Cat Eyes
Title: Cat Eyes
Link: On AO3
Fandom: Shadowhunters
Pairing: Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Rating: Mature
Warnings: None; mild spoilers for 3x12
Other tags: Porn with feelings, Angst and humor, Missing scene
Summary: Once upon a time, he’d have wreathed the room in blue flame for this, peeled both their clothes away with a thought, but now he’s needy and human in his own skin, with nothing but his own hands to clutch and pull at Alec, clawing at his damp t-shirt with helpless desperate hunger.
Missing moment from 3x12; takes place immediately after the training room scene.
*
He rounds the corner just in time to see a blond shadowhunter he doesn’t recognize intercept Alec halfway down the corridor.
“--thought you weren’t going to be in today,” he’s saying, “but if you have a minute-”
“Is it an emergency?” Alec interrupts in his best, sternest Head of Institute voice.
“Uh, well, not really-”
“Then it can wait.” He doesn’t even break stride. Magnus grins, delighted, and jogs to catch up with him, leaving the other shadowhunter blinking and baffled-looking in their wake. As he falls into step with Alec, he affects a very serious expression.
“Mr. Lightwood. Is the head of the New York Institute really ignoring his responsibilities in order to dally with a warlock?” He makes a face. Eventually, he’s going to stop forgetting. Eventually, it’s going to stop stinging when he does. “Former warlock.”
Alec glances down at him. He’s wearing an impressive deadpan, but the heat in his eyes is enough that Magnus has to link his hands behind his back to keep from shoving him against the nearest wall and ravishing him right there in the hallway. “It’s my day off.”
“So it is,” Magnus says, also deadpan. “So, shall we… dally?”
Alec’s lips twitch. There’s a beautiful flush high in his cheeks, and his hair is disheveled from where Magnus was grabbing at it a moment ago, and they really, really need to get somewhere private now. “Come on.”
“Oh, I intend to.”
Alec lets out a hard breath through his nose, glances down the now-empty hallway, then pushes into Magnus’s space. Cups his jaw between warm palms and leans in until his mouth is pressed against Magnus’s ear, hot breath raising the small hairs there. Very quietly, he says, “Let’s go, Magnus.”
“Now who’s cheating?” Magnus manages. Alec pulls back enough to flash him a smug, pleased little smile, drops a too-brief kiss on his mouth, then moves away. “You are a terrible man.”
The smile brightens into a real grin and Alec steps out of reach, which is probably wise, honestly. He doesn’t reach for Magnus’s hand, which is also wise. They keep a very careful, professional two feet of space between them for the entire agonizing three minute walk to Alec’s little-used Institute bedroom.
Alec has him up against the wall before the door has even clicked shut, his mouth hot against Magnus’s lips, against the curve of his jaw. A sharp, sweet nip of teeth that feels so good he involuntarily knocks his head back against the wall, rattling the hanging pictures.
God. He’s missed this. Once upon a time, he’d have wreathed the room in blue flame for this, peeled both their clothes away with a thought, but now he’s needy and human in his own skin, with nothing but his own hands to clutch and pull at Alec, clawing at his damp t-shirt with helpless desperate hunger.
“Careful,” Alec laughs against his throat, shifting back just enough to yank it off over his head. He lets it fall somewhere behind him, and then his hands are on Magnus again, pushing his shirt up as well, sliding the loose waistband of his pants down, stripping him with an easy familiarity that makes Magnus ache. That makes him grab for Alec, kicking out of his shoes and the last of his clothes, and maneuver him backward toward the unmade bed. Alec goes easily, allows himself to be toppled backward onto the mattress, hands catching at Magnus to pull him down too. He lands on his knees and elbows, straddling Alec, caging him in with his body, and leans down to capture his mouth in a fierce kiss.
They’re both entirely out of breath by the time he pulls away and sits back on his heels. He can feel the long muscles in Alec’s thighs trembling even through the cloth of the pants he’s still wearing for some fucking reason. His hands are flexing restlessly on Magnus’s skin. He looks entirely wrecked already. It’s wonderful.
“Do not,” Magnus says with a deliberate precision somewhat ruined by the unevenness of his voice, “tell me to be careful, Alexander.”
Alec stares up at him with wide eyes, pupils so dilated that the hazel has almost been swallowed up, lips kissed red and wet. He swallows audibly, then says, “Okay. Don’t be careful, then.”
