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Jace Herondale was not hiding.
No, great warriors did not hide, especially not great warriors that had the literal blood of angels flowing through their veins. He was a war hero at seventeen, having defeated Valentine and Sebastian - two of the worst Nephilim war criminals of their generation and his parents' generation. He had died and returned, traveled to Edom and back, carried heavenly fire in his veins, been stabbed multiple times in the last six months alone - not to mention how many times that actually occurred throughout his entire lifetime, and even had the claim to fame of taking on the Greater Demon Abaddon. He was who all Shadowhunters aspired to be. Or so he was told, anyways.
It wasn't exactly fair, if Jace was honest. Not everyone could be his equal. He had the blood of Ithuriel as a core part of his DNA, and, to top it all off, he was gifted with being undeniably attractive, and a natural blonde to boot. So, in conclusion, no, Jace Herondale was not hiding. He did not hide.
He did, however, decide to make himself scarce when it would seem he was wanted by people he would much rather avoid with every fiber of his being.
Izzy, for instance, had decided to nearly quadruple her cooking endeavors, especially now that Simon was more or less back with them and without a single memory of Isabelle in the kitchen to help him ward off all meal attempts at the Institute. Who would have thought demonic amnesia would have its perks - though Jace personally thought it added to the curse, but it made Clary and Isabelle happier than they have been in months, so he kept his mouth shut for once. However, this meant that breakfast, lunch, dinner, and anything in between were hazardous times, rivaling everything Jace had been through in his entire life, which was saying a lot. Even the small amount of free time they were allotted from studies and patrol duties was considered a time of an all-out meal war. Everyone avoided that kitchen, and only snuck down where the hunger became too much to handle and the stamina runes began to deteriorate.
Hence, Jace's current seclusion to the greenhouse. Again, not a hiding place.
If Izzy happened to be allergic to everything that they grew up here, which would then prevent her from coming up here and using her whip to forcibly drag him back down by his ankles, it was merely a happy little coincidence. Of course, she could always send Simon after him, and Jace felt something squirm uncomfortably in his chest.
Simon (middle name unknown and Jace had no burning desire to fill it in) Lewis was possibly the biggest personal conundrum of his life since the whole "Clary-is-your-sister" debacle. Simon had been nothing more than a mundane once upon a time, and a rather pathetic one at that, always pining with a sickening lovelorn after Clary, his best friend. Jace had hated him on sight for that simple fact, that this mundane got to be so close to the girl Jace was enamored by and constantly torn from. He'd never admit to anyone, other than Clary late at night, that he might have been jealous of the gawky boy, but in truth, that's what he was. Jealous. Uncomfortable feeling, really.
Simon had made Clary happy in a way that Jace could not hope to, especially back when all she had been to him was an odd mundane girl with an affinity for pissing him off, and it was a very strange plot twist to the tragedy he was calling his life up until that point. So Jace had done all he could to make Simon feel unwanted and inadequate, pointing out how Clary belonged to an entirely different world from him. It had backfired greatly - no matter what he did, Clary had always gone back to Simon: rescuing him from the Dumont, telling him everything about the Shadow World, bringing him to the Institute, and even dating him for a brief, horrible time.
If there ever was a form of true torture, it was watching Clary Fairchild and Simon Lewis attempt to be in a romantic relationship.
And then Simon had been Turned into a vampire and it seemed everything had literally gone to hell in a hand basket after that. They had quite literally gone to Hell. And Jace had begrudgingly accepted that Simon was part of the package deal that was Clarissa Fray. He had even given the former bloodsucker his own angelic blood to save his life, turning him into a Daylighter. That was, Jace recalled, a most unexpected twist, but it had made Clary so happy and had offered a sense of normalcy back to Simon's life. It was surprisingly worth it.
Jace may have saved Simon's life once or twice or a dozen times, but they all would be dead right now if it hadn't been for Simon. Isabelle would have bled out from demon poison, Magnus would have perished in his father's realm, and, frankly, the rest of them would have burned alive or withered away to dust because Jace knew Alec would have never left Magnus' side and Jace would never have left Alec behind, and Clary would have never left Jace.
