Quite magical

Chapter Thirty-Four

POV Alec

When Alec and his siblings entered the "Jade Wolf" together with Simon and Clary Magnus was already sitting at the counter and talked to a female bartender with brown skin and dark, curly hair. They seemed pretty familiar with each other and Alec wondered if they were friends.

"Oh, that's Maia by the way" Clary said when she saw him looking at her. "She's really great. Si had a thing with her once, right?"

She wiggled her eyebrows and poked Simon who seemed to be slightly embarrassed.

"Really?" Izzy asked and frowned at her boyfriend. "Why have you never told me about her?"

"I haven't?" Simon asked.

"No, you didn't."

Izzy had never been the person to be jealous but for a short moment it actually looked like she was. She quickly had herself under control again though.

"Then I'm looking forward to meeting her" she said. "She looks very nice."

Simon seemed surprised. "Really?" he asked. "It's no problem for you that she's my ex?"

"Why should it? You're with me now, aren't you?" Izzy said confidently and grabbed Simon's hand, pulling him over to the counter. Alec and the others followed them.

"Look at that" Jace mumbled. "The little nerd gets all the hot chicks. Crazy world we're living in."

"You think Maia is hot?" Clary asked and raised her eyebrows.

"Not as hot as you of course" Jace said quickly. "You're the only girl I'm interested in."

Clary said something in return but Alec didn't hear what it was because they had just arrived at the counter and his full attention was on Magnus.

"Hey, there you are" he said and smiled cheerfully. Then he stood up and kissed Alec's cheek. "I really missed you angel."

Alec blushed. "But you have just seen me a few minutes ago."

"Still." Magnus smiled at him and Alec felt like his heart was going to burst but at the same time he was still concerned about his boyfriend. He was pretty sure that something was going on and that Magnus was trying to hide it from him for some reason. The way he was acting since they had left the park was weird.

He was smiling and saying that he was fine and it seemed convincing if one didn't pay particular attention to it but Alec knew him pretty well by now. His smile didn't seem as real as before and underneath his mask of easiness Magnus looked tense.

He should really talk to him later when they were alone. Maybe Magnus would tell him what was bothering him then.

But first he needed to eat something. Alec felt like he was starving so he was very glad when Maia lead them to a free table and took their orders. She really was very sympathetic until now. She didn't make a drama about Simon being here with his new girlfriend but teased him instead by telling Izzy funny stories about him that were making his face turn into a tomato.

Especially Jace seemed to enjoy that a lot and he couldn't stop laughing when Maia told them about Simon being drunk on her last birthday.

"I definitely like her a lot" he said after Maia had left their table again to take care of some new guests. "We should ask her to tag along the next time we do something together. I would love to hear more stories about Simon."

"Me too" Izzy said with a grin on her face and Simon looked like he wished the ground would open and swallow him up.

In a different situation Alec probably also would have been pretty amused about Maia's stories but at the moment all he could focus on was Magnus. There definitely was something wrong with him. He hadn't said a single word in over five minutes now and his facial expression was even more tense than before.