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Jace sighed and tilted his head up letting the fresh breeze wash over his face. Peering through his eyelashes, he squinted at the sun that was slowly moving towards the skyline and painting everything gold. A flock of seagulls were flying towards the sunset, standing out black against the sun. It was mildly warm and felt like springtime, so Jace was perfectly comfortable sitting cross-legged on the beach, his jeans dusted with sand. It was quiet, and he could only hear the waves whispering softly against the shore. Jace hadn’t felt so peaceful for a long time, he tried and failed to even remember the last time he had been at the beach.
He looked at a pile of seashells he had just collected and picked up one, touching its smooth, water-polished surface. How did he manage to come here today when there was still so much to do? Wasn’t he supposed to… The shell cracked in his hand, and Jace gasped as the sharp pain suddenly flared up inside his head. Instinctively, he pressed his hand against his forehead and hissed when a jagged edge of the seashell broke the skin just above his eyebrow.
“Damn it,” Jace muttered and dropped the shell, wincing at another twinge of headache.
The pieces of the broken shell rolled down the shore where the waves immediately swallowed them, leaving no trace on the wet sand. Jace watched them disappear in the white curls of seafoam and then turned his gaze to the pile of shells next to him. Slowly but steadily, he started placing the shells on the sand in front of him, one by one. Sometimes he moved them, changing their positions, as if it were important that each took its own place. With every shell, the throbbing pain in his head subsided, and when Jace finally stopped, there was a perfect spiral pattern curving at his feet. He reached out and traced his fingers along the sprawling rays. He could already see that something was wrong with the pattern, he had to rearrange it and it was the most significant thing to do, the very essence of his life.
Jace didn’t know how long he had been sitting there, assembling the same pattern all over again. Every time he thought he was close to completing it, he would notice one seashell that had to be moved to a different place, and then another one, and three more…
“Look at me,” the waves whispered suddenly, and Jace started, raising his head, his eyes dazzled by hours of only staring at the seashells.
He looked around but the beach was empty, almost deserted, with the same dark silhouettes of birds in the sky. The sun was still there, gently caressing his face, and Jace frowned. It was exactly where it had been when he had looked at it for the first time, and so were the seagulls. The sun was leaning towards the pink strokes of clouds stretched along the horizon but it never reached them. The seagulls weren’t moving either, stuck in the sky as if they were in a painting.
Jace got to his feet and started walking quickly along the beach. He couldn’t see anything but sand and water, only those stripes of blue and gold going all the way up and down. It felt like a nightmare – lost and helpless, he was trapped in the exaggerated absurdity of a paradise. Jace turned and walked the other way, the sun standing still above him and his feet sinking in the sand. Everything around him was totally static, and it made him dizzy, but worst of all was a terrifying feeling that there was nothing else. Somehow the world had ceased to exist, and all that had been left was this strip of land and a handful of ocean, and all the rest was an endless dark void. Jace stopped in his tracks when a sudden thought hit him – he couldn’t remember how he had got here. And then another thought – he couldn’t remember anything at all. His memory was filled with shadows and silhouettes, they were moving and talking but Jace couldn’t make out anything, as though he was looking through the muddy water.
“Fight it,” the wind ruffled his hair, breathing softly in his ear.
Jace froze for a moment and then the dull ache in his head turned into the splitting pain making him drop to his knees. It felt like fire burning everything to ashes, purging every single thought, every single memory. When he finally managed to open his eyes, he was kneeling in front of the seashell pattern he had made. Jace groaned and lashed out, crushing the shells with his fingers, paying no attention to the shattered pieces that were cutting his palms. He came to his senses only when his hands were covered with blood and there was a bloody mess of sand and shells beside him. Jace was staring at it, wide-eyed, as he realised that the pattern had transformed into a lifeless body of a fair-haired man. He was lying on the ground, his chest ripped open, crimson blood splattered all around.
“No,” Jace whispered, his fingers clasped around the hilt of the blade and slick with blood. “Stop it.”
The blade fell on the ground, and Jace looked around, taking in the blurry outlines of an unfamiliar room and more bodies scattered around him. His head throbbed with pain and he felt a wave of nausea as he thought about inflicting all those wounds.