Simon had saved all of them.
Jace could easily pride himself on being a hero. He could preach for hours on how he defeated Sebastian and eliminated the Endarkened forces or how he learned to control the heavenly fire inside him, but he wasn't;t the one who got them home from Edom. Simon Lewis did that, and that idiot didn't even remember it. To be fair, he had no memory of any of them - not from this last year, and nothing about Clary at all. Sixteen years worth of memories wiped clean and edited precisely, a year's worth of memories of a hidden world he was no longer a part of evaporated from his mind. All wiped away as if they were nothing.
Maybe that's why Jace was avoiding - not hiding from - him. Simon had saved his life, and Clary's and Isabelle's and Alec's and Magnus'. Jace wasn't really great at expressing his gratitude to other people, or even his emotions in general, but how in the word were you supposed to thank someone who had no memory of saving you, no memory of you at all? How did you act?
Jace shook his head, disturbing the cluster of flowers he was laying underneath and sending a cloud of pollen into the air. He wormed his way further beneath the plant until it fell over him like a canopy and he was completely hidden from sight, with the exception of the tips of his boots.
Damn. He was hiding.
But how else was he supposed to have a minute to himself? He'd barely had any time to really sit and think, so he went to his second most favorite spot in the Institute and hunkered down under the blooming purple holly bells in the far corner of the greenhouse upper level. he figured he had been pretty clever, but he knew anyone could track him down, it would have to be Clary. Well, Maryse could definitely find him with frightening ease, but he'd much prefer his girlfriend if he could choose his captor. That idea gave way to pleasant fantasies and a few more painful memories - those long weeks he had been under Sebastian's influence and had left Clary in a state of confusion and hurt. The memory was hazy, as if he was remembering it from under water, but he wished he could still take away her pain instead of always being the cause of it.
Now, after a very long haul, the pain was finally over and they were together, for real, at last. It was amazing. Jace felt like he had known Clary, had lived her, all his life, and being with her felt like the most natural thing in the world, next to breathing. The feeling had only intensified the longer he was with her. It was so strong, he had started toying with an idea, despite it being way too early in their relationship. But he was still thinking about it.
A breeze from the various electric fans strewn around the greenhouse space circulated around him, moving the blond strands off his face, cooling the pricks of sweat from his forehead and neck. he sighed and blew a leaf that was tickling his nose.
Clary had been, understandably, upset about Simon, but Isabell had been - and honestly still very much was - absolutely distraught. Jace understood; she had finally given all of her heart to someone, someone who really loved her in return, only to have it ripped horribly from her grasp. For the first two weeks, she had holed herself up in her room, screaming and crying and then becoming scarily quiet in her grief. Maryse had tried to get her to open up, but Isabelle had screeched at her to go away and to deal with her own failed love life.
Maryse had not been back to Isabelle's room.
Clary had managed to talk her way into the room at the beginning of the second week, but she was shooed out shortly after with a sad, hopeless look about her. She and Isabelle had both loved Simon, in different ways but still, the pain was similar. So, Jace had tried, but even his sparkling wit couldn't get a viable response. The last time this happened, when Max died, Simon had been the only person Isabelle would talk to. Now, he was the one that was gone, but he was back all the same, and Jace watched as Isabelle interacted with this Almost-Simon, hoping for a sign of the boy she had loved so completely. It was agonizing.
It seemed to be a sort of unspoken rule to keep away from Izzy and the Old-New Almost -Simon, so Jace had been spending all his free time with Clary and Luke and Jocelyn, now returned from their long overdue honeymoon in London. Apparently, the Fairchild line had a deep connection to the Institute there, and Luke had taken his new wife on a tour of the whole city. Clary had also told Jace that, according to something Brother Zachariah - now simply called Jem - said, to would seem that all the ancestors of the Fairchilds, Lightwoods, and Herondales had begun in London, though how they ended up here in New York was beyond Jace's willing suspension of belief.
