Chapter Text
“Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind; and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind” – A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Alone together again. Even if it was but briefly as there was too much that had to take precedence. They needed to get to work on finding Jace. Family comes first. Responsibilities, as usual. But right now they both needed some kind of calm before the storm. Alec closed the door to his immaculate den behind Magnus who had walked beside him silently after Alec suggested that he stay and rest a while following the strenuous spell he had to perform to awaken Jocelyn. Magnus had jokingly replied saying he would happily stay, if he could quickly change his outfit because he felt dirty in the one Camille had latched onto, only hours before. Alec laughed at that. He felt comfortable enough around Magnus now to let his guard down a little bit. It felt odd, testing new waters, yet it was cathartic. To be able to really look at him. To take him in and marvel without alarm bells ringing in his brain, telling him he should stop. To accept Magnus’ unique and amusing quips and musings without raising a solid wall to mask what this warlock had managed to arouse inside him from the moment he first spoke. I prefer medium rare. He had to internalise his immediate urge to snort a laugh in that instance. Now, he no longer had to internalise anything. At least not when they were alone… not anymore. He knew he had to take it slow with his family. Especially his parents whom he still felt would never look at him the same way again. As he was pondering where they would go from here, aside from their first actual date, he caught Magnus out of the corner of his eye as he shut the door, staring intently at him, entranced. Alec shifted where he stood, looking down at the ground. Magnus’ adoring looks made him so nervous. He intertwined his own hands behind his back as he leaned into the doorframe and squeezed them tightly, his thumbs meeting in a battle as his eyes settled back on Magnus, who now had his back to him.
Magnus wordlessly moved to the armchair in the corner of his room and slowly sat in it, eyes surveying Alec’s towering, fidgeting figure by the door. Alec was caught in a daze, eyes transfixed down upon Magnus, scanning every inch of him he could observe, slowly. Taking him all in. He was startled when Magnus spoke in his airy, confident tone. When their eyes caught again, it was like an electric wave shot through the air between them from one to the other, hitting each other simultaneously and making them both jolt slightly.
“Alexander. You are the sweetest form of torture a miserable half demon like me could ever wish to endure. So long have I suffocated and burned in the fiery, bottomless pit of my bleak and vast existence. Then you come along and put out the everlasting fire. Like the very essence of the oxygen my lungs require to respire. The very same element formulating the water that begets all of life. You are the oasis that saved my soul. Now I no longer suffocate but drown in your water that hath doused my ever-incinerating flesh. YOU are my amaranthine spring, my river of peace and saving grace in this boundless black hole of an eternity. If I could somehow be granted one wish, I would wish for your current’s flow to be infinite.”
Alec searched Magnus’ eyes, the pitch black of his dilating pupils drowning out the glowing golden brown irises surrounding them. But Alec wasn’t seeing a darkness. He was blinded by a blazing light so strong, it could only be reminiscent of the big bang. Alec pondered that thought wonderingly. Magnus was his big bang. He was mesmerised as the thought kept pounding in his brain, in turn transmitting instantaneous electric signals to his heart which was beating with a ferocity he never knew could be contained in a half angel being, let alone a mundane one. As these feelings were overwhelming him, he continued to stare, mouth slightly agape, with intense longing and disbelief as this eccentric, glittery warlock continued gushing out these weighted words. How could he be compared to the source of life itself by this magnanimous, magical creature who, in Alec’s eyes, is describing his very own feelings? This ageless yet undeniably wise and mysterious wizard, rescued HIM, Alexander Gideon Lightwood, from an unbearable darkness that had been feeding on HIM for so long. A darkness that had engulfed him like a shrinking cage closing in, intent on reducing him to nothing. He had diminished himself for so long because all he wanted was to protect the people he cared about. These people he would give his life for without hesitation were it a choice between him or them. Sacrificing the chance to love and be loved for himself seemed like a fair price to pay to ensure their safety and happiness. To be accepted in the world he was born into and had no choice but to remain in, because if there is anything that he believed in deep down to his very core, it is honour and loyalty. He needed to be accepted to be able to perform his duty. This was his essence. He felt the heavy burden of that responsibility weighing him down his whole life. Thinking he had no choice. He was so bereft of anything remotely close to the feelings Magnus kindled in him that he came to regard his own happiness as an echo of his loved ones’. A product of their acknowledgement, or lack thereof sometimes. He was a shadow in Plato’s Cave. A lost soul not knowing what existed outside of that cave, if anything at all. Who thought he was content. For this very reason and countless more, he had never in his wildest dreams imagined he could be the life force holding up someone else’s soul. For admittedly, he could barely nourish and sustain his own.
