Work Text:
The heavy, tense silence and the scent of fried electronics met Alec when he returned home. He was immediately anxious, but also curious. It was rare that he had to fear for his two warlocks' safety when they were home together during the day while he was at the Institute, but that didn't negate the possibility of domestic catastrophes.
While Rafael was having a fairly simple adolescence marked by only a minimum amount of angst and minor acts of rebellion, their younger son was a different matter entirely. Alec suspected the air of doom and anger that consumed the air in the loft had to do with Max more than Rafael. Max and his increasingly difficult relationship with his formerly beloved Papa.
He found Magnus standing in front of Max's closed bedroom door, his body so tense it was shaking, fists blazing angry white fire at his sides. Alec couldn't tell if he was glaring at the door to blow it open, keep it shut, or just avoiding committing homicide in general.
"Magnus?"
His husband turned slowly, eerily slow, like one of those ridiculous "horror" films Simon always brought to movie night. Alec might not have been entirely surprised to see Magnus' head turn 360° on his neck. His usual chocolate brown eye glamour was absent, and his cat eyes burned.
"I am going to murder our son. You may want to call your siblings so they are ready to take me away and lock me up. And you will need several more warlocks as backup for good measure. I will most certainly lose control of my magic."
Alec lay gentling hands on Magnus' tense arms, and Magnus instantly relaxed a little, his aggressive magic sparking out. His sigh was so sad and tired, Alec immediately took the warlock into his arms and held his trembling form. He knew when Magnus lost his cool like this, he would either break down in tears, or just stay still in Alec's embrace while he struggled to regain it.
Magnus was never as vulnerable as he was when it came to their children.
When Magnus felt less likely to shatter in his arms, Alec pulled him away and looked into his love's face. Those green-gold eyes were a particularly acute sign that Magnus was deeply upset--he had forgotten all about the most automatic, basic glamour he ever used. Alec was glad for that, at least. He loved Magnus' beautiful, natural eyes.
"Do you want to tell me what happened?"
"No," Magnus grumbled. "Yes. I think he might actually be related to me by blood after all. It's entirely possible he is another one of my father's evil get. With that attitude, he may be the second coming of the Lightbringer himself, that prick. Not Max, Lucifer."
"Magnus..." Alec urged.
"I need a drink," Magnus lamented, heading for the wet bar. "I need all the drinks after today."
As they passed Magnus' office and casting chamber, Alec paused. It was difficult to miss the disaster area within. Magnus was not a tidy person--in fact, Alec wouldn't hesitate to call him a complete slob--and imagined if it wasn't for a combination of Alec's own desire for order, Magnus' magick in response to his husband's nagging, and the slave labor in the shape of their sons, the loft would be nothing but a vast box packed with filth. Rather than cleaning, The High Warlock of Brooklyn would no doubt just keep expanding the place until it was an indoor landfill the size of Texas.
On the other hand, when it came to Magnus' conjuring area, his lab, and his office, everything had to be precisely in its place at all times. To have it otherwise could be dangerous, even deadly. All it would take was one flake or drop of the wrong thing to mix with another thing, and... disaster.
Right now, Magnus' things were everywhere. Glass smashed, cabinets tipped over, the marble floor burned, the colorful chalk of a pentagram smeared into uselessness.
"Uh, Magnus? There isn't a demon wandering around loose here somewhere, is there?" He kept walking into the sitting area, where Magnus was gulping down what was probably his second or third scotch.
"Not anymore." He poured one more drink and collapsed on the couch with it. "Your son... your son is... he's a...he's just..argh!" Magnus sputtered.
Alec sat down next to him and waited. He knew Magnus was tempted to use a terrible name to describe their increasingly difficult 14-year-old, but he was careful never to say words that might deeply hurt Max's feelings. And while it was tempting to call him a little monster--which he was currently acting like--Magnus would never let the word past his lips no matter how angry and hurt he was.
That particular name wounded Magnus to his core when it had been used to insult him over the years, and it was one of many things the warlock swore would never be inflicted on his son as long as he lived.
"What happened?" Alec finally ventured.
Magnus took a deep, fortifying breath. "First... you know those belted wingtip Ferragamo boots I had to special order from Milan because they were discontinued in the States?"
Alec only knew what Magnus was talking about because he distinctly remembered the $4000.00 charge for them on the credit card bill. "Sure."
"Your son decided they would look cooler if he drew red zebra stripes on them."