"Oh, I wish I could have seen everything as it was back then," Clary gushed to him. "It's fascinating. I want to know everything! What were my ancestors like? What about the Lightwoods? Jem called them absolute worms, but he couldn't;t have meant it, could he? I can't always tell when he's joking. And you! He was your ancestor's parabatai! Ooh, I wish he hadn't left with Tessa - your grandmother, basically, with all the "greats" in front of that, you know what I mean. Maybe Magnus knows more about..."
Jace didn't really remember too much more of that particular conversation. At the mention of parabatai, his mind had immediately leapt to Alec, and thinking of Alec also brought up Magnus Bane, High Warlock of Brooklyn. Jace reached up above his head and plucked a purple flower from its stem. He brought it to his face, examining the silky purple petals with vague interest. His mind was on Magnus, and slowly, he crushed the flower between his fingers, releasing a sweet pungent smell.
That glittery bastard -
Jace sighed and tried, unsuccessfully, to quell his rage. If Alec could forgive Magnus, then Jace supposed the least he could do would be to try. He closed his eyes, and in his mind he saw his parabatai. Alec wore his trademark black ensemble of clothes, his porcelain white skin standing out shockingly against his black hair, his bright blue eyes set deeply in his angular face.
When Jace Herondale had first met Alexander Lightwood - well, he had been Jace Wayland. He was ten years old and recently dumped into the Lightwood's care by order of the Clave. Jace knew he had been a sullen kid (his "father" was murdered in front of his eyes, for Angel's sake) but eleven year old Alexander Lightwood put Jace's own sulking skills to shame. Robert Lightwood had yelled for his eldest son to meet him in the Library, and when Alec had finally walked in, Jace had been taken aback.
Jace Wayland was standing next to Robert Lightwood in the center of the Institute Library. It was a grand place, filled wall to wall with books, and it reminded Jace of the library back home in the Manor. He was trying really hard not to think of that place, with his father's body lying in a pool of blood on the floor. The Clavehad come as soon as he had figured out how to call, scooped him up, and dumped him here without a second glance. Robert Lightwood had apparently been his father's parabatai, though he had never heard his name before, and Robert was a large, imposing man. His wife, Maryse, was tall and stern looking too, but she had hugged him at least and said that she would try and find Alexander and Isabelle, her two eldest children, for him to meet. Jace had never know other children before, so when Alexander Lightwood had finally walked into the library, he wasn't quite like he had expected.
He had figured that kids who had the benefit of growing up in a place like the New York Institute, with siblings and two parents and a cat named Church (for some odd ironic reason that escaped Jace to this day), kids who had all of that would be happy, right? They'd be well adjusted and confident and tough. The boy who walked into the library that day was none of those things.
He was tall, stocky, and dressed in ratty dark blue jeans and a fraying black sweater. His skin was am luminescent white, his features brought out sharply by the styled black hair that hung in his face. But what really took Jace by surprise was how this boy, only a year older than himself perhaps, this boy looked as if he were already carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. His posture was stiff and uncomfortable, and his face was set into a carefully placed mask, blue eyes piercing with questions he was either too shy or stubborn to ask.
"Alexander." Robert nodded to his son. "Meet Jace Wayland. He's going to be your...brother, of sorts. Starting today, the Clave has placed him into this family's adoptive care."
Jace looked at this boy, Alexander, waiting to hear his response, his doubtless rage that there was another boy his age being taken age, especially one so close in age and clearly a rival to his place in the family hierarchy. Not only that, but Jace would also prove to be fierce competition in training. But Alexander only looked at him in shock, his mouth hanging open slightly.
"Alexander." Robert Lightwood's voice was firm, and his son snapped back to attention, a flash of guilt crossing his face before disappearing back under his mask as a dutiful son and solider. Jace was honestly fascinated. "Alexander, please show Jace to his room. Put him in the fifth door down past the second hallway, near yours."