It would take some time for him to get used to the idea that somebody was truly putting him first, and not because of a family bond obliging them to. Because it is what THEY wanted. These thoughts raced through his tired mind like a wildfire spreading relentlessly through a thick canopy of tress in the fall, hand in hand with the overwhelming physical sensations he felt radiate through his entire body at the mere sight of Magnus this close to him. They rendered him to remain unresponsive and utterly still like a statue of Michelangelo’s David. What seemed like a lifetime flashed before him as he stood there listening to Magnus, whose eyes were glued intently to his own. He could not muster up an adequate response to the warlock’s avowal.
Magnus had stood up now to avoid straining his neck looking up at his towering figure as he spoke. He is so majestic. Alec thought. Exuding confidence yet there was such a vulnerability haunting his expression... How does he do it? He was magnetised and drawn to Magnus like a firefly to the light and he absentmindedly closed the gap between them in two short strides. Alec could not help but continue to stand motionless for a few more moments. His heart was leaping out of his chest. This is where he would ordinarily stop himself from going any further. A deep-rooted habit he was going to have to break. Instead, he took a deep breath and licked his lips in earnest anticipation, choosing to silence Magnus’ own petite and rapidly moving lips in a sudden and forceful collision with his freshly moist and all encompassing ones. Their bodies followed suit.
Magnus, initially frozen, softened at his touch quickly and creaked open his own dry and cracked lips like an ancient door to an old attic full of secrets and buried treasure. Lying beneath mountains of dust and cobwebs. His breath hitched in his throat and he sighed into Alec’s mouth. Humming softly. Nmmm. He deepened the electrifying connection, welcoming the fresh new energy. Alec hesitated at the transition, pausing for a moment to pull back, face flushed and eyes shy, providing Magnus with the opportunity to survey Alec in all his glory. He was truly, a masterpiece. His subconscious soon took over entirely as he surrendered himself back into Alec, fully immersed.
Their tongues waltzed Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake ballet gracefully, together and in sync for an eternity. It was poetry to the senses. The universe’s delicate fabric of space and time itself flashed before their shut eyes, both their eyelids fluttering in and out of consciousness. How could eternity fit into a single moment so seamlessly?
Their bodies were emanating the heat of two supernovas colliding. Exploding in a shower of beaming light, pulsing in a cycle that gained momentum at an alarming rate. A nuclear bomb could not unleash that amount of radiation…
Alec felt like a starved tiger freed from captivity into the wild after only a few glimpses of it from a leash. He was his own leash. He was coming to terms with that now. Unsettled and lost at first, it was not long before his instincts kicked in. Where he was prowling before, now he was charging in powerful desperation. His nails dug into the back of Magnus’ blue silk shirt, clawing away at it. Oh how he loved that shirt on him from the moment he first saw it. All he could do then was smirk at his I’ll do you pro bono quip before he had to quickly catch himself. Now he could do so much more. Now he could finally act on his instincts. To bring that wish to fruition. Oh how he wanted to. But it was too soon for that… Someday. Just because he was able to acknowledge that he could, the time for that was not now. They needed to get to discover each other, to strip back the layers first. But he could still allow himself a small taste of it all…His body would not allow him to stop just yet. His heart had never felt more at home. He deepened the kiss, breathing hard and heavy into Magnus. Exasperated. Longing for more. He really did not want to wreck that exquisite piece of delicate fabric, but knowing the real masterpiece lay beneath it… Magnus could fix it anyway with a finger flick that would spark those miraculous blue flames. His hands were desperate for skin on skin contact and he could not deny them, so he continued to let them tear at its delicate material until they reached their target. His nose crinkled into Magnus’ jaw as he nudged away at it like a newborn puppy to its maker’s breast. He started nipping at the protruding veins near Magnus’ carotid artery. He then proceeded to suck it slowly, languidly executing circles with his swirling tongue as Magnus whimpered softly in combined pain and ecstasy.
