This fic was requested by il-sole-le-stelle, who prompted: Alec/Clary, whispers. So I hope this lives up to her expectations! My parabatai, the lovely Emilee, did the beta work. Lots of thanks go out to her. The banner for the story can be found on my tumblr.

Warnings: Sexual Content

Oh, Tremble These Mighty Titans

The lights are bright. Like stars. Like…like headlights hanging from the ceiling, dancing. She is dancing. She thinks she is dancing. She remembers dancing and doesn't remember stopping.

So she must be.

Someone bumps into her, and she laughs. She wants to dance with them, but then they're gone, spinning away. The music is too good. It shakes and rattles her until she is all bones. Skeletal. Where are the words? They are somewhere nearby. With the stars maybe. She reaches for them, but they just brush her fingertips. Someone is singing.

Her mouth is dry.

A glass slips from her hand and it disappears onto the floor. Now she is dancing in the sea. It is easy to move in the water where she is weightless, and it is okay to step on seashells. They don't mean any harm. There are no sharks in these waters.

Someone bumps into her, and she laughs. She wants to dance with them, and they don't leave. They are crashing over her like waves until every part of her is wet. Her skin is slick with them. Her hips, her thighs, her chest. There is water in her mouth, and it chokes her. She might be drowning. She laughs.

And then it is gone. The water and the lights. And she is not dancing. Her hands are tied. Blue eyes. Dark blue eyes that she knows. They are not the ocean. They are too still and too serious. And she knows these eyes and the hands that touch her cheeks and capture drops of ocean that have landed there.

"I'm happy," she hears herself say. He cannot catch the drops of ocean quickly enough. "I am so happy."

[ - [ - ] - ]

The zipper is in the back, so he has to help her out of the dress. Her arms tremble as he draws them out of the sleeves. First one and then the other. The satin smells like sweat, and alcohol, and Fey tricks, and Clary half-limps out of it as soon as it's pooled around her feet.

Alec watches her sink down onto the bed like an anchor heading for the bottom of the ocean. The hair around her face sticks to her skin, wet from where she splashed water from the sink. Mascara is smeared beneath her eyes.

He thinks he must have guessed right about the drug. The antidote he gave her seems to be working. She wasn't able to tell him what she'd taken, and too many things were being passed around that rave. But he must have guessed right because she was coherent and mostly sober, and in a few hours she'd have nothing but a headache.

He doesn't know what to do with her. Calling Isabelle would probably be a good idea, but that would involve calling Isabelle—so he decides against it.

Clary reaches down and fumbles with the buckle of her shoe. After a few attempts to unclasp it, she gives up and crawls toward the middle of the bed, heels strapped to her feet and blue cotton clinging to the curves of her body.

She collapses onto her side, facing him with her legs tucked toward her chest. The brightness of her eyes makes him uncomfortable. He's not a tidy person, but he bends down and scoops her soiled dress off the floor just to have something to do.

"Do you usually go to parties like that?" Her voice is hoarse and too loud, as if she's still trying to speak over music. His ears haven't stopped ringing.

"Do you usually take drugs without knowing what they are?" He knows he sounds rude and superior and uptight (because she's 22-years-old; she's an adult, a grown woman), but he thinks maybe this is his place. Maybe it isn't. Maybe Jocelyn should be saying this, or Luke, or Simon, but they're not here, and Alec is, and he's already let Jace down one too many times.

Clary is quiet. It's a lethargic silence, not thoughtful, and she doesn't answer his question. Absently she hooks a finger under her bra strap and runs it up and down. Up and down. Up and down. "It's cold in here."

She doesn't even realize she's doing it.

"I turned the heat down before I left." Alec drapes her dress over the back of the chair he never uses, a furry green monstrosity. It was one of Magnus' favorites. "I can turn it up."

"That's okay. I'm not that cold." Her arm extends out toward him, and all Alec can do is stare at her proffered hand as if it's some foreign thing. But then it stays there, hovering, and he realizes she is waiting for him to take it. He walks forward and lets her small fingers circle his wrist and draw him closer. She brings his hand to her hair. The strands are slightly frizzed and damp with sweat. "Can you get them?"

She means the pins. He feels them, cool and metallic beneath his palm. It takes a moment to figure out how they've been stuck in, but then he starts tugging them out with ease, releasing chunks of hair to curl around her face. She has to sit up for him to get to the other side, and as he leans over her it brings their bodies close together. He smells her perfume and the smokiness of the crowded warehouse where he found her.

He's searching for any pins that may have escaped his notice when her mouth grazes his neck. He finds one behind the curve of her ear and works it free as her lips move against him more deliberately. His fingers comb through her disarrayed locks to work out any tangles. He does it once and then twice. Her tongue grazes his jaw.

"Hey. Stop that." Gently he catches her chin in his hand. Her eyes are nearly closed, but he can still see them watching him. Alec runs a thumb gently over her mouth, and the action smears red lipstick onto her cheek. She's humanly warm. His fingers brush her lips a second time. "Stop that."