Alexander nodded and had turned to go with barely a wave in Jace's direction. Jace awkwardly made to follow him, unsure if this was truly a dismissal, and not looking forward to what he was assuming to be a long, painfully awkward and silent walk to whichever room he was dumped in for the foreseeable future. he was hoping that the girl, Isabelle, the boy's ten year old sister, might be more fun, or even the baby, max, who he had heard screaming and wailing from somewhere deeper in the Institute.
"Alec."
Both boys' turned around, surprised. Robert's voice had become softer, warmer than it was a moment ago, and he was smiling at his son. Jace saw Alexander's - Alec's - face open up, everything about him vulnerable in a split second. Jace looked back at Robert Lightwood and saw he was holding a slim wooden bow and a green quiver full of red fletched arrows.
"Happy Birthday, Alec."
Jace remembered this moment the best out of anything from his childhood. It was the moment that he knew Alec Lightwood was someone special. He couldn't;t explain it, not then and certainly not know. Jace surmised that maybe he had sensed a future friendship and parabatai bond - but really, when Alec's eyes saw that bow and arrow set, Jace had watched as the sullen and careful boy in black suddenly split open like the sun.
A dazzling smile changed his face into something unbearably sweet and innocent for an eleven year old, and his blue eyes lit up so brightly, they were almost white. Jace was thrown, but when Alec laughed and ran back to his father, he was so completely off balance, he nearly fell over.
A few minutes later, Alec Lightwood, carrying his birthday present in hand and a with a new feeling of contentment, was leading Jace down the dim corridors to his room.
"How old are you?" Jace said, trying to break the silence, even though he knew the answer. Normally, he was all for uncomfortable awkwardness, usually when he was the one causing them. But for some reason, he didn't;t want that with Alec. His new adopted brother gave a start of surprise at Jace's voice, a faint blush blooming on his neck.
"Eleven, as of yesterday. Didn't think Dad remembered" That last bit was muttered to himself, though Jace still heard it, and he heard the awe in Alec's voice as he gazed at his present again.
"Me too." Jace said. "I mean, I'm eleven too. My dad's...dead."
And that went from awkward to so much worse in the span of ten seconds. Jace could have thrown himself off the roof for that stupid comment, but what was he supposed to say to another kid his age? How did kids make friends? Were they going to be friends, or was he simply another stranger that would be passing through? He was going to be living with them from now on, so at the very least they have to find a way to get along without tripping over themselves, right? All of this was beginning to give Jace a headache.
"So…" Jace cleared his throat, trying to think of something, anything, to say. "Alexander, -"
"Don't call me that."
"What?" Jace blinked, startled at the vehemence in his new comrade's voice.
'Don't call me Alexander. Only my parents ever call me that, usually when they're disappointed or trying to make an example of me for Isabelle. Call me Alec."
Jace remembered how that, that moment there, was where he had thought that maybe things would be okay in New York.
"My full name is Johnathan Christopher, but that's such a mouthful, so everyone calls me Jace," he said in return. "And by everyone, I mean no-one cause this is the first time I've ever really met anyone other than my dad, or left Wayland Manor, so...you'd be the first...Alec."
Alec gave a sort of half smile, which seemed to surprise even him. Like Jace, it seemed Alec never had any kids his age to interact with before, or at least, not ones that genuinely got who he was. They reached Jace's room shortly after, and both boys had lingered in the doorway for several minutes.
"Um...so here." Alec nodded at the plain door. he pointed to the far end of the hallway, and he blushed slightly. "And, uh, my door is actually the last one at the end back there. In case you, uh - well, in case you need a sparring partner, or whatever."
Jace nodded but chewed his tongue in silence. Alec shifted in place for a few more minutes before turning even redder and his blush grew and he moved to walk away, huddling back in on himself once again. As he did, Jace said something he has since never regretted.
"I can't be your sparring partner."
