Chapter Text
To live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
to love what is mortal;
to hold it
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, when the time comes to let it go,
to let it go.
from "Blackwater Woods" by Mary Oliver
Alec doesn’t expect to speak with Magnus at all that night. He gets home so late it would have been easier to spend the night in his office, only the convenience isn’t worth it. His plan is to slip into bed and hold Magnus close enough to take the memory back to the Gard with him. He has his silencing rune activated because he doesn’t want to wake his husband. He’s being considerate, not underhanded.
But he opens the door and that changes quickly, because he knows instantly that Magnus isn’t asleep, and isn’t alone. For a second it’s still not eavesdropping; he takes the breath any shadowhunter would take in an environment that’s deviated from the safety of expectation, and he makes a decision. Threat or no threat.
“...won’t happen again,” says Raphael, from the dim warm glow of the kitchen. “You have my word.”
No threat, then, but Alec holds still and calls it delaying his decision. Magnus answers the way he would if Alec weren’t there, without the undercurrent of defensiveness over Raphael’s every action, and it takes too long. Magnus doesn’t like gaps in conversation, appears to think of them as unsightly flaws in construction to be papered over. The longer Magnus takes, the more of a decision it is as Alec waits with him. Finally, Magnus says, “If you could promise that, it wouldn’t have happened at all.”
Magnus’s usual take on forgiveness of those he loves might be cheerful or scornful or vulnerable, but always it’s hopeful. He always believes an apology. That was Magnus resigned. Startled into guilt, Alec deactivates his runes and clatters more than he needs to, shedding weapons and boots and coat. When he gets to the kitchen Raphael is standing to leave. “Well,” he says, stiffly and with a stop-motion nod in Alec’s direction, theoretically a greeting, “Karnstein won’t be a problem for you again. I wanted to let you know. We can discuss the rest another time.”
Magnus stands too, and puts a hand on Alec’s arm but doesn’t pause the conversation, which is Alec’s cue to keep his mouth shut. “Of course he won’t, dearest—Raphael, what exactly do you mean he won’t be a problem?”
Raphael pauses. His eyes flick to Alec and back to Magnus, and he doesn’t answer.
“All right.” Magnus’s fingers are slack on Alec’s arm. “Perhaps we could discuss it at this same later date, before you do anything unnecessary and, not to criticize the way you run your clan, but perhaps a bit risky for everyone involved?”
Raphael’s head tilts. He looks frankly bemused. “No. It’s done.”
Magnus slides his hand into the crook of Alec’s elbow and holds on tight. “You’re not serious. You can’t just—”
“Well. I evidently can. Again, it’s done.”
“I see, I—all right, then! I’ll call you tomorrow, my dear boy. It’s terribly late and I should get this one into bed.” He pats Alec’s shoulder.
Raphael nods, casts a final glance Alec’s way, and disappears in a blur.
Magnus sways into Alec’s side and scrubs at his face with both palms. “Well,” he says, muffled, “there was your welcome home, darling! Don’t you adore being a head of state?” He looks up again, already smiling.
“What was that about?”
“Vampire business.” He pats Alec’s chest. “Let’s not delve too deeply into our conflicts of interest until tomorrow?”
If Magnus wants to wait, Alec will wait. But there’s a clear trajectory to knowing something has gone wrong and that he should right it. He drifts sideways a moment, without the clear impetus of finding out drawing him forward, and catches on Magnus. On his hands, silk-soft under Alec’s except where Alec knows to search the edges of his fingers for calluses; on his neck, sleep-warm and free of cologne; on his deep brown eyes, lively and every bit as magnetic even without mascara to draw attention. His hair is mussed, his face and fingers bare. Alec loves every version of Magnus, but there’s a different quality to this one, an intimacy that clenches Alec’s throat. Magnus is so comfortable in makeup and jewelry that it all fits him like a second skin, and only when they’re gone does it strike Alec that they leave Magnus exposed in their absence.
“Alexander?” Magnus cranes up to rub their noses together. “Are you with me? How did it go today, with Ashdown and Rosewain?”
