My Alec, Magnus had said, you’ve been so sad. I didn’t know. And then he had sunk back against the floor, as if the effort of speaking exhausted him.
“Hold still,” Alec said now, and drew a seraph blade from his belt. He opened his mouth to name it, and felt a sudden touch at his wrist. Magnus had wrapped his slender fingers around Alec’s wrist.
“Call it Raphael,” Magnus said, and when Alec looked at him in puzzlement, Magnus glanced toward the blade in Alec’s hand. His eyes were half-closed, and Alec remembered what Sebastian had said in the entryway, to Simon: I killed the one who made you. Magnus’s mouth quirked at the corner. “It is an angel’s name,” he said.
Alec nodded. “Raphael,” he said softly, and when the blade blazed up, he brought it down hard on the adamas chain, which splintered under the touch of the knife. The chains fell away, and Alec, dropping the blade to the floor, reached forward to take Magnus by the shoulders and help him up.
Magnus reached for Alec, but instead of rising to his feet, he pulled Alec against him, his hand sliding up Alec’s back to knot in his hair. Magnus pulled Alec down and against him, and kissed him, hard and awkward and determined, and Alec froze for a moment and then abandoned himself to it, to kissing Magnus, something he’d thought he’d never get to do again. Alec ran his hands up Magnus’s shoulders to the sides of his neck and cupped his hands there, holding Magnus in place while he kissed him thoroughly breathless.
Finally Magnus drew back; his eyes were shining. He let his head fall onto Alec’s shoulder, arms encircling him, keeping them tightly together. “Alec . . . ,” he began softly.
“Yes?” Alec said, desperate to know what Magnus wanted to ask him.
“Are you being chased?”
“I—ah—some of the Endarkened are looking for us,” Alec said carefully.
“Pity,” Magnus said, closing his eyes again. “It would be nice if you could just lie down with me here. Just . . . for a little while.”
“Well, you can’t,” said Isabelle, not unkindly. “We have to get out of here. The Endarkened will be here any second, and we’ve got what we came for—”
“Jocelyn.” Luke drew away from the wall, straightening up. “You’re forgetting Jocelyn.”
Isabelle opened her mouth, then closed it again. “You’re right,” she said. Her hand went to her weapons belt, and she unfastened a sword; taking a step across the room, she handed it to Luke, then bent down to pick up Alec’s still-burning seraph blade.
Luke took the sword and held it with the careless competence of someone who had handled blades all their life; sometimes it was hard for Alec to remember that Luke had been a Shadowhunter once, but he remembered now.
“Can you stand?” Alec said to Magnus gently, and Magnus nodded, and let Alec lift him to his feet.
He lasted almost ten seconds before his knees buckled and he collapsed forward, coughing. “Magnus!” Alec exclaimed, and threw himself down by the warlock’s side, but Magnus waved him away and struggled up to his knees.
“You should go without me,” he said, in a voice made gravelly by hoarseness. “I’ll slow you down.”
“I don’t understand.” Alec felt as if a vise were compressing his heart. “What happened? What did he do to you?”
Magnus shook his head; it was Luke who answered. “This dimension is killing Magnus,” he said, voice flat. “There’s something about it—about his father—that’s destroying him.”
Alec glanced at Magnus, but Magnus only shook his head again. Alec fought down an irrational burst of anger—still withholding things, even now—and took a deep breath. “The rest of you go find Jocelyn,” he said. “I’ll stay with Magnus. We’ll head toward the center of the keep. When you find her, come looking for us there.”
Isabelle looked wretched. “Alec—”
“Please, Izzy,” said Alec, and he saw Simon put his hand on Isabelle’s back, and whisper something into her ear. She nodded, finally, and turned toward the door; Luke and Simon followed her, both pausing to look back at Alec before they went, but it was the image of Izzy that stuck in his mind, carrying her blazing seraph blade in front of her like a star.
“Here,” he said to Magnus as gently as he could, and reached down to lift him up. Magnus stumbled to his feet, and Alec managed to get one of the warlock’s long arms slung over his shoulder. Magnus was thinner than he had ever been; his shirt clung to his ribs, and the spaces under his cheekbones looked sunken, but there was still a lot of warlock to contend with: a lot of skinny arms and legs and long, bony spine.
“Hold on to me,” Alec said, and Magnus gave him the sort of smile that made Alec feel like someone had taken an apple corer to his heart and tried to dig out the center.
“I always do, Alexander,” he said. “I always do.”
City of Heavenly Fire
Cassandra Clare's books
- City of Ruins
- Invincible (A Centennial City Novel)
- City of Fae
- City of Lost Souls
- CITY OF GLASS
- City of Fallen Angels
- CITY OF BONES
- CITY OF ASHES
- City of Lost Souls
- Velocity
- Ascendancy of the Last
- Blood of Aenarion
- Broods Of Fenrir
- Burden of the Soul
- Caradoc of the North Wind
- Cause of Death: Unnatural
- Dark of the Moon
- Demons of Bourbon Street
- Edge of Dawn
- Eye of the Oracle
- Freak of Nature
- Heart of the Demon
- Lady of Devices
- Lance of Earth and Sky
- Last of the Wilds
- Legacy of Blood
- Legend of Witchtrot Road
- Lord of the Wolfyn
- Of Gods and Elves
- Of Wings and Wolves
- Prince of Spies
- Professor Gargoyle
- Promise of Blood
- Secrets of the Fire Sea
- Shadows of the Redwood
- Sin of Fury
- Sins of the Father
- Smugglers of Gor
- Sword of Caledor
- Sword of Darkness
- Talisman of El
- Threads of Desire (Spellcraft)
- Tricks of the Trade
- Visions of Magic
- Visions of Skyfire
- Well of the Damned
- Wings of Tavea
- Wings of the Wicked
- A Bridge of Years
- Chronicles of Raan
- Dawn of Swords(The Breaking World)
- A Draw of Kings
- Hunt the Darkness (Guardians of Eternity)
- Lord of the Hunt
- Master of War
- Mistfall(Book One of the Mistfall Series)
- The Gates of Byzantium
- The House of Yeel
- The Oath of the Vayuputras: Shiva Trilogy 3
- The Republic of Thieves #1
- The Republic of Thieves #2
- Edge of Dawn
- A Quest of Heroes
- Mistress of the Empire
- Servant of the Empire
- Gates of Rapture
- Reaper (End of Days)
- This Side of the Grave
- Magician's Gambit (Book Three of The Belgariad)
- Skin Game: A Novel of the Dresden Files
- Murder of Crows
- The Queen of the Tearling
- A Tale of Two Castles
- Mark of the Demon
- Sins of the Demon
- Blood of the Demon
- The Other Side of Midnight
- Vengeance of the Demon: Demon Novels, Book Seven (Kara Gillian 7)
- Cold Burn of Magic
- Of Noble Family
- Wrath of a Mad God ( The Darkwar, Book 3)
- King of Foxes
- Daughter of the Empire
- Mistress of the Empire
- Krondor : Tear of the Gods (Riftwar Legacy Book 3)
- Shards of a Broken Crown (Serpentwar Book 4)
- Rise of a Merchant Prince
- End of Days (Penryn and the End of Day #3)
- Servant of the Empire
- Talon of the Silver Hawk
- Shadow of a Dark Queen
- The Cost of All Things
- The Wicked (A Novella of the Elder Races)
- Night's Honor (A Novel of the Elder Races Book 7)
- Born of Silence
- Born of Shadows
- Sins of the Night
- Kiss of the Night (Dark Hunter Series – Book 7)
- Born Of The Night (The League Series Book 1)