Alec froze from where he was walking away. He didn't immediately turn back around, and Jace assumed that he was putting his mask back in place. Jace wondered why this boy who had everything Jace had ever coveted was so guarded.
"Why not?"
"I can't be your sparring partner if I don't know where the training room is. Or anything else, for that matter."
Alec turned around again, his face blank. But the longer the two of them stared at each other, the more his eyes cleared. But the time a smirk broke through on Alec's lips, Jace was already grinning.
From that moment on, he and Alec had grown and bonded, training and studying and exploring together. When it became clear that Jace needed Alec more than a best friend and brother, he worked up the nerve to ask him to be his parabatai, and they've been hunting together ever since.
"The End." Jace murmured to himself. If only life was that simple.
Jace considered himself a lot of things - handsome, skilled, extremely good in bed, charming witty, sarcastic, angsty, gentle, strong, misunderstood, controversial, complicated, and humble to name simply a few traits - but he had never thought himself to be heartless, or insensitive, or even altogether neglectful. He had never thought he'd be that way to Alec, his parabatai, his brother, best friend and other half. But it had happened, and the worst part was that Jace hand't even realized it.
It had started, really, when Clary first became entangled in the Shadow World. Alec had warned him that she would bring trouble, and - Jace remembered wryly - to be careful, because there was no rune to fix a broken heart. Jace had laughed, and what had happened? They had gotten dragged into the start of a war, starting with the fight of Abaddon, the Greater Demon who had possessed Madame Dorothea.
Alec had nearly died.
The thought still made Jace sick to his stomach, remembering the blood pooling underneath his parabatai's mangled body, blood tinting his lips, his skin failing to heal, and that awful labored breathing as Alex tried to fight against the poison that was killing him. Jace had never been more terrified as he watched Alec choke and bleed out, the iratzes doing nothing.
And it hadn't ended there.
On Valentine's ship - that disgusting, leeching demon - Alec being thrown off the ship into the dark water, Jace's feeling that his brother was drowning and he couldn't do anything to help -
Then - he could feel Alec distancing himself in Idris, and when Sebastian choked him, called him out for being disgusting, Jace had wanted to attack the demon boy with all his might but he couldn't, and Alec kept pulling away. Then Max died, and Alec finally came out and it seemed that everything was changing and Jace didn't know how to feel anymore. Alec and Magnus went on their vacation, and Jace was left alone to deal with his internal demons. When Alec came back, Jace could see that he was somehow better than the boy he was when he left, but Jace had been so absorbed with Clary and Lilith, that he hadn't seen the fraying edges of his brother's desperate love. Jace had gone through the exact same thing and he couldn't even help his brother like Alec helped him.
Jace could feel the guilt growing in his chest as he reminisced. To make matter worse, Jace just then had to go and get kidnapped by his psycho demonic adopted brother and he left Alec all alone, outside of their parabatai connection, to deal with finding him on top of his insecurities with Magnus, Camille, and keeping their family together. Jace had tried to be there for Alec when he came back, tried to console him from the breakup, but Jace only realized now what a shitty job he had done.
He was a terrible brother, best friend, and ultimately piss-poor parabatai. Magnus had broken Alec's heart (a fact that still made Jace fume - he quite literally spent weeks holding Alec as he cried himself to sleep) and Jace hadn't ever given the extent of Alec's pain a second thought.
So maybe he was hiding from Alec. How could he face him? How could he face his brother (who he basically betrayed, in every sense of the parabatai oath) and his brother's boyfriend -lover-person (he wasn't sure if he could be cordial to Magnus after everything he's done) when he made himself so sick?
The sound of the greenhouse door squealing open broke Jace from his reverie, and immediately, the Herondale boy was on high alert. He slide further back into the shrubbery, skidding a hand to his belt to feel for a seraph blade. Logically, he knew that whoever it was, was his family or Simon. But after all the literal hell he had endured this past year, he couldn't help but tense.