Alec lets out an inarticulate noise of disgust and nuzzles into Magnus’s neck. “Ashdown is under arrest. Rosewain doesn’t want the Sydney Institute.” On more sleep—on any sleep—he’ll feel an abstract degree of sympathy for Brandon Rosewain’s position. The Ashdowns have led Sydney for generations, and anyone who takes over will face suspicion from every other major shadowhunter family regardless of the situation. Given that the situation in question is one in which the Ashdowns allowed at least two werewolves to be hunted down for sport as recently as last year, anyone who takes over will also face suspicion from the local downworld leaders. Suspicion, and possibly assassination attempts.
“Ah. Which is unfortunate, for a man who’s already acting Head and with no competition for an unenviable role.” He combs through Alec’s hair. “I don’t suppose you could close it down?”
“Mm?”
“The Institute. Lots of cities tick along without localized angelic surveillance.”
Institutes don't close. “Not cities with five million people and a growing nest of shax demons. Rosewain’s the best option.” Alec sighs into the collar of Magnus’s shirt. “His uncle was one of our professors. Maybe I can work with that.”
“I know I very nearly didn’t accept the position of High Warlock of Alicante, but when my uncle, a professor, counseled me to reconsider—”
“Shut up, it’s the best I can do at 4 a.m.” Alec will in the light of day deny that his tone approaches a whine.
“And I don’t suppose I’d know, not having any uncles,” Magnus says, laughing into Alec’s hair and kissing his temple. “Their persuasive power may be without equal. Come to bed, darling, you’ve done more worthwhile today than the last ten Inquisitors in their entire combined tenures.”
Which is the problem.
But Alec’s vision is swimming a little, and he doesn’t say that, or ask again about Raphael. He lets Magnus steer him to their bedroom.
Alec is back in the office, reviewing every incident report out of Sydney that mentions the death of a downworlder for irregularities, when this turns over and surfaces: Magnus had greeted him barefoot and barefaced last night because he’d greeted Raphael the exact same way.
Alec doesn’t feel proprietary of the concept of Magnus without makeup on. He enjoys the rare occasion when Catarina or Izzy are over for a few days in a row, and Magnus is in the right mood, and he can share that version of him with someone else. He tries not to dwell on it, afraid he’ll jinx it, but thinks in the back of his mind that it’s good for Magnus to let his guard down around more than one person at once.
The problem is, he doesn’t like Raphael. He knows, intellectually, that Magnus does—that Magnus loves Raphael very much—but it takes another order of trust entirely for Magnus to let someone in three hours before dawn without steeling himself first.
So, first: Alec has fucked up. He can’t keep treating someone this important to his husband like a cousin he’s obligated to nod to at family reunions.
But, second: Given what he overheard last night, he suspects Raphael has also fucked up. Given Raphael’s track record with fucking up, there may be a body count.
He doesn’t have time to commit to the idea of calling Izzy and asking her to make some discreet inquiries about the conduct of the New York clan before he gets much worse news.
Alec can’t reliably feel magic, but he’s spent years now living with Magnus and breathing it in, and he’s not entirely numb to it. He has a sense, however dim, of the state of affairs in their home, because the loft is veined with spells and those veins pulse. A background heartbeat is what Alec usually picks up on. The few times he’s noticed a hummingbird whir, something has been badly wrong. For him to hear any of this, he needs to be quiet himself. This is where the question of reliability comes in.
When he hits the front door at a run, he knows the wards are firing, that just below the light he can see they’re hissing with sparks. For a second he knows, he’s sure, Camille has beaten him here.
“Alexander?” Magnus isn’t dressed yet beyond a robe and the silk pajama pants from last night. He stands from his coffee and a teetering pile of papers and books out on the balcony. He’s unscathed, untouched. Alec scans the loft before he turns his back on it even though there’s no way, if Magnus is safe, for Camille to be inside; a surprise attack might have worked, but only if she were brutally fast. She doesn’t have time to play hide and seek.
The adrenaline crash of going from all but smelling the blood to nothing, to Magnus approaching with baffled concern on his face, unbalances him. He crushes Magnus to him, almost lifting him off his feet, rather than let his own legs fold.
