A girl clutched Magnus's sleeve and gazed up at him, her false lashes dusted with silver glitter.
"Don't go in," she whispered. "There's a monster in there."
I am a monster, Magnus thought. And monsters are his specialty.
He didn't say it. Instead he said, "I don't believe you," and walked in. He meant it, too: the Shadowhunters, even Alec, might believe Magnus was a monster, but Magnus didn't believe it himself. He'd taught himself not to believe it even though his mother, the man he'd called his father, and a thousand others had told him it was true.
Magnus would not believe the girl in there was a monster either, no matter what she might look like to mundanes and Nephilim. She had a soul, and that meant she could be saved.
It was dark in the bar, and contrary to Magnus's expectations, there were still people inside. On a normal night the Beauty Bar was a kitschy little place full of happy people getting manicures from the staff, perched in the chairs that looked like old-fashioned hairdresser's chairs with massive hairdryers set up on the chair backs, or dancing on the black-and-white tiled floor that suggested a chessboard.
Tonight nobody was dancing, and the chairs were abandoned. Magnus squinted at a stain on the chessboard floor and saw that the black and white tiles were smeared with bright red blood.
He glanced toward Alec to see if Alec had noticed this too and found him shifting from foot to foot, obviously nervous.
"You all right?"
"I always do this with Isabelle and Jace," said Alec. "And they're not here. And I can't call them."
"Why not?" Magnus asked.
Alec blushed just as Magnus realized what he meant. Alec couldn't call his friends because he didn't want them to know he was on a date with Magnus. He especially did not want Jace to know. It was not a particularly pleasant thing to think about, but it was Alec's business.
It was also true that Magnus certainly didn't want any more Shadowhunters in the mix intent on dealing out their rough justice, but he saw Alec's problem. From what he'd seen of Jace and Alexander's showy sister, he was sure that Alec was used to protecting them, shielding them from their own rash actions, and that meant Alec was used to defending and not attacking.
"You'll do great without them," Magnus encouraged. "I can help you."
Alec looked skeptical about that, which was ridiculous since Magnus could do actual magic, something Shadowhunters liked to forget when they were deep in contemplation of how superior they were. To Alec's credit, though, he nodded and moved forward. Magnus noted, with slight puzzlement, that whenever Magnus tried to edge ahead, Alec put out an arm or moved slightly faster, staying in front of Magnus in a protective stance.
The people still in the bar were flattened against the walls as if pinned there, unmoving with terror. Someone was sobbing.
There was a low, rattling growl coming from the back lounge of the bar.
Alec crept toward the sound, Shadowhunter-soft and swift, and Magnus followed.
The lounge was decorated with black-and-white pictures of women from the 1950s and a disco ball that obviously provided no useful light. There was an empty stage made of boxes and a reading lamp that provided the only real illumination. There were couches in the center of the room, chairs at the back, and shadows all around.
There was a shadow moving and growling among all the other shadows. Alec prowled forward, hunting it, and the werewolf gave a growl of challenge.
And there was suddenly a slender girl with her hair in long dark coils, trailing ribbons and blood, dashing straight at them. Magnus leaped forward and caught her in his arms before she could distract or be attacked by Alec.
"Don't let him hurt her!" she screamed while at the same time Magnus asked, "How badly did she hurt you?"
Magnus paused and said, "We may be at somewhat of an impasse. Yes or no questions now: Are you badly hurt?"
He took hold of her shoulders gently and looked her over. She had a long, deep scratch all the way up one smooth brown arm. It was welling with blood, falling in fat drops to the floor as they spoke; she was the source of the blood on the floor outside.
She glared at him and lied, "No."
"You're a mundane, aren't you?"
"Yes--or I'm not a werewolf or anything else, if that's what you mean."
"But you know she's a werewolf."
"Yes, dumbass!" snapped the girl. "She told me. I know all about it. I don't care. It's my fault. I encouraged her to go out."
"I'm not the one encouraging werewolves to go out at the full moon and attack people on the dance floor," Magnus said. "But perhaps we can settle which of us is the dumbass at a better time when there are not lives at stake."