Heavy footsteps -
This person forget a Silence Rune -
They made their way around the lower level, and then up the metal spiral staircase to this level. Jace listened as the stranger came closer and closer, and he peered through the bush trying to see who it was, but they kept out of his sight, behind all the various plant life. Suddenly, they stopped. Jace held his breath, his hand at his belt. The next moment happened so fast, Jace didn't have the forethought to react. Someone reached out and grabbed his ankles, dragging him backwards out of the bush and into the clear pathway. The assailant flipped Jace over not his back in a second, and before Jace's unique fighting skills could come into action, an arm was pressing firmly on his throat.
"I thought the great Jace Herondale was always at the top of his game."
Jace blinked against the yellow fluorescent lights and saw, with dismay and shock, the face of his true and own parabatai, Alec Lightwood, staring down at him.
"First time for everything." Jace snapped, but he lacked the usual wit as the feelings of guilt overwhelmed him again. "Let me up, Alexander."
Slowly, his piercing blue eyes studying Jace's golden ones, Alec released him and let him sit up. Jace moved cautiously, trying to avoid his gaze, but they wee boring him accusingly.
"Is there something you want? A trophy, perhaps?" Alec didn't respond, only kept looking at Jace expectantly, and it was starting to piss him off. '"Seriously, Alec, what -?"
"Why are you hiding up here, Jace?"
"I'm not hiding," Jace whined, wincing at himself as he did so. "Look, maybe I just wanted to be alone where no one could possibly - hey." Jace suddenly realized that something ws off about this situation, and it did not bode well. "Hey. What are you doing up here, Alec? You and I both know you're allergic to everything in the greenhouse, I mean Hodge even told us that just breathing up here could send you into shock - and he's dead so there's no one here that could get you the antidote in time - unless Magnus - no, no, we've gotta go. It won't get that bad, I promise. But seriously, what the hell are you thinking? You can't be in here!" Jace reached out to grab Alec's arm, but he pulled away.
"Jace, wait -."
"What do you mean, wait? Look, we can talk all you want, okay, but not here. Let's go before your throat closes up and you break out in hives, and you start doing that wheezing hyperventilating thing that haunts my nightmares -"
"No, stop, Jace – "
"Alec, don't fight me on this, okay? Come on!"
"No! Jace, listen –"
"Alec, please!"
"I –"
"I can't be the reason you nearly die again, Alec!"
There was a terrifying silence that followed Jace's outburst. Alec simply stared slack jawed at Jace while he breathed heavily and rapidly, pinpricks of humiliating tears beginning to appear at the edges of his eyes. After a long pause, Alec reached across his body and rolled down the collar of his black shirt. On the side of his neck, burning slowly, was a rune. Clary must have drawn it, because Jace didn't recognize the simple swirling design.
"I had Clary Mark me before I came up here." Alec said softly. "Since there's no real rune for allergies, she drew one to help me breathe and withstand the plants that I'm allergic to while I'm up here. I'm fine, Jace. Nothing's going to happen to me."
Jace couldn't look away from his brother's neck, the faintly glowing Mark right across the jugular.
"Jace."
"You're okay?" Jace whispered.
"Jace, what's wrong?" Alec asked. "You've been avoiding all of us, hardly sleeping, I haven't seen you eat anything more than takeout in a few days, and you've barely acknowledged Simon or Magnus since we got back –"
It was a reflex. Jace couldn't help it. At the warlock's name, his whole demeanor darkened and a scowl broke out on his face. He managed to school his face back in order, but it was too late. Alec looked at him in utter shock, and all the horrid guilt came back to the surface.
"Start talking." Alec said softly.
'About what?" Jace stalled.
"Let's start with Magnus and work backwards from there."
Jace sighed and motioned for Alec to follow him to a nearby bench. If he was going to open up and get all disgusting with his emotions, he'd rather be sitting. When they were, Jace pulled out his father, Stephen's, knife and began to fiddle with it as he talked.