“Alexander, what—”
“No one’s hurt,” Alec says first, because he can get that out, and it’s the first thing. They live on sharp edges; worst-case scenarios for Magnus to imagine are nearby and plentiful. But once he’s dismissed them, he waits to savor the loose-limbed trust that returns as Magnus calms, the clever fingers that work into his hair, the scent of sandalwood and sun-warm skin. He keeps his arms locked around Magnus’s waist as he says, “There’s been an incident at the Gard. An escape.”
Magnus’s fingers go still, rings cool against the back of Alec’s neck. “Oh?” It’s polite, almost disinterested, and it sounds bizarre with his bare chest pressed to the strap of Alec’s quiver and Alec’s breath rushed in his ear.
“Camille,” Alec says.
“I see.” He picks up the motions he’s left off, tracing patterns in Alec’s hair with one hand and down his shoulder blade with the other. “That is… unfortunate.”
Alec is stranded, unexpectedly alone in his reaction. He grabs Magnus’s arms and hoists him back, where he can see his face. “Unfortunate.”
Magnus hesitates. “Has anyone warned Raphael and Simon?”
“I’ve got Izzy on it.”
“All right.” He runs his hands down Alec’s biceps, as best he can with Alec clutching him. “Darling, I understand your concern perfectly, but it’s misplaced. I doubt very much that she’s going to come after me. Frankly, I don’t believe she’ll go after Raphael either, but better safe. Yet more frankly, she may not remember Simon exists.”
“She’s not—Magnus, you personally turned her over to the Clave. You don’t think she might hold a grudge?”
“I’m sure she’s upset with me, and if an opportunity presented itself she’d wreak havoc.”
“So—”
“If an opportunity presented itself. Look at where we are. She’s not going to linger in Alicante, of all places. If she’s out of the Gard, she’s long gone.”
Alec pauses. Magnus is rumpled and shining in the light through the French doors, robe pressed into wrinkles. There are red marks fading from his skin where the buckles on Alec’s coat dug in. His ears are ringed in too many cuffs, as if he was distracted halfway through the selection process. He looks so vulnerable it cracks Alec’s ribs. He says, “She didn’t strike me as all that cautious when she went on a spree the second she escaped Raphael. In his city, with his entire clan against her.”
“When she made a display of having escaped him, in her city, with her entire clan there for the reclaiming once she weeded out the traitors.” Magnus shrugs, silk sliding in Alec’s grip. “She miscalculated. An unsuccessful bid for power doesn’t make her a mindless killer. And that is…” His expression flickers as he hesitates, but continues. “It’s her most common mistake. Thinking that once something is hers, it always will be.”
Alec doesn’t tighten his grip. “I noticed.”
“It made her quite a successful antiques dealer,” Magnus adds, brightening. “No harm selling things if they still belong to you on a spiritual level. I think she viewed it all as a series of very long term rental agreements.”
“Magnus. If your argument for staying calm is that the millennia-old serial killer won’t murder you outright because she wants to take you home, it’s a bad one. And that’s all she—I’m not acting irrationally because she’s your ex. She went on a literal killing spree last time she faced a single consequence for any of her actions, so no, with your safety on the line, I’m not going to credit her with some cool-headed long-term plan.”
Magnus shrugs his arms free, only to reach down and press his palms to Alec’s, locking their fingers tight. It’s a sweet gesture, one Alec’s come to depend on when they fight. It doesn’t touch his voice, which goes low with the strain not to raise it. “And I’m running out of patience with the premise that Camille’s whim of the day is the deciding factor in my safety.”
“Come on, she’s important to you and I don’t expect that to magically disappear. I’d just like us to take some reasonable precautions.” He shakes Magnus’s hands gently. “If you’ll stay in Alicante—”
Magnus looks down, and peels away just as suddenly, yanking his hands out of Alec’s and taking a step back. This isn’t a gesture Alec expects during arguments, and he’s ready to issue Camille a formal invitation to the loft himself if it will make up for whatever misstep was that serious. But Magnus snaps his fingers, pointing at Alec, and all but stomps his foot. “I knew this was about the couch! Admit you hate it, Alexander!”
Alec halts, stymied. “The what?”
“You don’t want me to go on any more shopping sprees because last time I brought home—” He sounds angry still, but he’s laughing, eyes crinkled at the corners.
“Oh… Angel. I won’t admit that, because the couch is fine. And I didn’t set Camille free to stop you from redecorating.” But he can breathe easier, with Magnus joking.
