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He had forgotten what it felt like. In a way, Magnus supposes he should consider himself lucky, since that isn’t the case for most people, but right now, all he feels is hot frustration burning his eyes.
It had never disappeared. The pain. Not completely. Except for the rare few lucky souls, it never really did. But for the longest time, it had at least been manageable: the constant, high-pitched static for those with chronic tinnitus, the humming of anxiety always right underneath the surface for GAD sufferers. It was never pleasant, had never been pleasant, but Magnus was nothing if not adaptable. He learned to cope, the same as everyone with chronic pain did.
His magic had helped a lot, when it learned how to interact with this imposter that had laid claim on his body (and, when it got really bad, his mind). There were a few potent potions that eased the symptoms as well, and although he rarely uses them because of their side effects, Magnus always makes sure to have some on hand, just in case. He’d been on his way to get one of them when a particularly nasty spasm had forced him into temporary retreat in his desk chair. Or at least, he had meant for it to be temporary. He has no idea how long he’s been sitting here, and the fact that he can see the jar only adds to his growing frustration.
He hasn’t been crippled by it for decades, hasn’t woken up in the middle of the night gasping for breath as phantom aches rip through his back and shoulder for even longer, and to suddenly have it back in full force, all this unadulterated, ceaseless pain that won’t be denied no matter how much he begs or cries or screams…
He is so tired of all this pain.
“Magnus?”
He startles, biting back a whimper at the jarring movement, and looks up.
Alec stands in the doorway to the apothecary, his eyes narrowing and the tentative smile on his face giving way to a frown.
“What’s wrong?”
What isn’t, these days. The thought is bitter, heavy with all the things they don’t talk about, can’t make themselves talk about, and Magnus shoves it away, deep down where he won’t have to look at or even acknowledge it, and attempts a smile.
“Nothing’s wrong,” he dismisses. He forces a cheer into his voice that he doesn’t feel. “I just wasn’t expecting you back so soon. How was your day?”
But his attempt at deflection is, as is most often the case with Alec, unsuccessful. His boyfriend shakes his head, the grooves on his forehead furrowing even deeper.
“What happened?” he insists, and Magnus really wants to avoid this conversation, but he is too weary, his mind too addled with this churning, unforgivable ache, to weasel his way out of it, so he just sighs tiredly.
“Nothing happened, Alec.”
Alec’s lips press together. It’s clear that he doesn’t believe him.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Magnus…”
“I’m not,” Magnus assures him. “I’m not hurt. I promise.” Now, hurting is a different matter altogether.
“But you’re in pain,” Alec says, as if reading his mind. Or maybe he’s just that adept at reading Magnus. “Don’t try to deny it,” he adds as Magnus opens his mouth to do just that. “I can tell.”
Magnus sighs again.
“Yes,” he admits. Grudgingly, but there seems to be little use in denying it.
Although he’s clearly not surprised, the honest response only seems to increase Alec’s concern.
“What can I do?” he asks, and Magnus wants to laugh. Or scream. Because ninety percent of their conversations these days seem to be made up of Alec either reassuring him that he isn’t as useless as they both know that he is, or asking him what can I do, or how can I help, or are you okay and Magnus is sick of it. He wants this strain that has infested their relationship gone.
But he has no idea how to make that happen, so he just waves lazily towards his bookcase.
“Get me that purple jar on the third shelf? Next to the werewolf claws.”
Alec is up, moving across the room and back and offering it to him before he’s even finished the sentence.
Magnus nods his thanks, feeling a little calmer now that he has relief literally in his grasp.
Beside him, Alec shuffles his feet.
“Nothing happened?”
“No.” Magnus exhales, slow and measured. “Nothing new, at least. It’s the remnants of something that happened to me decades ago. ‘Chronic pain,’ Catarina calls it.”
Alec tenses.
“Chronic? This is constant?”
“Yes,” Magnus admits after a moment’s hesitation. “Though it’s usually not this bad,” he hurries to add when Alec’s eyes widen in obvious alarm.
“You’ve never said anything about it.”
Magnus shrugs, biting back a groan as the movement shoots pain from his shoulder and up his neck.
“It didn’t use to be that much of a problem,” he hedges, averting his gaze when Alec’s whole expression changes into one of overwhelming sadness and crippling guilt, obviously hearing what Magnus isn’t saying.
Neither of them is too keen on using the m-word, these days.
“And that helps?” Alec asks, breaking the uncomfortable silence. He gestures towards the purple jar cradled in Magnus’s hands.
Magnus nods carefully.
“Yes.”
“Then you should take it,” Alec says. His hands twitch at his sides. “Do you need anything else? Anything I can get you?”
“No.” Magnus swallows, closing his eyes briefly as another wave rolls through him like scalding lava. “No. I’ll just… need to wait for it to ease a little.”
Alec frowns at him.
“Isn’t that the point of the potion?”
“Yes,” Magnus agrees. “But it comes with certain side effects, one of which is being really dizzy, and considering I have no intention of sleeping over my desk tonight, I should wait until I’m in bed, or at least supine.”
“I could always carry you to the bedroom…”
“No,” Magnus snaps, and it’s much harsher than what Alec deserves. He knows his boyfriend is only trying to help, is offering out of nothing but genuine concern for him, but he’ll be damned if he’s to lose his independence, too, atop of everything else.
He sighs, pushing his fingers into his eyes.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t apologize,” Alec says softly. Lean archer fingers close loosely around Magnus’s wrist, thumb rubbing gently over his pulse point. “I just hate seeing you in pain, especially when I’m responsible for it. I want to help. Tell me how to help.”
Magnus doesn’t have it in him to start yet another argument about how none of this is Alec’s fault. They’ll never see eye to eye on it anyway.