[ - [ - ] - ]

She's never been this close to him before, she realizes. And there are things she hasn't noticed before, like the triangle of freckles on his neck. The small, hooking scar just beneath his nose. The way his eyelids don't both fold the same way. She notices how his chin lifts when he's thinking about kissing someone.

"Can we whisper?" She watches his chin.

"What?"

"I want to talk but my throat hurts. So I'll have to whisper."

The rave is a slipping memory, a dream she's waken from to find Alec standing over her. Whatever he gave her, she doesn't like it. Usually she isn't this raw afterward. Usually she would not be aware of the cold.

Clary lies back down on the bed, and Alec, uncertain and reluctant, sits down beside her. Belatedly, she realizes that this is quite painful. Alec is achingly familiar in his runes and hunting gear, and yet he is not familiar enough to be reassuring. She wants to change his shape. Or she wants to change her shape, and that seems to be where the problem is. Because she's not really sure what shape she's in, only that she is bent like wire and won't go back.

"C'mere." She motions him closer with a curled finger.

"Clary, what—"

"Does it look like I'm hiding any dangerous weapons?"

Reflexively his gaze drops to her unclothed body. Pink colors his cheeks and he sighs. "No."

"Then come here."

He slides over, closing the two feet of space that separate them, and then has to lie down just to see her face properly. They're not close enough for her to feel his breath on her face, but she imagines that she can. It makes her steady.

"What did you want to talk about?" he asks when she doesn't speak.

"Whisper," she reminds him.

He lowers his voice. "What were you doing in that place?"

"I have to keep moving." She reaches for the Morgenstern ring around her neck, but it's not there. It hasn't been for months. "If I stand still, I'll want to lie down. And if I lie down, I won't want to get back up."

She does not look Alec in the eye when she says this. Eyes are dangerous, and his are particularly blue. Instead, she stares at the zipper of his gear, which is pressing stubbornly into his neck. She reaches out and eases it down to his collar bone.

"You can't run forever."

"I'm not running. I'm dancing."

He makes a frustrated sound. "It's dangerous. You didn't even realize what was happening around you. If Jace knew—"

She yanks the zipper to the bottom, and lets the top fall open. Alec's skin is nearly as pale as Simon's, and the scars and runes stand out like ink on parchment. Pushing the tough, black fabric off of his left shoulder, she reveals the most vibrant scar on his body. It's been nearly a year, and the curving scar of the broken parabatai rune has not even begun to fade. It is ugly and beautiful.

Clary traces the raised skin with a fingertip. "Jace will never know a lot of things."

She wishes that he had marked her. She wants to be able to look in the mirror and see proof of him there. When blood had doused her hands as she pressed a tightly folded jacket to the wound in his sternum, he was everywhere. His blood. His jacket. She pressed and pressed, and the blood had kept coming anyway. And then he was gone and she had thought her hands would be stained red forever. She can still remember the shock she felt watching the color disappear down the shower drain.

If she wore him more on the outside, maybe he would fit better.

Now, Alec's hand covers hers, and Clary has no choice but to meet his eyes. There her memories are nothing but a reflection. "But I know," he says.

I know and I care.

Clary counts five of her breaths in silence. "Why do you still live here? It's been years."

"I don't know." He allows the deflection. "Magnus left it to me and not someone else, so I just thought…" The words die there, but the thought keeps moving behind his eyes. She feels the depth of it even if she cannot see the bottom.

"Maybe you should try dancing," she says gently.

His lips twist into something just short of a smile. "Maybe you should try lying down."

"I already am."

He still has her hand trapped against his chest, his thumb running in thoughtless patterns across her skin. Then he lifts his chin. When she leans in and kisses him, his lips are already parted, waiting. She is able to sink down into him until it is not her finger tracing the scarred rune, but her heartbeat. It's a heady kiss. Maybe it's the texture of his tongue or the way his teeth graze her chin as she catches his top lip in her mouth. But she can't recall the last time she was this overwhelmed.

She loses track of his hands after they climb her spine and slide into her hair. The anticipation of where they could be next has her trembling and impatiently arching into him. Leading by example, she drags her palms down his chest to the flat of his stomach. No scar or contour of muscle is left untouched. Alec groans and pulls her tighter against him. His mouth breaks away from hers and drops to her bare shoulder, nipping and then soothing with his tongue.

Clary sucks in air and likes the way her lungs burn. This is what it's like to be human, she thinks, almost relieved that she hasn't forgotten.

She shoves the top the rest of the way down his arms, and then his hands are impatiently returning to her, fussing with the bra clasp until it snaps open, and the material ends up caught between their bodies anyway. Her nails break the skin on his back, and he bites her lip.

Their hips begin to meet frantically, and if either of them were clinging to any doubt about how this would end, all pretense falls away as Alec presses encouragingly into her palm. The slight tremor in her fingers does not stop her from efficiently working the belt buckle free or undoing the button and zipper of his pants.

"Not on the bed," he says against her skin and tugs at her waist.

"What?" But she understands.

They make it as far as the nightstand. Alec hoists her up, and she's still flinching from the cold wall at her back, when he steps between her legs and presses into her.