“You liar.” Magnus shakes his head. “You ignored it. You scorned even to look upon it, it was so hideous to you.” He runs a thumb along his ear and makes a face, starts collecting cuffs into his palm. “Supposing I were to submit to house arrest, how long would the sentence be?”
“Not house arrest. It’s an entire country. And I don’t know, until—” But he can’t say until we catch her when that could be decades, when he can practically feel Magnus’s near-claustrophobic impatience with the city on a bad day unfurling over a horizon of nothing but bad days. “For a few months,” he says, lamely.
Magnus pivots on his heel and drops onto the couch, scattering ear cuffs on the coffee table, and he looks up at Alec very patiently.
Alec crosses his arms.
“I’m not going to be distracted by your biceps, Alexander. I’m perfectly capable of appreciating your physique while maintaining that this is an exercise in futility.”
“Fine. I’d still appreciate it if you’d humor me for a couple weeks, just to be sure she’s on the run rather than lying in wait.”
Magnus leans forward, drumming his fingers on the table as he sorts through his jewelry, and he doesn’t meet Alec’s eyes but he nods. “Only if we camp out in the living room in some sort of blanket fort to truly capture that under-siege feeling.”
“And I’m putting Jace on protection detail. If I’m not with you, he is.”
Magnus keeps sliding jewelry around, a soft metallic drag on the wood. His eyelashes, heavy and dark with liner, flutter as he glances up from beneath them. “Darling, don’t you think that’s overkill? With the Inquisitor himself at my beck and call, surely I don’t need more protection.”
“If you distract me we’re ending up right back here afterward. I want someone with you at all times.”
His face crumples into something Alec will call a pout when he teases Magnus about it later, once they’re both in better moods. “Clary, then.”
Alec inhales sharply rather than reject this outright. His personal faith in Jace’s abilities would make Jace a more comfortable option, but only for himself. “Clary and Jace can trade off. So can Izzy.”
“You see how spoiled I am?” He starts redecorating his ears. “My personal security team, made up of the Inquisitor and both Heads of the New York Institute. And… Jace.” He holds one hand out to Alec, absently, and looks up when Alec steps forward and takes hold in too much of a rush. “I promise to play along if this makes you feel better. But Camille isn’t… You don’t have to worry about me. She has a sense of fair play, even if it’s warped. I didn’t do permanent damage. She won’t either.”
Alec runs a thumb over the rings on Magnus’s fingers. “Impermanent damage isn’t an acceptable outcome either.” There’s hesitation in Magnus’s eyes, in the corner of his mouth; a jumble of circumstances he believes are extenuating but won’t explain. Alec squeezes his hand to recapture his attention. “And it wouldn’t be fair play. You didn’t treat an ex-girlfriend badly out of spite. You stopped her from murdering people and letting others take the fall.” Magnus meets his gaze with something like hope, as if Alec can arbit his conscience quiet. Alec stops hovering and sits, tugging Magnus his way.
Magnus’s pin-straight posture lapses and he rests his forehead against Alec’s shoulder, curling his fingers in and tapping a pattern on Alec’s palm. “At the risk of sounding the teeniest bit hypocritical—”
“I won’t do anything alone either.” He won't, starting now. The run home was—he hadn’t been thinking. “Like you said. Both Heads of the New York Institute and Jace. Plenty of bodyguards to go around.” He pulls Magnus’s fingers up and kisses them. “We’re okay?”
“That’s what I’ve been saying.”
“No, I mean—us. Sorry I came on that strong. I know it's different for you, but when it comes to Camille I’ve mostly seen body counts.” He’s not sure how to complete the comparison without sounding snide. I’ve seen body counts and you’ve seen her sleeping, doing her makeup, laughing at your jokes.
Magnus shifts his head on Alec’s shoulder, looking up. “I thought we were past that and on to agreeing that measures need to be taken.”
“Yeah. Well. You seemed pissed off. You’ve never shaken me off in the middle of an argument before, should I be worried?”
“Darling…” Magnus sits upright, and then folds his legs onto the couch as he turns to face Alec. “You’re giving me far too much credit for emotional clarity under pressure, Alexander, if that stood out. I wasn’t especially angry, I just noticed what I was doing.”
