girl to the point of madness. And though I did not act upon my desires, I could no more conceal my love than the sun can hide its fiery face from the earth. Gloria was mad with envy and rage, and in the years that followed she became dark and cruel and spiteful. She killed without thought or reason, she killed dozens at a time, not even to drink their blood, merely for the fun of watching them die. She threatened more than once to murder Magdalena – her own sister – and I was obliged to send the girl away to a safe place, miles from our home, and I did not even write to her, for fear of what my wife might do. But in the end I put aside all vestiges of my loyalty, and I left her. I fled like a coward from Gloria's wrath, and I took our children with me, and Magdalena too, and we all began our lives afresh."

"Did Gloria ever find you?"

"No, I was careful," Angelotti said. "And she was not. She massacred whole villages and left blood and terror in her wake wherever she went. The rumors of her presence always spread far and wide, I assumed it was only a matter of time before she would die at the hands of the Nephilim. And indeed, as the years drew on, all rumors of her seemed to vanish. I haven't heard even a whisper of her presence in over two hundred years, and I must confess, I thought myself safe. I was wrong."

"And now she has Joseph," Magnus said, when Angelotti lapsed into a pensive silence. "Do you think she means to turn him, or kill him?"

"I don't know. And frankly, I'm not sure which is worse."

"All right, let's begin with another tracking spell," Magnus said, hauling himself to his feet and putting his hand on his friend's shoulder. It was so rare for Angelotti to show the merest sign of weakness that Magnus didn't know quite how to respond. "Have you got one of his belongings to hand?"

Angelotti handed the warlock a broken watch, and sat in silence while Magnus assembled the necessary components and tried to complete the ritual. But from the moment he began the incantation, he knew that something was wrong. The indescribable power that ought to be thrumming through his fingers was entirely absent. He said the incantation to the end, but nothing happened. The broken watch lay static and inert in his fingers.

"You're sure this watch belonged to Joseph?" Magnus asked.

"I gave it to him for his eighteenth birthday. I'm sure." Angelotti said quietly. There was a weary, defeated look in his eyes. He didn't even seem surprised.

"He might still be alive," Magnus said. "Vampires can't be tracked this way, as I'm sure you know – if Gloria has indeed turned him, that would explain why the incantation didn't work. How long has he been gone?"

"I don't know. Hours, probably. He slipped away sometime during the day while I slept – just disappeared from the inside of a locked room. Someone must have broken in and freed him. My subjugates saw and heard nothing."

"And you're sure Gloria is responsible?"

"As sure as I can be, with no concrete evidence," Angelotti's face looked grey and hollow, as though the full weight of his centuries of life had settled upon his shoulders all at once. "He is completely under her spell – he keeps calling out her name, even in his sleep. I don't know whether he escaped or was set loose, but I know that if he was given any choice in the matter, he would go to her. And I know she's here, in New York. My agents have seen her."

"Do you think she means to kill you?" Magnus asked plainly.

"I don't care," he replied. "She's already taken everything from me that matters. You know me, Magnus. You know the selfish and dissolute life I've lived. I'm a miserable creature, I've committed every sin imaginable, and I've enjoyed it. But my human descendants…there is a reason I've traced them through the ages, and promoted their interests where I could. They are my anchor in this world. They are my redemption."

"Listen, Angelotti," Magnus said. "Joseph might still be alive. He may be a vampire now, or maybe not – there could be another explanation – but that doesn't mean there's no hope for him. I can help you, but you're going to have to tell me everything you know. Where has Gloria been sighted? What do you know about her plans? What can you guess?"

"She'd building an army," Angelotti said, his face blank. "She has dozens of followers – maybe hundreds. They're assembling in several major cities across North America. New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Seattle, maybe more. They're lurking in dark alleys, abducting mundanes from the streets, feeding on most of them, recruiting others forcibly…"

"They're turning people into vampires against their will?" Magnus cried. "Look, I have no love for the Clave – they're a bunch of pompous dickheads for the most part – but they need to know about this. They can help. They're probably the only ones who can help."

"You mustn't tell them, Magnus," Angelotti's voice was raw with desperation. "They won't care that Joseph is innocent in this – they'll murder him."

"No, no, I'll call the Institute myself, I'll speak to Alec, or Isabelle, or Jace," Magnus insisted. "Hell, even Maryse would do. They'll do what they can for him – they can be trusted, I swear. God knows they owe me a favor or two. But you're going to have to tell me everything you know. If she's building an army it can't be just to take you down. What's she planning?"

"As to that, I've no idea," Angelotti said. "But if I know Gloria, it will be loud, and bloody, and vulgar."