“Jace…” the same voice he had heard before called out of nowhere, cutting through the ringing in his ears. “Don’t… I’m here… Please…”
The scattered words sounded as if they were coming through the static, and Jace froze, scared to miss a single one of them, struggling to discern anything among the shadows. He knew now that the voice didn’t belong to someone who had locked him up in this illusion while using him as a killing machine. On the contrary, it was someone Jace was reaching for with all his body and soul, someone he couldn’t hurt even if he had to die for disobedience. He felt the uncontrollable urge to kill rising in his chest again, his hands balled into fists, his vision getting more blurry. He couldn’t fight it any longer, he was losing control. Jace made an inhuman effort just to step back, but the silhouette of a man followed him in such a familiar way it shook him like an electric shock.
“Please go,” Jace pleaded, his voice weak and hoarse, as though there was a steel chain wrapped around his throat. “I said – go!”
He had to gather all his strength to shout at the stubborn faceless shadow in front of him, but at that moment the dim vision of the room disappeared, and another burst of blinding pain hit his head. Jace slid down onto the sand and curled up there, biting his lips to hold back a groan. Whichever demon was doing it to him, it would surely be pleased to hear him scream, and Jace wouldn’t let that happen. It wasn’t even a torture. He was being trained like a fighting dog, the invisible leash being pulled tighter by the minute. If he wanted the pain to stop, he had to sit there playing mindlessly with the seashells and let the demon control his body. No questions, no memories, as if he had turned into an empty shell himself. All he had to do was to stop fighting, and the agony would go away. All he had to do was to stop trying to remember him.
Jace’s eyes flew open, as he realised that despite the pain all this time he was racking his brain to catch a slipping image of that someone whose voice was the last barrier between him and the cold darkness he was drowning in. He tried to remember the height or eye colour but every time he thought he was close to remembering, another wave of pain was crashing over him, threatening to crack his skull. And then his fingers found a spot just above his hipbone and covered it, as if protecting something precious. Jace gasped in pain as he remembered long fingers tracing the pattern burnt into his skin right where his hand rested now. Or were those Jace’s own fingers brushing ever so carefully over the same pattern on the other’s skin?
They both hissed as they gently probed the fresh scars carved into their bodies, overwhelmed by curiosity and fascination and something so deep and raw that it hurt more than the overly sensitive skin under their fingers…
Breathing heavily, Jace managed to sit up and he blinked helplessly – there were no shattered pieces, no blood, only another neat pile of seashells by his side. He frowned and pulled up his shirt just to see the expanse of unblemished skin. Somehow it seemed unnatural to him, as if something was missing. There used to be scars or tattoos or…
Obediently, Jace bent his head forward, biting back a mischievous smile. He felt the other’s hand rest on his shoulder to steady him while drawing something across the nape of his neck. Jace’s whole body shuddered as the force of the rune rippled through him. He clutched his blade tighter and turned, grinning triumphantly…
Jace groaned quietly, the aftershocks of punishing pain echoing through his head. But now he couldn’t care less about it. The pain didn’t stop him from remembering anymore. Runes. There used to be runes. Jace glared at the pile of seashells and reached for the first one with a steady hand. It took him a long time to put the shells the way he wanted to, fighting the urge to make another abstract pattern. A crooked letter “A” stood out against the sand and Jace frowned, tracing it with uncertain fingers — the first letter in the alphabet, the first in his name…
They were running up the stairs, laughing and pushing each other. Jace was at the top half a step before A and raised his fists in an exaggerated sign of triumph.
“First,” he said, panting heavily rather because of laughter than exertion.
“So you’re the crowned king of the stairs now,” A chuckled, obviously not a sore loser. “Has anyone ever told you such competitiveness is unhealthy?”
“No, but you can tell me all about it if you beat me on the way down,” for a moment Jace jokingly pulled A so close their foreheads were almost touching, and then he rushed down the stairs...
The memory faded as quickly as it appeared in his blurry mind, and suddenly Jace couldn’t breathe, he was suffocating as if an invisible hand was choking him. Only when the world started fading to black, everything stopped, and Jace coughed, taking greedy breaths of air. Instinctively, he reached for his throat and felt a thin leather lace wrapped around his neck. Jace tried to pull it off but the more he struggled, the tighter the lace seemed to cling to his flesh. Then suddenly Jace felt something push him down to his knees, so that the scattered shells were right in front of his face. Jace gave an angry snarl and jerked against the invisible force, unable and unwilling to hold back his combat instincts. But the force was too strong to fight it, so all he could do was to wait until it finally released him.