“Huh.” Alec studies the green of Magnus’s nails, iridescent with purple where the light hits. His face heats slowly. “Not an ‘it’s okay that we’re fighting, I still love you’ thing, huh?”
Magnus groans and tips forward. “That’s such a beautiful interpretation. I wish—it is now, all right?” He laces his fingers through Alec’s and presses their joined hands to his cheek. “See? It’s okay we fought, I still love you!” he announces, beaming.
“Okay.” Alec smiles back, because it’s impossible not to, but it still looks like a reasonable conclusion to him. His husband holds both his hands during arguments as reassurance, that’s less a leap than a small step. “So what were you doing?”
Magnus shrugs. Alec is not distracted by, but is appreciative of, what it does to his bare chest. “Oh… you know that old chestnut about shaking hands as proof you’re unarmed? It’s quite literally true, by the way, I started it personally when Julius Caesar asked whether there was a dagger hidden in my toga or whether I might just be happy to see him—” He accepts the cushion Alec bats into his chest with good grace. “All to say,” he continues, with great dignity, “it’s a warlock thing. I couldn’t very well hex you into next week with both my hands otherwise engaged, could I?”
Alec narrows his eyes. He can’t specifically recall a time he saw Magnus do any spellwork without his hands, but he wouldn’t swear it’s never happened. “I don’t know, could you?”
“Clever boy.” Magnus taps his temple. “It’s not foolproof. But it’s a gesture. It belatedly struck me as over the top. You know I’m not going to curse you.”
“I do know that.” Alec manages to keep his tone even, and to smile faintly. Magnus doesn’t lie, exactly—not maliciously—but there are times he wades into the truth, step by step, adjusting to the temperature as he goes. Alec’s gotten better at detecting the retreat that accompanies this habit, the sudden cavalier cheer and slightly empty eyes, as if Magnus is watching from someplace far away.
“Now!” Magnus hops to his feet only to step onto and over the couch. “I should get dressed. I imagine we have work to do. Witnesses to question, security footage to review, alibis to disprove. I’m not going to wear sunglasses indoors, but I warn you I’m very tempted—” He pauses in the doorway. “You said no one was hurt?”
Alec makes a fist against his knee, presses until he can feel his nails. “I did. I meant… You know.” Not Izzy, not Jace, not Clary. No one we know. He ran out on the aftermath. He’d do it again, but standing by the decision isn’t going to make the fallout any easier.
Magnus nods. “Did anyone die?”
“Yeah.” He opens his hand. “Two guards outside her cell.” Aaron Springlaw was thirty-eight, easing toward lighter duties. Rhys Fairhallow was nineteen years old. “She must have had help escaping, but it looks like—she was probably the one who killed them.”
“I’m sorry.” He leans against the doorframe, robe pulled tight, winding the sash around his wrist and then undoing it. There are sparks fizzing around the beds of his nails. “Do you want me with you, when you tell their families?”
He wonders whether he’s too late. Not many people know about the break-out, and fewer about the deaths, but one of the disadvantages of the dwindling-and-insular dynastic approach is that several of the people who know are related to the dead men, and to everyone whom Alec should inform.
Magnus tugs at the sash. The light show between his fingers dies out. “On reflection, I imagine my presence might be impolitic.” He looks almost startled by the realization, and it strikes Alec as strange. Magnus was with Camille long enough to have experience staying out of her wake.
“It would make it worse if you were there,” Alec agrees. “For you. This is my job, it’s not on you.”
His mouth tightens. “I wish I could be there for you, at least.”
“You will be. After.”
Magnus walks back to him, and bends over the couch to kiss his forehead. He slides down and lingers, brow against Alec’s, too close for Alec to focus on his eyes. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
“And to answer your question, of course we’re okay.”
Alec isn’t heading up the effort to hunt Camille down because under the layers of carefully constructed professionalism he’s barely maintaining, this is the truth: he doesn’t care. He doesn’t care how the centuries of security protocols at the Gard faltered on his watch. He doesn’t care where she chooses to bide her time. It’s too late for any of that to matter. He might not know Camille, but Alec knows Magnus Bane, and he knows exactly where Camille will end up when she can’t stay away any longer.