Magnus sighed as he rummaged around in his pocket for his phone. He had a feeling Angelotti wasn't being as helpful as he possibly could've been, but his friend looked so empty and despondent he didn't have the heart to challenge him on it. He should call the Lightwoods anyway –the news that an ancient malevolent vampire was assembling a vast rogue army was probably enough to be going on with, even if he didn't have all the details. But when he looked at his phone, his heart froze. Nine missed calls from Isabelle, and four from Jace. His pulse raced as he dialed Izzy's number, and the phone barely began to ring before she answered.

"Magnus?" She half-screamed down the line. "Where the fuck have you been?"

"Sorry, I was working," he said quickly. "What's going on?"

"It's Alec, he's been taken – by vampires, we think," she said, and he could tell that she'd been crying. "We were on a mission, over in East Harlem. There were reports about a vampire abducting mundanes and taking them into this derelict warehouse, so Alec and I went to check it out. Only we couldn't find anything, and we were about to leave when…Alec fell. There was this trapdoor, and neither of us saw it until it was too late. It happened so quickly, Magnus, there was nothing I could do – one minute he was there, the next he was just gone. In the end I managed to break the trapdoor down, but it was too late. I couldn't find him. That was when Jace arrived. The trapdoor led down into an underground passage, and we followed it, but the tunnel kept branching off and we didn't know which way Alec had gone. We searched for over two hours and we couldn't find him – in the end we had to call the Clave. They've sent reinforcements, they're searching the underground tunnels now. Our parents made us get out of there. They say they need us elsewhere, but no one really seems to know what's happening. It's starting to seem like this thing is much bigger than we thought."

"Yeah, it is," Magnus said, feeling numb and cold. "I'll tell you all I know on my way over there. Are you at the Institute? I'm not far."

"Yes. We need you to track him," she said.

"Right. Have a map of the city ready, along with one of Alec's belongings," the warlock said, then he briefly held his hand over the receiver and motioned to Angelotti. "I have to go. Alec's in trouble. I'll do all I can for Joseph too. Would you like to help us?"

Angelotti shook his head. His eyes were dark and cold, like shuttered windows, and his face looked stiff and barren as ancient stone. Joseph's broken watch lay sadly in his unmoving fingers. Magnus wasn't sure whether he ought to console his friend or slap some sense into him, but he didn't have time to do either of those things right now. Alec needed him. He turned and hurried from the room without another word.

When he arrived at the Institute, his mind still hadn't managed to process the enormity of the situation, and for that he was glad. He felt lucid, hollow, and devoid of all but the most basic emotions, and given his current circumstances that could only be a good thing. On his way he'd explained the details of the situation to Izzy and she'd sounded close to tears. Her eyes were moist and red-rimmed when she greeted him at the Institute door. Jace stood a little apart from them, his face grim and his arms folded across his chest.

"About time," Jace snapped by way of a greeting. "We were beginning to think you'd skipped off the face of the earth."

"Are you going to let me perform this spell, or are you going to stand there griping at me?" Magnus demanded.

"I planned on doing both. I can multi-task," Jace quipped.

"Well I can't, not right now," Magnus said coldly. "Alec's in danger, and I need to concentrate." Under normal circumstances he quite enjoyed Jace's repartee, but right now it seemed both inappropriate and annoying. The only thing that prevented him from losing his temper was the knowledge that Jace invariably used humor as a defense mechanism, and was just as concerned about Alec as he was.

"He's not dead," Jace said, as the three of them strode briskly from the entrance hall. "If it's any consolation." Magnus took a deep breath. It hadn't occurred to him until now, but Jace and Alec were Parabatai. Their bond was unbreakable and absolute, and if Alec were dead or dying, Jace would immediately know about it.

The tracking spell was successful, to everyone's immense relief, and revealed that Alec was somewhere in the region of TrinityChurchCemetery. They made their way over there with no hesitation, Jace and Izzy pausing only to mark their skin with a profusion of runes. Magnus ignored the caustic glance Jace threw at him – the Shadowhunter was plainly annoyed at him for some reason, but right now Magnus couldn't care less. He didn't even stop to consider the danger they might be heading into; none of them had the slightest clue what they might find at the cemetery, but that wasn't important either. In the past, Magnus had rolled his eyes at the foolhardy antics of the Nephilim, most of whom would sooner die nobly in a useless battle than admit defeat. He was no coward himself, but he'd always been a pragmatist, and he wouldn't have lived as long as he had without knowing when to fight, and when to recognize a hopeless cause. But for once, his logic did not even come into play; his mind had become a dark, empty space in which a single point of light still burned. Alec was all that mattered now, and he was the only thing Magnus could think of as he conjured up the portal and was swallowed by the darkness on the other side.