“Alright, if you want stupid seashells, you’ll get them,” he muttered stubbornly as he sat up straight and pushed his hair off his face.
Jace did his best to focus, pausing only to breathe through an especially severe attack of headache, and soon another letter appeared on the sand. The “L” turned out even more deformed but Jace didn't care. Close to remembering, he managed to break the ultimate control the demon had over him. He had to fight back the painful haze, but the anger and those shaky letters gave him strength.
A fell on the floor laughing but still trying to punch back. Jace straddled him and grabbed his hands, cutting all the ways for him to fight back.
“Okay, okay, you won,” he said breathlessly and there was neither spite in his voice, nor hurt pride.
Jace felt that A stopped struggling against his grip but still he lingered. He hadn’t noticed before that A’s eyes had that deep hazel shade with bright specks of green. And Jace just stopped and stared. He hadn't known that trying to catch the green in those eyes could have put him in an almost hypnotic trance.
“Jace?” A called quietly, still making no attempt to move.
Jace shook his head chasing away the strange daze he had suddenly fallen into, and before A could say anything, he sat up and stated with a cocky smirk, “You hit the ground first.”
“I did,” A agreed obediently and suddenly wrenched out of his grip, taking a fighting stance in a blink of an eye. “But you’ll hit it harder!”
Jace jumped to his feet grinning happily, “Oh you’re going to regret that!”
Jace groaned desperately when the memory started slipping away. He knew he was under some kind of evil spell but still he felt there was something else that held him back from remembering, something that was hiding deep inside his own heart. It felt as if he wasn’t allowed to plunge into those memories, as if he had to stay away or someone would be hurt. A sudden gust of wind came like a cold breath from the ocean, and Jace looked up, startled at how dark the waves had become. The water was seething and growling, a predator threatening to attack any moment. Jace could swear that for a fleeting second he saw an ugly face, distorted with anger, floating beneath the surface. But before he tried to look closer, the waves crashed over the shore in the most unnatural way. Instinctively, Jace threw himself down, covering the letters on the sand, but the tide was too strong. It swept him off his feet and shoved him back like a giant invisible fist. Everything around him turned into a dark vortex, and Jace could only gasp for air when he had a chance, and then the waves swallowed him again.
Jace gasped, his eyes wide open and staring into the darkness. There was a loud pounding, as if the whole building was being demolished, and it took Jace a moment to realize it was his own heart, slamming against his ribcage.
“Another nightmare?” a cool hand slid across his temple, and Jace immediately relaxed, leaning into the touch with his feverish forehead.
“How did you know?” he croaked, his mouth dry as a desert.
“We didn’t get that for good looks,” A raised his eyebrows and pointed at Jace’s hand.
Only then did Jace notice that he was pressing his fingers to the rune just above his hipbone, his nails digging into his own skin. Slowly, he removed his hand and sat up, gratefully taking a glass of water A was holding out to him.
“Didn’t know I could use it as a call button,” Jace smirked, returning the empty glass.
“Don’t get used to that,” A huffed, his eyes lit up with humour, and then he became serious again. “Want to talk about it?”
“No,” Jace moved until his head rested in A’s lap and closed his eyes, letting out a sigh of relief. “Just stay here for a bit.”
“It’s not a call button,” A reminded with a smile, as his fingers started stroking Jace’s hair, massaging his scalp with just a hint of nails.
“Please don’t stop,” Jace groaned breathlessly, his eyes immediately falling shut.
He heard A give an amused chuckle, and then he bent down to whisper in his ear, “Goodnight, Jace.”
“Goodnight, Alec.”
Alec, it was Alec, how could he not remember it the moment he heard that voice whispering through the spell? Jace opened his eyes and froze.
“Goodnight, Alec,” Jace snarled, holding the blade to Alec’s throat, his eyebrows drawn together in an effort to force the blade down.
Laying on the ground in the dark alley, Alec felt the strength sipping out of him, unable to resist the attack any longer, and it wasn’t only physical tiredness. It was about Jace who was a minute away from killing him. It was about his face, even though his features were twisted in fury and barely recognizable. It was about his empty eyes, that used to sparkle with joy and cockiness during their sparring sessions, and now they were like two plastic buttons sewn to the face of a puppet.