I don’t give a shit unless one of you can bring me her ashes in a box within the next half-hour isn’t a useful leadership stance. He’s prepared to keep it to himself. Still, it’s a pressing enough conviction that he’s mildly relieved to see Simon has beaten them to his office. It’s much easier to keep things to himself with Simon around. Aside from his irritation with Simon, which tends to leak through.
The relief appears to be mutual, which is weird. Simon is unfailingly friendly even with people who don’t return the favor, but he rarely comes this close to hurling himself into Alec’s arms. “Alec!” Simon rushes over and makes a series of aborted attempts to latch onto him, beginning with a handshake and ending with a pat on the shoulder. “Crazy coincidence, seeing you here, would you believe you’re just the guy I wanted—Magnus.”
“No,” Alec says, mostly to himself, “I wouldn’t believe it.” Simon has shouldered him aside with less forced cheer and more open desperation, and is hovering at Magnus’s side.
“Inquisitor Lightwood,” says Abraham Rosewain. “How good to see you. Well, business presses. Perhaps another time, Mr. Lewis.”
“Yup. Yeah, love to—let’s interview that vampire, get the full… I see how that’s like, important to have on the books, sure, the first-person perspective on um, was it—the passage from this benignly softened outlook to the cruel and dazzling vista on the far side of the veil, was that how you put—”
“Is that how you put it?” Magnus asks, with a degree of polite confusion that verges on hostile.
“Professor Rosewain,” Alec says, stepping hastily forward. He has hazy memories of the professor being pro-downworlder, enough that it raised eyebrows in the capital. It occurs to him only now that what struck him at sixteen as fuzzy-minded progressivism may not have aged well. “Thank you for volunteering. Let me introduce my husband.”
“High Warlock Bane, of course. Your reputation precedes you.” This appears to be intended as a compliment, as Rosewain hurries forward to shake Magnus’s hand and continues, “It’s an honor.”
“Lightwood-Bane.” Alec keeps his tone neutral, barely. Generally shadowhunters who make reference to Magnus’s reputation aren’t paying him a compliment.
“Ah, I see. Professor Rosewain. My husband speaks highly of you.” Magnus lets the hostility fade, although he steps forward to meet Rosewain in a way that puts him squarely between the professor and Simon. “As Alexander was saying, we appreciate your taking this on. Knowing Camille, I’m sure finding her promises to be a long, thankless slog across truly unpleasant ground—”
“Camille’s in New York,” says Izzy, letting the office doors slam against the walls to either side as she strides in. Raphael has the decency to catch them on the rebound and close them softly. He crosses his arms tightly over his chest and stays near the exit.
“What did she—how do you know she’s there?” With Izzy in the room and Simon off his conscience, Magnus moves closer to Alec.
“They don’t, actually.” Raphael’s voice is low, but cuts across Izzy’s attempt to answer. “Karnstein has a lot of friends. One of them broke him out.”
“And if the friend in question was Camille?”
Raphael shrugs. “Then she’s playing a long enough game to deliberately use shoddy pieces. I doubt she’s an immediate threat, with the Institute on alert—” he nods to Izzy, courtly—“but in either case, I need to be there.”
“I have no doubt that’s true.” Rosewain clasps his hands behind his back. “Very pleased to meet you—Mr. Santiago, I take it—and allow me to express my admiration for all that you’ve accomplished.”
“Oh, boy,” Simon says, very faintly. Raphael’s eyes flicker his way and the tilt of his eyebrows changes.
“The New York clan has a remarkably clear record since you took over. Governing the behavior of dozens of apex predators demands astounding control. You have my utmost respect.”
Raphael blinks very slowly, and shares a look with Magnus. “Thank you,” he says, so sardonically that Alec finds within himself new depths of second-hand embarrassment.
Rosewain is unperturbed. “That said, before we discuss the possibility of your leaving Idris, as head of the investigation into Ms Belcourt’s disappearance I would like to have on the record your response to the obvious question.”
Magnus’s palm skates across Alec’s shoulders and settles, fingers tight in his collar. Alec realizes, a tad belatedly for keeping the peace, what the obvious question is.
“You were in the city last night,” Rosewain says. “Which makes for quite a coincidence.”