Magnus made it sound like he was telling Alec that their son (Max was only Alec's when he had been behaving particularly badly) had made his own shoes out of cat fur. Chairman Meow's specifically. "Uh... wow, that's... awful."
"It IS awful, Alexander! For one, we do not draw on Papa's one-of-a-kind, four thousand dollar Ferragamos. We don't touch Papa's one-of-a-kind, four thousand dollar Ferragamos! He used a SHARPIE. TO DRAW. RED STRIPES. ON THEM. And just as an aside: what is it with him and red, anyway? It clashes with his skin!"
This was certainly something that would upset Alec's husband, but not to the point he had found him in front of Max's door.
"That is really bad. I don't know what to tell you about the red thing. But you should make him work off the shoes--part of his allowance every week for the rest of his eternal life."
Magnus laughed, a half-choked sound that was almost a sob. Alec tucked a finger under his chin and made Magnus meet his gaze. His gold-green eyes were still ablaze... and full of hurt tears.
"Tell me," Alec urged gently, taking his love's trembling hands in his own. The special magic that existed between them--actual magic, Magnus insisted, power that they could share, and had, in terrible situations neither of them were certain they would survive--crackled to life, oozed like warm syrup over Alec's skin, until it seeped into his heart, making it swell, and pound, and race. There was nothing quite like holding his husband's soft hands in his rough, calloused ones.
Magnus' lower lip trembled. "He... I was trying to summon X'vlacx, a minor-major demon who can be helpful finding certain..." his gaze ticked to Alec and away again--a sign that whatever the demon found, it was probably illegal. As was, technically, summoning demons at all. But that was one of Magnus' jobs that they agreed to deny existed.--"Objects a client needed. It was a very delicate casting, and required an extremely careful, detailed pentagram to keep it contained. X'vlacx can be very unpleasant if he escapes."
He took another long drink before he went on, "The boys know if I'm working at home while they're here, it's imperative that they stay very quiet while I'm with a client. I have to concentrate, or things can get out of hand. So I was drawing the runes, doing the casting, and X'vlacx came in answer... and suddenly there was a horrible noise. Indescribable! It was so loud, it shook the walls, made the floors creak, and the windows shudder. It broke my concentration, and X'vlacx got out... Alec, he almost escaped the lab. If I hadn't been able to trap him and send him back to the void... Max and I and a lot of other people would be dead by now."
Alec suspected he knew what the noise was, and found his suspicion confirmed when he spotted a metallic puddle of goo on the table by the kitchen door. Goo that might have recently been an iPhone.
"Max's music," Alec concluded. Max had taken a liking to some truly earsplitting noises that he insisted on calling "music". Simon was helpful enough to identify it as "Metalcore Death Punk," or something like that. All he knew is that there was a lot of screaming, swearing and instruments that sounded more like various objects being forced across metal surfaces.
"YES! Alexander, he had it turned all the way up. You know I enjoy loud music as much as the next party animal, but not when there is complicated magic going on down the hall. I admit, I lost my temper. My shirt was ruined, I burned my hands, and I'm fairly certain X'vlacx stole some priceless, irreplaceable magical tools, and we almost died. Our baby almost died."
Magnus rose and paced to the bar, making himself another drink, and walking back and forth across the room as he went on, hand not occupied with his glass animated in emphasis. "I blew his bedroom door off the hinges, Alexander. I screamed at him. I don't even remember what I said, now. I was careful, you know that there are things I don't say to him, ever, but I know I wasn't kind. I may have deserved what he said to me in return."
Alec came to him and urged Magnus to sit back down. "No you didn't. He's a child, you're his parent. He can't talk to you that way no matter what. What did he say?"
Magnus usually strong voice quavered. "He... said he wished you were straight, and that he had a mother and a father like everybody else. He said he was ashamed that you were gay, and that I... that I was a freak." His breath hitched, but he soldiered on. "He said he wished he didn't have magick. He wished he was a mundane, and said when he has enough power, he's going to glamour himself pink and go live with them. He said I wasn't his real dad. And...and he said... he hated me and wished I wasn't immortal, so I would die."
Alec was frozen in shock. Magnus cried in that proud, understated way he had, like as long as he didn't make any sound, no one would know that his heart had been crushed. Fat tears poured down his face in glittering rivers, and his cat eyes were swollen and rimmed with red.
"He hates me," he choked.
"Magnus, God," Alec reached out and grabbed Magnus' cold hands, squeezing them and willing his own strength into his lover once more. "Max doesn't hate you. He adores you. You're his Papa. You hung the moon and the stars for him. You gave him magic."