Magnus freezes at that, just for a second. “Oh, darling, you’re going to be the death of me,” he murmurs, but when he kisses Alec this time it’s gentle, slow, soft and deep and wet. He’s suddenly terrified that Alec might keep talking, terrified of what he might say, but Alec seems content to allow himself to be kissed into silence. His long fingers trail up Magnus’s back, leaving prickles of heat in their wake, and Magnus grinds down against him, the fabric of his pants providing a friction that’s just on the sweet side of uncomfortable, and swallows the groan that Alec makes. His hand has curved around the back of Alec’s neck at some point, pressing into the muscle there hard enough that he might be leaving bruises, but Alec doesn’t seem to mind and Magnus doesn’t let go.
He keeps kissing him as he hooks his free hand under the waistband of his pants and tugs them down, and only then does he break away to peer down at Alec’s face. “You’re not wearing underwear.”
“Is that a problem?” Alec asks, laughing and breathless.
“No,” Magnus says, and proves it by shoving Alec’s pants the rest of the way down. Alec twists slightly, kicking his shoes off to land on the floor with two soft thumps. The pants follow immediately after, and then he’s naked against Magnus, hooking one strong leg over his thigh to drag them closer together, rolling his hips up. Magnus feels his breath stutter against Alec’s lips at how good it feels, and adds, “But it does raise some questions about what you had in mind for our, ah. Training session.”
“Is that so.”
“It is.”
“Well,” Alec says, grinning and reaching down between them to take Magnus in his hand, “let me clarify.”
“Okay,” Magnus groans, pushing into his grip. “Okay. I’m all about--oh fuck--clarity.”
“Mmhm.”
“Oh, get that smile off your face,” Magnus says, and bites him. Then soothes the bite with his lips and tongue, enjoying the ragged sound that’s dragged out of Alec as he hauls him in closer.
There’s no finesse about any of it. He can remember taking an entire afternoon to reduce Alec to his component pieces, to leave him breathless and shuddering and borderline incoherent on gold silk sheets, but this isn’t that. This is rough and frantic, gasping breaths and choked-off curses and a building adrenaline humming beneath his skin. Alec’s free hand finds its way into his hair at some point, tugging in a way that’s actually kind of painful and also so good that it makes his toes curl, and they’re rutting against each other with an awkward, perfect gracelessness. Alec feels like the only real thing that exists, and when Magnus comes it’s like the entire world has turned to light.
Once upon a time, he would have knocked over every piece of furniture in the room from this. Once upon a time, he could have felt the burn of magic like lightning through his veins, the ache behind his eyes that meant his Mark was laid bare.
Now, though, he falls back into his skin gasping and human, and there’s nothing magical about him when he dips his head to catch Alec’s mouth with his, feels the sudden tightness of his grip and the hot pulse of his release between them.
“God, Magnus,” Alec mumbles against his lips, after a moment. Magnus presses another kiss to his mouth, to his forehead where the hair curls damply and his skin tastes of clean sweat, then starts to turn his head away. Alec’s hand catches his cheek, cups him and keeps him still. “Hey.”
Magnus blinks, and finally turns his entirely ordinary gaze toward Alec. There’s a strange feeling that’s almost fear thrumming in his chest. Like even after all this he can’t quite relax, can’t quite--
“Did you miss my cat eyes?” he asks with as much airiness as he can muster.
Alec breathes out a laugh. His voice still rough, honey-warm, when he murmurs, “I think it’s pretty clear you enjoyed yourself,” and Magnus loves him, he loves him, he adores this sweet ridiculous boy so much that sometimes he thinks he can’t breathe from it.
The impulse he’s had for days now to crack his battered heart open and pour it into Alec’s hands is suddenly very close to the surface. Something about Alec always tempts him to shatter. To trust that Alec would be able to put him back together and make him whole again.
He doesn’t do it, of course. He does have a few shreds of a self-preservation instinct left, even when it comes to his darling Alexander. He rolls away instead, flopping back onto a mattress that’s not as comfortable as his own, sheets that smell like whatever industrial-strength laundry soap the Institute uses. Alec used to smell like that all the time, too; now he just smells like Magnus.
He’s still breathing hard, a sleepy half-smile on his face, and Magnus finds the lightness he needs to make a joke, to listen to Alec laugh and tease him back, and to believe that maybe, just maybe, everything will be okay.