Raphael's expression settles, heavy with the satisfaction of being right about something unpleasant. “Is that a question?”
Magnus’s hand has gone hot enough that Alec can feel it through his jacket, a slow radiating heat that reminds him of an ill-advised stakeout on a rooftop in midsummer. He reaches back and puts his hand over Magnus’s, and the heat dies away before his fingers even make contact. “I can vouch for Raphael’s whereabouts last night,” he says. “He was with Magnus.”
Rosewain nods, perfectly agreeable, and continues to disagree. “Purely a formality. It will keep the investigation tidy to have this all clarified from the beginning. It’s a noteworthy coincidence that someone with a working relationship with Ms Belcourt happened to be in the city on the night she disappeared, and that his alibi is a former paramour of hers.” There’s a moment in which Alec is too taken aback even to be angry, and Rosewain blithely continues, “No one doubts your ultimate loyalty, High Warlock Lightwood-Bane. But the baroness is as charming as she is cunning, and for all the power she wields beyond these walls, until last night she was simply a beautiful woman you once loved, and in distress. One might imagine it no terrible injury to the Clave to release one prisoner out of hundreds.”
Magnus smiles, wide and sharp, and the air boils—not hot now but bubbling as pressure builds. “Let me assure you,” he says, “that my ultimate loyalty has absolutely nothing to do with the Clave.”
“I don’t know that I was clear.” Alec tugs Magnus’s hand, pulls it down into the crook of his elbow and squeezes. “But I’m out of time to waste on this. Move on, Rosewain, or I’ll find someone who will.”
Rosewain sighs, but takes a diffident step back. “I suppose as long as Mr. Santiago is in protective custody it’s immaterial—”
“Oh, I’m not staying.” Raphael nods at Izzy and Magnus. “I’m here out of respect for the Head of the New York Institute and to see Magnus. I paid my respects, I’ve seen Magnus, and I’m leaving. As you pointed out, I have all those apex predators to herd.”
“Magnus!” Izzy cuts in. “Would you tell him to at least stay at the Institute where we can protect him?”
“Come on, man.” Simon waves a hand. “Full appreciation for the irony here, historically not a great spot for you, but you’re actually safer at the Institute. She’s thirty-pieces-of-silvering all of your least favorite coworkers right now for sure. We’ll have a slumber party, it’ll be like old times.”
“Raphael.” Izzy drops her voice. “I promise, I can do this. You’ll be safe.” Alec can feel her concern in his own chest, as sure as if she were Jace, with a tether for the emotion to travel down. Even Raphael hesitates.
“I’d like you to leave,” Magnus says, loud and ringingly clear. “Mr. Rosewain, emphatically, I’d like you elsewhere. Simon, Raphael, if you’d be darlings and wait at the loft for just a few minutes while I speak to Isabelle and Alexander.”
Alec is too relieved to have the full focus of the group off his baby sister’s complicated relationship with her ex to give much thought to what it is Magnus wants. “Absolutely.” He shakes Rosewain’s hand. “I’ll let you know if anything relevant comes up.”
Simon eyes Rosewain and the door to the office, behind which is a hallway Alec agrees is excessively long and makes for awkward conversations when trapped in it with someone unpleasant, and taps Raphael’s shoulder on the way past. “Race you!”
Raphael takes a breath and holds it in lieu of rolling his eyes. “I don’t have a lot of spare time,” he says.
“I appreciate that, dear boy, believe me. We’ll be quick.”
Magnus twists his fingers together and paces. Alec waits, leaning against his desk, Izzy at his side. He realizes belatedly that she’s echoed his posture, or he’s echoed hers, their arms folded at an identical slope and both of their left knees bent. It can’t be a comforting visual for Magnus, the tin-soldier shadowhunter army look, and Alec fumbles for something else to do with his arms. He’s increasingly concerned, given the level of nerves involved, that Magnus is going to admit he knows Raphael did this.
“It wasn’t Raphael,” Magnus says first, and Alec lets out a huff of relief. “Every other glaringly obvious objection to that impossibility aside, he absolutely wouldn’t have tried it now. He just moved against Karnstein. This is, as an understatement, a delicate time for him. If we don’t let him go back to New York tonight he could very well lose control of the clan. I can’t—I would feel responsible if that were to happen.”