The girl clutched his arm. She could see Alec, visible as Shadowhunters almost never were to the mundanes. She could see his weapons. She was bleeding too much, and yet her fear was all for someone else.
Magnus held on to the girl's arm. He would have done better with ingredients and potions, but he sent blue crackling power twining around her arm to soothe the pain and stop the bleeding. When he opened his eyes he saw the girl's gaze fixed on him, her lips parted and her face wondering. Magnus wondered if she had even known that there were people who could do magic, that anything but werewolves existed in the world.
Over her shoulder he saw Alec lunge and join battle with the wolf.
"One last question," said Magnus, speaking rapidly and softly. "Can you trust me to see your friend safe?"
The girl hesitated, and then said, "Yes."
"Then go wait outside," said Magnus. "Outside the bar, not this room. Go wait outside and clear out everyone that you can. Tell people it's a stray dog that wandered in--give people the excuse they will all want to dismiss this. Tell them you're not badly hurt. What's your friend's name?"
She swallowed. "Marcy."
"Marcy will want to know you're safe, once we've got through to her," said Magnus. "Go for her sake."
The girl nodded, a sharp jerky movement, and then fled from Magnus's grip. He heard her platform heels hitting the tiles as she went. He was able, finally, to turn back to Alec.
He saw teeth flash in the dark and did not see Alec, because Alec was a blur of motion, rolling away, then coming back at the wolf.
At Marcy, Magnus thought, and at the same time he saw that Alec hadn't forgotten that Marcy was a person, or at least that Magnus had asked him to help her.
He wasn't using his seraph blades. He was trying not to hurt someone who had fangs and claws. Magnus did not want Alec to get scratched--and he definitely did not want to risk Alec getting bitten.
"Alexander," Magnus called, and realized his mistake when Alec turned his head and then had to back up hurriedly out of the way of the werewolf's vicious swipe at him. He tucked and rolled, landing in a crouch in front of Magnus.
"You have to stay back," he said, breathlessly.
The werewolf, taking advantage of Alec's distraction, growled and sprang. Magnus threw a ball of blue fire at her, knocking her back and sending her spinning. Some yells rose up from the few people still left in the bar, all of whom were hurrying toward the exits. Magnus didn't care. He knew Shadowhunters were meant to protect civilians, but Magnus was emphatically not one.
"You have to remember I'm a warlock."
"I know," Alec said, scanning the shadows. "I just want--" He wasn't making any sense, but the next sentence he spoke unfortunately made perfect sense. "I think," he said clearly, "I think you made her mad."
Magnus followed Alec's gaze. The werewolf was back on her feet and was stalking them, her eyes lit with unholy fire.
"Those are some excellent observational skills you have there, Alexander."
Alec tried to push Magnus back. Magnus caught hold of his black T-shirt and pulled Alec back with him. They moved together slowly out of the back lounge.
The werewolf's friend had been as good as her word: the bar was empty, a glittering shadowy playground for the werewolf to stalk them through.
A
lec surprised Magnus and the werewolf both by breaking away and lunging at Marcy. Whatever he had been planning, it didn't work: this time the werewolf's swipe caught him full in the chest. Alec went flying into a hot pink wall decorated with gold glitter. He hit a mirror set into the wall and decorated with curling gold fretwork with enough force to crack the glass across.
"Oh, stupid Shadowhunters," Magnus moaned under his breath. But Alec used his own body hitting the wall as leverage, rebounding off the wall and up, catching a sparkling chandelier and swinging, then dropping down as lightly as a leaping cat and crouching to attack again in one smooth movement. "Stupid, sexy Shadowhunters."
"Alec!" Magnus called. Alec had learned his lesson: he didn't look around or risk getting distracted. Magnus snapped his fingers, a dancing blue flame appearing from them as if he had snapped on a lighter. That caught Alec's attention. "Alexander. Let's do this together."
Magnus lifted his hands and cast a web of lucent blue lines from his fingers, to baffle the wolf and protect the mundanes. Each of the shimmering strings of light would give off enough of a magical charge to make the wolf hesitate.
Alec wove around them, and Magnus wove the light around him at the same time. He was surprised at the ease with which Alec moved with his magic. Almost every other Shadowhunter he had known had been a little wary and taken aback.