The cemetery was cold and deserted. It looked as though it might've been a pleasant place by day, but the darkness lent it a macabre and uncanny appearance. A line of stone tombs marched across the horizon, casting black silhouettes against the rusty brown glow of the sky. Magnus had half expected to find the place crawling with vampires, but the desolate silence was somehow even more unnerving. The three of them moved forward, scoping the landscape carefully in the limited light. After a little while, Magnus almost stumbled over something soft, and he looked down into the blank, open eyes of a corpse.

"Vampires," Izzy muttered, and she was right. The body was withered and bloodless, with several sets of distinctive fang-marks at the throat. The face was waxen and the features strangely distorted in death – they were not obviously male or female. But more disturbing than the sight of the body itself was the fact that it had been left here at all. It was against the law for vampires to attack mundanes, and in the rare event that one of them did so, they were eager to conceal the evidence of their crime from the Nephilim. Leaving this body lying out here in the open suggested they didn't care if they were discovered; it was possibly even an invitation to war.

Suddenly there came the rustle of furtive movement from every angle, and Magnus, Izzy and Jace found themselves surrounded by an advancing battalion of vampires. Their number was hard to calculate in the shadows, but the faces of those nearby gleamed moon-white in the glow of the Shadowhunters' witchlight as they drew closer. What came next was utter confusion – the desperate flurry of limbs, the chime of Seraph blades unsheathed, the dying cries, the spatter of blood. Magnus fought against them like a creature possessed, shooting sparks of blue flame into the teeming ranks of vampires and watching them scatter before him. The three of them were greatly outnumbered, but to his relief he found that their enemies were disorganized, and seemed hardly prepared for this kind of attack. Some of them cowered or fled when the fighting began, and Magnus had to remind himself that many of these vampires were probably new recruits, abducted forcibly from the mundane world and dragged into a war they barely even comprehended. As he moved forward through the teeming mass, he tried to incapacitate rather than kill the enemies that blocked his path.

After a while he found himself separated from Izzy and Jace, though he could still hear them fighting in the distance. His only thought now was Alec, and he ran as fast as he could through the cemetery, searching every inch of the place for signs of his boyfriend. The vampires became more and more scarce as he continued, and most of them fled at the sight of him. Every now and then he saw an empty grave gaping in the earth, or another bloodless corpse littering the ground, but still there was no sign of Alec. He didn't even know how much time had passed since he'd lost sight of Izzy and Jace. This cemetery was vast, and in his panic he wasn't sure if he'd covered some of the same ground twice. He called out Alec's name until his voice grew hoarse, but his cries only attracted the occasional reckless vampire attack. He incapacitated them unthinkingly and moved onwards. Eventually he came to a place he was sure he hadn't seen before – an ornate stone mausoleum shrouded by a grove of bare trees. The door to the burial chamber lay in broken pieces on the threshold, and Magnus was certain he could sense movement coming from within the dark hollow. He crept inside, the flickering blue light from his fingertips casting strange, spidery shadows over the stone walls. Below him lay a crumpled figure. Magnus' heart heaved painfully against his chest.

"Alec?" He cried, his voice echoing weirdly in his own ears. "Alec!"

The Shadowhunter was lifeless and unmoving, but when Magnus ran to him and seized his freezing wrist, his eyelids fluttered. The warlock let out the breath he had unwittingly been holding into his lungs. Alec was alive.

"Alec! Can you hear me?" He shouted. Alec moved his lips, but only a faint moan came out.

"I can heal you," Magnus said hurriedly, scanning Alec's body for signs of injury and placing his hand over the Shadowhunter's cold forehead.

"No, you can't," Alec murmured. His eyes opened.

"What did they do to you, Alec? I can fix this, I swear."

"They turned me, Magnus," he whispered. "I'm a vampire."

"Did you feed?" Magnus demanded, feeling cold and sick. "Have you drunk any human blood yet?"

"No, they drained me of blood and buried me in the earth, but when I woke up they were gone," he said, letting Magnus help him to sit up. "They had a mundane girl with them – they were going to force me to drink from her. I swore I wouldn't do it, but I'm…I'm so hungry."

"You have to drink my blood, Alec," Magnus said. "If you don't feed in the next few hours the transformation can't complete, and you'll die. The sun will be rising soon, and we have to get you out of here."

"I can't do that, Magnus," Alec whimpered. "If I start drinking, I…I don't know if I'll be able to stop."

"If you don't, you'll die," Magnus insisted, holding out his wrist desperately. "I'll stop you before you take too much, I promise. I'm stronger than any mundane, and most Shadowhunters too, though I know you guys hate to admit it. You gave me your strength once, remember? This is just me returning the favor."

Alec closed his eyes as a spasm of pain crossed his face like a whip-lash. Then he opened his mouth to reveal a set of little white fangs. Magnus drew a sharp breath as they pierced the skin of his wrist.