“I’m sorry,” Alec whispered, hating how broken and helpless his voice sounded. “I can’t…”
Suddenly Jace’s hands on the hilt twitched. It was just one blink, and when the mismatched eyes opened again, Alec saw that something shifted. For a moment Jace pulled back, his eyes wide with horror, but then he shut down again and leaned back to Alex’s throat with a deep growl. Something slipped from under his shirt, a tiny seashell dangling on a lace in front of Alec’s face. He didn’t remember Jace ever wearing it. And suddenly he knew what he had to do. He grabbed the seashell and clutched it in his hand. He had to rely on just one hand to hold back Jace’s blade now, and that could have been the last thing he’d have ever done in his life.
But Jace’s hand wavered as soon as Alec caught the shell. He looked down at Alec, his lips moving soundlessly. Something flickered in those dead eyes, and Jace covered Alec’s fingers with his own, increasing the pressure on his hand, but this time not to push him away, but help him crush the shell. His other hand still didn’t obey him, and the blade was scratching Alec’s neck. He winced in pain, as the sharp steel cut deeper, and Jace’s fingers clenched around his own in a lethal grip. With the last effort, Alec wrenched himself from under the blade and ripped the lace off Jace’s neck, and at the same time there was a deafening crack, a piercing shriek and a flash of blue light blinded them both for a moment.
And then everything fell quiet. The blade fell on the ground, and suddenly Jace was all over Alec, checking for injuries, but with the panicked state he was in, still dazed from the spell, he was only making it worse. Alec hissed when Jace ran his hands over his most likely broken ribs, and recoiled.
“Stop, stop,” he said, trying to catch Jace’s gaze. “Jace, I’m alright.”
“I almost killed you,” he muttered, avoiding Alec’s eyes, and Alec had to grab his face with both hands to make Jace look at him.
“No, you didn’t, you show-off,” he retorted, shaking him just once but with all the strength he still had left. “Your head’s grown so big it disrupts your balance.”
Jace froze, blinking, as the words were sinking in. A weak smile tugged at the corner of his lips, and something lit up deep in his eyes.
“Oh shut up, Alec,” Jace laughed and pushed him away, which made Alec groan in pain. “Oh, sorry, I’m sorry!”
Alec vengefully punched him in the shoulder as hard as he could, and Jace hissed, unaware of the fresh cut he had there.
They didn’t talk much after that, taking turns to apply the Iratze on each other, since Jace didn’t have his stele. Then they just sat on the ground, their backs against the wall, their shoulders brushing.
“Did I…” Jace was the first to break the silence but stuttered. “Did it kill a lot of people?”
“A few,” Alex glanced at him sideways. “You know it wasn’t really you, right?”
“Yeah, I know but…”
“No buts.”
“But I…” Jace turned to look at his Parabatai but didn’t have a chance to finish because Alec leaned closer and kissed him.
It came so naturally Jace didn’t even flinch. It felt like they had always been that way, their souls bound and their bodies so used to reflecting each other in battle, they had no hesitation following each other into something much more dangerous. The kiss was gentle and tentative, with only their lips touching, and when Alec pulled back, Jace leaned after him with his eyes still closed, unable to break the contact so soon.
“Don’t you care about the curse?” he panted, for the first time pronouncing the exact thing he kept asking himself every time he thought about the way Alec’s lips curved into a smile or his bare chest heaved with exertion or… A lot of things that made him grin more carelessly and laugh louder and fuck another faceless girl from a club.
“There are worse things than the curse,” Alec’s voice was stern and full of confidence. He really didn’t care about it anymore.
“Like what?”
“Like losing you.”
Their eyes locked, and Jace reached out to trace his fingers along Alec’s jawline but before he could pull him into another kiss, Alec laughed quietly.
“What?” Jace frowned as he pulled back just a little.
“I kissed you first,” Alec announced with exaggerated triumph.
Jace looked at him incredulously, slayed with his own weapon, but still biting his lips to hold back the laughter.
“So what, you want a gold medal for that?” he huffed half-heartedly.
“You’re such a sore loser.”
“I’m not,” Jace shook his stubborn head, but his eyes never left Alec’s lips, as if he were mesmerized. “Kiss me again?”
And Alec did.