"He was born with magic. I've just taught him how to use it. Now he wants to use it against us."
"No, honey... look, I know this is hard for you to understand, but... Max is a teenager. He's at that age where he needs to cut himself off from us. Find his own way. Plus, with the hormones..."
"Hormones are supposed to make you horny, not turn you into... that! I wish he was just sneaking girls, or boys, or orgies of slime demons or whatever floats his boat into his bed at night and having his way with them. This... attitude. I don't understand it. What did I do to make him loathe me so much?"
"Babe, he doesn't loathe you. Listen to me: when you were a teenager, you lived with the Silent Brothers. But you rebelled, didn't you? And when you left them, wasn't your entire life about thumbing your nose at the rules? It still is, actually."
Magnus pouted. "I suppose. But I never treated...never mind. I disrespected the Brothers plenty, I suppose. But it's sort of hard to offend things that don't care what you think."
"Jace was a complete bitch at that age. He wouldn't do anything my parents told him to, and he got his rear end beat quite a few times for it. Izzy started wearing more makeup than a hooker at 11, and wouldn't wear anything but high heels starting at 13. Pretty soon, she was sneaking out every night, and I still don't want to know what she was doing or who with. Do you see what I'm getting at?"
"No," Magnus grumped.
"We have to be patient with him. He's a regular teenager in some ways, but carries a lot of baggage other kids don't. He wants to reject everything he feels was forced on him, and only accept things he thinks he wants. It'll pass."
"What if it doesn't? What if he really does hate me, or worse, himself? What am I supposed to do about that? After he was done yelling at me, he shoved me out of his bedroom with his magic, and barred the door behind me. He's getting so powerful... I hate that I can't just go in there and talk to him. Make all of this better. It's my fault. I shouldn't have shouted at him."
"Oh, my love," Alec sighed, and took Magnus into his arms, holding him against his chest and stroking his hair--carefully, so he didn't mess it up. Magnus didn't need more things to be upset about right then. "It's not your fault. It's nobody's fault. It's just the way kids can be."
"He's not just some kid, Alexander. He's our Max. He's our precious miracle boy. He's my baby. You say I hung the moon and the stars for him? Well, you brought the sun into my life, and he brought the moon. Do you know what happens without the moon? Tides go wild, werewolves go insane, people's blood stops flowing in their veins. I can't let this stand between us. I can't."
"Magnus... go talk to him then. Make his door vanish, chain him to the bed if you have to. He might not hear you, but you can talk. You can say what you need to say, and maybe, when he calms down, he'll let it sink in."
Magnus' eyes turned to the dark hallway, the tense, angry silence and the slight crackle of energy around Max's door. Then he looked back at Alec, and for the first time the Shadowhunter could remember in the years they had known each other, Magnus Bane looked afraid.
"Take my strength," he said, clasping Magnus' hands again, letting the magic rush between them. "I have your back, if you need me. Now and always."
The warlock smiled through his tears, and Alec could see him stand a little straighter, square his broad shoulders. He turned and marched down the hall, then stopped and knocked on the door like any father might.
"Go away!" Max shouted from within, like any teenager might.
"Max, I would like to talk to you, please."
"No."
"I don't want to be unpleasant, Max, but I will just make this door vanish and chain you to the bed until you listen." He turned and flashed Alec a wink, a thanks for the stolen idea.
The door clicked. Magnus didn't touch the doorknob, but pushed the door open and stepped inside.
~~~~~~~~~
Whether Max liked to think it or not, he was clearly Magnus' son. His room looked rather like X'vlacx had dropped in on his way out of the dimension, but rather than taking anything, had dumped several garbage cans and random clothing racks worth of stuff everywhere. The way his baby treated menswear struck Magnus as another manifestation of terrible behavior. Slacks hanging off curtain rods, more items piled on the closet floor than hanging on hangers, every surface of the room covered with things that didn't belong there.
He wouldn't touch a bit of it...except the dirty plates with the stinking food. Magnus made those disappear.
Max looked up at him with such anger that it made Magnus flinch. His son snapped his long, blue fingers, and loud music thundered into the room. The "singer" started screaming curse words, and Max glared at him as he did.
Magnus flashed his hands, and the music stopped. He cast a net around Max so the boy could no longer raise his power until Magnus allowed him to.
Max shot him a distinctly non-magical finger. Magnus was tempted, for a split second, to make that disappear as well. Serve him right, the little brat.
