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Jace liked watching Clary sketch.
She always got this adorable furrow between her eyebrows when she concentrated. She always stuck her tongue out from the corner of her mouth as she tried to get a particularly tricky part. Her movements were so certain, so perfect, so graceful. There was always this one red curl that never stayed in her hastily done ponytail and hung tantalizingly down by her ear that she was too focused and busy to brush back.
She was always incredible, always bright, always incandescent, but never more so than when she was doing something she loved.
“Uncle Jace!” Max called loudly, ruining the introspective mood. He held up and shook the wooden sword in his hand - one of the pair Jace and Clary had spent days painstakingly making for their nephews. “Come and help me!”
Jace smiled ruefully. Romance was hard with kids around, which was why Alec and Magnus had dropped them at the Institute, declaring they were off for a romantic get away which included rarely found gems such as peace and quiet and no levitating children and no explosions.
Fortunately, Max hadn’t started his anti-gravity antics yet, because Clary would kill Jace when he started climbing to follow. He would probably start soon though, seeing as he’d clearly gotten bored of the colouring books and was restlessly walking around, horns bumping into everything.
Rafe looked up from where he watching and helping Clary paint. “Can I go too, Tía Clary?” He asked softly.
Clary reached out to ruffle his hair. “’Course, kiddo,” she said in the tender voice she saved for the children whom she wanted to protect: Emma. Julian. The other Blackthorns. And now their nephews. “I’ll save your painting so you can finish it later, okay?”
Rafe nodded vigorously, before snapping to his feet and rushing over as Jace corrected Max’s grip on the practice sword. “Me too, Uncle Jace!”
Jace chuckled. “No rush, Rafe. Grab your sword and come.” He walked them through some simple exercises and maneuvers he thought they’d be able to do – the same ones he’d done with his younger brother so long ago.
“Gah!” Max growled, swinging his sword wildly. “I’m a Shadowhunter! I’ll kill all the demins!”
Jace grinned. “That’s my boy.”
Rafael was much smoother in his movements – which made sense. He was a Shadowhunter. He had a natural instinct with weapons, and Alec had told him he’d spied on other Nephilim and trained by himself. Jace admired that sort of independence and stubbornness. It reminded him of himself, how much ever Magnus would hate that comparison.
“Uncle Jace, when can we see Tavvy again?” Rafe asked suddenly. He left his sword down next to his overnight bag and came over. Max tossed his randomly and skipped towards them.
“Max, keep your sword properly,” Jace chided gently. “If you get hurt, how are you going to be a little nuisance? Besides, it could get damaged.”
“Not a nuisance,” Max slurred petulantly, but he went and retrieved his sword anyway.
“Alec or I’ll talk to Helen and Julian,” Jace promised his other nephew in response to his question. “I’m sure you’ll get to see him soon.”
He cast his mind back and tried to remember. Right. They’d had only one playdate with the youngest Blackthorn after the whole Cohort-fake death-giants fiasco, and Magnus and Alec’s wedding. Max and Rafael were probably still worried about how Tavvy was holding up after everything his family had gone through. Jace knew he worried about Emma and Julian plenty, despite them seeming perfectly happy on their travel year.
Rafe nodded, satisfied. Jace directed him to the myriad of toys spread on the floor, nearly obscuring it. Sometimes he nearly understood Alec’s concern that they were spoiled, but nah. If he was saw something he thought his nephews liked, he’d buy it. If he took them out, he’d get them unhealthy stuff and ice creams to eat. He was their uncle. That was his job. It was Magnus and Alec’s job to be the boring dads.
“I want to build the Col-o-se-um,” Max enunciated carefully. Clary came up to them, and Jace slid his arm around her waist, lightly pulling her in for a kiss.
“Where did you hear of the Colosseum?” She asked curiously.
“Bapak talked about it,” Rafe answered as they scrambled around looking for materials for the project. “He said he was there when it started to crumble. He said it was very ‘siting.”
“And then Daddy called him a very big liar,” Max added.
“But then Bapak said he was a liar whom Daddy loved,” Rafe continued.
“And Daddy said he was lucky he did,” Max said, gathering the cloth from their short-lived knitting project and dumping it to the side. Jace wondered how that was going to go in the Colosseum but decided not to ask. He didn’t want to know. “And Bapak agreed.”
“And then they kissed,” Rafe made a face. “So many kisses.”
“I don’t see why Alec and Magnus had to go on a vacation to get their share of romance,” Jace complained to his fiancée. “They seem to be bringing every cliché ever to life.”
“Yeah, but they won’t get their peace and quiet with you around,” Clary grinned as he made a face, and went over to the boys. “You know, I painted the Colosseum once.”
“Really?” Max asked, wide-eyed. “Can we see it, Tia?”
“Yes!” Rafe said excitedly. “I want to see your studio, Aunt Clary!”
“Sure, later,” Jace interrupted. “Didn’t you want to make your own Colosseum first? To work, builders!”
They nodded in agreement, starting to discuss (read: argue) how they ought to begin the construction.
“I don’t know how you get them to always listen to you,” Clart said, smiling, as the brothers argued over the largest of the plastic multi-colored building blocks Jocelyn had given Magnus and Alec, which Clary and Simon had played with when they were kids. There was a ‘CF + SL forever’ scribbled on one of them, which at one-point Jace would have loathed and felt intensely jealous of, but now merely smiled at in fond amusement.
How things had changed in the years since he’d left his father and the foreboding mansion in Idris to the welcoming shores of New York: Max. Alec. Isabelle. His mother. Robert. Simon. Magnus. Jem and Tessa. Ragnor. Emma and Julian. Rafe and Max. Kit.
And Clary. Always, always Clary. His one constant in the world, his home, where his heart would be forevermore.
He thought about the seven-year-old he’d been when his father had first told him that parabatai was weakness, emotions were to be hidden, love was destruction.
He’d run at risky missions and self-destructive behaviour and death in his teenage years like flies going to amber: so attractive a prospect that all intelligent thought was out.
He remembered telling Kit that however much he thought otherwise, he didn’t want to die. He remembered looking at that fragile, orphaned, sarcastic, scared, defensive child and feeling a pang of commiseration, of old memory and a person he wasn’t any longer.
“Uncle Jace?” Max tugged at him worriedly when he was silent for a while. “You okay?”
Jace pressed a kiss to his head, carefully avoiding his horns. He exchanged a look with Clary, who smiled softly at him. “Yeah, Max. I am.”