“That’s not fair,” Alec says. “You asked him not to do whatever he did to Karnstein.”
“I would have stopped him, if I’d known in time.” Magnus adjusts his rings, the cuffs on his ears. Window to bookshelf and back, he follows a line in the carpet’s pattern and it almost looks like he’s meandering, surveying the office’s contents because he’s bored.
“He did it for you, though,” Izzy says, satisfied the way she is when she’s solved a puzzle in the lab. “I saw where he had Karnstein. It was…” She glances at Alec. “But he was protecting you.”
Magnus laughs, a cracklingly dry sound, and twirls a button on his collar. “Alec, I told you that holding hands, both hands—” He unfurls his fingers all at once in their direction, palms up.
“Formal gesture, laying down of arms,” Alec fills in.
“Theoretically, if you wanted to prevent me from doing any magic—” He stops in front of the window and traces a line along the lead between the stained-glass panes. His fingernails glint. Alec knows what he’s going to say.
Izzy’s lips twist with distaste. “What, grab your hands? That sounds,” she looks at Alec again, changes course again. “Risky.”
“It would be roughly on par with my trying to take a dagger from you by the blade. Unless you’re a great deal faster than I am and totally confident you can hang on. Then it’s—” He turns to face them. “Well, it’s less of a gamble.”
“I hate this strategy.” Izzy straightens, shoves away from the desk and takes the center of the room. “You have an eternity to just get madder and madder at me while I hold on, and then the second I let go you can blast me.” She sounds impatient, as if this is a pointless hypothetical. Alec knows better, because it’s anchored him silent instead of setting him off but it’s the same dread she feels.
Magnus waits her out. He locks his hands behind his back, spine straight, chin high. “Most vampires don’t… warlock blood is something of an acquired taste. And a hazardous acquisition. Their reaction depends on all sorts of factors, some of which we don’t understand. Most of us don’t have the displeasure of even knowing what our specific demonic heritage is, and every time we think we’ve accounted for all the variables something new goes spectacularly wrong—”
“Magnus,” Izzy says.
“Most vampires,” Alec repeats. “Not Karnstein.” He needs this to be solid enough to the touch that he can break it.
Izzy crosses her arms, grip tight on her elbows.
“Karnstein isn’t just well-connected,” Magnus says. “He’s well-liked. You can imagine how rare that is for a vampire as old as he is, but he’s genuinely good to his own kind.” He flourishes his fingers, and a flash briefly whites the room out with his movement. He doesn’t appear to notice. “He’s a medieval horror to mundanes, but…” He looks at Izzy, or through her. “You’re right, I could have done something about it, afterwards, but I was with Camille at the time and we had to consider—”
Alec is still frozen when Izzy barrels forward and collides with Magnus in a hug. It’s ridiculous and bordering on dangerous, Magnus is so out of it and his magic is sparking so close to the surface, but at least she did something. Because he is, out of it and looking through them, and Alec should have stopped him.
Magnus blinks and puts a hand on the back of Izzy’s neck, stroking her hair. He meets Alec’s eyes, gaze clearer. “It was a long time ago,” he says. “But Raphael just found out. Alec, Karnstein doesn’t belong to the New York clan. Despite their… relationship… Raphael doesn’t have any real right to hold him accountable. I have faith in his ability to manage the situation, but he has to be in New York to do that.”
“Okay!” Izzy loops her arms around his waist and leans back to look up at him. “We’ll send Raphael home. I’ll tell Clary to get the Institute involved in case Camille tries anything. We’ve got this, it’s another Tuesday night. Right, Alec?”
Magnus needs this to have worked. But this wasn’t entirely truthful either, and there’s a thudding in Alec’s ears. “I’ll tell him,” he manages to say. Magnus talks about Karnstein like a topic he’s studied academically and found distasteful. Whatever else is there, it’s not familiarity. It’s not habit-forming. Karnstein isn’t the reason Magnus reaches for Alec’s hands during an argument. “He’s free to go. The Institute will back him up.”
“Thank you,” Magnus says, arm tightening around Izzy’s shoulders.
It’s not a thank you situation, but Alec nods like he’s accepting it. “Anything,” he says.