"Look, before you say anything, I know you love Magnus and I know he's your soulmate or true love or whatever and I'm happy you've found someone who can give you the world on a fucking silver platter, but...Alec," Jace looked to his parabatai. "Alec, he broke you. No, not just broke, he destroyed you. No, wait, just listen to me. I know what you did to make him break things off with you, but that's not the point. The point is that he told you he loved you, he changed you for the better and helped you in a way I couldn't, nor Izzy or Mom or Dad could. And then he tossed you aside and pretended it all meant nothing."
"Jace." Alec's voice held a warning note, but Jace couldn't stop now. Everything he had been holding onto was spewing out of him in one, long, disgusting flow.
"You're back together, that's great, and I see how happy you are, and all I want to do is protect you and make sure you are always happy like this. But then I remember all those weeks where you wouldn't;t eat because you felt like you needed to be broken for what you did, where all you did was hold your phone and beg Magnus to forgive you, and those nights when you cried to sleep. I laid there with you and held you, trying to take the pain away and I couldn't. I could feel your heart breaking, Alec, and it was awful."
Without really meaning to, Jace reached up and touched his parabatai rune gingerly.
'There's more your not telling me." Alec prompted.
"You were so broken for so long, even worse than when you were before you came out." Jace said quietly. "Before Magnus. I was, too. I thought we fixed each other, sort of, over the years we've known each other and fought beside each other. I thought we connected so well because we could reach each other like we were the mirrors of each other, and we could always fix what we hurt. But then when Magnus was taken, and we went to Edom, I saw how badly you were coping with everything and I realized that I've been -" he cut himself off and tried to collect his suddenly rolling emotions.
"Jace?" Alec put his hand on his shoulder.
"Alec, I'm so sorry. You know I'm not good at this sort of thing, but I need to tell you that I never meant to neglect you, I never -"
"Jace, Jace! Calm down." LAec placed both hands on his shoulders now and tried to grab his attention and shake him out of his self- hatred spiral. Jace looked at his brother through bleary eyes, Alec's wide and worried. Jace bit his lip to keep from scoffing. He thought he had gotten past all his lack of self-worth, but when it came to Alec, sometimes he still felt inadequate.
Alexander Gideon Lightwood had the biggest heart of anyone he had ever met. It seemed to be a part of Alec to always give those he loved more chances than they deserved. Look at Jace. Look at all the things Alec did for his father (another bastard, but Jace could growl and rant about Robert any day of the week).
"Jace." Alec began again. "I want you to listen to me. You have never neglected me. Never. Not one time since we were eleven have you ever put yourself before me, and vice versa. I appreciate everything you did for me after what happened with Magnus. And I get why you're angry with him and maybe why you'd want to avoid him. I get it. I was like that when Clary first started coming around. I didn't want to see you hurt, and then you were - you were ultimately destroyed to the point of nearly burning alive. But it made you stronger. The same happened for me."
"But-"
"But I couldn't have done it without you being there for me, helping me eat and train and look away from my phone and to just fall asleep."
"But, Alec –"
"No buts." Alec huffed, a smile on his face as he shook him silent. "I know you tend to attract more trouble than the average Shadowhunter. And most times, that means I nearly die above the average rate of Shadowhunters. I figured that out for myself when I first agreed to be your parabatai. You've always been a terrific brother, a smart-ass best friend, and a fantastic parabatai, and the most important person in my life."
"Next to Magnus." Jace laughed, and watched as Alec did the same.
"Next to Mags." Alec amended. "But you're first whenever you need me. I love Magnus, but you – you're my blood family. There's no breaking that bond."
Jace felt immensely lighter than he had in what felt like forever. He saw the sincerity in his eyes and, with no hesitation, he reached out and pulled Alec down into a fierce hug. He felt his arms wrap around his back and pull him tight, and it was like the they were back to being two eleven year old boys trying to push the other one's broken pieces back together again. But Jace knew that they weren't as broken as he had first thought. They had their families, and their true loves. But most importantly, they had each other.
They were parabatai.
And that was a bond not easily broken.