Maybe it was the fact that Magnus had never wished to help and protect in quite this way before, but the combination of Magnus's magic and Alec's strength worked, somehow.
The wolf snarled and ducked and whimpered, her world filled with blinding light, and everywhere she went, there Alec was. Magnus kind of knew how the wolf felt.
The wolf flagged and whimpered, a line of blue light cutting across her brindled fur, and Alec was on it. His knee pressed into the wolf's flank, and his hand went to his belt. Despite everything, fear flashed cold up Magnus's spine. He could picture the knife, and Alec cutting the werewolf's throat.
What Alec drew out was a rope. He wrapped it around the werewolf's neck as he held her pinned down with his body. She struggled and bucked and snarled. Magnus let the lines of magic drop and murmured, the magic words falling from his lips in fading puffs of blue smoke, spells of healing and soothing, illusions of safety and calm.
"Come on, Marcy," Magnus said clearly. "Come on!"
The werewolf shuddered and changed, bones popping and fur flowing away, and in a few long, agonizing moments Alec found himself with his arms wrapped around a girl dressed only in the torn ribbons of a dress. She was very nearly naked.
Alec looked more uncomfortable than he had when she was a wolf. He let go quickly, and Marcy slid to a sitting position, her arms clutched around herself. She was whimpering under her breath. Magnus pulled off his long red leather coat and knelt to wrap it around her. Marcy clutched at the lapels.
"Thank you so much," said Marcy, looking up at Magnus with big beseeching eyes. She was a fetching little blonde in human form, which made her giant, angry wolf form seem funnier in retrospect. Then her face tightened with anguish, and nothing seemed funny at all. "Did I . . . please, did I hurt anybody?"
"No," said Alec, his voice strong, confident as it only very rarely was. "No, you didn't hurt anyone at all."
"There was someone with me . . ." Marcy began.
"She was scratched," Magnus said, keeping his voice steady and reassuring. "She's fine. I healed her."
"But I hurt her," Marcy said, and put her face in her blood-stained hands.
Alec reached out and touched Marcy's back, rubbing it gently as if this werewolf stranger was his own sister.
"She's fine," he said. "You didn't--I know you didn't want to hurt her, that you didn't want to hurt anyone. You can't help being what you are. You're going to figure it all out."
"She forgives you," Magnus told Marcy, but Marcy was looking at Alec.
"Oh my God, you're a Shadowhunter," she whispered, just as Erik the werewolf waiter had, but with fear in her voice instead of scorn. "What are you going to do to me?" She shut her eyes. "No. I'm sorry. You stopped me. If you hadn't been here--whatever you do to me, I deserve it."
"I'm not going to do anything to you," said Alec, and Marcy opened her eyes and looked up into Alec's face. "I meant what I said. I'm not going to tell anyone. I promise."
Alec had looked the same when Magnus had spoken of his childhood at the party when they had first met. It was something Magnus hardly ever did, but he had felt spiky and defensive about the advent of all these Shadowhunters in his house, at Jocelyn Fray's daughter, Clary, showing up without her mother and with so many questions she deserved answers to. He had not expected to look into a Shadowhunter's eyes and see sympathy.
Marcy sat up, gathering the coat around her. She looked suddenly dignified, as if she had realized she had rights in this situation. That she was a person. That she was a soul, and that soul had been respected as it should have been.
"Thank you," she said calmly. "Thank you both."
"Marcy?" said her friend's voice from the door.
Marcy looked up. "Adrienne!"
Adrienne dashed inside, almost skidding on the tiled floor, and threw herself to the ground and enveloped Marcy in her arms.
"Are you hurt? Show me," Marcy whispered into her shoulder.
"It's fine, it's nothing, it's absolutely all right," said Adrienne, stroking Marcy's hair.
"I'm so sorry," said Marcy, cupping Adrienne's face. They kissed, heedless of the fact that Alec and Magnus were standing right there.
When they broke apart, Adrienne rocked Marcy in her arms and whispered, "We'll figure this out so it never happens again. We will."
Other people followed Adrienne's lead and came in by twos and threes.
"You're pretty snappily dressed for a dogcatcher," said a man Magnus thought was the bartender.