“Ale…..x…..ander” Magnus managed to mumble between low moans. Magnus’ hands were like attacking strands of Medusa’s hair, vipers encircling the muscular ridges of Alec’s back, squeezing hard, then sliding up his spine and outwards to his broad shoulders. His elegant fingers clawing and embedding in them for a while before brushing past his neck and ears, pausing to caress the flushed skin there before finally settling in Alec’s raven nest of messy hair. Clinging on for dear life.
“Please, never stop… torturing me…Alex….ander!” Magnus gasped into his ear. Alec was taken aback slightly and pulled back, raised his eyebrows, lips full and pursed.
“Am I hurting you?”
Magnus let out a short laugh through his nose and beamed, shaking his head.
“No, you foolish Nephilim. Were you not taking in a word of my rambling before?”
“I was wasting away of malnourishment when I met you Alec. Now I still starve, but I am no longer wasting”
Alec gazes at Magnus, perplexed, arching an eyebrow questioningly. Magnus smiles, knowingly. He continued, unabashed.
“I am starving for the feeling of you on me. Touching me. Even if it is just the tip of one fingernail alone. Hell, a simple look from those hazel swirls of yours and my very core reacts feverishly. I have never experienced death Alec, but I may as well have. Now… with you… I am reborn, somehow. Like a phoenix rising from its ashes.”
Magnus took Alec’s large, warm hand in his smaller, bejewelled one. The hand that Alec had begun to gently cup and stroke the side of his caramel face with, expressing anguish as he started speaking about death. He looked at the lifeline on his palm intently for a minute, the corners of his mouth falling slightly and his eyes holding a heavy and pained expression behind them. He then lowered his face and kissed the crying palm gently before guiding it on his heaving bare chest. It was too early for this kind of talk, but he had to somehow address it to ease Alec’s ever selfless, ever ruminating mind.
“I want you to know. You shall always live in here no matter what the future holds, Alexander. I know it still concerns you. Don’t try to hide it from me. But know that I can take it. The pain. I would take it all forever to have even a fraction of a grain with you in the sands of time.”
A tear departed Alec’s left eye at that, and rolled slowly down his smooth cheek, red from exertion. Magnus’ eyes welled with tears immediately at the sight of him like this and he quickly rubbed his eyes with the inside of his forearm, forging a smile when he met Alec’s gaze once more.
“I’ve spent too much time with Shakespeare, sweetheart. Don’t mind me. I am simply unleashing my pompous creative flair for orating tragedies and you are my target audience.”
That got a chuckle out of Alec. Magnus really has a knack for making those around him feel instantly better with his quick wit and sarcasm, even though he was hiding so much pain inside. It was his turn to make him laugh.
“Well in that case…” Alec steps back from Magnus, arms raising in a dramatic pose as he exclaims sarcastically “Woe is me! Apparently all that glitters is not gold, all that glitters is Magnus Bane”
Magnus stared transfixed at him for a moment, before breaking into a fit of laughter and shaking his head, his eyes shut tightly. When he could finally catch his breath, he exclaimed “Alec! You never told me you were into Shakespeare!”
Alec grinned mischievously at this golden opportunity. Preparing to channel Magnus’ flamboyance, he rolled his eyes and raised his eyebrows expressively, shrugged and lifted his arms up in defence. “I mean, hey. He’s ALRIGHT. I may have come across some of his works in the Institute’s audiobook collection. I may or may not have listened to a few whilst working out. Great mind, abysmal sense of fashion, not to mention horrible skin and that dreaded male pattern baldness Camille was going on about. Urgh” He shivered slightly and contorted his face in disgust to drive the message home. Magnus stared at him in utter awe. This was the first time he was seeing him in such a light-hearted, natural element.