"What do you want?" Max snarled.
How could this beastly punk possibly have grown from his squishy fat, sweet little blueberry? It was as if the horns growing from his skull had sucked out all of his brains and personality. But Magnus kept Alec's words--the power of his love--firmly in mind, and flashed a bunch of clothes out of a chair before moving it next to the bed and taking a seat. He crossed his legs, and steepled his fingers under his chin.
"I'm sorry for the way I spoke to you earlier," Magnus began, "It was rude, and there was no need for it. I hope you understand that I shouted because I was frightened. The demon I was summoning was incredibly dangerous. It would have killed us both if I hadn't been able to contain it. Your dad and I don't make the rules we do just to be mean. There are reasons for all of them. You understand that, right?"
Max said nothing, just glared down at his black-painted nails. Yes, definitely Magnus' son.
"I know you do. Max, I love you. I know at your age you don't want to hear that, but it's true, and it will always be true. No matter how many pairs of Papa's expensive shoes you ruin, or how many bloodthirsty demons you set loose on the world, I'm your father, and you are everything to me. You can hate me all you like, but that won't change a thing."
"You're lying," his son said, and it hurt almost as much as the other painful things he'd hurled at Magnus earlier.
"I never lie to you, Max. Ever." And it was true.
"Yes you do. You and Dad lie all the time. You lie about me, you lie about Rafe, you just lie your way through everything."
Now Magnus was deeply confused, as well as hurt and angry. "What are you talking about?"
Max swung his legs over the side of his bed, and rage snapped blue in his eyes. "You are always going on about how you love us the same, and how proud you are of both of us. But I know better! Rafael is your golden boy--he does everything right, and everybody loves him, and he can never do anything wrong. He's the one carrying on the proud Lightwood legacy! I'm just the blue little freak who sets things on fire when he's not paying attention, and scares people with his horns when his glamour slips. I'm the one Grandmother looks at like I'm dog shit on the bottom of her shoes. But Rafael, oh! Oh, how Grandmother loves Rafael. How excited she is to see him take the runes, to go out and hunt with the rest of the family. How proud she is of him. I could vanish off the face of the earth, and she'd probably be happy that she wouldn't have to waste time anymore trying to pretend that she doesn't want me dead!"
Magnus listened carefully to what Max was saying, revealing a pain that Magnus never knew his baby felt. He desperately wished Max was still a small boy. That he could reach out and take his hand, take him in his arms and hold him, let Max feel how much he did love him, how proud he was of him, how much he and Alec considered him to be carrying on their own family's traditions in their own way, not just those that came before.
"Maryse looks at me the same way, Max. You know how she is. She grew up thinking Downworlders were basically dark and evil, and we all wanted to eat that horrible eyeliner she uses that smells like motor oil."
Max rolled his eyes, which was probably as close to a smile as Magnus was going to get right then. He finally took a chance and leaned toward his beloved son, laying a hand on his knee. Max didn't object, which he took as a very good sign indeed.
"Your dad and I are proud of you. More proud than we could ever tell you. Especially me. We chose you to be our family. I never dared to imagine having children, Max--especially not a child who was like me. I never thought I'd have the chance to give someone all of the things I never got to have. That's not a lie, that's the way it is. The things that you do don't ever have to be perfect. They only have to be you. I love your brother too, but he's different. He needs different things from your dad and I. Rafe came to us when he was older, and all the horrible things he'd been through..." he shook his head, as if he could ever dislodge the memory of Rafael's condition when he arrived, "You were a baby. So tiny and brand new. You don't know what it is not to be loved. We've always been here, we've always given you everything. And that's because we do love you."
Max shrugged. At least he was listening.
"Do you know what makes me happier than anything else in the world?" Magnus asked him.
"No."
Now that Max's attitude seemed to have softened some, Magnus came to sit beside him on the bed. Taking it a little further, he rested his hand on the boy's back. "Seeing you grow. Watching your magic develop. I know you wish you had better control, but that will come with age and practice. You have forever to learn, Blueb--Max."
Max flashed him a look. "You said I was a bigger pain in your ass than Church and Ragnor. Put together. You said I was a deadly blue menace. You said I had worse taste in music than Simon, that my hair was terrible, and that I was going to be the Downworld's Sid Vicious pretty soon, if I didn't get eaten by a demon first. You melted my iPhone."
