West of Words (Alec Lightwood)

🗝 Chapter Forty 🗝

The shudder that passed through Varian after the words left his lips was prominent, his knees shook as they tried to hold him up, and his hands reached for whatever would keep him standing.

Both hands caught onto the guard rail next to him, he felt his skin pale, and the mirage over his hair started to fail. He huffed out a breath, feeling the magic that held him together start to seep out of every joint and every breath that shuddered through his lips.

"Varian." Alec's lips were moving, his face twisted into a look of concern, a hand warm on his waist. "Varian."

Varian looked at him, the edges of his vision turned blurry the harder he looked. "I've used to much." His voice cracked as he spoke, and Alec nodded, pulling Varian closer to his chest, and wrapping an arm around his shoulders. There was a firm amount of comfort in the embrace, and as Alec took Varian's hand in his own he could feel the Shadowhunter forcing an amount of energy through the skin to skin contact.

He didn't oppose.

Varian could only half pay attention to the trios physical surroundings as they walked down the street, his concentration more on the people and feelings that flit through the air as they move.

A specific emotion caught his attention, anger, unfiltered awful anger that poured directly from the soul.

"Valentine Morgenstern." Varian's voice was just a whisper, the idea of seeing the villain in such a depleted state terrified him, but he pushed the terror away, he let himself concentrate on the way he felt with Alec's arm around him. "We have to go."

Varian kept his hand in Alec's, but pulled out from under his arm and hurried forward. The pounding of his feet echoed up his body, a jolt to his system, but one that he bear for the sole purpose of getting to his destination. Izzy and Alec put up no fight as they ran steps behind him, their footsteps lighter compared to the staggered stomps that Varian thumped out.

The final corner, the final block was the worst for Varian.

The anger was tangible, and Varian felt as though he was walking through a sludge, though his steps did not slow. Alec kept in stride, only dropping Varian's hand to pull his weapon into the ready position, an arrow notched and pointed at the two across the street. Alec shouted for Jace, to catch his attention, but the shout was ignored.

Jace's seraph blade made a horrible noise as it entered the stomach of the Downworlder woman, and Varian blanched at the sight. His steps faltered, and he was suddenly left in the dust as both Alec and Izzy engaged in a fight with two of Valentine's goons. Varian watched on, ready to act, but unable to stop himself from looking at the dust that the Downworlder woman became.

The Shadowhunter turned, and Varian swallowed past the lump in his throat at the dark look in his eyes. Jace was loosing himself while in the company of Valentine Morgenstern, and Varian felt responsible.

Izzy fell first, and then Alec.

Varian started towards Alec, but only stopped when he waved him off. He turned to face Valentine and Jace, and almost pleading look in his eyes as he looked at Jace.

"Come Jonathon, you've done well." Valentine Morgenstern said it as though he was proud of the death that Jace had cause, a hand smacking against his shoulder in a movement he had been on the receiving end of from his baba  plenty of times. It was how he told him he was proud, but this between Valentine and Jace was almost threatening.

"Leave him be Valentine Morgenstern." Varian's voice was much more confident than he felt, he stood with his shoulders high, his hands unmoving by his sides.

The man scoffed, lowering his hand from Jace's shoulder and taking the sword from the young Shadowhunter's hand. "You have no right to speak to me Warlock."

The air around Valentine was red and brown, anger and hate, and the more he looked down his nose at Varian the darker the colors became. The sword spun once, twice in his hand, before he took what he thought was a threatening step closer to Varian.

Varian did not flinch, his head held high, and only a slight twitch in his hand to even signal that he had heard the man speak. Valentine stepped closer, lifting the sword so that it came to rest inches from the young Warlock's neck. 

"Demon half-breed." It was meant to be a threatening insult, and yet Varian did not feel threatened or insulted. The sword moved inches closer, a thrum of the Angelic power passing through the milometers of air in between Varian's neck and the sword.

Varian saw the movement before it was made, and he pulled to the side, his magic reacting to protect him. The threatening weapon was thrown far out of Valentine's reach, and the clatter of it hitting the pavement seemed to echo.

There was black in the air around Varian, he was loosing the grip he had on his magic.

Valentine was lifted into the air, his hands thrown out to the sides, an obvious strain on his face. He commanded that Jace help him, but Jace didn't move to help either party.

Varian's concentration did not falter. So much had happened in the past few weeks, his life had been thrown entirely out of balance, and as he stood facing Valentine Morgenstern, a hand in the air and dark magic flowing freely as it held the man in the air.

It was as easy as a flick of his finger and Valentine Morgenstern would be no more.

The dark side of him, the side that had already lost control was screaming at him to do it, to end the suffering of so many. But a voice whispered in the back of his mind, as if someone was reaching for him.

"Varian."

His hand raised in front of him, lifting the body higher.

"Varian!"