Magnus inclined his head. "Thank you very much."
More people swirled back in, cautiously at first and then in far greater numbers. Nobody was asking where exactly the dog had gone. A great many of them seemed to want drinks.
Perhaps some of them would ask questions later, when the shock had worn off, and this night's work would become a situation that needed clearing up. But Magnus decided that was a problem for later.
"That was nice, what you said to her," said Magnus, when the crowd had completely hidden Marcy and Adrienne from their sight.
"Uh . . . it was nothing," said Alec, shifting and looking embarrassed. The Shadowhunters did not see much to approve of in kindness, Magnus supposed. "I mean, that's what we're here for, aren't we? Shadowhunters, I mean. We have to help anyone who needs help. We have to protect people."
The Nephilim Magnus had known had seemed to believe the Downworlders were created to help them, and to be disposed of if they didn't help enough.
Magnus looked at Alec. He was sweaty and still breathing a little hard, the scratches on his arms and face healing quickly thanks to the iratzes on his skin.
"I don't think we're going to get a drink in here; there's much too long a line," said Magnus slowly. "Let's have a nightcap back at my place."
They walked home. Though it was a long way, it was a nice walk on a summer night, the air warm on Magnus's bare arms and the moon turning the Brooklyn Bridge into a highway of shining white.
"I'm really glad your friend called you to help that girl," Alec confessed as they walked. "I'm really glad you asked me along. I was--I was surprised you did, after how things were going before."
"I was worried you were having a terrible time," Magnus told him. It felt like putting a lot of power in Alec's hands, but Alec was honest with him and Magnus found himself possessed by the strange impulse to be honest back.
"No," said Alec, and went red. "No, that's not it at all. Did I seem-- I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry," Magnus told him softly.
Words seemed to explode out of Alec in a rush, though judging by his expression he wished he could hold them back. "It was my fault. I got e
verything wrong even before I showed up, and you knew how to order at the restaurant and I had to stop myself laughing at that song on the subway. I have no idea what I'm doing and you're, um, glamorous."
"What?"
Alec looked at Magnus, stricken, as if he thought he'd got everything wrong again.
Magnus wanted to say, No, I was the one who brought you to a terrible restaurant and treated you like a mundane because I didn't know how to date a Shadowhunter and almost bailed on you even though you were brave enough to ask me out in the first place.
What Magnus actually ended up saying was, "I thought that terrible song was hilarious," and he threw back his head and laughed. He glanced over at Alec and found him laughing too. His whole face changed when he laughed, Magnus thought. Nobody had to be sorry for anything, not tonight.
When they reached Magnus's home, Magnus laid a hand on the front door and it swung open.
"I lost my keys maybe fifteen years ago," Magnus explained.
He really should get around to getting more keys cut. He didn't really need them, though, and it had been a long time since there was anyone he wanted to have his keys--to have ready access to his home because he wanted them there anytime they wanted to come. There had been nobody since Etta, half a century ago.
Magnus gave Alec a sidelong look as they climbed the rickety stairs. Alec caught the glance, and his breathing quickened; his blue eyes were bright. Alec bit his lower lip, and Magnus stopped walking.
It was only a momentary hesitation. But then Alec reached out and caught his arm, fingers tight above his elbow.
"Magnus," he said in a low voice.
Magnus realized that Alec was mirroring the way Magnus had taken hold of Alec's arms on Tuesday: on the day of Alec's first kiss.
Magnus's breath caught in his throat.
That was apparently all the encouragement Alec needed. He leaned in, expression open and ardent in the darkness of the stairs, in the hush of this moment. Alec's mouth met Magnus's, soft and gentle. Getting his breath back was an impossibility, and no longer a priority.
Magnus closed his eyes and unbidden images came to him: Alec trying not to laugh on the subway, Alec's startled appreciation at the taste of new food, Alec glad not to be ditched, Alec sitting on the floor with and telling a werewolf that she could not help what she was. Magnus found himself almost afraid at the thought of what he had nearly done in almost leaving Alec before the evening was over. Leaving Alec was the last thing he wanted to do right now. He pulled in Alec by the belt loops of his jeans, closed all distance between their bodies and caught Alec's tiny needful gasp with his mouth.