“Help me up?” he says instead, trying to ignore how shame twists his stomach at needing assistance with such a simple, mundane task.
Hysteria bubbles up his throat, because that’s all that he really is now: a weak, helpless, useless Mundane.
If Alec is in any way bothered by the pathetic state he’s in, he doesn’t show it. If anything, he looks relieved at having something to do.
“Is there anywhere I shouldn’t touch you?”
“Back,” Magnus grinds out against another, sudden spasm. “Right shoulder.”
How they manage it Magnus will never know, but between one pained breath and another, he is suddenly being lowered onto the bed. He briefly wonders if he blacked out, if Alec did carry him after all, but with the prospect of finally being able to lie down so tantalizingly close, he honestly doesn’t care.
Before he can perform a most ungraceful stomach-plant, however, Alec places a halting hand on his arm.
“How about we get you out of these clothes first?”
Magnus can’t even find it in him to summon a suggestive leer at the innuendo. All he wants is to lie down, drug himself out of his mind, and sleep for the rest of the day. Or night. Whatever time it is.
But he knows that Alec is right, and, in the grand scheme of things, what’s a few more moments of agony?
“What should I do with this?” Alec asks when they’ve managed to wrestle Magnus out of his clothes and into a pair of sweatpants.
Magnus blinks blearily to see the jar in Alec’s hand.
“Ideally, it’s to be applied at the center of the pain,” Magnus mumbles. He nuzzles into the pillow, eyes falling shut. “But since it’s in a tough spot to reach, I usually just take it orally.”
Another innuendo wasted, he laments to himself. Life is certainly cruel.
“Where is it?”
“Hm?”
“The worst of the pain,” Alec clarifies.
“Oh. Spine. Between my shoulder blades.”
The bed dips next to him, followed by a soft pop that Magnus recognizes as the jar being opened. He frowns without opening his eyes.
“Alec, you really don’t have to…”
“The hell I do,” Alec mutters, cutting him off. He sighs, voice softening as he adds, “If there is anything I can do to help, I want to do it, Magnus. Just let me take care of you, please?”
Magnus sighs.
“Fine," he relents. "Be restrictive with that, though. It’s rather expensive. A little will go a long way.”
He expects the flare of pain when Alec’s fingers gently begin to rub in the tonic, but he’s surprised by how brief it is before relief starts to take over, and can’t quite hold back a soft moan.
Alec’s fingers immediately still.
“You okay?”
At Magnus’s low hum, he slowly resumes his ministrations, gently massaging his way up to Magnus’s right shoulder and then further to his hairline before going back down.
“How did it happen?”
Magnus makes a questioning noise at the back of his throat.
“The pain. Did something incite it or…” Alec trails off.
“Circle members,” Magnus mumbles, and later, he will blame his loose tongue on the confusing combination of pain and relief. “There was a battle a few decades back, one of the few I engaged in. I was distracted, and one of them got me in the back with a seraph blade.”
This time, it’s not only Alec’s fingers that still, but his entire body.
“A Circle member did this to you?”
Magnus sighs, already sensing where this is going.
“Alexander, please don’t. It was a long time ago.”
“Who?” Alec’s voice is hard as flint, sharper than the edges of an uncut diamond. Magnus loves him for it.
“I honestly don’t know who it was, or which family line they were from,” he says. “But you can rest assured that the person in question suffered a most brutal end by Raphael’s hands.” Or rather his fangs, but that was neither here nor there.
Alec exhales evenly through his nose. Some of the tension in the room eases.
“Good.”
Magnus hums.
“The physical injury was completely healed, but for weeks after, the pain still remained,” he continues. “Catarina searched everywhere without finding a reason for it, or a long-term solution. It’s one of the many mysteries of modern medicine.”
Alec’s fingers flex where they’ve come to rest in the juncture of Magnus’s neck and shoulder.
“There must be something we can do.”
“You’re already doing it.” Magnus shifts gingerly until he can catch Alec’s eye and offers him a soft smile. “When I said it’s not usually this bad, I wasn’t only referring to… my magic.” He swallows, briefly averting his gaze. “It helped to keep it manageable, but… some days are just worse.”
“I’m sorry,” Alec says softly. He doesn’t specify what for. For everything, Magnus suspects.
“I know you are, angel.” He pats—or rather, taps his fingers against—the mattress, sleep creeping in and shrouding his mind now that his entire system is no longer burning. “Lie down with me?”
Alec hesitates.
“Are you sure? I don’t want to hurt you even more…”
Magnus smiles, loose and easy.
“Don’t worry, you won’t. It’s not as bad anymore,” he promises.
Alec still looks hesitant, but he rises from the bed and starts shedding his clothes. Magnus closes his eyes and listens to him as he moves around the room, the small part of him still awake enough for conscious thought marveling at how safe he feels, having another human being in his space like this, seeing him vulnerable like this. He never thought he’d have that again, especially not after Camille.
He’s never been happier to be proven wrong.
The bed dips as Alec gingerly lowers himself onto it. A blanket falls over Magnus’s bare back soon after and he sighs contentedly. He blindly reaches for his boyfriend, movements clumsy and uncoordinated—another side effect of the potion—and tugs him closer, humming softly when an arm is carefully draped across his lower back.
Familiar lips press gently against his forehead.
“This okay?”
“It’s perfect,” Magnus mumbles sleepily. “Thank you.”
Alec squeezes his waist. He doesn’t say anything, but Magnus can hear him thinking even through the fog of fatigue. He knows they need to talk, really talk: not only about this but about everything. Because he’s not dealing—he can admit that, if only to himself. Alec isn’t dealing, either, and if they keep going like this it will ruin them, sooner rather than later.
But, Magnus thinks, as sleep moves in to claim him, that will just have to be a problem for another day.