"Oh, my sweet Maxi...Max, sorry." He tugged his son closer. "I apologize--not about the iNoise. Though...all of those other things are also sometimes true. We can work on your hair," he let levity show in his voice, and he felt Max relax further. "Is that why you're so angry? Because I said those things to you, or because Maryse doesn't treat you kindly?" If it was the latter, Magnus was fully prepared to go and have the "Come to the High Warlock" talk he'd resisted having on his own behalf for years. He thought her love for her grandchildren had softened Mayrse's edges some--when Max was a baby, at least, it had seemed that way--but no doubt as Max's warlock nature became more clear, it probably became harder for her to ignore it, no matter that he was her son's son.
"I guess. Maybe. Rafe gets to go to the Academy with Dad, and train... and everybody there except you and Dad's friends look at me like I'm a stain on the floor nobody can get out. I hate feeling like a freak."
"Well, my baby. You are not alone in being unusual. As you may know," he let the brown-eye glamour that was second nature to him fall away.
"Yeah, but you're not blue. You don't have horns coming out of your head that are so big they rub against your ears and give you blisters. People think your eyes are cool."
"Should I call Auntie Cat to come over and give you the "It's wonderful being blue" lecture again?"
"No... I've heard that enough times that I know it by heart. Pop. You know I don't really hate you, right?"
Magnus hadn't, for a few of the most painful moments in his very long life. Max's verbal blows had struck him in all his tender places, as they were no doubt meant to do. But Max didn't need to know that...or why they were so tender in the first place. "Of course. I know."
"I also don't wish I had a mom. Especially knowing Grandmother. You and Dad are the best parents I could ever have."
These honest confessions made Magnus wonder if Max was stoned. Why else would he give up so much vulnerability so easily, when he was such a raging maniac just a little while ago? Ah, right. Hormones.
"And I really, really don't wish you would die. Papa... I couldn't stand it if you did." Max grabbed his father's hand, and suddenly he was a tiny baby again, bitty fist clutched around Magnus' finger, and Magnus could barely believe the helpless, innocent little thing in his arms could possibly love him. He felt his eyes fill here in the present, but blinked his tears away. Max wouldn't appreciate if his Papa broke down. He generally didn't--he was far too old, and far too young, to appreciate the value of crying when it was needed.
"It's okay, Max. I mean, it's not okay, but I know that you don't really want me dead. Or your dad to have a wife." He made a face, and Max chuckled. "Max, don't ever let anyone make you feel less than. You are the son of the greatest Shadowhunter the world has ever known, and the most devastatingly handsome and fabulous High Warlock in the Universe. You are supremely special. You know, if you keep rolling your eyes like that, they're going to get stuck that way, and then where will you be?"
"Pop, if my eyes got stuck, that would still be the least interesting thing about me."
"The most, of course, being your stunning Papa."
Max laughed, full and honest, and Magnus felt something cold and tight loosen around his heart. He gave his son's hand one last affectionate squeeze, then got to his feet. "Now. For speaking to me like a snotty little nephilim, you are grounded for a month. You may not regenerate your phone, you may not make a television and you are restricted from the one in the living room, you may not send fire messages to that little fae girlfriend of yours that you think we don't know about. And no internet unless it's for homework. Yes, I did spell your laptop so I will know, so don't even try it. Someday you will be more powerful than your papa, but today is not that day. Are we clear?"
His son rolled his eyes. Magnus wondered where he got that habit from--it was terribly annoying.
"What am I supposed to do? Jump up and down and say, 'Yay! I'm grounded! And my fathers know I'm straight! And like faeries!'"
Magnus shrugged. "I understand. Girls and faeries can be very sexy. But for the love of the Angel, please do not let your grandmother know you're involved with one of the fae. She'll have a heart attack, and your father would find a way to blame it on me."
"Fine," Max still sounded grumpy, but there was no edge of malice to it any longer.
"I love you, Sid," Magnus teased.
"Oi! Bugger off, you!" his son said in a truly terrible cockney accent, and gave him the two-fingered salute popular in Great Britain that meant, "stick it".
Magnus laughed and shut the bedroom door behind him, only to run smack into Alec, who stood there with one of his gushy soft daddy smiles on his face.
"You did great," he reassured Magnus.
"I did, didn't I?" Magnus preened. "Honestly, I never would have been able to do it without your strength. There are so many things I couldn't do without you."
Alec took his hands, and that energy burst to life between them once more. "I don't know about that, but... maybe not as easily, or as well."
Truer words were never spoken. Magnus kissed his husband long and hard in agreement, letting the strength of their union wash through them the way it always did.