“I was more into his Juliet, though if you ask me” Alec continued. He smirked suggestively from the corner of his mouth, that big goofy smirk of his that took Magnus’ breath away the day they met. If that wasn’t enough, he had to top it with a wink now. It was Magnus’ turn to admire Alec open-mouthed.
Alec went on, seemingly unperturbed. Unflinching. “I mean, Mercutio said it right? O Romeo, that she were! Oh that she were An open arse, and thou a poperin pear."
The way he emphasised the word “pop-er-in”, by all the powers of all the supernatural forces combined, Magnus had lost it internally, imagining a scenario too R rated to mention. It was a while before he could regain his composure.
“You didn’t happen to come up with that one for Mr Shakespeare now did you, Magnus?”
He had to come out of his state of reverie at that, smiling elatedly as his boyfriend (was it too early to call him that?) moved slowly towards him, eyes locked on his and reigning him in by the “arse” so they were inches apart. Their breaths fought each other, lifting stray strands of hair out of their eyes and back down again, like reeds swaying in a gentle breeze. Magnus glanced up at Alec in adoration beneath his dark, thick eyelashes and heavy makeup splayed with traces of gold glitter. He lifted a finger in front of Alec’s slightly open mouth, teasing. He could feel his sweet breath on it and he held back a shudder. The action reminded him of their first unofficial drink date in his loft weeks ago. But the circumstances were so different. And so were his intentions. He did not want to reassure Alec, he wanted to draw Alec even further out of his comfort zone now. To make him squirm just like he made Magnus squirm before, as Alec had started to crack one of his solid walls in front of him. He wiggled that index finger ever so slightly in front of Alec, moving it at snail pace towards his lips until the surfaces touched. The feeling was so alien, unlike anything Magnus had ever felt before (and that’s saying something!), yet so satisfying. Alec’s eyes closed at the same time as his lips did, pressing them onto Magnus’ finger. Falling into the feeling of that touch alone. Just when Alec was about to open his mouth again to begin sucking on it, Magnus lowered it at snail pace to just beneath his chin, Alec’s lips parting and trying to cling onto it as it was escaping his clutches. Alec opened his eyes slowly and widened them in pleading desperation. His piercing gaze followed Magnus’ finger like a wide-eyed puppy follows a rolling ball. Filled with wonder and excitement. Magnus gently began to trace Alec’s block/deflect neck rune slowly with that rogue index finger. His nail was painted a sparkling navy and gold galaxy. He started making low whooshing noises with his mouth to indicate him drawing up imaginary power from the rune. Alec closed his eyes again to take in the sound as he shivered and gasped softly at his touch. The hairs on the back of his neck stood erect.
“I’ll leave it up to your imagination, Alexander. I think I ought to preserve some mystery about me or I might risk you exposing my deepest, darkest secrets.” Magnus paused for a moment, lost in thought. “And you may not like what you uncover.” Alec froze at this, ears perked before sighing audibly, clearly exasperated. He hoped Magnus was not going to make it too difficult for him to peel back those layers he cacooned himself in for God knows how long. Although, to be fair, he thought he deserved worse. After all, he had put Magnus through a hellish ordeal with his immutable distance and coldness.
Magnus, oblivious to Alec’s worry, carried on in that flirtatious, confident tone of his. Emphasising each syllable ever so precisely. His every gesture, a poignant one.
“Nevertheless. I stand by what I said in that wedding hall. You never cease to amaze me, Alexander. Just promise me, you will not make THAT same mistake twice. Come what may.” Magnus winked at that and smirked in a fashion so brilliant and timely that Alec lost all control and hardened. Magnus had it all wrong. Magnus was HIS saving grace. With that thought, he gave himself into this strange, new and all consuming feeling.