Not much had changed at Magnus’s since the first time Jace had been there. The same small entryway and single yellow bulb. Jace used an Open rune to get in through the front door, took the stairs two at a time, and buzzed Magnus’s apartment bell. Safer than using another rune, he figured. After all, Magnus could be playing video games naked or, really, doing practically anything. Who knew what warlocks got up to in their spare time?
Jace buzzed again, this time leaning firmly on the doorbell. Two more long buzzes, and Magnus finally yanked the door open, looking furious. He was wearing a black silk dressing gown over a white dress shirt and tweed pants. His feet were bare. His dark hair was tangled, and there was the shadow of stubble on his jaw. “What are you doing here?” he demanded.
“My, my,” said Jace. “So unwelcoming.”
“That’s because you’re not welcome.”
Jace raised an eyebrow. “I thought we were friends.”
“No. You’re Alec’s friend. Alec was my boyfriend, so I had to put up with you. But now he’s not my boyfriend, so I don’t have to put up with you. Not that any of you seem to realize it. You must be the—what, fourth?—of you lot to bother me.” Magnus counted off on his long fingers. “Clary. Isabelle. Simon—”
“Simon came by?”
“You seem surprised.”
“I didn’t think he was that invested in your relationship with Alec.”
“I don’t have a relationship with Alec,” said Magnus flatly, but Jace had already shouldered past him and was in his living room, looking around curiously.
One of the things Jace had always secretly liked about Magnus’s apartment was that it rarely looked the same way twice. Sometimes it was a big modern loft. Sometimes it looked like a French bordello, or a Victorian opium den, or the inside of a spaceship. Right now, though, it was messy and dark. Stacks of old Chinese food cartons littered the coffee table. Chairman Meow lay on the rag rug, all four legs sticking straight out in front of him like a dead deer.
“It smells like heartbreak in here,” said Jace.
“That’s the Chinese food.” Magnus threw himself onto the sofa and stretched out his long legs. “Go on, get it over with. Say whatever you came here to say.”
“I think you should get back together with Alec,” said Jace.
Magnus rolled his eyes up to the ceiling. “And why is that?”
“Because he’s miserable,” said Jace. “And he’s sorry. He’s sorry about what he did. He won’t do it again.”
“Oh, he won’t sneak around behind my back with one of my exes planning to shorten my life again? Very noble of him.”
“Magnus—”
“Besides, Camille’s dead. He can’t do it again.”
“You know what I mean,” said Jace. “He won’t lie to you or mislead you or hide things from you or whatever it is you’re actually upset about.” He threw himself into a wingback leather chair and raised an eyebrow. “So?”
Magnus rolled onto his side. “What do you care if Alec’s miserable?”
“What do I care?” Jace said, so loudly that Chairman Meow sat bolt upright as if he’d been shocked. “Of course I care about Alec; he’s my best friend, my parabatai. And he’s unhappy. And so are you, by the look of things. Take-out containers everywhere, you haven’t done anything to fix up the place, your cat looks dead—”
“He’s not dead.”
“I care about Alec,” Jace said, fixing Magnus with an unswerving gaze. “I care about him more than I care about myself.”
“Don’t you ever think,” Magnus mused, pulling at a bit of peeling fingernail polish, “that the whole parabatai business is rather cruel? You can choose your parabatai, but then you can never un-choose them. Even if they turn on you. Look at Luke and Valentine. And though your parabatai is the closest person in the world to you in some ways, you can’t fall in love with them. And if they die, some part of you dies too.”
“How do you know so much about parabatai?”
“I know Shadowhunters,” said Magnus, patting the sofa beside him so that the Chairman leaped up onto the cushions and nudged at Magnus with his head. The warlock’s long fingers sank into the cat’s fur. “I have for a long time. You are odd creatures. All fragile nobility and humanity on one side, and all the thoughtless fire of angels on the other.” His eyes flicked toward Jace. “You especially, Herondale, for you have the fire of angels in your blood.”
“You’ve been friends with Shadowhunters before?”
“Friends,” said Magnus. “What does that mean, really?”
“You’d know,” said Jace, “if you had any. Do you? Do you have friends? I mean, besides the people who come to your parties. Most people are afraid of you, or they seem to owe you something or you slept with them once, but friends—I don’t see you having a lot of those.”
“Well, this is novel,” said Magnus. “None of the rest of your group has tried insulting me.”
“Is it working?”
“If you mean do I suddenly feel compelled to get back together with Alec, no,” said Magnus. “I have developed an odd craving for pizza, but that might be unrelated.”
“Alec said you do that,” said Jace. “Deflect questions about yourself with jokes.”
Magnus narrowed his eyes. “And I’m the only one who does that?”
“Exactly,” Jace said. “Take it from someone who knows. You hate talking about yourself, and you’d rather make people angry than be pitied. How old are you, Magnus? The real answer.”
Magnus said nothing.
“What were your parents’ names? Your father’s name?”
Magnus glared at him out of gold-green eyes. “If I wanted to lie on a couch and complain to someone about my parents, I’d hire a psychiatrist.”
“Ah,” said Jace. “But my services are free.”
“I heard that about you.”
Jace grinned and slid down in his chair. There was a pillow with a pattern of the Union Jack on the ottoman. He grabbed it and put it behind his head. “I don’t have anywhere to be. I can sit here all day.”
“Great,” Magnus said. “I’m going to take a nap.” He reached out for a crumpled blanket lying on the floor, just as Jace’s phone rang. Magnus watched, arrested midmotion, as Jace dug around in his pocket and flipped the phone open.
It was Isabelle. “Jace?”
“Yeah. I’m at Magnus’s place. I think I might be making some headway. What’s up?”
“Come back,” Isabelle said, and Jace sat up straight, the pillow tumbling to the floor. Her voice was tightly strained. He could hear the sharpness in it, like the off notes of a badly tuned piano. “To the Institute. Right away, Jace.”
“What is it?” he asked. “What’s happened?” And he saw Magnus sit up too, the blanket dropping from his hand.
“Sebastian,” Isabelle said.
Jace closed his eyes. He saw golden blood, and white feathers scattered across a marble floor. He remembered the apartment, a knife in his hands, the world at his feet, Sebastian’s grip on his wrist, those fathomless black eyes looking at him with dark amusement. There was a buzzing in his ears.
“What is it?” Magnus’s voice cut through Jace’s thoughts. He realized he was already at the door, the phone back in his pocket. He turned. Magnus was behind him, his expression stark. “Is it Alec? Is he all right?”
“What do you care?” said Jace, and Magnus flinched. Jace didn’t think he’d ever seen Magnus flinch before. It was the only thing that kept Jace from slamming the door on the way out.