[ - [ - ] - ]

She's not as soft as he would have imagined her to be. She's small, compact, and mostly muscle. If it weren't for the spikes of her heels digging into him, he would hardly notice the weight of her legs wrapped around his waist. She's also warm and wet and feels amazing.

It's been a long time. A very long time. So he doesn't last long. Not a minute after he gets her on the nightstand, his control slips away and his entire body tightens with release. He keeps his eyes open and watches as her hips continue to rock against his, heightening the orgasm until he's spilling inside of her.

The euphoria is slow in ebbing. Clary's hands gripping his shoulders is the first thing he becomes fully aware of. She's leaning against the wall, head tipped back and chest heaving. He knows she didn't come, that she must be frustratingly close to that edge. But when he raises his eyes to hers, they are hazy with satisfaction, and she gives him a small, breathless smile.

She briefly touches his neck, chin, mouth. Her fingertips linger on his bottom lip until he kisses them and then kisses her. She kisses him back, one of her arms looped around his neck, holding them together like a paperclip. She already tastes familiar.

"Come on," he says, and begins to draw back. But her thighs remain locked firmly around his hips, and he's still inside of her.

She rubs the back of his neck. "This is nice."

"Come on," he repeats and promises they won't go far. And he's right. As soon as Clary's legs drop from him, they go limp. He helps her down, and once her feet touch the ground she's sinking to the floor and lying down on the plush, shaggy rug that takes up most of the bedroom.

She insists that she's comfortable. Alec rights his pants and then squats down and frees her from her shoes, tossing them aside so they land somewhere beneath the bed. She curls her toes against his thigh in appreciation.

"What are you doing?" she asks when he spreads her legs and then kneels between them. Then his fingers are on her. "You don't have to do that."

But he does. He does have to. Not because reciprocation is fair play, but because pleasure doesn't always have to be a cost. Feeling good can be an end, not just the means to one. He wants her to experience something better than escape.

At first he's searching, carefully watching her body for the slightest response. Then her hand bracelets his wrist and directs his touch to where she needs him. A few precise strokes has her gasping. Her hand falls away, leaving him to work as he pleases. Her fists find purchase in the neon threads of the rug, alternatively fisting or raking as his pace quickens then slows.

Her moans come in whispers. She comes trembling and jerking around his fingers.

This time she doesn't smile afterward. She looks a little stunned and more than a little overtaken, and he thinks he can almost see her heart racing inside her chest. For a moment, her shaky exhale is the only sound in the room.

"That was…" She bites her lip and shakes her head.

Alec moves up her body and leaves and presses his lips gently and languidly to hers. They're chest-to-chest with his elbows propped on either side of her head. Her fingers leave the carpet to tangle in his hair. He's not really sure why he can't stop kissing her, but she keeps reciprocating so it doesn't seem like a problem.

When he eventually draws away for air, she looks at him curiously. "Am I the first woman you've been with?"

He nods. And, really, this should probably concern him. He should probably question why it is for the first time in his life, he's wanted a female enough to do all of this. He should wonder what it is about her and now that makes a difference. But those thoughts are unsettling enough for him to ignore right now.

Clary's fingernails are still lightly scratching at his scalp.

"Had you ever slept with anyone besides Jace?"

She starts shaking her head but then stops. Her frown is so small he almost misses it. "Yes. With Simon. Once. Not long after…" Something like a shadow enters her eyes and then quickly disappears. "We don't like to talk about it."

Alec hesitates and then brushes some hair back over her ear. "Do you think you'll want to talk about this?"

Her brow crinkles with consideration, but then her face breaks out in a grin. "Oh, yes, I can't wait to give Isabelle all the juicy details. I'm sure she'll be a thrilled and willing audience."

He laughs. It feels strange but good. "I was being serious."

"I know," she says and then falls silent.

"What?"

"Why do you still live here? It's been five years."

"I told you."

"This isn't you." She jerks her chin toward the hideously bright rug they're laying on. It's indicative of the rest of the apartment's furnishing. Everything is as Magnus left it. Even the glitter on the hardwood floor. "You don't belong here."

"I do. This place is mine…"

Her hands, small and gentle, cup his face. Her green eyes probe him. "Alec, we're lying on the floor because you wouldn't fuck me in his bed."

He wants to argue against the unspoken implication and say that this has nothing to do with hiding or coping. He's here because this is where life left him, and it's fine. It's fine. But then he can't even consider the idea of leaving this place without his stomach twisting in knots, and maybe there's something there after all.

"You should come back to the Institute." Her hands fan out across his chest. "It's your home."

It was his home. Once. And then Lilith and Sebastian happened, and everything changed. Somehow he's ended up here, lying with the girl his parabatai loved more than anything and not feeling heavy for the first time since losing the man he loved. Normalcy is something more elusive than routine, and comfort isn't four walls and a roof.

"If you do come back, I promise to talk about this"—she gestures in the small space between them—"as much as you want."

"Whisper," he reminds her.

"Yeah, we can do that, too."

- fin -

AN:Thanks for reading! To those of you who are waiting on a Keep the Next Breath update, the new chapter should be up in the near future. It's just going through the beta process.